130 NATURAL HISTORY OF THE PAST YEAR. 
alders still exhibit the red color of their wood when cut 
through. These trees were not lying in any definite di- 
rection, but across each other in confusion ; the roots were 
still attached to the trunks, but without fibres; and fresh 
bark still clothed several of the stems; no marks of axe or 
hatchet have been discovered. The bed of vegetable 
matter in which they were found inclines and deepens 
towards the north, being about a foot thick at the upper 
end, and about 5 feet at the lower. This bed rests on a 
thin layer of blue clay, scarcely one foot deep; immediately 
above it is another layer of the same blue clay, of about 
the same depth; above this, a layer of 5 feet of a reddish 
clay, then another seam of blue, and lastly, nearly 8 feet 
of a yellowish clay, with a still thinner seam of blue, about 
the middle. All these seams and beds are sharply defined, 
and for the most part horizontal. 
In another excavation made a few years since, for the 
new Gas works, near the river, trees were also found, 
some of which had become so hard that they could not be 
cut, while others were in a similar condition with those 
now discovered. At that time, also, a pair of horns were 
dug up which are supposed to be those of the Elk. 
In excavating a further portion of the ground at the 
gaol, there has been found, 6 feet above the level of the 
trees, the skull and teeth, with some bones, of a pachy- 
dermatous animal; and a comparison of these bones, and 
especially the teeth, with some previously determined 
specimens from other localities, leaves little, if any, room to 
doubt that this animal was a Rhinoceros.* 
To an early portion, therefore, of the post-tertiary 
period, we must refer these remains, and therefore the 
* It hassince been identified by Prof. Quekett as a Rhinoceros tichorinus. 
