528 LOWER CARBONIFEROUS LIMESTONE [Aug. I906 



nephew, George Wetherall (then about thirteen), showed him some 

 fossils which he had picked up on the spoilbank. They were joints 

 of crinoid-stems and one or two species of Prodnctus. He told the 

 lad that they were likely to be Carboniferous Limestone, but explained 

 to him why its occurrence was improbable, and urged him to go on 

 searching, when home for the holidays. He collected m ore : they were 

 submitted to Mr. E. T. Newton, who kindly identified them ; and 

 the speaker was intending to publish a short note in the discoverer's 

 name, when he heard that the latter had told the Author, who was at 

 work on a paper. So, as he was so much better acquainted with the 

 details of the Coalfield, the speaker left the subject to him ; and the 

 result was the interesting communication to which they had listened. 

 The reason for being so cautious was this : about 22 miles to the 

 east, the Carboniferous Limestone appeared to thin out on the north 

 side of Charnwood Forest ; it was doing the same near Wellington, 

 about 47 miles to the west ; it was probably wanting under the 

 Leicestershire Coalfield, and certainly under the Warwickshire, Forest- 

 of-Wyre, and Shropshire Coalfields, — in other words, over a semi- 

 circular district of which Fair Oak was the centre. He thought 

 that the discovery marked a point in the southern shore-line of the 

 northern sea-basin, perhaps a bay : thus resembling the limestone 

 on the Titterstone-Clee Hills, which must occupy a similar position 

 on the northern shore-line of the southern basin. 



Mr. J. T. Stobbs, who was unable to be present, sent the 

 following contribution to the discussion : — 



' It is absolutely certain that the debris has been raised out of the shaft : 

 whether it was met with in the shaft itself, or in the heading, is not of 

 general importance. The horizon of the deposit may be referred to one of 

 those limestones that occur near the base of the Pendleside Series, or the 

 uppermost part of the Carboniferous Limestone ; and the Author is to be 

 congratulated on the paper, which is an important contribution to the problem 

 of the continuation of the overlain coalfields of Mid-Staffordshire. The 

 existence in this locality of a ridge of Carboniferous rocks belonging to a 

 much lower horizon than the lowest workable coal-seams occurring in the 

 Midland Counties is beyond dispute. 



' Another question is raised by this discovery, namely: whether the limestone 

 proved at the bottom of the borehole at No. 2 Cannock-Chase Colliery was 

 Silurian, or Carboniferous. So long as people were prepossessed with the idea, 

 scattered broadcast in geological and mining literature, that the Coal-Measures 

 of this Coalfield reposed unconformably on the Silurians, and that the Lower 

 Carboniferous rocks were absent, it was natural that any limestone found at a 

 great depth below the lowest coal-seam should be regarded as a Silurian 

 limestone. It is now of importance to know whether the person who examined 

 the cores was competent to determine Silurian, as distinguished from Carboni- 

 ferous Limestone : in other words, can we be certain that this limestone was 

 Silurian, and not Carboniferous ? ' 



Dr. Wheelton Hind also sent the following contribution to the 

 discussion : — 



' The observations made by the Author are most important, and of great 

 interest. They afford further evidence of the gradual attenuation of the whole 

 of the Lower Carboniferous rocks as they pass south. Of course it has been 

 long known that the Carboniferous Limestone is still present at Lilleshall 

 and near Wellington, both about the same latitude as the Fair-Oak Colliery at 



