SAND-FLOOD IN THE HEBRIDES. 373 



patches of several miles, separated by intervals of rock, 

 of equal or greater extent. In some places the sandy 

 shores are flat, or very gently sloping, forming what are 

 here called Fords ; in others, behind the beach, there is 

 an accumulation of sand to the height of from twenty to 

 sixty feet, formed into hillocks. This sand is constant- 

 ly drifting ; and in several places islands have been form- 

 ed by the removal of isthmi. The parts immediately 

 behind the beach are also liable to be inundated by the 

 sand ; and in this manner most of the islands have suf- 

 fered very considerable damage. Those of Pabbay and 

 Berneray in Harris may be particularised ; in the former 

 of which, a tract of about a mile and a-half long, by half 

 a mile in breadth, has been converted into a desert of 

 drifting sand ; and in the latter a large plain, that was 

 formerly noted for its fertility, has been entirely swept 

 away. The sand consists almost entirely of comminuted 

 shells, apparently of the species which are found in the 

 neighbouring seas. It is rather coarse in the grain ; but, 

 during high winds, by the rubbing of its particles upon 

 each other, a sort of dust is formed, which, at a distance, 

 resembles smoke, and which, in the Island of Berneray, 

 I have seen driven into the sea, to the distance of up- 

 wards of two miles, appearing like a thin white fog. The 

 cure of sand drift has been attempted in these islands in 

 two different ways. Mr Alexander Macleod, surgeon of 

 North Uist, is the inventor of the most efficacious method, 

 which is that of cutting thin square turfs from the neigh, 

 bouring pasture grounds, and laying them down at inter- 

 vals of some inches. In the course of a very few years the 

 turfs coalesce, and the stript ground is little the worse; for 

 the roots remaining in it, a new vegetation rapidly springs 

 up. The other method was introduced by Mr Macleod 



