Chapter IV: The Modes of Accumulation of Clays

From whatever sources clays may have been originally derived, the manner in which they have been accumulated in their present positions is a factor of great importance both in regard to their chemical and physical characters and their suitability for various purposes.

As explained in Chapter III, the china clays or kaolins may usually be regarded as primary clays derived from granitic or other felspathic or felsitic rocks by chemical decomposition. Such clays are found near to their place of origin, are usually obtainable in a comparatively pure state and are generally deficient in plasticity. They may occur in beds of small or great depth, but these are not 'accumulations' in the ordinary meaning of that term.

Residual clays (p. 70) also form a distinct class, as unlike the majority of argillaceous materials they are left behind when other substances are removed, usually by some process of solution. In many cases, however, the residual clays are really secondary in character, having been transported from their place of origin, together with limestone or other minerals, the mixture deposited and subjected to pressure and possibly to heat, whereby a rock-like mass is formed. This mass has then been subjected to the solvent action of water containing carbon dioxide or other substances which dissolve out the bulk of the associated minerals and leave the residual clay behind.

The chief agents in the transport and accumulation of clays are the _air_, in the form of wind; _water_, in the form of rain, streams, rivers, floods, lakes and seas, or in the form of ice and snow as in glaciers and avalanches; _earth-movements_ such as the changes wrought by volcanoes, earthquakes and the less clearly marked rising and falling of various portions of the earth's crust which result in folded, twisted, sheared, cracked, inclined, laminated and other strata.

These agents have first moved the clay from its original site and have later deposited it with other materials in the form of strata of widely varying area and thickness, some 'clay' beds being several hundred feet in depth and occupying many square miles in area, whilst others are in the form of thin 'veins' only a few inches thick or in 'pockets' of small area and depth. These deposits have in many places been displaced by subsequent earth-movements and have been overlain by other deposits so as to render them quite inaccessible. Others have been covered by deposits several miles thick; but the greater part of the covering has since been removed by glacial or other forces, so that clays of practically all geological ages may be found within the relatively small area of Great Britain.

The Transportation of Clays.

By the action of wind or rain, or of rain following frost, the finer of particles clay are removed from their primary site and as the rain drops collect into streamlets, these unite to form streams and rivers and the clay with its associated minerals is carried along by the water. As it travels over other rocks or through valleys composed of sandstone, limestone and other materials, some of these substances are dislodged, broken into fragments of various sizes and with the clay are carried still further. In their journey these materials rub against each other and against the banks and bed of the stream, thereby undergoing a prolonged process of grinding whereby the softer rocks are reduced to very fine sand and silt which becomes, in time, very intimately mixed with the clay. If the velocity of the stream were sufficiently great, the mixed materials--derived from as many sources as there are rocks of the districts through which they have passed--would be discharged into a lake or into the sea. Here the velocity of the water would be so greatly reduced that the materials would gradually settle, the largest and heaviest fragments being first deposited and the finer ones at a greater distance.

With most streams and rivers, however, the velocity of the water is very variable, and a certain amount of deposition therefore occurs along the course, the heavier particles only travelling a short distance, whilst the finer ones are readily transported. If the velocity of the stream increases, these finer particles (which include the clay) may become mixed with other particles of various sizes and the materials thus undergo a series of mixings and partial sortings until they are discharged at the river mouth or are left along its sides by a gradual sinking of the water level. The clay will be carried the whole course of the river, unless it is deposited at some place where the velocity of the water is reduced sufficiently to permit it to settle.

If floods arise, the area affected by the water will be increased. The _alluvial clays_ have, apparently, been formed by overflowing streams and rivers, the material in suspension in the water being deposited as the rate of flow diminished. Such alluvial deposits contain a variety of minerals--usually in a very finely divided state--clay, limestone-dust or chalk, and sand being those most usually found.

_River-deposited clays_, _i.e._, those which have accumulated along the banks, are characterized by their irregularity in thickness, their variable composition and the extent to which various materials are mixed together. This renders them difficult to work and greatly increases the risks of manufacture as the whole character of a fluviatile clay may change completely in the course of a few yards.

