SPEETON CLAY. 75 



beacon, eight hundred and five feet above the sea. From its last high 

 precipice the chalk descends along the shore by an irregular broken 

 escarpment covered with diluvium, and at length its lowest layers are 

 seen. These are always characterised by an admixture of red chalk 

 containing the very peculiar belemnites, which Dr. Lister noticed so long 

 ago, as occurring, semper in terra rubra ferruginea. * Serpulae, small 

 inocerami, and terebratula? have been found in this red chalk. 



To complete our description of the chalk cliffs, we may notice that 

 the chalk rubble, which so uniformly covers the stratum on the south 

 side of Flamborough head, is hardly ever seen on the north side. Caves 

 abound in the northern cliff which are exposed to the full rush of the 

 sea ; but not on the southern side, where the water is more calm. Or- 

 ganic remains are very abundant in the upper part of the stratum be- 

 tween Bridlington and the south landing-place ; but the lower and 

 harder chalk contains hardly any other fossil than the inocerami. Upon 

 the whole, the chalk of Yorkshire is comparatively poor in fossils. 

 About forty species only have yet been found in it, whilst thrice that 

 number have rewarded the collectors in Norfolk, Wiltshire, Sussex, and 

 Kent. 



CLIFFS OPPOSITE THE VALE OF PICKERING. 



FROM the termination of the white cliffs the coast bends to the 

 northward, and exhibits in succession, rising from beneath the chalk, the 

 Speeton clay and the coralline oolite series. The Speeton clay shews 

 itself immediately in contact with the red chalk, so that there can be no 

 question of its being the next subjacent stratum ; and therefore it will 

 be useless to look for the greensand formation in this part of Yorkshire. 

 The sand represented on Mr. Smith's map of Yorkshire, as ranging on 



* For want of examining the localities which he indicates, geologists have often given the name 

 belemnites Listeri to a very different species, (Smith, " Strata, ident. Brickearth," fig. 4, and 5,) 

 and assigned Lister's fossil to the gault and weald clay. 



L 2 



