40 RECORDS OF EXCURSIONS IN AYRSHIRE. 



roe-deer, and geese. A number of other articles was picked up 

 by visitors from the spoil-heaps. 



Leaving the Crannog, the old moat hill at Castlehill, opposite 

 Lainshaw, was visited ; and from it a view of Cam Duff was got, 

 where three urns, containing burnt human bones, were at one 

 time dug up. 



An excursion to the Eglinton Castle Policies, near Kilwinning, 

 took place on the 14th September, 1889. Outside the policies, 

 and near the Weirston Gate, a small tree of the cork-barked, or, 

 as it is called in the district, the crocodile-elm ( Ulmus monlana 

 var. major), was examined. The first year's shoots of this variety 

 of elm are hairy, after which they begin to develop the peculiar 

 corky excrescences. Near Lady Jane's Cottage there is a large 

 tree of the simple-leaved ash (Fraxifius heterophylla), and to the 

 south of the gardens, in the woods, a large healthy patch of the 

 asarabacca (Asarum europceum). Trained for the most part to 

 the south wall of the flower garden (this wall has now been partly 

 removed) were Garrya elliptica, Rosmarinus officinalis, Salisburia 

 adiantifolia (introduced from Japan, but which grew luxuriantly 

 in Scotland during the Miocene period), Pernettya mucronata, 

 Myristica fragrans, Magnolia (in flower), the poet's laurel, and 

 others. Specimens of the flowering ash (Ornus europceus), ever- 

 green oak (Qtcercus Ilex), variegated oak and hawthorn, and the 

 heterophyllous beech were also examined. In the Bullock Park 

 the size and beauty of the Spanish chestnuts, which sometimes 

 ripen their fruit, were much admired. Here are also some 

 beeches of large size and fine growth — one measured being 16 

 feet 9^- inches in girth at 4 feet 6 inches. In this park there are 

 also a Cedar of Lebanon (Cedrus Libani), a strangely-grown oak 

 with very gnarled bole, and many other trees. 



On Saturday, 14th May, 1892, the Society visited Cleaves Cove 

 and Blair Policies. Passing from Dairy Station eastwards, the 

 bridge over the Bombo was soon reached. A short distance 

 above the bridge there is an old limestone quarry where road 

 " metal " was for a long time worked, and in some of the beds of 

 which numerous fossils were to be obtained. The shale under 

 the limestone, a section of which can be examined at the little 

 waterfall close by, is also very fossiliferous, containing many fine 



