1873.] SHARP OOLITES OF NORTHAMPTONSHIRE. 235 



The following is the section of the quarry at this time being 

 worked ; with quarrymen's terms : — 



1. Earing, consisting of — ft. in. ft. in. 



a. Surface Soil, 



b. Boulder-clay, 



c. Upper Estuarine Clay 10 to 12 



2. " Top Fine Stone " — pink oolitic freestone, having nu- 



merous comminuted but few perfect shells on the 



bedding surfaces : extracted in large blocks 1 6 to 2 



3. " Rag " — a coarse red shelly stone, variegated horizon- 



tally, but not splitting in the planes of variegation ; 

 very soft in the bed, but hardening upon exposure ; 

 and very full of small shells. This stone, although 

 good and durable for some purposes, is for the most 

 part rejected, and buried with the infilling 2 to 2 6 



4. Marly limestone, blue-hearted, and sometimes hard : 



it would make good lime, but is thrown away 2 to 2 6 



5. " Lower Fine Stone " — also of a pink hue, very oolitic 



in grain, free in working, cut out in large blocks, and 



containing a few fossils 2 6 



6. " Bottom Fine Stone " — a finer, whiter, and very oolitic 



freestone ; the best stone of the section, and also raised 



in large blocks 2 6 



7. Below these beds, as shown by a trial-hole, are several 



other strata ; marly, sometimes shaly, and not worth 

 quarrying; and having an aggregate thickness ex- 

 ceeding 14 



About half a mile due north of the last quarry, is a shallow 

 lime- and road-stone pit, exposing a section of from 6 to 8 feet 

 of marly limestone, in very thin courses, but yielding no fossils. 

 These are probably the continuation of some of the lower and 

 unworked beds of the freestone quarry. 



Weldon is about midway of my horizontal section between the 

 Welland and the None valleys (PL IX. fig. 3) ; which has Rocking- 

 ham at its western and Oundle at its eastern extremity, and to which 

 I shall further allude when I come to describe the succession of beds 

 at the last-named town. Although the Lincolnshire Limestone 

 attains at "Weldon to a thickness exceeding 25 feet, its south-western 

 boundary cannot be very far removed ; as it is nowhere found in 

 directions due east, south-east, or south, at a greater distance than 

 three miles. Its original margin on this side, however, may have 

 been diminished by denudation prior to the deposition of the over- 

 lying beds. 



Kirby Old Slate Quarries. 



Two miles due north of Weldon are the Kirby " Old Slate 

 Quarries." These are not now worked, and no section is exposed. 

 From such portions as I could find in situ, it would appear that the 

 upper beds are oolitic, and the lower marly limestone. This 

 arrangement seems very frequent in the Northamptonshire districts 

 of the formation (as long since noticed by Professor Morris), although 

 by no means uniformly prevalent ; and it is probably merely the 

 result of varying accidental and local conditions. 



