ON THE PLANT REMAINS IN THE SCOTTISH PEAT MOSSES. 7038 
Horizontal exposures were then made of the successive beds, and the same general 
features were found to be present. The Empetrum bed can be traced for some distance 
without cutting into the peat, as the channels in the peat-hags are worn down to about 
a foot below its level. (Fig. 2.) Three sections were made between Elderholm and 
the watershed—a distance of about a mile—and the same succession of plant-beds were 
exposed in all cases. 
Sections were then made on the western margin of the peat at the foot of Craignaw 
—one of the out-lying hills of the Merrick range. The ground rises here to a little 
over 1000 feet, and the peat is better drained than in the centre of the valley. The 
same sequence of beds was found, but the character of the Empetrum bed alters con- 
siderably. Empetrum is only occasionally present, and its place is taken by abundant 
Salix herbacea and S. reticulata. The Eriophorum and Sphagnum beds are also 
thinner above and below the Empetrum bed, and the growth of the peat has been slower 
on this sloping, well-drained ground than at the bottom of the valley. 
Sections and borings were made north of the divide, towards Loch Doon on each 
side of Gala Lane, and the same plant beds were seen to extend here also. A section 
near Yellow Tomach, three miles north of the previously described section, exposed the 
following beds :— 
|. Scirpus and Sphagnum peat, . 8-43 feet. 
. Layer of Pinus sylvestris, L. 
. Sphagnum peat, with traces of shrubby birch in the lower layers, 1 foot. 
. Layer of Empetrum mgrum, L.,  . 5 : 3 inches. 
Oo e c Wb 
. Birch remains, with scanty Catan and Santon patches of 
Sphagnum. 
6. Below the last layer, but not sharply marked from it, stems 
and leaves of Salix repens, L. 
Racomitrium ellipiticum, B. & 8. Epilobiwm palustre, L. 
Comparing this section with the one previously described, it will be seen that layers 
1—4 agree, and that the difference lies in the absence of the underlying Eriophorum 
and Sphagnum layers in the northern section. In the case of the peat near Yellow 
Tomach, the growth of the birch appears to have been nearly continuous up to the 
occurrence of the Empetrum bed, although much Sphagnum is mixed with it in places. 
This variation at different spots does not, I think, impair the comparison between the 
different sections, as we should expect some variation in the contemporaneous vegetation 
at different places in the valley ; and the Empetrum bed always stands out as a kind 
of landmark— Empetrum dominant in some places, and Salix herbacea, L., and 
S. reticulata, L., dominant in others. 
The occurrence of a compact layer of Empetrum, mixed with such northern forms as 
Salia herbacea and S. reticulata, undoubtedly marks a period in the growth of this 
peat when the conditions must have been very different to those under which the under- 
lying peat and the overlying Eriophorum, Pine, and Scirpus-Sphagnum zones were 
