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ANCIENT ELEVATION PRODUCING 



the lower parts of the valley would be now covered with water, which could only escape 

 when sufficiently high to issue through one of these cockshoots, and the central dome 

 of Haugh Wood would, under such circumstances, be an island in the centre of a lake. 

 Such a condition of things, if it ever existed, was, however, long ago completely changed 

 by the opening of three, deep, transverse gorges, through the south-western segment 

 of the encircling ridges. The largest gorge or that of Mordiford, is traversed by the 

 Pentelow brook, the chief line of drainage of the valley, and the two smaller gorges, by 

 the rivulets of Fownhope and Sollershope, all feeders of the Wye. 



It is hardly possible, indeed, that masses composed of hard and stony matter could 

 be brought into their present ovoidal forms, and arranged with a qua- qua versal dip, 

 without being subjected to great transverse breaks ; for if, as we have seen, even the 

 straight ridges of other tracts, have been affected by dislocations more or less at right 

 angles to their line of bearing, how much more is it to be supposed, that masses of 

 similar rock cannot have been elevated in circular or elliptical forms, without great 

 fractures of the strata ! Thus, as might be expected, transverse breaks and faults are 

 observable in the surrounding rocks at many points, the existing ovoidal mass being 

 made up of a number of separate pieces, the ends of which were once united. (See 

 map with this chapter.) The greatest convulsions have taken place near the north- 

 eastern turn of the valley, in the Dormington Woods. The Wenlock limestone there 

 ranges in a regular escarpment, the beds dipping north and N.N.E. for the most part, 

 at a slight inclination ; but in one place they are thrown down at an angle of 35° ; 

 whilst at the end of the wood the strike is reversed to W.S.W., and the beds are pitched 

 abruptly to the south-east. From that point to the north of Fownhope, a distance of 

 nearly two miles, we lose all traces of the Wenlock limestone. This is the only portion 

 of the ellipse, where a large mass of any member of the series is wanting, and the effect 

 is naturally referrible to very powerful dislocation, followed, as will be hereafter 

 pointed out, by denuding currents of water. 



The chasm of Mordiford is, indeed, a considerable fault, as shown, not only by the 

 great disruption and loss of the Wenlock limestone, but also by the discrepancy 

 of inclination and direction of the Ludlow rocks, on the opposite sides of the gorge. 

 Between Stoke Edith and Mordiford, these rocks are thrown into broken hilly 

 masses, describing upon the whole a curve, the effect of various breaks and upcasts, 

 many of which may be observed in the beautiful wooded grounds between Stoke Edith 

 Park and the escarpment of Backbury Hill ; or on the outer slope of these rocks near 

 Dormington, Priors Court, &c. At Mordiford the Ludlow rock dips 40° north-west, but 

 on the south side of the defile of the Pentelow brook, the same strata project into the 

 narrow ridge of Westwood and Fownhope Park wood, several hundred yards to the west 

 of the line of bearing of the Mordiford rocks, and in a new direction. These beds dip 

 60° and 65° to the W.S.W.; and, finally, incline to the south-west as they pass from 

 Fownhope to Lindels, where they are last seen. 



