A SUMMER RAMBLE AMONG THE HEBRIDES. 75 



liar composition of the stone : it much rather resembles an 

 altered sandstone, in at least the weathered specimens, than 

 a trap, and yet there seemed nothing to indicate that it was 

 an Old Red Sandstona Its columnar structure bore evidence 

 to the action of great heat ; and its pale red colour was exact- 

 ly that which the Oolitic sandstones of the island, with their 

 slight ochreous tinge, would assume in a common fire. And 

 so I set myself to look for fossils. In the columnar stone 

 itself I expected none, as none occur in vast beds of the un- 

 altered sandstones, out of some one of which I supposed it 

 might possibly have been formed ; and none I found : but 

 in a rolled block of altered shale of a much deeper red than 

 the general mass, and much more resembling Old Red Sand- 

 stone, I succeeded in detecting several shells, identical with 

 those of the deposit of blue clay described in a former chap- 

 ter. There occurred in it the small univalve resembling a 

 Trochus, together with the oblong bivalve, somewhat like a 

 Tellina ; and, spread thickly throughout the block, lay frag- 

 ments of coprolitic matter, and the scales and teeth of fishes. 

 Night was coming on, and the tide had risen on the beach ; 

 but I hammered lustily, and laid open in the dark red shale 

 a vertebral joint, a rib, and a parallelogramical fragment of 

 solid bone, none of which could have belonged to any fish. It 

 was an interesting moment for the curtain to drop over the 

 promontory of Ru-Stoir : I had thus already found in con- 

 nection with it well nigh as many reptilian remains as had 

 been found in all Scotland before, for there could exist no 

 doubt that the bones I laid open were such ; and still more 

 interesting discoveries promised to await the coming morn- 

 ing and a less hasty survey. We found a hospitable meal 

 awaiting us at a picturesque old two-storey house, with, what 

 is rare in the island, a clump of trees beside it, which rises 

 on the northern angle of the Oolitic meniscus ; and after our 

 day's hard work in the fresh sea-air, we did ample justice to 



