Notices of Memoirs — A. Bell — Gravels of Wexford. 35 



II. — The " Manure " Gravels of Wexford. 1 By Alfred Bell. 



SINCE the last report the explorations carried out in the area of 

 the gravels, in Ballybrack, Balscaddin, and Balbriggan Bays, in 

 Larne Lough and the vicinity, and Portrush, have much augmented 

 the material previously accumulated. 



The exigencies of building and road-making have practically 

 obliterated the most prolific portion of the drifts in Ballybrack (or 

 Killiney) Bay and the deposit at Portrush, the only traces of the 

 shell-bed at the latter place occurring between the rocky masses on 

 the shore above high-water mark. Fortunately, previous to these 

 operations a quantity of material was obtained by the reporter, and 

 a list of about 120 species will be given in the sequel, wherein a brief 

 notice of the principal deposits will be found, with lists of fossils 

 obtained by the writer and previous observers. The line of research 

 to which an examination of the fossils has led is to the effect 

 (1) that the so-called Lower, Middle, and Upper drifts in Ballybrack 

 Bay have no connection whatever with the equally so-named deposits 

 in the English and Welsh areas, but are a continuation northward of 

 the Cotentin — St. Erth-Wexford sea-bed referred to in the second 

 report, 1888, further traces of this extension obtaining in the glacial 

 clays of the Isle of Man, Nassa reticosa, among other Pliocene 

 mollusca, occurring in the northern portion of the island. 



Coeval with the Pliocene fauna of Wexford, Ballybrack, and the 

 Isle of Man are numerous species of northern origin, and examination 

 of these suggests a Scandinavian rather than an American or Green- 

 landic origin — a suggestion intensified by the presence of a true 

 Scandinavian fauna in several parts of the Scottish lowlands from the 

 Clyde to the Forth and the eastern side of Scotland ; and it is not 

 perhaps too improbable to suppose that the Pliocene shells obtained 

 by Mr. T. F. Jamieson in Aberdeenshire came by this route rather 

 than from the Suffolk crag-beds. From the absence of the Pliocene 

 fauna northward of the before-quoted localities on the Irish coast and 

 Manxland, the writer is of opinion that the Irish Channel was closed 

 when the strata at these places were being accumulated, and 



(2) That the Severn drifts from Worcester northwards into Lanca- 

 shire are of much later date, not originating till the south of Ireland 

 was separated from the continent. And lastly, that the faunas 

 obtained both in England and Ireland, near Dublin and Wicklow, at 

 elevations of 1000 feet and more, are " remanie " and not in their 

 original habitat. 



An examination of the gravelly and shelly sand dredged from the 

 Turbot bank in the Irish Sea has long convinced the writer that the 

 accumulation is in the main of post-glacial age, intermixed with a 

 few recent forms, easily distinguished from the older species by their 

 appearance. The material is very rich in other groups than the 

 molluscan, catalogued already by Mr. Hyndman. Of all these he 

 purposes giving a list. 



1 Third Report read in Section C, Geology, at the Meeting of the British 

 Association, Newcastle-upon-Tyne, 1889. 



