GEOLOGICAL NOTES ON KJLLARNEY, 



91 



aquilina), and Osmunda regalis"— to the charming little Hymeno- 

 phyllum, with which the rocks are covered, and by the rich green 

 pasture of the alluvial flat through which the murmuring rivulet 

 Hows. 



Here, in the heights, the eagle builds her nest, and hardy and 

 active must he be that would attack her stronghold ; here the red deer, 

 " an tiered monarch of the waste," strays at his pleasure, with nought 

 to alarm him but the voice of the distant herdsman when driving home 

 the cattle at eventide. 



A little east of Cappagh glen, and parallel to it, is a deep ravine or 

 cleft in the mountains. It is separated from the former by a trappean 

 hill, called Benauumore. This hill is principally a mass of greenish 

 felstone, traversed in several places by dykes, on the east side of 

 which, viewed as you proceed southwards up the ravine, the rock assumes 

 a prismatic structure, caused by joints which fashion it into columns, 

 some of which are upwards of 200 feet in height. Their shape is usually 

 that of a five- or six-sided prism, and they extend for nearly a mile, in 

 one or two places being cut across by dykes of white felstone. 



This peculiar structure, and the great height of the columns, par- 

 ticularly when seen towering above the little lake called Lough 

 !N"abroda, give a most impressive appearance to the spot. 



Eastwards from this, wherever the trap is associated with the sedi- 

 mentary rocks, it appears to be interstratified with them. 



The hill of Benaunmore gives the idea of its having been the focus 

 or volcanic centre whence the ancient molten matter was ejected, and 

 flowed over the bed of the primeval sea in all directions. The 

 aqueous deposits went on again over this mass, and eventually the whole 

 was lifted up from the ocean-bed, and left in its present position. 



Could there be a wider contrast than that between the present con- 

 dition of the peaceful Cappagh, abounding in animal and vegetable life, 

 and the time when it lay in the depths of a gloomy sea, whose waters, 

 rendered noxious by the quantity of iron which they contained, sufi'ered 

 not the existence of animal life,* and but little or no vegetation — when 

 the only thing that broke in upon the monotony of this watery wilder- 

 ness was the hissing stream of molten mineral matter, so intensely 

 heated that it flowed for miles before it cooled ! 



* No fossils of any kind have hitherto been discovered in the old red sandstone 



of this locality. 



