Correspondence — Professor James Geilde. 283 



coiaiaiESiPOisrnDEiiTCiE. 



SCOTTISH INTER-GLACIAL BEDS. 



Sir, — Kindly allow me a few lines in reply to Mr. Clement Reid's 

 statements in the last number of this Magazine. Mr. Eeid doubts 

 the inter-Glacial age of certain deposits which have been described 

 as occurring between Lower and Upper Boulder-clays at Cowden 

 Glen, in Lanarkshire, and at Hailes Quarry and Eedhall Quarry, 

 near Edinburgh, brief reference to which is made at p. 99 of my 

 " Great Ice Age." third edition. I shall take the cases seriatim. 



1. Cowden Glen. — Mr. Reid has not visited this locality, and the 

 section has been obliterated for some years. He objects to the 

 fossiliferous beds being classed as inter-Glacial, for two reasons : 

 (1) because in some material sent to him for examination he detected 

 two seeds of the garden poppy, and (2) because the whole assemblage 

 of plants and the state of preservation of the animal remains suggest 

 to him an extremely recent date for the deposits. Now, had Mr. 

 Eeid perused a paper read by Mr. Bennie to the Geological Society 

 of Glasgow in 1889, he would probably have expressed himself 

 less decidedly. The material examined by Mr. Reid was washed 

 from the peaty silt by Mr. Bennie in 1868 and 1869, and had 

 lain aside for twenty years before it was submitted to Mr. Reid's 

 inspection. Among this material, some obtained from another 

 observer was included by Mr. Bennie. It is not unlikely, therefore, 

 as Mr. Bennie admits, that the two poppy seeds might have found 

 their way accidentally into the collection during the long time it lay 

 in his possession. It is even not impossible that they might have 

 been accidentally dropped into the packet by Mr. Reid himself. The 

 latter is quite sure they are poppy-seeds, but, under the circumstances, 

 it might have been as well had he got some botanist to confirm the 

 determination. So much then for Mr. Reid's first objection. Now 

 for his second. I am afraid that his inference from the fresh 

 appearance of the organic remains does not go for much. Mr. 

 Bennie, whose greater experience gives weight to his opinion, says 

 that the remains are no fresher than might have been expected. 

 Mr. Reid, having apparently made up his mind that Scottish 

 inter-Glacial beds should not contain a temperate flora, seems to 

 think that this preconceived notion of his should be accepted as 

 an argument against the inter-Glacial age of the Cowden Glen beds, 

 in which the relics of such a flora were certainly found. He must 

 excuse me if I decline to accept his dictum as to what the organic 

 contents of an inter-Glacial bed should be. Upon the whole, I think 

 I am justified in putting more trust in the evidence of my own eyes, 

 and in the corroborative testimony of my former colleagues on the 

 Geological Survey and others, than in his not very remarkable dis- 

 covei-y of two supposed poppy-seeds in a collection of washed 

 materials which had been lying past for twenty years before it came 

 into his hands. 



2. Hailes Quarry. — Here Mr. Reid has succeeded in finding a 



