Feather stonhaiigh's Geological Report. 



51 



glomerate, and ending with the weald ciaj, both inclusive, (a 

 very remarkable deficiency, which I was the first to point out, 

 in the year 1828,) I shall merely advert to the prominent 

 characters of the dilferent mineral beds, that any student into 

 whose hands this report may come, may have an opportunity 

 of applying those characters to any rocks he may meet 

 with, which are not in accordance with those of the rocks 

 hitherto alluded to. In an economical point of view, the for- 

 mations in question, not containing the precious metals, or 

 much of the useful ones, or embracing any important deposite 

 of coal, are not so much to be regretted, except, perhaps, on 

 the score of the fine freestones they include; but nothing, as 

 will hereafter be seen, can exceed the surprising interest 

 which the organic remains embraced in them have excited. 



We now come to a series of formations constituting the new 

 red sandstone group^ which varies very much in its structure 

 in diiferent portions of Europe. The whole group, however, 

 may be divided into five portions — the variegated marls of the 

 Vosges in France, the muschelkalk of Wurtemberg and other 

 parts of Germany, the new red or variegated sandstone., the 

 magnesian limestone or zechstein., and the Exeter red con- 

 glomerate or todtliegende. These will be briefly noticed in 

 the ascending order. 



The Exeter red conglomerate., or supposed equivalent of 

 todtliegendes., is a conglomerate formed of beds which have pre- 

 ceded it, fragments of the carboniferous limestone forming a 

 considerable portion of its structure. It is called in Germany 

 todtliegende or dead stratum, in contradistinction to a bed of 

 copper slate which rests upon it, and which is worked for the 

 metal it affords, itself producing none. 



The magnesian limestone or zechstein varies very much in 

 England and Germany. Professor Sedgv/ick* has described 



* Transactions of the Geological Society of London, vol. 3, part 3. " On the 

 geological relations and internal structure of the magnesian limestone, and the 

 lower portions of the new red sandstone series, &c. By the Rev, Adam Sedg- 

 wick," &c. 



4^ 



