Obituary — John Storrie, A.L.S. 479 



FOSSILS AND GARNETS. 



SiE, — On p. 165 of the current volume of this Magazine we 

 read that to the writer of the article there printed " it is very 

 difficult to understand how such a fossil as a belemnite could have 

 retained its characteristic form while molecular changes of such 

 importance were taking place in the matrix of the rock .... 

 The results of contact-metaraorphism most nearly resemble the 

 crystalline schists. In them, so far as my [the writer's] experience 

 goes, garnet, and still more staurolite, are not formed until the 

 materials of the rock have undergone such great molecular changes 

 as to obliterate all traces of a sedimentary origin " . . . . 



On p. 140 of " Etudes Synthetiques de Geologie experimentale 

 par A. Daubree," dated 1879, we read statements which when 

 translated into English are to the following effect : — 



" It is well known that the crystallization that is brought about 

 by the proximity of eruptive rocks has not always effaced the traces 

 of the fossils. There still remain very distinct vestiges of them in 

 the middle of rocks crowded with crystalline silicates. One need 

 only recall the fossiliferous Silurian limestone of Norway, which 

 contains at Brevig paranthine and garnet, and at Gjellebeck 

 amphibole and epidote .... and lastly, in the Vosges the 

 amphibole rock of Rothau, in which the corals have been replaced, 

 without being deformed, by crystals of amphibole, garnet, and 

 axinite. In some places the rock now consists entirely of a mixture 

 of lamellar pyroxene, epidote, and compact garnet, with flecks of 

 galena. In the middle of this rock, composed entirely of silicates 

 of this nature, I have recognized perfectly preserved impressions 

 of numerous corals (more especially of Calamopora spongites, Goldf.) 

 and Flustras .... More than this, the very cavities left by 

 the partial disappearance of the calcareous matter of these corals 

 are lined with crystals of the same minerals as form the bulk of 

 the rock .... 



" Now it is the same thing in the case of the crystalline masses 

 we are considering .... MM. Lardy and Strider have found 

 in the neighbourhood of St. Gotthard belemnites in the middle of 

 micaceous schists with garnets." Vebbum Sa.p. 



OBITTJ.A.I^l^. 



JOHN STORRIE, A.L.S. 

 Born 1844. Died Mat 2, 1901. 



John Storrib, for many years Curator of the Cardiff Museum, 

 and an earnest worker at the natural history of Glamorganshire, 

 was born at Muiryett, in Lanarkshire. His early years were spent 

 at Glasgow, where he was apprenticed to the printing-trade, and 

 about the year 1872 he found employment in the Western Mail 

 printing works at Cardiff. The writings of David Page had given 

 to Storrie an interest in geology, and he pursued the subject with 

 zeal when he came to reside in South Wales. The Silurian rocks of 



