﻿1861.] 



PKESTWICH FOSSIL FLINT IMPLEMENTS. 



365 



Kent. — In August last year Mr. T. Leech, while searching for 

 fossils in the cliffs between Heme Bay and the Reculvers, ac- 

 cidentally found in the shingle at the foot of the cliff a well-formed 

 flint implement. This induced him to make further search, and in 

 the course of the few weeks he spent there he found altogether 

 six specimens. They are all of the spear-head pattern, so common 

 at Amiens. One specimen, however, is peculiar, and so far unique ; 

 it is a pointed implement formed out of large, smooth, egg-shaped ter- 

 tiary flint-pebble. One end of the pebble is brought to a sharp point, 

 and the other retains its smooth, rounded surface. In February last 

 Mr. Evans and I, accompanied by Mr. Leech, visited the place, and after 

 a search of some hours, Mr. Evans found two, and I found one well- 

 made and un doubted specimen. They were lying on the sand and 

 shingle at a distance of from 20 to 30 feet from the foot of the cliff, 

 and distant three-quarters of a mile west from the Reculvers, and a 

 little to the eastward of Old Haven coastguard-station*. We searched 

 the cliff for them in situ, but without success. It is to be hoped 

 that the upper part of the cliff — the part to be searched — may 

 prove more accessible during the summer months. I satisfied my- 

 self, however, so far as to determine that at that spot there is at 

 the top of the cliff, which consists in its lower part of the Thanet 

 sands and "Woolwich series t, a local pebbly clay deposit of small 

 extent and about 8 feet thick, and which, I have reason to believe, is 

 of fresh-water origin, as it closely resembles the fossiliferous deposit 

 next mentioned. It is to this bed that I would refer the flint im- 

 plements. Its height above the sea-level is about 50 feet. The 

 annexed section fig. 2 shows the relation of this bed, a, to the sea- 

 level, and to the presumed older gravels, b, which cap the higher 

 ground. 



A few years since I found, in a section at Swalecliff near Whitstable, 

 a freshwater deposit (a in the western part of fig. 2), overlying the 

 London clav, and aboundingin land- and marsh-shells, with which were 

 associated a few mammalian bones. I again visited the spot on my 

 return from Abbeville in 1859, in the hope of finding flint implements. 

 My search, however, was not successful. We now again returned to 

 this spot to make a further investigation. On this occasion we had no 

 soorier reached the small bay east of the cliff, than Mr. Evans was 

 fortunate enough to find, lying on the shore, an oval-shaped flint 

 implement, identical in form with those so common at Abbeville. 

 The specimen was further interesting from its deep discoloration. 

 It possesses that bright light-brown colour which characterizes the 

 specimens from the gravel of Moulin Quignon. We searched the 

 cliff for specimens in situ, but did not succeed in finding any. We 

 noticed, however, that the fossiliferous clay was underlain by a bed 

 of gravel, the flints in which had the same peculiar brown colour as 



* An old wooden spout projecting from the upper part of the cliff may at 

 present serve as a guide to the spot. 



f For the general section of this part of the coast see my paper in the Journal, 

 vol. viii. pt. xv. p. 264. 



