Reports and Proceedings. 427 



when smuggling was carried on to a considerable extent between 

 the Continent and the east coast of Scotland, boats used to land near 

 St. Abb's Head and Fast Castle, in Berwickshire, at places where 

 they could not find sufficient water to land at present. The luggers 

 remained in the offing, a short distance from the shore, and two of 

 the principal places where the boats used to land, laden with Hol- 

 lands, brandy, tobacco, and silks, were in the coves at and near 

 Lumsden shore and near Dowlaw shore. They landed on ledges of 

 solid rock, where no boats could land at present, even at the highest 

 tides. He had measured the height of several of these ledges. He 

 "Ound one 6 inches, another 8 inches, and a third 9 mches above 

 hi ;h- water mark ; and taking the moderate computation of only 

 2 feet of water for floating a boat laden with goods, we shall 

 have an elevation or a rise of the land of from 2 feet 6 inches to 

 2 feet 9 inches within the last fifty years. He also stated that 

 several iron rings still remain as silent witnesses of the smuggling 

 operations. Mr. Smyth then said that all along the coast, especially at 

 Eedheugh, Prestonpans, Portobello, North Queensferry, and Aber- 

 dour, he had found evidence, though not so definite as the foregoing, 

 that the sea reached a point fifty years ago 2^ feet above the present 

 high- water mark. As corroborative of this, he entered into a minute 

 description of the Leith tide-gauges. The records were fii'st taken in 

 1806-7 ; but the first portion of the books had been lost, so that the 

 first register now begins only in the year 1827, yet we have internal 

 evidence from the marginal observations on one of the sets of books, 

 that in the year 1810 mean tides rose to a point 2 feet 10 inches 

 higher than they do at present. Mr. Smyth said that, in his calcula- 

 tions, he had taken all the changes in the docks into account, and 

 he was irresistibly drawn to the conclusion that there had been an 

 upheaval of the land of at least 2|- feet with the last half-century. 

 Mr. Smyth, in conclusion, stated that the upheaval, which is at present 

 taking place on the shores of the Firth of Forth, and in Berwick- 

 shire, has its counterpart in Caithness, which is rising at nearly the 

 same rate ; and he said it was probable, seeing that Norway and 

 Sweden are also rising, that this slow upheaval of our shores extends 

 to Scandinavia. 



The Geological Society of GtLASGOw held their second summer 

 excursion on May 12th, when they spent a delightful summer after- 

 noon on the Gleniffer Braes. The party, under the guidance of Mr. 

 E. W. Skipsey, examined the outcrop of a bed of Coal, known as the 

 " Lady Anne " seam, here calcined by an overlying bed of volcanic 

 ash. They next visited and examined the overlying Carboniferous 

 Limestone, here tilted up by the trap. Very few fossils were dis- 

 covered. 



II. — On June 9th the Society made an excursion to High Blantyre 

 and Calder Glen. The resident members, acting as guides, were the 

 Eev. P. J. Gloag and Dr. James Bryce, F.G.S. The quarries visited 

 were those of Newfield and Broomhouse, situated in East KUbride, 



