594 Notes on the Ettrick By James Hardy. 



precise evidence, and I have no intention of telling over again wliat 

 every one knows from local guide books or gazetteers. The 

 aim of the Club is to supply fresh materials ; not to compile 

 from resources readily obtainable. 



1. ABay ontheMtrick. — The Water Marks. By William Kemp. 



Many years have elapsed since I first observed traces of 

 "Ancient Sea Margins" along the flanks of the hills by the 

 Tweed. Since then, for ten successive years, as leisure occurred, 

 I extended my researches along its tributary streams. Upwards 

 of three years ago, a part of my notes were arranged and 

 published in a large work of great merit, by a gentleman of 

 high standing in literature. Partly from my ardour having 

 abated and the want of leisure, I have since then in a great 

 measure dropped the pursuit of Geology. Of all the valleys of 

 any note in this district, the Ettrick alone remained unvisited, 

 save by a passing view in a carriage. But enough was then 

 seen to excite an ardent desire for a day's investigation there. 

 To satisfy that wish, I lately, one fine day, set off to make a 

 careful survey for some distance up that river. I took my data 

 from the plateau of the town of Selkirk, which stands at an 

 elevation of 532 feet above the sea. That is one of the best 

 marked line of levels in the south of Scotland. When the sea 

 beat along that ancient shore line, the estuary along the vale of 

 the Tweed had extended to the town of Peebles. The plain 

 which that town stands upon is the detritus run into the head 

 of the estuary, by the waters of the Tweed and Eddleston. The 

 corresponding level on the Ettrick only extends to the village of 

 Ettrick-bridge ; consequently, that village is built upon a plateau 

 similar to that at Peebles, at the head of an ancient estuary of 

 the sea. This is no imaginary theory; the level from Selkirk 

 was taken with great care. So visibly is that ancient shore line 

 marked, that, to a practised eye, the level only requires to be 

 applied in confirmation of the fact. On the south side of the 

 valley, about three and a half miles west from Selkirk, by taking 

 up a position a little above the road, upon a slight undulation, 

 and there looking towards Selkirk, the spectator will observe 

 several spurs from the south hills extending into the valley. 

 How interesting it is to observe that all these are, as it were, 



