( 2C3 ) 
X. — The Agriculture of Staffordshire. By H. Evetjshed. 
A BRIEF geological description may be appropriately preceded 
by an estimate of the area occupied by the diflerenl formations : — 
Acres. 
I'2:m'0us rocks " .. .. 4G8 
Silurian beds 4,000 
Mountain limestone 15,000 
Yorcdalt> rocks and millstone ."vit .. .. G4,000 
Coalmcasnres .. .. .' 9G,000 
Permian 4,000 
New red sandstone 540,000 
Lias 5,000 
Total 728,408 
In North Staffordshire the carboniferous series of rocks consists, 
in descending order, of coal measures, millstone grit, Yoredale 
rocks, and mountain limestone, succeeding one another in natural 
order. A long synclinal called the Goyt Trough runs due south 
from Mottram, near Staley bridge, by the cast of Leek to the 
Cheatlle coal-field.* 
This hollow, or trough, is for the most part bounded on either 
side by ridges of millstone grit. The coal-field of the Potteries 
is enclosed on the north by the ridges of grit which form the 
northern boundary of the county at Mow Cop and Cloud. At 
Biddulph commences the valley, called Biddulph Trough, which 
runs southward to Stoke and Longton. A parallel ridge runs on 
the east of this valley from above Biddulph through Wesley 
Moor, and forms the eastern boundary of the Pottery coal-field. 
Another ridge, consisting of coal measures, passing southward 
from Mow Cop towards Stoke, forms its western boundary. 
Norton-in-the-Moors is the northern limit, in the valley, at which 
coal has been worked. The lower coal measures, consisting of 
thick masses of shales, and two or three thin coals, occupy the 
hollows of the basins that have been described. New red sand- 
stone rocks appear on each side of the Churnet Valley from a 
little to the north of Leek to about five miles below it. Two 
little patches of mountain limestone peep through the over-lying 
beds at Mixon, east of Leek. 
The mountain limestone commences at Wever, extending to 
Caldon, Waterfall, Grindon, .and Butterton, and thence towards 
the Dove, which separates it from the more extensive lime- 
stone district of Derbyshire. Wever Hill forms the southern 
* See a paper in the ' Quarterly Journal of ihe Geological Society,' 1864, p. 242, 
by Messrs. Hull and Green, Geologists of the Cieological Survey of Great Britain, 
"On the Millstone Grit of North Sla'iordshirc," &e. 
VOL. V. — S.S. T 
