Vol. 68.] INTERGLACIAL EED8 OF THE ISLE OP WIGHT, ETC. 21 



2. On the Inteeglacial Grayel-Beds of the Isle of Wight and 

 the South of England, and the Conditions of their Poemation. 

 By Prof. Edward Hull, M.A., LL.D., E.R.S., F.G.S. (Bead 

 November 8th, 1911.) 



[Abstract.] 



The Author, after referring to the investigations of previous 

 authors, especially of Mr. Codrington and the officers of the 

 Geological Survey, with which he in the main agrees, points out 

 that the origin and mode of formation of the gravel-terraces of the 

 Isle of Wight and of the New Eorest district are still open to 

 discussion. He points out that the levels of the higher beds on 

 both sides of the Solent, up to about 400 feet, indicate the amount 

 of subsidence of the whole area at a time when the stratified 

 gravels, composed mainly of rolled flints, were formed at the margin 

 of the uprising ridges of the Chalk in the post-Glacial Epoch, for 

 this part of England. Preceding this was the great uplift indicated 

 by Godwin-Austen, by which the British Isles were joined to the 

 Continent as land. By this uplift the English Channel was laid 

 dry, and along its centre there ran a river from its source about 

 the Straits of Dover to its outlet into the ocean through the 

 Continental Platform. This river- channel is laid down on the 

 Admiralty Charts under the name of ^the Hurd Deep' for a 

 distance of 30 miles of its course, and has been named by the 

 Author ' the English Channel Eiver.' 



The Author considers the gravel-beds of this region to be the 

 representatives of the High-level Gravels of the Midlands and 

 Cromer ; also of the ' Interglacial Gravels ' of Cheshire and Lanca- 

 shire ; and of the shell-bearing beds of the Denbighshire Hills, and 

 of Moel Tryfaen in Wales, at levels of about 1200 feet above the sea. 



Discussion. 



Mr. W. Dale welcomed this communication as a reasonable 

 explanation of the deposition of the high-level gravels of the New 

 Forest and the Isle of Wight. He had worked for many years as 

 an archaeologist among the implementiferous gravels of the district 

 found at lower levels, and was much surprised at the statement 

 that the deposition of some of the lower terraces was actually 

 going on down to the Boman period. This certainly could not be 

 the case with Palaeolithic gravels. 



He also wished to submit that possibly the 100- or 150-foot 

 gravels may have been laid down under sub-glacial conditions. 

 He showed upon the screen four views of a gravel-pit at Dunbridge, 

 4 miles north of Bomsey, in the Test Valley, at 146 feet above 

 CD. In this pit there is a lenticular mass of Woolwich and 

 Beading Clay about a yard thick in the middle, lying between the 



