The Ancient Volcanoes of Great Britain, Volume 1 (of 2)Geikie, Archibald
History
The Ancient Volcanoes of Great Britain, Volume 1 (of 2)
Geikie, Archibald
Volcanoes -- Great Britain
When we examine these rocky hummocks in detail we find them to consist
of coarse gneisses, the foliation of which has a prevalent dip to
N.N.W. Some portions abound in dark hornblende and garnets, others are
rich in brown mica, the folia being coarsely crystalline and rudely
banded, as in the more massive gneisses of Sutherland. Abundant veins
of coarse pegmatite may here and there be seen, with pinkish and white
felspars and milky quartz. Occasionally the gneiss is traversed by
bands of a dark greenish-grey rock, which remind one of the dykes
of the north-west of Scotland. There are other rocks, some of them
probably intrusive and of later date, to be seen in the same area; but
they require more detailed study than they have yet received.
The relation of this core of gneiss and its associated rocks to the
second group of pre-Cambrian rocks has not hitherto been satisfactorily
ascertained. The core may conceivably be an eruptive boss in that
group, and may have acquired its foliation during the movements that
produced the foliation of the surrounding schists. But it seems more
probable that the gneiss is much older than these schists, though
it would undoubtedly participate in the effects of the mechanical
movements which gave rise to their deformation, cleavage and foliation.
The second group of rocks occupies a large area in the west and in the
centre and south of Anglesey. The schists of which it consists are
obviously in the main a clastic series. One of their most conspicuous
members is quartzite, which, besides occurring sporadically all over
the island, forms the prominent mass of Holyhead Mountain. There
are likewise flaggy chloritic schists, green and purple phyllites
or slates, and bands of grit, while parts of the so-called "grey
gneiss" consist of pebbly sandstones that have acquired a crystalline
structure. That some order of sequence among these various strata may
yet be worked out is not impossible, but the task will be one of no
ordinary difficulty, for the plications and fractures are numerous,
and much of the surface of the ground is obscured by the spread of
Palæozoic formations and superficial deposits.
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