ETHE RIDGE DEYONIAI^ ROCKS AND FOSSILS. 



599 



line a little westward, and the continued seaward strike of the slates, 

 that bring the uppermost beds of the Lynton slates into visible con- 

 tact with the Hangman Grits, or second series of red sandstone in 

 the steep cliffs and bay of Woodabay. These slates are fossiliferous 

 up to their junction with the red grits, and contain the same species 

 that occur in the Valley of Eocks, with the addition of Bellerojphon 

 striatus, Fterincea spinosa, and casts of Crinoidal stems, &c. These 

 beds between Lee and Woodabay are certainly higher in position 

 than those which occur at Watersmeet or the Valley of Rocks, and 

 are evidently the same as those underlying the red grits and sand- 

 stone at Hcddon's Mouth, to be now noticed. 



Fig. 7. — Section at Woodabay. 



Hangman sandstones. 



Lower Devonian slates. 



Gentle rolling of the strata along the coast to Highwear Point and 

 Heddon's Mouth keep the slates above the sea, beyond which head- 

 land the Lower or Lynton group can no longer be well examined. 



It is thus clearly seen that these Lower slates are conformable to 

 and succeeded by the grits of Woodabay, Heddon's Mouth, and the 

 Hangman ; and their organic remains entirely cease on passing up 

 into the red series, it being only in the highest and fissile beds of 

 the Hangman Grits at Challacombe, Nertherton, &c., near Combe 

 Martin, that casts of a Myalina and Natlca &c. are found ; and 

 these beds graduate into the lower part of the Middle Devonian 

 slates of Combe Martin Bay, immediately south of Knap-Down 

 Mine and the places before mentioned. The lower part of the Lyn- 

 ton group is much more calcareous than the upper, and the beds 

 seem persistent and uniform throughout over the Lynton area ; but 

 as regards organic remains, and especially the Coelenterata, we have 

 only a small fauna, as compared with the numerous species occur- 

 ring in the deeper-sea accumulations of the Ilfracombe group ; and 

 the evidence adduced by ripple-marking and false bedding distri- 

 buted generally through the Lynton group, added to the gritty 

 character of both the slates and limestones, clearly shows their 

 littoral and shallow-sea origin, yet apparently under continued 

 depression ; for there is no evidence in the surmounting red grits 

 and sandstone of Woodabay and the Hangman, &c., to show that 



