THE MOORLAND DISTRICT. 7 
the district S. of the Esk, is towards the S. E. On the north side of that 
river, the upper plane of the lias is nearly one thousand feet high in ltose- 
bury Topping. From hence to the Lyth alum works, distant seventeen 
miles and a half, in a direction almost due E., the dip is eight hundred 
feet, or about forty -five feet per mile : to Hockcliff, E. N. E., twelve 
miles, the dip is forty-six feet per mile, to Eston Nab N., four miles, 
eighty feet per mile. Hence it may be inferred that on the north side of 
the Esk river, the strata generally dip to the N. E. 
The above measures were taken in directions where the results are very 
little affected by dislocations. But local variations of dip are very 
numerous. From Huntcliff and Hockcliff, the strata sink both toward 
the east and the west ; between Whitby and Bay Town they form a 
basin with meeting slopes ; and in Robin Hood's Bay they turn up in 
what is called a saddle. The most remarkable of these dislocations are 
under the High Peak and west of Whitby. (Consult the section at all 
these points.) The three members of the lias formation may be seen 
on the sea-coast in juxta-position at Robin Hoods Bay, and in the high 
cliffs of Boulby and Rockcliff. The upper and lower shales are seldom 
so well exposed, as to admit of being studied with advantage inland . 
but the middle group may be examined in Eston Nab, in Eskdale, along 
the front of the Cleveland Hills, in Bilsdale, and in the neighbourhood 
of Easingwold ; and in all these places its characteristic position in the 
shale, and the abundance and peculiarity of its imbedded fossils, emi- 
nently distinguish it, and strongly remind the geologist of the “ marl- 
stone” of Lincolnshire and Northamptonshire, to which it is certainly 
to be referred. 
The carboniferous and oolitic formation. — This formation 
is found resting upon the lias in all the high hills and cliffs which belong 
to the moorland district. As its character is, in a considerable degree, 
peculiar, it may be well to introduce here an epitome of its general 
history, for the sake of comparing it with the oolitic strata of the 
midland counties, and the carboniferous series of rocks at Brora, ip 
Sutherland. 
