360 ON THE SALT SPRINGS OF WORCESTERSHIRE. 



rocks of Cradley, Martley, and Abberley ; then again on its 

 northern limit, a similar class of rocks is found, and we have 

 also the Coal measures at Dudley; the Trap rocks of the Clent 

 Hills, the Basalt at Rowley, and the Quartz rock at Brorasg-rove.* 

 But the formation which most extensively prevails, and of 

 which the county generally may be described as consisting, is 

 the Red Marl, or New Red Sandstone, which geologists consider 

 as having been formed by the breaking up and disintegration 

 of the older rocks before mentioned, and their subsequent de- 

 position from the waters of the ocean. 



In England, the Red Marl or New Red Sandstone is a very ex- 

 tensive deposit, stretching with very little interruption from the 

 northern bank of the Tees, in Durham, to the southern coast of 

 Devonshire. Its texture is very various. It appears sometimes 

 as a reddish marl or clay, sometimes as a sandstone ; sometimes the 

 clay or sandstone are interstratified, or pass the one into the other; 

 and it will further appear that it is associated with, or contains beds 

 of a conglomerate, consisting of masses of different rocks, cemented 

 by marl or sand. When this deposit appears as a sandstone, its 

 characters differ greatly in different places; it is occasionally 

 calcareous, and sometimes of a slaty texture. Above all, this 

 extensive deposit is remarkable for containing masses or beds of 

 gypsum ; and the great rock-salt formation of England occurs 

 within it, or is subordinate to it. In some places the strata of 

 coal dip below it. Generally speaking, the red marl containing 

 gypsum is found in the higher, the sandstone in the central, and 

 the conglomerate in the lower portions of this deposit.f 



In Worcestershire, this formation begins at the very northern 

 boundary of the county, and spreads itself over the whole of the 

 district, — so that setting out from Stourbridge, and walking di- 

 rectly south to Longdon Heath, below Upton, we are continually 

 passing over Red Marl and New Red Sandstone, for the most part 

 hidden from our view by the beds of gravel which abound so 

 extensively in this line of country. In many parts, however, 

 the sandstone is exposed, and forms pleasing rising eminences, 

 and in some situations there are more elevated strata, as 

 in the sandstone hills about Bewdley and Kidderminster. Mr. 

 Murchison has lately read a paper to the Geological Society, 

 in which he takes a view of the New Red Sandstone which 

 occurs in parts of Salop, Stafford, and Worcester; and as 

 the formations which have usually been classed under this term 

 present various appearances, he proposes to divide the group into 

 distinct subformations, adopting the following subdivisions : — 



1st. Red and Green Marl. 



2nd. Sandstone and Conglomerates. 



* A complete description of these Transition Rocks, and of many organic remains 

 found in them, not previously known to naturalists, will be given by Mr. Mur- 

 chison in his splendid work on the subject, which will shortly be published. 



t See Conybeare and Phillips's Geology, p. 279. 



