My friend Mr. Samuel Stutchbury many years ago also furnished me with the accompanying sketch (fig. 6) of the beds of conglomerate during the period the remains were being removed.
Fig. 6. — Position of Reptilia in the Conglomerate of Durdham Down.
I may mention that several of the bones were in actual contact with, or resting upon, the carboniferous limestone ; whereas others, and the majority, were or distributed between one and two feet above the junction of the solid brecciated conglomerate with the limestone below.
The boulders were chiefly subangular, many of great size, and evidently had not been far removed from their parent source in the Carboniferous Limestone.
It was quite evident, from the condition and position of the remains in the breccia, that they must have been dismembered prior to their final deposition ; for many of the bones were much fractured. This is especially the case with a lower right ramus, which is fractured into three pieces ; and the vertebrae in some instances are much worn or mutilated ; so with the coracoids, tibia, and fibula, &c. I, however, abstain from entering into any particulars about these reptilian remains, and refer for such information to the researches of Prof. Huxley (loc. cit.),
8. Stratigraphical Relations or the Dolomitic or Reptilian Conglomerate to Continental Deposits.
The equivalence of this peculiar breccia, outside the region or area to which it appears to be confined, is not a matter of easy solution even in our own country.
Regarding its position stratigraphically, it may occupy the place of the Muschelkalk, a formation wanting (so far as we know) in the British islands*. In time, therefore, it may be, and probably is, the equivalent of this missing member of the Trias ; but the highly fossiliferous condition and extensive fauna of the Muschelkalk, as exposed in Northern and Central Germany, contrasted with the barrenness of this conglomerate, and perhaps also of the calcareous breccia and conglomerate of the Midland Counties, afford us no
- The Bunter series docs not appear to have been deposited in the Bristol area.
