﻿I860.] 



NICOL N.W. HIGHLANDS. 



107 



down the side of the hill, along the line of junction, has fully ex- 

 posed the connexion of the two rocks, but in no place could I find 

 the talc-slate resting on the quartzite. Had the beds been continued 

 in the dip, so as to pass below the slate, this could scarcely have 

 failed to be visible. 



In my former paper there is a section of the Loch Keeshom lime- 

 stone*. I have since examined the district more carefully than I 

 was then able to do. I have now ascertained that the limestone 

 rests on the quartzite, which in one place dips at 15°, to S. 40° E. 

 The limestone is, as usual, more broken and irregular, but near the 

 bridge to Applecross it dips at 64°, to E. 8° N. The talc-slates on the 

 east have a dip of 20°, to E. 30° 1ST.; and, on the whole, lower angles 

 than those given in my former paper seem to prevail in these beds. 

 Granulite and hornblende-rocks, however, abound near the fine of 

 junction ; and I was still unsuccessful in finding any point where the 

 talc- or mica-slates overlap the limestone or quartzite. I have now 

 no doubt, from the facts seen at the junction in other places, that the 

 limestone and talc-slate are divided by a line of fault. The occur- 

 rence of the limestone in this position, though quite analogous to 

 what is seen in Assynt, is very important. It lies in a low valley 

 at the foot of the red sandstone hills of Applecross, more than 2000 

 feet high, and, as its regular position is above the quartzite, it must 

 have been thrown down from fully 3000 feet. It must at one 

 time also have been far more widely distributed ; fragments of it, 

 some only a few feet or yards in diameter, being found in many 

 places, let in (as it were) along the line of junction of the quartzite 

 and crystalline schists. There is thus evidence of a most enormous 

 amount both of disturbance and denudation in this region ; and also 

 proof that, where the quartzite meets the talc-slates or gneiss, with- 

 out the intervention of the limestone, whatever may be their appa- 

 rent relations, there cannot possibly be a true conformable upward 

 succession. 



South of STcye. — The section of the southern part of Skye given in 

 my former paper (fig. 7, p. 31) offers similar proof that the red sand- 

 stone does not dip under, but rests unconformably on, the eastern 

 gneiss, and this gneiss dipping S.E., and identical in mineral cha- 

 racter with that of the mainland. The red sandstone dips W.N.W., 

 and is clearly continuous with that of Applecross and the North-west. 

 The section is so clear and decisive that I can do nothing more than 

 refer to the description in my former paper f. 



General Considerations. 

 The sections now noticed, at short intervals along the whole line 

 of junction from north to south, seem quite decisive of the true re- 

 lations of the quartzite and eastern gneiss. They have not been 

 selected as more favourable to my own views than others that might 



* Quart. Journ. G-eol. Soc. vol. xiii. p. 29. fig. 6. 



t Quart. Journ. Geol. Soc. vol. xiii. p. 31. In the sketch-map. in vol. xv. pi. 12, 

 this underlying gneiss is coloured and lettered the same as the so-called over- 

 lying gneiss in Sutherland. 



