228 E. A. WALEORD ON THE " NORTHAMPTON SAND " 



At the Constitution-Hill section near Banbury all that remains 

 of the Inferior Oolite is from twelve to twenty feet of white and 

 fawn-coloured sands with occasionally bands of stone containing such 

 fossils as are here quoted, associated with numerous plant-remains. 

 Between it and the Great Oolite above, both of which have been let 

 down by a fault, a thin stratum of black clay intervenes. 



Pycnodus. 

 Trigonia y-costata. 



conjungens. 



Tancredia axiniforniis. 

 Corbicella bathonica. 

 Astarte, sp. 

 Cardium, sp. 

 Gresslya abducta. 



Pecten articulatus. 

 Avicula braamburiensis. 

 Ostrea gregaria. 



, sp. 



Diastopora. 

 Serpula filaria. 

 Montlivaltia lens. 

 Annulated Algse. 



The type of deposits of the district N. and E. of Banbury is very 

 similar — sands, often ferruginous, with occasional courses of shelly 

 limestone towards the base. These rest upon and pass into the clays 

 of the Upper Lias, without, so far as I have seen, any appearance of 

 unconformability other than in the marked change of life. South- 

 westward the same conditions prevail. Over the high lands from 

 Tadmarton Camp to Hook Norton stretches a series of beds of sand and 

 sandy limestones, below which follow courses of brownish crystalline 

 limestone containing Montlivaltia lens, Pecten demissus, P. personatus 

 and P. lens, and rolled stones covered with Serpulce and Polyzoa. 

 From the sandy beds were obtained annulated stems of Algae ; and 

 by the Rev. P. B. Brodie a pretty new species of Trigonia, described 

 by Dr. Lycett, in his monograph of the British Trigonice, under the 

 name of Trigonia Brodiei, was got from the limestones which appear 

 to represent the base of the Inferior Oolite. 



The sequence of the beds may be noted in passing up the Mil- 

 combe Hill towards the Camp, a fine specimen of a Romano- 

 British earthwork. The road-cutting exposes the Upper Lias clays ; 

 and further on a small limestone-quarry yields, though sparingly, 

 the fossils mentioned. The overlying sands are shown best in the 

 sand-pits on Tadmarton Heath at the top of the hill. Other, though 

 sparingly fossiliferous, sections, where courses of hard limestone 

 come in between the sandy beds, may be seen nea.r the Gate Inn, 

 Hook Norton, by the roadside south of Sibford Ferris, and near the 

 Temple Mill. The whole of these beds, hitherto termed "Northamp- 

 ton Sand," are included under that phase of the Inferior Oolite 

 marked in the Survey map 5' g 7' ; and this same 5' g 7' also includes 

 the lower zone of the Great Oolite of this district. 



The new railway- cutting about half a mile south of Hook Norton 

 has fortunately supplied a section (fig. 1) so complete that we may take 

 it for our type in attempting the correlation of other beds of the dis- 

 trict. The hill has been but partially worked through, the cutting 

 on its north side being the longer and deeper ; that on the south 

 side near Duckpool Farm, though shallower, still shows the fossili- 

 ferous beds of the Inferior Oolite resting upon the Upper Lias, 

 against which are faulted a series of the Lower Limestones and clays 



