70 Geological Society. 



axis of the Lickey, ten miles south-south-west of Birmingham, and 

 one mile south of the termination of the altered rock, or Lickey 

 Quartz*. The sandstone is there thick-bedded, soft, and red, and 

 dips on the western flank about 5° west-south-west, and on the 

 eastern 5° east-south-east. In Grovely Hill, on the north-east of 

 the Lickey, it passes occasionally into a hard quartzose conglome- 

 rate with a calcareous paste f ; and at Finstal, on the south-west of 

 the Lickey ridge, the upper portion of the sandstone is light- coloured, 

 and contains obscure vegetable impressions, being a prolongation of 

 the stratum, with similar impressions, at Breakback Hill, on the 

 west of Bromsgrove X . 



On each side of the Lickey, the sandstone is conformably overlaid 

 by red marl, which extends on the north-east to Birmingham^, and on 

 the south-west to Stoke Prior and the neighbourhood of Hadnor, 

 where the railway intersects a ridge of lias. On the north side the 

 marl is there cut off by a fault, but on the south, at Dunhamstead, 

 the following juncture section is exposed : — 



(«.) Lias clay with contorted beds of lias limestone. 



(h.) White micaceous sandstone, with numerous speci- 

 mens of a smooth oval bivalve ..... 2 Feet. 



(c. ) Lias clay 6 



(d.) Grey marl 35 



(e. ) Red marl 



Dip of the beds 5° north-north-east. 



In the hill south of Dunhainstead, the grey marl (rf) abuts against 

 the red marl (e) in consequence of a fault. For the next five miles 

 the railway traverses a valley of red marl, between the escarpment 

 of the lias and a ridge of Keuper sandstone. On the south-east of 

 Spetchley the strike of that sandstone is altered by a fault from 

 south by east to south-west, and a projecting angle has been pro- 

 duced which is intersected by the railway. This stratum is a feeble 

 representative of the Keuper sandstone of Burg Hill, &c.|[, con- 

 sisting chiefly of greenish marl with thin laminae of white sand- 

 stone, about twenty feet thick, with red marl above and below. 

 At Norton the railway ascends the lias escarpment, and cuts through 

 a section exactly analogous to the one given above. A mile 

 further south the lias clay contains many calcareous concretions 

 abounding with fossils, including Plagiostoma giganteum, Modiola 



* See Mr. Murchison's Silurian System, p. 492. 



t Similar conglomerates occur in Worcestershire, Staffordshire, and 

 Warwickshire. — Silur. Syst., p. 42. Geol. Trans., 2nd Series, vol. v. 347. 



I Geol. Trans., 2nd Series, vol. v. p. 341 ; Proceedings, vol. ii. p. 564, 

 § The red marl extends from Birmingham along the London railway as 



far as Berkswell, forming the basin, in which occurs the lias outlier of 

 Knowle south-west of Berkswell. The true boundary of the sandstone and 

 marl in this district has been only recently ascertained ; it ranges from 

 Hewell Grange, nearly north, by Cofton Racket to Northfield, and thence 

 north-east to the south suburbs of Birmingham. 



II Proceedings, vol. ii. p. 503. Geol. Trans., 2nd Series, vol. v. p. 332. 



