ADDRESS. 13 



at which the Palaeolithic Period had its beginning almost transcends our 

 powers of imagination. 



We find distinct traces of river action from 100 to 200 feet above the 

 level of existing streams and rivers, and sometimes at a great distance 

 from them ; we observe old fresh-water deposits on the slopes of valleys 

 several miles in width ; we find that long and lofty escarpments of rock 

 have receded unknown distances since their summits were first occupied 

 by Paleolithic man ; we see that the whole side of a wide river valley has 

 been carried away by an invasion of the sea, which attacked and removed 

 a barrier of chalk cliffs from 400 to 600 feet in height ; we find that what 

 was formerly an inland river has been widened out into an arm of the 

 sea, now the highway of our fleets, and that gravels which were originally 

 deposited in the bed of some ancient river now cap isolated and lofty 

 hills. 



And yet, remote as the date of the first known occupation of Britain 

 by man may be, it belongs to what, geologically speaking, must be 

 regarded as a quite recent period, for we are now in a position to fix with 

 some degree of accuracy its place on the geological scale. Thanks to 

 investigations ably carried out at Hoxne in Suffolk, and at Hitchin in 

 Hertfordshire, by Mr. Clement Reid, under the auspices of this Associa- 

 tion and of the Royal Society, we know that the implement-bearing beds 

 at those places undoubtedly belong to a time subsequent to the deposit of 

 the Great Chalky Boulder Clay of the Eastern Counties of England. It 

 is, of course, self-evident that this vast deposit, in whatever manner it 

 may have been formed, could not, for centuries after its deposition was 

 complete, have presented a surface inhabitable by man. Moreover, at a 

 distance but little farther north, beds exist which also, though at a some- 

 what later date, were apparently formed under Glacial conditions. At 

 Hoxne the interval between the deposit of the Boulder Clay and of the 

 implement-bearing beds is distinctly proved to have witnessed at least 

 two noteworthy changes in climate. The beds immediately reposing on 

 the Clay are characterised by the presence of alder in abundance, of hazel, 

 and yew, as well as by that of numerous flowering plants indicative of a 

 temperate climate very different from that under which the Boulder Clay 

 itself was formed. Above these beds characterised by temperate plants, 

 comes a thick and more recent series of strata, in which leaves of the 

 dwarf Arctic willow and birch abound, and which were in all probability 

 deposited under conditions like those of the cold regions of Siberia and 

 North America. 



At a higher level and of more recent date than these — from which 

 they are entirely distinct — are the beds containing Palaeolithic imple- 

 ments, formed in all probability under conditions not essentially different 

 from those of the present day. However this may be, we have now con- 

 clusive evidence that the Palaeolithic implements are, in the Eastern 

 Counties of England, of a date long posterior to that of the Great Chalky 

 Boulder Clay. 



