Geological Notes. 63 



are some establishments where analyses have been manu- 

 factured wholesale without any apparent regard for accuracy 

 save in the mechanical operation of writing the report. But 

 great as has been the extent to which these conditions have 

 obtained, they have at last received a check, not perhaps so 

 much from any great strides chemical science may have re- 

 cently made, as, I believe, from the higher education of tlie 

 rising generation of farmers. 



II. Mr Egbert Etheridge, Jun., F.G.S., Paleontologist to 

 the Geological Survey of Scotland, exhibited specimens of 

 bitumen from the Bathgate limestone at Galabraes Quarry, 

 near Bathgate, consisting of — (1.) Fragments of white lime- 

 stone, containing small cavities filled with bitumen; (2.) Speci- 

 mens of the carboniferous coral (Lithostrotion hasaltiforyne, 

 Con. and Phil.), showing the various cavities of the coral filled 

 with a bituminous substance. The specimens were collected 

 by Mr James Bennie. 



III. Mr Peach exhibited bitumen enclosed in shattered 

 masses of rock, from a quarry of old red sandstone, near 

 Thurso East, Caithness, IST.B. He remarked that the fissure 

 in the specimen was six inches in length, two and a haK in 

 depth, and one inch across, and completely filled with bitumen, 

 which had cemented the shattered pieces together, and looked 

 like dirty pitch. It burns freely, and gives out black smoke, 

 with heavy, unpleasant fish-like smell. He also stated that 

 although bitumen was far from rare in Caithness rocks, he 

 had never before seen it in such abundance as at Thurso East. 



IV. Dr Egbert Brown, Secretary, concluded the business of 

 the session with some remarks on the scientific aims of the ncAv 

 Arctic Expedition, which is expected to sail from Portsmouth 

 towards the end of May. Its main scientific aims were not 

 merely to discover that point of the globe known as the 

 North Pole — a spot in no way differing from the world of 

 waters or the dreary wastes around, and only remarkable in 

 so far that it is here that the sun's altitude is equal to its de- 

 clination. What the expedition wiU endeavour to accomplish 



