W0olb0pi> jaaturaltsts' 3FW5 Club. 



May 27th, 1887. 



The first Field Meetinpr this year was held on Friday, May 27th. A large 

 muster of members assembled at Barr's Court,, and took train for Mitcheldean 

 Road, the first station beyond Ross, on the road to Gloucester. The business of 

 the Club was conducted at the Ruilway Station, when seven new members were 

 elected. Mr. Theophilus Lane, in recognition of his services to the Club from 

 April 23rd, 1878, a period of nine years, was elected an Honorary member. The 

 Honorary Secretary announced the presentation to the Club of the " Flora of 

 Cardiff " from the Cardiff Naturalists' Society. At a later period of the day, 

 the fixture of Monday, June 27th, for the next meeting at Thornbury Camp, was 

 altered to Tliursday, June 30th. 



Mr. Wethered, F.C.S., F.G.S., F.R.M.S., Hon. Secretary of the Cotteswold 

 Field Club, having travelled from Cheltenham by an early train, and taken his 

 breakfast at the Hotel near Mitcheldean Road Railway Station, met the Club 

 upon their arrival at this Station. Mr. E. Brammer, keeper. Lea Bailey Lodge, 

 also attended to ijuide the party tlirough the Delve and other parts of Meend Hill, 

 by the disused Roman workings for iron ore, unto " The Deep Cutting " near Mr. 

 Brain's house, " Euroclydon," where they were to examine the upper beds of the 

 Old Red Sandstone, and the interesting series of Transition strata which mark 

 those physical changes which closed the Devonian period of the earth's history and 

 introduced the Carboniferous. Here, it is reported, are exhibited " in 104 yards, 

 154 divisions of the passage beds between the Old Red Sandstone and the 

 Carboniferous Limestone." The party, reinforced by members picked up en route, 

 and by local visitors, now commenced the ascent of the Meend, and before gaining 

 its summit, halted at an exposed mass of conglomerate, where Mr. Wethered, 

 unfolding his diagrams, gave an outline of the geology of the locality. He under- 

 stood that there were some members of the Club who had not made a study of 

 Geology, and consequently he felt that no apology was necessary if he began at 

 the beginning of the story which the rocks around them had to tell. 



The strata which composed the crust of the earth was divided into three 

 periods. The first was termed the Palaeozoic from the Greek palaios, ancient, and 

 zoe life ; the next, Secondary or Mesozoic from the Greek mesos, middle, and zoe, 

 life ; the third Tertiary or Cainozoic from the Greek kainos, recent, zoe, life. On 

 the present occasion they were only interested in the first of these, namely, the 

 Palseozoic, which, as the name implied, included the earliest rock formation of 

 which they had knowledge. The Palaeozoic consisted of the following formations 

 or periods. First the Archaean, which were the oldest, second the Cambrian, third 

 the Silurian, fourth the Devonian, which included the Old Red Sandstone, fifth 

 the Carboniferous. At that moment they were standing on the upper beds of the 

 Old Red Sandstone, and the lower beds, consisting of Sandstones, Shales, and 



