102 Horace B. Woodtcard — Geology of the 



collecting from this lower bed, but I am disposed to group it with 

 the Great Oolite Series. The dark-grey and greenish clays are 

 similar to beds which characterize the Upper Estuarine Series, and 

 clays with rootlets, as well as layers with marine fossils, are well 

 known to occur in that division.^ The representatives of the Inferior 

 Oolite are probably confined to sandy strata (Northampton Sand). 



The details of the Public Well at Brackley, kindly communicated 

 by Mr. E. J. Eussel, do not help to elucidate the matter, although 

 they serve to indicate the varying character of the beds between the 

 Great Oolite Limestone and the Upper Lias. The well was sunk 

 60 ft. 6 in, and then bored, and the following strata were penetrated : — 



Soil 



Z^Marl 



Beds of limestone ... 



^ i. rv Ti c • Callous clay 



U-reat Oolite beries St- j. i j j i 



Limestone beds and marl ... 



1 Callous clay... 



l^ Eubble limestone ... 



AT 4-1 J. o J I Red sand 

 A' ortuampton band \ -ry, i, . j 



f Very hard blue clay 

 Upper Lias ,., \ Stone 



[ Blue clay 



^ Stone 



I Sand and hard clay... 



Middle Lias ... -! ^°'*^^r?'l 



I Very hard stone 



I Sand and hard clay... 



\^ Very hard stone 



198 6 

 Helmdon Stone was formerly held in repute, as, according to 

 Morton,- it was used in the mansions of Stowe and Woburn ; but for 

 150 years or more the quarrying of the stone for building-purposes 

 appears to have been abandoned. Some specimens of the stone 

 have been recently sent to the Museum at Jermyn Street by 

 Mr. T. K. Curtis, of Brackley, and they consist of shelly oolitic and 

 earthy limestone, evidently belonging to the Great Oolite. Judging 

 previously by the old records, I had been led to regard the stone as 

 of Inferior Oolite age.^ 



Chalky Boulder-clay was shown in the cutting east of Eadstone, 

 and to the south this Drift rests on clayey beds belonging to the 

 Estuarine Series. Crossing the stream, we pass an old quarry where 

 Great Oolite has been worked, and enter the cutting east of Hill 

 Farm, where Boulder-clay five or six feet thick rests on Great Oolito 

 Limestone. In places the Boulder-clay has been weathered into 

 a brown stony loam, but, further on, its grey and chalky character 

 is well seen, and some sections of considerable interest were opened 

 up. Much of the Great Oolite Limestone is a soft, pale, earthy 



1 Judd, "Geol. Eutland," p. 189, etc. ; H. B. W., "Lower Oolitic Eocks of 

 England," p. 402. 



^ "Nat. Hist. Northants," 170-5, pp. 108, 126. 

 s " Lower Oolitic Eocks of England," p. 475. 



