222 REPORT — 1903. 



overlying sandstone would have been flat on its under surface, as has 

 been shown by Messrs. Davies and Reade.^ 



Again, we could hardly expect to find the sharpness of the prints to 

 be so well preserved had they been subjected to the erosive action of 

 water moving with sufficient rapidity to carry fairly coarse sand. 



There are, however, some few cases in which the sand would appear to 

 have been deposited by water, where the casts of the prints consist of laminie 

 of rather micaceous sandstone. An example of this may be seen in the 

 collection at University College, Liverpool. Such prints are very imperfect. * 



Occasionally prints are met with on rippled surfaces with the ripples 

 extending across the prints. An example of this may be seen in a large 

 rippled slab at the Liverpool Public Museum, where the ripple marks 

 are distinctly traceable across some large imperfect prints ; but a long 

 series of smaller prints crossing these seem to have been made subsequently 

 to the rippling. There is also one large print from Storeton in the 

 University College, Liverpool, collection distinctly showing the same 

 thing. In these cases the larger prints may have been made whilst there 

 was a thin layer of water over the mud, just sufficient to form the short 

 ripples represented. Such rippled surfaces are usually free from desicca- 

 tion cracks, and the wind-borne sand may have been deposited before the 

 water had quite disappeared. The drying would in that case be very 

 gradual, and the curvature of the layer by the very unequal rate of 

 desiccation of the upper and lower surfaces would be prevented. The 

 covering of the mud by wind-borne sand whilst it still retained its moisture 

 will explain the absence of cracks on some surfaces, and their presence in 

 others where the thickness of the beds of marl is the same. 



Character of the Beds in which Footprints occur. 



Cheshire. — The quarries at Storeton are in the Lower Keuper Sand- 

 stone. It is here brought down by a trough fault into the Upper Bunter, 

 which bounds it on the east and west, and so forms the ridge that runs 

 approximately north and south from Oxton to Higher Bebington. 



The point now being worked, and where footprints are obtained, is at 

 the northern end of the south quarry, and the working shows a vertical 

 face of 120 feet. The footprint beds occur rather above the middle of the 

 face, and just there are three in number, confined within a thickness of 

 3 or 4 feet. They were estimated by Mr. Morton ^ to be about 

 124 feet above the base of the Keuper. The stone obtained is a fine 

 grained sandstone, white or cream-coloured, with occasionally more 

 deeply iron-stained surfaces. There are a few beds of very red marl from 

 an inch to some feet in thickness, and thinner beds of a fine white clay. 

 In the stratum containing the footprint beds the sandstone is flaggy, but 

 the rest is rather massive and compact, somewhat soft towards the top, 

 harder below, the best stone being obtained below the footprint bed. 



The method of working is to clear a space of 30 or 40 feet square 

 and work downwards, so that the surface of the footprint beds is only 

 exposed occasionally and its extent limited. It is hoped that careful 

 observations may be continued in order to ascertain whether some slight 

 difierences that have been noticed in the footprints from the three beds 

 are really characteristic of the three beds over a larger area. 



' ' Description of the Strata exposed during the Construction of the Seacombe 

 Branch of the Wirral Railway,' Proc. Liverpool Geol. Soc, vol. vii. p; 329. 



' Gcdo.jii <J' the Country around Livurjjool, 2nd edit., p. 106. 



