6 
a stack near the old Hall, and had left it for a while ; on 
their return they found that the ground had given way 
beneath the stack, which had disappeared. The men 
hastened in great consternation to their master, exclaiming, 
It's gone ! It's gone ! " The hole still remains a recep- 
tacle for rubbish. 
The following copy of a well-sinker's report will, I think, 
show how a pit may be formed in the new red sandstone, 
when a sufficient hollow has been formed below, and the 
limestone roof of the hollow gives way, for it shews that the 
new red is not a very coherent mass of rock : — 
" The well is sunk on the top of Hiitton Bank, and is 28| yards 
deep. After cutting through the soil, which is not very thick, a soft^ 
sandy, red rock, ten feet thick, was penetrated, and then a layer of soft 
marly clay, about ten inches thick. These clay layers occurred about 
every ten feet of rock. The rock was much harder as the shaft descen- 
ded, and alternated red and white. The rock is not laid in horizontal 
layers, but is what well-sinkers call ' eddy -rock ; ' and not all inclining 
one way, but crossing one another with great irregularity, and at various 
angles of descent." * 
I think, then, that these curious pits are due to the 
wasting away of the red marl and gypsum beds, rather than 
of the more solid beds of magnesian limestone which lie 
below, and that their occurrence in the neighbourhood of 
these gypsum beds is a strong presumption that such is the 
case. There are many caves indeed in the magnesian lime- 
stone, but they are not, as far as one can tell, large dome- 
shaped hollows, but long tortuous cracks and windings, often 
reaching to the surface, and forming along the streams 
which run over the limestone frequent swallow-holes, of no 
great size in themselves, but still in summer-time capable of 
taking in the whole of the streams, if they were not care- 
fully stopped up. 
* I am indebted to the kindness of Mr. H. Thirlway, bookseller, Eipon, for 
this "Copy of a Well-sinker"s Report." 
