156 Notes and Comments. 



was put up to defend the Brighton Museum against the hmding 

 of Napoleon, because some copper coins of that period were 

 found in an excavation there, or that it was put up to defend 

 the Brighton Pavilion and its royal ballroom against the 

 Kaiser dviring the recent war, because some remains of beer 

 bottles were found on its site ? What is the sum total of the 

 reasons Mr. Toms has for wanting to doubt the well-considered 

 conclusions of the greatest experts on prehistoric remains 

 in the country, many of whom have carefully examined and 

 excavated Cissbury — (and, presumably, Mr. Toms has not)? 



OYSTER SHELLS. 



The whole foundations of his two remarkable ' columns ' 

 consist of a few oyster shells, and upon such foundations any 

 structure is likely soon to collapse. Nobody doubts that 

 oyster shells if ere found, as reported, and it is quite possible 

 they were of Roman date, though oyster shells were opened 

 with the usual V-shaped notch in mediaeval times, and cer- 

 tainly as recently as the 17th century. But Mr. Toms probably 

 eats oysters — did he build Cissbury ? He might just as 

 well claim to be the architect, as try to tell us that the Romans 

 built it. As anyone who has the most elementary knowlsdge 

 of Roman remains knows, those early Italian invaders had a 

 very definite plan of carrying out their defensive work. 

 Why did they depart from it at Cissbury? To please Mr. 

 Toms ? And in no period of our history more than in Roman 

 times were coins, pottery, objects in iron, bronze, bone, 

 earthenware, glass and other materials thrown about so lavishly 

 and left in the soil, greatly to the benefit of subsequent 

 occupiers of their sites. Why are there no such crowds of 

 relics at Cissbury ? Instead, did the Romans collect the 

 thousands and thousands of prehistoric flint implements, 

 as well as the thousands and thousands of flint flakes and 

 ' wasters,' merely to confuse future historians and prove 

 they are all wrong and that Mr. Toms is right ? It reminds 

 one of the story of the dear old lady who was watching the 

 soldiers march by. ' Look,' said she, ' they are all out of 

 step but our Tom.' 



GEOLOGY OF MESOPOTAMIA. 



Among the useful compilations prepared for Army use 

 during the war, one has now been issuecl to the i^ublic. The 

 ' Geology of Mesopotamia and its borderlands,' compiled by 

 the geographical section of the Naval Intelligence Division, 

 Naval Staf^, Admiralty, Paper ' I.D. 1177,' price five shillings 

 net (Stationery Office), dates from March, 1921, has 116 pp. 

 8vo., four maps and ten sections. It deals with the geology 

 of Mesopotamia, Persian Gulf, parts of Persia, Arabia and 

 Armenia, with their economic minerals, oil-fields, and soils. 



Naturalist 



