G. Dowker — Water- Supply of East Kent. 203 



and in the next place the wells, especially the deep ones in the Chalk 

 area ; and I propose to show the connection between the height of 

 the springs and the rainfall of the district. 



Although I have chosen for the title of this paper " The Water- 

 supply of East Kent," I must premise that the area to which I shall 

 confine my remarks is chiefly East Kent as represented by a line 

 from West Hythe to Whitstable and eastwards, and generally to that 

 pai't of Kent included in the new one-inch maps, numbered Sheets 

 273, 274, 289, 290, 305, 306, which combined will form a very good 

 map of reference to my paper. 



The well-sections are many of them unpublished, bi;t my remarks 

 will chiefly be directed to their water-level rather than their geolo- 

 gical features. 



The section I have constructed from West Hythe to the north of 

 Canterbury will show the general dip of the beds of the whole area, 

 and define approximately the thickness of the underlying beds : 

 I say approximately, for the beds below the Chalk vary in relative 

 thickness, and between the Gault and the Wealden beds we may 

 expect to find (after the facts revealed in the deep well-section at 

 Dover Convict Prison, where the Lower Greensand is only I'epre- 

 sented by 31 feet of clayey sand) no certainty as to thickness or 

 character.' 



The bed called Upper Greensand between the Gault and Chalk 

 Marl is barely represented in East Kent, and the base of the Chalk 

 Marl, which (in all the sections I have met with) has been so squeezed 

 and contorted that no definite thickness could be assigned to it, and 

 some 50 feet of the Lower Chalk resting on the Gault is an alterna- 

 tion of sand and clay which for the most part retains water. It is 

 from this bed, probably the upper part of it, that we find the springs 

 thrown out all along the southern edges of the escarpment of the 

 Cbalk. For the details of these beds Mr. Hilton Price's paper on the 

 beds between the Gault and the Upper Chalk may be consulted.^ 



The rivers of this district are the Stour, the Little Stour, and the 

 Dour. 



The Stour has two branches, which both take their rise from 

 numerous springs which issue from the Chalk escarpment of the 

 Weald, mostly between the Chalk and Chalk Marl, or the latter and 

 the Gault. The southern source of the Stour is close to Postling 

 Church, where a strong spring rises at about the elevation of 330 

 feet above Ordnance Datum. Thence it flows in a north-westerly 

 direction receiving various tributaries ; strong springs at Horton Park, 

 Stouting, and Brabourne, the strongest springs in each case rising at 

 the level of 300 and 350 feet. The water is highly charged with car- 

 bonate of lime, and travertine (calcareous tufa) is deposited. Thence, 

 flowing westward by Ashford, it is joined by another branch, rising 

 near Lenham Church and Westwell, and so flowing in an opposite 

 direction to Ashford. Here the united streams cut through the Chalk 

 escarpment, and flow as one river between Wye, Godmersham, Chilham, 



• See Quart. Journ. Geol. Soc. vol. xlii. p. 36. 

 - Quart. Joura. Geol. Soc. vol. xxiiii. pp. 431. 



