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SUBMERGED FOREST AT ST. BEES. 



By R. Pickering, C.E. 



(Read at IVhitehavm.) 



The submarine forest at St. Bees is situated on the sea shore 

 nearly opposite to Sea Mill, stretching south-west from that place 

 and diagonally from the coast line. Some years ago I noticed two 

 small patches of peat bed on the shore, about four hundred yards 

 northward and nearer Sea Cote. These patches of vegetable 

 matter are, however, usually covered up with sand. Although a 

 connection with the forest was not very evident, it occurred to me 

 that, should the small patches of peat bed referred to, be a 

 continuation of the forest, and if they underlaid the drift of which 

 the adjoining cliff is composed, the deposit would be of great 

 antiquity, and preglacial. My geological friends held various 

 opinions on the matter, as well as to whether the forest was really 

 a forest in sitd, or an accumulation of drift wood and other 

 vegetable matter, such as is now forming on a large scale in the 

 embouchures of the Missisippi. I felt inclined to attempt a 

 solution of the problem. 



The forest extends, with a dip seawards, for about six 

 hundred yards, between the lines of high and low water-mark, and 

 still continues to dip under water. The width varies from forty to 

 seventy yards. Fully three-fourths of this surface is thinly covered 

 with gravel and boulders, yet these are of sufficient thickness 

 to prevent the forest being observed by persons previously 

 unaware of its existence. A considerable portion has been 

 denuded, and the process is still continuing. Seven bore holes 

 were put down through the remaining stratum ; the thickness varied 



