144 PREHISTORIC EUROPE. 



wich, as we have seen, considers these sheets of loam as forming 

 part and parcel of the ancient river-accumulations of the Pleisto- 

 cene Period. But they attain so great a development in various 

 parts of Europe, that many geologists have hesitated to accept 

 this explanation of their origin. Xor can it be denied that the 

 phenomena are sometimes produced on so grand a scale that 

 even the most exaggerated river-action seems hardly to account 

 for them. Geologists, therefore, have very generally discussed 

 the question of the origin of the great loamy deposits of the 

 Pleistocene Period apart from that of the ancient gravels, with 

 which the former are usually associated in the valleys. I 

 believe, nevertheless, with Professor Prestwich, that the expla- 

 nation of the one set of phenomena is bound up with that of the 

 other — that the loams and gravels in short are terms of one and 

 the same series. For the present, however, I shall follow other 

 geologists in considering the loamy deposits by themselves, and 

 shall reserve what I have to say about their origin to a sub- 

 sequent chapter. 



One of the most representative and typical of the accumula- 

 tions now under review is the loss of German geologists. This 

 may be shortly described as a yellow or pale grayish-brown, 

 fine-grained, and more or less homogeneous, consistent, non- 

 plastic loam, consisting of an intimate admixture of clay and 

 carbonate of lime. It is frequently minutely perforated by long 

 vertical root-like tubes which are lined with carbonate of lime 

 — a structure which imparts to the loss a strong tendency to 

 cleave or divide in vertical planes. Thus it usually presents 

 upright bluffs or cliffs upon the margins of streams and rivers 

 which intersect it. Very often it contains concretions or 

 nodules of irregular form, which are known in the Ehine dis- 

 trict as Lossmannclien or Ldsspiippchen, and in that of the 

 Danube as Losskindeln. Land-shells and the remains of land- 

 animals are the most common fossils of the loss, but occasionally 

 freshwater shells and the bones of freshwater fish occur. Such 

 is the typical character of loss. It is not, however, always an 

 unstratified mass. Often enough lines of bedding, a foot or 



