HIGHLAND MEMOEIES 355 



returned, for Mrs. Darwin made Lady Hooker a graceful 

 present of several pieces as a souvenir. 



In 1894 he was again in the West Highlands, where Mr. 

 La Touche wrote to him about the * parallel roads ' of Glen 

 Boy. 



Glenfinart House, Ardentinny, 

 via Greenock, N.B. : August 2, 1894. 



MY DEAB LA TOUCHE, I visited the Parallel Koads 

 some 20 years ago, with Smith of Jordan Hill, since which 

 much light has been thrown on their history, principally 

 by TyndalTs observation that the great Ice Dam must have 

 been exactly opposite what is now the Invereck side of 

 Ben Nevis ; and then by Prof. Dickie x of Aberdeen, who 

 examining the diatoms, still to be found under the stones, 

 showed them to be fresh water species ! so I think that 

 their sub-aerial formation must be admitted, and the marine 

 be dismissed. You do not say what your friend's theory 

 was. I do not see how he could escape the marine or the 

 sub-aerial (i.e. glacial). 



We are on a visit to a neighbour of ours at The Camp 

 [Mr. Pige Leschallas], who has bought a good many thousand 

 acres on the banks of Loch Long, on the Clyde, with a 

 first rate house thereon otherwise a valueless property of 

 mountain and moor, not grassy enough for sheep, or heathy 

 enough for grouse. The scenery is however lovely of its 

 kind, something like the upper end of Loch Lomond. It 

 is all very familiar to me, for it borders on a few acres (2, 

 I think) of property called Invereck that my father bought 

 some 60 years ago, with a pretty cottage on it, to which 

 we used to resort in summer from Glasgow. The site of 

 that cottage is now occupied by a fine house, built by 

 some wealthy Glasgow merchant, but the lovely scenery 

 remains, and is of melancholy interest to me, as there I 

 spent so many happy days with relatives all but one now 

 gone. There I fished, sketched, and practised rough survey- 

 ing, preparatory to my ardent aspirations for a traveller's 

 life in unknown regions. Unluckily the climate is typical 



1 George Dickie (1812-82), botanist ; M.A. Marischal College, Aberdeen, 

 1830; Professor of Natural History at Belfast 1849-60; M.D., Professor of 

 Botany at Aberdeen, 1860-77. He specialised on Algae and published works 

 on the Flora of the East of Scotland and Ulster. 



