132 Revieics — Dr. G. J. Hinde's Fossil 8ponges, 



The Canoe was found twenty feet deep in a bed of Brick-clay, and 

 this again was covered by about ten feet of the " Head," or ordinary 

 accumulation of Clay and Sand, with angular and subangular stones. 



Mr. Pengelly states that " its site was not only above the ordinary 

 level of the adjacent rivers, but by estimation fully twenty-two feet 

 above the level reached by the highest floods ever known to have 

 occurred in the district; " and the clay in which the Canoe was found 

 must evidently have been deposited in some depth of water. The 

 suggestion of its Glacial age is unfortunately of a very indirect 

 character. The Bovey Beds are overlaid at the large " Coal pit " by 

 an irregular accumulation, or " Head," of sandy clay with fragments 

 of granite, metamorphic, and other rocks from the north-west ; and 

 this has been looked upon by Dr. Heer and Mr. Nathorst as Boulder- 

 clay. Above this are deposits of white clay and sand, and m the 

 former occur Betula nana and Salix cinerea. These superficial 

 deposits are regarded by Mr. Pengelly as of Glacial age: and as the 

 Canoe was found beneath a similar " Head," the inference is that the 

 Canoe is older than the Betula-nana clays. 



Of course one might at once question the value of any correlation 

 of " Head " in different places, especially in a river- valley where the 

 older deposits are likely to be re-assorted in the formation of the 

 newer. Mr. Pengelly makes a difference between the above deposits 

 of High-Level Head, and others occupying a lower position — the 

 Low-Level Head. The Doll and Spear-head were found in Low- 

 Level Head. But the Rapier moulds were found in the High-Level 

 Head at Chudleigh Knighton, and they all evidently belong to the 

 same Bronze age. Mr. Pengelly gives reasons for concluding that 

 the moulds were intentionally lodged where they were found, which 

 if true, is a satisfactory way of getting out of the difficulty. 



The question is, could the Canoe have been deposited whei-e it was 

 found, without any change in the levels? Might the Bovey Basin 

 have been dammed up, naturally or artificially, in the Bronze period,^ 

 when we know that Lake-dwellings were in fashion not only amongst 

 Beavers but amongst Men? Of course there is no reason why 

 Palaeolithic Men should not have been able to paddle their own 

 Canoes, but we must be content to wait further evidence before we 

 confess the faith announced by Mr. Pengelly. H. B. W. 



n. — Catalogue of the Fossil Sponges in the Geological Depart- 

 ment OF THE British Museum (Natural History) ; with 

 Descriptions of New and Little-Known Species. (Illus- 

 trated by 38 Lithographic Plates.) By George Jennings 

 Hinde, Ph.D., F.G.S. 4to. pp. 297. (London, printed by 

 order of the Trustees of the British Museum, 1883.) 

 ^E congratulate Dr. Hinde on the completion of his three years' 

 arduous labours on the Fossil Sponges in the British Museum, 

 which have culminated in the publication of this admirable Descrip- 

 tive Catalogue. 



Every such well-finished piece of work as the present, which 

 forms a solid addition to our knowledge, is like a carefully pre- 



