84 Lincolnshire Notes & Queries. 



and with a dip to the east, overlapping in regular succession, 

 not unlike the leaves of an open book. * Much of the 

 picturesque beauty of the shire is due to the two main ranges 

 of hills, the chalk wolds and the oolite, having an easy slope to 

 the east, and more or less bold escarpments to the west. The 

 chalk or wold district commences at Barton-on-Humber, and 

 terminates near Burgh-in-the-Marsh, fifty-two miles, dipping 

 beneath the fen to appear again beyond the Wash at Hunstan- 

 ton, its greatest breadth is fourteen miles. The oolite runs 

 like a spine through the whole length of the county, and is 

 represented by a narrow band in the north and south of 

 Lincoln (where it is once cut through and divided by the bed 

 of the Witham), spreading into the wide elevated district 

 known as the c Heath,' where on its western side it forms the 

 striking escarpment called the c Cliff,' predominating the level 

 lias and new red sandstones of the Trent Valley. Between 

 these ranges of the chalk and the oolite lies the great central 

 plain of Lincolnshire greensands, gault, Kimmeridge, and 

 Oxford clays ; these all in South Lincolnshire pass beneath the 

 peats, clays, and gravels of the fens. There is still a third line 

 of elevated land formed by the Lias, Rhaetic, and red-marl beds 

 extending from the mouth of the Trent to as far as Gains- 

 borough. At its northern extremity, near Scunthorpe, is the 

 rich bed of iron ore, twenty-seven feet thick, which has already 

 added so much to the wealth and importance of this otherwise 

 poor and barren district. A section across the county from 

 east to west at its greatest breadth, passes first through the 

 chalky boulder-clay, overlaid in north-east Lincolnshire by a 

 considerable thickness of warp, and generally along the 

 maritime plain by recent alluvial deposits, sand, and clays. 

 In the Humber marshes borings for water show twelve to 

 forty-five feet of clean stoneless warp, with an occasional 

 cockle-shell ; beneath the warp is the forest bed, two and a 

 half feet in thickness, resting on about a foot of whitish clay 

 and sand. This old indigenous forest crops out at various 

 places, both within the Humber and the sea coast, at low- 



*The Journals of the Geological Society contain several important papers on 

 the geology of Lincolnshire, which may be studied with advantage by those who 

 take an interest in the subject, such are ' Rhaetic beds near Gainsborough ; * Strata 

 which form the base of the Lincolnshire ivolds,' 1867, Vol. XXIII., pp. 315,227 j 

 Glacial and Post-glacial strata of Lincolnshire, Vol. XXIV., 1868, p. 146; Neocomian 

 strata of Lincolnshire, Vol. XXVI., 1870, p. 326; Lias and Oolite of north-ivest 

 Lincolnshire, Vol. XXXI., 1875, p. 115 ; Southerly extension of the Hessle Boulder Clay, 

 Vol. XXXV., 1879, p. 397. 



