2l8 PROCEEDINGS OF THE COTTESWOLD CLUB 



those rocks in Wiltshire and in the North of Ireland, 

 must have hcen continuous, unless it was interrupted by 

 any Palaeozoic land-area. And there was no such possible 

 land-area in the Severn vale this side of the Malverns. 



So to commence the story of the Severn Valley, it is 

 necessary, in imagination, to refill that valley with its lost 

 Jurassic and Cretaceous strata, and then to tell the tale of 

 its excavation out of a great Cretaceous plain — like the 

 Wiltshire Downs — raised, perhaps, 3000 feet above the 

 present level of the road to Coomb Hill. 



At Coomb Hill we turned to the right towards Tewkes- 

 bury, running along a ridge. And this ridge is not easy 

 to account for. I have surmised the possibility that it is 

 the relic of one side of an old river-valley : that the Avon 

 flowed east of this ridge, past Tredington, into the 

 present course of the Chelt, to join the Severn where the 

 Chelt does now ; and that subsequently the Avon obtained 

 connection with the Severn at Tewkesburv. The ri2;ht- 

 angle turn of the Chelt below Boddington, and the 

 alluvium in which the old canal to Coomb Hill is cut, 

 seem to support this idea. 



We turned off from the Tewkesbury road, took the 

 way to the Haw Bridge, crossed the Severn there, and 

 followed the road to Ledbury. On this journey there is 

 a fine south-end view of the Malverns. They are grand 

 merely as scenery ; they are far more remarkable in their 

 geological aspect. 



For the Malverns stood up as a shore line — a huge 

 bluff of cliffs — against which beat the waves of the 

 Jurassic sea. They are the merest relic now of what they 

 must have been then. For just as it is necessary to 

 continue the strata from east to west in order to picture 

 the Severn Valley before its excavation, so it is necessary 

 to continue the strata from west to east, in order to 

 restore the Malvern Hills. 



