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of limestone extend up the hill, rising towards the north, and dip- 

 ping S.E. at 36. The rock is of a bluish-gray colour, about 

 twenty feet thick, and consists of twenty-two beds of limestone, 

 interstratified with the same number of beds of red shale, the thickest 

 stratum seldom reaching one foot. The workings are inclined 

 adits descending in the line of dip. Over the limestone are shales 

 with hematitic iron ore. Several dikes traverse the limestone, and 

 alter its structure ; fossils abound, but are procured with difficulty. 

 It has been remarked, as indicating the tranquil nature of the 

 deposit, that the large producti uniformly rest with the convex 

 side of the valve downwards. In the sandstone upon the shore in 

 front of the village several common species of coal plants are found. 

 A little south of Corrie, near the fall on Lochrim burn, another 

 bed of limestone occurs; that under Maoldon has been noticed 

 already (Art. 82) . The many interesting trap dikes have also been 

 noticed; and those curious irregular ridges on the surface of the 

 sandstone mentioned as occurring on the Corregills shore, are even 

 more remarkable here. They sometimes stand up six or eight feet 

 above the surface, and have very sharp jagged edges. In most 

 cases they are independent of whin dikes, and consist of matter 

 originally less liable to disintegrate than the sandstone, and prob- 

 ably introduced into fissures in this rock after it had consolidated. 



88. We return now to the contact of the carboniferous rocks 

 with the old red sandstone at the march of Achab farm, and 

 follow the latter rock northward along the coast. Expanding 

 inland, it rises into high cliffs. The forms into which these 

 have been moulded by the action of the sea, the disposition of the 

 natural wood upon them, and the huge granite blocks which 

 stand prominent by the road-side, give a unique and most 

 picturesque character to this part of the coast. One of the largest 

 blocks (on the western edge of the road among trees) we estimated 

 at above 200 tons ; farther north on the eastern edge of the road is 

 another very large block standing upright on its apex, perhaps let 

 down so from a floating berg, or originally imbedded in sandstone, 

 afterwards worn away as the tide ebbed and flowed around. A 

 melancholy interest attaches to another boulder south of the 

 march of Achab farm. A garrison of eighty men had been left in 

 Brodick Castle by Cromwell ; against these the natives became so 

 irritated, on account of the excesses of some of the soldiers, that 

 when they were out upon a foraging party in this direction, the 

 Arran men rose against them, and put them all to the sword, 

 except one poor fellow who escaped, and hid under this stone. 



