Portable apparatus for obtaining small oriented cores for geophysical or geological purposes is described. It consists of a 34 c.c. two-stroke engine with a 12 ft. long flexible shaft to a drilling head which accommodates the drilling bit and includes a pipe through which coolant from a pressure container may pass. All this weighs under 50 lb. Imperfectly cylindrical specimens may be obtained by hand drilling, or perfect cores with the aid of either of the two rigs described. The first weighs 21 lb. and allows a number of closely spaced specimens from horizontal and inclined outcrops to be obtained. The second weighs 15 lb. and is for obtaining specimens some fixed distance apart from more difficult vertical faces. Magnetic and non-magnetic orienting devices are described. The merits of the method of sampling are briefly discussed.

Matherella (?) acuticostata sp. nov. is described from the Lower Ordovician of Trefor, near Bryngwran, in mid Anglesey.

An occurrence of kyanite pseudomorphing andalusite, from the Urungwe District of Southern Rhodesia, is described. The pseudomorphs, which include some of the largest of their kind so far recorded, occur in profusion in certain Pre-Cambrian pelitic schists. The original andalusite was completely converted to kyanite during regional metamorphism but the shape of the original crystals was perfectly preserved. This, together with the habit of the kyanite within the pseudomorphs, shows that the change took place under conditions of insignificant shearing stress.

Folds in the uppermost 10 feet of Triassic rocks in the cliffs of Sully Island, Glamorgan, are described and their origin is related to processes operating when the area was subject to permafrost.

Kaolinite-mudstone bands, widely recoginzed in the Carboniferous of Western Europe, where they are known as tonsteins, are also represented in Britain. On the basis of the probable correlation eight such bands have so far been found in the Coal Measures of the East Midlands. Laterally two of these bands are thought to pass into rocks intermediate in type between tonstein and more normal Coal Measures mudstones.

In the Assynt area of the North-West Highlands of Scotland a regional preferred orientation of quartz [0001]-axes of sedimentary origin in Cambrian quartzites has withstood considerable deformation and destroyed only with the onset of granulation in the immediate vicinity of thrust planes. After partial granulation the remaining scattered quartz grains develop a preferred orientation of [0001]-axes quite distinct from the sedimentary fabric. Recrystallization is apparent well away from the thrust planes, but only supersedes granulation along certain sections of the major Moine Thrust plane. The preferred orientation of quartz [0001]-axes in these recrystallized fabrics is somewhat variable. The regional quartz fabric of metamorphic origin in Moine rocks immediately above the thrust planes can experience a similar deformation, recrystallization following granulation with the development of quartz fabrics similar to those in recrystallized quartzites below the Moine Thrust plane.

The denudation chronology of the mountainous district of south-west Mayo and north-west Galway is closely linked with drainage superimposition from a deformed Carboniferous cover. Small outcrops of basal Viséan sandstones and conglomerates, lying on bevelled summits and wide bevelled tablelands demonstrate unequivocally that the west Connaught summit level corresponds to the base of the Carboniferous. Uplift, to produce a pre-glacial divide, is believed to have occurred in Mid-Tertiary times. Upon the uplifted, faulted, and warped Carboniferous cover a consequent drainage was developed. Superimposition on to the Caledonian basement followed and during the Pleistocene considerable glacial modifications of the pre-glacial drainage pattern took place.

Complex fold patterns are described from a strongly deformed marble group in Northern Norway. The patterns are analysed in terms of fold superposition. One set of folds presents difficulties to such an explanation and an alternative possibility is discussed.

The basal Purbeck of Dorset includes interesting “dirt-beds” or fossil soils. The limestones, previously considered freshwater, are here shown to be largely of marine algal origin containing species of Ortonella, Girvanella, and Solenopora and presumed algal stromatolites. Petrographic evidence of anhydrite, gypsum, and celestine suggests evaporitic conditions during their formation. This is supported by the presence of ostracods belonging to marine or super-saline species, and by the scarcity of other fauna.

Absolute age determinations by the potassium-argon method on biotite from the Musensi Hill intrusion and feldspar from a feldspathic breccia on the Mbeya Mountain Range indicate a Cretaceous age.

The geology encountered in the driving of the Dinas Cwm-Rheidol Hydroelectric pressure tunnel is described.

Intensive structural and stratigraphic studies, supplemented by nine new absolute age data, have led to the recognition of two distinct orogenic belts in the Pre-Cambrian tract of Singhbhum and adjacent areas in India. The Iron Ore orogeny in the south, characterized by the generally low grade metamorphic, N.N.E.–S.S.W. trending formations, had its culmination in the emplacement of the batholithic body of Singhbhum granite (c. 2,000 m.y.). These rocks are separated by a prominent thrust zone (Copper Belt thrust) from the E.–W. striking, generally high-grade meta-morphic rocks of the Singhbhum orogeny whose closing age is 905 to 934 m.y.