182 Analysis of Scienlijic Bools. 



pect more savage than that of Glen-Molachan. Few scenes 

 even in the wildest places of the Alps, amid the eternal 

 glaciers of its valleys and the snows of its huge mountains, 

 have made a deeper impression on me than this first entry 

 into the Highlands. I imagined that I could discover in this 

 wilderness of nature, the secret of the wild and melancholy 

 character of the inhabitant of these mountains, of his super- 

 stitions, of his plaintive music, and of his poetry which speaks 

 to the imagination in the strongest figures." His impressions 

 on landing in Arran are thus described : " Some miserable 

 huts scattered up and down at great distances from each other, 

 were the only objects which indicated that this island, barren 

 as it seemed, was not altogether deserted. I had heard of a 

 town of Brodick, where we were to land ; I looked for it, 

 but could see only Brodick-Castle. What was my surprise 

 wlien they pointed out to me, on the sea-shore, four or five 

 little huts rudely covered with turf, difficult to distinguish 

 from the rocks and the heath ; and, when they said to me, 

 that is Brodick, the capital of the island of Arran. A village 

 of fishermen would have been a superb city compared with 

 this Brodick, which resembled the most wretched establish- 

 ment of a Lapland horde !" 



Mr. Necker was not left long to these unpleasant feelings. 

 The ever-ready hospitality of its people, and the supreme inte- 

 rest of its rock-scenery to a geologist, soon reconciled him to 

 Arran. 



The mountains of this island form a confused group. They are 

 not disposed in chains, nor are they separated by long valleys, 

 which, like those of the Alps and the Pyrenees, preserve 

 for a long space, the same direction. The glens, immense 

 hollows in the form of a funnel, divide the mountains into 

 several distinct summits. Some idea may be formed of the 

 conformalion of these glens, by viewing in the Alps, the bottom 

 of the valley of Sixt, that of the valley of Louesch, and those 

 enormous chasms, at the foot of the granitic needles of the 

 central chain, from which proceed the beautiful glaciers, that 

 descend into the valley of Chamouni. The Pyrenees offer also 

 similar appearances in the loftiest portion of their chain. 



The mountains of Arran are all collected in the northern half 

 of the island. Goatfield, the highest of all the summits, is 

 placed towards the southern limit of the mountain district, 

 from which, southwards, the heights rapidly diminish into mo- 

 derate hills, and pass latterly into lands of little elevation, 

 which constitute the southern portion. The highest part, as we 

 may naturally suppose, is formed of primitive rocks, while the 

 flat country of the south belongs to more recent formations. 

 Brodick is situated at the limit of these two great mineral 

 masses. The castle is built on rocks of standstone, schistose 



