The Student's Elements of Geology Part 65

The different quant.i.ty of the impurities or the refuse above alluded to, which may occur in all but the most transparent and perfect crystals, may partly explain the discordant results at which experienced chemists have arrived in their a.n.a.lysis of the same mineral. For the reader will often find that crystals of a mineral determined to be the same by physical characters, crystalline form, and optical properties, have been declared by skilful a.n.a.lysers to be composed of distinct elements. This disagreement seemed at first subversive of the atomic theory, or the doctrine that there is a fixed and constant relation between the crystalline form and structure of a mineral and its chemical composition. The apparent anomaly, however, which threatened to throw the whole science of mineralogy into confusion, was reconciled to fixed principles by the discoveries of Professor Mitscherlich at Berlin, who ascertained that the composition of the minerals which had appeared so variable was governed by a general law, to which he gave the name of ISOMORPHISM (from isos, equal, and morphe, form). According to this law, the ingredients of a given species of mineral are not absolutely fixed as to their kind and quality; but one ingredient may be replaced by an equivalent portion of some a.n.a.logous ingredient. Thus, in augite, the lime may be in part replaced by portions of protoxide of iron, or of manganese, while the form of the crystal, and the angle of its cleavage planes, remain the same.

These vicarious subst.i.tutions, however, of particular elements can not exceed certain defined limits.

BASALTIC ROCKS.

The two princ.i.p.al families of trappean or volcanic rocks are the basalts and the trachytes, which differ chiefly from each other in the quant.i.ty of silica which they contain. The basaltic rocks are comparatively poor in silica, containing less than 50 per cent of that mineral, and none in a pure state or as free quartz, apart from the rest of the matrix. They contain a larger proportion of lime and magnesia than the trachytes, so that they are heavier, independently of the frequent presence of the oxides of iron which in some cases forms more than a fourth part of the whole ma.s.s. Ab.i.+.c.h has, therefore, proposed that we should weigh these rocks, in order to appreciate their composition in cases where it is impossible to separate their component minerals. Thus, basalt from Staffa, containing 47.80 per cent of silica, has a specific gravity of 2.95; whereas trachyte, which has 66 per cent of silica, has a specific gravity of only 2.68; trachytic porphyry, containing 69 per cent of silica, a specific gravity of only 2.58. If we then take a rock of intermediate composition, such as that prevailing in the Peak of Teneriffe, which Ab.i.+.c.h calls Trachyte-dolerite, its proportion of silica being intermediate, or 58 per cent, it weighs 2.78, or more than trachyte, and less than basalt. (Dr. Daubeny on Volcanoes second edition pages 14, 15.)

BASALT.

The different varieties of this rock are distinguished by the names of basalts, anamezites, and dolerites, names which, however, only denote differences in texture without implying any difference in mineral or chemical composition: the term BASALT being used only when the rock is compact, amorphous, and often semi- vitreous in texture, and when it breaks with a perfect conchoidal fracture; when, however, it is uniformly crystalline in appearance, yet very close- grained, the name ANAMESITE (from anamesos, intermediate) is employed, but if the rock be so coa.r.s.ely crystallised that its different mineral const.i.tuents can be easily recognised by the eye, it is called DOLERITE (from doleros, deceitful), in allusion to the difficulty of distinguis.h.i.+ng it from some of the rocks known as Plutonic.

MELAPHYRE is often quite undistinguishable in external appearance from basalt, for although rarely so heavy, dark-coloured, or compact, it may present at times all these varieties of texture. Both these rocks are composed of triclinic feldspar and augite with more or less olivine, magnetic or t.i.taniferous oxide of iron, and usually a little nepheline, leucite, and apat.i.te; basalt usually contains considerably more olivine than melaphyre, but chemically they are closely allied, although the melaphyres usually contain more silica and alumina, with less oxides of iron, lime, and magnesia, than the basalts. The Rowley Hills in Staffords.h.i.+re, commonly known as Rowley Ragstone, are melaphyre.

GREENSTONE.

This name has usually been extended to all granular mixtures, whether of hornblende and feldspar, or of augite and feldspar. The term DIORITE has been applied exclusively to compounds of hornblende and triclinic feldspar. LABRADOR- ROCK is a term used for a compound of labradorite or labrador-feldspar and hypersthene; when the hypersthene predominates it is sometimes known under the name of HYPERSTHENE-ROCK. GABBRO and DIABASE are rocks mainly composed of triclinic feldspars and diallage. All these rocks become sometimes very crystalline, and help to connect the volcanic with the Plutonic formations, which will be treated of in Chapter 31.

