ANCIENT DISLOCATIONS OF THE VALLEY. 



431 



near Mordiford is a breccia, and in the plain of the Wye is a thick argillaceous allu- 

 vium. 



There are, however, instructive sections to the south of Fownhope, where the Ludlow 

 formation occupying the sharp ridge of Paget's Wood and Leigh Wood, plunges at an 

 angle of about 45° to 50° under the Old Red Sandstone, which is there not much de- 

 nuded, but occupies the hill of Capler's Camp. (See PL 36. f. 9 a .) 



Excellent detailed sections of the Upper Ludlow rock are visible at many points 

 around the external face of the elevated mass, by ascending from the plain of the Old 

 Red Sandstone to the highest ridge ; namely, behind the village and in the park of 

 Stoke Edith ; at Dormington and in the slope between Upper Dormington and Back- 

 bury Hill; or in Seager Hill, Marcle Hill, Ridge Hill, &c. The best sections, perhaps, 

 are in the deep-sided lane leading from Darley Common to the crest of Seager Hill by 

 Pilliard's Barn, where the strata are absolutely loaded with shells, not merely casts, as 

 is common in this rock, but with the shelly matter as well preserved as in the testacea 

 even of the tertiary period. Several of the most characteristic shells of the Ludlow 

 rock figured in this work have been found in these localities. (See PL 5.) 



Ancient Dislocations of the Valley. 



The arrangement of the rocks above described must be critically examined, before 

 we can account for the physical features of the valley of Woolhope. Some of these 

 features are the results of mineral structure. Thus, for example, we see that the soft 

 shale has been hollowed into depressions, leaving the harder limestone and sandstone 

 as walls or lines of circumvallation. In explaining, however, those transverse gorges 

 in which the waters flow, we must look to the movements which, in elevating this valley, 

 determined its present form and drainage. 



The major axis or anticlinal line of the valley ranges from Backbury Camp and Dor- 

 mington on the N.N.W., to Lindels and Oldbury Hill on the S.S.E. As the strata on 

 the eastern side of this line, dip at a lower angle than those upon the west, the 

 former side is necessarily broader than the latter. (PL 36. figs 9 a and 9 b , and wood- 

 cut, p. 428.) Throughout two thirds of the circumference, or that portion of it where 

 the strata are not much inclined, the outer ridge, consisting of the Ludlow rocks, is 

 unbroken by any deep transverse fissures. Slight depressions called " cockshoots," alone 

 separate the higher points of the ridge from each other. Hence the water descends 

 from all this part of the escarpment into the centre of the valley. These " cockshoots " 

 mark the rudiments of transverse valleys, and have been occasioned by minor faults or 

 dislocations which have proceeded neither deep enough nor far enough to produce com 

 plete gorges 1 . Had this symmetrical and elevated margin been without deeper breaks, 



1 See other accounts of these rudimentary transverse gorges, p. 349. 



3 h 2 



