CHAP. xiv. HA VEN OF ME Y. 211 



elevation of the sea, or a depression of the land, was 

 sufficient to enable the land to be covered with water, 

 and unite Dunnet Bay with the Pentland Firth. 



He went north to the Burn of Ratter, and found the 

 boulder clay thickly charged with marine shells He 

 next went in the direction of Barrogill Castle, on towards 

 the sea, to the Haven of Mey, where he found a bed of 

 boulder clay 60 feet thick, charged from top to bottom 

 with marine shells. 



" Here then," said he, " is the grand key to the whole 

 mystery ! When the sea stood sixty feet high at 

 Barrogill and its vicinity, the whole of the eastern parts 

 of the county, round to Wick, were drowned ! " 



" Where the Burn of Ratter enters the sea, the coast 

 ia very low, and there is a continuous valley on to Loch 

 Scister. 



" The bitterest opponent of geological deductions could 

 hardly fail to be converted by an examination of the 

 boulder clay precipices at the Haven of Mey. He 

 would find that the boulder clay was a distinct forma- 

 tion a generic production, differing entirely from 

 every other thing on the earth's surface. It is not a 

 conglomerate. It would never, though consolidated, 

 form a bed of rock similar to conglomerate. It is not a 

 production of the Mosaic Deluge. It is not, strictly 

 speaking, a production of the sea. It is not the sweep- 

 ings of a sea-shore. No ! nothing of the kind. No 

 Mosaic Deluge could have produced those beds of dark, 

 bituminous, sandy, tenacious, stony clay. No ocean 

 waves alone, by the friction of ten thousand years on 



