300 Proceedings of Societies. 
and also an armlet which had been placed on the arm of a buried person. 
When they looked in front of the great face of excavation and saw over- 
head the Jesuit College, the ancient Cemetery, and the Roman and Pre- 
Roman graves, the question arose, ‘‘ What could be the antiquity of the 
sand and gravel-deposit at the lower level?’’ In Sir Charles Lyell’s 
recently published volume the situation was fully described. Concerning 
the deposits, there was no difference of opinion; they were to be 
reckoned among the later deposits of the geological time, and in the lower 
parts of these deposits a great number of interesting implements had 
been obtained, and some of these he exhibited. He described the deposits 
in detail, from illustrations, stating that fresh-water and land shells were 
found in sand, and splintered flints in an argillaceous deposit over it. 
For the fresh-water and land shells in the grav¥el it was not necessary to 
appeal to the action of the sea, which, however, was seen in the lower 
part of the level. There were, in different levels, cases of great agita- 
tion of water, comparative agitation, and comparative tranquillity. They 
might imagine a lacustrine deposit, against which there would be the 
objection that it would not produce gravel in such a form, it being twisted 
about in all ways. There ought to have been found lying parallel to 
the surface of the lake a great number of lacustrine shells ; but that was 
not the case, and the explanation would not apply to the mixture of fresh- 
water and land and amphibious shells.* The more ordinary explanation 
was to suppose the action of a river which had changed its position, so 
that the flint instruments found near the bottom might formerly have 
existed near the top. The arrangement of the sands was obviously of 
such a kind that they floated over the pebbles and covered all below. The 
whole question came finally to this:—Could they determine the age of 
the gravel beds? They could not escape the conviction that the flint instru- 
ments were of the same age as the gravel beds. Upon the supposition of 
strata having been deposited by river action, the upper surface of the 
deposits would continually tend to become level, and would be so when 
the deposits were of an argillaceous nature. In this case the slope varied 
from 23 to 1} degrees. In order to account for the present condition of 
things, it would be necessary to suppose that the country had been dis- 
turbed, and that there had been an elevation affecting the valley of 
Somme. On an examination of the locality, they would speedily arrive 
at the impression that it was requisite to remember that there was no 
period of geological history from which it was safe to exclude a move- 
ment of the earth’s crust. The map of France showed the causes of the 
elevation. The rivers ran in parallel lines across the chalk, and it was 
impossible to separate the circumstance from the similar fact in this 
country where these phenomena had been discovered. As there was 
reason to think that the valley had been subject to upheaval, accepting 
the supposition, they would not be able to determine the question of age 
by the excavation of the river. If they followed the suggestion of Sir C.. 
Lyell, and took their measure from Scandinavia, they might come to 
some determination as to time ; but this was a case of a local disturbance 
of the earth’s crust, affecting certain lines of country in a given direc- 
tion, and apparently ceasing beyond that. As it would be to some pur- 
pose to ascertain the antiquity of these deposits, he trusted Sir C. 
Lyell would not think it otherwise than a compliment to hear an opinion 
differing from his own. 
‘© On the Drift Beds at Mundesley, Norfolk.” By Professor Paixuirs, 
—Professor Phillips made a statement respecting the drift beds at Mun- 
desley, Norfolk, remarking that he did so to confirm some views which 
