436 MAX OF SCIENCE. 



cottage, but almost all the exposed ones were dug out 

 about ten or twelve years ago, and burned into lime. 

 I saw, however, this season, the stump of a very large 

 tree projecting from the wasted surface of a shale bed 

 that, in the year 1842, had of itself furnished a whole 

 kiln-full. As to the question of the period of the petri- 

 faction of these woods, it must, I fear, be deemed a hard 

 one. They were, however, evidently petrified in the 

 tranquilly deposited shale ; and if so, why not in both the 

 underlying and overlying conglomerates, whose cement- 

 ing paste is so much more calcareous ? But this 

 special question, like not a few of the others raised, will 

 be found to hinge on the pressing one, Do the con- 

 glomerates in reality alternate with the tranquilly de- 

 posited, fossil-bearing shales ? I trust that, should 

 your Grace revisit Helmsdale, you will find materials 

 for its solution in the section exposed between that 

 place and the little cottage/ 



During the year 1853 a large proportion of the 

 chapters of Hugh Miller's autobiographical work appeared 

 in the Witness. In the beginning of 1854 the book 

 was published under the now well-known title, My 

 Schools and Schoolmasters. Its success was immediate 

 and decisive. Literary men were glad to meet Miller in 

 a field from which controversy of every kind was ex- 

 cluded, and to mark the skill with which he wielded the 

 instruments of pure literary art. Their disposition was 

 to pronounce it his most valuable work. Readers will 

 with interest peruse the two following letters on the 

 subject. 



FROM MR ROBERT CHAMBERS. 



' 1, Doune Terrace, March 1, 1854. 



* I cannot think of confining my thanks for your 



