,302 REV. E. HILL ON TRANSPORTED BOULDER CLAY. [May 1 896, 



16. On Transported Boulder Clat. By the Rev. Edwin Hill, 

 M.A., F.G.S. (Read January 22nd, 1896.) 



1 wish to put on record some facts lately observed respecting 

 two groups of Boulder-Clay masses which appear to have been trans- 

 ported from their original positions. 



One group occurs in the cliffs south of Great Yarmouth. The sands 

 of the cliffs which extend from Lowestoft to Yarmouth are usually 

 described as ' Mid-Glacial.' On tbem lies Chalky Boulder Clay as 

 seen at Corton and northwards, while below them are seen at several 

 spots a perfectly different stony clay, the sands called Pebbly Sands 

 or Westleton Beds, and the well-known Rootlet Bed. The Chalky 

 Boulder Clay extends continuously above the Mid-Glacial sands, 

 from Corton for about | mile northwards ; farther on, one or two 

 disconnected strips also lie on tbe top of the cliffs. But, besides 

 these, several masses of tbe same material occur embedded in the 

 sands. I first noticed them while examining the coast in 1893, 

 and in the spring of 1895 I again made a careful inspection, this 

 time in company with Prof. Bonney. Two lie one on either side of 

 the depression called League Hole, and others were seen respectively 

 about | mile, 1 mile, and 1| mile north, towards Gorleston. The 

 writer of the Survey Memoir (Mr. J. H. Blake) had his attention 

 attracted to these or similar masses, and remarks that ' at times 

 they looked as if they were lenticular patches of Boulder Clay in 

 the Glacial Sands ' (p. 56, Geology of Country near Yarmouth and 

 Lowestoft). He decided, however, that ' they were all introduced 

 after the deposition of the sands.' He does not explain how ; 

 probably he means that they had fallen from the top of the wasting 

 cliff, and had become buried in talus or blown sand. If he had 

 seen the sections exposed in 1893 and 1895, I think he would have 

 concluded that they really were what he then saw that they looked 

 like. 



The mass about 2 miles south of Gorleston Pier, or J mile north of 

 League Hole, as seen in the cliff-section, was about 4 feet thick, 

 with 40 feet of visible length (see fig. 1). Its northern end was 

 hidden by talus, but on the south it was seen, in a clean section 

 of the cliff, ending abruptly against the sands, which presented 

 their regular stratified appearance, and were in undisturbed con- 

 tact with it above and below. It was normal Chalky Boulder 

 Clay, crowded with fragments of chalk. The mass about 1 j mile 

 south of Gorleston Pier had a very dark matrix, full of rather 

 rounded chalk pieces of all sizes, from a foot long down to the finest 

 grains ; it contained also some larger inclusions of sand or silt. 

 This mass was about 6 feet thick, also with visible stratified sands 

 above and below. Here, too, one end was hidden under talus ; the 

 other passed into the sands in tongues and strings of dark mud, but 

 the termination of these was again hidden by talus. The mass 

 about 1 mile south of Gorleston was some 30 feet long ; one end 



