BENSTED — ON THE GEOLOGY OF MAIDSTONE. 
449 
process continuing for a very long period of time, as the depth of 
this clay is, in the highest faults, from eighty feet upwards. The 
transverse faults were filled also with the same cla}'', but we now find 
them occupied by drift-gravel from half an inch to three iuches in 
diameter. Another epoch, I imagine, then occurred, when a force of 
water swept out the fine clay in the transverse faults, and deposited 
the drift in its place. This had its subsequent subsidence into the 
fissure or fault. A. third period then took place, during which the 
land-surface was reduced to its present form ; some of the faults 
were hollowed out, others left undisturbed. The undisturbed faults 
show no indication on the present surface of the subsidence of ma- 
terials which has taken place within their walls, and this proves that 
the beds of clay were at one time much higher than they are now. 
We find a clay similar in many respects to this, lying upon the 
highest summits of the chalk-hills, and at an elevation of 200 feet 
above the ragstone on which this lower clay reposes ; but this upper 
clay contains chalk-flints not worn by attrition, and immense boulders 
of "Druid sandstone." I have never found any fragments of rag- 
stone in these upper beds of clay, which run up to the very verge of 
the chalk escarpment. At page 301 I have observed that in some 
situations no indication is seen at the surface of the land of the fault 
below, although this may be afterwards exposed in digging for stone ; 
and when a section is thus made, a great subsidence is seen to have 
taken place, as indicated by bending lines at d d d in the diagram. 
Eocby Hillk EiTer Medway. Thorn Hill. 
Fig. 10, — Section of the beda of Ragstone from E. to W., jNIaidstone. 
a a represents the beds or clifi*s of ragstone. c c, faults filled 
with red clay, d, divisions of beds of fuller's earth, gravel and sand, 
clay, etc., showing the lines of subsidence and of lateral pressure of 
the masses. 
The " Druid sandstone," of which rock Kits Coty house, Stone- 
henge, and many other Druidical remains are composed, is found 
scattered in great blocks over the surface of the chalk-hills, or buried 
superficially in the beds of clay retained in the hollows on the sum- 
mits of the escarpments. 
These blocks or boulders of siliceous sandstone are composed of 
granular quartz, and occasionally envelope chalk-flints and other ex- 
traneous bodies ; they are perfectly analogous to those found in 
Berkshire and Wiltshire, where they are distinguished by the title of 
"grey wethers." Dr, Mautell, in his ' Geology of the !South-East 
of England,' speaks of the " beautiful conglomerate or pudding-stone 
of Hertfordshire. I have occasionally found fragments of a similar 
TOL. V. 3 m 
