REV. D. GATH WHITLEY, PRIMEVAL MAN IN BELGIUM 27 
country like a gigantic winding-sheet. Over this, again, lies the 
Loess, an enormous deposit of calcareous clay, which is spread 
over every part of the country except the bottom of the valleys, 
and is also extensively developed in the valley of the Rhine. 
The most recent of the Quaternary formations in Belgium is a 
great deposit of sand, which is clayey towards the bottom, and 
shifting and movable near the surface, and which is known by 
the name of the “ Campinian Sand.” Now, all these different 
deposits belong to the same geological era, for they all contain 
the same remains', the bones of the lion, elephant,* hyaena, and 
rhinoceros, being found in all the beds, from the pebbly deposit 
at the bottom of the Quaternary series, to the Campinian Sand 
at the top. All, then, were formed, successively speaking, at the 
same geological period. Their thickness varies in different 
places, for it is rare to find all four members of the series present 
in the same locality. In the great delta, however, where meet 
the Rhine, the Escant, and the Meuse, Professor Gosselet tells 
us that the Quaternary deposits are more than 450 feet thick, 
on the borders of the Zuider Zee.f 
Now, how were all these deposits formed, and what were the 
causes which operated to bring them into their present 
position, and to spread them out over such a large extent of 
country ? Marine action is out of the question, for the animal 
remains found in them are nearly all terrestrial, being the bones 
of the great land mammalia, and such shells as are confined 
to the land and to fresh water. M. Dupont thinks that the 
deposit of rolled pebbles which come chiefly from the Ardennes, 
was formed by the rivers, cutting out their valleys, when they 
had a vastly greater volume of water, during the early part of the 
Quaternary Period. This view is, however, quite untenable, for 
the rolled Ardennaise pebbles are found not only in the bottom 
of the valleys, but also in patches on the tops of the hills 
where no rivers could have flowed. Another theory is, that 
this great pebbly bed is of glacial origin, having been formed by 
great floods occasioned by the melting of glaciers and ice-sheets, 
which ploughed out the land, as Belgium slowly rose out of the 
icy waters of the Glacial Sea. This theory is no better than 
the former. The Belgian hills were too low to support glaciers 
of any considerable size, and Professor Gosselet tells us, that 
all over North-Eastern France, where the Quaternary beds are 
the same as those in Belgium, no traces of any ancient glaciers 
* The elephant referred to is always the Mammoth, 
t Esquisse GSologique du Ford de la France , p. 3. 
