254 THE ESSEX FIELD CLUB. 



simply suggests some merely prehistoric or primitive domestic 

 purpose. And unless seen when quite fresh, the subsidence 

 caused by the collapse of an old subterranean storehouse would 

 suggest something of special interest as little as the sight of a 

 disused gravel or sand-pit. 



I have, therefore, much pleasure in saying that we are 

 greatly indebted to Mr. Squier for so promptly sending informa- 

 tion about this most interesting Mucking subsidence. I have 

 scarcely any doubt that in this, and in the hollows in the adjacent 

 field, we have examples of those deneholes in sand mentioned by 

 Palin as found in Mucking Woods, and which have been 

 hitherto in this country almost entirely ignored, though recog- 

 nised as existing, and now in use over large areas in Europe and 

 Asia. Indeed, as I have already remarked, from the fact that 

 the deneholes of south-eastern England have been preserved only 

 when they end in the Chalk, simply because it is the only com- 

 paratively hard rock in those parts of Kent and Essex where 

 they abound, their connection with the Chalk, which is only local 

 and accidental, has been erroneously supposed to be essential. 

 This mistake is one which the evidence afforded at Mucking and 

 Billericay in Essex, and by Lammas and Caister in East 

 Norfolk, will decidedly tend to correct. 



THE ESSEX FIELD CLUB.— REPORTS OF 

 MEETINGS. 



SPRING RAMBLE IN EPPING FOREST AND 246th 

 ORDINARY MEETING. 



Saturday, May 19TH, 1906. 



It has become almost an annual custom to open the summer session of the 

 ■Club with a ramble in Epping Forest, and on this day one of these pleasant 

 meetings was held. The assembling place was Theydon Green, and between 30 

 and 40 members attended. The route was through some of the most beautiful 

 parts of the woodlands, looking their best in a delicate livery of pale green 

 opening buds and white hawthorn blossoms. 



The Conductors were Mr. S. A. Skan, of the Royal Herbarium, Kew ; Mr. 

 Miller Christy, President ; and the Hon. Secretaries. Mr. Skan gave several 

 extemporary demonstrations in the woods, his main text being the coming science 

 of •' GEcology " or " Plant Relationships," which is rapidly assuming importance 

 because of its direct bearing on agriculture, horticulture, and forestry. Mr. Skan 

 explained by means of fresh specimens from Kew, some most interesting examples 

 ot the methods by which plants adapt themselves to varying conditions of 

 moisture, drought, shade, and sunshine, and the ways in which particular species 





