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geological features, easily accessible at many points in tliis county, 

 by which we ascertain, approxiinatively, the period at which these 

 commotions, to which we at present owe tlie clivei-sity of its soil, and 

 scenery, and access to its mineral wealth, took place. In and around the 

 Forest we have precipitous escarpments of Carboniferous limestone and 

 shales, with those of older rocks, in such position as to pi'ove how great 

 must have been the extent of their detidtus, carried away, we know 

 not whither. As the ancient detritic material of the lowest and most 

 compact strata — which would necessarily be the most recent, as the last 

 exposed to aqueous action — has left no trace of its existence here, we 

 may not reasonably expect to discover any debris of the higher strata 

 which once reposed upon these. 



We have no traces in the Forest area, for example, of the Magnesian 

 Limestone, and its associated beds, which in other paits of England, and 

 upon the continent, follow in regular series those of the Cai-boniferous 

 system ; yet we find at Bristol a Magnesian conglomerate, with the 

 remains of vmdoubted Permian reptiles, and as we cannot believe, from the 

 sharp angles of the rock fragments of which it is comjjosed, that they 

 have travelled any considerable distance, we must necessarily suppose 

 that the formation, of which it is the representative, %oas to some extent 

 developed here. 



We have seen the upper beds of the New Eed Sandstone, deposited 

 unconformably against the upthro-\vn Silurian and the Old Eed, at Flaxley 

 and elsewhere; the Lias against the Old Eed Sandstone as here; and upon 

 Silurian strata, as near Eastwood ; Mr. Charles Moore has infonned us 

 that the fissures of the Carboniferous Limestone of his district contain liassic 

 fossils ; and Mr. Etheredge has sho^vn us a specimen of the same limestone 

 bored by Lithophagidje, at whose death, their holes were filled up by then 

 forming oolitic granules. 



Under these circumstances, as we are not acquainted with any group of 

 strata intermediate to the Permian and Triassic formations ; and as we 

 do not find these in contact here, may we not reasonably infer, that 

 beds of Permian age had been deposited here in their due sequence ; but 

 having been swept away, either prior to, or in consequence of, their dis- 

 ruption by the disturbances indicated, when the deposition of the Triassic 

 formation commenced, the forms of life which characterized them are 

 here wanting, and the Mesozoic, which characterize the next vast 

 epoch, assumed their places. 



Truly, if a man have a devotional spirit within him, and can appreciate 

 the immensity of the gulf into which he gazes, and which he is 

 enabled to bridge over, by the exercise of that gift of intellect which 



