276 PHYSIOGRAPHY. [chap. 



was another pavement, D, of the kind which is termed 

 tessellated ; and underlying this was another bed of soil, E. 



There can be no reasonable doubt that the modern road- 

 way, A, was laid down after the old pavement, B, and 

 that this pavement again is of later date than the tessellated 

 pavement. The three layers of soil, those between the 

 pavements and that above the pavement, B, contained 

 fragments of pottery, coins, and other articles, such as are 

 apt to accumulate in the rubbish of great cities. 



Taking all the circumstances of the case into considera- 

 tion, this Cannon-Street section affords to the archseologist 

 sufficient grounds for the conclusion, that human beings 

 occupied this locality for a very long period ; though it 

 would be quite impossible to say how long, without inde- 

 pendent evidence. Moreover, as the pottery and other 

 relics in the layer E, are of a totally different character 

 from tliose in the layer C, the archjeologist would be 

 justified in supposing, either that the people who inhabited 

 the locality during the time represented by E, were of 

 different race from those who inhabited it during the time 

 represented by C ; or, if the same, that their posterity had 

 undergone some great change. 



If the relics in the layers E and C, were unlike any- 

 thing known, the conclusions of the archaeologist thus far 

 would be quite justifiable, but he could get very litUe further. 

 As a matter of fact, however, when the relics in the bed E 

 are compared with what are known, on independent grounds, 

 to be the coinage and pottery-work of the ancient Romans, 

 they can be identified with the latter ; while the tessellated 

 pavement is no less characteristically Roman. On the other 

 hand, the coins and other objects in the stratum C, have all 

 the characters of those which are known, from independent 

 evidence, to have been produced in England, in the period 



