VII. An Example of River Action and its Bearing on Plant Distribution

At the present day Geology seems to be more concerned with the Botany of a long past than with the plants that have not yet made their mark upon the world. The Rhynie fossils have thrown both Geologists and Botanists into ecstasies, whilst the hybrids—the Phyto-Geographer and the Agriculturist look on askance. Perhaps the reason for this contrast is due to Schimper and Axel Blytt, who held that soil has comparatively little to do with causing the characteristics of the vegetation of any region. In fact, it has been said elsewhere that it is heat that determines the flora of a country, climatic humidity the vegetation, and the soil as a rule only picks out and blends, and on its own account adds a few details. However that may be, I wish to-night to consider the Living Plant in relation to the Rolling Stone where both agencies are at work in altering the aspect of Nature. In the Upper Ward of Lanarkshire, between the villages of Lamington and Symington the River Clyde has laid down a broad tract of alluvium through which it slowly meanders. It is here a “consequent” stream, the well-known point where it was captured from the Tweed by the young “obsequent” Clyde, is about a mile further down—at Culter Railway Station. As far back as 1904-5, when fishing that stream, I had my attention drawn to the rapidity with which erosion was going on in one of its meanders. As the stretch was a promising one This 250-word extract was created in the absence of an abstract