Vol. 56.] STKTrCTTTRE OF THE MALVERN AND ABBERLEY HILLS. 173 



by the more probable assumption of overthrust of a portion of the 

 overfold running all along Hodge and Wallsgrove Hills, no addi- 

 tional fold being thus postulated (fig. 26). 



The peculiar disposition of the layers of Downton Sandstone 

 (fig. 25. p, 172) suggests that those on the east have been successively 

 thrust over those on the west, and the latter on to the Ledbury 

 Shale, and this in turn on to the Aymestry Limestone. The 

 limestone at the northern end of the quarry curves round, and 

 evidently terminates against the thrust - plane, a circumstance 

 which confirms the view that I have adopted. The strike of the 

 main thrust-plane is about 



Eig. 26. — Section across the northern 

 part of Wallsgrove Hill. 



south-south-west, but in 

 the southern part of the 

 quarry it becomes more 

 south-westerly. 



The disposition of the 

 Ludlow and Downton beds 

 in the quarry is somewhat 

 complicated by small trans- 

 verse faults, of too insig- 

 nificant a character to repre- 

 sent in the map (fig. 15 a, 

 p. 164): these would seem 

 to terminate against the 

 thrust-plane east of the 

 Ledbury Shales. The Down- 

 ton Sandstone in the quarry 

 contains abundance of fu- 

 coids, Pachytheca,Pterygotus, 

 Lingula, etc. 



We have, then, fairly 

 clear evidence of a well- 

 defined thrust - plane in 

 the Abberley Hills dipping 

 north-westward at an angle 

 varying from 70° to 80°. 



N.N.W. xS 



S.S.E. 



ALUL 



[Scale: 6 inches = 1 mile.] 



LS=Lec!bury Shale. 



DS = Downton Sandstone. 



UL = Upper Ludlow. 



AL = Aymestry Limestone- 



LL= Lower Ludlow. 



XII. The Old Red Sandstone and Coal Measures 

 west of Wallsgrove Hill. 



As already shown by Phillips, 1 the Old Eed Sandstone in the 

 Malvern and Abberley districts shares the folding which has 

 affected the conformably underlying Silurian recks ; immediately 

 west of Wallsgrove Hill it is markedly inverted, like the Ludlow 



1 Mem. Geol. Surv. vol. ii (1848) pt. i; see also T. C. Cantrill, ' Geol. of 

 Wyre Forest Coalfield ' Kidderminster. 1895, p. 10. 



