PERMIAN. 213 



Stephen, and are largely quarried in places for lime and building- 

 stone. Some of the beds were used by the Romans in the 

 construction of Hadrian's Wall. Sedgwick remarked on their 

 similarity to the Dolomitic Conglomerate of the Mendip Hills.' 

 The Brockram is also dolomitic in places, and although much 

 older than the Dolomitic Conglomerate, it was evidently one 

 of the shore-deposits of the lake in which the New Red rocks 

 were accumulated, and represents different horizons of the Penrith 

 Sandstone. Mr. Goodchild has suggested that shore-ice may have 

 aided in its formation.^ 



Footprints of animals (Ichnites — Reptilian ?) have been met with 

 in both the Penrith and the St. Bees Sandstones.^ 



The Hilton Shales or Plant-beds were first described by Mr. 

 E. W. Binney from Hilton Beck, a stream that descends from 

 Roman Fell to the Eden, near Appleby. They have yielded 

 specimens of Ullmania, Alei/iopten's, Cardiocarpum, Odonlopteris, 

 Sphenopttris, etc., and may represent the Marl Slate of Durham. 



The St. Bees Sandstone is quarried near Curthwaite and Aspatria. 

 It forms much of the beautiful rock-scenery along the banks of the 

 Eden, south of Corby Castle, and for this reason the name Corby 

 Sandstone was assigned to it by Murchison. Certain shaly beds 

 included with the St. Bees Sandstone at Cummersdale, south of 

 Carlisle, are locally known as the Cummersdale Beds. 



While Sedgwick and other authorities have considered the St. 

 Bees Sandstone to be Bunter, Murchison regarded it as Permian, 

 a view adopted by Mr. Holmes, because the Sandstone appears to 

 be more closely connected with the New Red strata on which 

 it rests, than with those overlying it.^ At the same time, when 

 we compare the succession of beds with that exhibited in other 

 areas, there appears little doubt that the St. Bees Sandstone 

 should be grouped as Bunter. The following is the section at St. 

 Bees Head (Barrowmouth) : — 



Feet. 

 Bunter. — St. Bees Sandstone 



I Red and gieen marls or shales with gypsum 30 



Permian. \ Yellow magnesian limestone with casts of fossils 1 1 



( Breccia with fragments of Whitehaven Sandstone 3 



Coal-measures. — Whitehaven Sandstone. 



The sandstone of St. Bees Head was used in the construction of 

 Furness Abbey. 



The Limestone breccia at Park, in Furness, is termed the " Crab rock." The 

 Haematite ores are said to be sealed up by this rock. They occur in cracks and 

 cavities of the Carboniferous Limestone of Ulverston, and at Cleator, south-east of 

 Whitehaven, over an area at one time covered by Permian rocks. 



1 T. G. S. (2), iv. 383. 



^ Trans. Cumberland Assoc. No. ix. 1885, p. 31. See also T. McK. Hughes, 

 Q. J. xxxiii. 422. 



^ G. Varty Smith, Q. J. xl. 479. 



* Sedgwick, T. G. S. (2), iv. 388; Murchison and Harkness, Q.J. xx. 15 1, 

 157, xviii. 205, 216 ; Rev. A. Irving, G. Mag. 1882, p. 162. 



