436 RAMBLES OF A GEOLOGIST. 



so divided, rather more than two parts will be found to occur 

 on the upper side, and rather less than four on the under ; 

 while in the caudal fin of the Dipterus the development seems 

 to have been restricted to the under side exclusively; at 

 least, in none of the many individuals which I have examined 

 have I found any trace of caudal rays on the upper side. These 

 are minute and somewhat trivial particulars ; but the geolo- 

 gist may find them of use ; and the non-geologist may be dis- 

 posed to extend to them some little degree of tolerance, when 

 he considers that they distinguished two largely-developed 

 genera of animals, to which the Author of all did not deem 

 it unworthy his wisdom to impart, in the act of creation, cer- 

 tain marked points of resemblance, and other certain points 

 of dissimilarity. 



From the Museum, accompanied by one of the gentlemen 

 to whom Mr Learmonth had introduced me at breakfast, and 

 who obligingly undertook to act as my guide on the occasion, 

 I set out to visit a remarkable stack on the sea-coast, about 

 four miles north and west of Stromness. We scaled together 

 the steep granitic hill immediately over the town, and then 

 cut on the stack, straight as the bird flies, across a trackless 

 common, bare and stony, and miserably pared by the Daughter 

 spade. The landed proprietors in this part of the mainland 

 are very numerous, and their properties small ; and there are 

 vast breadths of undivided common that encircle their little 

 estates, as the Atlantic encircles the Orkneys. But the state 

 in which I found the unappropriated parts of the district had 

 in no degree the effect of making me an opponent of appro- 

 priation or the landholders. Our country, had it been left 

 as a whole to all its people, as the Communist desiderates, 

 would ere now be of exceedingly little value to any portion 

 of them. The soil of the Orkney commons has been so re- 

 peatedly pared off and carried away for fuel, that there are 

 now wide tracts on which there is no more soil to pare, and 



