THE NEW RAILWAY BETWEEN UPMINSTER AND ROMFORD. 9 



Street, is by no means either slight or obscure, and it seems to me 

 quite sufficient to warrant us in regarding them as River Drift, unless 

 there should be strong special evidence to the contrary. And, on 

 the other hand, the decided presumption that they are River Drift 

 derives additional strength from what seem to me to be the very 

 slight grounds for the formation of an adverse opinion. 



For if the gravel, sand, and clay much resemble the material and 

 arrangement of the beds below the Upper Boulder Clay of Hendon 

 and Finchley, they equally suggest the gravel, sand, and loam which 

 are the usual constituents of river drifts, as well as the order in 

 which they usually occur. And when we remember that the beds 

 under the Finchley Boulder Clay are some five miles away, and are 

 found only at heights of more than 200 feet above the sea, it seems 

 to me that nothing but the finding of unquestionable Boulder Clay 

 capping the beds at Endsleigh Street could establish a real affinity 

 between them and the deposits at Finchley. " Race," also, may be 

 found in these Finchley beds ; but it may also be seen in clays and 

 loams of the most diverse ages. Readers of the chapter on the 

 Woolwich and Reading beds in Mr. Whitaker's memoir from which 

 I have already quoted, may note that " race " is mentioned as exist- 

 ing in clay or loam in at least ten different sections. And if we turn 

 to that on River Drift we find that " race " was found in many 

 sections in the unquestionable River Drift of Ilford, Erith, and 

 Crayford. Thus its presence furnishes no presumption whatever as 

 to the age of any bed in which it occurs ; but leaves that question to 

 be decided on the general evidence, which seems to me wholly in 

 favour of the River Drift view. 



It may be worth while to add that Mr. Hudleston (Proc. Geol. 

 Soc.) remarked after the reading of Dr. Hicks' paper that " so long 

 ago as 1 7 15, the Mammoth was found in deposits on the same 

 plateau (at Gray's Inn Lane) along with a Palaeolithic implement." 



I now return to Hornchurch. There are two points on which I 

 should like to add a few words in connection with this Hornchurch 

 Boulder Clay, and the conclusions deducible from its presence there. 

 Firstly, in the discussion on my paper at the Geological Society last 

 March it was remarked that the river deposits of the Thames valley 

 were not really terrace gravels at all. Now, it is quite true that if 

 anyone tries to map the boundaries of the various terraces at and 

 south of Hornchurch, he will soon find himself engaged in a hopeless 

 task, a bank which appears comparatively clear and sharp at a given 



