122 Dr Fleming’s Remarks on the Modern Strata, 
results of some very curious and valuable observations on the 
marine silt of the German Ocean, in the Wernerian Memoirs, 
vol. iii. p. 314. 
5. Diluvium. — -Violent movements in the waters of the globe, 
both of lakes and of the sea, appear to have taken place at dif- 
ferent intervals, and have introduced depositions among the mo- 
dern strata of the most interesting kind. These deposits, from 
violent inundation, divide themselves into two kinds. 
Lacustrine Diluvium. — This seems to have been produced 
by the sudden bursting of the barriers of alpine lakes, by which 
the waters flowing out in mass have carried before them all the 
detached fragments of rock, soil of every kind, detritus, and 
silt, and distributed them at the lowest level on the plain. Swit- 
zerland has frequently experienced the effects of such sudden 
inundations ; and the horizontal shelves of the glens of Locha- 
ber, in our own country, give unequivocal indications of similar 
occurrences. 
The diluvium, in some cases, consists of clay^ deposited in 
one unstratified mass, and the contained boulder-stones are as 
large at the top as at the bottom of the bed ; circumstances in- 
dicating the violent action of the transporting cause. This di- 
luvium is known in Scotland by the name of Till. The sand 
and gravel usually form small eminences, obviously influenced 
in their direction by the neighbouring hills or valleys, and oc- 
casionally containing deep cavities, the indications of the eddies 
in the torrent by which they were deposited. 
In some instances the diluvium consists chiefly of peat, as 
happened in the irruption of Solway moss, 16th December 
177^, an interesting account of which was published by Dr 
Walker in the Phil. Trans, vol. Ixii. p. 123. 
These materials seem to have been derived from the strata of 
the river district. Hence, even in a comparatively limited 
space, the materials of the diluvium may exhibit very different 
characters. In the neighbourhood of ray dwelling, where very 
extensive depositions of diluvium occur, the materials consist 
exclusively of the remains of primary, transition, and old red 
sandstone rocks. Ten miles to the south, they as unequivocally 
include the relics of the independent coal formation. 
In speculating on these changes which have taken place, We 
