Mar., 1892. 
PERMIAN BRECCIA OF LEICESTERSHIRE. 
55 
112.) The matrix at Blackfordby is of a yellowish colour, 
blotched with red, and among its finer materials green frag¬ 
ments are fairly numerous, but a chloritic or epidotic rock, 
which occurs in larger pebbles, seems to be at least as 
common as the above-mentioned slate. These specimens 
seem to call for only one general remark—that a larger propor¬ 
tion of “paste” (decomposed felspar or felspathic rock) and 
a smaller of quartz grains are present here than is usual in 
the Triassic sandstones. They have, however, some general 
resemblance to the basement breccia of the Keuper, if it be 
accurately represented by a large specimen in University 
College, collected, I believe, in the Kidderminster district by 
Prof. Morris. They have a rough similarity, especially in 
the dull red colour, to some of the Permian breccias of Wor¬ 
cestershire, while a specimen from Kowthorne, county Derby, 
is greyer, more quartzose and Triassic-looking. 
These breccias afford evidence which has an important 
bearing on the past physical geography of this part of the Mid¬ 
lands. The rock fragments are very various, and include speci¬ 
mens of Charnwood and other prse-Palseozoic or old Palaeozoic 
rocks, besides representatives of the Carboniferous Limestone, 
of the Millstone Grit (probably), and of the Coal Measures; 
the last in considerable abundance. The country, then, for 
a considerable distance around must have been affected not 
only by great post-Carboniferous movements,* but also by 
great post-Carboniferous denudation, sufficient at any rate to 
make a section through the members of the latter system, 
and probably to expose in places that ancient floor, which has 
been described by previous authors. Portions of it, of 
course, may not have been covered by the Carboniferous 
rocks. We must also remember that in Leicestershire the 
Millstone Grit is not thick, and the Carboniferous Lime¬ 
stone in many places is thinning, in some absent. It does 
not seem probable that any great and strong river rolled its 
sands over this area. The materials suggest the mingling of 
fragments of many kinds brought together' from different 
quarters. The comparative rarity of well-rounded fragments 
seems also irreconcileable with the deposit of a large river or 
the action of ocean waves.! According to a diagram con- 
*Mr. Gresley, in a manuscript note, states that in his opinion a very 
long time must have elapsed between the deposition of the Coal 
Measures and the formation of the Permian breccia, because the frag¬ 
ments of the former in the latter are very much the same in their 
lithological condition as are similar rocks in the existing Coal Measures. 
fAccording to another note of Mr. Gresley’s, the Permian breccia 
does not usually exhibit stratification—“ a confused mass of fragments 
are huddled together in an unstratified matrix.” 
