26 CHELTENHAM COLLEGE NATURAL HISTORY SOCIETY. 



division of the Oolite at Leckhampton Hill. There are a number of 

 different beds which may be seen and they have been given the fol- 

 lowing names : — 



1. Ragstone. 4. Lower Freestone. 



2. Upper Freestone. 5. Pea Grit. 



3. Oolite Marl. 6. Cephalopod Bed. 



The lowest bed of all is poorly shown and the most obvious bed 

 when one has climbed up the first incline from the road and arrived at 

 the lowest windlass, is the Pea Grit. This is an orange brown bed com- 

 posed of large circular flattened concretions some"times half an inch 

 across. The lower part of .the bed is cemented together into a firm 

 hmestone, the upper part weathers readily and crnmbles away so that 

 fossils are most easily extracted from this part of the bed. Above this 

 comes a thick bed of freestone, with very few fossils reaching up to 

 the top of the second tramway incline. Its base just above the Pea 

 Grit is often made up of smashed up shells and fragments of fossils. A 

 few feet below the second windlass platform, and easily reached, is a 

 well marked band of rock, weathering white, soft and very fossiliferous, 

 this is the Oolite Marl and it is about 6 feet thick. The character- 

 istic fossil of this bed is Tetebratula Fimbria^ so called because its 

 lower edge is all puckered and frilled, and many specimens may be 

 collected in a very short time, they are interesting also because no two 

 are exactly alike, an extraordinary amount of slight variation being 

 visible in the shell marking. Another very common shell is Astarte, 

 and a very good specimen of it was found by W. H. Williams and 

 presented to the College Museum. This band is the easiest to find 

 and well rewards the fossil hunter as it is one of the most fossiliferous 

 bands of the Hill. 



Above this Oolite Marl comes the Upper Freestone, a compact 

 Oolite with few fossils and right at the top of the cliff comes a loosely 

 packed bed with many oyster shells which is the lowest bed of the 

 Ragstone. 



This Ragstone has been much worked in past times at the top of 

 the hill, where the old heaps of refuse are now grown over with grass, 

 but the low cliff some 300 yards away from the edge of the present 

 face of the hill is well worth looking at, as there are a large number of 

 fossils to be got out of it, notably several kinds of Trigonioe, also Tere- 

 bratula Globata and Rhynconella Subteiratedra. In the clay bands in 

 the Ragstone, in the highest quarries the workmen are finding some 

 large Ammonites now (1896). Some of these should be obtained for 

 the College Museum, 



