232 REPORT OF THE MEETINGS FOR 1900 



Tuedian Beds (better known as the Lower Limestone 

 Shale or Ballagan Beds) were formed. These probably 

 overspread nearly the whole of what is now Berwickshire, 

 and indeed they were deposited over a large area which 

 extended over most of Great Britain and Ireland 



Then followed a long period during which the land 

 continued slowly to subside, while at the same time the delta 

 of a great river draining a continental area lying to the 

 north-west of Britian was slowly built up of pile upon pile 

 of sand, silt, mud, and vegetable matter over the present 

 area. Broken and disturbed remnants of these ancient delta 

 deposits are now seen turned bottom-upwards in places 

 along the shore at Boss Point, and elsewhere in the 

 neighbourhood. At a somewhat later period the land began 

 intermittently to subside to greater depths, the depth of 

 water increasing in a south-easterly direction. It was under 

 these deeper-water conditions that the limestones were 

 formed. The earliest rock of the deeper-water tjpe now 

 occurring along the Berwickshire coast is the Ijamberton or 

 Dun Limestone. In the intervals between the deeper-water 

 episodes sandstone, shale, and coal seams were deposited on 

 the sea floor. 



At a period still later the Upper Carboniferous Rocks 

 were laid down here, still in connection with a delta at 

 the mouth of the large river alrearly mentioned as 

 flowing towards deeper water from the north-west. There 

 is reason to believe that the total amount of subsidence 

 here during Carboniferous times amounted to some ten or 

 twelve thousand feet. It will be evident from a considera- 

 tion of these facts that the strata seen at Ross were at 

 one time nearer the centre of the earth by two miles or 

 more than they are now. Most of Berwickshire was covered 

 with the same vast pile of sediments, which for a long 

 time remained in horizontal layers. 



At last came an end to the downward movement to 

 which deposition was due. Then ensued a renewal of the 

 geographical changes which had affected these parts prior 

 to Carboniferous times. The old sediments were steadily 

 folded — though to nothing like the same extent as on the 

 former occasion — mountain masses were gradually squeezed 



