23 
Our knowledge of the later portions of the Pliocene Period is 
more distinct and definite ; further changes took place, and the 
character of the physical geography is gatdered from the nature 
of an interesting deposit on the coast of Norfolk called the ‘‘ Furest 
Bed.” As weexamine its contents we feel that we are approaching 
modern times. Tne southern area of the North Sea had become 
an extensive plain, covered with forests of spruce and Scotch firs, 
oaks, beeches and elms, and through it all wandered a large river. 
Scattered over this plain were numerous shallow lakes, in and on 
the borders of which grew white and yellow water lilies, pond- 
weeds such as you see in the ponds on the Warren, Buckbean, and 
other familiar forms. These meres probably resembled the 
present Norfolk ‘ Broads,’’ which may in fact be the remnant of 
Pliocene days. 
Driven by the increasing cold there wandered into Britain from 
northern and central Asia numerous forms of mammals, most of 
which, but not all, are now extinct; e.g. Mastodon, Rhinoceros, 
Deer, Hipparion (an ancestor of the horse), Elephant, Hippopota- 
mus, Bear, &c. In the Forest Bed we find remains of Beavers, 
Voles, Squirrels, Moles, Shrews, Mice, Wolves, Foxes, etc., 
showing how rapidly we are appreaching modern times—modern, 
geologically I mean, though according to ordinary reckoning many 
thousands, if not hundreds of thousands of years have passed 
since then, and many strange changes have yet to be described. 
An examination of the pebbles composing the gravelly portion 
of the deposit by Mr. C. keed shows it to have been laid down by 
a river, and that these pebbles could not have been brought there 
from the north or the west, but only from the south and east; the 
river therefore could have been no other than the Rhine, the 
estuary of which in those days was on the coast of our Norfolk 
and Suffolk as shown on the map. 
No satisfactory traces of Man have as yet been proved to occur in 
Pliocene deposits. 
We now come to the latest geological period, that known as the 
Pleistocene, which shades off imperceptibly into the Prehistoric 
Age by which it is linked on to the Present. It was characterized 
by several upheavals and subsidences, but more especially by the 
fact that for part of it at least, all the British tract, in common 
with the northern portions of Europe and Asia, was reduced to 
- conditions in almost all respects like those prevalent in Greenland 
at the present time; this period is known as the Great Ice Age, 
or the Glacial Period. To this most interesting of all geological 
epochs only brief reference can now be made, but we hope to 
describe it more fully on a future occasion. The marks and signs 
left behind are unmistakeable and can be read of all men,— 
