172 report— 1879. 



them, but in some cases the layer has resisted denudation and forms a 

 sort of platform. In other places, where the layer dips, it may appear at 

 the surface as an outcrop, or form a diminutive escarpment. 



The space over which this layer spreads has not been accurately made 

 out. It is not, however, co-extensive with the sandhills, which can be 

 explained by supposing that other hills of sand have been heaped up 

 since the time the manufacturers of flint implements lived there. At 

 Portstewart and the opposite side of the river Bann this layer may be 

 ■estimated with safety to spread over two square miles, all of which, 

 with the pits already mentioned, has a covering of sand, not of a shifting 

 nature, but of a permanent kind, because covered and protected by a close 

 crop of vegetation. Although the sandhills now reach to the very mouth 

 of the Bann, the black layer does not extend so far. It has been observed 

 that from 1^ to 2 miles from the river's mouth, though we have the same 

 kind of sandhills and pits as we have farther inland, there are no such black 

 layers or flint objects to be found on either side of the river, which would 

 lead to the conclusion that at the time this black layer was an exposed 

 surface the river Bann emptied into the sea about two miles farther inland 

 than it does at present. 



The operations of the past year at Portstewart have been chiefly 

 confined to digging over the exposed portions of the black layer, though 

 a small amount of excavation has been made into the black layer which 

 is still beneath the sandy covering. 



In one spot of exposed layer, measuring three square yards, one scraper, 

 one core, and several flakes were obtained, but no animal remains. Another 

 small piece of layer, of similar extent in a different pit, yielded several 

 flakes and a great many fragments of pottery. Two small pieces were 

 ornamented. These were parts of the rim of a vessel, and the orna- 

 mentation was longitudinal lines with cross striation, resembling what 

 would be produced if the milled edge of a shilling were rolled along soft 

 clay. No animal remains were found. Another small piece of exposed 

 layer in a third pit yielded a little nest of eleven small scrapers, but no 

 other remains. 



In one of the largest pits, at a place where the edge of the dark layer 

 is seen cropping out under 50 feet of sand, and where bones, both cut and 

 split, and also teeth had been found in abundance lying exposed, a portion 

 of the covering was removed, laying bare about 20 square yards of the 

 dark layer, which was carefully dug over. A considerable quantity of 

 broken and split bones and teeth were obtained, chiefly those of ox and 

 deer, two flint flakes, two hammer-stones, one of which, in addition to 

 the hammered ends, had its sides also hammered, as if an attempt had 

 been made to form an oval tool-stone. The depression seems to have 

 been formed by repeated blows with another stone being struck on the 

 same spot. Also a small stone, four inches long, rather square in section, 

 having one end sloped away by rubbing. Mixed up with these in the 

 layer were small pieces of charred wood and many broken and rounded 

 stones, and also a few shells, chiefly Patella. It was near this place that 

 some bone implements, a small ornament, and cut bones were found on 

 the surface, and which have been described in previous papers. One of 

 the persons employed, in the absence of your secretary, dug out of the layer 

 at this place a portion of the antler of a red deer having several tines 

 sawn off. It is the upper half of the antler, and one long tine remains 

 projecting at the upper extremity in such a way that a sort of pick is 



