Dr. Nils Olof Hoist — The Ice Age in England. 441 



or at least may occur, as two distinct layers, an observation the 

 correctness of which I am able to confirm from the gravel-pits in 

 Portfield immediately east of Chichester. It is most natural to 

 regard the lower bed as deposited during the depression of the 

 district, and the upper bed during the elevation which immediately 

 succeeded. 



The loam, the uppermost and last deposit during the period of 

 depression now in question, occurs at some distance below the 

 uppermost shore-line, in consequence of the fact that, especially on 

 an open coast, it could only be deposited in deep water. It has the 

 usual aspect of the ' late-glacial ' loam. In Bognor it is said to be as 

 much as 14 feet thick. 



On the south coast of England the loam cannot, to any considerable 

 extent, have arisen from the inland ice, which lay at too great 

 a distance, but had as a rule a less remote origin, namely, from the 

 south coast itself. 



The glacial deposits now in question have been traced by 

 Mr. Clement Beid from the Chichester map-sheet westward over the 

 map-sheets of Eareham, Southampton, Eournemouth, and Dorchester, 

 where its upper limit descends to a somewhat lower level. In the 

 area of the Torquay map-sheet it may be observed in the shore 

 deposits at Hope's Nose, where, however, it only ascends to 48 feet 

 above O.D.; and west of Brixham Harbour, between there and 

 Churston Cove, Mr. W. A. E. Ussher has directed my attention to 

 a small but well-developed sea-platform covered with loam and 

 reaching a height of about 50 feet. 



Cornwall with its steep shores has a deposit called ' head ', which 

 follows the coastline and must therefore be a shore deposit. 

 Concerning this and other coast deposits of Cornwall, Mr. Clement 

 Beid has the following, as it seems to me, well-grounded remarks : 

 " The succession in these Pleistocene deposits corresponds so exactly 

 with that found along the Sussex coast that we cannot refrain from 

 thinking that the strata are of the same date. The 'head' of the 

 Cornish coast seems to be equivalent to the ' Coombe rock ' of the 

 Sussex coast." x 



"West of Cornwall lie the Scilly Isles, and here too is found the 

 ' late -glacial ' unfossiliferous loam as a thin deposit, and Gr. Barrow 

 has been able to establish the fact that it has precisely the same 

 aspect as the loam on the coast of Brittany. Here it contains 

 'scratched stones', which show that it is "essentially a glacial 

 deposit". 2 



Eastwards from Chichester the gravel and loam deposits are proved 

 to occur at various places on the coast, such as Brighton and 

 Eastbourne. I have myself seen the loam in the neighbourhood of 

 Hastings, and Professor X. Stainier, of Ghent, who there accompanied 

 me, remarked on the extraordinary resemblance to the Belgian 'limon 

 hesbayen'. At Sangatte, Prestwich observed both gravel and loam, 



1 C. Eeid & E. M. Keid, 1904. " On a probable Paleolithic Floor at Prah 

 Sands (Cornwall) " : Quart. Journ. Geol. Soc, vol. 60, pp. 106-12, see p. 110. 



2 G. Barrow, 1906. Mem. Geol. Surv. England and Wales, Expl. Sheets 

 357 and 360, " Isles of Scilly," see pp. 27-8. 



