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PROCEEDINGS

OF THE

COTTESWOLD NATURALISTS’

FIELD CLUB

VOLUME X

PRINTED BY JOHN BELLOWS, GLOUCESTER
1892

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CONTENTS

PAGE
THE PRESIDENT’s ADDRESS at the Annual Meeting at Gloucester, 1890. 1
A Slight History of Flint Implements, with especial reference to our
own and adjacent areas. By W. C. Lucy, F.G.S. ; : 2.22
Modern Falconry. By Masor FisHeEr. : : ‘ : : oo
The Minerals of Gloucestershire: Observations on Celestite. By
FREDK. SMITHE. . : : : : : : : : Some cil
On the Sections in the Forest Marble, and Great Oolite formations,
exposed by the new railway from Cirencester to Chedworth. By
ALLEN Harker, Professor of Natural History, R. A. College,
Cirencester. . ‘ : ; : ; ; : ‘ : = 82
The Sections exposed between Andoversford and Chedworth: a com-
parison with similar strata upon the Banbury Line. By S&S. S.
Buckman, F.G.S. . : : : : , : ; ; oO:
On the occurrence of fossil forms of the Genus Chara in the Middle
Purbeck Strata of Lulworth, Dorset. By EpDwarD WETHERED,
FG.S., F.C.S., F.R.MS. ; : : : : : : - 101

THE PRESIDENT’Ss ADDREsS at the Annual Meeting at Gloucester, 1891. 105

Geological Notice upon the Forest of Dean, by H. D. Hosxoxp, M.E.,
F.G.8., etc., Director-General of the National Department of
Mines and Geology, Buenos Aires, Argentine Republic. : » 123

On the Geology of Cirencester Town, and a recent discovery of the
Oxford Clay in a deep well boring at the Water Works. By ALLEN
Harker, Professor of Natural History at the Royal Agricultural
College. . ; : ; : : : : : : : Pe Ws

Abury and its Literature. By the.Rev. WILLIAM BazELEy, M.A. . 192

Some Remarks on the Geology of Alderton, Gretton, and Ashton-
under-Hill. By FREDERICK SMITHE, F.G.S., &c., and W. C. Lucy,
FGS.. : : : ; ; , : : : : . 202

PaGE

THE PRESIDENT’s ADDRESS at the Annual Meeting at Gloucester, 1892. 213

Notes on certain Superstitions prevalent in the Vale of Gloucester. By

the late Jonn JONES... : : : é ‘ : : . 229
Bird Song and its Scientific Value. By C. A. WircHeny. . : . 238
The Laws of Heredity, and their Application in the case of Man. By

8. S. Buckman, F.G.S. : ; : : +, 258
Notes on the Dynamic Geology of Palestine. By J. H. Taunton. . 323

q Gf BEE ow
eaevOL. X YUEN SS PART I

> TE O-
UR ay wise

PROCEEDINGS

OF THE

- — FIELD CLUB

For 1889—1890

President
WiLLIAM.-€.-EUCY, F-:G.S:.

Vice- Presidents -

Rev. FRED. SMITHE, M.A., LL.D.,, F.G.S.
. JOHN BELLOWS

| Proressor HARKER, F.L.S.

ye Rev. H. H. WINWOOD, M.A., F.G.S.

|
' Honorarp Creasurer
jac. JONES

Honorary Accretarp
EDWARD WETHERED, F.GS., F.C.S., F.R.M.S.
CHELTENHAM
e eee eat
Contents

The PRESIDENT’s ADDRESS at the Annual Meeting at Gloucester, 1890

we;
) A Slight History of Flint Implements, with especial reference to our own and adjacent areas.
i By W. C. Lucy, F.G.S.

| Modern Falconry. By Major FISHER.
1 The Minerals of Gloucestershire : Observations on Celestite. By FREDK. SMITHE.
|
}| On the Sections in the Forest Marble, and Great Oolite formations, exposed by the new

Yailway from Cirencester to Chedworth. By ALLEN Harker, Professor of Natural

History, R. A. College, Cirencester.

The Sections exposed between Andoversford and Chedworth: a comparison with similar
strata upon the Banbury line. By S. S. BuckKMaN, F.G.S.

On the occurrence of fossil forms of the Genus Chara in the Middle Purbeck Strata of
Lulworth, Dorset. By EpwARD WETHERED, F.G.S., F.C.S., F.R.M.S.

PUBLISHED BY JOHN BELLOWS, GLOUCESTER Ss 167343

i Cotteswold Unaturalists’

Annual Address to the Cotteswold Naturalists’ Field Club, read at
Gloucester, April the 29th, 1890, by the President,
Mr W. C. Lucy, F.G.S.

The Annual Meeting was held as usual at the School of
Science, Gloucester, on Tuesday, April 29th, 1889.

After the President’s Address, Mr J. H. Jones, the Hon.
Treasurer, laid before the Meeting the accounts, shewing a
balance in favour of the Club of £47 11s. 7d., which were
passed and ordered to be printed.

Mr Lucy was re-elected President ; and Dr Paine, the
Rev. Dr F. Smithe, Dr Day, Mr John Bellows, and Professor
Harker, Vice-Presidents. Mr E. Wethered, Hon. Secretary,
and Mr J. H. Jones, Hon. Treasurer, were also re-elected.

Great regret was expressed at the absence of Dr Paine
and Dr Day—both from ill-health.

The Field Meetings for the year were fixed :—

Tytherington and Thornbury ... May 28th
Bourton-on-the-Water ... -... June 27th
Cirencester and Andoversford ... July 25th
Westbury and Flaxley ... ... August 20th

Professor Harker read a paper on “‘ Remarkable Occurrence
at Sharpness of the Eggs of Tetranychus lapidus,” an Acarine
Arachnoid observed by Mr W. B. Clegram, and which is
published in the last number of the Proceedings, p. 396.

There was a large gathering at the dinner at the “ Bell
Hotel,” and after the President had proposed the usual toast of
“The Queen,” Professor Harker requested permission to make
a departure from the Cotteswold rule, and he proposed, in a
very kind manner, the health of the President, who feelingly
replied.

B

2

On Saturday, July the 10th, one of our Vice-Presidents—
Deputy Surgeon-General Day—after a long and painful illness,
died at his residence in Cheltenham.

I gather from an excellent notice of his life, in the
“ Cheltenham Examiner,” that he was the third son of Mr W.
Day, of Hadlow House, Sussex, and was educated under Dr
Kennedy at Shrewsbury School; and on leaving there he
studied Medicine at St. George’s Hospital, London, and went
to India in 1852 as Assistant-Surgeon in the Madras Army.
He saw active service in the Burmah campaign, for which he
received a medal. His leisure was devoted to his favorite
pursuit—Natural History ; and he was made Inspector-General
of Fisheries in India, and published several works on the fishes
of the most important rivers of that country.

In 1877 he retired from the Madras Medical Staff and
settled in Cheltenham, and commenced to investigate the
history of the fishes and fisheries of Great Britain, and gave the
result—in 1880—83—of his researches in a work of two
volumes, entitled, ‘‘The Fishes of Great Britain and Ireland.”

In 1881 Dr Day received a Silver Medal from the Norwich
Fisheries Exhibition for works on Ichthyology, and a Gold and
Silver Medal from the Edinburgh Fisheries Exhibition in 1882.

He was appointed, in 1883, Commissioner for the Indian
Department at the Fisheries Exhibition, and for his own
exhibits he received three Gold Medals, and the Ist prize of
£100 for “ Treatise on Commercial Sea-fish.’”’ The services he
rendered to the Exhibition were fully recognized in the follow-
ing letter to the Secretary of State for India :—

“T am requested by His Royal Highness the Prince of
“Wales (the President) and by the members of the Executive
*“ Committee of the International Fisheries Exhibition, to
“convey cordial thanks for the aid rendered by the Govern-
*““ment of India in this undertaking ; and I would here ask to
‘““mention Dr Francis Day, who has so ably carried out the
“duties entrusted to him by the Government.

*< Besides the services rendered by Dr Day, as Commis-
“‘ sioner of the Indian Empire, it isa duty which devolves upon

3

“ us to bring to your Lordship’s notice the great benefits which
“have generally been derived throughout the operations of the
« Bxhibition by the experienced and learned advice which has
“been so freely and generously afforded to us by so learned
‘and competent an authority on all matters relating to
“fisheries; and we trust that your Lordship may deem it
“expedient to convey to Dr Day the sense which we entertain
“ of his assistance.”

