116 REPORTS ON THE STATE OF SCIENCE.—1914. 
The Upper Old Red Sandstone of Dura Den.—Report of the 
Committee, consisting of Dr. J. Horne (Chairman), Dr. 
T. J. JEHv (Secretary), Mr. H. Botron, Mr. A. W. R. Don, 
Dr. J. S. Furrt, Dr. B. N. PeEacH, and Dr. A. SmitH Woop- 
WARD, appointed to conduct the further exploration thereof ; 
with a separate report by Dr. SmitH Woopwarp on the 
Fish Remains. 
Srvce the preliminary report was presented at the Birmingham 
Meeting the excavations for fossil fishes at Dura Den have been com- 
pleted and the ground has been levelled. The Committee desire 
again to acknowledge the courtesy of Mr. Bayne-Meldrum, of 
Balmungo, the proprietor, who gave great facilities for carrying out 
the operations. They wish also to express their obligations to Mr. R. 
Dunlop, from Dunfermline, who superintended the work on the spot 
and who took a series of excellent photographs of the best specimens 
of fossil fishes. 
At the outset brief reference may be made to the geological struc- 
ture of the ground near Dura Den. Strata of Upper Old Red Sand- 
stone age underlie the long depression of the Howe of Fife, which 
ranges westwards from St. Andrews Bay, between the slopes of the 
Ochil Hills on the north and the heights of the Carboniferous 
rocks with their intrusive masses on the south. The actual junction 
with the Lower Old Red Sandstone volcanic series of the Ochils 
is hidden everywhere by drift, but the line of contact is evidently an 
unconformable one. For the sheets of andesite dip south-east 
at angles of about 15°, and are overlapped at different horizons by 
the more gently inclined members of the Upper Old Red Sandstone. 
In Central Fife there is a conformable passage from the Upper Old 
Red Sandstone into the Lower Carboniferous strata. But in Eastern 
Fife the top of the Upper Old Red Sandstone is cut off by a fault 
which crosses Dura Den in a north-easterly direction and brings down 
the Carboniferous strata on the south-east side. 
The ravine of Dura Den has been cut by the Ceres Burn since the 
Ice Age. This rivulet is formed by the union of a number of smaller 
streams which rise in the Carboniferous area of Fife. ‘The Den has 
been excavated across the line of fracture and is about a mile and a 
half in length (see Fig. 1). 
Below the mouth of the Den the Ceres Burn enters the alluvial 
plain of the Eden and joins that river about a mile above the village 
of Dairsie. Dura Den is eroded in the Lower Carboniferous and Upper 
Old Red Sandstone formations. For a distance of several hundred 
yards the Upper Old Red Sandstone strata are laid bare in the channel 
of the stream and in a range of picturesque cliffs on either side. The 
section runs along the strike of nearly horizontal beds, so that only a 
comparatively small thickness of rocks is exposed. These belong 
to the upper part of the formation, but the actual top, as already 
