of Edinburgh, Session 1883—84. 
753 
beds, then, I take to be of the same age, and to betoken the same 
conditions, as are shown by the old fluviatile accumulations of the 
Forth at the point where these merge into the estuarine-marine 
beds of the Carse-lands. 
It is remarkable that precisely the same phenomena are met with 
in the lower reaches of the Tay valley. In that district, however, 
the succession of changes evinced by the Carse-deposits and the 
correlative fluviatile accumulations of the Tay and Earn, is even 
more clearly read. In the Carse of Gowrie, for example, we detect 
underneath the clay of the Carse the remains of an ancient buried 
forest. The lower portions of the Carse-deposits are often abund- 
antly charged with drifted vegetation, and here and there marine 
shells occur. I got oyster-shells and drifted wood in the Carse-beds 
a few years ago, during some excavations that were being made 
within the grounds of the Perth Penitentiary. But no marine 
remains have been met with higher up the valley, for as the deposits 
are traced further in that direction they pass gradually into fluviatile 
gravel and sand. That the Carse of Gowrie, &c., is of the same age 
as that of Falkirk, may be inferred from the fact that its upper 
limits reach the same elevation, viz., 45 feet. I may add that 
underlying the buried forest of the Tay and Earn valleys fluviatile 
gravel, sand, &c., are seen in some places. These phenomena, 
which I have described at length elsewhere,* seem to me to indicate 
the following succession of changes : — Taking first the fluviatile beds 
under the buried forest, these point to a time when the Tay flowed 
at a lower level than at present — for the old fluviatile beds referred 
to occur underneath the present mean tide-mark at and below Perth. 
Hence we may further assume that the land stood relatively to the 
sea somewhat higher then than it does now. Next in succession 
comes the buried forest. This, as I have shown, represents an old 
land surface which extends out seaward, and consequently proves 
that the Scottish shores formerly stretched much further to the 
east. I need not recapitulate the evidence which has led me to 
believe that the buried forest of the Tay valley finds its counter- 
parts in the so-called submerged forests which are met with at 
many points along the shores of these islands and the opposite 
coasts of the Continent ; and that the evidence furnished by these 
* See Prehistoric Europe, p. 385. 
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