AND THE MIDLAND AND WESTERN COUNTIES. 61 



Midland and "Western counties, I have long felt that this work 

 would be incomplete if* I did not turn this experience to some 

 account in attempting to correlate the generally representative 

 series of Devonshire with that lying along the borders of Wales and 

 extending into the Midland counties of England. The opportunity 

 for so doing has at length been given, and I proceed as briefly as 

 possible to summarize my conclusions. 



The typical district with which, as it seems to me, the Devon- 

 shire sections are comparable in the northern area, is that lying 

 along the Severn Valley in parts of AYorcestershire and Salop, about 

 Enville and Bridgenorth. The actual continuity of the series be- 

 tween the northern and southern areas has (as is well known) been 

 interrupted by the Palaeozoic ridge — which comes to light from be- 

 neath the Liassic and Oolitic beds in Somersetshire — composed 

 mainly of Carboniferous rocks, and which in some places was never 

 submerged during the whole' Permian and Triassic periods. Under 

 such conditions it would have been by no means surprising if the 

 representative series to the north and south of this dividing ridge 

 had been so different as to render any correlation of the members 

 impossible. It is, therefore, with pleasurable surprise that one 

 finds sufficient evidence in the succession and composition of the 

 strata on both sides to admit of a general correlation of the whole 

 series, with very few doubtful intervals, and amply sufficient to de- 

 termine the relations of all the most important divisions. In fact, 

 in crossing the strike of the Triassic series a few miles inland from 

 the Devonshire coast, we might often imagine ourselves in some 

 part of Staffordshire, Shropshire, or Worcestershire, so remarkably 

 similar are the beds themselves, and the features of the landscape 

 which are the outward manifestation of them. 



The general succession of the post-Carboniferous series in the 

 Western Midland district north of the old Palaeozoic ridge may be 

 thus stated : — 



{Eed Marl passing downwards into 

 Lower Keuper Sandstone (with base of Cal- 

 careous Breccia). 



Trias 



f Upper Mottled Sandstone (Upper Bunter). 

 Bunter | 

 Series. ■{ Pebble-beds and Conglomerate (Middle Bunter). 



l^ Lower Mottled Sandstone (Lower Bunter). (?) 



T . R P RAfTATf f -^^^pl® Sandstones, Marls, and unconsolidated 



/T> i.1 4- ji T J N T Breccia made up of fragments of Palseozoic 

 (Rothe-todte-hegende). | ^^^^^ ^^.^^ ^^J^^^ ^^^£, 



In my short description of what I consider the representative 

 series in Devonshire, it will be convenient to commence with the 



1 Sometimes (as in the Abberley Hills) the Permian beds are represented by 

 breccia only. The most complete series is to be found at Enville in Salop ; see 

 ' Triassic and Permian Eocks of the Midland Counties,' Mem. Geol. Survey 

 (18(59). 



