370 Mr. Cumberland's Remarks on the Strata at Stinchcombe. 



• 



though atDundry we meet with few or no pentacrinital remains. The upper- 

 most of the strata at Newnham consist of brown ochreous iron-shot sandy oolite, 

 blended with calcareous spar. They contain an abundance of organic remains 

 viz. Myae, Pinnse, three or four species of Anomia, casts of trigoniae, ammo- 

 nites, belemnites, pentacrinites, and fossil wood. The lower and more solid 

 strata contain the stems of two species of pentacrinite, distinguished by their 

 whiteness from the brown mass in which they are imbedded, and often well 

 displayed on the weathered surfaces of the rock. In these strata we also find 

 three or four species of belemnite, which are easily detached in consequence 

 of their polished surfaces. We have also the Anomia sulcata, which some- 

 times parts with its exterior coat, and then appears with a fine silky lustre. 

 The spined Anomia and spined Ostreae can never be obtained perfectly clear of 

 the rock. 



Under these ochreous beds we almost every where meet with a whitish or 

 drab-coloured clay, occasionally interstratified with beds of blue clay, and 

 forming itself into somewhat indurated concretions. In these concretions we 

 find Myae, Anomiae, and three or four species of ammonite, which may easily 

 be detached by a slight blow of the hammer, and then frequently retain their 

 originally nacre. These argillaceous beds are found at the depth often feet 

 at Newnham quarry. They lie nearer the surface at the mill of Messrs. Shep- 

 herd and Hawker at Uley, where in the year 1821, while enlarging the water- 

 course, the workmen cut through the ochreous beds, full of shells, into those 

 of clay, from which they turned up numbers of ammonites and other organic 

 remains. The clay-beds are also seen in a water-course at Leonard Stanley 

 under Frocester hill, at Cam, and at several other places below the Cotswold. 

 In these retentive strata the springs appear, and wherever the clay occurs 

 beneath the brown and ochreous beds, good water is found. 



Beneath the foregoing beds we must place those of the blue lias, so well 

 exhibited at Fretherne cliff on the Severn. The uppermost strata consist of 

 slaty clay, in which gryphites are contained. Below them is a bed abound- 

 ing in a peculiar pentacrinite, of which no head has yet been found, that I am 

 aware of, except an injured specimen in the collection of Mr. George Hawker 

 of Stroud. We can walk at low-water on the blue lias of Fretherne, to the 

 extent of half a mile, as on an extensive level floor, and there see enormous 

 ammonites under our feet, some exceeding four feet in diameter. In the lias 

 is found jet, with calcareous spar traversing its cracks. 



In the vale of the Severn we find red marl, which probably at some depth 

 contains beds of salt ; for at Ashton Somerville, at Child Wickham, and at 

 Sandhurst, all lying on the same line near to Gloucester, brine springs have 

 been discovered, though never worked. 



