PROCEEDINGS OF GEOLOGICAL SOCIETIES. 



469 



organic remains of these two formations, probably more genera and species 

 will be found to be common to both than is at present supposed ; but in all 

 cases where the remains of Stigmaria and Spirorbis carbunarius (Microcon- 

 chus) have been found in the strata, the author has termed them Carbonife- 

 rous. In the absence of organic remains, which is generally the rule and 

 not the exception, the Permian character of the strata has been decided by 

 the mechanical character of the deposits and the order of superposition, 

 the beds of breccia and the soft red sandstone generally affording pretty 

 good evidence of the Permian age of the strata over a great extent of 

 country, and varying with the character of the older rocks found in situ in the 

 district. If the Permian beds are taken as the Moat sandstone, the red shales 

 with gypsum and four breccias lying in soft red sandstone at Canobie 

 and Riddings, their identification is pretty easy ; but in continuing them 

 downwards into the upper coal-measures, or in tracing their boundary up- 

 wards into the Trias, there is greater difficulty, as natural sections showing 

 the passage of one into the other are not often with ; but he considers the 

 soft red sandstone of Longtown, West Linton, Rockliffe, and Dalstontobe 

 of Triassic age, and covered by the waterstones and red marls of Carlisle, 

 and these, in their turn to the west, overlaid by the lias of Quarry Gill 

 and Oughterby. 



The Knotty Holm sandstone and a similar rock at Penton, especialty in 

 their lower portions, reminded the author of the Whitehaven sandstone, 

 and it is possible that they may be of the same geological age as that rock, 

 but for the present he has included them in the upper coal-measures. 



In the valleys of the Esk and Liddel he described some interesting Per- 

 mian sections, and detailed at length the particulars of the strata found 

 over a distance of above twenty miles from the upper coal-measures at 

 Canobie to the same beds, as seen in the Raw Beck, near Dalston, where 

 the following strata are met with, viz. : — 1. Red and variegated clays, 

 13 ft. 1 in. ; 2. Bed of limestone with spirorbis, etc., 1 ft. ; 3. Red clays, 

 10 ft. ; 4. Purple shales containing stigmaria, 80 ft. ; 5. Soft red sandstone, 

 40 ft. ; 6. Purple shales, 16 ft. 2 in. After tracing the Shawk sandstone by 

 Westward Chapel, Wigton, West Newton, near Allonby, to Maryport, he 

 passed over the West Cumberland coal-field, and followed it by St. Bees 

 to the south of Cumberland, as far as Drigg Cross. He described at 

 length the Permian strata of Barrowmouth and Ben How, south of 

 Whitehaven. At the former place the beds occurred in the following de- 

 scending order, viz. : — 1. Fine-grained red sandstone, laminated and 

 ripple-marked, same as that seen at Moat, Glenzier, Cove, Shawk, West- 

 ward, Maryport, and other places, which may be conveniently termed the 

 St. Bees sandstone, fully 1000 ft. ; 2. Shaly marls, 30 ft, ; 3. Red marls 

 containing granular gypsum, 29 ft. 6 in. ; Magnesian limestone of a cream 

 colour, containing shells of Bakevellia and Schizodus, 10 ft. 6 in. ; Breccia 

 composed of pebbles of coal-measures, sandstones, and slate rocks, 3 ft, ; 

 Red and purple sandstones, 110 ft. ; Conglomerate sandstone full of 

 white quartz pebbles, with peroxide of iron and volcanic ash, containing 

 common coal-plants, 30 ft. The two last beds have been long known as 

 the Whitehaven Sandstone, and Professor Sedgwick many years since 

 classed them as Lower Red Sandstone. After further investigation the 

 author is inclined to indorse this opinion, as he cannot find any difference 

 between these sandstones and his Lower Permian beds of Astle}^, Bedford, 

 and Moira, near Ashby-de-la-Zouch. These singular sandstones lying un- 

 conformably to the breccia above and the coal-measures underneath, he 

 thinks will be found to be the English representatives of the Lower Roth- 

 liegendes of the Germans. 



