ESTHERIA MINUTA, VAR. BRODIEANA. 73 



the Estherian bed at Westbury, and a yellowish-grey limestone), and at Hob- 

 Lench. 1 



" Mr. Tomes and I found it also at Barrow, in Leicestershire, and at Penarth, South 

 Wales ; and when we were with Mr. Charles Moore at Vallis, near Erome, we found 

 Estheria in the same relative position." (See below.) 



II. Staffordshire. — In Staffordshire also this Estheria appears to have been met 

 with, according to the following quotation from Dr. T. Wright's paper. [Loc. cit., 

 p. 385)— 



" The Sandstone of the Bone-bed has been found, by Mr. H. Howell, of the Geological 

 Survey, at Abbot's Park, near Abbot's-Bromley, Staffordshire, at the base of an outlier 

 of the Lower Lias. In a section which is exposed in the road at Buttermilk Hill, on the 

 northern escarpment of this outlier, Mr. Howell found some beds of impure limestone, 

 above which is a thin bed of micaceous sandstone containing Ptdlastra arenicola, Strick- 

 land, and what appear to be Estheria, all of which are in moulds and casts." 



III. Somersetshire. — The same variety of Estheria minuta has been found by Mr. 

 Charles Moore, E.G.S., of Bath, in some Rhsetic beds which he discovered a few years 

 since in the neighbourhood of Erome, Somersetshire. He thus describes the section of 

 the strata referred to (' Quart. Journ. Geol. Soc.,' vol. xvii, p. 497) : 



" In the Vallis, near Erome, there are quarries worked for the Carboniferous Limestone, 

 some of the beds of which have their upturned edges capped with horizontal Inferior 

 Oolite. In a section near Hapsford Mills I noticed a conglomerate with a few thin inter- 

 mediate layers of stone and clay. The limestone in this section has a dip of 35° N.W., 

 and is worked to a depth of fifteen feet. Lying upon it there is a band of blue clay, 

 four inches in thickness, which, on close examination, I found to contain a very interesting 

 fauna. Associated with remains of Eishes and Reptiles of the Bone-bed age, it yielded 

 Avicula contorta, Ostrea interstriata abundantly, Pecten Valoniensis, Avith other genera 

 never before noticed in beds of this age, such as Chiton, Podicijjes, &c. This clay is 

 succeeded by a dense conglomerate of rounded siliceous pebbles, two feet thick, and con- 

 taining, though rarely, Fish-teeth and scales ; another blue clay of four inches succeeds, 

 but without organic remains ; then a grey conglomerate, four inches, upon which there are 

 courses of grey or cream-coloured nodular limestone, intermingled with a grey clay, one 

 foot in thickness. In this, organic remains are extremely rare. Specimens of Estheria, 

 Insects, and one block containing Plant-remains are all I have obtained. Above the latter 

 are beds of Inferior Oolite, twelve feet in thickness, conglomeratic at their base. 



" The interposed beds of conglomerate, stone, and clay between the Inferior Oolite and 

 the Carboniferous Limestone, although but four feet in thickness, may represent in this 

 section the geological eras of the White Lias, the Estheria-beds of Warwickshire and 



1 At all these localities the Estheria-bed occurs at the same horizon as it does at Westbury, accord- 

 ing to Mr. Etheridge, who has kindly assisted me in examining several specimens collected by Mr. Kirshaw 

 and himself, in Warwickshire, and now in the Museum of the Geological Survey. 



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