[47] One or two paragraphs condensed from the seventh chapter of
_Summer Rambles_, 1866. Long since out of print.
Although the new red sandstone, so general in the southern parts,
offers scarcely any attractions to the palæontologist, Lancashire is
still a rich locality in regard to fossils. The coal-fields and the
mountain limestone, the latter so abundant near Clitheroe, make
amends. The organic remains found in the mountain limestone almost
invariably have their forms preserved perfectly as regards clearness
and sharpness of outline. The history of this rock begins in that of
primeval sea; the quantity of remains which it entombs is beyond the
power of fancy to conceive, large masses owing their existence to the
myriads, once alive, of a single species of creature. A third
characteristic is that, notwithstanding the general hardness, the
surface wears away under the influence of the carbonic acid brought
down by the rain, so that the fossils become liberated, and may often
be gathered up as easily as shells from the wet wrinkles of the sands.
Access to the mountain limestone is thus peculiarly favourable to the
pursuits of the student who makes researches into the history of the
life of the globe on which we dwell. How much can be done towards it
was shown forty or fifty years ago by the Preston apothecary, William
Gilbertson, whose collection--transferred after his death to the
British Museum--was pronounced by Professor Phillips in the _Geology
of Yorkshire_ at that moment "unrivalled." Gilbertson's specimens were
chiefly collected in the small district of Bolland, upon Longridge,
where also at considerable heights marine shells of the same species
as those which lie upon our existing shores may be found, showing that
the elevation of the land has taken place since their first appearance
upon the face of the earth.
The quarries near Clitheroe and Chatburn supply specimens quite as
abundantly as those of Longridge. Innumerable terebratulæ, the
beautiful broad-hinged and deeply-striated spirifers, and the
euomphalos, reward a very slight amount of labour. Here, too, are
countless specimens of the petrified relics of the lovely creatures
called, from their resemblance to an expanded lily-blossom and its
long peduncle, the crinoidea, a race now nearly extinct. A very
curious circumstance connected with these at Clitheroe is that of some
of the species, as of the _Platycrinus triacontadactylos_, or the
"thirty-rayed," there are myriads of fossilised _heads_ but no bodies.
The presumed explanation of this singular fact is, that at the time
when the creatures were in the quiet enjoyment of their innocent
lives, great floods swept the shores upon which they were seated,
breaking off, washing away, and piling up the tender and flowerlike
upper portions, just as at the present day the petals of the pear-tree
exposed to the tempest are torn down and heaped like a snowdrift by
the wayside, the pillar-like stems remaining fast to the ground. There
is no need to conjecture where the _bodies_ of the creatures may be.
At Castleton, in Derbyshire, where the encrinital limestone is also
well exhibited, there are innumerable specimens of these, and few or
no examples of heads. The bodies of other species are plentiful at
Clitheroe, where the actinocrinus is also extremely abundant, and may
be detected, like the generality of these beautiful fossils, in nearly
every one of the great flat stones set up edgeways in place of stiles
between the fields that lie adjacent to the quarries.
The organic remains found in the coal strata rival those of the
mountain limestone both in abundance and exquisite lineaments. In some
parts there are incalculable quantities of relics of fossil fishes,
scales of fishes, and shells resembling mussels. The glory of these
wonderful subterranean museums consists, however, in the infinite
numbers and the inexpressible beauty of the impressions of
fern-leaves, and of fragments of the stems--well known under the names
of calamites, sigillaria, and lepidodendra--of the great plants which
in the pre-Adamite times composed the woods and groves. In some of the
mines--the Robin Hood, for instance, at Clifton, five miles from
Manchester--the roof declares, in its flattened sculptures, the
ancient existence hereabouts of a vast forest of these plants. At
Dixonfold, close by, when the railway was in course of construction,
there were found the lower portions of the fossilised trunks of half a
dozen noble trees, one of the stone pillars eleven feet high, with a
circumference at the base of over fifteen feet, and at the top, where
the trunk was snapped when the tree was destroyed, of more than seven
feet. These marvellous Dixonfold relics have been carefully preserved
by roofing over, and are shown to any one passing that way who cares
to inquire for them. Beneath the coal which lies in the plane of the
roots, enclosed in nodules of clay, there are countless lepidostrobi,
the fossilised fruits, it is supposed, of one or other of the
coal-strata trees. Two miles beyond, at Halliwell, they occur in equal
profusion; and here, too, unflattened trunks occur, by the miners
aptly designated "fossil reeds." Leaves of palms are also met with.
The locality which in wealth of this class of fossils excels all
others in South Lancashire would appear to be Peel Delph. In it are
found calamites varying from the thickness of a straw to a diameter of
two or three feet, and as round as when swayed by the wind of untold
ages ago. The markings upon the lepidodendra are as clear as the
impress of an engraver's seal. In another part there is a stratum of
some four feet in depth, consisting apparently of nothing besides the
fossil fruits called trigonocarpa and the sandy material in which they
are lodged. With these curious triangular nuts, no stems, or leaves,
or plant-remains of any description have as yet been found associated.
All that can be said of them is that they resemble the fruits of the
many-sided Japanese tree called the salisburia.
At Peel Delph again a stratum of argillaceous shale, five or six feet
in thickness, contains innumerable impressions of the primeval ferns,
the dark tint thrown forward most elegantly by the yellow of the
surface upon which they repose. The neighbourhood of Bolton in general
is rich in fossil ferns, though Ashton-under-Lyne claims perhaps an
equal place, and in diversity of species is possibly superior.
* * * * *
Thus whether considered in regard to its magnificent modern
developments in art, science, literature, and useful industries, its
scenery and natural productions, or its wealth in the marvellous
relics which talk of an immemorial past, Lancashire appeals to every
sentiment of curiosity and admiration.
_Printed by_ R. & R. CLARK, _Edinburgh_
* * * * *
Transcriber's note:
Archaic and inconsistent spelling and punctuation were retained.