SKETCH-BOOK


OF


POPULAR GEOLOGY
 
 

BY HUGH MILLER
 
 
 
 

FOURTH EDITION
 
 
 
 
 

EDINBURGH:

WILLIAM P. NIMMO

1869

Hugh Miller

Hugh Miller, Scottish Geologist
From Alexander Winchell, Sketches of Creation (1870)

Editor's Note: This Book was published posthumously.
The Dedication and Preface are written by his wife, Lydia Miller.


TITLEPAGE

The Poet Delta (Dr. Moir) — His Definition of Poetry — His Death — His Burial-place at Inveresk — Vision, Geological and Historical, of the Surrounding Country — What it is that imparts to Nature its Poetry — The Tertiary Formation in Scotland — In Geologic History all Ages contemporary — Amber the Resin of the Pinus succinifer — A Vegetable Production of the Middle Tertiary Ages — Its Properties and Uses — The Masses of Insects enclosed in it — The Structural Geology of Scotland — Its Trap Rock — The Scenery usually associated with the Trap Rock — How formed — The Cretaceous Period in Scotland — Its Productions — The Chalk Deposits — Death of Species dependent on Laws different from those which determine the Death of Individuals — The Two great Infinites. . . . 81-120
 
 

LECTURE FOURTH.

The Continuity of Existences twice broken in Geological History — The three great Geological Divisions representative of three independent Orders of Existences — Origin of the Wealden in England — Its great Depth and high Antiquity — The question whether the Weald Formation belongs to the Cretaceous or the Oolitic System determined in favour of the latter by its Position in Scotland — Its Organisms, consisting of both Salt and Fresh Water Animals, indicative of its Fluviatile Origin, but in proximity to the Ocean — The Outliers of the Weald in Morayshire — Their Organisms — The Sabbath-Stone of the Northumberland Coal Pits — Origin of its Name — The Framework of Scotland — The Conditions under which it may have been formed — The Lias and the Oolite produced by the last great Upheaval of its Northern Mountains — The Line of Elevation of the Lowland Counties — Localities of the Oolitic Deposits of Scotland — Its Flora and Fauna — History of one of its Pine Trees — Its Animal Organisms — A Walk into the Wilds of the Oolite Hills of Sutherland. . . . 121-152