15 



their object or their use. After spending a very agreeable after- 

 noon, the ladies and gentlemen of the party drove home to town 

 by Shaw's Bridge and the Lisburn Road. 



EXCURSION TO CASTLE ESPIE AND 

 NEIGHBOURHOOD, 



On Saturday, 24th Aug. 



Proceeding- to Comber by railway, cars were then engaged to 

 convejr the party to and from Castle Espie. The country looked 

 beautiful, and the several tidy farm- steadings along the route, 

 nestling amid surrounding crops, seemed smiling in the antici- 

 pation of an abundant harvest. Arriving at the extensive lime- 

 works at Castle Espie, the party examined the kilns, quarries, 

 and new works in progress. The Mountain Limestone occurs 

 here below the New Red Sandstone, and lies uncomformably on 

 the Silurian rocks of the County Down. Though not hydraulic, 

 it is, nevertheless, valuable for the manufacture of lime, and, 

 being the only outcrop within an extensive area, has to supply 

 a considerable demand. It is capable also of being largely em- 

 ployed as a building-stone, and for many ornamental purposes, 

 for which its durability, texture, and colour admirably fit it. In 

 the same locality deposits of sand and clay occur ; the latter 

 does not seem to be available for pottery of any kind, but 

 answers very well for the manufacture of bricks and tiles. The 

 zone of the Carboniferous system represented here by the lime- 

 stone, is too low for the occurrence of the fireclay or ironstone of 

 other localities ; but the extensive buildings and machinery 

 erected by Messrs. Murland will be fully employed in developing 

 the capabilities of the other materials above mentioned. Besides 

 the peculiar conditions under which the limestone occurs here, 

 the locality is also interesting to the geologist as exemplifying 

 in a remarkable manner the effect of glacial action. The lime- 

 stone is covered by a considerable thickness of drift, sand, gravel, 

 clay, and boulders, made up of materials principally carried by ice 

 from the County Antrim during the glacial period. Even some of 

 the fossils from the Lias of the coast of Antrim are found in this- 



