92 Reports and Proceedings — Geological Societg of London. 



bands in the Grenville limestone. The Huronian in their classification 

 stands for what heretofore has been called the Hastings Series. The 

 Laurentian includes both the Keewatin aud Grenville Series.^ 



i=tE:poi^TS JiL.i<rjD jpjeioc:e:ejdxi<tg-&. 



I. — Geological Society of London. 



I.— December I8ih, 1907.— Sir Archibald Geikie, K.C.B., D.C.L., Sc.D., 

 Sec. E.S., President, in the Chair. 



The following communications were read: — 



1. "Some Recent Discoveries of Palaeolithic Implements." By 

 Sir John Evans, K.C.B., D.C.L., LL.D., F.R.S., For. Sec. G.S. 



By the courtesy of Mr. Worthington Smith, the author is enabled 

 to call attention to some recent discoveries of Palajolithic implements 

 on the southern borders of Bedfordshire and in the north-western part 

 of Hertfordshire. In addition to the discovery of a Palaeolithic floor 

 at Caddington brickfield, at between 550 and 590 feet above sea-level, 

 implements have since been found on the surface of the gi'ound at 600 

 and 760 feet respectively ; while a good ovate implement was found 

 in thin, water-laid material, at 651 feet O.D. In Hertfordshire, 

 Palaeolithic implements have been found at Great Gaddesden, at 

 a brickfield about I^ miles north-east of Hemel Hempstead, and at 

 Bedmond, 2 to 2^ miles south-east of the last locality. The drifts 

 which cap the hills in North-West Hertfordshire seem to be of very 

 variable origin ; and a great part of the material is derived from clay 

 deposits of Eocene age, but little remanie. It seems to the author 

 that it is safest not to invoke river-action for the formation of the 

 high-level deposits, which extend over a wide area and are in the 

 main argillaceous and not gravelly or sandy in character, but to adopt 

 Mr. Worthington Smith's view that in early times lakes or marshes 

 existed in these implementiferous spots, the borders of which were 

 inhabited by Palaeolithic Man. The evidence that he has brought 

 forward as to the implements having, in some of the Caddington pits, 

 been manufactured on the spot, most fully corroborates this view. 



2. "On a Deep Channel of Drift at Hitchin (Hertfordshire)." By 

 William Hill, P.G.S. 



Evidence is given, from nine borings running along a line slightly 

 west of north from Langley through Hitchin, of the existence of 

 a channel of considerable depth, now filled with Drift, occupying the 

 centre of an old valley in the Chalk escarpment, which may be called 

 the Hitchin Vallej'. For the first 3 miles it appears to be contained 

 within narrow limits, persistent ridges of Chalk occurring on each 

 side, and it might almost be compared to a Chalk combe. At Hitchin, 

 after passing between two Chalk knolls, its confines become less clear, 

 and there seems to be some evidence of broadening as it emerges on to 

 the Lower Chalk plain and leaves the higher ground of the main 



' Ih conuection with the above see report of paper by Professor F. D. Adams, 

 Geol. Mag., Dec, 1907, pp. 574, 575. 



