544 
PROFESSOR JAMESON'S NOTES ON 
prevailing colour is grey, red being of comparatively rare 
occurrence. In some cliffs we observed numerous pseudo- 
fragments of granite in granite, of syenite in syenite, of 
hornblende in syenite, of felspar in granite and syenite ; 
and also contemporaneous veins of granite, of felspar and 
quartz, and of felspar alone. 
From New Abbey to Kirkbean, the usual transition- 
slates are met witli ; but on approaching Carse, a watering- 
place on the shore, not far from Kirkbean, rocks of the 
coal-formation, more or less covered with alluvial matters, 
make their appearance. To describe all the geognostical 
phenomena in this quarter, would be inconsistent with the 
nature of these memoranda ; but a fev^r sentences will be 
sufficient to convey a very general view of the nature of 
the strata. Immediately under the soil, in many places, 
there is a bed of peat about a foot thick ; below this a bed 
of clay, a foot and upwards in thickness ; next a bed of 
gravel : in some places belov/ the gravel there is a bed of 
clay, and the undermost layer of the alluvial series is a 
bed of gravel and rolled masses. The gravel and rolled 
masses are fragments of rocks of the district, and therefore 
are of slate, syenite, granite, sandstone, &c. The alluvial 
clays are sometimes impregnated with iron-pyrites, and the 
percolating waters issuing from them have chalybeate pro- 
perties. None of the newer secondary formations occur in 
this part of the island ; even those of a middle age are want- 
ing, for the formation directly belov/ that we have just de- 
scribed, is one of the oldest of the secondary class, — it is 
the principal coal formation. The strata of this formation, 
as it occurs here, are sandstone, mountain or first second- 
ary limestone, aboii.jding in petrified corals, particularly 
madrepores of great beauty, slate-clay, ])ituminous shale, 
and clay iron-stone. The positions of the strria are various^ 
mid afford p< ilnc study for those iiiterc:?ted in such gep- 
