74 SCOTT : LAND AND FRESHWATER MOLLUSCA OF TARBERT. 



freshwater lochs, there are two within a reasonable distance of 

 Tarbert, both are well up among the hills to the northward, the 

 nearest — Loch-na-Kenna — it is a large pond rather than a 

 loch — is the most promising of the two, being comparatively 

 shallow, and nearly half of it overgrown during summer and 

 autumn with yellow water lilies and other aquatic plants, but 

 all the species of molluscs I have as yet noticed in it are one 

 or perhaps two Pisidia and the same number of Limnsea ; 

 the other loch I found to be even more unproductive. The 

 many ditches and pools in the district appear also to contain 

 but a very limited number of species, the most common and 

 generally diffused being Pisidium pusillmn, Linincea trmicafula, 

 and Z. peregra, this last usually small in size ; but if the phy- 

 sical conditions of the district appear to be against the aquatic 

 species being largely represented, it is rather otherwise with the 

 land molluscs, which, as the subjoined list shows, may compare 

 favourably, as regards species and varieties, with other and more 

 promising localities. Only a few species, however, seem to be 

 generally distributed and equally common throughout the neigh- 

 bourhood, three of these, viz. : — Helix rotundata, Pupa uni- 

 bilicata, and Clausilia rugosa, may be got so near the sea as to 

 be scarcely beyond high water mark, and where they must be 

 drenched with spray during every storm, and are also found 

 well inland ; one or two other species such as Helix aspersa, 

 H. tiemoralis, and H. arbustorum, though frequent within a 

 restricted area, appear to be otherwise scarce, while Pupa 

 ringens has only been noticed at one place as yet. 



The ruins of the ' Old Castle ' of Tarbert stand on what 

 is, by some, called ' the Castle Rock,' an outstanding rocky 

 knoll, perhaps about one hundred feet in height, and near to 

 the old quay. A good deal that is interesting might be said 

 about the history and traditions of the olden times of which 

 these ruins are now the only tangible tokens — when stalwart 

 men and stately dames walked about these now solitary and 

 crumbling walls, but this is not the place to do so ; but is the 



I.e., v., July, 1886. 



