88 Transactions. 



could not be obtained. The full width of the road only measured 

 15 feet as against 21 feet at Chapel Hill, and no kerbstones were 

 visible at the sides of the excavation, but the evidence of their 

 orginal presence was plainly visible in the row of stepping stones 

 carrying tlie footpath over a marshy place in the immediate 

 vicinity of the road, and which I have no doubt had been 

 originally taken from it, and the reduced width of the road is 

 also evidence that a lot of material had been taken from this part 

 of the road at one time or another. 



Section at Meikleholmside Hill. — The position of the section 

 exposed here was about two miles north from Chapel Hill section, 

 and about 300 yards north from the Greenhillstairs road at end 

 of Holehouse Linn Wood. Here again tlie general formation of 

 the road was different from that at the other two sections, the road 

 here being 21 feet wide, as at Chapel Hill, but there was no 

 appearance of kerbstones, and no evident appearance of the road 

 having been much disturbed, and it did not show such a pro- 

 minent mound in its external appearance as the other two places. 

 The ground has a good decline to tlie south, and is pretty flat on 

 each side of roadway. The road had evidently been kept in 

 place by the sides of the cutting formed by the removal of the 

 original soil, &c. The bottom layer at this section was eleven 

 inches deep, and instead of resting on a bed of clay, as at Chapel 

 Hill, the clay and stones had the appearance of having been 

 mixed together and laid in like conci'ete. The stones used were 

 also smaller, being similar to those forming the surface layer at 

 Chapel Hill. The next and surface layer was six inches thick, 

 formed of stones with the vacancies filled up with till, and, like 

 the Coate's Hill, the road had been formed in two layers. At 

 the Coate's Hill and Meikleholmside Hill the sections were not 

 made right across the roadway full width and depth, but the 

 turf was flayed off across the full width, and sections excavated 

 at centre and sides of road down to the hard undisturbed till. 

 In following the line of the road, it occasionally runs through wet 

 and marshy places which liave been drained within lecent years, 

 and at these places fair sections of the road can be seen. And 

 it is interesting to observe that when cutting these drains the 

 workmen, when crossing the road, have only removed the turf 

 from the surface, while on the lower side of the road the drain is 

 the full depth, making a small waterfall fully twelve inches high 