According to the districts traversed by the water, the extent to which the materials have been deposited and re-transported and the fresh materials introduced by earth-movements, river-deposited clays may be (_a_) _plastic_ and sufficiently pure to be classified as 'clays,' (_b_) _marls_ or clays containing limestone-dust or chalk thoroughly mixed with the clay, and (_c_) _loams_ or clays containing so much sand that they may be distinguished by the touch from the clays in class (_a_). Intermediate to these well-defined classes there are numerous mixtures bearing compound names such as sandy loams, sandy marls, argillaceous limestone, calcareous sands, and calcareous arenaceous clays, to which no definite characteristics can be assigned.

To some extent a transportation of clays and associated materials occurs in _lakes_, but the chief processes there are of the nature of sedimentation accompanied by some amount of separation. On the shores of lakes, and to a much larger extent on the sea coasts, extensive erosion followed by transportation occurs continuously, enormous quantities of land being annually removed and deposited in some portion of the ocean bed. The erosion of cliffs and the corresponding formation of sand and pebbles are too well known to need further description. It should, however, be noticed that the clay particles, being much finer, are carried so far away from the shore that only pebbles and sand remain to form the beaches, the finer particles forming 'ocean ooze.'

The action of the _sea_ in the transport of rock-materials is more intense than that of rivers, the coasts being worn away by repeated blows from the waves and the pebbles and sand grains the latter contain. The ocean currents carry the materials dislodged by the waves and transport them, sometimes to enormous distances, usually allowing a considerable amount of separation to take place during the transit. In this way they act in a similar manner to rivers and streams.

_Glaciers_ may be regarded as rivers of ice which erode their banks and bed in a manner similar to, but more rapidly than, streams of water. Owing to their much greater viscosity, glaciers are able to carry large boulders as well as gravel, sand and clay, so that the materials transported by them are far more complex in composition and size than are those carried by flowing water.

Separation and Sedimentation.

The clay and other particles having been placed in suspension in water by one or more of the natural forces already mentioned, they soon undergo a process of sorting or separation, previous to their deposition. The power of water for carrying matter in suspension depends largely on its velocity, and when this is reduced, as when a river discharges into a lake or sea, the larger and denser particles at once commence to settle, the smaller ones remaining longer in suspension, though if the velocity of the water is reduced sufficiently all the particles will be deposited. Hence, the deposits in lakes (_lacustrine_) and at the mouths of rivers (_estuarine_) increase more or less regularly in fineness according to their distance from the point at which the water enters, the gravel and stones being deposited first, then the coarse sand, next the finer sand and finally the silt and clay (fig. 14). If cross-currents are present, the deposits will, naturally, be made more irregular, and in some cases variations in the flow of the transporting water may cause the coarser particles to be carried further than usual so that they may cover some of the finer deposits previously formed; but as the clay and silt particles are so much finer than sand and gravel they usually travel so far before settling that their deposits are very uniform if the area over which they are spread is sufficiently large. Lake-deposited clays are for this reason more uniform than estuarine beds, whilst beds deposited at considerable depths in the sea and at a great distance from land are still more uniform.

A _lacustrine clay_ is usually more persistent and uniform than fluviatile beds though sometimes difficult to distinguish from the latter. Some of the most valuable clay deposits are of lacustrine formation; their comparative purity and great uniformity enabling ware of excellent colour and texture to be produced without much difficulty. Thus the Reading mottled clays of the Hampshire basin, on the outskirts of the London basin and in Northern France are well known for the admirable red bricks, tiles and terra-cotta produced from them. Still purer clays deposited at Bovey Heathfield in Devonshire are also of lacustrine origin, though they differ in many respects from the ordinary lake-deposited clays and are of unusual thickness for deposits formed in this manner.

The greater purity of lacustrine clays, as compared with fluviatile ones, is attributed to the much larger area over which the deposit is spread,--enabling variations in the deposits to be much less noticeable than when a smaller area is covered--and to the very small velocity of the water in lakes, whereby all the coarser particles are deposited a considerable distance away from the clays and silts.

Ries (6) has pointed out that many (American) lake-clays are of glacial origin, having been laid in basins or hollows along the margin of the ice-sheet or in valleys which have been dammed by an accumulation of drift across them. Such clay beds are usually surface deposits of variable thickness and frequently impure. Like all lacustrine deposits they show (though in a more marked degree than in the older and larger lakes) alternate layers of sand and clay, though the former are usually too thin to be noticeable except for their action in enabling the deposited material to be easily split along the lines of bedding.

