142 THE GEOLOGY OF MOW COP, ETC. 



millstone grit, which assume the form of a saddle on its 

 western aspect, so that lower down the hill the Biddulph 

 coal measures rest upon it. Below these, leading down 

 towards the railway station, about one quarter of a mile 

 from it, the division between the coal measures and the 

 new red sandstone is distinctly seen crossing the road, 

 and forming what is called the " red rock fault " of this 

 part of Cheshire. Proceeding northwards on a line with 

 the railway as far as Grotto Wood Farm, and in a lane 

 close by to the left, the same circumstance is clearly shown, 

 namely, dark coal shales on one side of the fault and soft 

 mottled sandstone on the other. About one mile still 

 further north, close by the Lime Kiln Farm, we come to 

 a singular and almost unique affair in witnessing an upheaval 

 of the carboniferous limestone nearly to the surface, through 

 all its superincumbent strata, with a throw, it is said, of 

 8,000 feet. This mass is dome-shaped, displacing the lower 

 keuper sandstone to the west and the Yoredale rocks 

 eastward. There is 2,000 feet in thickness of these rocks 

 striking up the hill, which assists in the formation of 

 Congleton Edge, and the lower division of them, for some 

 distance from the boss of limestone, has nearly a vertical 

 dip arising from the excessive squeezing they were subject 

 to during the disruption of the surrounding strata. Towards 

 the summit of the Edge they are overlaid by the first and 

 third beds of the millstone grit, which, along with them, 

 dip at a very acute angle to the south-east, and form the 

 coal basin of the Biddulph trough. The bold ridge which 

 is observable eastward on the opposite side of this valley 

 (a distance of about three miles from Biddulph Moor,) 

 consists of the outcropping of the same strata I have just 

 described, namely, the first and third beds of the millstone 

 grit with the Yoredale rocks lying below them. These 

 grit beds are very persistent in this district, since from 



