198 LIAS OF ENGLAND AND WALES: 
out at the base of the Starfish Bed as well as at other levels in the 
cliffs. The position of the Starfish Bed as a part of the Lias, 
was noted by Lonsdale.* Two species are recorded from it, 
Ophioderma Egcrtoni and O. tenuibrachiata. (See Fig. 64.) 
Above the Starfish Bed, come the Laminated Beds, a series of 
micaceous and ferruginous sandy clays and marls (the " Grey 
and Brown Sands with Nodules " of Mr. Day) having in places 
a banded appearance ; and these beds, which throw out ferru- 
ginous springs, are surmounted by more distinctly laminated 
micaceous sands and clays, with bands of hard micaceous and flaggy 
sandstone, that exhibit current-bedding and occur in isolated 
masses. The full thickness of these beds, from the Starfish Bed 
to the base of the Yellow Sands, is about 90 feet. 
Between these beds there is a layer of hard bluish-grey shelly 
and sandy limestone, occasionally separating into two beds, and 
from 1 feet 5 inches to 2 feet 3 inches in thickness. It occurs about 
100 feet up in Down Cliff, about 130 feet up under Thorncombe 
Beacon, and is seen also in Eype Cliff. It contains Pentacrinus 
gracilis and Starfish, and is sometimes made up of fragments of 
these organisms. Mr. Day notes the occurrence of Gryphcea 
cymbium, Pecten csquivalvis, and Plicatula spinosa in these beds.f 
I have found Ostrea irregularis at Eype. 
On the top of the Laminated Beds there is a hard blue and 
reddish-brown ferruginous sandy limestone, fissile at the base, 
occurring at a height of about 200 feet in Down Cliff. It forms 
a conspicuous red band about 1 foot in thickness. Among the 
fossils, which can be best obtained from fallen blocks, are Belem- 
nites, Gryphcea cymbium, Lima, Pecten cequivahis, Spiriferina 
pinguis, Rhynchonclla serrata, &C.J This is the u Ma rgaritatus 
stone " of Mr. Day, and he notes the occurrence in it also of 
Ammonites Jimbriatus, A. margaritatus, Nautilus, Plicatula 
spinosa, Rhynchonella tetrahedra, Waldheimia quadriftda } &c. 
Above it there is a band of pale bluish-brown or light grey 
clay, from 6 to 20 feet thick ; this is overlaid by the Yellow 
Sands, the downwash from which in some places obscures this 
otherwise conspicuous band. 
The Yellow micaceous sands (" Brown Sands and Sandstones," 
of Mr. Day) resemble those at the base of the Inferior Oolite, 
and were indeed included in that formation in De la Beche's 
section of the cliffs^ These sands are often cemented into a hard 
rock, in bands with ferruginous joints, and in the form of huge 
rounded concretionary masses or Doggers, of which many 
examples are to be seen on the foreshore. The beds do not, 
however, exhibit the marked alternate bands of sand and sandy 
limestone which characterize the Midford Sands at Bridport 
* See Broderip, Trans. Gepl. Soc., ser. 2. vol. v. p. 174. A specimen of Ophio- 
derma Egertoni was figured in the London Geological Journal (1847), Plate 19, as 
from the " Inferior Oolite " of Dorset. 
t Quart. Journ. Geol. Soc., vol. xix. p. 292. 
J See also J. F. Walker, Kep. Brit. Assoc. for 1890, p. 799. 
Trans. Geol. Soc., ser. 2, vol. i., Plate via. 
