134 THE STORY OF THE EARTH. 



thigh bone resembles that of the Australian duck 

 bill Ornithorhynchus. Flying saurians are named 

 Rhamphocephalus. Long snouted types of croco- 

 dile occur, and remains of the great terrestrial 

 carnivorous Megalosaurus, which appeared first 

 in the Inferior Oolite. All these fossils are in a 

 bed full of marine shells. 



About Hath and in Dorsetshire the Great 

 Oolite is succeeded by a brown clay crowded 

 with the ApiocritlUSy or pear encrinite, which has 

 a cylindrical stem. This (May, named Bradford 

 clay, separates the Great Oolite from the thin- 

 bedded Forest marble above it. That shelly lime- 

 stone at Ertslow Bridge near Oxford, at Chipping 

 Norton, and other localities yields the remains of 

 CetiosauruSy which is the largest terrestrial fossil 

 reptile found in England. 



In Northamptonshire and Lincolnshire there 

 is a (May above the Great Oolite limestone, in the 

 position of the Forest marble and Bradford clay, 

 called the Blisworth clay. 



All these irregularities in mineral character of 



the bower Oolites as they are traced through 



'.and may result from the sinuOUS contours 



of bays and promontories of the shores at the 



time of their deposit u re, which did not corre- 

 spond with the line along which the several de- 

 posits Come to the surface of the country at the 

 -lit day. 



nbrash is the name given to a shelly lime- 

 stone Which Closes the bower Oolitic period. It 



irely more than 10 to 15 feet thick. Many of 



Itfl fossils arc like those of the Inferior Oolite. 



The most characteristic species is the Avicula 



>;,i/a. It is the first deposit since the 1 

 Which extends continuously through England, 



