CHAPTER VI.
The Lines of the Geographer rarely right Lines.—These last, however, always worth looking at when they occur.—Striking Instance in the Line of the Great Caledonian Valley.—Indicative of the Direction in which the Volcanic Agencies have operated.—Sections of the Old Red Sandstone furnished by the granitic Eminences of the Line.—Illustration.—Lias of the Moray Frith.—Surmisings regarding its original Extent.—These lead to an exploratory Ramble.—Narrative.—Phenomena exhibited in the Course of half an Hour's Walk.—The little Bay.—Its Strata and their Organisms,
CHAPTER VII.
Further Discoveries of the Ichthyolite Beds.—Found in one Locality under a Bed of Peat.—Discovered in another beneath an ancient Burying-ground.—In a third underlying the Lias Formation.—In a fourth overtopped by a still older Sandstone Deposit.—Difficulties in ascertaining the true Place of a newly-discovered Formation.—Caution against drawing too hasty Inferences from the mere Circumstance of Neighborhood.—The Writer receives his first Assistance from without.—Geological Appendix of the Messrs. Anderson, of Inverness.—Further Assistance from the Researches of Agassiz.—Suggestion.—Dr. John Malcolmson.—His extensive Discoveries in Moray.—He submits to Agassiz a Drawing of the Pterichthys.—Place of the Ichthyolites in the Scale at length determined.—Two distinct Platforms of Being in the Formation to which they belong,
CHAPTER VIII.
Upper Formations of the Old Red Sandstone.—Room enough, for each and to spare.—Middle, or Cornstone Formation.—The Cephalaspis its most characteristic Organism.—Description.—The Den of Balruddery richer in the Fossils of this middle Formation than any other Locality yet discovered.—Various Contemporaries of the Cephalaspis.—Vegetable Impressions.—Gigantic Crustacean.—Seraphim.—Ichthyodorulites.—Sketch of the Geology of Forfarshire.—Its older Deposits of the Cornstone Formation.—The Quarries of Carmylie.—Their Vegetable and Animal Remains.—The Upper Formation.—Wide Extent of the Fauna and Flora of the earlier Formations.—Probable Cause,