1862^] JAMIESON GLACIATION OF SCOTLAND. 169 



contours of the surface. Now here, as in the basin of the Forth, 

 no ordinary glacier-action will suffice for the explanation ; yet the 

 proof is clear that the action has come from the west or land side, 

 and not from floating ice propelled inwards or parallel to the coast. 



§ 4. In a paper in the 16th volume of the 'Journal of the Geological 

 Society,' at pp. 368 and 370, I gave it as my opinion that at the 

 commencement of the Drift-period this country had stood as high as 

 at present, or perhaps much higher, with an extensive development 

 of glaciers and land-ice, Hke that of Greenland ; and I there described 

 a case near Killiecrankie, in Perthshire, where the flank of a hiU called 

 Meal Uaine is rounded, scored, and in some places even polished, 

 as if by the passage of ice down the valley ; and I pointed out that, 

 as the markings on the hill-top are about 1800 feet above the pre- 

 sent bottom of the glen, it was evident that, were land-ice the cause, 

 it must have been in a volume altogether extraordinary. My curiosity 

 was greatly excited by what I there saw ; and since then I have been 

 so fortunate as to discover some other cases quite as remarkable, 

 where the cause of the phenomena is more clearly indicated. 



One of the most complete of these was in the Lochaber district of 

 Inverness-shire, so celebrated for its Parallel roads or terraces. 



High up among a cluster of hiUs forming the eastern extension of 

 Ben Nevis, there is a mountain-pass, of a beautifully wild and 

 savage character, where two streams take their rise, and flow in 

 opposite directions. One of these runs to the N.W. down a very 

 short glen, called the Larig Leachach, into Glen Spean. This Larig 

 Leachach, or '^ the Stony Larig," is at its upper end very rocky ; and 

 some strata of quartz, that run vertically across the glen, show 

 abundant traces of glacial actipn, the hardness of the rock having 

 preserved even the finer striae and scratches : these markings are 

 parallel to the direction of the stream, and the abrasion is most 

 visible upon the faces of the rock looking up the hoUow. Further 

 down there is a great deal of moraine-matter — more indeed than is 

 usually seen, owing, I imagine, to the precipices and high corries 

 that overhung the ancient glacier, and had sent down much rocky 

 debris upon its surface. 



The other stream, taking its rise at this mountain-pass, flows S.E. 

 into the head of Loch Treig down a much longer glen, known simply 

 as " the Larig." Similar evidence of glacial action occurs along its 

 course, but owing to the nature of the rock being different, and 

 yielding more rapidly to the weather, the glacial impressions have 

 not been so well retained. Prom this pass, therefore, we may sup- 

 pose two ice-streams to have set out in opposite directions — one to 

 the N.W., the other to the S.E. 



Two other glens, one of them larger than the Larig, contribute 

 their streams to Loch Treig — a beautiful sheet of water, about six 

 miles long, in a N. and S. direction, and scarcely a mile broad at its 

 widest part. It is enclosed by steep hills on both sides, and is so 

 deep that I am told it was never known to be frozen over. Around 

 its upper extremity there are many irregular hillocks of unstratified 

 stony debris, fuU of boulders ; these are most numerous in the curve 



