compofes Ben Nevis, which he feems to
defcribe as being four miles in length.
It is unneceflary to follow him through
the mazes of theory; fuffice it to remark,
that he fuppofes veins and faults to be
fiflures occafioned by heat, and afterwards
filled by depofitions from water. He examines
at fome length the fyftem of Buffon,
which he considers as impious and chimerical.
He afterwards inveftigates the
ftrudture of mountains, and points out a
valuable mill ftone rock near Loch Broom.
One of his moft lingular remarks p. 152, &c.
relates to the pudding rock, which he traces
in Sutherland, Rofs, and Invernefs, &c. in
th,e north of Scotland, and from .Monteath
to Stonehaven in the fouth ; and in p. 156,
that it is alfo found to the weft of Thurfa
in Caithnefs, and tfte vitrified forts, as he
fays only occur upor* this kind of rock,
the account of which he amplifies p. 158,
as ftretching along the S. E. fide of the
#*
Grampian Hills, by Kinfauns in Perthfhire,
' and into Dunbartonlhire, crofting the Clyde
to Ayrlhire, whei-9 it finally enters the
eaftuary of that river. Some alfo appears
in the neighbourhood of Dumfries, and it
feems palpably to have been wafhed down
from the higheft mountains.
In the confufion of his arrangement, he
next ■ defcribes talc and mica, and in his
account of quartz and felfpar, he blends
and confounds thofe different fubftances.
He mentions p. 175, a Angular amethyftine
fand on the river Aldgrant, in the call of
Rofshire,* but this is probably as imaginary
as his rocks at Lofiymouth and Rothes.
Of Ihill or fhorl he alfo gives an imperfect
account.
He afterwards particularly examines the
* He calls it the river Allgrade, and fays it runs into
Moray Firth, inliead of the Firth of Cromarty.
0 3 ftrata