72 
PROCEEDINGS  OE  THE  GEOLOGICAL  SOCIETY. 
[May  1893, 
Beds  relates  to  deposits  below  the  East  Anglian  Boulder-clay. 
The  first  part  deals  more  especially  with  the  sections  on  the  coasts 
of  Norfolk  and  Suffolk,  and  the  second  with  the  range  inland  of  the 
Westleton  Beds  or  their  presumed  equivalents ;  the  third  part, 
relating  chiefly  to  the  Southern  Drift,  belongs  to  another  category. 
It  is  well  known  to  students  of  geology  that  the  classification  of 
the  variable  series  of  beds  which  lie  between  the  undoubted  Pliocene 
and  the  Chalky  Boulder-clay  in  Norfolk  and  Suffolk  has  exercised 
the  faculties  of  observers  in  East  Anglia  for  a  long  period  of  time. 
There  are  few  subjects,  indeed,  which  have  been  more  fruitful  of 
divergent  opini  fii.  No  one  can  doubt  the  importance  of  these  beds, 
for  they  cont  1  the  key  to  the  history  of  the  first  half  of 
Pleistocene  time  in  this  country.  Prof.  Prestwich,  in  describing 
the  relationship  of  this  group  to  the  Crag  Series  below  and  the 
Glacial  Series  above,  while  he  admits  the  value  of  the  distinction 
drawn  by  Messrs.  Wood  and  Harmer  between  the  Norwich  Crag 
and  the  Bure  Yalley  Pebble-beds,  does  not  think  that  either  the  palae¬ 
ontological  or  stratigraphical  proofs  respecting  the  position  of  these 
Pebbly  Sands  are  so  well  defined  in  the  Bure  Yalley  district  as 
they  are  in  the  Westleton  and  Southwold  districts,  or  so  fitted  to  be 
taken  as  the  type  of  a  widespread  geological  zone. 
It  is  not  very  easy  to  understand  the  duplicate  character  of  the 
4  Westleton  Beds.’  However,  we  learn  that  on  Westleton  Common 
a  general  section  shows  about  50  feet  of  sandy  shingle  or  pebbly 
sands  without  fossils.  At  Munclesley  about  half  that  thickness 
of  variable  gravels,  sands,  and  clays  occasionally  fossiliferous, 
represents  the  series,  which  on  the  Norfolk  coast  is  held  to  consist 
of  the  Arctic  Freshwater  Bed  of  Beid,  the  Leda  myalis-bed  of  King 
and  Beid,  and  the  Upper  Freshwater  Bed  of  Beid. 
Since  the  Pebbly  Sands  at  Westleton  are  themselves  unfossiliferous, 
a  difficulty  occurs  at  the  outset.  It  was,  in  fact,  pointed  out  that 
although  the  name  Mundesley  Beds  might  be  a  useful  local  term  for 
the  series  immediately  above  the  Eorest-bed,  yet,  if  the  term  Westle¬ 
ton  Beds  was  associated  with  them,  it  might  turn  out  in  the  end 
that  there  were  no  4  Westleton  Beds  ’  at  Westleton.  As  regards  the 
above  grouping,  Mr.  Beid  objected  to  his  Upper  Freshwater  Bed 
being  merged  in  the  Westleton  or  Mundesley  Series,  giving  reasons 
for  his  having  included  it  with  the  Eorest-bed  group.  As  to  classing 
the  Arctic  Freshwater  Bed  with  this  one,  he  noted  that  the  floras 
showed  a  difference  of  climate  amounting  to  20°  F.,  and  thus  he 
considered  the  grouping  of  the  two  unadvisable. 
