accumulate so vast a mass of material, which 

 occupied a very diff- rent relationship in regard to 

 the s*-a which nuva it hirrh. 1 hey had another 

 ioptance in that v^ry county. They were accus- 

 tomed to look upon Kent as a very prrtry county, 

 but we could haidly call it a bold county. Tht-y 

 had not anything like the Wel^h scenery in the 

 county. They had in the Weald of Kent, if 

 record bad been nt'h'ly read by their geologists, 

 almost absolutH pr .of that there had been cleared 

 away from the surface of the Wenld of Kent 

 strHta, upwards of ^ (XiO feet thick, which of 

 C'-uree mnant a very respectable mountain. 

 UnHeineath that chalk layer — l"ng before the 

 chalk layer or the ocean, the bottom of which 

 it Ct'Cstituted, was thought about— there was a 

 huge formation called Wealden What who its 

 orit»in .^ 1 here could be no doubt thnt it was 

 the deUa of a huge river, a river comparable 

 to the Wangesor the Missis si pi. It was certain, as 

 there had been such things as the suhmergence 

 or dii^persioDS of huge continents, that their 

 existence went to provide de t* such as that. 

 There wa5 a story, which only wanted unfolding, 

 which, by careful study, would give one a very 

 large id^-a indeed of the past hit-tory of the Weald, 

 and showed what a variety of life, always studied 

 in regard to the particular time in which it was 

 adapted, peopled that wonderful world of theirs. 

 They were every day visiting places like Ash 

 ford and the Weald of Kent, and they were apt to 



fnrget what had taken place thpre. Another 

 phenomena as regarded the Weald, was the dis- 

 pel sion of thnt three thousand feet of stratufica- 

 tion. Wheie hnd it gone toi' It was very amus- 

 ing that when the Weald of Kent was practically 

 studded with geologists, they cnlkd to 

 their assistance t'l account for the disper- 

 sion, the might? rushes of salt water. They 

 appeared to think that some great deluge had 

 Cleared away at one str ke a mass like that. Of 

 course they knew diff.-rently now. A deluge, 

 however tremendous, even if caused by the 

 shifting of the pole of the earth, wuuM be utterly 

 ina'iequate to do an.vth ng of the kind They 

 knew that the dispersion was slow and pystematic 

 and as calm and passive as the giowth of the 

 cha'k which lay at the bt.ttom -if th« ocean In 

 his fuither rem-»rk-!, Mr. Haivey expressed the 

 opinion that » hat they called CHtastroph4-s must 

 be li)oked upon with c-ire, and showed, by illustra- 

 tions, that phenomeoa which appeared to hn de- 

 structive actions were in nearly all cases beneficent 

 ones. 



At th« close of the address, the Presid-nt was 

 accorded a very hearty vote of thanks on the 

 pr"p"Biti'm of Mr. Facer, seconded by Captain 

 J. G. McDakio 



Many interesting exhibits, apparatus, instru- 

 menrs. etc.. were then expl lined by Paptaia 

 McDakin, Mr. W. P. Mann, Mr. W. Cozens, and 

 Mr. A. Lander. 



SECOND WINTER MEETING— NOVE.VIBER 8th, 1904. 



'THE INITIAL CAUSE OF THE DOVER VALLEY. 



McDAKIN, R.U.S.L 



-By C\VTAi:s J. G. 



The fpcond winter meeting was held at the 

 B- anej I .st it ate on November 8, w'-en Captain 

 McDakin gave a lecture on ''The D.iver Valley 

 tak* n as an exception to the gt-neraily ascribed 

 cau-e ' that valleys are formed by the rivers fl iw- 

 ing through them.'" The lecture was itlubtrated 

 by lantern sLdes of river-formed valleys on the 

 grandest scale, as the Can^n of Colorado in 

 America ; the Swiss vallt^ys of Meirengan, the St 

 Gothard, the Gorge of Peffers, and the valley of 

 Liuterbrunnen ; in England, the Gorge of the 

 Avon ; in W^les, the Llanberis Waterfall ; and in 

 Scotland. N<»var, the Rngiu, and the Devon. 



Iq the Course of his remaiks, the h cturer said : 

 In the Dover Valley we have features of a very 

 distinct character, which are better appreciated 

 by looking at the excelli-nt geological map of the 

 neighboui hood than by any written or pictorial 

 description. It will be observed that the mnin 

 valley, containing the river D -ur, runs in a south 

 easteily direction, and that it is joined by five 

 comparatively laige valleys, and seven or eight 

 minor ones, or elongated cwms fiom the high 

 ground OQ the south west. It an imagiuiiry line 



be drawn for six miles as the axis of the main 

 valley, and another parallel to it on the northern 

 side and four hundred feet above sea level, it will 

 b seen th>it this northern side is not penetrated 

 by a single valley coming down the watershed 

 from the south west, although some deep cwms 

 sc re its tace, but do not cross the parallel line 

 dra,wn along its crest Another series of valleys 

 oomiuence on the northern side and follow the 

 inclination of the surface, having no affinity with 

 those on the southern side, showing that the 

 watersJ^od was intercepted by a fissure which was 

 parallel to the conticlinal of the Weald and the 

 synclinal between the Lie of Thanet and the 

 mainland of East Kent. On sailing round the 

 South Foreland a number of fissures may be 

 Botict-d running in a nurth-westerly direction, and 

 consequHutly supporting the theory that the Dover 

 valley is an exception to the generally-ascribed 

 cause that valleys have been formed by the rivers 

 fl .wing through them, but was producnd by the 

 Same or a repetition of the same earth movements 

 that, el^^vated the Weald and depressed the valley 

 of the Wantaum. 



