Flints of the Dpper or White Chalk. 173 



observed that " no reef-building corals are occupants of the 

 deep sea, on which there is little doubt the Chalk was depo- 

 sited " (Quart. Journ. Geol. Soc. 1875, p. 419) — an authori- 

 tative statement which it is somewhat unfortunate Mr. Sollas 

 should have overlooked, inasmuch as it might possibly have 

 saved him from drawing a very misleading parallel between 

 the flints of the Triraminghara and those of really typical 

 Upper-Chalk strata. 



On the other hand, we have it on the authority of an 

 observer, whose opportunities of arriving at a correct estimate 

 of the mean depths at which the modern deep-sea calcareous 

 deposits are being formed have never been equalled, that 

 there can he no doubt ivhatever that we have, forming at the 

 bottom of the present ocean, a vast sheet of rock, which very 

 closely resembles chalk;" andi^^ there can he little doubt that the 

 old chalk loas produced in the same manner and under closely 

 similar circumstances^'' ('The Depths of the Sea,' 1872, 

 p. 470). 



But another, and perhaps the most material, fact in relation 

 to the Trimmiugham beds remains to be noticed. It is one 

 on which I lay very great emphasis, as proving that a large 

 proportion of the spicules (on which Mr. Sollas has based the 

 whole of his superstructure of argument in relation to his 

 hypothesis of the flint-formation as a Avhole) have, in all pro- 

 bability, been both drifted to and fro on the sea-bed and subject 

 to very powerful disturbing agencies, and accessions from other 

 more or less littoral localities, since the period when the asso- 

 ciated Cretaceous deposit was formed. The fact referred to 

 is described in a letter from Mr. Clement Reid, of H.M. Geo- 

 logical Survey of England and Wales, which was published 

 in the ' Geological Magazine,' Dec. 2, vol. vii. p. 238. Mr. 

 Reid, after remarking on another explanation that had been 

 suggested, says : — " My difficulties in accepting the view that 

 the contortions were formed by the dead weight of masses let 

 down from above are, firstly, that I cannot find a single case 

 where uncontorted beds have been deposited over the contorted 

 one, though at first sight many sections have that appearance ; 

 and, secondly, that no weight we can imagine possible could 

 drive up the solid chalk at Trimmingham in a ridge three 

 quarters of a mile long from N.W. to S.E., and apparently 

 about 250 yards wide, tliis disturbance^ it must be remembered, 

 affecting not only the chalk, but 200 feet of overlying clays and 

 sands^ Any commentary on such evidence is, I submit, 

 unnecessary ; for, to quote a favourite expression of Mr. 

 Sollas's, " these facts speak for themselves." 



But, strange to relate, Mr. Sollas arrives at the conclusion 

 Ann. dc Mag. N. Hist. Ser. 5. Vol. vii. 13 



