212 ANCIENT REMAINS IN ARRAN. 



blocks, diameter 21 yards. It is close to Tormore farm- 

 house, and the most western of the group. 



With regard now to the nature of the stones of which 

 these circles consist, it is worthy of note that while the 

 granite circles consist of such loose blocks of the coarse and 

 fine varieties as are commingled on the moor, and could be 

 readily rolled into position by a number of men with crow- 

 bars, none of them being heavier than from 4 to 5 tons the 

 pillared stones are of Old Red sandstone, which does not 

 occur nearer than the cliffs towards Auchincar, and are of 

 much greater weight, the largest being not less than from 8 

 to 10 tons, and the others 6 to 8 tons. The intervening 

 country is rough and difficult; yet there does not appear to 

 us any other conclusion possible than that this is the origin 

 whence they have come. All of them have plainly under- 

 gone a certain amount of coarse " dressing," but with what 

 tools it is impossible to say. 



100. The excavations were begun on the morning of the 

 24th May, 1861, with a body of nine men, under command 

 of the chief hedger, whose intelligence and zeal were of the 

 greatest use to me. I broke ground in the circle No. 2 ; 

 and considering that the centre of the circle and the base 

 of a pillar were the spots most likely to receive any object 

 valued or venerated, I found the centre easily, knowing 

 three points on the circumference, and excavated there, and at 

 the base of the most southern of the three pillars, the one on 

 the S.W. side. Nothing was found here; but I may mention, 

 for the guidance of future excavators, that, except iu a peaty 

 or gravelly soil, the ground can be felt to a considerable depth 

 by means of a strong pole, armed with an iron facing, and 

 thus either much digging be saved or the right direction 

 given to it. The ground was sounded in this way, in the 

 central digging, after 15 inches of peat were cleared off and 

 the till reached, and we became aware, by the peculiar 

 sound, that we were over a flat stone of considerable size. 

 The interest of the inquiry now rapidly increased ; and when 



