414 Meetings of Berwickshire Naturalists' Club, by J. Hardy. 



and Dr Douglas : — Rosa spinosissima and Geranium sanguineum, 

 very abundant, Thahctrum minus, Scabiosa columbaria, Oenanthe 

 Lachenalii, and Silaus pratensis. 



Before reaching the ruins of Dunstanborough Castle the 

 " Saddle Bock " — an out-crop of limestone of a remarkably 

 strange shape, which afterwards dips away under the basalt — 

 was examined. The ancient ruins are situated on the basalt, 

 which rises perpendicularly from the sea to the height of over 

 forty feet, and having many fissures filled with metamorphosed 

 shale and sandstone. It is in these patches that the various 

 coloured quartz crystals called Dunstanborough diamonds are 

 found. Near the northern point of the promontory a column of 

 basalt, having probably been of a softer nature, has crumbled 

 away ; and, looking down through the basalt into a well-like 

 hole, the sea lashing the stones beneath can be seen. Beneath 

 the basalt is a bed of limestone, which is gradually wasting 

 away, and in many parts it has been hollowed out so as to form 

 an almost continuous cavern. The various geological features 

 of the locality having been duly noted, the ruins were in- 

 spected. The castle and its precincts occupied a space of 

 over ten acres,' and, standing on a lofty eminence, it was 

 almost inaccessible from the east, north, and west sides, 

 though the ground to the south was more favourable for 

 purposes of attack. The building of the castle was com- 

 menced in 1313, and at one time the fortress must have been 

 exceedingly strong, for the ruins show that, aided by the natural 

 features of the site, it would be able to resist a long and severe 

 siege. The principal part of the ruins is the entrance gate-house 

 and keep, with its two great semi-circular towers, which, at the 

 height of about thirty feet, are converted by means of skilful 

 corbelling into square towers, which, when completed, rose to 

 the height of eighty feet from the ground. Close at hand, and 

 connected with the keep, is St. Margaret's tower, which is 

 slowly, though surely, crumbling away. In fact, many stones 

 are falling out of their places, and tumbling into Queen 

 Margaret's cove below. On the west side are the ruins of the 

 Lilburn Tower, which had for some time previous been a pro- 

 minent object in the landscape. Exhaustive accounts of the old 

 castle are contained in the Eev C. H. Hartshorne's " Feudal and 

 Military Antiquities of Northumberland," London, 1852 ; and in 

 the late Mr Tate's article in the Club's Proceedings, vol. vi. 



