NEAR CASTLE-STUART. 



253 



is peculiarly well adapted to admit of the mode of 

 transportation it underwent, as it has a projecting 

 ledge running all around it, (marked A A. in the 

 accompanying pen-and-ink sketch) *, the lower edge 

 of which is above a foot in perpendicular height 

 from the surface of the sand ; and from this edge 

 downwards, the stone is suddenly bevelled off, in a 

 form something resembling that part of the bottom 

 of a boat which is under the belly, and approaching 

 the keel. The upper surface of the stone is gradu- 

 ally rounded into a ridge, rising into a peak towards 

 the one extremity. The annexed sketch, taken 

 from the south-side, will give a tolerable idea of this 

 mass, which, on a rough calculation, (formed by weigh- 

 ing about a square inch of the stone), may weigh 

 about eight tons. 



This large mass is remarkable, for having been 

 removed from a situation which it formerly oc- 

 cupied, about 260 yards farther to the E. S. E. 

 by natural means, and in the course of one 

 night, to the position where it now stands. It had 

 formerly served as a boundary stone (or as it is 

 called in Scotland, a march-stone) between the pro- 

 perties of Castle-Stuart and Culloden ; the former 

 belonging to the Earl of Moray, and the latter to 

 Duncan Forbes, Esq. As it is too ponderous to 

 have been moved by human power, at least in that 

 part of the country, it must have been originally de- 

 posited in that, its first place of rest, by causes si- 



* Plate XIIL, etched by Miss Baird, Ramsay Lodge, 



