On the Age of the Norfolk Forest-hed. 269 



and also what Mr. ]N"orton, F.G.S., has written on the same subject. 

 If stools of trees ever have been seen in situ, it is my firm conviction 

 they were rooted on the same land-surface I have described 



The true stratigraphical position of the E.ootlet-bed (frequently 

 called a Forest-bed) is, however, of considerable geological interest. 

 All the evidence, as shown by superposition, etc., in my opinion 

 clearly points to the conclusion, that it immediately overlies the 

 Chillesford clay. The Eootlet-bed in some cases apparently being a 

 freshwater deposit, as at Gorton and at Kessingland ; sometimes 

 forming a distinct and separate bed one stage more recent than the 

 Chillesford clay, and sometimes apparently passing down into the 

 Chillesford clay, forming, as it were, the uppermost portion of the 

 same ; at other times it is to be seen lying on a more or less denuded 

 surface of the Chillesford clay, as at "Weybourne 



JN'ow we come to a very important part of the history of this so- 

 called Porest-bed, viz. the true age of the mammalian remains, which 

 are referred to the period of the " Forest-bed " or " Forest-bed Series," 

 and which, as you are aware, are at the present time undergoing a 

 very careful investigation by my colleague Mr. E. T. Newton, F.Gr.S. 

 (Assistant IS^aturalist to the Geological Survey). In this analysis, it 

 is all important to know where each specimen was actually found, and 

 from what bed it was derived. If there is any doubt as to the relation 

 of the beds, much confusion must necessarily ensue. Some writers, 

 in giving a history of this so-called " Cromer Forest-bed," have 

 inferred, that the animals whose remains we find round that coast 

 lived in a forest that existed in that very locality. Nothing can be more 

 erroneous, in my opinion, the facts being entirely against any such 

 conclusion. Marine or estuarine conditions prevailed at the time, as 

 proved by the numerous marine and estuarine shells, with occasionally 

 a few freshwater intermixed, and in places alternating with the 

 marine, which have been traced by my colleague Mr. Ileid along 

 the foreshore from Weybourne, where the formation rests on the 

 Chalk, to Sidestrand, on the east of Cromer, a distance of about ten 

 miles ; and they reappear again in the lower part of the cliff, 

 further south, at Easton Bavent, the intervening space lying now 

 at too low a level for them to be observed. . . . The timber may have 

 been derived from a forest; but the forest itself may have been situated 

 miles away from where we now find the remains of it ; and so likewise 

 the Elephants, Hippopotamuses, Rhinoceroses, Deer, and other animals 

 may have lived and died miles away from where we now find their 

 scattered and commingled remains, intermixed in places with marine, 

 freshwater, and a few land shells. The term Forest-bed can only be 

 correctly applied to a bed forming a land-surface, and on which a 

 forest grew 



I use the term "Eootlet-bed" in contradistinction to "Forest- 

 bed," inasmuch as up to the present time no reliable evidence of 

 forest growth has been observed in situ upon it, and also, as pre- 

 viously stated, because the rootlets have been the means of tracing 

 the land-surface. The rootlets which mark the horizon are all 

 similar in nature ; but it has not yet been determined to what 

 vegetable growth they belong ; — it is to be hoped some botanist will 



