564 Trof. Lapivorth — Cambrian Rochs near Birmingham. 



Lickey ridge, which extends from the railway station at Barnt 

 Green to the new Asylum near Enbery. These rocks consist of 

 quartzites (or intensely hardened sandstones), and are largely 

 quarried for road-metal, for which their intractable character pre- 

 eminently fits them. They were supposed by Sir Roderick I. 

 Murchison and others to be of the age of the Llandovery formation, 

 which forms the base of his Upper Silurian system (as unquestionable 

 Llandovery fossils have been procured in abundance from what 

 appeared to be the highest beds of the quartzites at Eubery and 

 elsewhere), and to owe their present indurated character to 

 "metamorphic action." 



The author, who first studied these Lickey quartzites in company 

 with Mr. S. Allport, F.G.S., in October, 1881, felt certain, upon 

 general grounds, that they were of pre-Llandovery date ; and, during 

 the discussion which followed the reading of Mr. W. J. Harrison's 

 paper upon the " Fossiliferous Quartzites of the Drift," read at the 

 meeting of the Birmingham Philosophical Soc, Feb. 9, 1882, expressed 

 his conviction that these Lickey quartzites would eventually be 

 demonstrated to be of pre-Silurian age — that the local Llandovery 

 beds would be found to overlie them unconformably, and to owe their 

 superficial resemblance merely to the fact that they were actually 

 composed of the reconstructed debris of the quartzite itself. This 

 view was supported by Mr. T. S. Houghton, F.G-.S., who had 

 visited the Rubery section some years previously, and felt assured 

 that the visible phenomena could best be explained upon this 

 suggested hypothesis of an unconformity. 



Early in March last the calculated unconformity between the 

 quartzite and the Llandovery was detected by the author in company 

 with his friend Professor Hill, M.A., of Mason College, and abundant 

 evidence obtained to place it beyond question that the quartzites lie 

 unconformably beneath the Silurian rocks, which latter are made up 

 of the reconstructed fragments of the quartzites, and rest upon their 

 eroded edges. A short account of these phenomena was given to the 

 public in the Introductory Lecture of the author's summer course of 

 Local Geology delivered at Mason College on April 25th. The same 

 facts appear, however, to have been detected at an earlier date by 

 Mr. T. S. Houghton, who communicated a short note upon the 

 subject to the meeting of this Society ("Note on the Age of the 

 Quartzite of the Lickey," read May 11th, 1882), and who has thiis^ 

 the credit of being the first to break ground in this new departure in 

 the history of the geology of the Birmingham district. 



Quartzites resembling those of the Lickey occur in great force 

 between Nuneaton and Atherstone, on the eastern flank of the North 

 Warwickshire Coalfield, where they have been mapped by the 

 Geological Survey as Millstone-grit, and it was believed by the 

 author that these also would prove to be of pre-Silurian age. On 

 communicating his views to his friend, Mr. W. J. Harrison, F.G.S., 

 the author found that he also had arrived at the same conclusion, and 

 early in May, Mr. Harrison and the author visited the Nuneaton 

 quartzites in company, and recognized the general identity of the beds 



