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56 Prof. Sedgwick on the Classification of the Strata [May," 



An examination of the vegetable fossils of the district makes 

 the analogy between the deposit just described, and the great 

 coal formations of England still more complete. Unfortunately 

 1 am possessed of hardly one of these fossils, and can, therefore, 

 only speak of them in general terms, without entering on any 

 specific comparison of them with the similar spoils derived from 

 our great coal fields. The most remarkable of these fossils may 

 be divided into the following orders. 1. Ferns. Many species 

 are found in the bituminous shale ; beautiful specimens are also 

 sometimes met with in the sandstone beds. A few species are 

 figured in the "Survey of the Yorkshire Coast." (PI. 2, figs. 

 4, 5, and PI. 3, figs. I, 2.) 2. Arundinaceous plants. Some 

 beautiful upright stems traverse a sandstone bed which overlies 

 one of the lower coal seams near Whitby. 3. Stems surrounded 

 with verrucate impressions, for the attachment of leaves, gene- 

 rally disposed in a quincunx order. Of these, there are many 

 varieties : two are figured in the " Survey of the Yorkshire 

 Coast," PI. 3, figs. 4, 5. — The condition of these fossils is pre- 

 cisely similar to that of those numerous fossils belonging to 

 analogous orders of the .vegetable kingdom in our great coal 

 deposits. On the contrary, there is hardly any thing resembling 

 them in the beds associated with the oolitic series in the south 

 of England. 



The organic remains of testaceousvanimals found in this dis- 

 trict do, however, form a link between the Yorkshire beds and 

 the general oolitic series. It is well observed by the authors of 

 the " Survey of the Yorkshire Coast," that these remains much 

 more nearly resemble the fossils of the Pickering oolite than 

 those of the alum-shale. They are very irregularly distributed, 

 in many places entirely wanting, and in general only abundant 

 in those beds where an unusual quantity of calcareous matter is 

 present. In a hasty passage along the coast, I was able to 

 detach very few characteristic specimens. The following imper- 

 fect notices respecting the grouping of the fossils are all which 

 I have it in my power to offer from personal observation. 1. In 

 some beds of grit under the great shale bed of Scarborough 

 Castle Hill were, beds of the gryphaa dilatata, ostrea Marshii (t), 

 perna aviculoides, fragments of a pimia, a deeply sulcated tere- 

 bratula, serpida, &c. 2. Some calcareous concretions said to be 

 derived from the shale beds north of Filey Bridge, contained beleni' 

 7iites, ammonites subl(cvis, and fragments of other ammonites, avicula 

 {inequivalvis^.). 3. In some beds ofsandstone and coarse oolitic cal- 

 careous grit near Cayton mill (between Filey Bridge and Scarbo- 



difFerent parts of its range. A section described by Messrs. Young and Bird (p. 116), 

 neither reaches the top nor the bottom of the formation, yet passes through beds, the 

 united thickness of which is about 500 feet. Another section (determined by boring) 

 had been proved to a depth of 328 feet below the Cloughton Wyke limestone, without 

 reaching the alum-shale. The greatest thickness of the whole formation is perhaps not 

 less than 700 or 800 feet. 