The Indian Government shortly afterwards made him a
Companion of the Indian Empire.

Dr Day enriched our Proceedings with the following
papers :-—

“Qn the Burbot and Air-Bladders of Fishes.”

“The Breeding of Fishes.”

“ Salmonide.”

“The Propagation of the Common Kel.”

«“ Notes upon the Breeding of the Salmonide.”’

‘Notes on Hybridization.”

It was only in January, 1889, the last one was given,
which, owing to his illness, was read by his friend, the Rev. E.
Cornford.

In our neighbourhood there was no one who possessed the
same general and accurate knowledge of fishes, and he was in
the first rank of the Icythyologists of Great Britain and the
Continent; and while we mourn his loss, first as a justly
esteemed departed frien, we cannot forget there will be a
blank for some time to come in our Proceedings in that special
branch of Natural History which was peculiarly his own.

Dr Day was a Fellow of the Linnean and Zoological
Societies of London; an Honorary Member of several foreign
Scientific bodies; and a member of the Severn Fishery Board.

William Brown Clegram died June 3rd last at Saul Lodge.
He was born at Shoreham, in Sussex.

When a young man he accompanied his father, Captain
Clegram, to Gloucester, who had received an appointment as
Engineer to the Gloucester and Berkeley Canal Company.

Mr Clegram was also by profession an engineer, and was
in the service of the Canal Company for sixty years.

B2

4

He had a charming manner, a good knowledge of astro-
nomy, was a diligent student with his microscope, took much
interest in Natural History generally. In him I have lost one
of my oldest and most valued friends.’

For many years he was a member of the Club, and fre-
quently attended the Field Meetings, but he did not contribute
to our Proceedings. Shortly before he died he brought before
Professor Harker some minute white eggs he had observed on
stones at Sharpness, and which the Professor has described in
a paper in our last number—under the name Tetranychus
lapidus—a genus of Arachnida belonging to the family Trom-
binada.

It was only last week we lost very suddenly an Honorary
Member, Mr Handel Cossham. He contributed to our
Proceedings a paper on the “ Cannington Park Limestone,”
and another “On a Discovery in the Kingswood Coalfield,”
both of which are in Vol. VIII.

Mr Cossham took a warm interest in the Club: we
were frequently his guests, and the meetings held under his
auspices were so well arranged and accompanied with such
hospitality, that they will always be remembered by us as
‘““red letter days.”

Owing to the interest felt in the able paper on
Tytherington, read by the Rev. H. H. Winwood before the
Club, which appears in Vol. IX., the first Field Meeting
was held at Tytherington and Thornbury on May 28th.

The Section was thoroughly examined and explained by
Mr Winwood and the Hon. Secretary. It was seen under more
than ordinarily favourable circumstances in consequence of the
care which our colleague, Mr Meredith, Engineer of the
Midland Railway, had taken in having the obstructions
in the cutting cleared away, well exposing the different beds,
and also to the admirable map he had prepared of various parts
of the line.

After lunch at the “Swan,” Thornbury, the members pro-
ceeded to the Castle, where they were met by the owner, Mr
Stafford-Howard, who courteously explained its leading features.

5

It was commenced in 1511 by Edward Stafford, Duke of
Buckingham, and was left by him in an unfinished state at the
time of his execution in 1522.

Rickman, in his work on Gothic Architecture, says :—“ It
“is a fine specimen of the baronial mansions of that age, built
“for magnificent display rather than for defence.”

An interesting account of this Castle is given in the
Presidential Address of Sir Wm. Guise in Vol. VI. page 7, of
the Proceedings, where he refers to the visit of the Club to
Thornbury in 1871.

The second meeting was on June the 27th, the members
assembling at Bourton-on-the-Water Station, where convey-
ances were in waiting to convey them to the Hyford Quarries
in the Stonesfield Slate, and on the way there Mr George
Witts pointed out the “ Buggilde Street ’—a British road—
which runs from Ryknield Street, near Bidford, in Warwick-
shire, ascends the Cotteswolds near Saintbridge and Willersey
Camps, and joins the Roman Foss Way close to Bourton-on-
the-Water. He stated that the first mention of this road is in
a Saxon Charter, printed in Kemble’s Codex Diplomaticus,
dated 709.

Mr Witts called attention to several mounds in the fields
passed, which he considered to be Barrows—probably British
burying places—and that flint implements were often found
when the land was ploughed.

At Eyford the quarries were described by Professor
Harker and Mr Wethered, who were both agreed that the bed
of clay at the base may safely be regarded as the upper stratum
of the Fuller’s Earth, upon which rests the Stonesfield Slate.

I am indebted to our Vice-President, the Rev. Dr coal:
for the following list of the fossils found :—

Amongst others are—

Teleosaurus. T. cadomensis (scutes and teeth)
Megalosaurus (vertebre and teeth)

Palatal teeth of fish, viz. :—

Gyrodus trigonus. Aq.

Pycnodus rugulosus. Ag.

6

Spine of Hybodus dorsalis. Ag.
— apicalis
Belemnites Bessinus. D?Orb.
Rhynchonella concinna ;
— obsoleta
Trigonia impressa. Sby.
Ostrea acuminata
Nerita and Eulima etc. ete.

At Eyford Park, the residence of Mr and Mrs Cheetham,
an acceptable lunch was partaken of en route to Lower Swell
Vicarage, where the Rev. D. Royce cordially welcomed the
party, and showed his beautiful collection of flint implements,
which were exhibited on 23 large cards. Time, unfortun-
ately, would only admit of a cursory examination of
this valuable collection, and the carriages were again taken to
the Rev. F. E. B. Witts, of Upper Slaughter, to inspect the
fine collection of fossils from the Stonesfield Slate—made many
years since by his father; and a unique Star-fish was greatly
admired.

After a most welcome tea, with strawberries, the church
was visited, and an earthwork adjoining, which Mr George
Witts considered to be Post-Roman. In the centre of the
mound a well was found a few years since, which he thought
belonged to the Saxon period.

On leaving our hospitable host and hostess, I wrote in the
Visitors’ Book—

«A visit, long to be remembered by the Club :”
and the 5.45 train was taken at Bourton for Cheltenham.

July the 25th was the third Field Meeting to examine the
sections on the new line of railway from Cirencester to
Andoversford.

On arrival at Cirencester, Saunders’ stone yard was visited
to see a large Ammonite embedded in a block of Bath stone,
which, in sawing, was most fortunately cut through horizon-
tally, shewing perfectly all the chambers. Ammonites seldom
occur in solid masses of the Bath Oolite, hence the additional
interest in this specimen.

7

While in the yard Earl Bathurst joined the members, and
kindly invited them to see the fine yew trees in front of his
residence, which were much admired.

From there the members proceeded to the station of the
Midland and South Western Junction Railway, where
they were met by Mr Shopland, the engineer, who had pro-
vided comfortably-seated trucks to convey them over the line.

The length is nearly thirteen miles, in which there are 28
cuttings, 27 embankments, and a tunnel at Chedworth 420
yards long. At one of the cuttings the engine was stopped,
and Professor Harker gave a short description of it, and the
beds that would be seen during the day. He remarked that
the cutting showed the transition beds between the Great Oolite
and the Forest marble, which thus represented two divisions
of the Great Oolite series—the former known as the Bath
freestone. A considerable distance of the line was in the
Great Oolite, but as they proceeded they would descend in the
geological scale, passing through the Stonesfield slate and
Fuller’s Earth into the Inferior Oolite.

A halt was made to see the Roman Villa at Chedworth,
which, in the unavoidable absence of Mr G. Witts, was explained
by the Hon. Secretary, Mr Wethered.

A walk over the tunnel brought the party to the railway
trucks again, and in proceeding along the line the Hon.
Secretary gave a lucid description of the beds, and explained
the general position of the Inferior Oolite series.

During the day I called attention to the numerous fissures
in the rocks in the cuttings, filled in with a reddish-brown clay,
which I believed belonged to the boulder clay which once
covered the Cotteswolds. It must have been of great thickness,
as not only the vertical fissures, to the depth of 8 to 10 feet,
were jammed with it, but it was also forced some distance into
horizontal ones many feet below the surface.

Quartz pebbles have been found in this description of clay,
and samples taken from various parts shew an average of 68
per cent. of silica in the clay—(for full particulars see my
paper, “ Extension of Northern Drift and Boulder Clay over
the Cotteswold Range,” Vol. VII., page 55.)

