264 A Geological Description of the Parish of Portishead. 



the quarry stand upon old red, which however ceases a few yards beyond 

 them. 



Following the road to the first fork, at which the old red is obscurely 

 seen forming the hill, the road to the battery crosses a valley of dolomite, 

 not however there exposed. Where the road reaches the opposite hill, at 

 its turn, a fine section of the carboniferous limestone is seen. The beds 

 exposed are the lowest above the shale, and have been exceedingly disturbed ; 

 so much so, that a very complete, though local, anticlinal line is observed. 

 By following the road to the west end of the hill, up to the point at which 

 it is intersected by a footpath, the general dip will be found at 70°, and 

 bearing about N. by E. These beds are for the most part thin, much 

 shattered, and interstratified with shale, resembling the lower beds of 

 the same rock elsewhere. They contain few perfect fossils, but chiefly 

 fragments of crinoidea and producti. They are of a green^ red, and in 

 some cases of a buff colour. 



Just beyond the footpath the carboniferous limestone disappears, being 

 covered up by the dolomitic conglomerate, and some beds of new red sand- 

 stone. 



Retracing our steps to the fork, if we take the road towards the hotel, 

 we shall observe, a few yards on, a section of the dolomite, covering up 

 the skirts of the old red hill, all the way to the second fork, where these 

 roads join. If we take that on the right, a new one, we shall cross a field 

 of red dolomitic conglomerate ; and on arriving at the cutting, where the 

 road crosses the tail of the hill, we shall observe the dolomitic conglomerate 

 covering up the skirts of the lowest beds of the carboniferous limestone 

 shale, which are there seen to rest upon the old red. These limestone beds 

 dip in a radiated manner from the hill as a nucleus, being, no doubt, thrown 

 out by the old red, which makes its final easterly appearance at this place. 



The beds of the old red are thin and comminuted ; their dip is not very 

 evident, but appears to be N. N. E. As the road proceeds and descends 

 the hill, the old red ceases, and is covered up by the horizontal rocks. 

 The whole of tliis end of the hill is covered over with a thick mask of 

 debris, composed of angular fragments of old red, imbedded in a very large 

 proportion of a red sandy soil. 



Retracing our steps to the second fork, if we take the road up the hill to 

 the left, we shall observe a quarry of carboniferous limestone, just emerg- 

 ing from beneath the dolomite. This section exactly corresponds to the 

 section at the other end of the hill, and shews the local anticlinal, here seen 

 to be only local, and the general contortions of the strata very well. The 

 dip here varies from eighty to vertical, and the bearing is N. by E. 



Some of the beds in this quarry are very thick, and contain producti; 

 they present fine specimens for polishing. This road, if followed, leads to 

 the summit of the ridge, which is of carboniferous Hmestone. 



Returning to the second fork, and taking the middle road towards the 



