120 OLD RED SANDSTONE. 



in the Cornstones at Hinston and Acton Beauchamp, near Brom- 

 yard, by Mr. Humphrey Salwey of Ludlow. 



According to JMurchison, the upper beds of the Old Red Sand- 

 stone, near the Brown Clee, and Titterstone Clee Hills, show a 

 thin band of conglomerate ; then follow, in descending order, 

 red or green marls, with two or more zones of impure limestone 

 called cornstone ; to these succeed micaceous flagstones, marls, 

 and cornstone.' 



The quarries in the lower beds at Leysters Pole, north-east of 

 Leominster, and around Puddlestone, have yielded many fossil 

 fishes ; and Mr. Symonds observes, that when first struck out from 

 the rock, the enamelled plates of Scaphaspis and Pteraspis glisten 

 with purple and blue, due to the presence of phosphate of iron. 



At Dinmore Hill, between Hereford and Leominster, the Lower 

 Old Red Sandstone may be well studied, but Hereford itself is an 

 excellent centre for observations, and large quarries have been 

 opened in the sandstones at Lugwardine.* Near Malvern and 

 Abberley the Old Red Sandstone rests on the Ledbury Shales and 

 Ludlow Rocks. Sandstones are well exposed at Cradley, near 

 Malvern, and cornstones at Heitington, near Bewdley. Near 

 Ledbury the beds are seen at Bush Pitch, the Wall Hills, Canon 

 Frome, and Bosbury, where sandstones and cornstones, with fish- 

 remains, occur. (See Figs. 4, 12, 13, 14, and 15.) 



At Pontrilas Mr. Symonds has obtained remains of fishes from 

 the sandstones ; and he observes that above these strata are the 

 Cornstones of the High Common of Ewyas Harold ; and it is this 

 hard Cornstone that arrested the denudation which has been so 

 rife in this district, and that occupies the plateaux of many hills 

 in this part of Herefordshire and IMonmouthshire. 



Marly and sandy beds cap the hills of Rowlestone, which, in the 

 opinion of Mr. Symonds, are the equivalents of the building-stones 

 of Cradley, before mentioned. At Rowlestone these beds contain 

 Stylonunis Symondsii, Cephalaspis, and a giant Isopod, named by 

 Dr. H. Woodward Prcearcturus gigas. Near Hay these beds overlie 

 the lower Cornstones, and underlie an upper Cornstone series, 

 below the Brownstones of the Black Mountains. 



Near Abergavenny cornstones are exposed in the railway-cuttings 

 between that town and Llangvihangel. These, according to Mr, 

 Symonds, are the lowest beds exposed in the district, and the 

 upper Cornstone group forms the hills named the Deri and the 

 Rolben below the Sugar Loaf, and also the wooded escarpments 

 that lie below the Blorenge. Higher up the Brownstones set in, 

 and these unfossiliferous deposits constitute the upper strata of 

 the Sugar Loaf, and the Scyrrid Fawr in Monmouthshire ; while 

 in the Blorenge they are overlaid by higher beds of the Old 

 Red Sandstone. IMr. Symonds observes that "at the summit of 

 the Cornstone group there is probably a break in the stratigraphical 



1 Proc. G. S. i. 473. 



'^ W. S. Symonds, Edin. New Phil. Journ. April, 1859, p. 232. 



