Geological Society. 327 



nation of actual glaciers in the Alps, that he acquiesced in the cor- 

 rectness of Prof. Agassiz's theory relative to Switzerland. On his 

 return to Neuchatel from the glaciers of Rosenlaui and Grindelwald, 

 he informed M. A^assiz that he had noticed in Scotland and Ene:- 

 land phaenomena similar to those he had just examined, but which 

 he had attributed to diluvial action: thus in 1811 he had observed 

 on the head rocks on the left side of the gorge of the Tay, near 

 Dunkeld, rounded and polished surfaces ; and in 1 824, in company 

 with Mr. Lyell, grooves and striae on granite rocks near the east base 

 of Ben Ne^ds. About the same time Sir George Mackenzie pointed 

 out to the author in a valley near the base of Ben Wyvis, a high 

 ridge of gravel, laid obliquely across, in a manner inexplicable by 

 any action of water, but in which, after his examination of the effects 

 of glaciers in Switzerland, he recognizes the form and condition of 

 a moraine. 



After these general remarks, Dr. Buckland proceeds to describe 

 the evidence of glaciers observed by him in Scotland last autumn, 

 partly before and partly after an excursion, in company with Prof. 

 Agassiz ; but he forbears to dwell on the phaenomena of parallel ter- 

 races, though he is convinced that they are the effects of lakes pro- 

 duced by glaciers. 



ITie district which Dr. Buckland examined previously to his ex- 

 cursion with Prof. Agassiz, lay in the neighbourhood of Dumfries ; 

 and the line of country which he investigated subsequently, extended 

 in Scotland from Aberdeen to Forfar, Blair Gowrie, Dunkeld, and 

 by Loch Tumel and Loch Rannoch to Schiehallion and Taymouth, 

 and thence by Crief, Comrie, Loch Earn Head, Callender and Stir- 

 ling, to Edinburgh ; and in England by Berwick, Wollar, the Che- 

 viots, Penrith, and Shap Fell, to Lancashire and Cheshire. 



Moraine near Dumfries. — The picturesque ravine of CrickhopeLinn, 

 about two miles north of Closeburn, and one mile east of Thornhill, in- 

 tersects nearly horizontal strata of new red sandstone, and is traversed 

 by the Dolland rivulet. On emerging from the upper end of the ra- 

 vine a long terminal moraine is ^•isible, stretching nearly across the 

 mountain valley, from which the Dolland Burn descends to fall into 

 Crickhope Linn ; and it resembles, when viewed from a distance, a 

 vallum of an ancient camp, being covered with turf. It is formed 

 principally of an unstratified mass of rolled j^ebbles, derived from the 

 slates of the adjacent Lowder Hills, with a few rounded fragments 

 of granite, the nearest rock of which in situ is that of Loch Doon, in 

 Galloway, thirty miles to the north-west. Its height varies from 

 twenty to thirty feet ; its breadth at the base is about one hundred 

 feet, and its length is four hundred yards. At the southern extre- 

 mity it is traversed by the Dolland rivulet, and at the northern by 

 the Crickhope Water ; and in the centre it is intersected by a road. 



Moraines in Aberdeenshire. — Dr. Buckland considers the gravel and 

 sand which cover the greater part of the granite table-land from Aber- 

 deen to Stonehaven to be the detritus of moraines ; and the large 

 insulated tumuli and tortuous ridges of gravel, occupying one hun- 

 dred acres, near Forden, a mile east of Achinbald, to be terminal 