The name trachyte (from trachus, rough) was originally given to a coa.r.s.e granular feldspathic rock which was rough and gritty to the touch. The term was subsequently made to include other rocks, such as clinkstone and obsidian, which have the same mineral composition, but to which, owing to their different texture, the word in its original meaning would not apply. The feldspars which occur in Trachytic rocks are invariably those which contain the largest proportion of silica, or from 60 to 70 per cent of that mineral. Through the base are usually disseminated crystals of gla.s.sy feldspar, mica, and sometimes hornblende. Although quartz is not a necessary ingredient in the composition of this rock, it is very frequently present, and the quartz trachytes are very largely developed in many volcanic districts. In this respect the trachytes differ entirely from the members of the Basaltic family, and are more nearly allied to the granites.

OBSIDIAN.

Obsidian, Pitchstone, and Pearlstone are only different forms of a volcanic gla.s.s produced by the fusion of trachytic rocks. The distinction between them is caused by different rates of cooling from the melted state, as has been proved by experiment. Obsidian is of a black or ash-grey colour, and though opaque in ma.s.s is transparent in thin edges.

CLINKSTONE OR PHONOLITE.

Among the rocks of the trachytic family, or those in which the feldspars are rich in silica, that termed Clinkstone or Phonolite is conspicuous by its fissile structure, and its tendency to lamination, which is such as sometimes to render it useful as roofing-slate. It rings when struck with the hammer, whence its name; is compact, and usually of a greyish blue or brownish colour; is variable in composition, but almost entirely composed of feldspar. When it contains disseminated crystals of feldspar, it is called CLINKSTONE PORPHYRY.

VOLCANIC ROCKS DISTINGUISHED BY SPECIAL FORMS OF STRUCTURE.

Many volcanic rocks are commonly spoken of under names denoting structure alone, which must not be taken to imply that they are distinct rocks, i.e., that they differ from one another either in mineral or chemical composition. Thus the terms Trachytic porphyry, Trachytic tuff, etc., merely refer to the same rock under different conditions of mechanical aggregation or crystalline development which would be more correctly expressed by the use of the adjective, as porphyritic trachyte, etc., but as these terms are so commonly employed it is considered advisable to direct the student's attention to them.

PORPHYRY.

(FIGURE 586. Porphyry. White crystals of feldspar in a dark base of hornblende and feldspar.)

PORPHYRY is one of this cla.s.s, and very characteristic of the volcanic formations. When distinct crystals of one or more minerals are scattered through an earthy or compact base, the rock is termed a porphyry (see Figure 586). Thus trachyte is usually porphyritic; for in it, as in many modern lavas, there are crystals of feldspar; but in some porphyries the crystals are of augite, olivine, or other minerals. If the base be greenstone, basalt, or pitchstone, the rock may be denominated greenstone-porphyry, pitchstone-porphyry, and so forth. The old cla.s.sical type of this form of rock is the red porphyry of Egypt, or the well-known "Rosso antico." It consists, according to Delesse, of a red feldspathic base in which are disseminated rose-coloured crystals of the feldspar called oligoclase, with some plates of blackish hornblende and grains of oxide of iron (iron-glance). RED QUARTZIFEROUS PORPHYRY is a much more siliceous rock, containing about 70 or 80 per cent of silex, while that of Egypt has only 62 per cent.

AMYGDALOID.

This is also another form of igneous rock, admitting of every variety of composition. It comprehends any rock in which round or almond-shaped nodules of some mineral, such as agate, chalcedony, calcareous spar, or zeolite, are scattered through a base of wacke, basalt, greenstone, or other kind of trap. It derives its name from the Greek word amygdalon, an almond. The origin of this structure can not be doubted, for we may trace the process of its formation in modern lavas. Small pores or cells are caused by bubbles of steam and gas confined in the melted matter. After or during consolidation, these empty s.p.a.ces are gradually filled up by matter separating from the ma.s.s, or infiltered by water permeating the rock. As these bubbles have been sometimes lengthened by the flow of the lava before it finally cooled, the contents of such cavities have the form of almonds. In some of the amygdaloidal traps of Scotland, where the nodules have decomposed, the empty cells are seen to have a glazed or vitreous coating, and in this respect exactly resemble scoriaceous lavas, or the slags of furnaces.

