The Scottish Xaturalist. ijj 



Many vast rocky, masses have been formed through the in- 

 strumentality of animals, and it is not more wonderful that 

 silicate of alumina — the general constituent of clays — should 

 be formed by these means, than that carbonate of lime should 

 have such origin ; but the Professor's fact does not disprove 

 the chemical origin of clays any more than the coral reef or 

 chalk ooze annuls the chemical origin of stalagmite and certain 

 limestone strata. Still the fact that immense beds of clay may 

 have been formed by means of organised beings is another of 

 the grand illustrations of the perfectness of the economy that 

 constitutes our world. 



Gold in Scotland.— On the occasion of a recent visit to the National 

 Museum of .Science and Art at Edinburgh, I found, in the Mineralogical 

 department, a large lump of Auriferous Quartz labelled "Gold : Gediegen 

 Gold Gemi. : Or natif Fr., from Leadhills, Scotland: 1 It has quite the 

 naked-eye characters of numerous samples of Auriferous Quartz I have seen 

 from California, Australia, New Zealand, Nova Scotia, or other auriferous 

 countries, 



F. W. Hutton, F.G.S., Provincial Geologist of Otago, and Director of 

 the Otago Museum at Dunedin, New Zealand, writes me of date May 28 

 J 875> "I suppose that by Quartziles you mean Quartz-veins? For Quartzite 

 is a Rock, an altered Sandstone, and never to my knowledge contains Gold. 

 . . . It is quite certain that Quartz Mining is improving in Otago." 

 I have used the term Quartzite in its most comprehensive sense, as includ- 

 ing all forms of massive quartz, whether as a Rock or in Veins. In 

 Scotland, Auriferous Quartz occurs chiefly, if not exclusively, in the 

 form of Veinstones in various Rocks. But there are, in other auriferous 

 countries, very few Rocks indeed in which Gold has not been frequently or 

 occasionally found. 



Reports of Gold-finds in Scotland, in other localities than those men- 

 tioned in my various published Papers on the Native Gold and Gold-rocks 

 of Scotland, every now and then reach me. The latest comes from Dr. 

 Grierson of Thornhill, Dumfriesshire, who writes of date August 18, 1 8 75 

 — " I beg to communicate to you that Gold has been found in Gattozuay. 

 I have just returned from a Natural History and Antiquarian tour in 

 Galloway and have brought with me Native Gold. " He does not explain 

 in what form it occurs, or under what circumstances or where he found it ; 

 but he promises details in a future communication, which he might very 

 fitly make direct to the Scottish Xaturalist in his own name. A subse- 

 quent Dumfries newspaper, reporting the proceedings of the August (1875) 

 meeting of the Society of Inquiry, Thornhill, states that "Dr. Grierson 

 gave a lengthened account of a Natural History and Antiquarian tour in 

 Galloway, from which he had just returned; in the course of which he 

 mentioned the finding of Native Gold in Galloway, and exhibited 

 specimens. The Gold will be specially inquired after by competent 

 parties. It may be remembered that about two years ago the first Gold 



