451 



Bovey beds belong to the Post- Pliocene epoch. In 1856 , Dr. Croker, 

 of Bovey Tracey, sent to the same Society a paper in which he men- 

 tioned the occurrence of large " flabelliform leaves," together " with 

 tangled masses of vegetable remains in some of the higher beds." 



In 1860 Sir Charles Lyell and Dr. Falconer visited Bovey, and 

 returned with the impression that the formation belonged to the 

 miocene age. The latter introduced the subject to Miss Burdett 

 Coutts as one which it was eminently desirable to have fully and 

 carefully investigated. Miss Coutts having soon after visited the 

 district with the author, requested him to undertake an investigation 

 of the deposit, which he accordingly did ; and at once engaged Mr. 

 Keeping, the well-known and experienced fossil collector of the Isle 

 of Wight. 



Sections of the deposit at the coal-pit show a series of beds natu- 

 rally dividing themselves into three parts, namely, 



1 st, or uppermost, a bed of sandy clay, containing large angular 

 and subangular stones, chiefly of Dartmoor derivation, unconformably 

 covering the lower beds. No stones occur below this. 



2nd. A series of twenty-six beds of lignite, clay and sand, the base 

 of which is a bed of ferruginous quartzose sand, in some places 27 

 feet thick, in others less than one foot, but which everywhere occurs 

 as a well-marked feature in the pit-sections. Excepting this bed, 

 sand is almost entirely confined to the uppermost part of the division. 



3rd. A set of forty-five beds of regularly alternating lignite and 

 clay. 



The stones by which it is characterized, and its unconformability, 

 show that the uppermost division could not have been formed under 

 the same conditions, nor probably in the same geological period as 

 the two lower series. This view has been confirmed by the identifi- 

 cation of certain fossil leaves found in the clays of the uppermost 

 series. 



The two lower series are strictly conformable, and dip 12 

 towards S. 35 W. (mag.). Five beds, one of clay and four of 

 lignite, in the second series, and nine, one of clay and eight of 

 lignite in the lower, a total of fourteen, have yielded fossils, all of 

 them remains of plants only. A few only of these beds require par- 

 ticular mention. The seventh bed is, in many places, a mat of the 

 .debris of a coniferous tree, the Sequoia Couttsice, and fronds of 



