76 Reports and Proceedings. 
island is formed of soft clayey amygdaloidal trap. This is overlain 
by Oolitic rocks, which contain the rare fossil Pinztes Eiggiensis ; 
and above all comes a mass of porphyry, rising to a height of 1,300 
feet above the sea. The soft amygdaloidal trap is worn into deep 
caves, in one of which the whole population of the island were 
suffocated by the Macleods of Skye, as told by Sir Walter Scott in 
the ‘Lord of the Isles.’ To the west of this district we find more 
aquecus rocks. A broad band of sandstone, apparently Triassic, 
rises up, overtopped in some places by Liassic shales. Along the 
shore the sandstone is most disintegrated, and forms a clear white 
sand. This is called by the inhabitants the ‘Singing Sands,’ from 
the fact that when they are struck by the foot they emit very sin- 
gular, almost musical, notes. The noise seems sometimes to be 
like the sound of an X®olian harp, but reminded us more of the 
squeaking of a flock of young turkeys. There are but two other 
known places in the world where similar ‘singing sands’ are to be 
met with: one is in Arabia Petrza, and the other on the borders of 
Thibet and Tartary.* Further west lie Liassic rocks. In some 
boulders lying over them, Hugh Miller found, some years ago, a 
number of Saurian teeth; but lately entire perfect specimens have 
been obtained from the shale, some of which are to be seen in the 
Museum of the Glasgow University.— Saunders’ News-Letter. 
EpInBuRGH GEOLOGICAL SocieTy.—I. December 22nd; Mr. 
Maurice Lothian, Vice-President, in the chair. 
In a paper On the Upheaval of the Shores of the Firth of Forth 
during the Human Period, with a notice of the recent discovery of 
funt weapons at Marionville (between Edinburgh and Portobello), 
Mr. Tuomas Smytu first described the remains of the several old 
coast-lines or terraces which occur on both sides of the Firth of 
Forth, at 9, 26, and 63 feet above the present sea-level. In the 
second part of his paper, he referred to the proofs of upheaval during 
the Human Period, and cited, in support of the supposition that an 
elevation had taken place in this period and is still going on, various 
facts already mentioned by Sir C. Lyell and others, as well as some 
new observations made by himself, and a series of very careful 
measurements regarding the rise which has taken place within 
the last 100 years. He exhibited a plan of Portobello, made in 
1770, which shows that the sea at high-water then reached a point, 
on an average, 60 feet further inland than at present. He also 
described a large boulder, from which people were in the habit of 
bathing 40 years since, but which is now far above high-water 
mark. He then mentioned the discovery at Marionville of flint 
weapons which he exhibited and described. 
The Chairman remembered living some sixty years since in Por- 
tobello in a house the back of which was close to the shore; but now 
there has been such a gain of land, that a large house and garden 
stand between it and the present sea-beach. 
* Hugh Miller’s ‘ Cruise of the Betsy.’ 
