664 PROCEEDINGS OF THE GEOLOGICAL SOCIETY. [June 22, 
size. In most instances the roots of the trees are found extending 
far down into the subsoil beneath; and when the overlying peat is 
removed, about 2 feet of the stem is found left standing above the sur- 
face of the ground in which it grew. Submarine forests are found, 
more or less, all along the Lancashire coast, as in North Cheshire— 
and when not seen, are present beneath the sea-sand, occurring 
sometimes at Southport 80 feet below high-water mark. The sub- 
marine peat and forest 1s everywhere connected with the peat and 
submerged forest of the lowlands (or “broads,” as they would be 
called in some districts), running under the sand dunes which 
fringe the coast, in a belt varying from a half to nearly four miles 
in breadth, and often reaching an elevation of nearly 100 feet above 
the level of the sea. 
To the north-east of Southport, towards the river Douglass, the 
site of the old lake, Martin-Mere, called by Camden “the biggest 
mere in Lancashire,” is covered with very thick and dense peat, 
resting on the Cyclas-clay. Its waters appear to have been bounded 
to the north by the hill of Boulder-clay, masked at the bottom by 
Shirdley-Hill sand, near Tarleton, referred to in the description of 
that sand, the position of which is traced on fig. 3. 
The lake contained in the sixteenth century 3400 acres, but was 
‘drained in 1692 by Mr. Thomas Fleetwood, who spent an enormous 
sum of money in doing so. While the excavations were going on, 
eight canoes, each hewn out of a single tree, were found; one of 
them, I believe, is in the British Museum. According to Leigh’s 
‘ Natural History of Lancashire,’ published in 1700, one of the canoes 
had iron plates on it. He also relates the finding of great quantities 
of fir stocks and fir-apples. The fir trees found under the moss, then 
as now, were so bituminous as to be used as candles by the neigh- 
bouring inhabitants. Leigh also mentions that, under the moss, 
distinct plantations of birch, oak, ash, and pine were found, that 
had evidently been planted. Some trees that I have observed dug 
up from the moss over the site of this lake certainly appear to 
have been cut down by some blunt implement, possibly a stone axe; 
and many of the oak trees in the submarine forest near the mouth 
of the Alt appear to be placed in right lines at equal distances. 
But the bases of these have every appearance of having become gra- 
dually rotten, owing to the obstruction of drainage causing the rise of 
water, in which peat began to form, and into which the trunks were 
afterwards blown by powerful westerly and south-westerly winds, to 
which the half-rotted stems formed an easy prey. Everywhere in 
West Lancashire the heads of the buried trees generally lie to the 
north-east, especially when the trunk is not entirely separated from 
the roots. 
The trees dug up from the mosses are generally of a black colour ; 
and the wood has often acquired a considerable density, and is occa- 
sionally used for furniture and house-fittings. The trees at the base 
of the peat at Rimrose Brook, the mouth of the Alt, Formby, and 
near Southport are chiefly oaks and pollard ashes, in Croston and 
Marton Mosses chiefly oaks and yews, and in Lytham Moss oaks and 
