328 ME. A. J. JUKES-BROWNE OJST [A.Ug. I904, 



risiug to over 800 feet, and that on the south side to about 

 500 feet. Mr. H. J. Lowe has suggested 1 that this valley is that of a 

 stream which formerly ran from east to west and was a tributary 

 of the Lower Teign, which river he supposed to have then run 

 southward into Tor Bay ; but he offers no explanation of the 

 manner in which the slope of such a valley could have been 

 reversed, and have become an outlet for the waters of what he 

 regards as the main stream. 



In my opinion, it is much more probable that this estuary is part 

 of a very ancient valley, formed by a stream which ran from the 

 eastern part of Dartmoor over the eastward -sloping plain of 

 Eocene deposits in Oligocene time. The present Bovey Plain 

 is a locally-depressed portion of this ancient plain, and I regard 

 the Bovey Biver as a comparatively-recent development ; but there 

 is another stream which debouches into the Teign at Newton 

 Abbot, exactly opposite to the opening of the Teign estuary. This 

 is the Lemmon, the higher tributaries of which rise on Haytor and 

 Bagtor Moors at a level of about 1200 feet above the sea. It is 

 obvious that a stream rising at so high a level, and flowing east- 

 ward, could take a course that was likely to have initiated the 

 valley of the Teign estuary, even if this valley was commenced on a 

 plain which was coextensive with that of Little Haldon (800 feet). 



Moreover, there is some reason for believing that the Lemmon was 

 a more powerful stream in Oligocene and Miocene times than it is 

 now, and that its head-waters included those of the stream called 

 the Yeo, which now runs through Ashburton to join the Dart. 

 About 2 k miles west of Newton Abbot, the Lemmon receives a small 

 tributary stream called the Kester Brook, which runs through a 

 well-marked valley, but is now a small and insignificant brook. It 

 seems to be merely a rivulet, fed partly by rainwater and partly by 

 small springs on each side of the valley as far west as Alston Cross 

 and Mead Farm, about a mile and a half west-north-west of Ash- 

 burton. But the valley continues beyond this point, and is fairly- 

 well defined by the lines for the 400 -feet contour on the 6-inch and 

 1-inch Ordnance maps (see fig. 3, p. 329). The actual watershed at 

 the head of this valley appears to be about half a mile west of Mead 

 Farm, and only about 15 feet higher than the centre of the valley 

 at Mead Cross near that farm. 



In the opposite direction, that is to the south-west, this col or gap 

 opens into the valley of a little stream which joins the Yeo in 

 Ashburton. On the west side of this stream is a shallow depression, 

 which looks like a continuation of the Kester-Brook valley ; 

 and this opens into the Valley of the Yeo at Cuddaford Bridge. 

 My suggestion is, that the valley of the Kester Brook is really 

 the ancient valley of the Biver Yeo, which in early times continued 

 the curve of its present course above Cuddaford Bridge, so as to 

 pass through the above-mentioned depression, and thence eastward 

 through the col at the head of the Kester-Brook valley. 



1 Trans. Devon. Assoc, vol. xxxv (1903) p. 645. 



