12 
OcToBER 12TH. 
ORDINARY MEETING.—DR. STEVENS ON 
“FLINT WORKS AT CISSBURY.” 
In the absence of Dr. Stevens, of St. Mary Bourne, his paper on 
“*The Flint Works at Cissbury ” was read by Mr. Wonror, who ex- 
plained that the paper owed its origin to a visit paid in company with 
Dr. Stevens and Mr. J. P. M. Smith, to Cissbury, in August, when 
Dr. Stevens promised to contribute a paper on what he had observed. 
This paper, dated September 15th, he had received on September 20th. 
It was as follows :— 
‘Of the many interesting features of Sussex, the broad and bold 
South Downs, extending from Beachy Head to the Hampshire border, 
might be considered as among the most attractive to the tourist and 
student of Nature ; for here the enquiring might find, according to 
predilection, an endless source of interest. The stunted wild 
flowers, the wild and solitary hill birds, the lepidoptera and 
the mountain mollusks, the wandering bees and the agile grass- 
hoppers, furnished an abundant mental harvest ; some small 
items of their life history already gathered in, but by far the larger 
portion remaining undisclosed. Again, the solid hills themselves 
awaited only the mattock and shovel of the geologist to reveal their 
long-entombed relics of a world, more fluctuating, perhaps, although 
as largely populated with animal forms as the present. 
The earthworks also crowning their summits had their page of 
instructive but misty history, respecting the early and rude tribes 
whose remains testified that they occupied for purposes of war these 
places, now, happily for ourselves, the scenes of peaceful industry. 
Of these magnificent hills, Cissbury more particularly claimed 
attention, from the circumstance that much rude flint cutlery was 
found within its ramparts, and from which it might not inaptly be 
considered, in the long past, as the silicious Sheffield of Sussex. Sub- 
sequently it might have been a Roman oppidwm ; and its fortifications 
in nature and period appeared to be in common with those of the 
neighbouring hills of Chanctonbury, Hollingbury, Highdown, and 
others, the series having evidently formed a guard to the inlets of the 
channel. Eminences so framed for defence would naturally have been 
used by any people resisting invasion from the sea, as they would have 
