208 



NOTE BOTANY. 



depth of 1 7 feet. For about 70 yards at the Skipton end of the cutting 

 a yellow clay was noted, filling up a depression in the strata. Then 

 the gritstones re-appeared, the latter becoming, as we passed, more 

 shattered in their character, and containing concretions or nodules 

 largely charged with iron. When broken, these nodules displayed 

 quite a number of concentric coats. In this cutting, also, nearer the 

 Ilkley end, the sandstone was observed interbedded with shales, the 

 former, in one good example, stretching like a tongue into the latter. 

 Crossing another embankment, a little over 300 yards in length, we 

 entered cutting No. 12, about 530 yards long, with a maximum depth 

 of 10 feet. This was cut through a yellow stony clay, but no large 

 boulders were seen. An embankment, nearly 600 yards in length, 

 had now to be traversed to reach cutting No. 13, which was entirely 

 cut through boulder clay. It had a length of 300 yards, and its 

 greatest depth was 22 feet. Some large boulders of encrinital 

 limestone, with ice scratches, had been taken out of this clay, and 

 also others of gritstone, some yellowish, some various shades of a 

 red colour. An embankment some 500 yards in length brought the 

 party to the point where the railway crosses the main street of 

 Addingham by a bridge of 52 feet span. We now went a short 

 distance into a cutting which will be eventually 1,300 yards long, to 

 note the boulder clay through which it is cut. It is of two characters, 

 the upper being a yellow clay, containing principally blocks of local 

 gritstone ; the lower division being a stiff, dark-blue, most tenacious 

 till, containing a quantity of rounded and subangular blocks of lime- 

 stone and sandstone, many of the former being ice-scratched. The 

 blocks of limestone were observed to be much more numerous in 

 the lower division than in the overlying yellow clay. The few 

 remaining cuttings in the Ilkley direction are also through similar 

 clays, some showing the junction in a more marked manner, but 

 they do not call for any detailed notice. The copious information 

 supplied by Mr. Wilson, the engineer to the line, and the careful 

 and skilful leadership of Mr. C. Brownridge, F.G.S., on both 

 occasions, alike deserve unstinted praise. 



NOTE— BOTANY. 

 The "Ply Orchis near Wetherby. — Early this month (June) I had a 



walk to West Woods, Bramham, passed along the rich (botanically) old straggling 

 Dalton Lane, with its wealth of roadside brushwood and rare plants, such as 

 Columbine, Barberry, Buckthorn, Spindle Tree, Meadow Rue {Thaliciritm 

 flexiiosum), and the grass Melica 7intans, found some pure white Hyacinths in the 

 wood, and on a dry heathy bank at the north end of the wood, whilst picking up 

 a few pink specimens of the Milkwort, great was my delight to stumble on four or 

 five specimens of the Fly Orchis {Ophrys naiscifera). I may say that for several 

 years I have made annual visits to these woods, but have never before noticed this 

 rare and curious orchid. — J. Jackson, Wetherby, June 14th. 



Naturalist, 



