PROCEEDINGS OF GEOLOGICAL SOCIETIES. 



467 



tlie Trias, their characters and organic remains clearly indicating more of 

 a Permian age.* Accordingly, in his first paper published on this sub- 

 ject in the Society's Memoirsf in 1855, allusion was made to these beds, 

 and they were classed as Permian after tracking the Permian beds of Lan- 

 cashire through the north-western counties of York, Westmoreland, and 

 Cumberland. His attention was chiefly directed to the red marls, magne- 

 sian limestones, conglomerate, and soft red sandstone strata, those being 

 the common Lancashire types ; and where the red sandstones of the neigh- 

 bourhood of Carlisle and St. Bees were incidentally mentioned, they were 

 treated as Upper New Eed Sandstone or Trias, as Professor Sedgwick 

 has described them in his valuable memoir. But in his second communi- 

 cation,]; published in 1857, where the Howrigg, Shawk, and Westward 

 sections are described, he came to this conclusion that " the brick-red sand- 

 stones of those places, with their underlying red clays, as well as the 

 breccia at Shawk, I have little doubt will be proved to be Permian. It is 

 true that no fossil organic remains have yet been found in them, with the 

 exception of the track alluded to in this paper ; but if mineralogical cha- 

 racters and geological superposition are to be taken as evidence of their 

 age, they are as good Permian beds as those of West-House, Kirby Stephen, 

 and Brough, in England, and Dumfries and other places in the south-west 

 of Scotland, with the latter of which they are most probably connected." 



In a paper published by Professor Harkness in 1862, § that geologist 

 adopts in substance this view, and agrees with the author's opinion of the 

 Howrigg, Shawk, and Westward red clays and sandstones being of Permian 

 age, and describes a very beautiful section at Hilton, in Westmoreland, 

 which strongly confirms it. Of course, it was not intended to question the 

 Triassic age of the soft red sandstones of Dalston and Holmhead, near Car- 

 lisle, which are covered by waterstones, red marls, and lias, as stated in 

 the author's paper on the latter deposit. || 



The Shawk sandstones are well seen at Westward Chapel near Wigton, 

 West Newton, near Aspatria, near Allonby, and to the north of Maryport, 

 and after the Maryport, Workington, and Whitehaven coal-field is passed, 

 they appear again to the south on the coast, in the magnificent promon- 

 tory of St. Bees' Head, and continue southward certainly to Netherton, Sea- 

 scales, Gosforth, and Drigg Cross, and probably, as Professor Sedgwick 

 suggests, into Furness. 



On the north of the Solway the Permian strata on the opposite side of 

 the Vale of Eden are well exposed near Biddings Junction, on the Waver- 

 ley line of railway, about Carwinlay, Moat, and Canobie, and the range of 

 the Moat sandstone (the same age as that of Shawk) by Glenzier Quarry, 

 Cove, near Kirkpatrick Fleming, above Annan, on to Dumfries, is well 

 marked. 



In addition to a description of several Permian sections at Penton, Bid- 

 dings, Carwinlay Burn, Barrowmouth, and Ben How, two sections were 

 given, which showed the occurrence of the upper coal-measures, similar to 

 those described by the author some years since in the valley of the Ayr, 



* In the ' Quarterly Journal of the Geological Society for 1851,' p. 162, Sir R. I. 

 Murchison doubted the sandstone of Dumfries being of Triassic age, and preferred to class 

 it with the Permian. 



t On the Permian Beds of the North-West of England, vol. xii. p. 209, of the 

 Society's Memoirs. 



% Additional Observations on the Permian Beds of the North-West of England, 

 vol. xiv. p. 101, of the Society's Memoirs. 



§ ' Quarterly Journal of the Geological Society for August, 18C2,' p. 205. 

 || Ibid., for May, 1859, p. 519. 



