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During these outbursts of igneous activity or subsequently to the cooling 
down of the trap it is probable that the whole district became elevated to 
its present position by a gradual upheaval with intervals of rest ; these are 
indicated by the evidence of the upraised sea-margin resting on the north 
shoulder of Bluff Head where shells such as are now found living on the 
coast occur, and by the elevated sea-bed at Newtown Head on the opposite 
side of the estuary where a bed of cockle shells is seen in the cliff, among 
which I discovered the perfect human skeleton. The shells are also found 
in the adjacent fields where the action of the plough brings them to the 
surface and scatters them by thousands along the furrows. 
SECTIONAL. 
On the Development op the Carboniferous System in the 
Neighbourhood op Edinburgh. 
By E. W. Claypole, B.A., B.Sc. 
Bead before the Section on January 10th, 1871. 
In the Scottish counties of Linlithgow and Mid Lothian the carbon- 
iferous system is very fully developed especially in its lower formations, 
but in many respects it strikingly differs from the same system as familiar 
to those who have studied it only in the south-western part of England. 
Before calling attention to these differences it will be necessary to say a 
few words on the general geology and physical geography of the district. 
From a very distant date in the history of our earth, somewhere in the 
interval between the deposition of the lower and upper Old Eed Sandstone, 
the Pentland Hills have existed as a dividing ridge along a line from 
north-east to south-west. They consist fundamentally of Silurian and lower 
Devonian rocks, in an almost vertical position. On the upturned edges of 
these lie in striking unconformity the upper Devonian beds, and above 
these the carboniferous. Of the original Pentland range but a small 
fragment remains which with these later deposits and their interbedded 
felstones composes the present hills. A great gap is thus seen to exist in 
