306 Proceedings of Societies. 
The following Communications were read :— 
1. Notice of a Botanical Trip to Ben Lawers and Schihallion in Sep- 
tember 1860. By Wituiam Keppiz, Esq., Lecturer on Natural Sci- 
ence, Glasgow. 
Professor Balfour having taken up his autumn residence at Aberfeldy 
last year, the writer gladly accepted of an invitation from his old friend 
and teacher to join him in a quiet botanical ramble to Ben Lawers and 
Schihallion. At Aberfeldy they were joined by William Bell, who was 
commissioned from the Botanic Garden, Edinburgh, to collect ferns. We 
devoted the 4th and 5th of September to the exploration of Ben Lawers, 
and after strolling through the grounds and garden of Taymouth Castle 
on the 6th, visited Schihallion on the 7th. A notice of our excursions, 
however pleasing the recollection may be to our small party, will, it is 
feared, possess little interest to the Society, yet may not be altogether 
unprofitable, if it should induce any of the members who have not visited 
that delightful district, to follow the course we pursued. With the aid 
of the morning coach from Aberfeldy, we were at the foot of Ben Lawers 
at a seasonable hour, and having engaged our lodging at a comfortable 
inn, situated on Loch Tay, at a spot convenient for commencing the 
ascent, we at once buckled on our vasculums and began our journey. 
Ben Lawers is known to be one of our loftiest Scottish mountains, being 
4015 feet high, and consisting of mica-slate mingled with chlorite-slate, 
and exhibiting remarkably contorted forms where the surfaces are ex- 
posed in the upper precipices. The water-courses below show beds of 
limestone interstratified with the schist. The mountain is equally cele- 
brated for its alpine plants and the extensive and varied views obtained 
from its summit. Dr Macculloch gave the palm to Ben Lawers, after 
having ascended almost every principal mountain in Scotland; and, 
oddly enough, he mentions that on the hill he met “‘ two missionaries 
from the Edinburgh garden, with huge tin boxes slung over their shoul- 
ders, who seemed to be in a perfect ecstacy of happiness.” The lapse of 
some forty or fifty years since then had, on the present occasion, di- 
minished neither the bulk of the boxes, the gaiety of their bearers, nor 
the prospects with which they made their way directly over the shoulder 
of the hill to the corrie overlooking Loch-na-Chat, the field of their 
operations for the day. The following were among the plants collected 
this day :—Draba incana, Cerastiwm alpinum, Cherleria sedoides, 
Silene acaulis, Sagina sabulata, Rubus saxatilis, Rk. Chamemorus, 
Sibbaldia procumbens, Epilobiwm alpinum, E. alsinifolium, Cornus 
suecica, Hicracium alpinum, Saussurea alpina, Erigeron alpinus, Arcto- 
staphylos Uva-wrsi, Polystichum Lonchitis, and Polypodium alpestre. 
Various cliffs and crevices were examined for Cystopteris montana, not 
a vestige of which could be detected in its old haunts, but Woodsia hy- 
perborea was found in considerable quantity on the precipitous face of 
the corrie, which was ascended by Bell with the fearlessness of a crags- . 
man. The ascent to the summit was reserved for the succeeding day. 
The corrie occupies a secluded recess in the north-eastern declivity, 
where the view is closed in on the south by a ridge of the mountain, and 
only some glimpses of the distant heights of Strath Tay are revealed. | 
The snow of the previous winter still lay in thick wreaths among the 
crevices of the rocks. The lofty cliffs overhanging the corrie were cast 
into shade by the mists drifting down the ravines from the upper ridges, 
unvisited by the sunshine which, in the valley below, was diffusing 
cheerfulness and warmth over the green strath and the yellow corn fields. 
The weathered micaceous rocks, twisted into a thousand fantastic forms, 
