VOL. XVI. (3) THE LOWER SEVERN 263 
The Shoots was marked out by the stream. In the work 
of cutting, the tide has co-operated, and is even now 
doing so. When the foundations of the piers for the ferry 
at Portskewet were in process of execution, the holes 
excavated at low-water were filled with large stones by 
the tide. 
The Shoots may be regarded as a river gorge; not the 
less so that, unlike the Avon gorge, it is below the water. 
In a far-distant future, it may be uplifted and its sides 
clothed by ferns and flowers, just as gorges now on 
mountain tops may, in some far-distant past, have been 
formed in the beds of rivers by the co-operation of tide 
and stream and rolling stones. 
I am indebted to Mr Arthur J. Cullis, Engineer to the Canal Navigation, for the 
drawing shown in fig. 10, and to Mr W. E. James, also an Engineer, for those shown in 
figs. 2 and 9. The other figures are the work of my daughter. 
