448 RAMBLES OF A GEOLOGIST. 



presentatives of these may still exist in some of our sandstone 

 quarries, it might be well to be possessed of a knowledge of 

 the peculiarities by which they are to be distinguished from 

 deposits of subaqueous origin. In order that I might have 

 an opportunity of studying these peculiarities where they are 

 to be seen more extensively developed than elsewhere on the 

 eastern coast of Scotland, I here formed the intention of spend- 

 ing a day, on my return south, among the sand-wastes of 

 Moray, a purpose which I afterwards carried into effect. 

 But of fcliat more anon. 



On the following morning, availing myself of a kind invi- 

 tation, through Dr Garson, from his brother, a Free Church 

 minister resident in an inland district of the Mainland, in con- 

 venient neighbourhood with the northern coasts of the island, 

 and with several quarries, I set out from Stromness, taking 

 in my way the Loch and Standing Stones of Stennis, which 

 I had previously seen from but my seat in the mail-gig as J 

 passed. Mr Learmonth, who had to visit some of his people 

 in this direction, accompanied me for several miles along the 

 shores of the loch, and lightened the journey by his interesting 

 snatches of local history, suggested by the various objects that 

 lay along our road, buildings, tumuli, ancient battle-fields, 

 and standing stones. The loch itself, an expansive sheet of 

 water fourteen miles in circumference, I contemplated with 

 much interest, and longed for an opportunity of studying its 

 natural history. Two promontories, those occupied by the 

 Standing Stones, shoot out from the opposite sides, and ap- 

 proach so near as to be connected by a rustic bridge. They 

 divide the loch into two nearly equal parts, the lower of which 

 gives access to the sea, and is salt in its nether reaches and 

 brackish in its upper ones, while the higher is merely brackish 

 in its nether reaches, and fresh enough in its upper ones to be 

 potable. The shores of both were strewed, at the time I 

 passed, by a line of wrack, consisting, for the first few miles, 



