BEICHES, ETC., OF THE SOUTH OF ENGLAND. 287 



Fig. 10. — Section at Anchor Head IIW, Weston-super-Mare. 



I 



feet 

 a. Angular limestone-rubble (Head) mixed with red clay and 

 sand (this is overlain by 2 feet of modern' talus formed of 



loose limestone-fragments) 5 to 12 



' h. Sand — the lower 2 feet concreted 2 to 10 



c. Old Eeach, consisting chiefly of rounded pebbles of limestone, 

 with a few scattered subangular blocks of the same, and a few 



shells— the whole concreted into a solid mass 4 



c\ Present Beach. 

 - L. Carboniferous Limestone. 



(18) The Loiver Severn. — No traces of the Beach, have yet been 

 discovered on the coast farther northward, unless some indications 

 of it occur at Clevedon. At the foot of the hills at the back of that 

 place there is a large accumnlation of angular debris (Head). 



There can be little doubt that the sea of the liaised Beach period 

 stretched northward up the Valley of the Severn, but whether it 

 formed a deep bay or estuary, or whether at that time it was pro- 

 longed through to the Irish Channel, forming the ' Severn Straits ' 

 of Murchison, seems uncertain. It is probable that the marine beds 

 at the higher levels should be referred to an earlier stage of the 

 Glacial period. This point, however, is beyond the present enquiry, 

 and one on which Murchison's writings should be consulted.^ 



To the south of Gloucester no marine beds have been described, 

 but the fluviatile and mammaliferous beds of the Stroud Valley 

 form, at their junction with the Severn Valley at Stonehouse, a 

 terrace about 50 feet above the level of the Severn, which indicates 

 possibly the near level of the adjacent sea or estuary at the Beach 

 time. Above Gloucester, there are two instances of the occurrence 

 of marine beds at levels approximating to that of the Baised 

 Beaches. The Bev. W. S. Symonds has recorded the occurrence of 

 worn specimens of Anomia, Turritella, and Cyprina in the railway- 

 cutting at Upton,^ and Mr. W. C. Lucy that of Purpura lapillus 



^ ' The Silurian System,' pp. 533-557, and various papers in Quart. Journ. 

 Geol. Soc. 



^ ' The Severn Straits ' (1883), p. 34. These may, however, be merely shells 

 washed out of the Boulder Clay. 



