248 THE LOESS AND OTHER DEPOSITS OF SHANTUNG. [May 1895. 



terrace to the west of Fort Hill, Chefu (fig. 3), and, having passed 

 by some sand-dunes probably of the age of the Marine Sands, we 

 came upon the plain of the Taku. We at first thought that this 

 was composed of the alluvium of that river, but on reaching its 

 banks we found the true alluvium to be very narrow (see fig. 4). 

 We again went up on to the clay plains, and so journeyed as far as 

 Sin Ho (lat. BT. 36° 51', long. E. 119° 34'). 



As implied by its name, Sin Ho, or New Eiver, is the termination 

 of a canal, made in the 9th century to connect the Yellow Sea with 

 the Gulf of Pe-chi-li, and so enable the rice tribute to be conveyed 

 to Peking without necessitating the passage of the grain junks 

 round the (to them) dangerous headlands of the Shantung Promon- 

 tory (see map, fig. 1, p. 240). The canal started at Kyao Chow (lat. 

 K 36° 17', long. E. 120° 2'), on the Yellow Sea, and thence led 

 towards Kin Kia K'eo, in Lai Yang-hyien (lat. N. 36° 40', long. E. 

 120° 50'). An intermediate branch followed apparently the line of 

 the Wu Lung Ho, crossed the watershed and descended to Sin Ho, no 

 part of its course being more than a very few feet above sea-level. 

 The whole country which it traversed is a nearly level plain, and 

 evidently in the Marine Sand period formed a strait, dividing the 

 main area of Western Shantung from the islands which then repre- 

 sented the eastern prolongation of that province. The northern 

 portion of this strait was about 30 miles wide, and a whole day was 

 occupied in traversing its sands. At intervals the surface rose in 

 long, low sand-ridges trending north-westerly, representing eddy- 

 banks caused by the currents passing through the straits. 



Peaching again the clayey deposits, which we had seldom lost 

 sight of, on the other side of the old strait, we found that they had 

 assumed the unmistakable character of genuine loess, and were 

 divided into beds by layers of its characteristic calcareous nodules. 

 We had first observed these nodules shortly after leaving Hwang 

 Hyien (lat. N. 37°, long. E. 119° 40'), eastward of the old strait, 

 but it was not till now that they had become characteristic, and 

 that theloess changed its brown hue for the lighter yellowish-grey 

 so marked to the westward. The change was so gradual and the 

 sections were so nearly continuous that the identity of the loess 

 with the Chefu deposit and the valley-deposit of the Taku was 

 placed beyond question, and this was the more assured that in the 

 sections here, as well as farther east, in following the loess down 

 to the bed-rock the layer of gravel was found to be an invariable 

 concomitant. 



Still, though evidently loess, it was loess of a degenerate type, and 

 bore plain traces of re-deposition and re-arrangement, which 

 increased in clearness as we went on. The position of the old 

 strait between Eastern and Western Shantung, and the occurrence 

 of Marine Sands in its bed, showed moreover that the theory of a 

 barrier between Shantung and Korea during the deposition of the 

 old superficial beds around Chefu must be surrendered, and with it 

 the suggested freshwater lake, for those deposits have turned out to 

 be part of the great loess. 



