1857-] PHILLIPS — OOLITE AND LIAS, YORKSHIRE. 85 



be most remarkable in the group of the Bath or Lower Oolite, though 

 some peculiarities worthy of notice occur in almost every part of the 

 section between the Chalk and the Triassic formations, and even ex- 

 tend to the Chalk itself. The author proposes, on a future occasion, 

 to present a memoir on the Lower Cretaceous and Upper Oolitic 

 deposits, including the Speeton Clay ; but his remarks are now 

 limited upwards by the Coralline Oolite and downwards by the Lias, 

 both included. And they relate to the deposition and succession of 

 strata, with some references to the distribution of organic life. 



It is now above thirty years since, following the steps of William 

 Smith, I began to draw the parallels of geological time from the 

 south of England into the north-eastern district of Yorkshire. Se- 

 parated as these districts are by the nonconformity under the York- 

 shire Wolds, and still more alienated by modifications affecting more 

 or less all the strata, it was necessary to use great caution in select- 

 ing the principal lines of contemporaneity. Guided by the evidence 

 of organic remains and the succession of strata, we traced in the 

 first place the continuous area of the Lias, and marked the place and 

 value of the Marlstone, which Smith, first of all observers, had cha- 

 racterized near Bath. We then defined the Kimmeridge Clay, Coral- 

 line Oolite, Calcareous Grit, and Oxford Clay, and beheld with sur- 

 prise a rock 60 or even 90 feet thick replacing the weak sands of 

 Christian Malford, and holding in abundance the peculiar fossils of 

 Kelloway Bridge. Even this was not achieved without some diffi- 

 culty ; for the Coralline Oolite of Malton contains several fossils 

 identical with, and others not easily separated from, frequent residents 

 in the Inferior Oolite. 



Beyond this every fresh step was difficult at that time, and re- 

 quires wary movements at the present moment. 



In my work on the Yorkshire Coast, published in 1829, the sec- 

 tion of the cliffs was taken as a type, and the results then affirmed, 

 after three complete surveys of the whole coast, have met with gene- 

 ral acceptance. In one important point they have, indeed, been em- 

 ployed by some of my friends with quite as high a trust in their con- 

 tents as I ever felt, — for I have always regarded as a bold decision 

 my reference of the grey limestone series of White Nab to the Forest 

 Marble and Great Oolite of Bath ; and the shelly sandstones of Blue 

 Wick to the Inferior Oolite of Somersetshire (see edition 1, 1829). 



On another point, the fixing of the Brandsby slate on a parallel 

 above the assumed Great Oolite, though no doubt has been publicly 

 expressed, my friends can hardly have avoided feeling it ; for this 

 rock is analogous to the Stonesfield slate, and that lies under the 

 Oolite of Bath. By three separate investigations I have assured 

 myself of the accuracy of my first determination ; and thus, if the 

 place of the Great Oolite be rightly given in the sections of York- 

 shire, the Brandsby stone is an equivalent of Hinton Sandstone or 

 Forest Marble. 



It is not, therefore, for the purpose of a formal correction, or of 

 an implied amendment of my published sections, that I offer this 

 paper ; but for the purpose of recording variations in the deposits, 



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