(FIGURE 587. Scoriaceous lava in part converted into an amygdaloid. Montagne de la Veille, Department of Puy de Dome, France.)

Figure 587 represents a fragment of stone taken from the upper part of a sheet of basaltic lava in Auvergne. One-half is scoriaceous, the pores being perfectly empty; the other part is amygdaloidal, the pores or cells being mostly filled up with carbonate of lime, forming white kernels.

LAVA.

This term has a somewhat vague signification, having been applied to all melted matter observed to flow in streams from volcanic vents. When this matter consolidates in the open air, the upper part is usually scoriaceous, and the ma.s.s becomes more and more stony as we descend, or in proportion as it has consolidated more slowly and under greater pressure. At the bottom, however, of a stream of lava, a small portion of scoriaceous rock very frequently occurs, formed by the first thin sheet of liquid matter, which often precedes the main current, and solidifies under slight pressure.

The more compact lavas are often porphyritic, but even the scoriaceous part sometimes contains imperfect crystals, which have been derived from some older rocks, in which the crystals pre-existed, but were not melted, as being more infusible in their nature. Although melted matter rising in a crater, and even that which enters a rent on the side of a crater, is called lava, yet this term belongs more properly to that which has flowed either in the open air or on the bed of a lake or sea. If the same fluid has not reached the surface, but has been merely injected into fissures below ground, it is called trap. There is every variety of composition in lavas; some are trachytic, as in the Peak of Teneriffe; a great number are basaltic, as in Vesuvius and Auvergne; others are andesitic, as those of Chili; some of the most modern in Vesuvius consist of green augite, and many of those of Etna of augite and labrador-feldspar. (G.

Hose, Ann. des Mines tome 8 page 32.)

SCORIAE and PUMICE may next be mentioned, as porous rocks produced by the action of gases on materials melted by volcanic heat. SCORIAE are usually of a reddish- brown and black colour, and are the cinders and slags of basaltic or augitic lavas. PUMICE is a light, spongy, fibrous substance, produced by the action of gases on trachytic and other lavas; the relation, however, of its origin to the composition of lava is not yet well understood. Von Buch says that it never occurs where only labrador-feldspar is present.

VOLCANIC ASH OR TUFF, TRAP TUFF.

Small angular fragments of the scoriae and pumice, above-mentioned, and the dust of the same, produced by volcanic explosions, form the tuffs which abound in all regions of active volcanoes, where showers of these materials, together with small pieces of other rocks ejected from the crater, and more or less burnt, fall down upon the land or into the sea. Here they often become mingled with sh.e.l.ls, and are stratified. Such tuffs are sometimes bound together by a calcareous cement, and form a stone susceptible of a beautiful polish. But even when little or no lime is present, there is a great tendency in the materials of ordinary tuffs to cohere together. The term VOLCANIC ASH has been much used for rocks of all ages supposed to have been derived from matter ejected in a melted state from volcanic orifices. We meet occasionally with extremely compact beds of volcanic materials, interstratified with fossiliferous rocks. These may sometimes be tuffs, although their density or compactness is such as the cause them to resemble many of those kinds of trap which are found in ordinary dikes.

WACKE is a name given to a decomposed state of various trap rocks of the basaltic family, or those which are poor in silica. It resembles clay of a yellowish or brown colour, and pa.s.ses gradually from the soft state to the hard dolerite, greenstone, or other trap rock from which it has been derived.

AGGLOMERATE.

In the neighbourhood of volcanic vents, we frequently observe acc.u.mulations of angular fragments of rocks formed during eruptions by the explosive action of steam, which shatters the subjacent stony formations, and hurls them up into the air. They then fall in showers around the cone or crater, or may be spread for some distance over the surrounding country. The fragments consist usually of different varieties of scoriaceous and compact lavas; but other kinds of rock, such as granite or even fossiliferous limestones, may be intermixed; in short, any substance through which the expansive gases have forced their way. The dispersion of such materials may be aided by the wind, as it varies in direction or intensity, and by the slope of the cone down which they roll, or by floods of rain, which often accompany eruptions. But if the power of running water, or of the waves and currents of the sea, be sufficient to carry the fragments to a distance, it can scarcely fail to wear off their angles, and the formation then becomes a CONGLOMERATE. If occasionally globular pieces of scoriae abound in an agglomerate, they may not owe their round form to attrition. When all the angular fragments are of volcanic rocks the ma.s.s is usually termed a volcanic breccia.

