HOLDERNESS. 47 



ton ; and, at all these places, the chalk sinks below the wide diluvial 

 plains of Holderness. The extent of surface occupied by the chalk 

 formation of the wolds is about three hundred and seventy-six square 

 miles, and the thickness of the stratum not less than five hundred feet. 

 Throughout its whole course its mineral characters are much alike ; and 

 its fossil remains nearly identical : yet, as the beds are more completely 

 exposed on the sea-coast, it is from Bridlington and Flamborough that 

 most fossils are procured. The rock is generally much harder than 

 in the southern counties, and the layers of flint are more diffused through 

 its substance. On the western slopes of the wolds, as about Bishop- 

 Wilton and Brantingham, the lower portion of the chalk is softer than the 

 upper part, and apparently more argillaceous ; it seems to correspond 

 with the chalk marl of Oxfordshire, but no fossils have been collected 

 from it. At the bottom are red layers, containing small belemnites 

 (B. Listeri) and terebratulEe, which do not occur above. The blue clay 

 of Speeton ends abruptly under the chalk, without any traces of gradual 

 change. 



In wells and pits sunk on the wolds, the chalk has been several times 

 perforated, and found to rest on Kimmeridge clay, near Sherburn, and on 

 lias, containing characteristic fossils, (of which specimens have been pre- 

 sented to the Yorkshire Philosophical Society by the Rev. T. Rankin,) 

 at Huggate. The latter fact is highly important, as it shews to what an 

 extent the unconformed arrangement prevails under the central part of 

 of the wolds. 



HOLDERNESS. 



HOLDERNESS, taken as a natural division, may be said to include 

 the whole country lying between the eastern slope of the Yorkshire 

 wolds, the German ocean, and the channel of the Humber. Its 

 western limit passes by Bridlington, Burton-Agnes, Driffield, Beswick, 

 Beverley, and Cottingham, to Hessle ; what may have been anciently its 

 extent towards the east and south-east, is not easily determined, because 



