OF THE EARN AND TEITH. 175 



that of a raging ocean as gunpowder ignited within the confined tube of a 

 cannon is more terribly powerful than the same material when suffered to 

 explode on the open ground."* It is no wonder if, with such force at work, 

 there should be strange tales to tell of the results of denudation. Instances 

 of farms, where six, eight, or ten acres were eroded and swept away, are so 

 common as hardly to deserve notice. At Mains of Orton, on the Spey, when 

 the proprietor, Mr Wharton Duff, came, after the flood, to examine his farm, 

 he found he must make a new bargain with the tenant, and deduct some 50 

 or 60 acres which were gone. At Braemoray, the whole low land was 

 annihilated, and the green slopes of the hill converted into naked precipices. 

 At Relugas, the pleasure-ground and lawn were swallowed up, and in their 

 place that river might be seen raging for 300 yards along the brink of a red 

 alluvial precipice 50 feet high. At Dalrachney, the river Aven attacked a 

 wooded bank from which it carried off a mass of not less than 90,000 cubic 

 yards, leaving a sandy precipice 90 feet high. At Tillyglens, on the Dorbach 

 part of the farm, an acre in extent was carried off bodily before the eyes of the 

 farmer ; and, as he looked at it sailing away, he observed another half acre 

 detach itself from the hillside and descend some 60 feet into the valley, carrying 

 a grove of trees on its surface. 



But if the flood could thus tear down, in the same proportion it could build 

 up, often leaving its deposits where they were little welcome. On one of the 

 farms of Captain Macdonald of Coulnakyle, consisting of 200 acres, 150 were 

 ruined by a deposit of sand and gravel to the depth of 3 feet. At the mansion 

 house of Ballindalloch, the garden was covered by sand to such an extent that 

 only the tops of the apple trees were seen rising through it, presenting a strange 

 appearance still laden with fruit. Yet more remarkable was the height of the 

 deposits at the Mill of Logie, near Relugas. The flood completely filled with 

 sand the lower story of the mill rising 28-| feet above the ordinary level of the 

 river. These examples are instructive ; but, in order to appreciate the subject, 

 the whole volume should be studied, showing the marvellous power of such 

 torrents, both in denuding and in building up. If we suppose, that from what- 

 ever cause,t there had occurred in the old times a series of torrents, surpassing 

 the Moray floods as these latter surpassed the ordinary summer floods of 



* Page 101. 



t It has been suggested by Mr Buchan of the Scottish Meteorological Society, that if the bed of 

 the sea round our coast were elevated, and especially in the direction of Greenland the effect on 

 the climate would be greatly to increase the river floods. Now already, on stratigraphical grounds, we 

 have been led to the conclusion that it was precisely at that period of elevation that our high river 

 terraces were formed. (See note, page 169.) The coincidence is remarkable. The whole strati- 

 graphical evidence makes it probable that these high gravels were deposited just at the time when 

 meteorology teaches us to expect that the river floods would be much beyond the present ; and if even 

 in the present state of things there could be such results as the Moray floods have to show, we may be 

 prepared for the still more striking effects of that former age. 



