11)43 



FORFARSHIRE. 



FORFARSHIRE. 



1050 



ancient market-cross. On a peninsula (at one time an island in the 

 lake) a nunnery anciently stood, said to have been the residence of 

 Margaret, queen of Malcolm III., and still called Margaret's Inch. 

 From the Inch a causeway runs westward a considerable distance 

 into the loch. The Loch of Forfar abounds with perch and pike, and 

 has a few trout. It also affords cover for wild fowl. lu a moor 

 about a mile and a half north-east from the town, are the remains of 

 a trench, believed to have been a portion of a Roman encampment. 

 Some ruins of the priory of Restenuet are within the parish. Eight 

 annual fairs for eheep, cattle, and horses are held in the town. 



(New Statistical Account of Scotland; Communication from Pot-far.) 



FORFARSHIRE, a maritime county in the east of Scotland, 

 bounded E. by the German Ocean, S. by the Frith of Tay and Perth- 

 shire, W. by Perthshire, N. by Aberdeenshire, and N.E. by Kincar- 

 dineshire. It lies between 56 27' and 56 59' N. lat., 2 25' and 

 3 23' W. long. The extreme length of the county from south to north 

 in a straight line is 38 miles, and its breadth from east to west 26 miles. 

 Its area is 889 square miles, or 568,750 statute acres, of which a great 

 part is moor and mountain. The population of the county in 1851 was 

 191,264. The county returns one member to the Imperial Parliament. 



Coast-line. The chief towns and harbours on the coast are Dundee, 

 Arbroath, and Montrose, the former situated on the sestuary of the 

 Tay, and the latter on a sandy peninsula at the mouth of the South 

 Esk River. Between the Buddon Ness and Montrose, which embraces 

 nearly the whole line of sea-coast, the most remarkable feature is the 

 line of sandstone cliffs extending from the neighbourhood of Arbroath 

 to the Redhead, and containing several curious marine caves, the 

 most of which open only to the sea, while a few are accessible from 

 the beach. The shore of the Frith of Tay and the sea-coast from 

 Buddon Ness to Arbroath is for the most part a tract of sand, though 

 many parts of it are of considerable fertility. The Basin of Montrose, 

 a shallow pool through which the Esk empties itself into the sea, 

 contains an area of 4 square miles. It is flooded only at high water. 

 Broughty Ferry and Carnoustie, two thriving villages on the coast, 

 are much frequented for sea-bathing : the fishing villages of East and 

 West Haven, Auchmithie, Usan, and Ferryden are inhabited almost 

 solely by fishermen. Auchmithie is picturesquely situated among the 

 clittrt, about 5 miles E. from Arbroath. Seaward, about 13| miles E. 

 from the Buddon Ness is the Bell Rock lighthouse. [BELL ROCK.] 

 The other lighthouses on the coast are the two at Buddon Ness, 

 which with the two lighthouses at Ferry -port-on-Craig on the Fife side 

 of the Frith of Tay, guide ships in navigating the river. 



Surface. There are four natural divisions of the surface of the 

 county : 1. The Grampian district, comprising the greater part of 

 the north-western half of the county, exhibits a tract of irregular 

 mountain-ridges, for the most part having a shallow moorish soil, 

 covered with short heath and large tracts of peat-moss ; but the many 

 valleys by which they are intersected are fertile and picturesque. 

 The Grampians are here called the ' Braes of Angus : ' they rise in 

 several places to an elevation of 3400 feet, and exhibit much of the 

 scenery of an alpine country. The principal valleys are Glen Ma, 

 Gleu Prosen, Glen Clova, Glen Lethnot, and Glen Esk. 2. The great 

 valley of Strathmore, which extends across the centre of the county 

 from south-west to north-east. In it are the towns of Cupar, Forfar, 

 and Brechin. Its length is 33 miles, the width from 4 to 6 miles. 

 The surface is undulating, diversified with streams, plantations, and 

 villages. 3. The Sidlaw Hills, which run parallel with the Grampians, 

 from the south-west extremity of the county, and terminate in the 

 promontory on the coast called Redhead, which rises to about 1500 

 feet above the eea. Some of these hills are upwards of 1400 feet 

 high, in many parts covered with short heath, and in others cultivated 

 up to their summits : they contain several fertile valleys. The length 

 of this district is about 30 miles, its width from 3 to 6 miles. 4. The 

 maritime district is included between the Sidlaws and the Tay and the 

 ocean, and extends from the boundary west of Dundee to the hills 

 about 7 miles S. from Montrose, varying in width from 3 to 8 miles, 

 and sloping gently towards the shore to the east and the south. This 

 tract is generally fertile, under high cultivation, and adorned with 

 numerous villages, plantations, farms, and villas. Near the shore of 

 the Tay are mounds of loose sand, containing extensive beds of sea- 

 shells, at least 60 feet higher than the present level of the sea. 



Numerous large trees found in the mosses and marshy ground 

 indicate that formerly the lower part of the county was covered with 

 forests. Some of the Grampian glens are partially clothed with oak 

 and hazel coppices and natural birches; others are covered with 

 thriving plantations, but trees do not grow on the higher parts of the 

 mountains. Plantations are confined chiefly to thin moorish soils 

 resting on clay or gravel. On the declivities of the Sidlaw Hills 

 extensive tracts have been planted with forest-trees, chiefly larch, oak, 

 ash, elm, plane, beech, and poplar. 



Geology, Mineralogy, Ac. The Grampians are composed of 1. 

 Granite of various qualities, formed of crystallised rhomboidal felspars, 

 commonly intermixed with laminated talc or mica. In the cavities 

 and fissures are found yellow and smoke-coloured topazes : when they 

 are white they are named rock-crystals. Their usual form is that of 

 pentagonal prisms, sometimes 12 or 14 inches in length. 2. Next to 

 the granite a very large proportion of the Grampians is composed of 

 fine-grained, hard, and grayish gneiss, and mica-schist. This is always 



stratified ; the beds lie at various angles, and are often perpendicular. 

