32 Prof. BucKLAND and Mr. De la. Beche on the 



base of Golden Cap presents an almost continuous pavement of Belemnites, 

 running for some distance along the shore; these marl beds also contain the 

 remains of Saurians. A detailed description of this lias formation at Lyme 

 having been published by Mr. De la Beche*, we deem it sufficient to refer 

 our readers to that paper. 



VALE OF BREDY. 



We have already pointed out details of the leading formations of the Vale 

 of Bredy in our description of the westward terminations of the strata that 

 occur in the Vale of Weymouth; we here sum them up in a few words. The 

 structure of the Vale of Bredy is much less complicated than that of the Vale 

 of Weymouth ; its strata do not, as there, dip in opposite directions from an 

 anticlinal line, but emerge regularly from beneath the chalk and greensand 

 escarpments of its eastern and northern frontiers, rising to the west and 

 south, until at their western termination they rest on the inferior oolite of 

 Burton Cliff and the hills near Bridport. 



Around the eastern and northern frontiers, the greensand constitutes a sub- 

 escarpment to the chalk, and also forms the outlying summits of Abbotsbury 

 Castle, Swyre Knoll, Shipton Beacon, and Hammerdon Hill already men- 

 tioned : its southern frontier next the sea, is composed of forest marble and 

 thick beds of clay connected with it; its middle region also (constituting the 

 bed of the river Bredy,) is made up of these same clays, interspersed occa- 

 sionally with thin stony beds of forest marble. The entire face of this Vale of 

 Bredy is so destitute of roads and sections, and so covered up with grass from 

 the bottom of the valley to the escarpment of the hills, that it is extremely 

 difficult to trace the separation between these extensive clay beds of the 

 forest marble formation, and those which may be made up of the continua- 

 tions of Kimmeridge and Oxford clays, interposed between the forest marble 

 and the greensand. 



EFFECTS OF DISTURBING FORCES. 

 Having thus far considered the character and extent of each formation which 

 occurs on the coast of Dorset, it remains only to examine the effects that have 

 been produced on them by disturbing forces : these may be divided into five 

 heads; namely, — I. Elevation; — y. Depression; — 3. Contortion; — 4. Faults; 

 — 5. Denudation. 



I. Elevation. 



The most important feature which pervades the whole Vale of Weymouth 



* Geol. Trans. Second Series, vol. ii. Part I. p. 21. Plate III. 



