[ 1019 ] 
XXXIX. The Lignites and Clays of Bovey Tracey^ Devonshire. 
By William Pengelly, F.G.S. Communicated iy Sir Charles Lyell, F.B.S. 
Eeceived November 16, — Eead November 21, 1861. 
The little town or village of Bovey Tracey, in Devonshire, nestles at the foot of Dart- 
moor, very near its north-eastern extremity ; it is situated on the left bank of the river 
Bovey, about two miles and a half above the point at Avhich it falls into the Teign, and 
is about eleven miles from each of the towns Exeter, Torquay, and Totnes*, — bearing 
south-westerly from the fii’st, north-westerly from the second, and northerly from the last. 
A considerable plain stretches away from it in a south-easterly direction, having a 
length of six miles from a point about a mile west of Bovey to another nearly as far 
east of Newton ; its greatest breadth, from Chudleigh Bridge on the north-east to Black- 
pool on the south-west, is four miles. It forms a lake-like expansion of the valleys of 
the Teign and Bovey rivers, especially the latter, whose course it may be said to follow 
in the higher part, where it is most fully developed ; whilst the Teign constitutes its axis 
below the junction of the two streams. Its upper, or north-western portion, immediately 
adjacent to the village, is known as “Bovey Heathfield,” and measures about 700 acres. 
On its west and north-west, rise the lofty granite hills of Dartmoor, with their border 
of metamorphic rocks ; on the north, the trappean elevations of Hennock ; on the north- 
east and east, the Greensands of the Haldons, and the traps and limestones of the 
Chudleigh and Kingsteignton districts; and on the south, the traps, Devonian lime- 
stones, and associated rocks extending from Newton towards Ashburtonf. 
Contrasted with this rugged and elevated country, the so-called “ plain ” is not without 
some claim to the appellation, though by no means characterized by evenness of surface. 
Shafts and other excavations have shown that the deposits in this basin consist of an 
accumulation of coarse gravel (mixed with sand and clay), of variable thickness, uncon- 
formably covering distinct strata of lignite, clay, and sand, which are familiar to geologists 
as the “ Bovey deposit,” whilst the lignite is equally well known as “ Bovey coal.” 
This deposit not only occupies the plain which has been described, but is continued, 
in a narrow southerly prolongation, from Newton to near Kingsker swill, about three 
and a half miles from Torbay. This entire prolongation is a divergence from the Teign. 
Where it crosses the estuary of that river it is about four miles from the coast. 
The most important of the excavations is that known as the “ Coal-pit,” which is 
situated on the Heathfield, somewhat less than a mile south of the village, and about 
the same distance from the western margin of the deposit. It is open to the day, and 
* The distances throughout are measured in straight lines on the Ordnance Maps, 
t See Map, Plate LII. 
MDCCCLXII. 6 Z 