 The rock is of a lead colour, but is occasionally brilliant with the 

 mica, which covers the surface of its plates. Among the schistose 

 rocks are veins and detached masses of quartz, frequently of a red 

 colour from the presence of iron. It is thickly studded with small 

 garnets, varying in colour from a faint to a deep crimson. Porcelain- 

 stone is abundant on some of the Grampian heights. Its colour is 

 generally white, inclining to gray, or reddish, owing to the presence of 

 iron. Lead-mines were wrought in the Grampian range above a cen- 

 tury ago, and the ore is said to have yielded l-64th part of silver. 

 Limestone is plentiful in various parts of this mountainous district. 

 At Glenesk on the banks of the North Esk, and at Cortachie on the 

 South Esk, large masses of jasper are imbedded in schistose and 

 micacious rocks. 3. The third component of the Grampian rocks is 

 porphyry. It occurs in broad veins contiguous to the schistose rocks, 

 and forms numerous hills, is generally of a brown, yellowish, or 

 whitish colour, and is interspersed with grains of quartz and rounded 

 felspars. The transition rocks, lying between the granite and fleetz, 

 appear on the declivities of the Grampians towards the valley of 

 Strathmore. They consist of schistose-grauwacke slate, in which 

 occur beds of slate, spar, and elliptical masses of jasper, measuring 

 30 feet by 10 feet. Greeustone, basalt, and dark-coloured limestone 

 are also prevalent, with compact felspar in extensive beds of a reddish- 

 brown colour. The flootz rocks of this lower district, which rest upon 

 the transition rocks, present much variety of composition, but mcy 

 all be referred to the red-sandstone formation. This sandstone is 

 often fine-grained, and valuable for architectural purposes. It is 

 traversed by extensive beds of conglomerate limestone, greenstone, 

 basalt, amygdaloid, clinkstone, felspar, and porphyry, and contains 

 veins of heavy spar, and traces of copper ores. Pearls have been found 

 in the bed of the North Esk. 



In descending from the Grampians to Strathmore the first rock that 

 occurs after the porphyry is a coarse pudding-stone, gravel-stone, or 

 breccia. It is sometimes called ' yolky stone/ from being composed 

 of numerous rounded pebbles resembling yolks of eggs, which are 

 held together by a ferruginous cement of great hardness. This rock 

 has evidently been formed from fragments detached from the rocka 

 above described, which, in their progress towards their present posi- 

 tion had been rounded by the action of water. As we descend along 

 the beds of the streams which form the rivers South and North Esk, 

 the pudding-stone graduates into rubble-stone, which is of a brown or 

 red colour, and consists of particles of sand united by the cement 

 which combines the pebbles in the pudding-stone. Lower down, this 

 first species of sandstone graduates iuto one which is softer, of a deep 

 red colour, and has beds of red clay interposed between its strata. It 

 consists of particles of silex cemented by ferruginous clay. It often 

 occurs in lamina?, or slates, fit for roofing, and is easily cut with the 

 chisel. Its beds frequently contain detached yolks or rounded 

 pebbles, and pudding-stone is often found with it in alternate beds. 

 Shell-marl, formed from the exuviae of several kinds of fresh-water 

 shell-fish, abounds in the lakes in various parts of Strathmore. 



The mountain ridges of the Sidlaw Hills are composed chiefly of 

 sandstone, the strata of which lie almost horizontally towards tb 

 south, and decline towards the north at an angle of 45. It is of 

 various colours red, brown, gray, white, and greenish. Interposed 

 between these strata of saudstoue are large beds of the yolky -stone, 

 varying from 50 to 100 feet in thickness. The rounded stones 

 imbedded iu this species of rock consist of white and red quartz, 

 jasper, whinstone, porphyry, and gray and red granite, all combined 

 with a ferruginous sandy cement. The superficial stratum of this 

 range of hills is formed of several varieties of whinstone, which 

 appears iu the various forms of basalt, greenstone, porphyry, and a 

 cellular stone by some believed to be volcanic lava. The colour varies 

 also from red, brown, and gray, to green, dark blue, and black. All 

 the kinds of agate and onyx enumerated by mineralogists are found 

 on these hills. Limestone of a peculiar structure is extensively 

 wrought. It is composed of rounded fragments of various colours 

 cemented together in a crystallised spar, and is, in fact, a species of 

 mottled marble. Large beds of clay marl occur in several parts of 

 this district along the ravines and alluvial bottoms. On the south- 

 east declivities of the Sidlaw Hills are large quarries of sandstone flags 

 of superior quality for pavements, steps, tomb-stones, &c. Those 

 which split off from half an iuch to an inch in thickness are much 

 used for roofing. The slabs from these quarries are exported from 

 Arbroath to Leith, London, and other places. Their strata form 

 a broad continued zone from the south-west to the north-east 

 side of the county. Lead has been discovered in small quantities, 

 also some copper ore. 



In the maritime district beds of red-sandstone, including rounded 

 fragments as before, occur frequently to the south and east of the 

 zone of sandstone flags. Veins of whin and porphyry intersect the 

 sandstone, and form numerous hills. Near Moutrose limestone is 

 extensively wrought. The stratum lies deep, and is 25 feet in thick- 

 ness. The stone is hard, white, and of a fine grain. Rock and clay 

 marl are abundant in the district round Montrose. Numerous large 

 boulder stones of Grampian granite lie scattered in the lower parts of 

 the county, and shapeless detached masses several tons in weight, 

 evidently of the same origin, are found iu the Strathmore and 



