

HOLDERNESS. 55 



have been filled. It is remarkable that the observers of this coast 

 have bestowed very little attention on the lacustrine deposits which 

 appear so frequently on the cliffs, and exhibit, so convincingly, the 

 proof of long-elapsed time since the deluge. To amend, in some degree, 

 this defect, I propose to describe them pretty minutely in my observa- 

 tions on the section ; but it will be desirable to sketch a general outline 

 of their characters here, and to put them in comparison with the con- 

 temporaneous marine deposits, which are so remarkable on the shores 

 of the Humber. 



All the lacustrine deposits containing peat, which I have inspected 

 in Holderness, agree in this general fact, that the peat does not rest 

 immediately upon the diluvial formation beneath, but is separated from 

 it by at least one layer of sediment, which is seldom without shells. 

 The peat is very generally confined to a single layer, and shells are 

 seldom found above it. Supposing that all the varieties which I have 

 witnessed in different places existed together, the section would be 

 nearly in the following general terms : 



1 Clay, generally of a blue colour, and fine texture. 



2 Peat, with various roots, and plants, and in large deposits containing abundance 



of trees, nuts, horns of deer, bones of oxen, &c. 



3 Clay, of different colours, with fresh-water lymnaeae. 



4 Peat, as above. 



5 Clay, with fresh-water cyclades, Sic. and blue phosphate of iron. 



6 Shaly curled bituminous clay. 



7 Sandy coarse laminated clay, filling hollows in the diluvial formation. 



Of these, the most constant beds appear to be No. 1, 2, and 5, and, in 

 general, these constitute the whole deposit. In different places, the layers 

 exhibit much diversity of colour, consistence, and thickness. The peat 

 varies in its thickness from five feet to less than as many inches, and 

 its constituent parts seem not the same : in a few instances there are no 

 shells in the lower clay, and when they do occur, they are sometimes 

 of different kinds ; cyclades and paludinze are most plentiful. Anodons 

 occur in it at Owthorne, but I did not find them elsewhere. 



