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trap and sandstone exhibit many curious alterations in the texture of 

 both rocks. The conical hill named North Berwick Law, which 

 springs sheer from the surrounding plain to a height of about 900 feet 

 above the sea-level, and is seen for many miles on both sides of the 

 Firth, together with several scattered islets of the shore, appear to be- 

 long to the same geological period, and consist of felspathic trajD of a 

 reddish hue. One of these islets, standing about a mile and a half 

 from the shore, and to which access is obtained by a boat from Canty 

 Bay, is the Bass, which is celebrated as having been the bastile of 

 Scotland in the time of the Covenanters. It presented some rare bo- 

 tanical as well as historical attractions to our party, and after a long 

 day's expectation of the reward that awaited them, it was perhaps ex- 

 cusable to gratify their botanical ardour first, and then to indulge in 

 the recollections which the place was so well fitted to awaken. Ac- 

 cordingly, no sooner had they achieved a footing in a somewhat 

 difficult landing-place, and scrambled up the rocks on the only 

 side of the islet where it is accessible, than they were gratified to 

 find abundance of Beta maritima growing under the shade of the 

 dismantled fort. The crowning attraction, however, was within the 

 walls, where the Professor introduced them to a sight which was in- 

 deed a novel one to all present except himself. This was a perfect 

 forest of Lavatera arborea, the tree mallow of the Bass, a plant in- 

 digenous in a very few localities in Scotland. The rarity and profu- 

 sion of this beautiful plant in a station so unpromising and inhospi- 

 table, afforded the party unmingled delight — that kind of delight which 

 only botanists feel in discovering a new or rare plant in a new station. 

 The rock is productive of no other plants of note, and the catalogue 

 of its entire flora is very soon exhausted. In addition to the above 

 we observed Silene maritima, Cochlearia officinalis. Lychnis diurna, 

 Hieracium Pilosella, Geranium molle, Urtica dioica, Holcus lanatus, 

 a glaucous var. of Festuca ovina, Cerastium semidecandrum, Dac- 

 tylis glomerata and Carduus lanceolatus. The rock is about a mile 

 in circumference, and rises 420 feet above the level of the sea. Its 

 northern face rises perpendicularly nearly to the full height of the 

 rock. On the south it slopes down gradually till near the base, pre- 

 senting an outline which has been compared to that of the old-fa- 

 shioned box which used to grace the side-board as a receptacle for 

 knives and forks, A cavern penetrates the rock from east to west, and 

 may be explored at ebb-tide. The islet offers but one landing-place, 

 which is on the south-east. We were fortunate enough to have visit- 

 ed the Bass during the period of incubation of the solan geese, which 