Laterite is a red or brick-like rock composed of silicate of alumina and oxide of iron. The red layers called "ochre beds," dividing the lavas of the Giant's Causeway, are laterites. These were found by Delesse to be trap impregnated with the red oxide of iron, and in part reduced to kaolin. When still more decomposed, they were found to be clay coloured by red ochre. As two of the lavas of the Giant's Causeway are parted by a bed of lignite, it is not improbable that the layers of laterite seen in the Antrim cliffs resulted from atmospheric decomposition. In Madeira and the Canary Islands streams of lava of subaerial origin are often divided by red bands of laterite, probably ancient soils formed by the decomposition of the surfaces of lava-currents, many of these soils having been coloured red in the atmosphere by oxide of iron, others burnt into a red brick by the overflowing of heated lavas. These red bands are sometimes prismatic, the small prisms being at right angles to the sheets of lava. Red clay or red marl, formed as above stated by the disintegration of lava, scoriae, or tuff, has often acc.u.mulated to a great thickness in the valleys of Madeira, being washed into them by alluvial action; and some of the thick beds of laterite in India may have had a similar origin. In India, however, especially in the Deccan, the term "laterite" seems to have been used too vaguely to answer the above definition. The vegetable soil in the gardens of the suburbs of Catania which was overflowed by the lava of 1669 was turned or burnt into a layer of red brick-coloured stone, or in other words, into laterite, which may now be seen supporting the old lava-current.

COLUMNAR AND GLOBULAR STRUCTURE.

One of the characteristic forms of volcanic rocks, especially of basalt, is the columnar, where large ma.s.ses are divided into regular prisms, sometimes easily separable, but in other cases adhering firmly together. The columns vary, in the number of angles, from three to twelve; but they have most commonly from five to seven sides. They are often divided transversely, at nearly equal distances, like the joints in a vertebral column, as in the Giant's Causeway, in Ireland.

They vary exceedingly in respect to length and diameter. Dr. MacCulloch mentions some in Skye which are about 400 feet long; others, in Morven, not exceeding an inch. In regard to diameter, those of Ailsa measure nine feet, and those of Morven an inch or less. (MacCulloch System of Geology volume 2 page 137.) They are usually straight, but sometimes curved; and examples of both these occur in the island of Staffa. In a horizontal bed or sheet of trap the columns are vertical; in a vertical dike they are horizontal.

(FIGURE 588. Lava of La Coupe d'Ayzac, near Antraigue, in the Department of Ardeche.)

It being a.s.sumed that columnar trap has consolidated from a fluid state, the prisms are said to be always at right angles to the COOLING SURFACES. If these surfaces, therefore, instead of being either perpendicular or horizontal, are curved, the columns ought to be inclined at every angle to the horizon; and there is a beautiful exemplification of this phenomenon in one of the valleys of the Vivarais, a mountainous district in the South of France, where, in the midst of a region of gneiss, a geologist encounters unexpectedly several volcanic cones of loose sand and scoriae. From the crater of one of these cones, called La Coupe d'Ayzac, a stream of lava has descended and occupied the bottom of a narrow valley, except at those points where the river Volant, or the torrents which join it, have cut away portions of the solid lava. Figure 588 represents the remnant of the lava at one of these points. It is clear that the lava once filled the whole valley up to the dotted line d-a; but the river has gradually swept away all below that line, while the tributary torrent has laid open a transverse section; by which we perceive, in the first place, that the lava is composed, as usual in this country, of three parts: the uppermost, at a, being scoriaceous, the second b, presenting irregular prisms; and the third, c, with regular columns, which are vertical on the banks of the Volant, where they rest on a horizontal base of gneiss, but which are inclined at an angle of 45 degrees, at g, and are nearly horizontal at f, their position having been everywhere determined, according to the law before mentioned, by the form of the original valley.

(FIGURE 589. Columnar basalt in the Vincentin. (Fortis.)

In Figure 589, a view is given of some of the inclined and curved columns which present themselves on the sides of the valleys in the hilly region north of Vicenza, in Italy, and at the foot of the higher Alps. (Fortis Mem. sur l'Hist.

Nat. de l'Italie tome 1 page 233 plate 7.) Unlike those of the Vivarais, last mentioned, the basalt of this country was evidently submarine, and the present valleys have since been hollowed out by denudation.

