in.] THE STONES IN THE WALL. 73 



are two great divisions of these New Bed sandstones, 

 ' ' Trias," as geologists call them. An upper, called in 

 Germany Keuper, which consists, atop, of the rich red 

 marl, below them, of sandstones, and of those vast 

 deposits of rock-salt, which have been long worked, 

 and worked to such good purpose, that a vast subsi- 

 dence of land has just taken place near Nantwich in 

 Cheshire; and serious fears are entertained lest the 

 town itself may subside, to fill up the caverns below, 

 from whence the salt has been quarried. Underneath 

 these beds again are those which carry the building- 

 stone of Runcorn. Now these beds altogether, in 

 Cheshire, at least, are about 3,400 feet thick; and 

 were not laid down in a year, or in a century either. 



Below them lies a thousand feet of sandstones, 

 known in Germany by the name of " Bunter," from 

 its mottled and spotted appearance. What lies under 

 them again, does not concern us just now. 



I said that the geologists called these beds the 

 Trias ; that is, the triple group. But as yet we have 

 heard of only two parts of it. Where is the third ? 



Not here, but in Germany. There, between the 

 Keuper above and the Bunter below, lies a great series 

 of limestone beds, which, from the abundance of fossils 

 which they contain, go by the name of Muschelkalk. 

 A long epoch must therefore have intervened between 

 the laying down of the Bunter and of the Keuper. 

 And we have a trace of that long epoch, even in 

 England. The Keuper lies, certainly, immediately on 

 the Bunter; but not always "conformably" on it. 

 That is, the beds are not exactly parallel. The Bunter 

 had been slightly tilted, and slightly waterworn, before 

 the Keuper was laid on it. 



