116 



to the Diamond, the hardest known body. I have not seen any 

 of the Cumberland specimens ; but they are said to occur in the 

 form of hexagonal crystals. It would be interesting to know 

 whether this mineral occurs with us in the Hypersthenite of 

 Carrick, or whether it was found, where so many other minerals 

 were, associated with the quartz-vein traversing the Skidda Granite 

 at Brandy Gill. 



Next after Corundum, but second in point of economic import- 

 ance to none in the list, follows our well-known ore of Iron, 

 HAEMATITE, Red Iron Ore, Iron Sesquioxide, or Ferric Oxide. 



The mineral is so well known that not much need be added 

 here to what has been before written about it. It occurs in the 

 form of pockets, veins, and flots, chiefly in the Carbpniferous 

 Limestone Series skirting the Lake District; though here and 

 there veins of the same mineral are found traversing the older 

 " rocks. In the same Carboniferous Limestone rocks that form the 

 Cross Fell escarpment and the great upland tract of mining country 

 that extends away to the east and the north-east from the line of 

 the Pennine Faults, Haematite is nearly or quite unknown : the 

 iron ores occurring there being chiefly the Iron Carbonate, and 

 the hydrated oxide known as Limonite. 



The origin of our deposits of haematite is a subject I have felt a 

 keen interest in ever since the time when I picked up a piece of 

 West Cumberland ore containing perfect impressions of Carbon- 

 iferous corals and encrinites while geologically surveying the 

 railway sections near Tebay in 1867. Since that time my official 

 connection with the Geological Survey has enabled me to collect a 

 large store of facts and observations bearing upon this important 

 subject. These, it is to be hoped, will appear eventually in the 

 regular Survey publications, and they cannot, therefore, be more 

 than referred to here. 



So far as my own observations have gone, they long since led 

 me to a similar conclusion to that so ably advocated by our Associ- 

 ation Secretary, Mr. Kendall, in his paper on the Hcematite Deposits 



