176 ON EEMAINS OF INDIGENOUS WOOD IN OKKNEY. 
therefore more reasonable to explain the unnatural position of these 
trees by assuming a general subsidence of the land, due possibly to 
some geological change such as we know has long been m operation, 
and is still observable, in the islands of the Pacific and in other places. 
I do not venture to assert that these depressions of surface were the 
result of plutonic agency in some remote era of the past, but I confess 
that I see no other feasible way of accounting for them. 
If we look back into history, we find that Einar, one of the first 
Scandinavian Earls of Orkney', who lived about the end of the ninth 
centurv, was named Torf Einar, from his having taught the inhabitants 
the use of peat as fuel; this would seem to indicate a scarcity of trees, 
if indeed anv then remained, which is very doubtful. Solinus, who 
wrote a.d. 240, states that the Orkney islands were "only three m 
number, uninhabited, destitute of woods, partly rough with rushes, and 
partly covered with rocks and with sand." This statement obviously 
must be received with caution. Tacitus, a much earlier writer, says 
that these islands were subjugated by Agricola ; we may therefore 
conclude that they were then inhabited ; bnt on this point many dif- 
ferent opinions have been expressed. Some suppose that, prior to 
the time of the Norse invasion, the islands were merely the temporary 
abode of pirates, while other accounts state that the aborigines were 
exterminated by the Norsemen. A feeble ray of light, has been thrown 
upon this " vexed question " by the recent discovery of Maeshowe, of a 
building undoubtedly constructed by that ancient race. There are 
Runic inscriptions on its walls. Some of them referred to the ninth 
century, one translation of which informs us that it was a sacie 
edifice which had been broken into by the Scandinavians amidst the 
lamentations of the wild men. It seems probable that the natives were 
not actually put to death, as has been asserted, but that they gradually 
receded before a superior and more enterprising race, and thus even- 
tually died out, perhaps contemporaneously with the woods and tie 
wildanimals that frequented them. Be this as it may, if we take the 
whole subsequent period of Scandinavian rule, from about 890 a.d. 
until the Scottish annexation in 1471, as narrated by the Dams 1 
historian Torfseus, we find no mention of trees. Where hunting is 
alluded to, otters are generally specified ; and there is reason to re- 
lieve that at that time they also captured seals and other m^ine 
animals. But to return to the aborigines and the forests. 
