But, on each side of this great alpine ridge, we find the hard country
skirted with one which is lower, flatter, or of a softer nature,
in which coal is found, upon the one side, in the shires of Fife,
Clackmannan, and Stirling; and, on the other, in that hollow which runs
from the Murray Frith south-west, in a straight line, directed upon the
end of Mull, and composed, for the most part, of water very little above
the level of the sea. Here, to be sure, the coal is scarce, or not so
evident; but there is coal upon the sea coast in several places of this
great Bay betwixt Buchan and Caithness; and the lowness of the country,
across this part of the island, is almost sufficient testimony that it
had been composed of softer materials.
Thus the coal country of Scotland may be considered as in one band
across the island, and included in the counties of Ayr, Lanark, and all
those which border upon the Frith of Forth. Now, in all this tract of
coal and tender strata, we do not find ridges of alpine stone or primary
mountains, but we find many hills of solid rock, little mountains, from
500 to 1000 feet high; such as that beautiful conical hill North Berwick
Law, Torpender Law, Arthur's Seat, the Lowmands, and others of inferior
note.
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