Lesley.] 39 Q [May. 



the table-land begins, Whatever the age of the gravel and loam, 

 they undoubtedly rest upon the old topography of the chalk just as 

 they were at first deposited upon it. 



Returning through the old city and going out over its moats in the 

 opposite direction, I was driven through the long one streeted-village 

 of Menchecourt. Behind the houses, at the distance of a hundred 

 yards, are the quarries, with their common floor on a level with the 

 site of the village and their vertical faces, or stopes, rising behind to 

 the height of from twenty to thirty feet, no more. As they are 

 slowly cut back into the upland, the stoping becomes higher; but so 

 gentle is the slope of the land, in that direction, that years will be 

 consumed in obtaining a face of twice that height. There is not the 

 least appearance of a slide anywhere. The soil above, the layers of 

 broken flint and loam, are evidently in their normal condition. The 

 original stratification is nowhere concealed or confused by subsequent 

 movements from above. The " falsebedding " or oblique deposition 

 is cuiiously visible, and aff'urds abundant evidence of the diversity of 

 currents which introduced the materials. In a few places the sub- 

 ordinate members of the section express themselves by waved lines, 

 suggesting lateral pressure, but not in the form so well known to 

 geologists, where the mass is broken and crumpled by a side thrust 

 or by a slip of the upper upon the under strata. The characteristic 

 feature of all quiet, loamy, and sandy depo.sits, viz , the isolation of 

 lenticular belts of one stratum inside of the limits of the stratum next 

 above or below, is beautifully exhibited. The distribution of the 

 chalk fragments is also open to easy study. But the most striking 

 appearance is that presented by perfectly horizontal parting planes, 

 marked sometimes by thin beds of equally distributed broken flints. 

 Such are, for example, the two lines between b and c, and c and d, 

 in Fig. 1, Plate VII. 



In this section, a represents a layer of broken flints, no doubt a 

 river shore. It passes down into a fine loamy sand. Beneath the 

 second thin horizontal sheet of broken flint, the mass of loam d is 

 stratified in lenses, alternately greenish and yellowish. No chalk or 

 gravel is seen at the floor of the quarry here. 



Fig. 2, is a section about 100 paces west of Fig. 1, ", 1=] metres 

 thick, is a stifi" clay, with a few broken flints at the top and at the 

 bottom ; d, a reddish, yellowish clay, tolerably well filled with broken 

 flints; //, 1 metre, is quite filled with broken pieces of chalk and 

 broken flints ; c, is a perfectly homogeneous mass of drab or dove- 

 colored loam, 2 metres of which are visible, and no floor. 



