Salopian 



' Lower -[ Middle (B) 



Pekmian ' 



295 



T. C. CantriU — Spiro ibis- Limestones. 449 



Feet. 

 I Upper (C) Trappoid breccia ..... . 450 



/■&. Marls, and one thin baud of sandstone . 50'\ 

 5. Cornstone . . . . . .10 



4. Marls, and 3 to 4 feet of brown sandstone 100 



3. Cornstone 10 



2. Marls 100 



\\. Cornstone and calcareous red sandstones . 25^' 

 ^ Lower (A) Sandstones and marls, say .... . 200 



With the trappoid breccia (C) we have no concern here. The so- 

 called cornstones of the Middle division (B) appear to be calcareous 

 sandstones containing small, rather angular chips and pebbles of 

 pyroclastic rocks, with occasional pebbles of limestone. 



The Lower Sandstones and Marls (A), which I correlated in 1895 

 with the fossiliferous beds of Sandwell, Hamstead, and Wyre Forest,' 

 and claimed as Coal-measures, have since been identified by my 

 colleague Dr. Walcot Gibson* with the Keele Beds of the North 

 Staffordshire Coal-measures. The beds consist of red and crimson 

 marls, mottled blue, with some pale-red sandstones and occasional 

 bands of conglomeratic cornstone; some of the sandstones and marls 

 are characterized by small green decoloration spots or ' fish-eyes ', 



Hagley. — The pipe-trench entered these Keele Beds about 250 yards 

 west of Wassel Grove Lane at Hagley.^ At a point 100 yards west 

 of the lane the debris from the trench contained small j)ieces of 

 grey limestone, which, though they did not 5'ield the characteristic 

 Annelid, were clearly pieces of Spirorhis-\un.e^ionQ, derived doubtless 

 from an outcrop close by (Fig. 1,1). This band apparently lies not 

 more than 50 feet above the base of the Keele Beds, the lowest 

 members of which form a slight escarpment, about 300 yards to the 

 north-east, easily to be recognized where it crosses the Birmingham 

 Road immediately west of the Gipsy's Tent Inn. Obviously, then, 

 this band of limestone is a new one, and will not do for any of those 

 found at Sandwell, Hamstead, or in the Wyre Forest district : it is 

 much too low in the sequence. 



Romsley, — The same crimson marls with red sandstones apparently 

 extend in an easterly direction through Hagley Wood and Offmoor 

 Wood, and were open to view at several points on the pipe-trench, 

 which gradually crosses the oiitcrop and slowly ascends the sequence. 

 Just where the pipe-line emerges from Offmoor Wood, at a point 

 500 yards I^.N.E. of the Fox Inn at Komsley (Fig. 1, 2), the debris 

 again contained small pieces of limestone, though here also the fossil 

 was not forthcoming. The horizon at which this outcrop occurs is 

 probably at least 250 or 300 feet above the base of the Keele Beds, 

 and to judge by the 1 inch geological map it is certainly considerably 

 higher than any horizon so far reached by the trench, and I think 

 there is little doubt that it lies well within the Middle subdivision (B). 



Between Horsepool Farm and the Halesowen Railway the trench 

 seems to have entered on a paler-coloured group of beds, containing 

 some greenish-grey sandstone and conglomeratic cornstone. The tip 



1 Quart. Journ. Gaol. Soc, vol. li, 1895, p. 528, 



- Ibid., vol. Ivii, 1901, p. 251. 



3 Old Series 1 inch map, 54 N.W. ; 6 inch, Worcestershire, 9 N.E. 



DECADE v. — VOL. VI. — NO. X. 29 



