Blair Collection > Place names in Strathbogie, with notes historical, antiquarian and descriptive

Cab rack. 147
as to the proper application of the names of
these streams. From the testimony of the older
people I think they are properly named in the
Ordnance map — the Allt-Deveron to the east, and
the Rouster to the west, Gordon of Straloch
gives, in his map of 1640, the eastern branch as
the River Dovern. Macfarlane, in 1725, takes
the opposite view, and gives Rouster, or Royster
as he spells it, to the Allt-Deveron. We are not
left, however, either to conjecture or tradition on
the subject ; the names speak for themselves.
Rouster, I think, is derived from ruadh, ' red,' and
snith (E. pron. stru), *a stream,' meaning the ' red-
water,' as the next affluent is called the Black-
water, and for a similar reason — because red is
characteristic of one stream, as black is of the
other. How it is so will be seen by the follow-
ing notes on the geology of this part of the Cab-
rach, with which Mr. Hinxman, H.M.G.S., has
kindly supplied me. He says — ' The greater part
of the basin of the Upper Cabrach is occupied
by a small outlier of Old Red Sandstone. Like
the Rhynie area, it is bounded on the west side
by a fault, and, on the east, rests uncomformably
on metamorphic and igneous rocks. It extends
from a point a little to the N.E. of Bank of
Corinacy in a S.W. direction, to a point some-
where between Aldivalloch and Reekomlane,
while its most easterly extension may be seen
just above the bridge at Kirkton.