﻿140 Correspondence — 3Ir. J. R. Bakyns — Mr. J. Durham. 



now give the reasons for our oiDinion, all details being reserved 

 for a pajDer in preparation. W. Gunn. 



Geological Society of England and "Wales. 

 Eaknaud Castle, February 18th, 1877. 



BASE OP THE CARBONIFEROUS ROCKS IN TEESDALE. 



SiE, — I have just opened Phillips' Geology of Yorkshire, Part 2, 

 by chance at page 81 : and the first words that caught my eye were 

 " Widdybank " and " anomalous breccia." 



This is the breccia which, on my visit to Teesdale, last October 

 and November, I suggested to my companions, Messrs. Gunn and 

 Clough, was the base of the Carboniferous rocks, for the reasons 

 quoted by me in the Geol. Mag. for February. From the use of the 

 term "anomalous," it is clear that Phillips had noticed th,e peculiar 

 character of the bed. It is somewhat sti-ange that none of the 

 geologists, as far as I know, who have written about the rocks in 

 Teesdale, should have been struck with the possibility of the breccia 

 being the base of the Carboniferous. They seem to have been too 

 much taken up with the Whin Sill to think about tliat. Perhaps 

 they did not see the Silurian-like dykes and pencil-beds below 

 Cronkley ; but if they did, they must have equally missed their 

 suggestive character. 



It is some satisfaction to us youngsters that the older geologists 

 have left us something to discover. J. K. Dakyns. 



Kendal, February 20ih, 1877. 



"KAMES" AND DENUDATION. 



Sir, — Mr. Mackintosh is quite right. I have not seen either the 

 English or Welsh ' Eskers ' he mentions, so that perhaps, as another 

 critic of my paper has said, I am " not entitled to generalize." But 

 at the same time I cannot help expressing my astonishment at being 

 told that there are vast numbers of Karnes, or similar gravelly 

 mounds, whose shapes have nothing to do with denudation. Since 

 many of these mounds were first exposed to atmospheric influences, 

 not only have rivers cut their channels to great depths through the 

 most compact rocks, but the hard metamorphic mountains of the 

 Highlands have been so wasted that their flanks are usually draped 

 with debris, which, spreading over the floors of the valleys, bury 

 them deep under masses of angular rock fragments, which are 

 frequently shaped into very good imitations of Kames by the action 

 of streams running along the valleys, aided by torrents from the 

 mountain-sides. I do not suppose that any one would maintain that 

 the shapes of these mountains have nothing to do with denuding 

 agencies. How is it then that the loose gravels of the Kames 

 " sometimes on the summits of hills," as Mr. Mackintosh says, have 

 withstood influences before which the solid hills literally " flow from 

 form to form " ? 



That the Newport Kames do not enjoy such immunity from the 

 action of the rain-fall, has been demonstrated during the recent 

 excessively wet weather. All the mounds not protected by grass 

 Lave water-courses cut in their sides, some of them of considerable 



