Dr. Mac Culloch on the Geology of various parts of Scotland. 389 



elucidation, the references to the places where they were found will 

 enable future visitors to verify or correct them. In this view the 

 remarks which I have hazarded are even more necessary than in that 

 of perfecting a catalogue of hand specimens, since of many important 

 geological facts, it is impossible to preserve a sufficient record in a 

 me^e collection of rocks. A great portion of the country which is 

 the subject of this miscellaneous notice, has been already surveyed 

 by various geologists, and particularly by Professor Jameson in his 

 tour to the Western Isles. Those who are accustomed to geological 

 investigations will be as little surprised to find me occasionally differ- 

 ing from those observers as I shall be to find future observers differing 

 from me. The science is as yet far removed from the class of accu- 

 rate ones, and must still owe a great deal to that free enquiry which 

 alone can lay the foundation of a precise and stable induction. It Is 

 peculiarly necessary in its present state that the labours of many 

 should co-operate, as the wide diffusion and difficult accessibility of 

 its leading facts put It out of the pov/er of any single observer to add 

 much from his own stock. 



To the more extended geological remarks which seem to be called 

 for by the peculiar circumstance of some of the rocks included in the 

 catalogue, I have added a few words on specimens whicli scarcely 

 involved any novelty either of a mineralogical or geological nature. 

 Yet it will not be useless to describe their situation, since our Society 

 among other objects offers Itself as a deposit of miscellaneous infor- 

 mation on those subjects, and of such detached facts as must other- 

 wise perish in the portfolios or memories of those whose fortune it 

 has been to notice them. It is not one of its least advantages that it 

 forms a school of practical knowledge for those whose opportunities 

 are circumscribed by the scarcity of scientific Institutions or schools 

 of this nature, and with this view, even the humble offering of a 

 new habitat is deserving of record. 