(FIGURE 590. Basaltic pillars of the Kasegrotte, Bertrich-Baden, half-way between Treves and Coblentz. Height of grotto, from 7 to 8 feet.)

The columnar structure is by no means peculiar to the trap rocks in which augite abounds; it is also observed in trachyte, and other feldspathic rocks of the igneous cla.s.s, although in these it is rarely exhibited in such regular polygonal forms. It has been already stated that basaltic columns are often divided by cross-joints. Sometimes each segment, instead of an angular, a.s.sumes a spheroidal form, so that a pillar is made up of a pile of b.a.l.l.s, usually flattened, as in the Cheese-grotto at Bertrich-Baden, in the Eifel, near the Moselle (Figure 590). The basalt there is part of a small stream of lava, from 30 to 40 feet thick, which has proceeded from one of several volcanic craters, still extant, on the neighbouring heights.

In some ma.s.ses of decomposing greenstone, basalt, and other trap rocks, the globular structure is so conspicuous that the rock has the appearance of a heap of large cannon b.a.l.l.s. According to M. Delesse, the centre of each spheroid has been a centre of crystallisation, around which the different minerals of the rock arranged themselves symmetrically during the process of cooling. But it was also, he says, a centre of contraction, produced by the same cooling, the globular form, therefore, of such spheroids being the combined result of crystallisation and contraction. (Delesse sur les Roches Globuleuses Mem. de la Soc. Geol. de France 2 ser. tome 4.)

(FIGURE 591. Globiform pitchstone. Chiaja di Luna, Isle of Ponza. (Scrope.))

Mr. Scrope gives as an ill.u.s.tration of this structure a resinous trachyte or pitchstone-porphyry in one of the Ponza islands, which rise from the Mediterranean, off the coast of Terracina and Gaeta. The globes vary from a few inches to three feet in diameter, and are of an ellipsoidal form (see Figure 591). The whole rock is in a state of decomposition, "and when the b.a.l.l.s," says Mr. Scrope, "have been exposed a short time to the weather, they scale off at a touch into numerous concentric coats, like those of a bulbous root, inclosing a compact nucleus. The laminae of this nucleus have not been so much loosened by decomposition; but the application of a ruder blow will produce a still further exfoliation." (Scrope Geological Transactions second series volume 2 page 205.)

VOLCANIC OR TRAP DIKES.

(FIGURE 592. Dike in valley, near Brazen Head, Madeira. (From a drawing of Captain Basil Hall, R.N.))

The leading varieties of the trappean rocks-- basalt, greenstone, trachyte, and the rest-- are found sometimes in dikes penetrating stratified and unstratified formations, sometimes in shapeless ma.s.ses protruding through or overlying them, or in horizontal sheets intercalated between strata. Fissures have already been spoken of as occurring in all kinds of rocks, some a few feet, others many yards in width, and often filled up with earth or angular pieces of stone, or with sand and pebbles. Instead of such materials, suppose a quant.i.ty of melted stone to be driven or injected into an open rent, and there consolidated, we have then a tabular ma.s.s resembling a wall, and called a trap dike. It is not uncommon to find such dikes pa.s.sing through strata of soft materials, such as tuff, scoriae, or shale, which, being more perishable than the trap, are often washed away by the sea, rivers, or rain, in which case the dike stands prominently out in the face of precipices, or on the level surface of a country (see Figure 592).

(FIGURE 593. Ground-plan of greenstone dikes traversing sandstone. Arran.)

In the islands of Arran and Skye, and in other parts of Scotland, where sandstone, conglomerate, and other hard rocks are traversed by dikes of trap, the converse of the above phenomenon is seen. The dike, having decomposed more rapidly than the containing rock, has once more left open the original fissure, often for a distance of many yards inland from the sea-coast. There is yet another case, by no means uncommon in Arran and other parts of Scotland, where the strata in contact with the dike, and for a certain distance from it, have been hardened, so as to resist the action of the weather more than the dike itself, or the surrounding rocks. When this happens, two parallel walls of indurated strata are seen protruding above the general level of the country and following the course of the dike. In Figure 593 a ground plan is given of a ramifying dike of greenstone, which I observed cutting through sandstone on the beach near Kildonan Castle, in Arran. The larger branch varies from five to seven feet in width, which will afford a scale of measurement for the whole.