526 Reports and Proceedings— Geologists' Association, 



some localities, as in the hill above them, and their thinness in other 

 localities at small distances apart, received a satisfactory explanation 

 by adopting the view that the genesis of the Oolites was due to the 

 vital energies of Zoophytes that lived in the Jurassic seas. 



The reefs that remained were mere fragments of those which had 

 once existed, and the calcareous masses that had disappeared as reefs 

 had furnished the material out of which all Oolitic Limestones were 

 formed. The same explanation applies to the oolitic beds found in 

 the Carboniferous Limestone which had been formed out of the waste 

 of the coral beds of the Carboniferous sea ; in a great many of these 

 Carboniferous oolitic gi-ains he had found the microscopic shells of 

 Foraminifera which had served as the nucleus of the particle : thus 

 the presence of a calcareous paste and the incessant roll of the 

 ocean along a coral strand were the elements and physical condi- 

 tions under which the Oolites were produced. 



A description of the beds in situ followed the lecture, on which an 

 interesting discussion ensued until lunch was announced, and so the 

 party repaired to Major Barnard's, at Bartlow, and enjoyed a solid 

 repast. The valley looked more beautiful than ever to-day from the 

 hill, and many an exclamation told how the scene had impressed 

 itself upon the geologists. After lunch the party went over the 

 upper beds, and walked through Hartley-bottom to the Seven 

 Springs, to see the source of the Thames. 



July 22nd. — May Hill or Yartleton was the excursion to-day — 

 Mr. J. Logan Lobley, F.G.S., acting as Director. The party took 

 train to the Longhope station, and walked from thence to the sum- 

 mit of May Hill, 972 feet above the sea. 



The view from the summit is magnificent ; looking to the N.N.W. 

 one sees the dome of Woolhope Forest in the line of the axis of the 

 hill on which one stands, and to the N.N.E. the Malverns are seen be- 

 yond a long line of fracture and unconformity with outcrops of Coal- 

 beds ; between these two lines the trough is filled in with Old Eed 

 Sandstone ; to the South the eye follows the group of hills gradually 

 contracted by the approach of the Eed Eocks, till at Flaxley the 

 May Hill ridge terminates. The distant Cotteswolds have a pictur- 

 esque effect when seen from the summit, and the Forest of Dean 

 with its reeking chimneys tells us of the iron and coal industries 

 that are there at work. The structure of the Hill was explained by 

 the Director, with the aid of maps and sections, and the quarries of 

 Llandovery rocks (May Hill sandstone), Woolhope Limestone, 

 Wenlock Limestone, and Lower Ludlow Eocks were ransacked and 

 tielded some fine specimens to the knights of the hammer. 



July 23rd. — Garden Cliff, near Westbury-on-Severn, was the 

 rendezvous for the day, and Mr. W. C. Lucy, F.G.S., the Director. 

 The party went by train to Grange Court, and walked from thence 

 to the Cliff, a distance of four miles. Garden Cliff is one of 

 the most typical sections of the Avicula contorta beds, a series of 

 deposits which contain a well-marked set of fossils, and are inter- 

 posed between the lowest beds of the Lias and uppermost beds 

 of the Keuper ; they indicate a great change in the physical geogra- 



