282 Proceedings of the Royal Physical Society. 
the ground now called Youngs Yard, a little east of the 
present harbour, nearly 100 yards south of where the sea 
now reaches, at that part of the coast. 
We have seen, then, that there is a part, at least, of these 
lands that have been formed by the recedence of the sea ; 
' and this being admitted, it is easy to show that the whole 
has been formed in the same manner. If the whole of the 
town lands of Musselburgh have been formed by the recedence 
of the sea, we should reasonably expect that the strata of 
the whole should be the same as that we know to have 
been thus formed ; and if it is so, that circumstance alone 
constitutes unquestionable evidence that the whole has been 
so formed. 
Now, we see that the whole of these lands are what may 
be called a dead level, — the highest knoll not rising 10 feet 
above tide-mark, and some of them even below that mark; for 
we have seen the tide at the Millhill, and even at the Cross 
of Musselburgh, and we see that the newly-formed land is 
exactly similar in these respects. When we examine the 
strata in the digging of foundations, wells, or such like, we 
find fine sand above, then fine gravel, and lastly, on the level 
of the mussel-bed, we find stones similar to those forming 
that bed, and we see that the strata of the newly-formed 
land are exactly the same. No other proof is required to 
convince us that the whole has been formed in the same 
manner. 
The time that these lands have been in forming cannot 
be precisely known. Mr Hay suggests it as probable that 
about 400 imperial acres had been formed in about 300 years. 
This he calculated chiefly from analogy, drawn from his own I 
observations for a number of years, together with the obser- ; 
vations of others who lived before him. i 
We have seen there have been 10 chains gained at the | 
mouth of the Esk in about seventy-five years. Should this | 
breadth gradually decrease to nothing at the extremities of i 
the town lands, we would have 100 acres gained in seventy- j 
five years, or 400 acres in 300 years. This, however, supposes 
that the formation had been uniformly progressive — an 
assumption we are perhaps not warranted in making; so that, 
