Geological Society. 
isn.] 
(quarry of this stone which has been yet 
worked, is tlie grounds of Claude Scott, 
esq. The opening liitherto made is but 
small; it is however sufficient to show 
that the stratum here worked, has suf¬ 
fered some degree of displacement, as 
it dips with an angle of about forty-hve 
degrees. 
At Feversham, over the chalk, Mr. 
Francis Crow luts discovered a bed of 
dark-brown sand, slightly agglutinated 
by a silicious cement, and intermixed 
with a small poiiioa of clay. In tltis 
stratum, which has been hitherto but 
little explored, he has found in a sili¬ 
cious state specimens of Stiombus pes 
pelicani, ajul a species of CucuU&a, nearly 
resembling those which are met with in 
the Black-down whetstone pits. 
Patches of jdastic clay are frequently 
found over the chalk: some of tiiese are 
yehow, and employed for the common 
sorts of pottery; but oihets are white, or 
grayish-white, and are used for finer 
purposes. The coarser clay is very fre¬ 
quently met with, nor are the liner kinds 
of very rare occurrence. In the Isle of 
Wight, two species of plastic white clay 
are worked for the purpose of making 
tobacco-pipes. A similar clay, which is 
used for making gallipots, is dug from 
the banks of the Medway. A fine, 
light, ash-coloured, nearly white, clay, 
w'hich is employed in pottery-works, is 
also dug at Clieain, near Epsom, in 
S^urrv. 
The upper or flinty chalk, which is 
the next older stratum, is extremely 
thick, forming stupendous cliffs upwards 
of six hundred and fifty feet high, on the 
south-eastern coast of the island. It 
extends neiirly through ahnost all that 
part of the island which lies south of a 
line supposed to be drawn from Dor¬ 
chester, in the county of Dorset, to Flam- 
borough-head, in Yorkshire. 
In this stratum there is a great quan¬ 
tity of flint, chiefly in irregularly-forined 
nodules, disposed iit layeis, wliich pre¬ 
serve a parutlelisni (vith each other, and 
witii contiiiiions seams of tiioc, some¬ 
times not exceeding iialf an inch in 
thickness, 
d'he state in whicli the fossils are 
found, plainly evinces that the matrix in 
which they are imbedded was J'ormed by 
a gradual tlepositioo, which entornhed 
these animals whilst living in their native 
beds. The> fine and delicate spinous 
projections of the shells are unbroken, 
and the spines are still found adhermg 
t© the crustaceoijs coverings of tlie 
cchhu; neither of which circumstances 
could have occurred, had these bodies 
been suddenly and rudely overwhelmed 
by these investing depositions, or had 
they been brought hither from distant 
spots. 
That the deposition of chalk and of flint 
was sometimes alternate, and even, as it 
is expresssd by Messrs. Cuvier and 
Brongniart, pei'icdicaly appears from the 
seams or' strata of flinty nodules, and 
particularly from the woclely extended 
flat or tabular flinty depositions inter-' 
posed between the chalk. 
But that the chalk was permeated by 
the silex at some distance of time after 
the deposition of the former, stems also 
to be proved by the state of the fossils 
of this stratum. There does not appear 
to be a single instance in which the ani¬ 
mal remains are impregnated with silex. 
On the contrary, the substance of all 
these fossils has become calcareous spar, 
and their cavities have been filled with 
flint; thus plainly evincing that sufficient 
time must have elapsed tor the crystaU 
lization ot the calcareous spar, previ¬ 
ously to the infiltration of the flint. 
1 he hard chalk lies immediately be- 
neatli the sole chalk. In this stratum 
there are no flint nodules. “ Its beds," 
according to Mr. Farey, “ increase in 
hardness, until near the bottom, where 
a whitish freestone is dug, at Totternlioe, 
in Bedtordshire, and at mimerous other 
places: that brought from Ilyegate and 
ocher quarries, of this stratum, south of 
London, is used as a fife-stone." 
It h IS been generally supposed that 
these two strata of chalk are of one for¬ 
mation : but not only the absence of tlie 
flints, but the characters of their fossils, 
prove them to be of distinct formations. 
No fossils indeed are marked by more 
decidedly peculiar characters than those 
of this stratum ; since hardly a single 
fossil has been found in it, which has 
been met with in the soft chalk, or any 
other stratum. 
It is in this clialk that the genus 
monites is first met with; or, in otiier 
words, it appears that the water which 
formed this stratum, was chat in uhieUi 
this genus last existed, no traces of it 
having been seen in tlie soft chalk or in 
the other superior strata. The chief, and 
perhaps th;- only ciicular species of tliis 
gersiH, whicii has been found in tins 
stratum, is of a large size, with nodular 
projections on its sides, towards the 
back, which is generally flat. This fossil 
appears to be of a different species from 
