Baza and Jl/tama. 345. 



two or three inches, and preserving the horizontahty of the 

 gypsiferous marls between which it is enclosed. The sul- 

 phur is of a pale yellow colour, of a compact structure, and a 

 few minute scales of laminated gypsum are occasionally dis- 

 seminated in its mass. Amongst the debris resulting from ex- 

 cavation, and surrounding the aperture of one of the shafts, I 

 observed fragments of the marl strata, studded with numerous 

 minute organic bodies, with whose nature I was then unac- 

 quainted, but have since been informed that they belong to the 

 genus Cypris, and are similar to those found in the weald clay 

 of England. The stratum to which these belonged had a more 

 arenaceous character — a greater proportion of fine sand — than 

 the generality of those which constitute this formation. A few 

 broken fragments of testacea were also observed, whose nature 

 it would be difficult to determine, being principally converted 

 into a crystalline substance in the form of minute concretions. 

 The above organic remains are met with, as the workmen in- 

 formed me, in the strata immediately ovei'lying those in which 

 sulphur is found. During the three hottest months of summer, 

 it becomes necessary to suspend the workings for this mineral, 

 as the exhalations are so powerful, that the lights attempted to 

 be introduced are immediately extinguished. 



The road from Benamaurel to Huescar proceeds up the little 

 valley of the Guardal, on the right bank of, and at a variable 

 but never considerable distance from, the rivulet. The oppo- 

 site bank is formed by a high perpendicular escarpment, the 

 continuation of that below Benamaurel, nearly the whole way. 

 to a village called Castillejos, several openings or entrances into 

 caves being observed along its face, which tradition states to 

 have been inhabited by the Moors. All the tract to the left of 

 the line of road, as far as Castillejos, exhibits a succession of 

 little escarpments, in the gypsiferous marl deposit, bordering 

 table-formed flats of different dimensions, or surrounding de- 

 nuded hollows ; and from the summit of the high escarpment 

 forming the left bank of the rivulet, the surface presents a si- 

 milar character and configuration in the opposite direction, as 

 far as the eye can reach. 



Sulphur is also met with in this deposit, and worked by 

 means of shafts, in the immediate neighbourhood of Castillejos. 



JULY — SEPTEMBEK 1830. Z 



