58 The American Geologist. July, 1898 
REVIEW OF RECENT GEOLOGICAL 
LITERATURE. 
On the Alleged Proofs of Submergence in Scotland during the 
Glacial Epoch. I. Chapelhall, near Airdrie. By Dugald Bell, F. 
G. S. Trans., Geol. Soc. of Glasgow, vol. ix. pp. 321-344, with map, and 
view of the village of Chapelhall. Since the researches and observa- 
tions of Belt, Gooclchild, Clement Reid, Carvill Lewis* and others have 
shown that the shell-bearing morainic deposits and associated kames 
at hights from 1,100 to 1,350 feet above the sea, on Moel Tryfaen in 
northern Wales, at various localities in northwestern England, and on 
Three Rock mountain, near Dublin, are doubtless referable to glacial 
transportation from the bed of the Irish sea, and therefore cannot be 
longer accepted as proofs of a great marine submergence of these parts 
of the British Isles, attention is naturally directed, as in this paper, to 
the lower occurrences of marine shells in the British drift deposits, 
among which the highest, aside from the instances before mentioned, 
is at Chapelhall in Lanarkshire, Scotland. In this village, a well dug 
about fifty years ago by Mr. James Russell, passed through 11 feet of 
till, then through 2 feet of clay enclosing numerous shells of Tellina 
proxima, under which a deposit of lower till has a thickness of about 
24 feet and rests on the Carboniferous strata of the district. The well 
is at a hight of 521 (or 520) feet above the sea, and is on the rounded 
top of a long drumlin-like ridge of till, such as abound in that district, 
trending nearly from northwest to southeast. No other well of the vil- 
lage nor of any land at similar hight in all the surrounding region re- 
veals any marine shells; nor are any shore lines, deltas or other 
evidences of sea action found above the late glacial marine beds of the 
lower part of the basin of the Clyde, a few miles distant on the west 
and extending up to 100 or 125 feet above the sea, in which this arctic 
species of Tellina is very abundant. 
The site of Mr. Russell's well was first visited and its fossils brought 
to the knowledge of geologists by Mr. James Smith in 1850, since which 
date it has been often quoted as evidence of a marine submergence of 
that part of Scotland to the extent of 510 feet or more, during an inter- 
glacial epoch. About a dozen years later it was visited by Archibald 
( ieikie, who wrote of it: "From a number of additional wells, sunk on 
purpose, Mr. Russell ascertained that the clay lay in a hollow of the 
undermost till, and that this hollow measured about 19 feet long by 
about 5 feet broad. Pits which were dug beyond the boundary of this 
little trough showed a great depth of the usual till, but without a trace 
of brick clay. The shells consisted, entirely, I believe, of Tellinaprox- 
i inn. Usually the specimens were broken, but a good many were taken 
out entire, with both valves together.'" The very interesting discussion 
which is here given by Mr. Bell concerning the geologic and topographic 
conditions of this locality and its relationship to the glaciation of Scot- 
*American Geologist, vol. ii, i>p- 375, 376, Dec, 1838. 
