ALLUVIAL COVERING. 31 



particularly hazel-nuts, acorns, and the cones of the fir, are often 

 met with in great abundance. Immense quantities of leaves are found 

 matted together; and these leaves may frequently be separated and 

 obtained entire, by dipping lumps of the decayed masses in water, 

 and dissolving or breaking them, when the leaves may be seen on 

 examining the fresh fractures. The leaves are usually intermixed 

 with decayed grass, and other vegetable remains. On examining the 

 contents of the bog at Hartlepool, the authors also discerned among 

 the leaves the remains of insects, particularly the wings of small bee- 

 tles. The trees are generally much decayed; though many of the 

 oaks are in a good state of preservation. The bark of the hazel and 

 the birch often appears remarkably fresh, while the wood is com- 

 pletely rotten. 



It has been supposed, that an entire stratum of this kind of bog, 

 three or four feet thick, passes under Holderness; that the one edge 

 of this stratum may be seen on the banks of the Humber and of Hull 

 river, while the other edge may be traced all along the coast from the 

 <8purn to Bridlington; and that it may be found in any part of the 

 interior of Holderness, by boring to the same depth.* But the^e 

 ideas are neither consistent with facts, nor agreeable to the nature 

 and arrangement of the alluvial beds. It is not pprrect to say, that 

 such remains may be found at low water all along the Holderness 

 coast; for they are found only in certain spots, the greater part of 

 the coast being destitute of them. Did a continued stratum of this 

 kind really exist, we ought not to find it at one uniform level, but 

 rising or falling with the curvature or dip of the other alluvial beds. 

 The truth is, though the morass found at Hull probably extends 

 through the whole of the flat ground in that vicinity, whether near 

 the sea or not, the remains of that description observed on the Hol- 



* See Dr. Aldeison's Paper on this subject in the Philosophical Journal for October, 1799:. 



