92 DESCENDING THE CLIFFS. CHAP. vin. 



its lofty and weathered front to the wasting waves and 



" We have chosen the right time, when the tide is at 

 the lowest. Consequently we are enabled to move 

 along at the foot of the cliffs, which otherwise would be 

 impassable. We actively and untiringly explore, but 

 with no success; and are at last so wearied that we 

 clamber up to the top of the headland by a rugged sort 

 of footpath, and, moving along the edge of the precipice, 

 we make through the grass and heather for the crags 

 immediately facing the Western Ocean. How strange 

 to find, as we move along, a white butterfly or two 

 flitting about, a solitary mason wasp, and a sparrow- 

 hawk looking out for prey, the sun all the while beating 

 down upon us. 



" It is possible to get down the western face of the 

 rugged cliffs of Dunnet Head. We got down, and what 

 do we find ? ibe sight is worth all the toil of walk- 

 ing to see it. Immense masses of sandstone, fallen from 

 the cliffs overhead, skirt the mighty wall. The masses 

 lie in rude confusion. Applying the hammer to them, 

 no remains of fish or quadruped are to be found, but 

 pieces of quartz, clay pebbles of a reddish brown, and in 

 some places balls of sulphur-yellow clay, as big as a 

 man's fist. Here and there are large patches of some- 

 thing like rusty sheet-iron, which would almost make 

 one fancy that they were the remains of some Antedilu- 

 vian Frying-pan that had been swept to sea and buried 

 there. 



" There is very little real red sandstone at Punnet 



