SYMONDS — NOTES OF A GEOLOGIST IN IRELAND. 333 
Killarney ; for to the rich glow of verdure and exquisite combination of 
colour, which makes Killarney so justly famous, Cara unites the wildest 
hill-scenery in Ireland. In geology, the district represents the fans of 
Brecon, but the mountains are higher, more rugged, and retain on their 
weathered sides and surfaces deep furrows and scratches, and 
innumerable boulder- rocks, the sure sign of ice and glacier action in 
days long since past. 
Walking among these hills is most fatiguing, owing to the boulders 
which cover the sides ; and it is quite necessary to warn the traveller 
against beiug overtaken by night, when it becomes absolutely dangerous. 
We ascended one of the highest mountains of the " Black Valley," and 
all the way from Lough Cara we observed that the dark, heather- 
covered moors were studded with innumerable blocks of grey rocks, 
which had been rent from the mountain side, and were dropped by ice- 
rafts floating out to sea by way of the Lough Cara Valley. The head of 
the Pass into the Black Valley must have been the actual bed of a large 
glacier which filled up the valley, and has left long lines of debris, 
marking the old moraines. 
Seated on the crest of a deep ravine, facing the Xing of the Eeeks 
(Carran Tual), we looked over the wildest scene we ever beheld in the 
British Isles. Around us, on the hill summit, all was desert-like and 
lonely ; not a sound was heard save the bleating of a distant goat ; and 
at our feet lay a dark, deep valley, covered with grey boulder-stones, 
whence a shroud of mist was rising, and which might well have 
furnished a painter with a subject for the Valley of Death. And the 
sun shone upon hill rising above hill, withhold rocks intermingled with 
the purple blossom of various heaths and the bright yellow of the 
gorse ; while in the distance gleamed a lake, and here and there were 
scattered a half-ruined chapel or smoking hovel. Crossing the platform 
on the summit to the eastern edge, we looked down upon the outlet of 
the Black Valley and the Lakes of beautiful Killarney, the headlands 
of the Eeeks and the mountains of Dromore stretching away on either 
side, while a short walk in the opposite direction gives a magnificent 
view of Bantry Bay, with the Islands of Scara and Dursey, dim and 
distant. The march homewards also required many a halt among scenes 
of solemn and imposing character. 
Descending the hill-side we observed specimens of the Saxifraga 
umbrosa, though not in flower; also in marshy ground the leaves of 
