46 JOURNEY TO SCOTLAND. [1835. 



and my sketch of the specimen so imperfect, that I waited until 

 another trip to Shropshire would enable me to afford you more 

 minute details. 



The fossil in question was found in a vertical position in a 

 fine-grained sandstone, associated with numerous plants, prin- 

 cipally of the genera Calamites and Stigmaria, lying in all posi- 

 tions. The stem was truncated ahout eighteen inches above the 

 roots, which, to the number of four, were prolonged from it to 

 a length of about four feet ; but as the seams of the sandstone 

 were continued through these roots, the lower parts of them 

 were separated and lost upon the removal of the specimen, 

 which, at the time that I saw it, had been so acted upon by 

 the weather that the external marking was nearly obliterated. 



This sandstone bed overlies a thick deposit of shale contain- 

 ing ironstone, and characterised by numerous exuvise which are 

 totally wanting in the sandstone. In this latter, in common with 

 several other beds of sandstone, the larger fossils are generally 

 in a vertical position, traversing several divisions of the rock, 

 whereas the lesser specimens lie in all positions, but most fre- 

 quently horizontally, and in the seams of the beds. . . . 

 Trusting that this slight communication may be yet of some 

 service, I remain, my dear sir, yours sincerely, 



J. PKESTWICH, Junr. 



As a worker not altogether unknown, for the value 

 of his Coalbrook Dale paper (although not yet pub- 

 lished) had been at once recognised, he was present at 

 the meeting of the British Association in Dublin in 

 1835. In the same year he again made a length- 

 ened tour in Scotland, when an extract from a letter 

 posted at Inverness gives an account of a visit to 

 Edinburgh : 



J. Prestwick to C. Prestwich. 



MY DEAREST KATE, . . . Now I must take you back 

 again to Edinburgh, where I was detained much longer than 

 was agreeable. However, some letters of introduction, with 



