304 



CARADOC, GRIT, AND LIMESTONE OF POWIS CASTLE. 



another parallel, contiguous mass 1 . The rock beneath the castle is a red grit, in 

 parts so calcareous and highly charged with portions of encrinital stems as to consti- 

 tute an impure limestone. The faces of these beds are well exposed as massive buttresses 

 in the hanging garden-terraces, where, being nearly vertical or inclined at angles of 70° 

 to 80° to the E.S.E., they have the appearance of forming the lower walls of the noble 

 building. Between this rock and the lower ridge upon the west, the carriage road 

 passes through a depression, which is probably on the line of a fault, for upon reach- 

 ing the quarries we find the strata in a parallel ridge dipping to W.N.W. 45°. These 

 relations will be understood by inspecting this wood-cut. 



50. 



Garden terraces. 



Castle rock. 



Road and fault. 



Old quarries. 



The character of the strata varies much, even in a very short distance ; but in a trans- 

 verse section made near the south end, the quarries present in descending order : 



Feet. 



a. Purplish brown, calcareous grit, with many fragments of encrinites, in beds from eight inches to one foot 



and a half, with way-boards of red shale, in parts a sandy and gritty, in others an encrinital, subcrystal- 

 line limestone (see wood-cut,) 20 



b. Blotchy grit with much red shale , 5 



c. Hard, fine-grained, calcareous grit, passing downwards into a mottled, dingy green, and purple impure 



limestone with irregular traces of way-boards 6 



d. Purple and white limestone with blotches of red shale 4 



e. Hard, fine, thick-bedded, calcareous conglomerate, red where weathered, but greyish where freshly broken. 



It consists of fragments of encrinites, green earth, chocolate-coloured schist, and a few quartz pebbles, 

 of sizes varying from almonds to small peas Q 



f. The lowest bed visible is a purple and whitish, semi-crystalline limestone with white veins 3 



So numerous are the dislocations at this spot, and indeed through every part of the park, that 

 these beds can be traced continuously for only a few paces to the north-east, when they are thrown 

 back into another low ledge, the strata of which dip 70° to the N.N.W. In this the prevailing 

 colour is grey, and at the extremity of the quarries, the beds pass into concretionary, subcrystalline, 

 hard, impure, mottled limestone. Where these rocks do not form separate knolls, their course is 

 marked by the red roads or red land produced by the decomposition of the beds extending from 

 Welch Pool through Powis Castle Park, to the Red Lane, where the axis subsides. 



1 Some idea of the beauty of this scene may be formed from the sketch prefixed to this chapter. It is 

 taken from Powis Castle looking to the Breiddens, and presents almost the same outline as a coloured drawing 

 by Lady Lucy Clive. The name of the castle in Welsh is Castel-coch or goch (Red Castle). 



