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extent, a depression which diminislied eastwards, — and many 
cliaracteristic members of the old fauna associated with palajolithic 
man were driven away or exterminated. How long this state of 
things continued we know not, but after a time the whole area was 
elevated, and England again formed part of the Continent. 
Ihen, in what may be called the beginning of the ^Modern 
period, wo turn from a time of extensive deposition and subsequent 
erosion to one essentially of destruction, although on a more 
gradual scale. From this date little has been added to Norfolk, 
much has been taken away, and some material has been transferred 
from one part to another. Our present features had been roughly 
marked out of the materials brought together during the ages that 
had passed, and the further consideration of tliem leads us to the 
second part of our paper. 
II. Physical Gkograpiiy. 
At the commencement of the Modern period, England was 
united to the Continent at its south-eastern jiortion, and the land 
in Norfolk stood at a higher level than it does now, apart from 
the wear and tear it has since undergone. judge this from 
the depth of alluvium in our valleys,— at Norwich over forty feet ; 
at Wroxham Fridge as much as seventy-two feet. The land, too, 
extended considerably further to the north, as we judge from the 
present destruction of the coast, and from the historic evidence 
of former villages, whose sites are now buried up by the relentless 
ocean. 
^ Iho transition from what is called (by some authorities) the 
Glacial period to that of Modern times is so gradual that we 
cannot fix a hard line ; but that there were considerable changes 
IS indicated, not only by the difference in the fauna associated 
with palieolithic man and tliat associated with his neolithic 
successors, but also by the marked difference in the stage of 
culture to Avhich these respective races had advanced. 
We have inferred that, towards the close of the Glacial period 
our rivers had commenced to scour their channels out of the 
yielding Glacial strata that covered the greater part of Norfolk; 
and in the first instance their particular courses may have been 