8

The rain began to come down in torrents, and the train
was driven rapidly, over very bad gradients, to the discomfort
of some of our nervous members, to Andoversford, where the
one for Cheltenham was taken. ;

The fourth Meeting was on August 20th, when a large
number of members proceeded in a brake from Gloucester to
Flaxley under the guidance of your President.

Sir Thomas Crawley shewed the fine church, which was
erected in 1856 at the expense of his relative, Mr Gibbs. Sir
Gilbert Scott was the architect; and the reredos, by Mr
Phillips, of London, was much admired.

Within a short distance of the church, and close to the
schools, occurs the remarkable upthrust of Silurian and Old
Red Sandstone rocks, of which I gave the following description :

The last time the Club visited this section was in July,
1877, and in referring to the notice given of the meeting in
our Proceedings, I was painfully reminded of the losses we
have sustained in the death of some of our most distinguished
workers who were then present. Our President, Sir William
Guise, Mr Witchell, the Rev. W. 8. Symonds, and Dr Day are
nowno more. To the Rev. W. S. Symonds we were indebted for
an able and interesting address on the geology of the district of
May Hill, the Forest of Dean, and Flaxley. He told us how
years had passed away since he visited this area with Mr
Strickland, conducting the old Silurian chief, Sir R. Murchison,
to the rocks we are now looking upon, and he dwelt generally
upon the history of the Paleozoic rocks and their fossils. Mr
Symonds said the Silurians swarmed with invertebrate life:
mollusca, crustacea, corals, and like forms of marine animals
were abundant, and it was not until the time of the Lower
Ludlow rocks that the scales and scutes of a ganoid fish
gave proof of the existence of vertebrate life. The Old Red
Sandstone proper of this country was probably laid down under
fresh-water conditions; and the Devonian rocks were the marine
equivalents of the fresh-water beds of the Old Red. Alluding
to the carboniferous period, with its wonderful land vegetation,
he remarked how, after that period had ceased, in Permian

ee ee a

9

times, igneous upheavals took place, which made the South
Wales and Dean Forest coalfields available for man, and con-
cluded his address with an eloquent description of the days of
the mammoth and pre-historic man during the time of the
Severn Straits. Now I am not going to dwell upon the many
changes which have taken place in the Malverns and May
Hill, and which were felt upon the spot upon which we are
standing, but I strongly advise those who wish to study the
subject to refer to the able paper by Dr Holl on The Geo-
logical Structure of the Malvern Hills; in the Quarterly
Journal of the Geological Society, Vols. XX. and XXI.; and
also Professor Phillip’s Malvern Hills (Mem. Geol. Survey
of Gt. B., Vol. II. pt. 1.) The time of the upheaval of the
beds before us was during the Permian age, when probably
the igneous rocks at Damory Bridge, near Berkeley, Charfield
Green, and also the ridge of Silurian rocks which cross the
Severn at Purton Passage were brought to the surface. That it
was before the deposit of the new Red Sandstone is beyond all
doubt, as that formation rests upon the boss under our feet at
the slight dip of about 2 degs. S.S.E., the same as we shall pre-
sently see in the New Red Sandstone at Garden Cliff. You will
observe a marked resemblance in the contorted condition of these
Silurian beds to those in the quarry at Huntley, which was so
well explained to us by Dr Smithe in 1887. There is the same
evidence of great lateral pressure, but the beds are not folded to
the same extent, as Flaxley is further removed from the seat of
the disturbance which brought May Hill to the surface.. I do not
know a more interesting place in our neighbourhood wherein to
study physical geology. All to the west are the older Paleozoic
rocks rising into hills and mountains, while to the east and south
the oldest rocks which are visible are those belonging to the
Secondary or New Red formation, and we are now standing on
the edge of an enormous downthrow fault. You may naturally
ask where are all the older series of rocks? What has become
of the Silurians; the great thickness of the Old Red; the
3,500 feet of the Carboniferous series of the Forest of Dean;
the Permians, of which the only trace we know of is at Haffield ?

10

Were these older rocks ever deposited in the plain before us?
Fortunately we are now able to give a complete answer. The
various borings for water which have been made in different
parts of the kingdom have disclosed Silurian rocks at Ware,
Upper Devonian at Erith, Meux’s Brewery, London, Turnford,
near London, and Harwich, and coal measures to the east
of us at Burford, and they are without doubt underneath
the Severn area we are looking upon. In considering the
cause of all this change we must dismiss from our minds
that it was altogether a local disturbance. It forms part,
as Professor Phillips has shown, of a great line of dislocation
extending 120 miles from Flintshire to Somersetshire, and
he places the major part as having occurred at the close
of the Permian. Strickland says this great fault seems
to have formed a marginal cliff against which the Upper
portion of the Triass or New Red Sandstone was deposited at
Bewdley, Abberley, May Hill, and Purton Passage. I should
like to say a word upon the change of organic life in the period
represented by this boss. In the opinion of Professor Geikie,
no greater contrast is to be found between the organic contents
of any two successive groups of rock than that which is pre-
sented by a comparison of the Upper Silurian and Old Red
Sandstone systems of Western Europe. The abundant marine
fauna of the Ludlow period entirely disappear from the region
when the Old Red sets in. On the land that surrounded the
lakes or inland seas of that period there grew the oldest
terrestrial vegetation, of which no more than mere fragments
are now known. It has been scantily preserved in the ancient
estuarine beds in Europe and England, and more abundantly
at Gaspé and New Brunswick. The American localities have
yielded to the researches of Principal Dawson, of Montreal, no
fewer than 118 species of land plants. I have often been to
this section, and when considering the great physical changes
which have taken place, the words of the Poet Laureate have
come into my mind—
“The hills are shadows, and they flow
From form to form, and nothing stands ;

They melt like mist, the solid lands
Like clouds, they shape themselves and go.”

Pt

After lunch at the Red Lion, Westbury, and the election
of Dr Davis, of Cheltenham, and Mr F. W. Waller, of
Gloucester, as members, a short walk brought the party to the
classic section of Garden Cliff, where the President said—I am
old enough to remember when the lower part of the section
before us was regarded as belonging to the New Red, and
above, where the beds are of a different colour, to the Lower
Lias. Sir Philip Egerton was the first to suggest—grounded
on a careful examination of the Fish remains at Aust, which he
found were more of a Triassic than Liassic type—that they
probably belonged to the former, or occupied an intermediate
position between the two formations. Our old Vice-President,
Dr Wright, in a paper printed in the Geological Society’s
Journal in 1860, placed the upper part in the zone of the
Avicula contorta, from the presence of that very characteristic
shell, considering them the equivalent of the Upper St. Cassian
beds of the Alps. Mr Charles Moore, also a member of our
Club, in 1861 read a very able paper before the Geological
Society, in which he showed most conclusively that this
important series is the representative in this country of the
Upper St. Cassian and Kossen beds of Escher, and he called
them Rhetic, from their occurring in the Rhetian Alps.
Subsequently the Geological Survey, through Mr Bristow and Mr
Etheridge, examined the beds in this area, and as they found
them very fully developed at Penarth Head, opposite to
Cardiff, they gave them the name of “ Penarth,” a term
which has since then been adopted in the Survey Maps.
The first detailed notice of Westbury in our Proceedings
will be found in Vol. II. p. 88, in the President’s Address for
1860. He says—“ The Cliff has lately been carefully examined
by our Secretary and Mr Lucy, who have noted a section
differing from those already published, and by permission I will
proceed to incorporate it in this resumé of our Proceedings.”
In 1865 Professor Etheridge wrote a most exhaustive paper
upon these beds for our Proceedings, entitled, ‘“‘On the Rhetic
or Avicula Contorta Beds at Garden Cliff.” The upper part of
Mr Etheridge’s section was practically the same as the one by

12

Mr John Jones and myself, and in the 35 feet the difference in
measurement was only three inches. Mr Etheridge, however,
included the Ostrea bed at the top, in the Rhetic, while we
were disposed to place it at the base of the Lower Lias, and he
further included over 14 feet of the Tea-green marls as belong-
ing to the Rhetic. With regard to the latter beds, Mr
Etheridge had fuller information than we possessed from having
examined the same series at Watchett, Penarth, and other
places where they are much developed. There is still, however, a
difference of opinion upon the subject, as most geologists
consider they belong to the Keuper. I would, however,
mention two interesting matters in relation to these beds.
Many years since—over thirty—Mr R. F. Tomes visited
the section with Mr John Jones and myself, and when we
came to the cream-coloured band of limestone he said at once
from observations he had made in Warwickshire, “ This is the
Estheria bed.’’ We replied sceptically it might be, but that we
had broken up a great deal of it without finding any organic
remains. “ Well,” he replied, “I don’t mean to leave until I
have found some,” and in about five minutes he knocked out a
fine cluster. The moral to be drawn from this is, “ Never rely
too much upon negative evidence in geology,” and I would
advise all young workers in the science to answer under like
circumstances that “at present the fossil has not been found.”
The second case occurred in 1875, when the students of the
School of Science were induced to visit the section after hearing
a lecture of mine upon these beds. Theyfound several specimens
of the Brittle Starfish (Ophiolepis Damesii), a fossil then new
to this country. Only twelve months before Dr Wright had
received a specimen from similar beds at Hildesheim, in Prussia.
The finding of this little fossil, Dr Wright thought, was
decisive of the marine character of the bed in which it occurred.

