106 
from the Calf to North Barrule. Where they are found 
lying level they present a different appearance from that 
shown when they are found lying nearly vertical or con- 
torted. In the former case they are comparatively soft and 
plastic, but in the latter the argillaceous beds are often 
hardened into fibrous slates, whilst the arenaceous beds have 
been converted into an impure quartzite. This appearance 
is well shown in the quarries near the gasworks at the south 
side of Douglas Harbour, and is probably due to the great 
heat which would necessarily be developed by the moving 
and bending of the beds after they had been consolidated, 
without resorting to any other cause. In the neighbour- 
hood of the granites of Foxdale and Dhoon, however, the 
adjoining schists are converted into gneissic and micaceous 
rocks, and exhibit all the appearances of metamorphic action, 
and probably these granites, especially the latter, may also be 
proved on more careful examination to be due to that cause. 
No measurements have been made of the thickness of the 
schists, nor have any marked characters been observed so as 
to divide them with certainty, with the exception of a bed 
of dark blue slates which I have traced running from Oak- 
hill, in Braddan, past Port Soderic Railway Station to 
Mary Yeg, in Santon. Above these strata lie the schists of 
Walbury, Douglas Head, and Banke’s Howe, of great thick- 
ness, and certainly a much greater thickness lies below, 
between them and the granite at Foxdale. It is very 
desirable to obtain a base line, especially if it is marked by 
organic remains, to assist in measuring and classifying the 
beds. 
All the authors above quoted notice the absence of organic 
remains with the exception of undetermined fucoids and the 
Palceochorda major observed by Professors Harkness and 
Nicholson. For myself, after some years’ search, I have not 
been able even to find the above-named specimens in such 
