117 



sinuous bank, from whose shattered edge masses float away when 

 the breeze gets up, and, dashing against the flat side of the ridge of 

 Goatfell, are driven in rapid eddies round its south end or over its 

 upper edge. To one looking up from the quiet depths below, this 

 would suggest the existence of a furious gale upon the summit. As 

 the weather thickens and the clouds accumulate, the cone gets com- 

 pletely hidden, and the rolling vapours pass even lower than the mill- 

 dam, veiling the edge of the great waterfall, which then seems to 

 issue directly from the clouds. 



But such a day as this will not suit for our walk ; we must wait 

 for bright skies and still air few walks in Arran will then please us 

 more. Every lover of mountains has a keen desire to climb the 

 highest summit within his reach, and many will choose this walk 

 for their first excursion. 



79. The woods which stretch westwards from the castle are 

 crossed by two roads, by either of which we may pass upwards into 

 the moors. A path lies near the east bank of the Cnocan burn, as 

 far as the mill-dam, where this stream is gathered from many heads. 

 Beyond this a track is marked out among the granite blocks to the 

 east shoulder of the mountain ; thence, along the edge of the ridge, 

 a rugged path conducts us to the summit, over huge masses of rock, 

 and along the edge of Cyclopean walls. But the geologist has much 

 to see on the ascent which this route will not show him, and we 

 must conduct him by another way. 



Beds of fossiliferous limestone occur in the woods N.W. of 

 Brodick castle ; they belong, of course, to the carboniferous system, 

 and are higher in the series than the sandstones, which appear 

 in the bed and banks of the burn before it enters the wood. They 

 are regarded by Murchison and Sedgwick as an upthrow of the 

 Corrie beds, a theory to which we do not object ; but the facts may 

 be explained otherwise (Art. 52). These sandstones are succeeded 

 by the old red as we ascend the burn above the wood, the junction 

 being somewhere about the place where the wall enclosing the new 

 plantation abuts against the bank of the stream. But the contact 

 is not seen, nor is there any gradation visible. The old red is here 

 a hard quartzose slaty sandstone, with many thin brown laminae, 

 and elliptic blue or white claygalls : the dip is back against the 

 slate of the mountain, contrary to that of the overlying carboni- 

 ferous beds, at angles varying from 55 to 70 W. of magnetic N. 

 As we advance the strata become much obscured by debris ; and a 

 little above the point where the west burn enters the main stream 

 the dip is reversed or toward S.S.E., at about 65 to 70. The rock 



