CHAP. xxi. A DISTANT VIEW. 351 



are one and the same. It is true, they have been cut 

 across, and the rocks have been disturbed and lifted up 

 twisted, broken, bent, and what not in a thousand 

 different ways ; and yet I have no doubt they were once 

 continuous. What numbers ! I turned them up, rotten, 

 by twos and threes. . . . 



" I stood up to rest me, and looked around. It 

 was a beautiful day. The sun was shining brightly. 

 Far south I saw Skerry Ben and Morven. Skerry Ben 

 had hardly any snow wreaths on it, and thin vapour 

 seemed to be rolling away from its summit. Looking 

 over all the intervening space, the country seemed very 

 bare. Nothing broke the uniformity of the prospect 

 until the eye rested on the Dorery Hills, and these 

 seemed black and uninteresting. 



" Seaward, all was in motion. The Orkney hills on 

 the north were capped by clouds, which rolled along 

 their summits. Not very far west frowned a dark 

 precipice, at least 200 feet high, at whose base the sea 

 waves were toiling and grinding. 



" I went to work again, raising up thin layers of 

 rock, and turning out rotten fish ; but nothing of any 

 worth. As I got down the stone got firmer, and the 

 fish were sounder. But where was my dream ? I had 

 fancied that I should find the big fossil. I knew that 

 part of it indeed two parts of it were found in this 

 neighbourhood; and I thought that perhaps I might 

 alight on a whole one. But no ! There was no fossil 

 for me, such as I wanted ; and having raised up a stone 

 with three tolerably good fishes on it, I thought that I 

 had better wend my way home." 



