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Published online by Cambridge University Press: 14 March 2016
Towards the end of last winter session, a Memoir by me, on the “Parallel Roads of Lochaber,” was read to this Society, and it has since been published in our Transactions. The subject was far from being exhausted. Nevertheless, I had no intention of continuing the inquiry, venturing to think, that enough had been adduced by me to support the conclusions at which I had arrived. But during the course of last summer, Dr Tyndall of London visited Lochaber. He went for the special purpose of studying the “Roads,” and of enabling him to give a public lecture regarding them in the Royal Institution, Albemarle Street, on 9th June.
In the course of his lecture, Dr Tyndall alluded to my recent Memoir, and also to researches described in a previous Memoir. But he dissented from my solution of the problem, and told his hearers (I quote his words) that they might “with safety dismiss it (the detrital barrier theory) as incompetent to account for the phenomena. The theory which ascribes the Parallel Roads to lakes clammed by barriers of ice, has, in my opinion, an amount of probability on its side, which amounts to a practical demonstration of its truth.”
These views having been rested on observations made in the district by Dr Tyndall himself, I felt that it was only due to a person of his scientific reputation, to reconsider my own opinions, and to weigh well his reasons for coming to a different conclusion.
page 96 note * For many examples of ancient lakes, altogether or partially drained off in consequence of the wearing down of blockages of detritus, see a recent work on “The Jamnioo and Kashmir Territories,” by Frederic Drew, F.G S., 1875.
page 98 note * These intermediate shelves are described by Dr Chambers and myself in our respective previous Memoirs. See also my last Memoir, p. 600.
page 99 note * See reference to this Cony at pages 631 and 632 of former Memoir.
page 100 note * This ravine, now known under the name of “Corry Choilzie,” is situated a few hundred yards to the east of Corry N'Eoin. At Corry Choilzie Shelf No. 4 is quite distinct. Beyond Cony Choilzie and towards Corry N'Eoin, the shelf exists only in patches.
page 102 note * According to Admiralty tide tables, when it is high water at Inverness, it is low water at Fort-William, with a difference of 12 feet between high and low water.
page 103 note * It is a curious circumstance that the old Celtic names of several places in Glen Spean are in accordance with the conclusions of geological observation and reasoning. The Ordnance Map marks a spot at Inverlair as Ceann-a-Mhuir, which means the head of the sea, or lake. At Inverlair there is now neither lake nor sea. Was there a lake, reaching up to Inverlair, when this name was given ? The Map likewise marks a spot lower down Glen Spean Yalley as Ceann-na-Mara, which has exactly the same meaning as the above, though varying in form, in the same way as “Loch-end” and “End of the Loch.” Can this refer to the west end of the supposed loch, or can it refer to the sea, which, when the name was given, came up to a point not far from this? “Mur-laggan” situated on the north bank of the supposed lake, signifies “hollow by the sea or lake.” “Monessie,” or “Munessie” situated at the lower or west end of the supposed lake, signifies the plain by the waterfall. Was this the waterfall from the lake over the ridge or barrier of the lake ? The word Muir, which makes its genitive in Mara, is evidently the same word as the Latin Mare, the English Mere, the French Mer, &c.
page 103 note * See my last Mernoir, p. 641, and Jameson, , Geol. Soc. Proc. vol. xix. p. 241 Google Scholar.
page 117 note * This terrace has a historical interest. My guide informed me that, in the year 1745, advantage was taken of it to form a rampart for cannon bearing on Fort-William; and he showed to me what he called the embrasures.