104 REPORT — 1869. 



formation of new reservoirs and filtering-ljecls by tlie East London Waterworks 

 Company. Two new resen-nirs are now being made, covering 120 acres in extent, 

 and of an average depth of 10 feet. The " puddle-walls " are excavated to a depth 

 of about 25 feet. The materials removed are all of posttertiary age, consisting of 

 surface soil, loamy clay, peat, sliell-marl, coarse and tine sands, rounded and sub- 

 angular gravels from tlie Challc and Woolwich series, with pebbles of chert and 

 sandstone from the older rocks. The deposit is rich in vegetable remains, the peat 

 attaining a thickness of tliree feet, and containing evidences of the oak, the alder, 

 the liazel, and other trees and plants. The sbell-marl is at places equally thick, and 

 is rich in shells, twenty-six species having been detenuined by the author. The 

 bivalve shells are still united, and the Fahidi/KT See. have their opercula still in 

 place. Of the animals may be mentioned humaji remains and works of art of the 

 stone, bronze, and iron age. The wolf, the fox, the beaver, horse, wild-boar, red 

 deer, roebuck, fallow deer, reindeer, the elk, the goat, three oxen (including £os 

 p->>iii(/('imis, B. lo7if/ifro/is, and li. fronfosiis), the sea-eagle and some iish-remaius 

 complete the list. In the deep trenches of the puddle-walls tusks of the JMani- 

 moth and horns of the gigantic Bos and Cerrua have been found. Mr. A. W. 

 Franks, F.S.A., Keeper of the Ethnographical Collections in the British Museum, 

 has obtained from this deposit a flint scraper, two bronze spear-heads, one bronze 

 arrow-head, one bronze knife, an iron sword (late-Celtic), bronze sheath, a Kini- 

 meridge-clay armlet, a pierced axe-head of stag's horn, a bone knife, a stag's horn, 

 club, various earthen pots (some hand-made and some turned on the wheel), 

 besides many cut bones. In 1-300 all Essex was one vast forest. In 1154 the 

 forest of Middlesex commenced at Iloundsditch and extended north and east for 

 many miles, and the forest is described as abounding in wolves, wild boars, stags, 

 and wild bulls. The Walthamstow marshes have not been disaflbrested more 

 than 100 years. Of the antiquity of these deposits no doubt can exist, for the 

 presence of the reindeer, the elk (determined by Professor Owen), and the beaver 

 is conclusive. Their preservation so near the surface is entirely due to the pro- 

 tective intiuenee of forest vegetation, which has precluded the inroads of agri- 

 culture. The author expressed his belief that the deposits indicated, at places, the 

 efl'ects of beaver-works, tracts of forest having been to all appearance submerged 

 and destroyed by the action of beaver-dams. 



BIOLOGY. 



Address hj C. Spence Bate, F.JR.S., F.L.S., Vice-PreskUnt of the Section, 

 to the Department of Zoology and Botany. 



Allow me on taking possession of this chair to say, as a resident of Devonshire, 



how gratified we all feel at receiving you as Members of this Association. It is 

 now nearly thirty years since this county had the honour of last receiving you. In 

 the year 1840 you paid a visit to Plymouth. You were then a Society young in 

 years, with many and powerful enemies to contend against. Since that time you 

 have grown in dimensions, and become a power in the State, and second to none in 

 your influence on, and encourngement of, science among the generally educated 

 masses of the country. 



With the importance that the Society has assumed, has sprung rxp a natural and 

 honourable rivalry among ihe more important towns in the country as to which 

 shall have the honour of receiving you. On this occasion the good fortune has 

 fallen to Exeter, and well we are assured that the hospitality of Devonshire may 

 be trusted in the safe keeping of the " Ever-faithful City.*' 



But this desire to show welcome to you is not confined to this town ; the ex- 

 cursions to Plymouth, Toiquay, Bideford. &c. are evidence of a wish on the 

 part of the inhabitants of the county generally to bid you welcome, and to receive 

 you heartily ; nay, this desire is not confined to Devonshire, but further west ; in 



