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Because a certain bed at Claiborne in Alabama, which contains "four hundred species of marine shells," includes among them the Cardita planicosta, "and some others identical with European species, or very nearly allied to them," Sir C. Lyell says it is "highly probable the Claiborne beds agree in age with the central or Bracklesham group of England."
Fifty-six of these have been found in the intermediate Bracklesham beds, and the reappearance of the other 14 may imply a return of similar conditions, whether of temperature or depth or of a muddy argillaceous bottom, common to the two periods of the London and Barton Clays.
Among the Bracklesham fossils besides the Cardita, the huge Cerithium giganteum is seen, so conspicuous in the Calcaire Grossier of Paris, where it is sometimes two feet in length. Out of 193 species of testacea procured from the Bagshot and Bracklesham beds in England, 126 occur in the Calcaire Grossier in France.
When they came together again in Bracklesham Bay, John Castellan's rage against the hated Saxon had very considerably cooled. Evidently something serious had happened, and something that he knew nothing about, and now that the excitement of destruction had died away, he remembered more than one thing which he ought to have thought of before.
In a couple of hours Portsmouth, Gosport and Portsea had ceased to be towns. They were only areas of flaming ruins; but at last the ammunition gave out, and Castellan was compelled to signal the See Adler to shape her course for Bracklesham Bay in order to replenish the magazines. They reached the bay, and descended at the spot where the Leger ought to have been at anchor.
To that great series of sands and clays which intervene between the equivalents of the Bracklesham Beds and the London Clay or Lower Eocene, our Government Survey has given the name of the Lower Bagshot sands, for they are supposed to agree in age with the inferior unfossiliferous sands of the country round Bagshot in the London Basin.
No less than 33 shells of this group are said to be identical with shells of the London clay proper, yet, after visiting Cuisse-Lamotte and other localities of the "Sables inferieurs" of Archiac, I agree with Mr. Prestwich, that the latter are probably newer than the London clay, and perhaps older than the Bracklesham beds of England.
Being a light craft, she was to take up an agreed position off Bracklesham Bay three miles to the north-west of Selsey Bill, the loneliest and shallowest part of the coast, with all lights out, ready to supply all that was wanted or to make any repairs that might be necessary. Her sinking, therefore, deprived John Castellan's craft of their base.
The Barton Clay, which immediately underlies these sands, is seen vertical in Alum Bay, Isle of Wight, and nearly horizontal in the cliffs of the mainland near Lymington. This clay, together with the Bracklesham beds, presently to be described, has been termed Middle Bagshot by the Survey. In Barton Cliff, where it attains a thickness of about 300 feet, it is rich in marine fossils.
A.3: Headon series, Isle of Wight: Calcaire siliceux, or Travertin Inferieur. A.4: Barton series. Sands and clays of Barton Cliff, Hants: Gres de Beauchamp, or Sables Moyens. B.1: Bracklesham series: Calcaire Grossier. B.2: Alum Bay and Bournemouth beds: Wanting in France? B.2: Wanting in England?: Soissonnais Sands, or Lits Coquilliers. C.1: London Clay: Argile de Londres, Cassel, near Dunkirk.
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