ROCKS OF SOUTH DEVON. 



497 



support a Triassic outlier, and are faulted against the red slates and 

 mudstones in Avhich Mr. Lee discovered the Upper-Devonian Gonia- 

 tite-fauua of Biidesheim. The fault is entirely concealed by slips 

 and undergrowth, and at the bridge spanning the adjacent railway- 

 cutting it is by no means clear. 



As before mentioned, Mr. Champernowne placed the Cockington 

 grits in their true position at the base of the series in 1878* ; but 

 the stratigraphy of the districts he subsequently investigated was 

 so contrary to this view that he abandoned it, placing them at the 

 top of the series, a conclusion I also came to from the independent 

 observation of the Plymouth section t. 



Mr. Champernowne's later views appeared in the succession 

 given in the Ashprington paper lately communicated to this 

 Society t, in which the Lower-Devonian slates or shales, correlated 

 by him with the Cockington beds, were placed above the Goniatite- 

 beds. This opinion was evidently entertained in ignorance of the 

 discovery of Lower-Devonian fossils by the Eev. G. P. Whidborne 

 in these beds in the adjacent railway-cutting. Incidental reference 

 to this discovery is given by Davidson in the • Supplement to the 

 British Devonian Brachiopoda,' p. 4, in the following passage :— 

 " At Saltern railway-cutting (behind Saltern Cove, within four or 

 five miles of Torquay), Mr. J. G. Greenfall and Mr. G. F. Whidborne 

 came upon a light brownish-red shale, in which several species of 

 Brachiopoda occurred in considerable numbers, accompanied by 

 Pleurodictyum prohlematicum and Petraia, sp. The fossils occur in 

 the condition of impressions and casts, much distorted and compressed, 

 so that it is not possible in most cases to arrive at a satisfactory^ 

 identification. I thought I could, however, recognize among them 

 S'pirifera Icpvicosta, Rhynclionella Paigellijana^ Leptoiyia Looiensis, 

 Orthis hipjmriony.v, a small circular species of the same genus 

 somewhat similar in shape to 0. arcuata. and Ghonetes MardrensisJ' 



At p. 8, further on, " Goodrington Sands (south of Paignton) " is 

 bracketed with " PUurodictyiim-prohleniatknm beds," under the 

 heading of Lower-Devonian localities. 



On accidentally hearing of this discovery from Mr. Hunt, early in 

 1888, I visited the cutting with him and Mr. Whidborne, when we 

 obtained Pleurodictyum lyrohlematicum^ Chonetes sordlda, &c. 



As I considered a single find of Lower-Devonian fossils insuf- 

 ficient to disprove my friend's stratigraphical conclusions, I pro- 

 ceeded to ascertain whether the fossiliferous beds were really a part 

 of the Cockington series, and whether that series was wholly unfos- 

 siliferous. 



The success I met with in these quests is more than neutralized 

 by regret that my friend cannot share in it. 



Fossils are exceedingly scarce in the Lower-Devonian slates, 

 shales, and sandstones of the Paignton area ; but a diligent search, 

 in spite of repeated disappointments, has enabled me to place the 



* Geol. Mag. 1878, p. 193. 



i" Pvoc. Geologists' Assoc, vol. viii. pp. 442, &c. 



X Quart. Journ. Geol. Soc. vol. xlv. p. 369, &e. 