The President then called upon Professor Harker to
explain the paleontology of the beds. Professor Harker said
that the chief interest which attached to the fossils of the
Rhetic Beds was centred in the vertebrate remains, which
comprised 30 species of fishes, five reptiles, and one mammal

13

(microlestes). Sir Philip Egerton had pointed out that the
fishes showed Triassic affinities, while on the other hand the
Reptilia were undoubtedly of close relationship to the Lias.
We had here the first known remains of those genera
Ichthyosaurus and Plesiosaurus which were to form a marked
feature and culminate in the Liassic division of the Jurassic
period, while all the reptiles (save Labyrinthodon) and amphibia
of the Trias were absent. Large vertebre of Ichthyosauri
and Plesiosawri have been found in the bone beds of the
spot they were standing on. The fish remains, consisting
of scales, spines, and teeth, were of intense interest. Three or
four genera were represented in the Trias, and others extended
up into the Lias. The most remarkable fish was Ceratodus, of
which genus nine or ten species have been obtained. Founded
by Agassiz on a single tooth, it was one of the marvels of
Zoology, that a living fish of the same genus had, long
subsequent to the founding of the genus, been discovered to
exist in certain Australian rivers; the Barramunda or mud fish
of the Darling River. It belongs to the order Dipnot, charac-
terized by the possession of a true lung as well as of gills,
enabling it to exist for a long time out of water, embedded in
the half-dried mud of its native creeks. It furnishes us with
another proof that in a certain sense some Australian animals
represent an old world fauna dating so far back as Devonian and
Jurassic times. The commonest fishes here at Garden Cliff are -
Hybodus and Saurichthys ; every slab of the bone bed contains
some of their scales and spines. The small star-fish Ophiolepis
Damesit, first found at Westbury, is the sole Echinoderm yet
recorded. Some fifty species of Lamellibranchiate mollusca
occur, of which Pullastra arenicola, Cardium Rheticum, and
Avicula contorta are most abundant. The general conclusion to
be drawn from a study of the fauna was that the Rhetics were
transition beds between the lacustrine and estuarine conditions
of the Keuper, and the deep seas of the Lias; the land surface
of the epoch, which must have been a very long one, furnishing
an occasional mammal and numerous reptiles to leave their
bones and coprolites in the shallow estuarines and seas of the

14

time, and thus affording a clue to the zoologist of the changing
land and shore fauna which probably included the earliest
of mammals.

The Professor’s remarks were supplemented by some
valuable observations by the Rev. W. Winwood, who thought
Professor Etheridge had carried the line of separation between
the Rhetics and New Red too low, and that the series should
be regarded as one of transition. After returning from the
Cliff the members availed themselves of the thoughtful and
kind hospitality of Mr and Mrs Colchester-Wemyss, who, in
their fine old garden, had provided refreshments, which were
much appreciated, and made an agreeable termination of a very
pleasant day’s excursion. Mr Colchester-Wemyss showed a very
beautifully-worked flint hatchet, of neolithic type, which was
found on his property at the Wilderness, in the Forest. The
party then took the brake and reached Gloucester in time for
the 6.30 train to Cirencester and Cheltenham.

I am indebted to Mr Colchester-Wemyss for the following
interesting information as to the change of name of Garden
Cliff :—

In the year 1591—33rd year of the reign of Queen
Elizabeth—Manor of Rodley, is an entry—

“The Presentment of the aforesaid Jurors of the
‘< customarie tenants within the said Manor concerninge certen
“things there required of as followeth, viz. :—

“That every Barke or Pichard of any Stranger that shall
“make staie, load or unloade or bee att anchor in any place of
“ Seaverne betweene the Pill of Newnham on the west parte
“and Garron Cliffe on the east parte oughte to paie kiellage—
“for every such Barke or Picharde iiij?* (= 4d.)

And on the 1st October, 1683, there is an entry—

«“ At a Court Baron &c. this day held, the Jury presented
“the names of several persons ‘To make up their Walls and
“Banks from Garron Mill to Gay Shard.’ ”

This is the last time the name of Garron occurs; and on
the 14th October, 1731, is an entry, without mentioning the
Cliff, but the Mill close to it, which was then called Garden
Mill.

t=
’

15

“ At a Court Baron held this day, the Homage presented
* that the late Philip Hampton had taken in part of the Lord’s
“ Waste into a ground of his from the Gravells to Garden Mill
*‘ which part was to be thrown up again.”

Again, 5th October, 1739—

“At a Court Baron held this day—The Jury presented
“Thomas Crawley, Esquire, to erect a Bridge over the Great
“ Brook in Westbury at Garden Mill, by 25 March next.”

On 13th October, 1786—

“At a Court Baron held this day—held at The Flat
‘““ House—The Jury presented Thomas Crawley Boevey Esquire
“for not keeping a Bridge across the Great Brook at Garden
“* Mills, near The Severn.”

Being anxious to know the meaning of the word “ Garron,”
and seeing the name occurred in Ireland, I wrote to Professor
Hull on the subject, and from whom I received the following
satisfactory explanation :—

* According to Dr Joyce, Garran, Garrane, and Garraun
“‘ means, in Irish Celtic, ‘A Shrubbery.’ It is not an uncommon
“name in Ireland, and is the nearest thing to ‘Garron’ I can
“find. At Garron Point, co. Antrim, the Cliffs are clothed in
“a natural growth of small trees or shrubs, which may very
“ fitly have given the origin to the name.”

The Sessions of our Winter Meetings commenced on
November 26th, when Major Fisher gave a paper on
“ Falconry ”—a subject new to the present members of the
Club, and which he treated in an able and interesting manner,
giving the result of many years of original observations.

This paper will be found in the forthcoming number of
our Proceedings.

Mr T. 8. Ellis afterwards read a paper on “ River Curves,”
which was the substance of a paper he read before the School
of Science Philosophical Society in February, 1882, and which
he now illustrated with diagrams and maps.

Some discussion followed, and as the subject evidently
much interested those present, and it was getting late, the
President suggested that further consideration should be post-
poned until the next meeting.

16

The Second Meeting was on January 25th, when the
discussion on Mr Ellis’s paper was resumed.

He stated he believed that the formation in the course of
slowly-flowing rivers of great horse-shoe curves round alluvial
plains, and of double channels, leaving islands, as illustrated in
the Severn near Gloucester, resulted from the entry of a
tributary stream, and where the latter entered the main stream
the tendency was to wear away the immediately surrounding
bank, and thus open out a curve. Then the stream of the
river, becoming gradually diverted, assisted in the formation of
the curve by wearing away the bank.

Mr Keeling agreed with Mr Ellis as to the Severn above
Sharpness, but gave an instance at Lydney to the contrary.

Professor Harker believed that curves originated from
various causes, and referred to how an obstruction in a stream
would divert its course.

Mr Embrey had tested Mr Ellis’s theory in a voyage from
the Upper Severn to Gloucester, and found it correct.

Mr Taunton took exception to the view of Mr Ellis that
the natural course of a river passing through alluvial plains
was to run straight, as the stream was subject to the influence
of gravitation, and its course influenced by the amount of
friction to be overcome, and he could not accept Mr Ellis’s
postulates.

Mr Buckman shewed by a diagram that the effect of the
meeting of two volumes of water would be felt on the opposite
side to which the tributary entered, and gave some instances
where the entry of a tributary did not produce a curve.

Speaking from experience of rivers in India, General
Babbage confirmed Mr Buckman’s observations.

Dr Bond, the Rev. H. Winwood, and Mr Meredith also
took part, and their views were generally adverse to Mr Ellis,
who shortly replied.

