334 
SILUEIA. 
[Chap. XIII. 
overlain by a breccia, c, charged with fragments of igneous rocks. Above the 
last-mentioned are the highest beds of the Permian group in this quarter, con- 
sisting of red sandstone and marl, d, — the whole series being crowned by uncon- 
formable beds of other red sandstones and conglomerates, e, f, which constitute 
the lower members of the Trias or New Red Sandstone. 
Section op the Permian Rocks between the Coal of the Forest of Wyre and the 
New Red Sandstone of Enville. 
S.W. N.B. 
a. Coal-measures, b, c, d. Permian rocks (b, sandstone and red marl with two beds 
of calcareous conglomerate ; c, coarse breccia ; d, sandstone and red marl), e, f. Bunter 
Sandstone (e, lower brick-red or variegated sandstone ; /, pebble-beds or conglomerate). 
*. Fault. 
At Alberbury and Oardiston in Shropshire, a calcareous conglomerate over- 
lying the Lower Red Sandstone, and dipping under other red strata, assumes so 
much the character of a bedded though brecciated limestone, and also con- 
tains so much magnesia, that I still consider it to be probably the equivalent of 
the Zechstein (see Sil. Syst. p. 63). 
In advancing from the centre towards the South of England, one member only 
of this group of rocks is exposed, besides the doubtful rocks of South Devon. 
Thus the peculiar hills that range along an axial line from Abberley to Malvern, 
and which, on account of the vast quantity of igneous materials contained in 
them, I formerly considered to be of eruptive origin, have since been proved by 
Professor Phillips t to be a reaggregated trappoid breccia. Professor Ramsay $ 
has shown that this rock is of the same age as the breccia, c, of the diagram above, 
and that, besides felspathic and porphyritic materials, it contains subangular 
blocks and fragments of old slaty rocks, mostly derived from the Longmynd 
Mountain in Shropshire, and the rocks of the adjacent country of Shelve, 
described in the Second and Third Chapters of this work. The exact place of 
these breccias in the Permian series, which there separate the Old Red from the 
New Red Sandstone, will be eventually denned by the Government Surveyors, 
who will also precisely coordinate the other varieties of this British group, 
whether they be the red, yellow, and white sandstones overlying the Coal and 
supporting the Magnesian Limestone, or the varied equivalents of that rock and 
its overlying red and sandy marls &c. 
In parts of their range, through the central counties, the Permian rocks have 
been found to contain Plants. At Allesley, for example, near Coventry, such 
fossils have long been known as existing in a highly silicified state, like that of 
the stems in the Roth-liegende of Germany. 
The rock in which these Plants occur has been separated from the New Red 
Sandstone, with which it was formerly classed, through the detailed examination 
of Professor Ramsay and his associates. Indeed, in the sheets of the Survey 
Map explanatory of the structure of those central tracts, much of the red sand- 
stone which ranges up to near Warwick is shown to form part of the Permian 
series of rocks, even some casts of certain Permian Shells having been found 
near Exhall. The best fossiliferous British types of the Permian group are, 
t Mem. Geol. Surv. vol. ii. pt. l.p. 112. 
J Quart. Journ. G-eol. Soc. vol. xi. p. 155. 
