264 MR. W. GIBSON ON THE CHAEACTER OF [May I9OI, 



Keele Beds. They are underlain by grey sandstones and shales, 

 containing at least one seam of coal. After passing through 91 

 feet of these grey measures, red marls of the Etruria-Marl type and 

 containing the characteristic bands of green grit were proved for a 

 thickness of 257 feet. Below these ordinary grey Coal-Measures 

 were entered. 



At or near the junction of the grey beds with the underlying red 

 claj's, the cores contained calcareous nodules, but no entomostraca 

 were found in them. At the junction of the grey with the over- 

 lying red beds, the cores consisted of black shales with entomostraca 

 similar to those found at the junction of the Keele and Newcastle 

 Series in the N^ewstead boring near Trentham (JS'orth Staffordshire). 

 How much of the North Staffordshire sequence is present at 

 Thurgarton it is not safe to say, for undetected faults may have been 

 passed through. It is certain, however, that the Keele, Newcastle- 

 under-Lyme, and Etruria-Marl Series exist at Thurgarton to the 

 east of the Pennine Chain, and that the chief Pennine movements 

 are therefore of post-higher Coal-Measure age. 



YI. General Summary. 



By means of the type established in North Staffordshire it has 

 been shown that a similar set of conditions prevailed over a wide 

 area in the Midlands during the closing stages of the Coal-Measure 

 period. In North Staffordshire, where the relation of the different 

 groups of the Coal-Measures has been studied in detail, no break 

 has been detected in the Coal-Measure sequence. On the contrarj-, 

 one stage merges imperceptibly into the other. In the remaining 

 areas dealt with in this paper the higher Coal-Measures are in- 

 variably underlain, except near the margin of the basin where 

 overlap takes place, by ordinary Coal-Measures with coal-seams. 

 It is, therefore, evident that the higher Coal-Measures were deposited 

 in one basin, which included at least North Staffordshire, Denbigh- 

 shire, South Staffordshire, and Nottinghamshire; and that whatever 

 movements occurred were of a local, and not regional, character. 



From descriptions and accounts of other areas it would appear 

 that the higher series is present in Lancashire [1], Cumberland [2], 

 Anglesey [3], Shropshire [4], Worcestershire [5], and Warwickshire 

 [6].^ In all these areas, excepting perhaps Cumberland and Lan- 

 cashire, the Keele Series is represented, and corresponds to the 

 ' Salopian Permian ' of Prof. Hull. In all of them much work 

 remains to be done, before the important questions can be answered 

 as to the distribution, thickness, and character of the higher Coal- 

 Measures and their relation to the productive series. 



^ The numerals iu brackets refer to the appended Bibliographical List. 