In referring to some authorities on the subject of rivers, I
find Dr Evans quoting from Sir Charles Lyell—10th edition of
Principles of Geology, Vol. I. page 354—

17

“When we are speculating on the excavating force which
“a river may have exerted in any particular valley, the most
“important question is, not the volume of the existing stream,
“nor the present levels of its channel, nor even the nature of
“the rocks; but the probability of a succession of floods at
“ some remote period since the time when the valley may have
“been first elevated above the sea.”

And he, Dr Evans, further mentions that Mr Fergusson on
“ Recent changes in the Delta of the Ganges,” says—

“That all rivers oscillate in curves, the extent of which is
“directly proportionate to the quantity of water flowing
“through them.”

It appears to me, while Mr Ellis’s theory is a factor, which
must in future be recognised in the formation of river curves,
it is only one of several. I have often noticed a brook, which
is a miniature stream, in passing through alluvial meadows, is
almost sure to wind, and sometimes it forms acute angles. The
volume of water in a river—the velocity at which it travels—
the character of the ground it passes through (as when hard
rocks are crossed they often deflect its course)—and that the
tributary of a stream is the minor force, and therefore under
the control of the major one—the main stream—all of these,
and probably others, must necessarily be present to our minds
when considering the subject.

The paper led to one of the longest discussions the
Cotteswold Club has ever had, and Mr Ellis deserves our thanks
for having given his own views, the result of many years’
original observations, on a difficult question.

The Rev. Dr Smithe followed with a paper, ‘Report on
the Celestine (Strontian sulphate) of Gloucester and its vicinity,
with remarks on the same mineral in Sicily,” which will be
found in our Transactions.

I wish to commend to our members the great value of
papers like Dr Smithe’s, and to express a hope that when they
visit interesting places abroad, where like formations occur to
those in our own neighbourhood, they will follow his example,
and give us the result of their observations.

c

18

The Third Meeting took place on February 25th, when a
paper “On the Geology of the New Railway now in course of
construction between Andoversford and Cirencester,’ was
given in two parts—the first by Professor Harker, which
included—“ The Sections of Forest Marble and Great Oolite
between Cirencester and Chedworth, with their bearings on
the study of Homotaxial Strata on the Cotteswolds;” and the
second part by Mr 8S. 8. Buckman, “On the Sections between
Chedworth and Andoversford compared with similar beds
exposed on the Cheltenham and Banbury line.”

I have already referred to the visit of the Club in July,
1889, to these fine sections. At the conclusion of the papers I
suggested, and it was at once accepted, that the Club should in
the summer again inspect them, as they are now so fresh and
well exposed, and are of great interest in the study and
elucidation of our Jurassic Geology.

The Fourth and last Winter Meeting took place on
April Ist at the School of Science, Gloucester, when the Hon.
Secretary gave a paper “ On the discovery of Coal in Kent, and
the possibility of its occurrence beneath the Trias Rocks in the
Severn Valley.”

He began by referring to the Royal Commission on Coal
appointed in 1866, and took exception to the part of the Report
of the Commissioners which estimated that our coal supply
would last 276 years, and gave the following figures, which
show how largely the output has of late increased :—

Tn, 18600000 ec 2 cs » 849042,698"'Tons
Sil Sree att eek OAS TIES oo
LSC Oinre. Hees Wea tse) ASE BIR BOn. =
A i Oe os ee een i

He laid great stress on the fact that, owing to the competition,
the best seams were the most worked, and when they were
exhausted would consumers be able to pay a higher price for
the inferior that was left? This he regarded as a matter of
serious consideration, and increased the importance of ascer-
taining what supplies are hidden beneath the secondary rocks,
more especially in the 8.E. of England.

i ee

19

Coal had been recently found in Kent, and a Committee
had been formed to raise funds to extend the investigations.
He thought, however, that the matter was one which the
Government might reasonably be asked to undertake, and to
receive in return a small royalty of about 1d. per ton on all
coal raised from coalfields discovered by the Government.

A history was then given of the position of the rocks,
commencing with the Plutonic, which were succeeded by the
Laurentian, Cambrian, Silurian, Old Red, including Devonian,
upon which rested the great Carboniferous deposits, which
before they were brought to a close, were subjected to great
physical disturbance, which produced synclinal and anti-clinal
curves, and led to the formation of coal basins.

Then followed the Permian, and whether these beds
belonged to the Paleozoic or Secondary, he considered a
debatable point which did not now concern them.

The Secondary rocks covered up the coal basins, and after
a time the former were partly denuded, thus giving us what
are called “visible coalfields.”” But underneath the Secondary
rocks which remain may there not be coal, and at what depth?
These rocks are computed to be 17,350 feet thick, but they
are not persistent, and as Professor Hull has shown, they
thin out rapidly in an eastward direction. The Middle Lias,
which at Leckhampton is 115 feet;—at Burford is only 20
feet. As to whether the Coal Measures have also thinned out
is a question which might properly be raised, but he wished to
impress upon them that the physical conditions under which
the two systems were deposited differed very greatly.

It was to the late Mr Godwin Austen the credit was due
of predicting that coal would be found beneath the Secondary
rocks of the §.E. of England, and he was afterwards sup-
ported in this view by Professor Prestwich; and coal has
now been reached at Dover at a depth of 1160 feet. The
boring passed through 590 feet of the Cretaceous Strata, and
the remainder was in the Oolite series, ranging from the
Portlandian to the Bath Oolite; the whole of the lower
Secondary rocks were absent.

c 2

20

Mr Wethered suggested borings in the Thames Valley,
also south of the Mendips, and it would not surprise him if
some day the smoke of collieries were seen as far as the
classic city of Oxford and east of the Cotteswolds.

Dealing next with the Severn Valley, by means of a
geological map, he pointed out that, if we look from the outcrop
of the Forest of Dean coalfield towards Worcester, we see a
narrow strip of country covered by red rocks of Trias age,
which latter disappear eastward beneath the Jurassic rocks. -
This narrow strip soon widens out, and then we have black
patches of coal measures, among which were the coalfields of
South Staffordshire, Leicestershire, Warwickshire, and those
known as the Severn Valley coalfields. The question he wished
to ask was, is there a coalfield between the outcrop of the
Forest of Dean coalfield and that of South Staffordshire ?
There are, as is well known, signs of coal at Newent, and still
further up the Severn Valley (just north of the Abberley Hills),
the coalfield of the Forest of Wyre. The inference to be drawn
from these facts seems to point to a barrier in the Severn
Valley, close to which, on either side, the coalfields thin out.
Thus if we compared the thickness of the Carboniferous strata
in the Bristol coalfield with the same rocks in the Forest of
Dean we should discover a considerable decrease in the latter
area. If we passed to the coalfield of South Staffordshire and
to that of the Forest of Wyre, we should find the lower divisions
of the Carboniferous rocks absent. The latter coalfield is the
one nearest to the Forest of Dean, and it is significant that its
seams of coal are of inferior quality. What he had stated was
not conclusive proof that there may not be coal in the Severn
Valley ; still the facts he had mentioned were against the
supposition that coal-getting there would be a sound com-
mercial undertaking. There would be greater probability of
finding coal in South Warwickshire, a little north of Stratford-
on-Avon, but the question of depth was a speculative one on
account of the great development of the Permian and Trias
rocks northward. Doubtless the rocks thinned out southward,
but what would be the thickness in South Warwickshire he
could not say.

21

The Secretary was congratulated on his clear and lucid
paper by the President, the Rev. H. H. Winwood, and Professor
Harker; and owing to want of time the second paper by the
Hon. Secretary, “On the occurrence of Characee in Purbeck
Strata, near Weymouth,” was taken as read, and it will be
found in our Transactions.

During the year the following changes have taken place
in our Members :—

The Rev. Christopher Smythe, Vicar of Bussage

Mr Charles Upton, Bownham, Stroud

Mr W. A. Bailey, Cirencester

Mr A. A. Hunter, Cheltenham

Mr K. Lloyd Harford, do.

Col. C. Frankland, do.
were elected. Dr Francis Day, Mr W. B. Clegram, the Rev. J.
H. Lee Warner, and Mr G. F. Riddiford we have lost by death;
and General Pearse, C.B., Mr G. Whitcombe, and the Rev. T.
Keble have resigned.

