12 PROCEEDINGS OF THE COTTESWOLD CLUB 



the older dating back to a time l)efore the North Sea had 

 divided England from the Continent, and before the Severn 

 Valley had been scooped out, and the newer being, so far 

 as is known confined to the period within which the 

 country had assumed its present configuration. 



Next he showed that the men who made the long 

 barrows belonged to the earlier part of the newer stone 

 age, and that in the opinion of anthropological experts 

 they were Iberians, a race which at one time inhabited a 

 a great part of Western Europe. When the Uley and 

 Nympsfield barrows were constructed it was, he concluded, 

 impossible to determine ; it was best to follow the advice 

 of the Duke of Argyll, and to treat ])re-historic chronology 

 not as time-absolute but as time-relative. 



From Uley Bury the party retraced their steps to the 

 top of Frocester Hill, and then drove to Selsley Common, 

 stopping on the way to see the Nympsfield tumulus in a 

 field on the road-side. At the top of Selsley Hill the 

 members left the break, and walking across the <lown were 

 shown the difi'erent beds of the Inferior Oolite by Mr 

 Charles Upton. His intimate knowledge of the strata of 

 this hill, and of the fossil contents of each bed, was fully 

 placed at the disposal of the party. 



At the quarry on the west side of th^^ hill Mr Upton 

 drew attention to the Oolite Marl and Upper Freestone 

 overlaid by Upper Trigonia-grit : and Mr Pjuckman, by the 

 aid of a diagram, explained the result of his recent 

 investigations in the Cotteswolds — shortly to be published 

 by the Geological Society — saying that though to their 

 eye the Upper Trigonia-grit followed the Upper Freestone 

 in a perfectly regular manner, yet other localities shewed, 

 as separating their deposits, more than 6o feet of strata, 

 all of which are absent here. He said that the same state 

 of things obtained at Birdlip, and that it was due to 

 erosion before the time when the Upper Trigonia-grit 

 was deposited. At Birdlip this erosion had cut out a 



