574 Correspondence — Mr. A. J. Juhes- Browne. 



mingling in other Drift deposits of the same area. If Mr. Kendall 

 were to try to explain the distribution of the rocks in the Drifts of 

 the Trent Valley on the glacier theory alone he would be in even 

 greater difficulties than he is at present. 



Mr. Kendall is not quite accurate in implying that Dr. Carvill- 

 Lewis was the originator of the idea that the valley of the Trent 

 formed a large lake at one time. This was clearly stated in a paper 

 read by me before the Geological Society in 1886. In that paper 

 I make the Middle Pleistocene Epoch open with a " land, locked 

 and probably ice-locked "...." Melton-sand sea." Indeed the 

 idea is used to explain the absence of mollusca in the deposits of this 

 epoch. Dr. Carvill Lewis, I think, held that the water level in this 

 sea or lake was above that of the Atlantic ; but the facts rather sup- 

 port the .view that it was connected with the outside sea, the water- 

 shed of Central England being submerged several hundred feet. 



It appears to be quite time that the advocates of glacier theories 

 and submergence theories joined hands for the purpose of ascertain- 

 ing if a more careful study of the " Glacial Succession " will not 

 reconcile their present conflicting views. jj ]y[_ J)eeley 



10, Charnwood St., Derby, Nov. I5th, 1892. 



THE MAMMOTH AND THE GLACIAL DRIFT. 



Sir, — In the September Number of the Geological Magazine 

 (p. 405) Sir Henry Howorth writes: "I claim to have shown that, 

 as tested by these islands, the Mammoth beds are in every instance 

 overlain by the Drift, and are never underlain by it ; " this claim 

 being limited to cases where it is possible to apply the test of super- 

 position. In my letter of October, I took two of his cases and 

 showed that in both the beds enclosing Mammalian remains were 

 undei'lain by Glacial Drift, i.e., that the main mass of the local 

 Boulder-clay passed beneath them ; thereby disproving the verbal 

 accuracy of his statement. 



Again, on p. 400, he discusses the gravels in the valley of the 

 Ouse, near Bedford, a case by the way in which the test of super- 

 position does not apply. In this connection he quotes the discovery 

 of flint-implements "at Thetford on the Ouse," and a few lines 

 lower down he "turns to another site in the same valley," being one 

 not far from Bedford (italics are mine). Eeplying to my obvious 

 comments on this he saj^s he has nothing to correct and nothing to 

 alter in what he wrote, except the spelling of a word, and that the 

 point is "only a test of my knowledge of the English language!" 

 I feel sure your readers will by this time have seen that it was really 

 a test of Sir H. Howorth's knowledge of English geography, and, 

 as I said, of his practical acquaintance with the subject. I did not 

 expect that I should be called upon to point out that the valley of 

 the Little Ouse, between Norfolk and Suffolk, is entirely difi'erent 

 and distinct from the valley of the Great Ouse, near Bedford ! Not 

 even Sir H. Howorth's approved ingenuity in the use of the English 

 language can make them parts of one and the same valley. There 



