322 ME. A. J. JUKES-BROWNE ON [Aug. J904, 



have abandoned it, and consequently the hypothesis fails to account 

 for the deeply-cut gorge of the Teign. 



A theory exists that the Teign once flowed southward by Kings- 

 kerswell into Tor Bay, and it has been attributed to Mr. J. H. Key ; 

 but this appears to be a mistake, for Mr. Key only pointed out 1 

 that, if the Bovey deposits were formed in a lake on the site of the 

 present basin (as he supposed they were), the overflow of this 

 lake must have been in the direction of Torquay. William Pengelly 

 made a similar statement in 1863 2 ; but thought it far more likely 

 that the overflow was through the present valley towards Teign- 

 mouth. Neither of the writers just quoted said anything about the 

 River Teign ever having run into Tor Bay, and I think that the 

 idea of its having done so is in the highest degree improbable. 



In the years 1901 and 1902, Mr. A. Somervail published several 

 short notes on the valley of the Teign, 3 and in the last of them 

 he concludes that ' the river Teign, or the Teign as we now 

 know it, had not its present course marked out until long after the 

 Oligocene ? ; but he does not discuss its ancient course. He refers 

 to, and dissents from, the theory that the Teign once flowed along 

 the Tor Valley into Tor Bay. 



Still more recently, Mr. H. J. Lowe has written on ' The Teign 

 Valley & its Geological Problems.' 4 He describes and discusses 

 the curious basin-like depression through which the river flows 

 between Chagford and Hunts Tor, considers but rejects the idea 

 that it has ever been a lake, and attributes its formation to a more 

 rapid local decay and disintegration of the granite ; he dissents 

 from Ormerod's view that the Teign originally ran out of this 

 basin by Moretonhampstead, and concludes that its exit has always 

 been in the direction which it now takes. He remarks : — 



' If the river has, for the most part of its existence, followed in the main its 

 present course, it is necessary to assume that it originally took this direction 

 because the head-waters found a natural discharge this way along the most 

 available slope to the sea. But tbis must have been many hundreds of feet 

 above the level at which it at present runs.' 



With this remark I cordially agree, and I think that, if Mr. Lowe 

 had followed out this line of thought, he would probably have come 

 to the conclusion that the course which the Teign now takes beyond 

 this gorge is not likely to have been its original one. 



It is certain that, before we can arrive at any satisfactory 

 explanation of the facts, we must consider the probable conditions 

 of the ancient surface out of which the present surface has been 

 developed, to what extent the older rocks around Dartmoor may 

 then have been covered by newer deposits, and what changes have 

 been (or may have been) accomplished between that time and the 

 present. 



1 Quart. Jonrn. Geol. Soc. vol. xviii (1862) p. 16. 



2 ' The Lignite of Bovey Tracey ' 1863, p. 19. 



3 Trans. Devon. Assoc, vol. xxxiii (1901) pp. 517 & 521 ; and ibid. vol. xxxiv 

 ( 1902) p. 528. l Ibid. vol. xxxv (1903) p. 631. 



