Border Country of Salop and North Wales ; Sgc. 249 



line sandstone in strata nearly vertical, and in masses, often of great size, scat- 

 tered over the broken edges of the strata and the declivity of the ridge. At 

 some distance further east is another ridge, nearly parallel to the former, and 

 separated by a second valley ; it consists of a slaty sandstone resembling some 

 of the varieties of grauwacke already described, and dips eastward at an angle 

 of rather less than 30° to the horizon. Still further eastward, but in a direction 

 towards the south, a third siliceous ridge commences, which is called the End 

 Hill of Hope Bowdler; its northern extremity is an abrupt cliff, from which 

 it extends southwards about a quarter of a mile ; it consists of a straight chain 

 of extremely rugged barren eminences of quartz-rock, in nearly vertical strata. 

 At the distance of several miles to the south, and at the other extremity of 

 Hope Bowdler, we find a coarse serpentine, containing grains of sand. Still 

 further southward a considerable quarry is worked in strata resembling those 

 of Ludlow and Downton. The strata are nearly horizontal ; in the lower 

 part of the quarry they are a yard or more in thickness, and when broken, 

 show most distinctly the great conchoidal fracture : and their natural separa- 

 tion, according to their cleavage, is into square or rhomboidal pieces with 

 sharp angles. 



The hilly country of slate and trap terminates about a mile to the north of 

 Church Stretton. We here stand upon the verge of an extensive plain varied 

 only by swelling knolls of clay and gravel. But on coming within two miles 

 of Shrewsbury, we cross a ridge of trap, which is intersected by veins of 

 schist resembling that at Church Stretton. This ridge is called Baseton Hill, 

 and ranges through a considerable space from N. E. to S.W. 



I now proceed to give some account of the detached portions of rocks, 

 which are of the same nature with those already described. 



1. The first detached district, which I shall notice, is the vicinity of 

 Bewdley. A remarkable trap-dyke is situated a short distance to the north 

 of that town. The Earl of Mount-Norris, through whose estate it passes, has 

 traced it along a straight line of 4 miles in length and in a direction nearly 

 from N. N. E. to S.S.W. It probably extends still further towards Enville 

 in Staffordshire and the forest of Wyre in Shropshire. At Shatterford it 

 crosses the turnpike road from Kidderminster to Bridgenorth, and is accom- 

 panied by a bed of coal and by thin broken beds of the usual sandstone of 

 coal-formations, all in a vertical position. It crosses the Severn nearly 2 miles 

 above Bewdley, and occasions a considerable fall in the water, which the 

 bargemen surmount by steering through a gap in the dyke. On the lower 

 side of the water this dyke presents to it a vertical face 16 feet in depth, the 



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