HOLDERNESS. 53 



distinct from shells now existing in our own seas, and, therefore, felt 

 unwilling to believe that they were of greater antiquity than the deluge. 

 This opinion was proved correct by an examination of the locality in 

 1828. About a mile south of the house of my kind friend, Mr. Stickney 

 of llidgemont, near Hedon, is a large excavation, from which gravel 

 has been obtained for the neighbouring roads. The highest point of 

 the hill in which the excavation is made, is thirty-six feet above the 

 adjacent marshland, which Mr. S. informs me is five feet below the 

 level of high water at spring tide, and the pit is sunk down to the level 

 of the marshes. Sand, pebbles, and marine shells of comparatively recent, 

 and water-worn fossils of more ancient date, are here mixed together, in 

 confused and irregular layers. The pebbles and fossils may be clearly 

 identified with the chalk and flint of the wolds, the lias of the coast 

 near Whitby, the magnesian limestone near Sunderland, the coal and 

 limestone series of west Yorkshire, as well as the grey wacke and other 

 slate rocks, with porphyry, granite, &c. of Cumberland and West- 

 moreland. 



Amidst this heterogeneous mass, which indicates such various and 

 violent currents of water, it is remarkable that we find many rather de- 

 licate marine shells, in tolerable perfection. Besides the strong shells 

 of Turbo littoreus, Purpura lapillus, and Buccinum undatum, we have 

 Mya arenaria, Tellina solidula and tenuis, Mactra subtruncata ? Cardium 

 edule, * and a shell which appears to me to be Crassina scotica. The 

 shells are most abundant along particular layers in the gravel. The 

 mass descends to a great depth, and is found beneath the adjacent marsh- 

 land, which consists of fine clay, lying upon peat and trees, and is part 

 of an extended level tract, reaching from the Humber near Pattrington, 

 almost to the sea, at Sandley mere. It seems to have been, at some 

 former period, a channel for some vast volume of water ; for it winds 



It must be owned the gravel shells are generally less truncate posteriorly, and less convex than 

 the recent specimens ; but there are variations in the form of Cardium edule, some individuals 

 more oblique then others : both varieties occur in this gravel-pit. 



