406 Rev. Br. Irving — Elevation of the Weald. 



the western part of the Weald too (e.g. at Leith Hill and near 

 Farnham) that the same authority x tells us that the greatest amount 

 of dislocation occurs ; the faults recorded at these two localities 

 being apparently connected with the Hog's Back line of elevation, 

 as is also another south of St. Martha's, near Guildford. 



4. The chief transverse synclinals of the Weald are those of the 

 valleys of the Med way and the Stour on the north-east side, and of 

 the Adur and the Arun on the south side ; while there appears to be 

 an absence of such synclinals on the north side of the western 

 part of the Weald. 3 This looks very much as if they were formed 

 in a series of later movements caused by forces acting from the 

 south-east or east, and not affecting the previously-elevated portions 

 of the Weald to the north-west. 



5. The fact that the raised beaches rise as they are traced west, 

 till at Bourne Common, near Goodwood, they are 130 feet higher 

 than at Brighton, 3 has been pointed out by Mr. Topley as showing 

 greater western elevation. 



A progressive elevation of the English portion of the Weald from 

 west to east, such as the facts advanced above would seem to 

 indicate, leads of necessity to the conclusion that the assumption 

 (which has so often been made in certain quarters) that the mere 

 accident of the Lenham deposits being now at almost the same 

 elevation as certain outliers at Chipstead, Headley, and on the north 

 side of Netley Heath, points to their contemporaneous age, is scarcely 

 tenable. For, if such an elevation went on progressively in the 

 direction indicated, it may well have happened that those outliers of 

 sands may represent transgressive portions of the later Eocene, and 

 have been raised above sea-level during Miocene or early Pliocene 

 times, while the north-eastern portion of what is now the Weald was 

 still beneath the waters of the Pliocene sea, and receiving deposits, 

 of which remains are preserved to us in the hollows of the Chalk at 

 Lenham. The general strike of the strata from the valley of the 

 Medway to Folkestone seems to favour this view. 



A little reflection will show that the same negative reasoning 

 applies to the rather characterless plateau-gravel described by Prof. 

 Prestwich 4 as occurring on the hills west of Canterbury. There is 

 nothing in the natui'e of things to necessitate contemporaneity, though 

 similar causes acting under similar conditions have produced similar 

 results ; on the other hand, there are, as we have seen, facts which 

 militate against the assumption of contemporaneity of similar deposits 

 situate so far as these are from those of East Berks and West Surrey, 

 notwithstanding the fact that they are all of pre-Quaternary age. 



But I think there is not wanting evidence of a more general 

 nature, tending to show that the Wealden area must have made 

 some advance towards the position of a hill-range before the close 

 of the Eocene period. This evidence is found in (i) the high 

 inclination of the Lower Eocene strata along the northern flank, 

 as seen at Highclere ; (ii) the shallowing of the waters of the 



1 Ibid, pp. 230, 232, 233. 2 Topley, Ibid, pp. 277, 278. 



3 Ibid, p. 286. i Q.J.G.S. vol. xlvi. p. 156 ; see also pi. viii. 