_Estuarine deposits_ partake of the nature of both fluviatile and marine beds, according to their position relative to the river from which they originate. They are usually uncertain in character and are often irregular in composition owing to the variations in the flow of the water. The Estuarine clays of Great Britain--with the possible exception of the Jurassic deposits in Northamptonshire and Lincolnshire--are of minor importance, but in some countries they form a valuable source of clay.

_Marine clays_ are, as their name implies, those deposited from sea water. They are frequently found at a considerable distance from the shores of the ocean in which they were laid down, and subsequent risings and fallings of the surface of the earth have so altered the areas occupied by sea water, that a large number of marine deposits now form dry land. Though usually of enormous size and of generally persistent character, marine clay deposits vary considerably in the composition of the material at different depths, as well as in different areas. This is only to be expected from the manner of their deposition, from the varied sources of the material and from the numerous river- and ocean-currents taking part in their formation. For this reason it is generally necessary to mix together portions of the deposit drawn from various depths in order to secure a greater uniformity than would be obtained if a larger area were to be worked to a smaller depth.

The Oxford clay which extends from the centre of England to the centre of France is a typical marine clay.

At the bottom of all oceans at the present day is a deposit, of unknown thickness, of red calcareous clay or _ooze_ which is steadily increasing in amount and is thereby forming a fresh marine deposit, though at present its inaccessibility deprives it of all economic value.

It is important not to overlook the enormous part played by variations in the level of the land relative to that of the ocean in past ages. For instance, there is abundant evidence to show that practically the whole of Great Britain has been repeatedly submerged to great depths and has been raised to heights far greater than its present average. These oft-repeated risings and settlings have caused great changes in the nature of the deposited materials so that in the Coal Measures, for example, there are deposits of obviously fresh-water origin sandwiched in between others undoubtedly marine. It can readily be understood, as stated by Arber (24), that if, at a given period, the dry land during the formation of the Coal Measures gradually subsided, it would first be covered with clear water, whilst from those portions of the area which occupied the higher ground the rivers and streams continued to pour into their estuary a large amount of fresh-water material. Later, a stage would be reached when mud of marine origin invaded the area and covered the previous deposits. When, after an indefinitely long period, the ground again rose, fresh-water deposits might again form, and this alternation of marine and fluviatile deposits appears to have been repeated with great frequency during the Carboniferous period.

In the Lower Coal Measures of Yorkshire and Lancashire, Stopes and Watson (23) have shown that the shales forming the roof of the Upper Foot Coal were derived from drifted sediments of marine origin.

Precipitated Clays.

If the plasticity of some clays is really due to the colloidal nature of their particles, it is obvious that they must have been formed by a process of coagulation or precipitation at a distance from the site of the minerals from which they have been derived. According to the 'colloid theory,' felspar and other alumino-silicates are decomposed by 'weathering,' the chief effect of which is the formation (by hydrolysis) of a colloidal solution of 'clay.' This apparently clear solution flows along in the form of a small streamlet, joins other streamlets and continues its journey. So long as it is quite neutral or contains free alkali the solution will remain practically clear, but as soon as acids enter the stream, or are formed in it by the decomposition of organic matter, a coagulation of the colloidal matter will commence and the amount of 'clay' thus thrown out of solution will depend on the amount of such free acid.

If the coagulation or precipitation occurs in still water, the 'clay' will be deposited almost immediately, otherwise it will be carried forward until it reaches a place where it can be deposited in the manner already described.

Such precipitated clays need not necessarily be pure, as other substances may be present in colloidal form and may be coagulated at the same time as the clay. In addition to these, the admixture of sand and other minerals present in suspension in the solution may become mixed with the particles during coagulation and be deposited with them.

Clays formed in this manner are extremely difficult to identify on account of the highly complex nature of the reactions occurring in their vicinity both during and subsequent to their formation.

Re-Deposited Clays.

Although many clays and other materials have been transported and accumulated in the manner described, the majority of those now available have been subjected to repeated transportation and deposition, owing to the frequent and enormous changes in the relative levels of land and water during the various geological epochs. So far as can be ascertained, it is during these changes of position and the recurrent exposure to air and to water containing various substances in solution, together with the almost incessant grinding which took place during the transportation and deposition, that most secondary clays became plastic. If this is the case, it explains the impossibility of increasing the plasticity of clay by artificial means, at any rate on a large scale.

