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FIRST IMPRESSIONS OF

CHAPTER IV.

Quit Manchester for Wolverhampton.—Scenery of the New Red Sand stone; apparent Repetition of Pattern.—The frequent Marshes of England; curiously represented in the National Literature; Influence on the National Superstitions.—Wolverhampton.—Peculiar Aspect of the Dudley Coal-field; striking Passage in its History.—The Rise of Birmingham into a great Manufacturing Town an Effect of the Development of its Mineral Treasures.—Upper Ludlow Deposit; Aymestry Limestone; both Deposits of peculiar Interest to the Scotch Geologist.—The Lingula Lewisii and Terebratula Wilsoni.—General Resemblance of the Silurian Fossils to those of the Mountain Limestone.—First-born of the Vertebrata yet known.—Order of Creation.—The Wren's Nest.—Fossils of the Wenlock Limestone; in a State of beautiful Keeping.—Anecdote.—Asaphus Caudatus; common, it would seem, to both the Silurian and Carboniferous Rocks.—Limestone Miners.—Noble Gallery excavated in the Hill.

I quitted Manchester by the morning train, and travelled through a flat New Red Sandstone district, on the Birmingham Railway, for about eighty miles. One finds quite the sort of country here for travelling over by steam. If one misses seeing a bit of landscape, as the carriages hurry through, and the objects in the foreground look dim and indistinct, and all in motion, as if seen through water, it is sure to be repeated in the course of a few miles, and again and again repeated. I was reminded, as we hurried along, and the flat country opened and spread out on either side, of webs of carpet stuff nailed down to pieces of boarding, and presenting, at regular distances, returns of the same rich pattern. Red detached houses stand up amid the green fields; little bits of brick villages lie grouped beside cross roads; irregular patches of wood occupy nooks

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