VOL. XXVII.] PHILOSOPHICAL TRANSACTIONS. 635 



tains, for the most part; there are many mosses, which lie very high on these 

 hills ; sometimes not far from the top. But the peat mosses are always in a 

 plain, though there be descents to them, and descents from them ; yet I never 

 observed them to stand on such a plain as the water might stagnate on: and 

 they always have a descent to them, from some higher grounds, by which 

 water descended to that plain ; which I take to be the parent of peat. 



In many of these mosses, there are found quantities of fir and oak wood; 

 but I never observed nor heard of other kinds in them. They are usually found 

 in whole trees; but the smaller branches are seldom found unconsumed. I 

 have seen many, and very great trees of both kinds : generally the oak is black; 

 the fir sometimes whiter, sometimes redder, as is observed in all firs : but neither 

 fir nor oak are found with any bark on them. The fir is generally as fresh and 

 tough, and as fit for any use, as any other old timber : only they have imbibed 

 so much water, that they take a long time to dry, and be fit for use, especi- 

 ally the oak ; so that when put into any small work, it readily warps, and 

 changes its figure. We never find any of the oaks standing in the woods, 

 have that blackness ; so that I presume that colour arises from the water. 



There are many places, where woods do not now grow ; and yet the mosses 

 in these places are well stored with this kind of under ground timber, more 

 especially the fir ; such are the Orkneys, and the Lewes isles, Caithness, Tar- 

 bartness, and the coast of Buchan. So that probably there have been woods 

 formerly in these places : and this is further confirmed by the following 

 account. 



In the year l651, I being then about ig years old, and occasionally in the 

 parish of Lochbrun, passing from a place called Achadiscald, to Gonnazd, I 

 went by a very high hill, which rose in a constant acclivity from the sea ; only 

 in less than half a mile up from the sea, there is a plain about half a mile 

 round, and from thence the hill rises in a constant steepness for more than a 

 mile in ascent. This little plain was at that time all covered over with a firm 

 standing wood; which was so very old, that not only the trees had no green 

 leaves, but the bark was quite thrown off; which the old countrymen, who 

 were with me, said was the universal manner in which fir woods terminated; 

 and that in 20 or 30 years after, the trees would commonly cast themselves up 

 from the roots, and so lie in heaps, till the people would cut, and carry them 

 away. They likewise showed me, that the outside of these standing white 

 trees, and for an inch deep, was dead white wood; but what was within that, 

 was good solid timber, even to the very pith, and as full of rozin as it could 

 stand in the wood. 



About 1 5 years after I had occasion to come the same way, and calling to 



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