I most heartily congratulate our indefatigable Hon.
Secretary on having received from the Geological Society of
London, at the Annual Meeting on February 21st, 1890, the
Murchison Geological Fund, and I desire to place on record the
words addressed to him on the occasion by the President,
Dr Blandford:—

“Mr Wethered,—The remainder of the Murchison Donation
“Fund has been awarded to you by the Council of this Society
*“on account of the researches you have undertaken into the
“‘ microscopic structure of sedimentary rocks, and to aid you in
** prosecuting further inquiries. The results of your examina-
“tion of the insoluble residues obtained from the Carboniferous
“Limestone, and of the remarkable minute tubular forms
“(apparently organic) from various limestones, that you have
“ascribed to Girvanella, are of great interest, and have
“furnished an important contribution to our knowledge of the
“manner in which Paleozoic and Mesozoic limestones have
“been formed.”

Having concluded this rather long account of the work of
the Club during the past year, in which I have been greatly

22

aided by the admirable reports of the meetings in the news-
papers from the pen of our Hon. Secretary, I trust you will
not think I am presuming in making a departure from the rule
observed by my predecessors. I now propose to take up a
subject, and to give you

A SLIGHT HISTORY OF FLINT IMPLEMENTS
WITH ESPECIAL REFERENCE TO OUR OWN
AND ADJACENT AREAS.

After seeing the Rev. D. Royce’s fine collection—of which
I have made mention in the early part of this address—and
the beautifully-worked specimen shewn to the Club by Mr
Colchester-Wemyss at the Westbury Meeting, I determined to
obtain all the information in my power of their occurrence in
the Severn area up to Worcester, of the numerous tributaries
of that river, and of the high ground of the Cotteswolds and
the hills west of the Severn.

The following are the brief references in our Proceedings
to Flint Implements :—

When the Club met at Apperley Court in 1860, Mr John
Jones mentioned the discovery of mammalian remains by Dr
Falconer in a Cave near Palermo, and reference was made by the
Rey. W. 8. Symonds and Sir W. Guise to the occurrence of flint
implements in the gravel of the Somme by M. Boucher de
Perthes; a short paper by Mr John Jones in Vol. IIT. page 97,
“On some Flint Instruments, and the geological age of the deposit
in which they were found upon Stroud Hill;” a paper by the late
Mr George Playne in Vol. V., ‘‘ On the early occupation of the
Cotteswold Hills by Man,” in which there is a plate at page
209 of ten worked flints, most of them found in the fields
adjoining Hazlewood Copse Camp, and he mentions that Flints
are scattered over the whole surface, a district of five square
miles, having the village of Nailsworth as its centre.

Also, in Vol. V., page 271, is a short paper by Mr W. T.
Thiselton Dyer “On some Flint-flakes from the Valley of the

23

Churn at Cirencester.” He mentions having shown the most

presentable to Mr Franks, of the British Museum, who
accepted a few of them as being of human manufacture, and
selected examples for the Christy collection: and in Professor
Buckman’s account of the British Tumulus at Nymphsfield.
At page 188, Vol. III. of our Proceedings there is a drawing of
three Flint-flakes which were found in the Tumulus.

It is not my intention to go at length into the history
of Implements, which are so fully described by Dr J. Evans
in his exhaustive work on the “ Ancient Stone Implements
of Britain ;” and “ Flint Flakes,” by Mr Stevens; numerous
works by Professor Prestwich, Professor Boyd Dawkins, Sir
John Lubbock, Sir C. Lyell, and other authorities.

A brief account, however, is necessary; and as the history
by Dr Evans is so clear, rather than make an imperfect para-
phrase, I prefer to use his own words :—

“It was in the year 1847 that M. Boucher de Perthes, of
“ Abbeville, called attention to the finding of flint implements,
“‘ fashioned by the hand of man, in the pits worked for sand and
“ gravel in the neighbourhood of that town. They occurred in
“such positions, and at such a depth below the surface, as
“to force upon him the conclusion that they were of the same
“ date as the containing beds, which he regarded as of diluvial
“ origin.

“Tn 1855 Dr Rigollot, of Amiens, also published an account
“‘ of the discovery of flint implements at St. Acheul, near Amiens,
“in a drift enclosing the remains of extinct animals, and at a
“depth of 10 feet or more from the surface. From causes, into
“which it is not now necessary to enter, these discoveries were
“regarded with distrust in France, and were very far from being
*‘ generally accepted by the Geologists and Antiquaries of that
* country.

“Tn the autumn of 1858, however, the late distinguished
“paleontologist, Dr Hugh Falconer, F.R.S., visited Abbeville in
“order to see M. Boucher de Perthes’ collection, and became
“satisfied that there was a great deal of fair presumptive
“evidence in favour of many of his speculations regarding the

24

“ remote antiquity of those industrial objects, and their associa-
* tion with animals now extinct.”

“Acting on Dr Falconer’s suggestion, Mr Prestwich, F.R.S.,
‘‘ whose researches have been so extensive and accurate as to
“place him in the first rank of English geologists, in April,
“©1859, visited Abbeville and Amiens, where I, on his invitation,
“had the good fortune to join him. We examined the local
“collections of flint implements, and the beds in which they
“were said to have been found; and in addition to being
“ perfectly satisfied with the evidence adduced as to the nature
“‘ of the discoveries, we had the crowning satisfaction of seeing
“one of the worked flints still in situ, in its undisturbed matrix
“of gravel, at a depth of 17 feet from the original surface of
“the ground.

“From the day when Mr Prestwich gave an account to the
** Royal Society of the results of his visit to the Valley of the
“Somme, the authenticity of the discoveries of M. Boucher de
“Perthes and Dr Rigollot was established; and they were
“almost immediately followed by numerous others of the same
“character both in France and England. In this country,
“indeed, it turned out, on examination, that more than one
‘such discovery had already been recorded, and that flint
“implements of similar types to those of Abbeville and Amiens
“had been found in the gravels of London at the close of the
“17th century, and in the brick earth of Hoxne, in Suffolk, at
“the close of the 18th century, and were still preserved in the
“ British Museum and that of the Society of Antiquaries.”’

These implements are now met with in Middlesex, Berks,
Bucks, Bedford, Herts, Northampton, Essex, Suffolk, Norfolk,
Sussex, Surrey, Hants, the Isle of Wight, Dorset, Somerset,
Wilts, Oxford, Cambridge, and Kent. In May, 1881, Mr J. E.
Greenhill found at Stoke Newington, and almost close to Hack-
ney Brook, two long pointed implements; and subsequently Mr
Worthington G. Smith has met with, in the neighbourhood of
London, and particularly at Stoke Newington, what he terms a
Paleolithic floor [Memoirs of the Geological Survey of England
and Wales, by W. Whitaker, Vol. I. Hd. ii. 1889, pp. 350, 351,
Geology of London] and he remarks :—

25

“The implements have been found in such positions that
“ the idea is sometimes forced on one that all the makers of the
“implements suddenly left the place in fear of some impending
“ danger.”

He believes he is able to divide Paleolithic man into three
divisions. The men of the floor were probably, though savage,
a peaceful and intelligent community. The abundance of
scrapers shews that they scraped skin for clothing. Few of the
implements are suited for weapons; and nearly all are obviously
tools.

Of the men of the next underlying gravel he said they
were ruder, “yet, as one finds undoubted scrapers. . . . it
“must be conceded the men knew how to dress skins. It is
“not easy to form an idea of the men who made the oldest
“tools (in the basement gravels); they were savages of low
“degree, with instruments suitable only for hacking and
“battering. As no scrapers or knife-forms are to be found (in
“that gravel) the men probably knew nothing of dressing skins,
“and so went unclothed.”

Year by year the area widens, and the number found
greatly increases. The most recent addition is from the
neighbourhood of Ightham, in Kent, by Mr B. Harrison, and
it has been fully described by Professor Prestwich in the
Quarterly Journal of the Geological Society, May, 1889.

Last Autumn I had the pleasure of seeing Mr Harrison’s
collection, and he afterwards went over the ground to shew me
where most of them were found, and the next day I visited
Professor Prestwich, at Shoreham, who gave me additional
information.

Within five miles of Ightham, upwards of 400 specimens
were found, and at elevations varying from 110 to 600 feet
above the sea level ; but only 6 were found over 500 feet. The
largest number—161—was at a range of 390 to 460 feet.

The most interesting feature in connection with these
Paleolithic implements is the conclusion that so cautious an
observer as Professor Prestwich has arrived at—“ that the facts
“< described carry back these rude works of early man to a period

26

“Jong anterior to the ‘ valley gravels,’ formed under the present
“river régime, and may, I think, prove even to belong to an
“early stage of the glacial or pre-glacial period. The condition
“‘ of the implements themselves is certainly in accordance with
“the assumption of extreme age, and they bear also the
‘impress of a very primeval art.”

