748 
Proceedings of the Royal Society 
(c) Peat, about 9 or 10 inches. 
(d) Gravel and Sand, excavated to a depth of 8 or 9 feet. 
,c a 
Fig. 1. Section in Sand Pit, Olive Bank, Musselburgh, a, Soil, &c. ; h, sand ; 
c, peat ; d, sand and gravel. + Position of drifted trees. 
The Sand (a) is a moderately fine-grained siliceous sand, seen 
only in the north part of the sand-pit. It dies out rapidly to the 
south. The granules are often coated with hydrous ferric oxide, 
and the bed becomes quite ochreous towards the north. No fossils 
seem to occur. The bed is overlaid by a mass of “made ground,” 
consisting of sandy soil, in which fragments of very recent pottery and 
glass are seen. 
The thin bed of peat underlying this sand is in like manner 
restricted to the north end of the pit. It occupies a hollow, and 
dies out rapidly to north and south. Both it and the overlying 
sand abut against the subjacent gravel and sand in such a way as to 
show that the latter had been considerably denuded before the 
accumulation of the peat and upper sand-bed had commenced. 
There is nothing particularly noteworthy about this peat, save that 
it seems to be made up to a considerable extent of the remains of 
trees, such as birch, elm, Scots fir, (fcc. Here and there I detected 
the wing-cases of beetles, and possibly other organic remains may 
occur, for I made no special search. Both this peat and the 
overlying sand-bed are evidently of much more recent date than the 
gravel and sand below, and it is to these specially that attention is 
at present directed. 
The deposits in question have been excavated to a depth of 
8 or 9 feet, and how much thicker they may be I cannot say, but 
the boulder-clay will probably be met with at no great distance 
from the bottom of the sand-pit ; and possibly the sand and gravel 
do not attain a greater thickness than 20 or 30 feet. The beds 
