50 Brigadier Silvertop's Sketch of the Tertiary Formation 



loamy deposit is formed of a bed of calcareous sandstone, con- 

 taining numerous pectens, and the summit of the contiguous^ 

 hilly tract displays a bed of zoophytical limestone in thick strata, 

 in which there is such an abundance of ostreae, that a whole 

 family of these molluscae appears to have been entombed at this 

 point. The strata of the calcareous sandstone and zoophytical 

 limestone are horizontal. 



Carhonera to Vera, distance five leagues. For the first three 

 miles the road traverses the north-eastern portion of the tertiary 

 band that has been followed along the coast from San Pedro, and 

 then crosses La Sierra de Cabrera, at whose base the former has 

 been stated to terminate. The breadth of this primary ridge, 

 which is a ramification from the great Sierra Nevada chain, 

 and descends to the shore, is here between eight and ten miles. 

 It is composed of mica-slate intersected by quartz veins, in which 

 I occasionally observed imperfect crystals of Andalusite. The 

 road subsequently descends to the beach, along which it pro- 

 ceeds to a miserable village called La Garrucha, an open road- 

 stead considered as the port of Vera. 



From the Sierra de Cabrera to La Garrucha no tertiary beds 

 were noticed : the coast in this interval is bordered by a broad 

 expanse of shingle, beyond which inland succeeds the moun- 

 tainous district belonging to the great primary chain that runs 

 parallel to the Mediterranean. A village called Majacar stands 

 upon one of these great groups of mountains, at about two miles 

 distant from the shore. 



Vera, a town of considerable importance, containing about 

 10,000 inhabitants, and the head-quarters of several marine de- 

 partments connected Avith the military and fiscal duties of the 

 adjacent coast, is situated at the distance of about four miles 

 from La Garrucha, in an extensive open low tract, confined to- 

 wards the SE. and NE. by districts of primary and transition 

 mountains, presumed to belong to the tertiary formation. (See 

 Sects. 14. and 15. PL I.) In passing from the Mediterranean 

 shore near El Castillo de la Garrucha to Vera, the beach rises into 

 an indurated mass of conglomerated shingle, which forms a bare 

 inland escarpment, at the base of which there is a dead flat of 

 argillaceous loam, succeeded by another flat gently rising in- 

 land, of yellowish micaceous sandy loam. The road goes over 



