390 CRETACEOUS. 



sand fringes the Marlborough Downs from a little south of Swindon 

 to Cherhill and Devizes, spreading out eastwards in the Vale of 

 Pewsey (or Pusey) and appearing again in the inliers of Shalbourn, 

 south-west of Inkpen, and of Burghclere and Kingsclere.^ (See Fig. 

 63, p. 382.) South of Devizes, the Greensand extends by Market 

 Lavington to Westbury and Warminster, and thence by Heaven's 

 Gate in Longleat Park to Maiden Bradley and Alfred's Tower at 

 Stourton. It borders the Vale of Wardour, being exposed at 

 Fonthill on the north side, and at Fovant on the south ; ' and still 

 further south it forms a fine escarpment, about 800 feet high at 

 Shaftesbury. 



Our earliest knowledge of the Wiltshire fossils is largely due to 

 the labours of Miss Etheldred Benett, who had made sketches of 

 the Warminster Sponges as early as 1816.^ The Sponges include 

 Siphonia tulipa {pyri/ormis), Hallirhoa (^Siphonia) costata, H. agarici- 

 formis, Jerea {^Siphonia) Wehsteri, Cheiiendopora fimgiforjnis, etc.* 

 They have mostly been obtained from pits on the west of War- 

 minster. The Plant Seqiioiites Woodward/ has also been found in 

 this neighbourhood. Many specimens of Mollusca were obtained 

 by INIiss Benett from a field named Brimsgrove at Shute (or Chute) 

 Farm, south of Shirewater in Longleat Park, near Warminster. 



The term Warminster beds was used by Mr. C. J. A. Meyer in 1874 for the 

 upper beds of the Greensand of this neighbourhood ; and from the fact that many 

 of the fossils are found in the so-called Chloritic Marl of the Isle of Wight and 

 of Chardstock, he further proposed to group the Warminster beds with that 

 formation.^ (See sequel.) 



The Upper Greensand is exposed in small quarries and road- 

 cuttings south and south-east of Warminster, where the beds 

 consist of greensand with indurated beds and chert. The chert- 

 beds, which are worked for road-metal, are largely composed, as 

 Dr. Hinde points out, of spicules of lithistid and tetractinellid 

 sponges.'' Many Echinodermata {Saknia, Diadema, etc.) have been 

 found in the Greensand of Warminster ; and a large number of the 

 fossils, as at Blackdown in Devonshire, are replaced by chalcedony. 



In Dorsetshire the Upper Greensand, consisting of glauconitic 

 sand with concretions, about 70 feet thick, may be seen at Punfield 

 Cove, north of Swanage, where many fossils have been obtained.'' 

 (See Fig. 54, p. 347.) Greenish sand and sandstone crop out 

 beneath the Chalk along the Purbeck Chalk range, and may be 

 seen at Church Knowle, west of Corfe Castle and other places 

 between Swanage and Worbarrow Bay. The beds form a fertile 

 strip of ground below the downs. Beneath the Chalk at White 



1 T. R. Jones, Geol. History of Newbury, 1S54, p. 34. 



2 Fitton, T. G. S. (2), iv. 246. 



^ A Catalogue of the Organic Remains of the county of Wilts, 1831 ; see also 

 Phillips, Geol. Oxford, p. 432. 



* Dr. G. J. Hinde, Catalogue of Fossil Sponges, 1SS3. 



5 Q. J. XXX. 371 ; G. Mag. 1878, p. 547. 



« Phil. Trnns. 1885, p. 419. 



'' H. G. Fordham, P. Geol. Assoc, iv. 511. 



