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AYR, river, bay, and headlands in Ayrshire. The river rises on the eastern border of the widest part of the county ; traverses, first, bleak moors and hill pastures, next, an ornate plain, next, a low narrow dell ; is subject to such freshets as make it, in Burns' phrase, ' just one long lengthened tumbling sea ; ' and runs altogether about 33 miles westward to Ayr bay at Ayr town. The bay is a lateral expansion of the Firth of Clyde ; has a land-line in nearly the form of a segment of a circle, with prevailingly low shores ; and measures 20 miles south-south-east-ward from Fairlie Head to Ayr Heads, and nearly 7 miles in mean breadth. The headland, or Ayr Heads, are rocky, precipitous projections from the skirt of Brown Carrick Hill, and have a height of about 200 feet.
