132 PROCEEDINGS OF THE GEOLOGICAL SOCIETY. [DeC. 19, 



those beds are met with, hut rolled oolitic fragments are very scarce. 

 They do, however, occur, and one considerable block of coral rag was 

 found last summer by Sir C. Lyell and myself in a gravel-pit near the 

 Thames between Twyford and Henley. When this gravel reposes 

 on the chalk it is generally mixed at its base with a large proportion 

 of chalk-rubble, which sometimes is concreted and forms a thin solid 

 base or pan to the gravel. 



At various places in this gravel of the Thames Valley there have 

 been found from time to time numerous organic remains consisting 

 of land shells and bones of land animals. These it is not now my 

 object to allude to further, except to state that they are not found 

 constantly, but, on the contrary, only at distant intervals. Mr. 

 Trimmer long since discovered them at Brentford, and last summer 

 elephant remains were found in the gravel near Kingston. Mr. 

 Blackwell has also found them far up the Valley of the Thames, or 

 rather the branch Valley of the Kennet, at Aldermaston near New- 

 bury. But although it was apparent that the same gravel extended 

 over the greater part of the intermediate area, yet no organic remains 

 had hitherto been noticed in the central district of Windsor and 

 Maidenhead. 



On the right-hand side of the Great Western Railway, just before 

 reaching the Maidenhead station, there is a large gravel- pit which I 

 had formerly visited, and which has of late been extensively worked 

 for ballast. I had never found any bones in this pit ; still the locality 

 appeared very favourable for further research. Therefore, when, last 

 summer, Mr. Lubbock informed me of his intention to spend a few 

 days at Maidenhead, I pointed out this spot to him, and expressed 

 a hope that he would examine it carefully. This he kindly undertook 

 to do, and, to my great gratification, returned in a few days with 

 the remarkable specimen of which Prof. Owen has given so able and 

 interesting a description. Besides the skull of this Buffalo, Mr. 

 Lubbock procured a few Elephant and other bones *, but in a very 

 imperfect state. They were all found low down in the gravel — at the 

 point where it becomes mixed with chalk-rubble, or on the top of the 

 chalk itself. I only hope that he will return there again and follow up 

 an investigation so well begun. 



The bones, as usual in such situations, although very friable, are 

 tolerably entire, or if broken are not worn. Nor does the gravel 

 itself afford any evidence of long-continued movement or of much 

 wear. If we eliminate from it the flint-pebbles derived from the ter- 

 tiary beds and the pebbles of the older rocks derived from the new 

 red sandstone, we have a residue of subangular flints which exhibit 

 extremely little wear — nothing like that which would result from 

 long-continued river or shore action, — and it is necessarily this residue 

 which gives us the true measure of wear and tear which the mass has 

 undergone. To this I wish merely to allude in passing, as it is a point 



* I have since visited this pit and obtained part of a tooth of the Elephant. 

 The workmen informed me that a considerable quantity of bones were found some 

 time since at the other (west) end of the pit. At the east end, where they are now 

 digging, they have found but very few bones. 



