216 Geological Society. 



of the plastic, and probably also of the London clays; and 

 that these two basins wei'e once connected together across the 

 now intermediate chalky strata of the downs of Hants, Wilts, 

 and Dorset ; since it appears that the plastic clay formation is 

 so far from being limited to the lower levels of the present 

 basins, that large residuary fragments of it still occur on the 

 summits of the most elevated portions of chalk in these coun- 

 ties, e.g. on the summit of Likpen near Newbury, and on that 

 of Blackdown near Abbotsbury, as w ell as on the top of Chid- 

 bury and Beacon hills in the highest part of Salisbury plain. 

 The strata that covered the intermediate spaces have probably 

 been removed by diluvial denudation, and the destructible na- 

 ture of their component materials would render them pecu- 

 liarly liable to be swept away by the transit of violent currents 

 of water. The wreck of the harder portions of the sandy 

 strata thus destroyed forms the sandstone blocks called Grey 

 Weathers that lie loosely scattered on the naked surface of the 

 chalk in all these counties, and of which Stonehenge is con- 

 structed. In lower levels within the existing basins these 

 same strata have been less destroyed, in consequence of the 

 greater protection their low position has afforded them from 

 the ravages of diluvial denudation. 



The author concludes with referring to the occurrence of 

 similar tertiary strata, as well as of chalk and green sand, on 

 the summits of the Savoy Alps, nearly 10,000 feet above the 

 level of the sea, where they seem to bear the same relation to 

 the tertiary strata of the valleys of Italy, France, and Germany, 

 that our trifling elevations of Inkpen, Blackdown, &c. bear to 

 the basins of London and Hants ; and concludes that since the 

 depositions of these beds, either by the elevation of the moun- 

 tains or the depression of the valleys, or the united effect of 

 both tliese causes, the relative level of the one to the other has 

 been changed to the amount of many thousand feet. 



March -i. — -A notice was read On some silicified wood from 

 the desert between Cairo and Suez, in a letter from George 

 Francis Grey, Esq. to the Rev.W. Buckland, Pres. G.S. 



Large masses of silicified wood, resembling in form the 

 trunks of palm-trees, lie scattered, the author observes, over a 

 tract of gravel in the desert, about 15 miles from Cairo, and 

 for two days' journey all the way from that place to Suez. 



A notice was also read On the bones of several animals found 

 in peat near Romsey in Hampshire, extracted from a letter 

 from Charles Daman, Esq. to the Rev.W. Buckland, P. G.S. 



Mr. Daman mentions that the skulls of several beavers, as 

 well as the bones of oxen, swine, stags and roe-bucks, have 

 been dug out of the peat near Romsey and out of the shell 



marl 