I will now consider the general difference between the
Paleolithic and Neolithic implements. The former are mostly
found in river gravel, or embedded in clay near the surface of
the ground; they are fashioned in a rude manner, and appear to
be separated from the Neolithic by a wide interval of time, in
which probably the contour line of the country was somewhat
different. The Paleolithic flints found, not only in our own
country, but in France, shew a great resemblance to each
other. Professor Prestwich remarks, in his Igtham paper—
“the character of ordinary Neolithic surface specimens is very
“ distinct from that of these Paleolithicforms. The unpolished
“Neolithic flint implements that are found on the surface are
“at once recognised, not only by their form, but also by their
“condition. The flint is weathered, and the black surfaces
“have become irregularly whitened with a dull lustre, and with
“the edges slightly blunted, but not water-worn. There is an
“absence also of that uniform but varied colouring which
“results from entombment in a matrix of a special character.
“The specimens are free from incrustation, except in a few
“cases, where they have lain in alluvial beds; while from
‘“‘ exposure on the surface they have commonly come in contact
“with plough or spade, and the iron rubbed off by the sharp
“edges of the stone has rusted and fringed them with strong
“ferruginous stains, in contrast with the generally colourless
“surface. The surface of these Paleolithic flints, on the
“contrary, although they occasionally show contact with the
“plough, are more usually free from these iron-marks, and
“ exhibit generally the deep uniform staining of brown, yellow,
“or white, together with the bright patina resulting from long
“embedment in drift-deposits of different characters; and
“while some are perfectly sharp and uninjured, others are

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27

“more or less rolled and worn at the edges by drift action—
‘some very much so.”

Dr Evans is of opinion that “in the case of the unpolished
“implements of the Neolithic Period, which most nearly ap-
*¢ proach those of the Paleolithic in form, it will, as a rule, be
*‘ found that the former are intended for cutting at the broader
‘end, and the latter at the narrower or more pointed end. Even
‘‘in the nature of the chipping a practised observer will, in
“‘ most instances, discern a difference.”

He further remarks—“If it be uncertain to how late a
“‘period these Neolithic implements remained in use in this
‘¢ country, it is still more uncertain to how early a period their
“introduction may be referred. If we take the possible limits
“in either direction, the date into which they fell into disuse
“becomes approximately fixed as compared with that at which
“they may have first come into use in Britain, for we may
“‘safely say that the use of bronze must have been known in
“this country 500 or 600 years B.C., and therefore that at that
“time cutting tools of stone began to be superseded; while by
“A.D. 1100 it will be agreed on all hands they were no longer
“in use.

“We can, therefore, fix the date of their desuetude
“within, at the outside, two thousand years; but who can tell
“within any such limits the time when a people acquainted
“with the use of polished stone implements first settled in this
_ “island, or when the process of grinding them may have been
“< first developed among native tribes? The long period which
“intervened between the deposit of the River Gravels (con-
‘taining so far as at present known, implements chipped only
‘and not polished) and the first appearance of polished hatchets,
“is not in this country so well illustrated as in France; but
“even there all that can be said as to the introduction of
‘polished stone hatchets is, that it took place subsequently to
“the accumulation, in the caves of the South of France, of the
“deposits belonging to an age when reindeer constituted one
“of the principal articles of food of the cave-dwellers.

28

« Ag to the date at which these cave deposits were formed,
“history and tradition are alike silent, and at present even
“‘ Geology affords but little aid in determining the question.”

Paleolithic implements have also been found in caves; but
Professor Boyd Dawkins believes there is distinct evidence
that the River-drift men are older than the Cave men, and the
latter possessed a singular talent for representing the animals
they hunted as shewn by several sketches, found in the caves,
on bone and stone.

Neolithic implements are found in all parts of Great
Britain and Ireland, in Europe, parts of Africa and Asia, and
in Oceania.

Dr Evans divides them as follows :—

1. Those merely chipped out in a more or less careful
manner, and not ground or polished.

2. Those which, after being fashioned by chipping, have
been ground or polished at the edge only ; and

3. Those which are more or less ground or polished, not
only at the edge, but over the whole surface (Ancient Stone
Implements of Great Britain, pp. 59 and 88).

He afterwards divides the latter under the head of Polished
celts :—

1. Those sharp, or but slightly rounded at the sides, and
presenting a pointed oval, or vesica pixis, in section.

2. Those with flat sides.

3. Those with an oval section.

4, Those presenting abnormal peculiarities.

Dr Evans mentions the following ten places where flint
implements had been found in Gloucestershire at the date of
the publication of his book in 1872 :—

A hatchet of greenstone near Cirencester.

Flint flakes in graves from Oakley Park.

Three flint flakes from a barrow at Rodmarton ; also some
lozenge-shaped arrow-heads, apparently purposely injured at
the point, from a long-chambered barrow.

Two from base of the cairn in the chambered tumulus
at Uley.

oo

. a2 ee ee, eee

29

Numerous specimens of cores of flint.

British hatchet of flint, Roman Villa, Great Witcombe.

An oval knife, about two inches long, ground at the edge,
and over a great part of the convex face, found at Mitcheldean,
is in the Museum at Truro.

A barbed arrow-head, Turkdean.

An almost spherical stone, but flattened above and below,
where the surface is slightly polished, was found at Whittington
Wood in 1866.

He also gives a polished celt from Cherbourg Camp, Pusey,
Farringdon; but that is in Berkshire.

Although I was aware that The Earl of Ducie, the Rev. D.
Royce, Mr G. Witts, the late Mr E. Witchell, and the late Mr
G. J. Playne had made collections of flint implements, I did not
know they had done so much, and was surprised to find the
extent of the work of other gatherers in the field, and I now
proceed to give you the result of my enquiries, by which you
will see how largely our knowledge has increased since Dr
Evans wrote.

No. 1 is a drawing of a hatchet found at the, Wilderness
Works, Mitcheldean, near the bottom of a valley, covered over
with rubble washed down from the hill side, and about 5 inches
below the surface, July, 1888. Natural size.

No. 2, Neolithic flint, from the late Rev. Winnington
Ingram’s collection in the Worcester Museum, labelled, “ Found
by George Stewart between Pitchill and Rouse Lench, Beving-
ton Waste, when it was first cultivated in 1874,” and seen
by me at his cottage ; bought 3rd November, 1878.

There is also in the same Museum a card with some flint
flakes, found at Bredon Hill by the Rev. F. Holland.

From the Gloucester Museum I have two specimens, which
were given by the late Mr J. H. Cooke, of Berkeley.

One was found in 1884, near some pit dwellings, now
destroyed, as the land is converted into arable, at Westridge,
near Wotton-under-Edge ; and the other from the slope on the
Stancombe side of Stinchcombe Hill. Mr Cooke pointed out
the spot to Mr Bellows and myself shortly before he died.

30

I learn from The Earl of Ducie that he has flints in his
collection from the district between Charlbury, Chipping Norton,
Chipping Norton Junction, and Shipton-under-Wychwood.

Scrapers are the most numerous, numbering 10 to 1 of
Arrow-heads: the barbed ones of the latter are about 400, and
of the leaf-shaped form 150.

All the flints found were small in size, varying from } to
24 inches in length, and were most abundant in sheltered
situations near to springs. The shapeless fragments The Karl
of Ducie has thrown away would fill a wheelbarrow.

At Tortworth only a few flint scrapers and two arrow-
heads were met with.

The late Mr Edwin Witchell collected a considerable
number of Implements from the high ground above Stroud
extending to Lypiatt, Bisley, Brown’s Hill, and Rodborough
Common. In Vol. III. of our Transactions, page 103, in the
plate given by Mr John Jones, are some flints of Mr Witchell’s,
found in excavating a reservoir on the brow of Stroud Hill.
I have examined the collection: some are of very rude form,
and I am indebted to Mr Charles Witchell for the cards on
the table with specimens. He finds that the following cor-
respond with plates in Dr Evans’ book :—No. 1 to fig. 3; No. 4,
fig. 5; No. 8, fig. 205; No. 12, fig. 386. The arrow-heads
resemble those figured from the Yorkshire Wolds, 321-22-23,
page 344, and the peculiar form on card from the Yorkshire
Wolds, 221.