The simplest of the agents of re-deposition are rain-storms and floods which, forming suddenly, may cause the water of a stream or river to flow with unwonted velocity and so carry away previously formed deposits of various kinds. Clays transported in this way are termed by Ries (6) _colluvial_ clays, the term 'diluvial' is generally employed in this country. If these are derived from a primary clay which has not travelled far since it left the original granite from which it was formed, they will usually be white-burning and of only slight plasticity, but if the flood affects materials which have already been re-deposited several times, the colluvial clays may be of almost any imaginable composition. Floods of a different character--due to the subsidence of the land so that it is partially covered with lake- or sea-water, which beats on its shores and erodes it in the manner already described--are also important factors in the transportation of clays.

So far as clays are concerned, the action of the sea is both erosive and depository, though the sedimentation in it being that of the pelagic ooze at great depths the clayey material is quite inaccessible. Under certain conditions, however, the sea may erode land in one area and may return the transported material to the land in another area. The diluvial clay-silt known as _warp_ in the valley of the Humber is of this character.

Quite apart from the action of water, however, much denudation, transportation and re-deposition of clays and associated materials has been due to the action of ice in the form of glaciers, though these do not appear to have had much effect in increasing the plasticity of the clays concerned.

_Glacially deposited clays_ are characterised by their heterogeneous composition, some of them containing far more sand than true clay, whilst yet retaining a sufficient amount of plasticity to enable them to be used for rendering embankments impervious and for the manufacture of common bricks, and, occasionally, of coarse pottery; others contain so much sand as to be useless for these purposes. Most glacial deposits contain a considerable proportion of stones and gravel which must be removed before the clay can be used.

The large proportion of adventitious matter is due in great part to the much greater erosive force and carrying power of ice as compared with water, resulting in much larger pieces of material being carried, and as the whole of the ice-borne material is deposited almost simultaneously when the glacier melts, only a very small amount of separation of the material into different grades takes place. The comparative freedom from coarse sand of some glacial clays shows that some sorting does occur, but it is very limited in extent as compared with that wrought in materials which have been exclusively transported by water.

For the manufacture of bricks, tiles and coarse pottery in Yorkshire, Lancashire and some of the more northern counties of Great Britain, glacially deposited clays are of great importance in spite of their irregular composition. They are frequently termed 'boulder clays' or 'drift clays' (p. 65), but in using these or any other terms for clays transported by glacial action it is important that they should not be understood to refer to the whole of the deposited matter. Large 'pockets' of coarse sand and gravel frequently occur in deposits of this character and veins of the same materials are by no means uncommon. The custom of some geologists of referring to the _whole_ of a glacial deposit as 'boulder clay' has, in a number of cases, led to serious financial loss to clayworkers who have erroneously assumed that, because some 'boulder clays' are used for brick and tile manufacture, all deposits bearing a similar title would be equally suitable. This difficulty would largely be avoided if, as is now increasingly the case, the term 'drift' or 'glacial deposit' were used for the deposits as a whole, the term 'boulder clay' being restricted to the plastic portions and not including pockets of sand, gravel and other non-plastic materials.

_Boulder clays_--using this term in the limited sense just mentioned--consist of variable quantities of sand and clay, stones and gravel being generally associated with them. The stones may usually be removed by careful picking, and the gravel by means of a 'clay cleaner' which forces the plastic material through apertures too small to allow the gravel to pass. The plastic material so separated is far from being a pure clay and may contain almost half its weight of sand, the greater part of which is readily separated by washing the material.

Boulder clays, when freed from stones and gravel, are sufficiently plastic to meet the needs of most users, without being so highly plastic and contractile as to necessitate admixture with sand or similar material.

Some boulder clays contain limestone in the form of gravel or as a coarse powder produced by the crushing of larger fragments. These are less suitable for manufacturing purposes as the lime produced when the articles are burned in the kilns is liable to swell and to disintegrate them on exposure.

Owing to their origin and the nature of the impurities they contain, boulder clays are never pure and when burned are irregular in colour and somewhat fusible unless subjected to some process of purification.