Discovery of Laic Glacial Implements in Galloway. 327 



little astonished on examining- a celt that was found in a 

 moss at Pinniinnoch, Portpatrick, to notice that it afforded 

 what may be an example of glacial scratching in different 

 directions, but chiefly in that of its length. It is of light 

 brown slate stone, has a cutting face at both ends, but not 

 cross-set, like tliose on an unpolished short thick flint one 

 kindly given me by Mrs M'Gaw, and which was found on 

 Xildonnan Hill, where sand beds were lately exposed. The 

 Tinminnoch specimen is over ten inches long, three and a 

 quarter broad, and one and a quarter thick in the middle. 

 Tie sides slope out with a slight curvature from the narrow 

 end one and three-fourth inches wide to the rounded face 

 thiee inches broad. There is more chipping into form than 

 polishing seen, or the once polished surface has been much 

 injured as well as scratched and grooved, or, in other words, 

 the celt has come to grief in ice probably of the close of the 

 surface drift age, and there have been polished implements 

 then. It is a solitary example to draw such a conclusion 

 from ; but so was the first flint saw I found in the face of the 

 7(-ft. terrace, and from that day to this my belief that man 

 was closely associated here with glacial conditions has been 

 strengthened more and more, and in spite of strong opposi- 

 tion to it has never wavered. I have got several wrought 

 flints with glacial striae. It would now be less surprising to 

 find a polished celt in sitii beneath the surface drift margin 

 than to have found implements of the Curghie group there, 

 and they are there. But still one would expect to get it in 

 more recent deposits than these. 



At the time I first found implements stratified in beds 

 connected with the closing scenes of the ice age, th& follow- 

 ing notice of the fact was sent to a gentleman who had been 

 the greatest historian of the neolithic implements of Wigtown- 

 shire. That was in November 1881. He said it completely 

 took his breath away. 



You will remember about our 25-ft. raised beach, parts of 

 which are seen along the coast, and about the escarpment of 

 a terrace of stratified sands and gravels, averaging from 50 to 

 70 ft. in height, and being highest where intersected by ridges 

 of boulder clay (ancient points). It forms a striking feature 



