File:The Quarterly journal of the Geological Society of London (13935516931).jpg

1866..
JIJKES OLD BED SANDSTONE AND DEVONIAN.
353
This sandstone might be either
part of the Old Red Sandstone
or a Coomhola grit. No rock
was to be seen for three miles
south of this, on or near to the
road to Simonsbath, until I came
to a place where the road crossed
a little rocky ravine with a small
brook, which the driver declared
was the head of the Exe *.
The rock shown here was a
bluish-grey, shining, clay-slate,
precisely like some parts of the
Carboniferous Slate of Ireland,
which appeared to dip south at
10°. Near Simonsbath similar
slate, but paler, appeared to dip
south at 30°. At both places the
cleavage dips south at 70° or 75°,
and as there were no decided grit
bands, and no layers of fossils,
or any appearance of fossils at
all, it was with some doubt that
I decided on the dip of the beds.
The section in fig. 12 will show
the above facts in a diagram-
matic form, starting from a point
a mile east of Lymmouth and
crossing the country to Simons-
bath.
The green little open valley
of Simonsbath was very similar
in aspect to valleys in the Car-
boniferous Slate in Ireland, and
I greatly regret that I was un-
fortunately prevented from re-
turning here, as I intended, to
trace the Barle down to the part
where it runs in a deeper and
wilder glen through the Old Red
Sandstone north of Dulverton;
for it is there that I should most
hope to find sufficient exposures

• The people at Simonsbath assured
  

me that this was the place called
Prayway, which, on the Ordnance
map, is placed at the head of another
stream. The map was, indeed, nearly
useless here, as neither the roads, ri-
vers, nor features of ground marked