238 THE BATH OOLITE PERIOD. CHAP. 



FOSSILS OF THE GREAT OOLITE GROUP. 



The following- list of Great oolite fossils includes also those 

 of the Bradford clay and Forest marble, which are in this district 

 always close allies and often inseparable parts of the thicker oolitic 

 series, but excludes those of the Stonesfield beds. Their partially 

 estuarine character is chiefly manifested by drifted wood and bones 

 of amphibious and terrestrial reptiles, and a few rare examples of a 

 fresh-water bivalve. The localities are limited to the neighbourhood 

 of Stonesfield and Oxford, for the purpose of presenting the forms 

 of oolitic life in what seems one natural series, in a limited part 

 of the sea-basin. The far richer assemblage which occurs at 

 Minchin- Hampton has been made well known by the researches 

 of Mr. Lycett. To his comprehensive work, in conjunction with 

 Professor Morris, on the Great Oolite Fossils in the Memoirs of 

 the Pala3ontographical Society, and to his Handbook for the 

 Cotteswold Hills, recourse may be had for many excellent figures. 



It is chiefly from the deep cutting on the railway near North- 

 leigh, south of Stonesfield, and from other cuttings and quarries 

 at Enslow Bridge and Islip, that we obtain our fossils from the 

 oolite and the forest marble. Mr. "Whiteaves was very successful 

 in both localities. From his lists g , the Memoirs of the Geological 

 Survey, and our own explorations, the following Catalogue is 

 prepared. The Islip fossils, marked F. M., are from white beds of 

 clay, like that of Bradford, with partial beds of shelly stone, above 

 the Great oolite. At Kirtlington Station and in the Enslow Bridge 

 quarries the upper parts of the Great oolite, and in the cutting near 

 Northleigh the middle and lower parts, have been examined. 



So many of these fossils are repeated in the cornbrash, that sure 

 upper limit of the Bath oolite series, that it seems natural and 

 useful to combine in one catalogue all the species known in the 

 immediate vicinity of Oxford, between the Stonesfield slate and the 

 Oxford clay. 



The following abbreviations are used : G. O. for Great oolite ; 

 F. M. for Forest marble and Bradford clay ; C. B. for Cornbrash. 



% Reports of the British Association, 1857. 



