36 
COLE : ON THE RED CHALK. 
e.g. one opposite the church before reaching the village green 
(elevation 198 ft.), and another a little further on, under 
the National School, at an elevation of 224 ft. A grand 
section (Section 6) may be seen in the brickyard adjoining 
Warter, on the road to Pocklington (elevation 275 ft.) Here 
the colours are remarkable. Under the surface soil is a band 
of grey chalk, from 1 ft. to 2 ft. thick ; then red chalk (1 ft.) 
of various hues, occasionally pink, full of iron nodules ; 
followed by a band of orange-coloured clay (1 ft.) ; and this 
again by grey clay tinged with light blue (1 J ft.) Under- 
neath is exposed the Lias. 
The colour of red chalk is very variable. At Speeton it 
is rich in colour, as in fossils. It is also fairly bright just 
below Acklam brow (the finest view in East Yorkshire), where 
it is well developed, above some springs, bordered by willows. 
At Burdale Station, and in two dales near Wharram Percy 
Church, it has a duller colour, whilst there is no trace of red 
colour in the valley north of Burdale tunnel. It is brightest 
of all in Warter, in the hard bed above mentioned; though even 
here, in the upper beds, the colour fades to a very slight tinge 
of pink. The colour at Millington Springs is also darker than 
at Speeton, and most resembles the beds at Warter, distant 
only two and a half miles. At the Warter brickyard, the 
colour occasionally resembles magenta. 
Whether the colour was introduced at the time of deposi- 
tion or subsequently, is a question hitherto, I believe, 
unsettled. I am inclined to think subsequently. Certainly 
at Warter there are alternate beds of red and grey chalk, 
and even in the same piece of chalk the red colour is found 
at the top and the grey at the bottom, without any apparent 
distinct line of separation ; and in fossils in my possession, 
taken from the actual red chalk of Speeton, the interior filling 
of the shell is grey, not red, as if the shell had prevented the 
colouring matter from entering. 
