314 DEEP BORING IN THE NEW RED MARLS NEAR BIRMINGHAM. 
on the east of the line of fault. The chief obstacles to such 
an undertaking are the unknown—certainly considerable— 
thickness of the Red Marls ; and the fact that no one likes 
to be the first to experiment in a matter in which—while 
there is certainly a possibility of failure—any good result 
obtained would be quite as much for the benefit of one’s 
neighbours as for one’s self. It would seem that such borings 
might well be executed by Government, or by the County 
Boards which it is proposed to establish, the cost being 
defrayed by a small tax levied on the landowners of the 
district. 
The work of the Geological Survey has given us some 
information as to the probable thickness of the Red Marls. 
Prof. Jukes, writing of South Staffordshire,* says:—“The 
total thickness of this sub-formation cannot be much less 
than 600 feet and Mr. Howell, speaking of this very 
district,! states that “ south of Birmingham the Keuper 
Marls attain a thickness of nearly 600 feet,” and again adds 
“ in this district, the Red Marl attains a maximum thick¬ 
ness of about 600 feet.” However, he gives a section of a 
boring on the Lindley Hall Estate (four miles north of 
Nuneaton), about which, although a depth of 660 feet was 
attained, he says “ it does not seem certain that they got 
through the Red Marl series; some of the lower beds, 
however, may belong to the Lower Keuper Sandstone.” In 
a deep boring for water, at Rugby, after passing through 400 
feet of Lias and seventy feet Rhaetic Beds, the New Red 
Marls were pierced, and found to be 670 feet in thickness; 
at a depth of 1,140 feet the Keuper Sandstone was reached, 
and a rush of water flooded the borehole ; unfortunately this 
water was so impregnated with salt and with gypsum as to 
be unfit for domestic purposes. 
About eight or ten years ago the Birmingham Corpora¬ 
tion put down a bore-hole in Small Heath Park (a southern 
suburb of Birmingham) in search of water for certain baths 
and wash-houses which it was proposed to build there. A 
depth of 440 feet was attained, entirely in the Keuper Red 
Marls, before the boring was abandoned. I have seen 
numerous specimens of fibrous gypsum obtained from 
varying depths in this bore-liole. 
Early in the present year Messrs. Bates, of the King’s 
Heath Brewery, three miles south of Birmingham, resolved 
to make a deep boring for water through the Red Marls on 
* Warwickshire ^Coalfield, Survey Memoir, 1859, pp. 11-44. 
t South Staffordshire Coalfield , Survey Memoir, 1859, p. 4. 
