The Scottish Naturalist. 317 



visible to the eye, is, and has been, frequently found both here 

 and at Leadhills, and a small nugget intimately mixed is in the 

 possession of Mr Noble, I^eadhills. ... It is beyond doubt 

 that auriferous quartz has been found in Wanlockhead by myself 

 and others." ^ 



On the other hand, Mr Dudgeon of Cargen, who is a resident 

 proprietor in the county of Dumfries, and has written specially 

 " On the Occurrence of Gold in the South of Scotland," tells us 

 that " it is only very rarely that gold has been found in this dis- 

 trict in the matrix — i.e., in vei7i-qiia7'tz ; and then it has only been 

 obtained in detached pieces, and never in situ. The auriferous vein 

 of quartz mentioned in Atkinson's ' Discouverie and Historic' 

 has never been refound, though doubtless auriferous veins must 

 exist somewhere in the locality."^ 



As I have already shown, the Director of the Geological 

 Survey of Scotland, who is also Professor of Geology and Min- 

 eralogy in the University of Edinburgh, up to 1874 either ignored 

 or denied the existence of auriferous quartz at Wanlockhead or 

 Leadhills.^ But his opinion, must recently have undergone a 

 complete revolution, in so far as we find him stating at the 

 Royal Society of Edinburgh in March (1878), in reference to 

 the Gemmell specimen of gold-quartz in the Museum of Science 

 and Art there, that it represents or belongs to the rocks of the 

 district in which it was found. " Professor Geikie had no diffi- 

 culty whatever in saying that the quartz in question was native 

 to Wanlockhead, despite the coincidence that it was discovered 

 immediately after the famous flitting of the Laidlaws;"^ and again, 

 " Professor Geikie expressed agreement with those who believed 

 that the specimen was Wanlockhead quartz."^ 



Lastly, Calvert says (p. 169), ''I found ... a small speci- 

 men in quartz in Wanlockhead mine " — meaning the lead mine, 

 no doubt. 



1 'North British Daily Mail ' of March 13 and 19, 1878. 



2 Paper in the ' Mineralogical Magazine,' vol. i., 1876, p. 27. 



3 Vide footnote to p. 212 ; as well as p. 53 of paper on "The Aurifer- 

 ous Quartzites of Scotland," 'Scottish Naturalist,' vol. iii., 1876. In a 

 letter, of date December 1874, he informed me that "the Geological Survey 

 has not yet met with any of the auriferous quartzites of Scotland." 



" 'Daily Review' of March 5, 1878. 

 ^ ' Scotsman ' of same date. 



