118 Mr Lyell on the Loaviy Deposit of the Rhine. 



vertin, I was unable to determine ; but I was told by naturalists 

 at Stuttgardt, that the land-shells of the travertin were of recent 

 species, and the same as those in the loess. From Stuttgardt I 

 went to Goppingen and Boll in Wurtemberg, and between the 

 last two places saw loess resting on lias, after which I met with 

 no more of it in the course of a tour by Heidenheim, Steinheim, 

 Wasser Alfingen, Nordlingen, Solenhofen, Pappenheim, Ellin- 

 gen, Nuremberg, Pegnitz, Bayreuth, the cave-district round 

 Muggendorf, and thence to Forcheim and Bamberg. Between 

 Bamberg and Wurtzburg, in the valley of the Mayn, I again 

 found the loess, at Dettelbach, of a somewhat redder tint than 

 in Wurtemberg, but exhibiting the same want of stratification, 

 and containing the same terrestrial and aquatic shells, especially 

 Pupa and Succinea. The loess near Dettelbach is seen not only 

 in the Valley of the Mayn, but on the hills of muschelkalk, 

 five or six hundred feet above the valley, where its redder tint 

 is probably, in part, derived from the degradation of the red 

 hunter sandstein. 



In the Spessart, and in the country immediately around 

 Aschafi'enburg, I observed no loess. The road which leads from 

 Frankfort to the foot of the Taunus, passes first over the low 

 flat plain of the Mayn, which is covered with yellow sand, for 

 the most part very barren. (See section. No. %) At Hochst, 

 on the Mayn, is a higher platform, composed of loess, and here 

 the soil is extremely fertile. This platform afterwards rises to 

 a still greater height between Hochst and Soden, which last 

 town is situated in a valley cut through the loess, at the bottom 

 of which the subjacent tertiary strata of the Mayence formation 

 are laid open. On quitting Soden, I ascended the steep flanks of 

 the Taunus mountains, and saw no loess. (See diagram, No. 2.) 



Tauvrus 



JPlain of R.MaT/ne> 4.^ ^ Tocrs 



b Miocene tertiary. a Schist of the Taunus. 



I then crossed the highest part of the Taunus, where the grey- 

 wacke passes into crystalline schists, and from thence descended 

 towards Esch and Walsdorf, where the more ordinary greywacke 



