ORKNEY [SLANDS. 
‘were eventually renounced, in exchange for other poffeffions 
and honours. Queen Mary attempted to confer thefe 
iflands, with the title of duke, on her favourite the earl of 
gave them to 
again reverted to the crown, and were afterwards granted to 
the earl of Morton. In this family they pegs till the 
year 1766, at which time pel were Aa Id to the father of 
prefent many {cenes truly fublime. laces they re- 
main entire; but in sale having yielded to the force of 
the ocean, and the ravages of time, they appear fhattered 
into a thoufand pieces, ieee into majettic arches, or hol- 
owed out into dark and unfathomable caverns. 
difpofition of the ftrata, and many other confiderations, little 
doubt can be entertained but that thefe iflands, in remote 
times, were conne@ted with each other, and alfo with the 
a of Scotland. 
n the iflands to the north of Pomona, and in thofe 
elke cre does 
this group afford, that almoft t oye veins. of any confe- 
quence, hitherto difcovered, are two of lead in the ‘hand of 
Shapinfay, and fome iron-{tone in The ftrata of the 
main-land are smilar to thofe in the other iflands; but it 
likewife contains fome flate, granite, marble, and alabafter, 
and is more abundantly fupplied with metallic ores. A 
large rock, of rather fingular character, ftands at the weftern 
entrance of the Pentland frith. The ground of this rock is 
of various colours; brown, red, grey, white, yellow, and 
greenifh. Small rounded pebbles, generally quartz, of a 
white colour, are diffeminated through it; and fragments of 
granite and other ftones are immerfed in it, in various places. 
Veins and detached saeasad of white calcareous fpar are like- 
wife frequent. In fom 
general is a fhapelefs aials or blotch. 
a fine inn cups, vafes, and ornamental trinkets, are 
formed from 
Soil and Climate—T he foil of the Orkney iflands is more 
various, probably, than in any other diftri eat 
fe varieties are fo inter 
¥ i e the foils are thin 
or allow, being fe . ldom more than one or two feet deep; 
ut the elefs uncommonly fertile. The rocks 
the foil retts, and which in many places are fo 
afford food tor sed 
Though fituated fo much to the north, the climate of 
thefe iflands is not liable to thofe extremes af heat and cold, 
which prevail in ae countries, lefs diflant from the 
This fact is the refult of the proximity of every 
appears by ey fprings, amounts to 45°; and t 
range, between the loweft point of in winter and the 
highelt of heat in fummer, is from 257 to 75° of Fahrenheit’s 
thermometer. The mott preriene at here blow from 
requent. n 
eae of time; and the winds, from whatever quarter they 
blow, or in whatever feafon, are ioe! ever tempeftuous, 
though often loud and ftrong; a circumftance which con- 
tributes greatly to the falubrity of the atmofphere. Rains 
fall here in confiderable quantity, and more on the weftern 
than on the rie ace 
tion of heat, occafioned by the change o 
the folid to the fluid ftate. About 50 years ago, the 
habitants were thrown into great alarm, by the fall of ie 
was terined black frow, during this period. The pheno- 
menon, however, was foon afterwards explained, and their 
fears allayed, by an account of an eruption of mount 
Hecla, in ere having taken place on the day previous, 
which no doubt was the fource whence the fnow derived its 
— hue. i 
view of the faét, on account o we 
confult Buffon (Natural Hittory), who diftin@ly ftates, 
that in fome of the eruptions of mount or Vefuvius, 
the afhes have been carried by the winds ‘to the fhores of 
sypt 
‘Another ftriking peculiarity in the climate of thefe iflands 
n fum 
but, in direét contradition to the apparently general law of 
nature, a then only when le 
ments n commotion. ‘To phe cae! this anomaly 
winter are fh proportion. The long abfence of the 
» however, throughout this feafon, is in fome meafure 
compenfated by the ae luftre of t oon, d 
periods of fhining, and by the fcarcely lefs tranfcendent 
brilliancy of the aurore-boreai, ua arifes almolt every 
veft nter, and {pring months, 
with which almoft every ifland abounds. For fome account 
of this phenomenon, fee Aurora-Borealis. 
Tenure of Lands.—Landed ais ade i in Orkney is held in 
a variety of forms, which may, however, be generally re- 
duced to three: crown-lands, church- ade and udal-lands. 
The firft were anciently the private property of the earls, 
but came in the courfe of time to be feued out, or granted 
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