472 BUTE. MINERALS. 



hopeless : so strong are their wishes and so great their 

 jealousies on this point. 



The bed lies between the two strata above described, 

 with a common dip to the westward and an inclination of 

 ten or fifteen degrees ; but that cannot now be accurately 

 ascertained, the workings being full of water. It varies 

 from two to three feet in thickness, and is of a dry quality, 

 containing at the same time much pyrites. A sort of 

 ferruginous indurated clay, resembling a decomposed pyri- 

 tical shale, is interposed between it and the soft trap rock. 

 It is said to have been formerly wrought in other places 

 along this shore ; but there are not now any traces of other 

 workings to be seen. Attempts have also been made to 

 cut it in other parts of the hill ; but they have been aban- 

 doned almost at the outset. It is sufficiently obvious that 

 they should not have been made ; as such a bed of coal, 

 so situated, could hold out no prospects of remuneration. 



It also appears that coal has been found on the west side 

 of the island near Scalspie, and that it was situated in the 

 sandstone. This is sufficiently probable, as the same 

 mineral occurs in that situation in Arran ; but there is 

 no longer any access to examine the spot, as the pit was 

 filled up after an unsuccessful pursuit. 



As the small island of Inchmarnoch, which lies on the 

 west side of Bute, presents no circumstances which can 

 entitle it to a separate consideration, it will be sufficient 

 here to say, that it resembles in every respect that schistose 

 district of the latter with which it corresponds in the linear 

 direction of the strata ; being also, like that, noted for its 

 slate quarries. 



Of the minerals which occur in Bute, chlorite is by far 

 the most abundant and conspicuous. It is frequently 

 found in the usual scaly form, filling the minuter rifts of 

 the clay slate ; nor is it necessarily confined to those 

 varieties which pass into chlorite schist, being equally 

 common in the dark blue rock and in the whitish speci- 



