49 
preserved, and the greater part of them appear in these 
Pisolitic beds for the first time. All the circumstances, there- 
fore, point to the distinct character of the two formations. 
It is true there are occasional thin layers of large grains 
and shelly fragments in the lower beds, but they also occur 
in the building freestones, and are not of sufficient importance 
to affect the general character of the formation. The Pea Grit 
comes in between the freestones and the basement beds, like a 
broad wedge, the thick end of which is at Cleeve and the thin 
end somewhere near Frocester hill, thinning off likewise on its 
south-eastern side not far from Chalford. 
I think we have overlooked these basement beds mainly 
because our Gloucestershire geologists have regarded the Pea 
Grit as the base of the Inferior Oolite, in consequence of that 
term having been used to include not only the Pea Grit proper, 
but all the underlying beds which are not properly Pea Grit nor 
even Pisolitic. 
I regard these beds as constituting the first stage of the 
Inferior Oolite, unless the Cephalopoda bed ought to be so 
regarded. They cover a considerable area, are very persistent 
in their petrographical features, and can be identified with as 
much certainty as any of the other beds of the Inferior Oolite. 
I propose to call the series the Lower Limestone. 
