230 
THE GEOLOGIST. 
one side, — for a river al\va3-s adds to the beauty of any landscape — and 
the absence of this is ahnost the only defect in the general scenery of 
the outer escarpments of the Cotswolds, since the Severn can only be dis- 
tinctly seen from the more southern hills, as Eobinswood, near Gloucester, 
and others in that direction. From Alderton Hill a fine view may 
be obtained, both of Bredon, the Malverns, the hills about Gretton, 
Stanley, "Winchcomb, and Sudeley, with their well-wooded, grassy 
slopes, and the ramifying valleys which intersect them. 
The geologist will carefully notice the scenery, not only for its own 
sake, but for its value in the physical geography of a country. It is 
not enough merely to examine a section in a quarry, and to note the 
zoological contents of the beds ; a much wider survey must be taken of 
those grand phenomena which have, at various and immeasurably dis- 
tant periods, affected the crust of the earth, upraising deep-seated rocks, 
and causing, in various ways, the present configuration of its moun- 
tain-chains and valleys, regulating its river- courses, and giving to tlie 
outer surface of the globe its present diversified outlines, so attractive 
to the eye and so serviceable to man. 
To violent and often repeated igneous action in former times, must 
be attributed the breaks and dislocations, whether of upheaval or 
depression, of which (in technical language termed " faults ") many 
instructive examples may be seen on the southern side of Eredoii 
Hill, at Dumbleton and Oxenton, and in manj^ other localities of 
the Lias, especially in the neighbourliood of Tewkesbury, where an 
extensive fault, traversing both the Lias and Ecd Marl, may be traced 
for a considerable distance. 
Eeturning from this digression, we will now ascend Alderton 
Hill ; passing over the lower Lias, which is there no where laid bare, 
we reach -the Marlstone, which is partially quarried, but not to 
its entire thickness. On this the upper Lias immediately reposes, 
its lower portion only being visible ; the main mass forming the top 
of the hill which is covered by a thick plantation, so that only about 
twenty feet of the rock appears. Nearest the Marlstone it consists 
of a blue indurated clay, containing many fossil shells, especially a pretty 
species of Rostellaria, very difficult to extract entire. The beds 
above are chiefly shale, varying in colour and consistency, the colours 
brown and grey prevailing. Jfany fossils may also be found in it, 
chiefly Ammonites, which are abundant, but very fragile ; and at 
