496 PEOCEEDINGS OF THE GEOLOGICAL SOCIETY. 



1838) : — At a brewery in Kingsmead Street a well was sunk for 

 an additional snpply of cold water ; but, in more ways than one, 

 the proprietor got into hot water. A well 60 feet deep was first 

 sunk, which was bored an additional 19 feet, and afterwards con- 

 tinued 91 feet more, making in the whole 170 feet. Yery little 

 water was found at 60 feet ; and there was little increase until the 

 boring had reached 79 feet, when the well-sinkers found a spring 

 which yielded 50 hogsheads per day at 80° of heat ; in the second 

 operation they had no sensible increase, until they had reached the 

 depth above stated. They had bored about a foot into the " red 

 ground," and on leaving work left their rods in the hole. Next day 

 they found the water running over the top of the well at 99°. On 

 the rods being removed the water continued to discharge 114 im- 

 perial gallons per minute." At this well the hot-spring was tapped 

 which supplied the baths 250 yards distant, the water in which very 

 sensibly diminished, both in quantity and in temperature. The en- 

 gineering operation to stop the spring and restore it to its original 

 course was one of much difficulty. 



The beds passed through show most clearly their succession under 

 this part of the city, — f^^ in^ 



1. Black marl (Upper blue marls of the Lower Lias) 50 



2. Thin beds of blue Lias, succeeded by blue Lias nearly solid 40 

 o rWhiteLias 40 



t Thin beds of White Lias and clay 16 



4. Very white clay 12 



5. Yery black sulphurous clay 11 



6. Dark-red soil where the water rises 1 



170 

 There can be no doubt from the above that the Bath hot water was 

 tapped at the junction of the Keuper and Rhaetic beds, and that 

 it reaches its present springs from a westerly direction. The dark- 

 red soil represents the Keuper Marls. The black sulphurous clay, 

 and probably the " very white clay " above, belong to the Eheetic 

 Avicida-contorta series. The White Lias tells its own tale ; and the 

 nearly solid and other beds of the Lias above belong to the Ammonites- 

 Bucklandi and A.-angulatus beds, which we find coming to the sur- 

 face at Locksbrook and Weston beyond. "When the coal-shaft was 

 sunk in 1815 at Batheaston, 2^ miles north-west of Bath, a con- 

 siderable body of tepid chalybeate water was reached at the same 

 point, which is flowing in considerable quantities from the shaft to 

 this day. It is said (but with what truth I know not) that the 

 Bath springs were affected by the continuous pumping operations 

 that were then carried on. Although the waters may have been 

 reached at the junction of these horizontal beds, their source is likely 

 to be more deeply seated, amidst older disturbed rocks, which are 

 probably to be found not far below the Bath basin. 



It is worthy of remark that in the wells connected with the baths 

 there is a regular but slow accumulation of quartzose sand, amongst 

 which may often be found hazel-nuts and many seeds, beautifully 

 electrotyped with iron pyrites, and also Liassic and Oolitic organisms, 



