OF LOCHABER. 55 



am also inclined to think, that the evidence which they have 

 left behind them, will reflect some strong rays of probability 

 upon the theory I have adopted as to the formation of this 

 very singular glen ; and that the Shelves of Lochaber, and the 

 Glen-mor-na-Albin, will be found upon examination, mutual- 

 ly to elucidate the history of each other. 



Let us suppose, then, that the lochs were brought to the 

 state which is represented in Plate VIII. fig. 3., and that the 

 Glen-mor-na-Albin having as yet no existence, the whole 

 country to the north and west of what was then their upper 

 extremities, was a solid and undivided mass. An examina- 

 tion of the map of Scotland would at once show, that in such 

 a situation of things, the discharge of the combined waters, 

 generated in all of them, towards the Eastern Sea, by the chan- 

 nel of the River Spey, would have been then much more na- 

 tural, than it even is now to the Western Sea by their present 

 courses, under the circumstances that exist. Nor can it be 

 doubted that the opening of this vast fissure, would produce 

 all the effects necessary to explain the seeming difficulties, and 

 to reconcile the various incongruities that otherwise encoun- 

 ter us, and perplex our speculations on this interesting subject. 

 The terrible convulsions attending the creation of such a 

 yawning crack, running through ground previously unbroken, 

 although it might not cut exactly across in the very line be- 

 tween the lakes and their south-western boundaries, so as to 

 allow the whole body of the water to escape from each of 

 them in one moment, would certainly so rive and shatter the 

 country, that the weight of the water itself would almost in- 

 stantly complete the annihilation of any thing that remained 

 to prevent its escape. From the appearances which still ex- 

 ist indeed, this would seem to have been the very manner in 

 which it must have operated with respect to the Spean lake, 



since 



