Section Iv.--the Non-Fossiliferous Stratified (or Metamorphic) Rocks.

1. Gneiss is the most abundant rock in this class, and is generally found reposing on granite. Its stratification is sometimes very distinct, but it is often so imperfect that it can scarcely be recognized. This is more frequently the case in the vicinity of granite on which it rests, and into which it insensibly passes. A large part of the material used for building purposes, under the name of granite, is obscurely marked gneiss. In all primary countries it is an abundant rock, occupying extensive districts, and sometimes forming mountain masses.

2. Mica slate lies next above gneiss, and is a very abundant rock. As it differs from gneiss only in the proportion of mica which it contains, and as the quantity of mica in it is very different in different places, it is often difficult to make the distinction between them. It also passes by insensible degrees into the argillaceous rocks. Many of the argillaceous rocks are found, upon close examination, to contain mica in minute scales in such abundance as to make it doubtful whether they ought not to be regarded as mica slates; that is, the metamorphic action by which argillaceous slate is converted into mica slate had proceeded so far, before it was arrested, that it becomes impossible to say whether the argillaceous or micaceous characters predominate.

3. Argillaceous slate.--The last rock of this series is a slaty rock, more or less highly argillaceous. It does not differ in lithological characters from the same rock in the higher strata. It is doubtful whether the roofing-slates should be considered as belonging to the metamorphic series or not. They have been subjected to a very high degree of metamorphic action, and yet strata intimately associated with them have, in occasional instances, contained fossils.

It is not easy to fix the exact upper limit of this series. The fossils are few, obscure, and seldom met with in the lowest fossiliferous series; and the transition is very gradual from the distinctly metamorphic to the fossiliferous rocks. This renders it impossible always to determine accurately the line of separation.

The gneiss, mica slate and argillaceous slate, have the order of superposition in which they are here named. They differ only in the amount of metamorphic action to which they have been subjected; and the gneiss which is most highly metamorphic has, by being the lowest, been most acted upon,--the mica slate less, and the argillaceous slate least. In a particular locality, however, the lowest rock which was subjected to these causes of change, instead of having been of such a character as to produce gneiss, may have been a limestone, and in that case the lowest metamorphic rock would be a saccharine marble. In another locality the lowest rock may have been a sandstone, which would be converted into quartz rock. Hence there may occur, in any part of the metamorphic series, crystalline limestone, quartz rock, hornblende slate, chlorite slate, and talcose slate; and any one of these rocks may be as abundant in any particular region, as gneiss, mica slate or argillaceous slate, is in another.

The metamorphic rocks occur in all countries where there has been any considerable amount of volcanic action, and their total amount is very great; but their stratification is so confused and contorted, their superposition so irregular, and denudations have been so extensive, that no estimate can be made of their thickness. They are, perhaps, equal to all the other stratified rocks.