G. W. Lamplugh — The Bridlington Shell-heel, etc. 539 



bed was found in the drift at Dimlington, 32 miles south of Brid- 

 lington. The most complete account of this bed, that I have seen, 

 is the following, by Mr. S. V. Wood, jun,' . . . . " The seam of 

 sand in, but near the top of, the Basement Clay of Holderness at 

 Dimlington, whei'e its junction with the Purple Clay which over- 

 lies it is displayed in the cliff, was detected by a party of geologists 

 consisting of Sir C. Lyell, Mr. Leonard Lyell, Prof. T. M. Hughes, 

 and Mr. Rome ; and a description of it was sent to me by Sir C. 

 Lyell with the molluscan remains which they extracted. These 

 remains, especially those of the Nucula, were, many of them, 

 broken, though freshly fractured and unworn ; but the written 

 description sent me with them was that they were taken from a 

 seam of dark sand literally packed with perfect specimens of Nucula 

 CohboldicB, which seemed to be double ; and this was certainly the 

 condition of one of the bivalves {Astarte compressa) which was 

 sent me." 



Having thus summarized our present knowledge of the subject, 

 I will record the new facts which have come under my notice. 



Description op the shelly patches kecently seen in the 

 BouLDER-OLAY AT Bridlington. — I have already mentioned that 

 in the section opposite the Alexandra Hotel at Bridlington Quay, the 

 Basement Boulder-clay was seen to include several masses of different 

 materials (see section A. A. A.). These masses consisted for the 

 greatest part of a very fine clay, generally either light-blue or dark 

 bluish-black in colour ; but in one place brown. This clay seemed 

 to have been a stratified deposit ; but the stratification was so nearly 

 destroyed, that it was shown merely by irregular stripes. Coarse 

 yellowish-green sand was incorporated with this clay in most of the 

 patches, spreading curiously through their mass in irregular little dabs 

 and threads forming doubtful lines, as though it had been partially 

 kneaded in. This sand always contained many shells, which were 

 generally crushed into fine fragments. Shells also occurred in 

 the clays, but much less plentifully, and often with sand under 

 the valves. The beds contained a few erratic pebbles, chiefly 

 little black phosphatic-looking lumps (which remind me of those 

 in one of the Lower Neocomian beds at Speeton) and a dark green 

 quartzite. I did not notice either chalk or flint in them ; in which 

 they differ markedly from those previously described. The lax-gest 

 of these masses was of irregular shape, about 14 feet in its 

 greatest length and 4 feet in height, and seemed to be crushed 

 vertically between walls of Boulder-clay. From it I obtained the 

 most perfect specimens. The others were much smaller, and were 

 squeezed out so as to form wavy lenticular streaks. The junction 

 between these and the Boulder-clay was sometimes well-marked 

 and sometimes insensible. After finding a few of the larger shells, 

 I washed lumps of the sand and clay, and obtained thus many small 

 specimens, which were far less broken than the larger, and also 

 many foraminifera and entomostraca, and two or three small echinoid 

 spines. A few, even of the larger shells, were in an absolutely 

 ^ Quart. Journ. Geol. Soc. vol. xxxyi. p. 515. 



