SUPPOSED UPHEAVAL OF SCOTLAND. 47 
discovered at the western termination of the Roman wall on the Clyde, and as 
Professor GEIKIE founded also on some circumstances observed at that end of 
the wall in confirmation of his views, I have made inquiries applicable to that 
district also, and think it right to state the result of them in this paper. 
Western Termination of the Roman Wall. 
Chapel Hill, where the wall terminated on the west, ison the north bank 
of the Clyde, and projects from the Kilpatrick Hills. I cannot say what is the 
nature of the rock composing Chapel Hill—not having had an opportunity of 
visiting the place. Its point next the river, is about 150 yards distant from 
what is now the river margin; and the height of the hill, as ascertained by 
Ordnance surveyors, is about forty-two feet above high water. 
The base of the hill is stated by Professor GEIKtE to be about twenty-five 
feet above the present sea-level. (Lond. Geol. Soc. Journ. vol. xviii. p. 229.) 
He considers that, when the Roman wall was built, the sea washed the base of 
the hill, because in that case (as he argues) there would be (I now quote his 
words) “ a peculiar fitness in the site of its western termination.” “The 
Chapel Hill must, in that case, have been a promontory jutting out into the 
stream,” and “‘ commanded the passage of the Clyde.” . 
If this is the only ground on which it is supposed that the sea must then 
have reached to the base of Chapel Hill—and I can see no other stated— 
it appears to me to be avery slender basis for so weighty a conclusion. Chapel 
Hill, though it might not be peculiarly fit as a site for the termination of the 
wall, might have been thought sufficiently suitable; and the mere circum- 
stance that a narrow stripe of land existed between the hill and the Clyde, 
certainly did not make it unsuitable. This stripe was probably not then so wide 
as It now is, viz.,150 yards; and, at all events, with a garrison of soldiers on 
the hill, it would have been easy to have opposed the passage of an enemy 
between the hill and the river. 
I think, therefore, that the reason assigned for supposing that the sea must 
have washed the foot of the Chapel Hill, when the wall was built, is not sound, 
But in the course of my inquiries I have learnt one or two facts, which seem 
conclusive against the supposition. 
(1.) Thus it is stated, in the Statistical Account of the parish by the Rev. 
Mr Barciay, that “ the workmen employed in forming the canal in 1790, 
which passes the bottom of the Chapel Hill, found, in a subterranean recess, 
vases and Roman coins.” 
I do not know whether it is to this “jind” that Professor GEIKIE alludes 
when he says in his paper, that, “in making the canal, a number of Roman 
antiquities were found at various depths in the alluvium. These seem to have 
VOL. XXVII. PART I. N 
