Contaminated igneous rocks [1, pp. 177–83; 2, pp. 446–86; 3, pp. 128–46] are those resulting from the solidification of a magma which has been modified by reaction with xenoliths, usually of sedimentary origin. The Younger Gabbro masses of North-East Scotland provide what are probably the best examples of this phenomenon yet known, and their investigation will doubtless throw some light upon current petrogenetic theory.

To the geologist the soil is an inconvenient mantle hiding the more important material which he wishes to study. Even the drift geologist, who is more particularly interested in superficial deposits, generally dismisses the soil as lying above his zone of interest. Yet the processes which go on in the soil horizons have an importance apart from their significance in practical agriculture. The study of soils has, perhaps, suffered from its close relationship to practical affairs, for it has naturally been left to the agricultural chemist, who has been obliged to approach it with an applied bias. We have in our own country scarcely any research in which the material is treated from a purely scientific point of view and studied in the same way as rocks have been studied by geologists.

Remains of arthropods are among the rarest of fossils in the Coal Measures. Rare as they are, however, they have been recorded in some numbers from nearly all the principal coalfields, including those of the British Isles, the Continent of Europe, and North America. But of the larger British coalfields, that of Northumberland and Durham appeared till recently to be conspicuously poor in fossil arthropods.

In a recent paper on the age of the East Fife volcanoes, Mr. Balsillie has laid stress on the occurrence of xenocrysts of soda-microcline in various ashes and agglomerates in East Fife. These Fifeshire occurrences are well known, but it may be of interest to draw attention to the fact that xenocrysts of similar composition have been encountered in at least two other Scottish localities.