Mr. Johns writes : — One of the most striking geological features of the district 
is the evidence of the existence of an ancient river valley, in which the sediments 
of the '* Red Conglomerate " were laid down, and which later formed the estuary 
to which the shales, mudstones, and dolomites of the Lower Limestone shales 
seem to be confined. Such evidence as is now available points strongly to the 
upper old Red Sandstone age of the Red Conglomerates. The almost total 
absence of records of organic remains from these deposits is significant, but need 
not deter workers from making a systematic search in the fine sections which will 
be visited. The Lower Limestone Shales are interesting in that they represent 
the very oldest Carboniferous rocks of the county, and may be correlated with the 
Tournaisian of South Wales and Belgium. Owing to the conditions under which 
they were laid down, the formal evidence is scanty, and the beds represent a facies 
distinct from the typical areas. 
Mr. W. Robinson writes: — The pronounced upheaval of the Lake District is 
continued right up to the Dent portion of the Pennine fracture, the downthrow on 
the east being between 2,000 and 3,000 feet. The Coniston series, so well seen 
at Clapham last year, reappear on the west side of the fault, their exposure being 
due to the folding and crumpling of the rocks, coupled with this general upheaval. 
The downthrow at Clapham (and at Ingleton), i.s on the west side. 
The lowest rocks here seen are the Caradoc and Bala groups. Though greatly 
faulted and folded they are fairly well exposed in the Cautley Valley, and are here 
accompanied by much volcanic and igneous material. Exposures of lavas and beds 
of ashes, apparently contemporaneous with the deposition of the Bala Limestone, 
will be visited and described, so also will be the splendid section about a mile 
away, described by Prof. Hughes in vol. xvi. (plate 6), of the proceedings of the 
Yorkshire Geological Society, which section the professor says "is the most com- 
plete I know of in the lower beds of the Silurian and the upper beds of the Bala 
series." 
Some time will be devoted to an examination of the two dissimilar con- 
glomerates at the base of the Carboniferous rocks, as they are rarely found, as here, 
in near juxtaposition. The lower one (the old Red), is exceedingly coarse, and con- 
tains angular and sub-angular fragments of the underlying rocks, and might have 
been, it is suggested, torrentially deposited during that immeasurable length of 
geological time following the upraising of the old Silurian sea-bed, when the 
northern part of Britain was mountainous land continuous with Scandinavia, and 
the Lake Hills and the Howgill Fells constituted features far exceeding in size 
their existing dimensions. The other conglomerate, at a slightly higher horizon, 
green in colour, and containing quartz pebbles, is doubtfully conformable to the 
lower, and certainly forms the base of the lower Limestone shales, and may be also 
of the Carboniferous series. Both these conglomerates and the lower shales are 
well seen in Nor Gill, where they are tilted at high angles like manuscripts on a 
bookshelf, and can there be studied with great facility. 
Superficial Geology. — The moraines of glaciers and other evidences 
of ice action should be noted, especially the crescent-shaped drumlins at 
the turn into the Lune Valley ; as well as the notched outline of 
Middleton Fell, connected as it is with a series of ascending parallel lines of 
ice flow, well seen at Brackensgill, where they cause cascades in the waterfall; 
and a recent exposure of deeply grooved rock on the Golf Links, the origin of 
which is open to discussion. 
An instance of a valley in the making may be discerned at the base of Barfell 
(wrongly spelled Baugh Fell on the Ordnance Maps), and across the line of weak- 
ness on Rysell. 
BOTANY. — The Botanical Section will be officially represented. 
Flowering Plants. — Mr. John Handley, J. P., writes : — The following is a 
list of wild flowers likely to be found in the neighbourhood of Sedbergh : 
Hieraciuvis in great variety and some very scarce, Rubns saxatilis, Riles alpinumy 
Metim athamanticum, Listera cordata, Pynis communis, Galium boreale, Pyrola 
media, Thalictrum minus, Alchemilla alpina^ Centaurea cyan us, Paris qnadrifolia^ 
