212 Dr. C. A. Matley — Bunter Pehhle-heds in Midlands. 



Midland Bunter came from the north-west, though he agrees that 

 the fossiliferous quartzite pebbles could not have come from that 

 direction, and he suggests for these a south-easterly derivation 

 (Suffolk). 



The question cannot, however, be considered as finally settled by 

 this pronounceme'nt, and I am tempted to re-open it in the hope of 

 stimulating further investigation. I also urge a fuller consideration 

 of Mr. Shrubsole's arguments, which do not appear to have been 

 sufficiently appreciated. 



Although hitherto refraining from the discussion of this problem^ 

 I have for over thirty years taken an interest in it. While yet 

 a schoolboy I followed the example of P. B. Brodie, W. Jerome 

 Harrison, and others by collecting the fossiliferous quartzite pebbles 

 of Bunter origin found in the Drift of the Birmingham district. At 

 a later date, when engaged in mapping the Keuper Marls of 

 Warwickshire, I turned my attention again to the associated 

 Drift, from which I got together a further collection of the 

 fossiliferous, as well as of non-fossiliferous pebbles. It was not 

 till last winter, however, that I was able to take up their 

 examination in detail, and it so happened that I had not proceeded 

 far with the work when I had to leave it owing to taking 

 up an appointment in India at very short notice. As I shall 

 not be able to resume this work for at least tAvo years, it seems 

 convenient to give a short account of the evidence on which I came 

 years ago to conclusions almost completely in accord with those of 

 Mr. Shrubsole, and which I have as yet seen no good ground for 

 modifying. 



A large proportion of the pebbles which occur so abundantly in the 

 Drift of the Birmingham district have unquestionably been derived 

 from Bunter beds, and though in theory it appears unsafe to frame 

 arguments as to the Bunter deposits from material found in the Drift, 

 the worker who is acquainted with both sets of deposits has usually 

 no hesitation in deciding that certain pebbles in the Drift are of 

 Triassic origin. I should, of course, have preferred to deal with the 

 Bunter pebbles at first hand, but my geological work happened to lie 

 on Keuper Marls, and the investigation of the Bunter material found 

 in the Drift of that area was only pursued as a side issue to my study 

 of the Drift. 



Fossiliferous quartzite pebbles are distinctly rare ; as Mr. W. J. 

 Harrison has remarked, probably not more than one pebble in 

 a thousand is fossiliferous. Those containing worm-burrows are most 

 abundant, and my collection contains about fifty such pebbles (of 

 which two came direct from the Bunter Conglomerate), though I could 

 have obtained probably twice that number had I collected every 

 specimen I found. These burrows are all straight sub-cylindrical 

 tubes which can be grouped roughly into about four types, according 

 to diameter and amount of corrugation. The differences may not, 

 however, be specific, but be dependent merely upon the amount of 



^ Except in the discussion on Dr. A. E. Salter's j)aper " On the occurrence 

 of Pebbles of Schorl-rock from the South--vvest of England in the Drift Deposits 

 of Southern and Eastern England " : Q.J.G.S., vol. b;, pp. 220-3, 1899. 



