On the shell-bearing clay in Kintyre

Abstract

In the spring of 1899, when I visited Scotland, Mr J. Horne, F.R.S.E., F.G.S., and Mr B. N. Peach, F.R.S., F.G.S.—to whom I am much indebted for assistance during my journey—advised me to go to Kintyre, where some of the best sections in Pleistocene shell-bearing deposits occur. Amongst the exposures of these deposits on the west side of Kintyre, north of Machrihanish Bay, the two southern localities, in Tangy Glen and Drummore Glen, are of less interest, partly because the sections are very indifferent. Only the northern locality, in Cleongart Glen, close to Bellochantuy, shows a good section with an abundance of shells. The shell-bearing deposits were investigated by a committee1 appointed by the British Association in 1895-6 with the view of ascertaining whether these layers are marine and in situ , showing a submergence in Pleistocene (interglacial ?) time, or if they have been carried to their present place by ice. I shall briefly recapitulate the results of the Committee's examination. In the main section on the south bank of the burn, the Committee found in the bottom of the glen, crystalline schists, which, a short distance westward, are covered with Upper Old Red Sandstone. Above the mica-schists “ a bed of compact coarse sand and gravel,” probably 10 feet thick, was found by digging, but owing to the percolation of the water, the cutting was not continued downward to the solid rock. Resting upon the gravel lies the shelly clay with a thickness of 27½ feet; this again is