154 DE. H. HICKS ON THE 2IETAM0RPHIC AND 



with the Torridon series. Mountains of considerable height appear 

 to be completely made up of thick beds of sandstone interstratified 

 with more flaggy beds. Nos. 28 and 29 may be looked upon as 

 characteristic of those found in this area. On reaching the coast of 

 Loch Alsh, near Balmacarra Hotel, reddish sandstones like No. 30 

 are found. The promontory west of the line of fault already men- 

 tioned consists therefore mainly of Torridon Sandstone, with little or 

 no signs of important alteration, but with slaty and flaggy bands 

 showing indications of cleavage as the result of pressure. 



The rocks beyond the fault towards the upper end of Loch Alsh 

 are almost identical in character with those that have been described 

 as occurring about Strome Perry. East of this point, along the 

 shores of Loch Duich, gneisses of the Ben-Eyn type are found, and 

 associated with these are some bands of highly crystalline limestone. 

 These are separated, according to Murchison*, by " talcose, actino- 

 litic, and micaceous schists, often serpentinous like the limestones 

 themselves ; red felspar-porphyry and syenite also occur in bosses, 

 dykes, and veins." Though I was unable to visit the sections along 

 the shores of Loch Duich, I feel satisfied from the descriptions that 

 have been given of the rocks by Murchison and Geikie and by Prof. 

 Nicol, and from an examination which I have made of the specimens 

 deposited from these areas in the Geological Museum, Jermyn Street, 

 that they must be older than the Torridon Sandstone. 



They are much like specimens which I collected along the shores 

 of Loch Eil, from rocks underlying sandstones which must, I believe, 

 also belong either to the Torridon or Quartzite series. These Loch- 

 Duich and Loch -Eil types are probably the newest rocks of the Ben- 

 Eyn type found on both sides of the axis of the older rocks as shown 

 in the map (PI. VI.). The main object I had in view in my explora- 

 tion in these areas was to endeavour to trace the actual conditions at 

 those points where it had been supposed there was clear evidence 

 of a gradual passage from unaltered fossiliferous rocks to those but 

 partially changed, and afterwards from the latter to the highly crys- 

 talline schists found in the more central areas. I did not therefore 

 think it necessary to examine many sections south of the point last 

 described, as all who have written on those areas state clearly that 

 metamorphic series only occur there ; and the specimens I have 

 examined, which have been collected from those areas, prove this 

 very conclusively. The only other section therefore that I need refer 

 to in this paper is one I examined carefully to see the connexion 

 between the very highly crystalline series of the more central portions 

 of this district and the apparently less highly altered rocks directly 

 west of the Caledonian Canal and to the east of the axis. Several 

 sections across, from the west coast to the line of the canal, have been 

 carefully described by Murchison and Geikie, and in these sections 

 they invariably show that the more crystalline rocks are found in a 

 line from the neighbourhood of Loch Shiel (by Loch Quoich and 

 Glen Shiel) to Loch AfFrick ; and to the N.N.E. I have recognized the 

 same types also as far north as the neighbourhood of Loch Luichart. 

 * Quart. Journ. Geol. Soe. vol. xvii. p. 198. 



