DORSET-SOMERSET DISTRICT. 29 



4. Concavus- or " Sowerbyi"-zone ^ 



5. Murchisonge-zone f T _ . . 



„ ~ ,. > Lower Division. 



6. Opalmus-zone ■ I 



7. Radians-zone (Sands) J 



The Sauzei-zone is an appendage of the jHvmphriesianus-zone, and both are 

 often but feebly developed, except in the neighbourhood of Sherborne. The 

 cowcavws-beds represent the upper part of the Maliere of Normandy, and the true 

 Am. Sowerhyi is hardly ever found in them. The most mixed Fauna occurs in the 

 " Sauzei-hed " of Oborne, and some might class it with the Lower Division. 



Burton Bhadstock. — This name is very well known to collectors, and fossils so 

 marked may come from shallow quarries and cuttings in the neighbourhood of the 

 village, or from the cliff which overhangs the English Channel. Between Burton 

 Castle and the neighbourhood of Bridport Harbour there is an isolated massif 

 made up of the Yeovil Sands, capped by the Inferior Oolite Limestone ,- and in one 

 place, where the sequence is very complete, these are succeeded by a fragment of 

 the Fuller'' s Earth. This massif presents a bold front to the English Channel, 

 and has a length of one and three quarter miles, by an average width of about 

 half a mile. It is unequally divided by the River Bredy, which separates " Burton 

 Cliff " from the area to the north-west. The Inferior Oolite Limestone of Burton 

 Cliff, containing the fossiliferous beds presently to be detailed, is elevated out of 

 reach by reason of the great thickness of the " Sands," and it is only where masses 

 of this hard capping fall upon the beach that the fossils themselves come within 

 reach of the hammer. Hence their relative position has not in all cases been de- 

 termined with precision. Nevertheless, there is one horizon in Burton Cliff which 

 is so pre-eminent above all others for the number and beauty of its Gasteropoda, 

 that fossils marked " Burton Bradstock " are most likely to have been derived 

 from it. 



The portion of the cliff west of the River Bredy is sometimes known as the 

 Bridport Cliff, but generally speaking the fossils from here are not well defined as 

 to geological horizon, though they chiefly belong to the rich bed before mentioned. 

 Some of the fossils marked " Bridport" come from here, but the term is applied 

 rather loosely. The town of Bridport is at some distance from the coast, and is 

 situated on the Middle Lias. 



The sands of the Inferior Oolite, or, as Oppel calls them, the sands of the Lias, 

 exposed in this noble sea-cliff, consist of yellow sands with numerous indurated 

 layers of bluish calciferous grit, which are sometimes continuous and at other times 

 occur as nodular masses. These beds contain but few Gasteropoda, and those 

 for the most part so ill-preserved that they require but trifling notice. As is so 

 often the case where sedimentary accumulations are of great vertical development, 

 they are comparatively barren of life, partly, perhaps, because such areas were 



