BETWEEN THE TYNE AND THE WANSBECK 85 



those of the Edington bed. A somewhat similar deposit 

 occurs at the same height (200 feet) near the Shilvington 

 Burn about i^ miles away, though in both cases the develop- 

 ment is poor. 



Passing mention may be made here of a small pebble bed 

 which is exposed in the bed of the Ouseburn a little below 

 West Brunton. It is covered with about 6 feet of prismatic 

 clay, and is remarkable in so far as it abounds in roots, now 

 partly converted into peaty matter, which do not penetrate the 

 clay above. Though its base is not seen, there is a great 

 thickness of drift in this place, and the bed must rest upon 

 this. In character and position it resembles the beds of peat, 

 lying beneath brick earth, which have been observed at Shields 

 and near Redheugh.* 



Er7-atic Blocks. — These are strewn broadcast over the 

 surface of the land, and have been largely drawn upon for 

 the construction of stone dykes and houses. They consist 

 almost invariably of whinstone, sandstone, and limestone, and 

 both in number and size increase enormously towards the 

 west of the district, that is near to their presumable source of 

 origin, the Great Whin Sill and the outcrops of Bernician 

 Limestone. 



The Glacial Sands seem, from the evidence of borings and 

 sinkings, to occur at all horizons in the drift. On the surface 

 they cover extensive tracts in the valleys of the Ouseburn and 

 the Pont and Blyth. Near to Gosforth they form hillocks, 

 eUiptical in shape, with the major axes running roughly east 

 and west, i.e., parallel to the Ouseburn. Such hillocks are to ' 

 be seen at Brunton Low Plantation, Bent Hill, Fencer Hill, 

 and about Gosforth Lake. In the flats about the Pont and 

 Blyth they are quite smoothed out. There can be little doubt 

 that some of these deposits of surface sand have been pro- 

 duced by denudation acting since glacial times, since they 

 occasionally occur near the bottoms of valleys which have 



* Lebour, "Handbook to the Geologj" and Natural History of Northumberland 

 and Durham," p. 13. 



