BRITISH ASSOCIATION MEETING. 



497 



Towns, the labours of the Committee for obtaining the Uniformity of "Weights and 

 Measures, with remarks on the services of science to the State, conclude this 

 luminous review of physical science in its ever memorable progress during the past 

 two centuries. 



British Association. — The papers read by the Rev. W. Norwood, Dr. Bevan, and 

 the Rev. F. F. Stathamhave been forwarded to us for publication in this Magazine, 

 and will appear in our pages. Sir R. I. Murchison has also very kindly caused an 

 abstract of his paper to be forwarded to us ; and we have to acknowledge similar 

 courtesies from the Rev. E. TroUope, Mr. Page, Mr. S. Baines, and Mr. J. Yates; 

 and more are promised from other gentlemen who attended the meeting. 



Geology of Scotland — Meeting or tee British Association, 1858, (Con- 

 tinued). — Sir Roderick I. MrRCHisox, the Director-General of the Geological 

 Survey, laid before the Geological Section " The results of his researches among 

 the Older Rocks of the Scottish Highlands." He commenced his observations by 

 indicating the various steps which had been made in developing the geological 

 structure of Scotland, from the days of Hutton and Playfair through those of 

 Jameson and M'Culloch. to the state in which the subject was advanced a few 

 years ago by the proofs of the existence of considerable numbers of organic remains 

 of Silurian age in the southern Scottish counties, which, from the wild and hilly 

 outline of most of them, have been termed the " Southern Highlands." This was 

 the first great step made in the reform of Scottish classification ; and for proofs 

 of this, he referred chiefly to a memoir by Professor J. Nicol, in the " Journal of 

 the Geological Society," and to his own memoir "On Ayrshire and the adjoining 

 Counties." He then went on with a sketch of the knowledge progressively acquired 

 respecting the structure of the North Highlands, pointing out that, besides what 

 might be termed a lithological and mineral description of the oldest rocks, little 

 or nothing had been effected in determining their true relative order of super- 

 position — still less the identification of their different members by the evidence 

 of fossil organic remains. For example, red conglomerates of different tracts, now 

 known to be of various ages, had formerly been merged with the " Old Red Sand- 

 stone." 



Passing over the presence of masses of Oolitic or Jurassic age (Brora, &c.), which 

 he had formerly described in a memoir published in the "Transactions of the 

 Geological Society," he showed to what extent Professor Sedgwick and himself 

 had, thirty-one years ago, ascertained an ascending order from gneiss, covered 

 by quartz-rocks with limestone, into overlying quartzose, micaceous, and other 

 crystalline rocks, some of which have a gneissose character. They had also 

 observed what they supposed to be an associated formation of red grit and sand- 

 stone ; but the exact relations of this last to the crystalline rocks was not ascer- 

 tained, owing to bad weather. In the meantime they, as well as all subse- 

 quent geologists, had erred in believing that the great and lofty masses of purple 

 and red conglomerate of the western coast were of the same age as those on the 

 east, and therefore " Old Red Sandstone." In addition to the valuable researches 

 of Mr. Cunningham, the observations which the author made in the summer of 

 1855, when accompanied by Professor James Nicol, were communicated to the 

 Geological Section at their last meeting at Glasgow ; and to the abstract of that 

 memoir, as published in the volume of the " Transactions," he referred, to indicate 

 the then state of knowledge, and to prove the existence of a lower gneiss, clearly 

 superposed by a younger series of crystalline rocks, as seen in sections from 

 N.W. to S.E. across Sutherland, Caithness, Ross, Inverness, &c. The great 

 feature, independent of the order of superposition, which has given to some of 

 these lower rocks their most distinctive character, is the discovery by Mr. C. 

 Peach, in the crystalline limestone subordinate to the quartz-rocks, of certain 

 organic remains, which even at the Glasgow meeting he had affirmed (on the 

 authority of Mr. Salter) to be of Lower Silurian age. He was indeed convinced, 

 from the physical position of the masses alone, and their inferiority to the great 

 and diversified series of Old Red or Devonian age of the east coast, that such was 

 the epoch of their accumulation. Now, although he had also observed, in com- 

 pany with Mr. Nicol, the clear interposition of a great mass of coarse red con- 



