348 MR. TATE ON POLISHED AND SCRATCHED ROCKS, 
And, in Wallis’s history of Northumberland, when the Author 
is describing the district near Ford Castle, he observes, “ At a 
place called Haltwell-Swire, near Fenton, half a mile from 
Broom-ridge, Sir Henry Percy was defeated by the Scots, under 
the Earl of Bothwell, in the year 1558.” 
Swire, though so interesting and expressive a remnant of the 
old Border speech, has been absurdly metamorphosed into squire 
and square ; so prone are men to pervert what they do not com- 
prehend, rather than confess their want of information, and wait 
for better. 
XIV.—The Polished and Scratched Rocks in the neighbourhood 
of Alnwick, viewed in connection with the Boulder Formation 
in Northumberland. By Grorcs Tate, Ksq., F.G.S. 
[Read Wednesday, December 12th, 1849.] 
THE objects of this paper will be to describe the polished, scratched, 
and grooved surface of a Jiimestone bed in the neighbourhood of 
Alnwick ; to shew the connection of these phenomena with the 
Boulder Formation ; and to consider the agencies by which they 
may have been effected. Under the term Boulder Formation, I in- 
clude the series of superficial deposits of sand, gravel, and clay, with 
large and small blocks, overlying the stratified rocks. The sub- 
ject may not be devoid of local interest ; for though such pheno- 
mena are not uncommon in other parts of Britain, and particularly 
in the North of Europe and in North America ; and though, also, 
detached Rocks scratched, and to a certain extent polished, have 
not unfrequently been met with in the superficial deposits of 
Northumberland, yet Rocks, in situ, exhibiting such appearances, 
have very rarely been noticed in this county. 
