CiRC. No. 84. 

 reached, with a beautiful trout stream meandering along well stocked 

 with the silvery fish. The village of Lowthorpe possesses a fine old 

 ivy-covered church, with its i:nonuments and an old cross. The walk 

 bemg continued through the fields Bracey Bridge Mill is reached, 

 and here the romantic scenery baffles description and will amply 

 repay a long journey, the woods and bogs, with their hidden treasures 

 of mosses, reeds, and flowers, forming a natural ampitheatre than 

 which few places are more delightful. 



The geological party will diverge here and proceed along the 

 high road about half-a-mile to view a chalk quarry at Ruston Parva, 

 in which are found sponges, Belemnites, and several other fossils of 

 the chalk ; the quarry will cover two acres and is nearly eighty feet 

 deep — standing on the top a delightful view is unfolded to the gaze, 

 on a clear day Hull, Beverley Minster, Foston, Kilham, Ruston 

 Parva, Lowthorpe, and Harpham Churches and the ships in Bridling- 

 ton Bay being observable. The party could either walk to Driffield 

 (four miles) or, what some think preferable, return by another route 

 to Lowthorpe Station (3-51 p.m. train), three miles. 



Physical Geography and Geology. 



The Rev. E. Maule Cole, M.A., F.G.S., writes :— The district to 

 be visited forms the borderland between the wolds on the west, and 

 the lowland on the east, which though not, strictly speaking, part of 

 Holderness, is a continuation of it. A group of dales issuing from 

 the watershed, known as the High Street, unite at Langtoft, and form 

 a valley stretching S.E. to Kilham, which debouches on the plain 

 near Lowthorpe. Here a beautifully clear stream, celebrated for its 

 trout, is met with, which, rising at Beck Head a little to the east of 

 Kilham, forms the most northern feeder of the river Hull. Occasion- 

 ally, though very seldom in the course of many years, the water 

 forming this beck has been known to burst forth at Henpit Hole, a 

 mile-and-a-half north-west of Kilham. Then the ' gypseys ' are said 

 to be out. This requires some little explanation. The fact is that 

 the chalk is very porous, and holds in the interstices of the rock a 

 great deal of water. What is called ' the level of saturation ' is con- 

 tinually rising and falling according to the rainfall. After prolonged 

 heavy rains, which however seldom occurs on the Wolds, the chalk 

 rock IS so thoroughly saturated that it can hold no more, and then 

 springs break out at weak points, and rivers, like the bournes in 

 Surrey, are seen running in dry places. In addition to this, it must 

 be remembered that the dip of the chalk is towards the east here, and 

 that the plain of Holderness is covered with a thick mantle of im- 

 pervious boulder clay, so that when as much water has been 

 accumulated under it as the underlying chalk beds will hold, the sur- 

 plus is bound to find its way out at the edges of the basin, much the 

 same way as a cup will overflow the rim if you pour too much tea 

 into it. Hence the springs, almost ready-made streams, which, in 

 striking contrast to those on the N. and W., appear on the eastern 

 margin of the Wolds. 



Geologically, there is not much of interest in the present excur- 

 sion. The Chalk beds belong to the Upper Chalk without flints, and 



