PROCEEDINGS OF THE COTTESWOLD CLUB II 



Icebergs, which, acting on a soft formation hke the 

 OoHte, would in course of time wear it away, forming a 

 large valley, though not of the size we now see it. 



It was during this epoch that the rocks we find in our 

 gravels and on the highest point of the range were derived 

 from Scotland and the North of England ; and the boulder 

 lately discovered at Cleeve confirms this. 



This Drift doubtless reached as high as the present high- 

 level terraces, and the Severn was probably filled with it, 

 remains of which were found in its bed after the great 

 storm in which the "Royal Charter" was wrecked, when a 

 strong south-westerly wind occurred which swept away 

 a good deal of sand in the lower part of the River above 

 Sharpness, exposing a great quantity of large rounded 

 pebbles of Northern Drift; and when sinking the cyHnders 

 in the deep water for the Severn Bridge, Northern Drift 

 was also met with in considerable thickness. The boulder 

 clay probably belongs to the later period of this Drift, and 

 was deposited on the. hills, most of it afterwards being 

 swept away ; and the enormous thickness it once attained is 

 evident from the way in which it is forced into the 

 fissures of the OoHte quarries not only vertically, but many 

 feet down, laterally. 



From an examination of the boulder clays taken at 

 distant points in this area, it may not be uninteresting 

 to show how their identification is traced. 



In my papers on the "Gravels of Severn, Avon, and 

 Evenlode," I mentioned I had not then been able to find 

 Northern Drift pebbles higher than seven-hundred-and-fifty 

 feet. Professor PhilUps in his " Geology of the Thames 

 Valley,'" says of the Drift : — 



" It may have covered those highest hills (Chalk and 

 " Oolite) but proof fails at seven-hundred-and-fifty feet 

 "according to the careful researches, which I am happy 

 "to confirm of Mr Hull and Mr Lucv." 



