CARBONIFEROUS VOLCANIC ROCKS OF THE FIRTH OF FORTH BASIN. 451 
between the Burdie House Limestone and the lower calcareous bands of the 
Carboniferous Limestone series. The interstratification of these volcanic 
materials with the estuarine beds, coal-seams, and marine limestone, can be 
admirably studied along the coast between Burntisland and Kinghorn. I 
hardly know any other section where the characters of true lava-streams are 
more strikingly displayed than in the two miles of shore between Pettycur and 
Seafield Tower. The hills around Burntisland likewise furnish similarly 
instructive examples of volcanic necks filled with agglomerate and basalt ; also 
of intrusive sheets, and the effects of dislocation. 
It will be observed that in the Saline and Burntisland tracts, voleanic action 
was conteniporaneous with that in West Lothian, and ceased nearly about the 
' same time, probably rather earlier. The thickest pile of volcanic rock in this 
district is that which lies between Burntisland and Kirkcaldy. It consists, 
like the bank south of Linlithgow, almost wholly of successive sheets of basaltic 
lavas, and must have a total thickness of upwards of 1500 feet. Yet, in spite of 
this considerable mass of igneous matter, its emission was confined within a 
limited area. The Burntisland lavas stretch southward, the island of Inchkeith 
being probably a part of the same group; but they did not reach the 
_ Edinburgh district, which as we have seen was wholly free from volcanic 
disturbance, except during the early period of the Arthur Seat eruptions.* 
6. East of Fife District—In some respects this is one of the most important 
volcanic areas in the basin of the Firth of Forth; for it contains an extra- 
ordinary number of volcanic vents, many of which have been admirably laid 
bare along the coast. It extends from the neighbourhood of Leven north-east- 
wards to St Andrews—a distance of 15 miles, with an average breadth of about 6 
miles. In this tract, somewhere about fifty distinct orifices of eruption filled 
with tuff and agglomerate may be observed, besides many masses of dolerite 
and basalt, some of which may likewise mark the position of active vents. 
Many of the details to be given in a succeeding part of this paper regarding 
volcanic necks have been derived from a study of those in this interesting 
district. 
Next to the number of the vents, the feature which most attracts notice in 
the east of Fife is the almost total absence of any interbedded volcanic rocks. 
The necks are hardly ever connected with any surrounding interstratified beds 
of tuff, such as are so abundant in the other districts. They rise indifferently 
through many various portions of the Carboniferous formations. In the eastern 
parishes they pierce some of the lower portions of the Calciferous Sandstone 
series ; in the west they rise through the Coal-measures, 
¥ A small outlier of tuff among the sandstones on the shore to the east of Cramond may be an 
exception to the statement in the text ; but this mass might belong to some isolated cone between the 
West Lothian and Fife districts, 
