286 LECTUEE X. 



Ireland, and consequently much younger than the Norfolk 

 cragj the accumulations of bones of the Elephas meridionalis 

 and antiquus. 



" What is the animal world which characterises the beds in 

 which traces are found of a rude industry the genuineness of 

 which cannot be easily doubted ? — land and fresh water shells, 

 which, with few exceptions, still inhabit these regions, iJachy- 

 dermata, ruminants, and carnivora; namely, Ele^lias primigenius 

 and antiquus, Rhinoceros ticliorldnus, Hippopotamius major, Ger- 

 vus tarandus, Gervus megaceros, Bos primigenius and ^noschatus, 

 JEquns fossilis, Felis spelcea, Hyoena spelcea, Ursus speloius, etc. 

 That is to say exactly that assemblage of species which we 

 find in the fluvio-marine beds of Menchecourt, in the sandy and 

 flinty alluvium of localities near Abbeville and Amiens, as well 

 as in the valley of the Oise near Chauny. 



" The analogy of these Faiinee on both sides of the Channel 

 is still more strikingly proved by the occurrence near Menche- 

 court of the Gorbicula consohrina or fluminalis , which occurs 

 from Grays Thurrock, on the left bank of the Thames, up to 

 Hull on the Humber, and is also found in the borings of Ostend. 



" The remains of this Fauna of invertebrate and vertebrate 

 animals were found in the great deposit of sand, clay, and 

 rolled flints, which extends over the east and south of England, 

 and which there, as on the continent, was in some places suc- 

 ceeded by a gravelly clayish deposit which corresponds to the 

 older alluvium. 



" In now comparing the results obtained on the other side 

 of the Channel with the deposits of the Somme valley, we must 

 necessarily consider the latter as not much older than the fresh 

 water formations of the south of England, and contemporaneous 

 with such strata as beyond the Channel contain the Fauna of 

 those large mammals which lived during the quaternary period. 

 The deposits of the Somme valley and the basin of the Oise 

 are thus younger than the boulder-clay, than the ISTorfolk crag, 

 and belong in fact to the phenomena which occurred in the 

 second glacial period, 



" Thus, on the one hand, the comparison of these deposits 

 with those of the adjoining departments in the east, where the 



