468 Kotice^ of Memoirs — Prof. Prestuich on Mundesley Beds. 



lighter-coloured and more ovoid than those of the New Eed. They 

 probably have drifted from a continental area on tlie east, the author 

 having found similar beds in parts of Belgium. 5thly, the absence 

 of northern drift. 



Besides their position under the Boulder-clay on the lines of 

 railway, the Westleton Shingle caps some isolated hills in Essex, 

 such as Danebury and Langdon Hills. It is to this age also that the 

 author would refer the drift gravel capping some of the higher ground 

 in Epping Forest, and also the Middlesex hills around Barnet and 

 Southgate, and extending thence in outliers to the range of hills 

 between Hertford and Hatfield, South Mimms and St. Albans, and 

 possibly as far north as Tyler's Hill, near Cheshara. Eanging 

 further westward, it forms a small capping on Horsington Hill, near 

 Harrow, which serves to connect it with its highest position on 

 Bowsey Hill, near Henley-on-Thames. Southward, it caps St. 

 George's Hill, near 'VVe3'bridge. Approaching its southern boundary, 

 this drift becomes less woi'n and passes into a subangular flint-gravel, 

 capping several of the hills south of the Thames. At Cherry Down, 

 near Windsor, it consists in large part of subangular fragments of 

 chert and ragstone. It caps Hungary Hill, near Farnham ; another 

 hill west of Ceesar's Camp, near Bagshot ; Meadow Down, near 

 Guildford ; and Pobly Hill, near Dorking. To this period may 

 probably be also assigned the gravel on the top of Well Hill, near 

 Chelsfield, Kent ; and some of the sands and gravel on the top of the 

 cliffs near Minster, in the Isle of Sheppey. 



The author reserves for another occasion the description of the 

 beds next in order ; but he would mention here, that the Boulder- 

 clay and some Glacial gravels occupy in Herts and Berks a lower 

 horizon than the Westleton Beds. It would therefore appear that, 

 while the eastern area was submerged, and the strata followed in 

 regular succession upon a surface which did not undergo denudation, 

 the southern and western area was slowly elevated, and underwent 

 partial denudation before the Upper Boulder-clay was deposited. 

 Previous to the period of the Westleton and Mundesley beds, it is 

 probable that the denudation of the Weald had hardly commenced. 

 The area was spread over by Cretaceous strata under water at the 

 beginning of the Crag period (the Lenham Beds), and judging from 

 the character of the beds which fringe the North Wealden ai'ea at 

 Chelsfield, Cherry Down, etc., the author concludes that there was 

 land south of this fringing shingle, whence the great mass of Chalk - 

 flints and of Lower Greensand cherts and ragstone must have been 

 derived. This mass of debris serves to attest to the great extent of 

 these strata that have been removed from the Wealden area while 

 yet it was an elevated and not a depressed area. After the rise of 

 the area over which the Westleton Beds extended, it underwent 

 extensive denudation, and it was at this period that the great plain 

 of the Thames Valley received its first outlines, although it was not 

 uutil much later that the river valley received its last impress. 



