Vol. 68.] SUCCESSION iisr the noeth-west of England. 537 



On the north side of Roman Fell the lowest Carboniferous 

 deposits are exposed in Scordale and Swindale Becks, and close 

 to the jnnction of these streams they are brought down against 

 the Skiddaw Slates by the Inner Pennine Fault. 



In Scordale Beck above Hilton, on the right bank of the stream, 

 chocolate-coloured grits with green streaks occur interbedded with 

 fine conglomerates and green and red shaly sandstones, containing 

 pebbles of the underlying Silurian rocks. The deposit appears 

 to be completely unfossiliferous, but the outcrop is buried under 

 landslips and scree-material. In Swindale Beck, which drains the 

 north-eastern flank of Eoman Fell, this series of basement beds 

 is better exposed, and consists of false-bedded, green, pebbly grits 

 containing fragments of felsite, Skiddaw Slate, etc. These are 

 overlain by yellow concretionary sandstones passing upwards into 

 a coarse conglomerate, which gives rise to a small waterfall in the 

 beck. 



The Athyris-glahristria Zone. — In Swindale Beck, about 

 two-thirds of a mile above its junction with Scordale Beck, a 

 fossiliferous bed crops out on the left bank of the stream (S in 

 fig. 3, p. 356). This outcrop is of especial interest, as it is the only 

 fossiliferous exposure met with in the beds below the Melmerby- 

 Scar Limestone north of Eoman Fell. The rock is predominantly 

 a crinoidal limestone stained by limonite ; some of the layers, 

 however, consist of a calcareous grit enclosing small quartz-pebbles 

 and crinoid-ossicles. This deposit appears to be a beach-formation,, 

 most of the fossils being fragmentary, and some of them probably 

 derived. A few feet higher in the series, and farther up the stream, 

 a calcareous breccia occurs on the same bank of the stream, nearly 

 opposite Swindale Crag ; this contains a similar fauna, but in a still 

 more fragmentary condition. The most abundant fossil in both 

 exposures is Syringotliyris cuspidata. The following is the list of 

 species obtained from these two exposures : — 



Syringopora sp. 1 Rhipidomella michelini (L'Eveille). 



I Schellwienella cf. crenistria (Phill.). 



Athyris ylabrisiria (PhiW.). j Seminula at ambigua (Shj.). 



Camarophoria isorhi/ncJia (M'Coj). j Spir if er fiircatus M' Coy. 



Produchts cf. punctafus Mart. Syr in got ht/ 7ns cuspidata (Mart.). 

 Froductus cf. hemiqyhericits Sby. 



Eeticularia Ivaeata (Mart.). | Bellemphon sp. 



This assemblage recalls that found in the Brownber Pebble-Bed 

 and in the Spirifer-furcatus Band of the type-districts. The pre- 

 sence of Syrinciotluiris cuspidata and Atliyris glahristria is suffi- 

 cient evidence that the deposit must underlie the Michelinia Zone ; 

 for, although rare in the North-Western Province, S. cusjndata, as 

 noted above, occurs only in beds at and below the base of that zone. 

 Again, the bed resembles very closely the JSyringothyris Grit at the 

 base of the MidieUnia Zone under Cunswick Scar in the Kendal 

 Divstrict, and may, therefore, represent, in part, the Brownber 



