1855.] NICOL GRAMPIANS. 545 



The finer beds are of a dark brownish-red colour, and consist 

 essentially of grains of quartz imbedded in a copious basis of red- 

 coloured, earthy, and decomposed felspar. A few scales of mica 

 appear, but this mineral is by no means abundant. In these fine- 

 grained sandstones large boulders occasionally occur, and in some 

 beds form almost the entire rock, which is then a true conglomerate 

 of well-rounded boulders, from one or two inches to as many feet or 

 even more in diameter. I collected indiscriminately numerous spe- 

 cimens of these boulders, both at Stonehaven, and also at Caterline 

 Harbour, about four miles further south. Taken generally, the 

 same kinds of rocks occurred at both localities, though in varying 

 proportions. Thus at Stonehaven boulders of compact quartz or 

 hardened sandstone, in some specimens with distinct rounded grains, 

 were very abundant ; at Caterline these formed a smaller, though 

 still a large, portion of the specimens. Brown quartzose felspar- 

 porphyries were next in number at Stonehaven ; and at Caterline 

 even more numerous than the quartz-rocks. Trap-rocks, like many 

 still common in Scotland, ranked next at Stonehaven, but were 

 fewer at Caterline. At the latter several rocks occurred that might 

 be designated granite, but only one specimen was the regular com- 

 pound of quartz, felspar, and mica. In all the others mica was 

 wanting ; and at Stonehaven I procured no rock to which the name 

 of granite could properly be given. At neither did I find any spe- 

 cimen of gneiss or mica-slate, though these rocks form the principal 

 part of the mountains on the north, along the base of which these 

 conglomerates now extend for miles, and from detritus of which they 

 are said to have been formed. 



This very curious fact, of the coarse conglomerates consisting 

 chiefly of rocks difiPerent from those on which they rest, is often seen 

 in various parts of Scotland. Taken in connexion with the position 

 of the strata, and with the remarkable break in the succession of the 

 fossiliferous deposits below the Devonian, it leads to some interesting 

 speculations to which I may afterwards advert. 



Another remarkable peculiarity of these boulders was noticed in a 

 paper in the first volume of the Journal of the Society (p. 147) by 

 Sir W. C: Trevelyan. These rounded water-worn stones, often several 

 inches, or even above a foot, in diameter, have, subsequently to their 

 being imbedded in the conglomerate rock, been broken into numerous 

 fragments, and again cemented together. They often appear as if 

 crushed by some heavy body, which has pushed the splinters slightly 

 out of place. The sharp angular form of the pieces proves that these 

 boulders were not soft when they were thus acted on. They appear, 

 however, to have been afterwards reunited by heat. Other boulders, 

 which have their surface indented, as it were, by the pressure of a 

 harder neighbour, must have been in a softened condition when this 

 took place. 



In the plains of Kincardineshire, a few miles from the boundary- 

 line of the primary strata, the red sandstone is nearly horizontal, or, 

 as at Crawtown on the coast, even dips with a slight inclination to 

 the north. At Stonehaven, as shown in the section, the beds are 



