IRON SAND FORIVIATION. 31 



to admit of their characters being correctly determined. This hmestone 

 extends from Hastings to near Battel, Ashburnham, Netherfield, Bur- 

 wash, Kotherfield, and Framfield ; and although its outcrop is in many 

 places obscured, or altogether concealed by alluvial deposits, yet there can 

 be no doubt of its continuity beneath the surface, along the tract of country 

 here described. On the estate of the Earl of Ashburnham extensive Ume- 

 works have long been estabhshed, and previously to the present depressed 

 state of agriculture, were carried on upon a very extended scale. These 

 works are in the centre of Archer's Wood, about two miles from Battel. 

 The limestone is worked by means of shafts, sunk to the depth of from 90 

 to 120 feet. The following is the order in which the beds ussually occur : 



1. Loam of an ochraceous or greyish colour, with thin layers of friable 

 shelly limestone. 



2. Grey limestone, remarkably firm and compact, composed of bivalve 

 shells, converted into spathose calcareous spar, and held together by a 

 calca: eous cement, alternating with grey marl and shale. 



3. Compact blue shale and limestone, in alternate layers, from 14 to 20 

 inches thick, and destitute of organic remains. 



The depth of these beds is indeterminate, but exceeds fifty feet. The 

 strata incUne towards the south-west, and dip beneath the iron sand of 

 Ashburnham Park. 



Mr. Young has given the following admeasurements of the entire 

 series of Hmestone and shale, exposed by one of the shafts at Archer's 

 Wood ; enumerating them according to their order of succession. 



