XC PROCEEDINGS OF THE GEOLOGICAL SOCIETY. 



di Ronca. The lowest beds consist of unfossiliferous clays, over 

 which are fossiliferous marls and marly limestone, with seams of 

 coal ; these are succeeded by yellow and white sands, above which 

 again are sandy and calcareous beds, abounding with Nummulites, 

 which form the upper member of the deposit. Echinoderms also 

 abound in the nummulitic limestone of Piemberg. These beds rest 

 on the north side of the trough, on argillaceous mica-slate, and on 

 the south side on the cretaceous formations. These latter, however, 

 are more extensively developed in the north-eastern portion of Carin- 

 thia, and the occurrence of Hippurites (Rudistce) leaves no doubt of 

 their belonging to the chalk ; here they consist of marls, sandstones, 

 and limestones, the latter being the most predominant. In these the 

 author also found several species of corals and undetermined bivalves. 

 The author concludes by describing the other localities in which these 

 cretaceous beds occur in Carinthia. 



Norway. — In the last number of the Edinburgh New Philo- 

 sophical Journal, Mr. David Forbes has published an interesting 

 paper on the Silurian and Metamorphic Rocks of Norway, the result 

 of investigations partly undertaken at the request of Sir R. Murchison. 

 This communication must be considered only as an introduction to 

 the subject, as from the natural difficulties of the country considerable 

 time will be required to enable him to produce any detailed account 

 of the rocks, especially as regards their fossil contents. Mr. Forbes 

 describes the peculiar appearance of the foliation of the metamorphic 

 rocks on the western side of Langesund Fjord as in striking con- 

 trast with the Silurian beds constituting the promontory of Lange- 

 sund, which have a general dip of 12° to the eastward. The 

 appearance was so striking, that it at once annihilated all idea of its 

 having resulted from any alteration of the original lines of stratifica- 

 tion. The occurrence of miles of such vertically foliated rocks, 

 dijffering even as they do in mineral composition, seemed to Mr. 

 Forbes incompatible with the idea of supposing them to represent 

 originally horizontal strata tilted into a vertical position. He is dis- 

 posed to think, that, having been originally deposited as a moderately 

 thick and nearly horizontal bed of sandstone, conformable to the 

 Silurian strata now seen overlying them at one extremity of the 

 section, the foliated arrangement is due to their having been affected 

 by the intrusion of granite veins and other agencies, thus producing 

 a series of cracks and joints, possessing comparative regularity when 

 viewed on a large scale. After describing the principal geological 

 features and the organic remains of the district he visited, Mr. Forbes, 

 in concluding his remarks, again returns to the question of the vertical 

 foliation, and, repudiating the idea of stratification having produced 

 it, refers to an opinion formerly pronounced by himself, that the 

 particles of matter in rocks may rearrange themselves at a compara- 

 tively low temperature, and he believes that this theory will give the 

 best explanation of the phsenomenon, and that there will thus be no 

 difficulty in accounting for the vertical structure of these rocks. 

 Setting aside, then, the direction of the lines of foliation as due to 

 other causes, and keeping in view the character of the rock masses 



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