1898-99.]| A Bryological Excursion to Ben Lawers. 35 
right, a terrific noise, which appeared to us to resemble the 
mingling of many discordant sounds. We stood still wonder- 
ing what was going to happen, when there came up out of the 
deep glen and passed in front of us, about twenty yards distant, 
the most terrible whirlwind I ever heard—nay, I may say 
saw, for we seemed to see the wind. It is impossible for me 
to make plain the kind of noise we heard. I could scarcely 
have believed it possible for the wind to make such a noise 
over smooth ground. We did not take time to look for 
specimens while crossing here. It will not, however, be 
surprising that from a hurried survey we found there was 
nothing growing but a few stinted mosses. We climbed the 
crag, where, from the top, there is a long steep rise to the 
summit, along the crest of a narrow ridge, with an almost 
perpendicular drop of several hundred feet down to Lochan-a- 
Chait glen. Another very rare moss—Conostomum boreale— 
was found in fruit here: though none of the capsules were 
ripe, there was plenty of it in small detached patches. A few 
heath (Calluna vulgaris), a fair covering of Salix herbacea of 
small growth, a few varieties of moss, chiefly Dicranums, with 
some Bryums and Hypnums, were the principal other plants 
to be met with. I can hardly describe how pleased I was 
to reach the summit of Ben Lawers. No words of mine 
could do justice to the view. The air was beautifully clear, 
and standing there almost 4000 feet above sea-level and about 
1000 feet above the surrounding mountains, we commanded a 
prospect of many miles of mountain, loch, moor, and glen, 
stretching away on every side as far as the eye could reach, 
probably unsurpassed in grandeur and beauty by any similar 
view in Britain. To have such a panorama at one’s feet is 
truly worth the climb. I was informed that Ben Nevis may 
be seen from Ben Lawers. We thought we could distinguish 
its outline, but were not certain. Of course, one must go to 
the top of the cairn. It stands upon a peak on the north- 
east corner of the craig which runs round three sides of a 
large hollow, having the appearance of a great quarry in which 
there had been a monster blast, by which enormous masses of 
rock had been displaced, to lie where they fell. Near the 
south-east corner is a deep hollow or basin, which had in the 
centre a large wreath of snow. Close to this wreath I gathered 
Polytrichum formosum, P. alpinum, and P. sexangulare, the 
