found in and near Glasgow. They are all, with one exception, formed of single oak trees-in some instances, by the action of fire, in others, by tools evidently blunt, probably of stone, and therefore referable to a period so remote as to have preceded the knowledge of the use of iron. The first known instance was in 1780. The canoe lay under the foundation of the Old St. Enoch's Church, at a depth of twenty-five feet from the surface—that is, about the level of low water in the river below Argyle Street—and within it was a stone hatchet of polished greenstone, in good preservation. The second, in 1781, while excavating the foundation of the Tontine, at the Cross; the surface being here twenty-two feet above high water. A third, in 1824, in Stockwell Street, in a deep cutting opposite the mouth of Jackson Street. The fourth was found in 1825, in a cutting for a sewer in London Street, on the site of the 'Old Trades' Land.' The canoe was vertical, the prow uppermost, and a number of shells were inside. The next discovery was made in 1846, when the improvements in the river began to be actively carried out. Eleven canoes were discovered in a short period. Of these, five were found on the lands of Springfield, opposite the lower portion of the harbour; five more on the property of Clydehaugh, west of Springfield; and one in the grounds of Bankton adjoining Clydehaugh. The ten were in groups together, nineteen feet below the surface, and above one hundred yards south from the old river-bank, which was then where the middle of the stream now is. The twelfth canoe was brought up by the dredging machine on the north side of the river, a few yards west from Point House where the Kelvin enters. The Erskine specimen was found in 1854." "At the time," says Sir Charles, "when the ancient vessels above described were navigating the waters where the city of Glasgow now stands, the whole of the lowlands which bordered the present estuary of the Clyde, formed the bed of a shallow sea. The emergence appears to have taken place gradually and by intermittent movements, for Mr. Buchanan describes several narrow terraces one above the other on the site of the city itself, with steep intervening slopes composed of the laminated estuary formation. Each terrace and steep slope probably mark pauses in the process of upheaval, during which low cliffs were formed, with beaches at their base. Five of the canoes were found within the precincts of the city at different heights, on or near such terraces. As to the date of the upheaval, the greater part of it cannot be assigned to the Stone Period, but must have taken place after tools of metal had come into

use.'

ONCE IN THREE YEARS CAME THE SHIPS OF TARSHISH BRINGING APES.-1 KINGS X. 22.

WILLIAM MACKENZIE. GLASGOW, EDINBURGH, LONDON & NEW-YORK

Now, it is well known that the late Professor Fleming and others have asserted that all the phenomena associated with the Clyde canoes, and the marine shells found at a distance from the sea, may be better accounted for by the action of storm or earthquake waves, than by that of gradual upheaval. While I am of opinion that Dr. Fleming did not look in the face many appearances which the theory of "raised beaches" can alone adequately account for, it yet seems to me that the alternative of storm-waves to explain the phenomena now referred to has never been set aside. This fact of course renders all speculations as to the great antiquity of these canoes of no great value. Boece (Historia Scotorum, lib. iii.) mentions that a storm-wave of this kind occurred in the reign of Alexander III., about 1266, which specially influenced the Rivers Tay and Forth, and destroyed many houses and even villages. Fordun, referring to this same marine inundation, says that it was accompanied with a violent north wind. Sir Charles Lyell himself has pointed out remarkable illustrations of the "earthquake-waves." "A great wave swept over the coast of Spain, and is said to have been sixty feet high at Cadiz. At Tangier, in Africa, it rose and fell eighteen times on the coast. At Funchal, in Madeira, it rose full fifteen feet perpendicular above high-water mark, although the tide, which ebbs and flows there seven feet, was then at half-ebb. Besides entering the city and committing great havoc, it overflowed other seaports in the island. At Kinsale, in Ireland, a body of water rushed into the harbour, whirled round several vessels, and poured into the market-place. Peru was visited, on the 28th of October, 1746, by a tremendous earthquake. In the first twenty-four hours, two hundred shocks were experienced. The ocean twice retired and returned impetuously upon the land: Lima was destroyed, and part of the coast near Callao was converted into a bay; four other harbours, among which were Cavalla and Guanape, shared the same fate. There were twenty-three ships and vessels, great and small, in the harbour of Callao, of which nineteen were sunk ; and the other four, among which was a frigate called St. Fermin, were carried by the force of the waves to a great distance up the country, and left on dry ground at a considerable height above the sea."

A great difference of opinion obtains on the question of the period at which the alleged upheaval took place. Sir Charles thinks "the greater part of it must have taken place after tools of metal had come into use." Mr. Maclaren says "There is satisfactory evidence to prove that the bed of the Firth of Forth, and the land on both sides of it, have been raised twenty feet or more, at an epoch which, though

very recent, geologically speaking, is probably long anterior to the records of history."-(Geol. of Fife and Loth., p. 228.) It is highly suggestive that many of the bivalved shells found in the brick clays of the Clyde valley have the umbonal ligature entire, though the shells themselves are much broken. Such features point to a violent and sudden force, and not to conditions illustrated on our present beaches. But even apart from these considerations, is it not at once evident that, if you acknowledge the action of upheaval and subsidence over large areas, you bring an element of extreme uncertainty into the whole matter, and find very many reasons for caution in drawing conclusions as to the time at which phenomena, met with in such areas, occurred. Yet here is a specimen of the reasoning which Sir Charles Lyell believes warranted when reviewing some of the appearances referred to, the application of which in other localities might very easily make the first inhabitants of Scotland an old people at the date of Adam's birth! "But the twenty-five feet rise is only the last stage of a long antecedent process of elevation, for examples of recent marine shells have been observed forty feet and upwards above the sea in Ayrshire. At one of these localities, Mr. Smith of Jordanhill informs me that a rude ornament made of cannel coal has been found on the coast in the parish of Dundonald, lying fifty feet above the sea-level, on the surface of the boulder-clay or till, and covered with gravel, containing marine shells. If we suppose the upward movement to have been uniform in central Scotland before and after the Roman era, and assume that as twentyfive feet indicate seventeen centuries, so fifty feet imply a lapse of twice that number, or 3400 years, we should then carry back the date of the ornament in question to fifteen centuries before our era, or to the days of Pharaoh, and the period usually assigned to the exodus of the Israelites from Egypt. But all such estimates must be considered, in the present state of science, as tentative and conjectural, since the rate of movement of the land may not have been uniform, and its direction not always upwards, and there may have been long stationary periods, one of which of more than usual duration seems indicated by the forty feet raised beach, which has been traced for vast distances along the western coast of Scotland."

Sir Charles has considerably modified the views stated in his "Principles of Geology" (1853, p. 740), with regard to the animal remains in "bone caves"-not, however, I think, in the right direction. An unbiassed perusal of pages 59-74 of his present work, will show how much uncertainty still attaches to the question regarding the mode in