THE YOUNG NATURALIST. 



a black carbonaceous belt occurs, occupied by a band of Unio, dark blue and 

 greenish clays follow, containing remains of turtle and fish, followed by a 

 narrow strip of striped sandy clay, and which separates the above from a 

 fresh-water bed containing Limncea, paludina and planorhis, along with Cyrena 

 semistriata, and with some feet of unfossiliferous strata terminates this por- 

 tion of the section. 



Fossififerous beds follow. They consist of alternating blue green and fer- 

 ruginous shaly clays, separated by a belt of almost reniform or potato-shaped 

 concretions, of clay ironstone from three or four feet of similar clays, with 

 carbonaceous zones and pyrififerous belts, containing Paludina seeds, fish 

 scales, and in the shales impressions of plants. 



The lower portion of these beds become obscured by the slips high up the 

 cliff. A marked feature in the series succeeds, in the shape of a consolidated 

 ferruginous band of broken and entire shells, called Whiteband, one exceed- 

 ingly useful for the guidance of the fossil collector, it contains Paludina lenta 

 and Cerithuim sedgurckii, apparently peculiar to this zone, it varies in thick- 

 ness from two feet to only a mere strip of ironstone. Following are about 

 40 feet of pale blue and yellow shaly marls with few fossils, containing at 

 intervals bands of crushed shells, mostly Cyrena semistriata. These marls 

 rest upon a thickness of about ten feet of dark blue shaly clay, with numerous 

 bands of shells ; they rest on a series of compact grey marls and greenish 

 blue clays, with gritty and pyritiferous interrupted belts. About twelve feet 

 of laminated and compact pale bluish marls, with seams of Paludina lenta 

 and occasional specimens of Rissoa cnastelii (major) intervene, between the 

 beds just described, and a singularly marked stratum called the Black Bed, 

 which is the base bed of the series. It consists of nearly two feet of firm 

 carbonaceous laminated clay, abounding in fossils. At its base is a seam of 

 Unio Gibbsii, containing well preserved specimens. The black band before 

 mentioned rises from the shore at an angle of five degrees, nearly under the 

 fir wood on the eastern side of the synclinal on the western, its rise and out- 

 crop are concealed, but fallen fragments are to met with on the shore, under 

 the highest part of the crest of Hempstead Hill. 



Fossil Eemains of the Hempstead Series. — Mollusca. 



Cerithium elegans „ Sedgwickii 



„ inornatum „ subcostellatum 



plicatum „ trizonatum 



„ pseudo-cinctum Corbula pisum 

 „ Lamarkii „ Yectensis 



mutabile Cuma Charles worthii 