There are 50 flakes, 9 saws—the latter are of same
character to figs. 199, 200—Evans ; and 54 scrapers of various
forms.

Mr Moore, of Bourton-on-the-Water, has about 30 fine
arrow-heads, and numerous sling stones from Hasleton—a high
plateau between Andoversford and Northleach; and he has
kindly made for me the beautiful drawing I hold in my hand
of some of them.

The Rev. D. Royce, of Lower Swell, has the finest collection
I have seen, and they were found in an area embracing
Luckley, Condicote, Swell Wold, Swell Hill, Lower Swell,

31

Donnington, and Upper Slaughter. A few were picked up at
Benborough and Scarborough. He has something like 1000
specimens, beautifully mounted and classified on cards. Scrapers
are most abundant. ‘The arrow-heads shew a marked difference
in work and shape, and many of them have one side only partly
made, or perhaps they have been broken, like figures 321, 322,
and 323 in Mr Evans’ book; and they are more numerous than
the leaf-shaped form.

There are several, which apparently have been set in wood,
with sharp chisel ends, and it has been suggested they may
have been for sacrificial uses; some were probably needles ;
others have serrated edges.

There is a fine javelin, or spear-head ; two celt hatchets,
which have been broken, and are now about half the natural
size; and there is a remarkable flint core 2} inches long, with
a naturally pointed end, with nearly one-half of the other end
grooved out for the thumb, and a smaller groove underneath
for the finger to rest in.

The rarest form is that of the lozenge or shuttle, which is
beautifully worked, like figures 298, 299, Yorkshire Wolds, page
338—Evans.

The large specimen on the card greatly interested me
when I saw it in Mr Royce’s collection, and I am glad to find
the opinion I then expressed that it was an igneous rock has
been confirmed. It is a dolerite. From the rude character of
the manner in which it was chipped I thought it might be
Paleolithic. However, experts in London have, from the partly
rubbed smooth face, pronounced it to be Neolithic. It cer-
tainly to my mind seems to partake of a transitional character.
I would call especial notice to the beautiful specimens on the
three cards he has sent me, and in one there are several
sacrificial knives.

Mrs Dent, of Sudeley Castle, has kindly allowed me to in-
spect her beautiful and well-arranged collection of Implements,
which were found on the high ground on one side of Sudeley,
at Belas Knap, and the neighbourhood, and on the other side
of the valley from Sudeley Lodge round to Farmcote Wood.

32

It comprises at least 450 arrow-heads with barbs—some of
the latter are broken: others are very well executed, and cor-
respond with figures in Dr Evans’ book from 315 to 333.

Some of the leaf and lozenge-shaped javelins or arrow-
heads are beautifully-formed, and are the counterparts of
figures 278 to 279 of Dr Evans’ book.

There are saws, borers, awls or drills, trimmed flaked
knives, and sling stones similar to examples given by Dr
Evans.

There is at least one sacrificial knife.

Round the Castle, and also at Stanway, only a few arrow-
heads.

Mrs Dent has many hundreds of chippings, flakes, etc.,
still to classify.

She has some studs of like character to Figures 374 that
were found in the field in which Belas Knap tumulus is, or on
the hills by Farmcot.

Mr Ernest Sibree, of the Indian Institute at Oxford, has
collected about 70 Implements from the high ground in the
neighbourhood of Bussage, and most of them from a field at
the north end of the Frith Wood.

He has one specimen of a long barbed arrow-head which
was picked up in a field close to Rodmarton.

I am much indebted to him for having compared his
specimens with the illustrations in Dr Evans’ book, and he finds
they correspond more or less to Figures 205, 206, 207, 210, 211,
212, 213, 215, 216; and 205 is the actual size. The knives like
Figures 233, 241; and arrow-heads 279, 281, 311, 326; but
some of the latter are only fragments. The remainder consist
of chips of other worked flints which are difficult to identify—
one possibly being the top of an awl, Figure 228.

With the flints, Pyrites were found, and they were doubt-
less used for the purpose of producing sparks, as they are as
effective as iron—Evans, page 281.

Mr G. B. Witts has permitted me to retain for some time
his specimens. They are as follows :—

33

ELKSTONE

No. 1.—Scraper. Dense flint.

5, 3—Scraper. Flint.

»» %—Scraper. Cherty flint.

» 8—A partly formed large Javelin or Arrow-head.

Cherty flint.
No. 10.—Cherty Flint, partly formed, with serrated edge.
ANDOVERSFORD

No. 2.—Celt. Igneous Rock. Probably an aphanite.
No. 4.—Celt. Unusually dense quartzite.
No. 5.—Celt. Fine grained quartzite.
No. 6.—Celt. Basalt—Diorite.

LEcKHAMPTON
No. 9.—Seraper. Opaque flint. |
No. 11.—Javelin or spear-head. Slate.

BrIrRDLIP

No. 12.—Flint arrow-head—beautifully formed.
No. 6.—Large Celt of the Irish type.

The igneous specimens were shewn to Mr Rudler, who
submitted them to Mr Teale—a great authority on igneous
rocks; but he refused to express an opinion unless he had
sections taken, which could not be done without injury to the
implements.

Petrologists now, by the aid of the microscope, make so
many divisions of the igneous rocks, that the old general term
of greenstone is in a great measure abandoned; but these
specimens may safely come under the general head of very
dense igneous Dolerite and Diorite rocks, which were trans-
ported from areas far removed from the Cotteswolds.

I have met with rocks of like character in the drift, and
also many other rocks derived from distant areas, which will be
found enumerated in Vol. VIII., page 34, of our Proceedings.

It was only within the last few days I became aware that
the Rev. J. H. Cardew, who formerly resided at Cheltenham,
had made, when he was there, a large collection of implements
from the high ground of the Cotteswolds, extending as far as

D

34

Northleach. His son, Dr Cardew, has shewn me some of the
specimens, and they correspond with those I have exhibited,
and he told me that he believes his father must have had
200,000 flints, of all kinds, of which 10,000 exhibited evidence
of human manufacture.

I was glad to hear that the sadull of the Rev. J. H. Cardew’s
observations is embodied in a paper which will shortly be read
to the Gloucester and Bristol Archeological Society.

In commencing my investigations I thought I might be
able to arrive at some general conclusion as to the number of
kinds into which implements might be divided, the proportion
of each, and variation in certain localities; but I have failed
to arrive at any general law. Of the most highly worked
implements, the lozenge-shaped and pear-like forms are the
least numerous; and the arrow-heads perhaps are the most
abundant; whilst the number of all kinds found, and the
evidence of progress from rude to higher forms, certainly point
to a long occupation of our hills by man. Indeed, some of
them are so beautifully worked as to shew much artistic skill
in the design and manufacture. They are not implements of
mere utility, and the old inhabitants probably possessed a
higher degree of intelligence than is generally thought.

I have been struck with the general resemblance of the
implements found on our Cotteswolds to those of the York-
shire Wolds, which seems to indicate a connection between the
then inhabitants of both hill grounds. They may have been
the Highlanders of the period.

Although we have evidence of how flint implements are
made and used by uncivilised nations, reasoning by analogy it
is fair to assume that they were similarly employed by the
Neolithic people ; yet, in looking over the various collections, I
have observed some of the forms are so peculiar as to leave
room for the imagination to run somewhat wild when suggesting
the purpose for which many were intended, and more careful
observation is necessary before their use is rightly understood.

The subject of Neolithic implements may be thought by
some to belong more to Archeology than Geology, but the

35

former study has always formed part of the investigations of
the Club.

It is often difficult to define where one ends and the other
begins, and indeed in this particular branch of the subject they
appear to mutually assist each other.

The object for which these implements were made belongs
more to the Archeologist, but he has to fall back upon that
branch of Geology now much _ studied—Petrology—which
determines the rocks they are composed of, where they are
derived from, often hundreds of miles away—and which widens
and deepens our knowledge, and gives additional interest to the
subject.

And now to return to the Paleolithic implements, of which
at present there is no reliable evidence of any having been
found in our area, but I shall endeavour to give reasons for
thinking there is hunting ground where they may be met with.

Dr Evans informs me the nearest spots to our district
where they have been found are the Thames basin above Oxford,
and the Valley of the Axe, near Axminster; but he has in his
collection a black chert core from Fladbury, which may be
natural, if not Neolithic.

In other areas where Paleolithic implements are found
they are often associated with Mammalian remains, and as we
are rich in specimens of them—as shewn in the Gloucester and
Worcester Museums—it is in the localities and neighbourhood
where they occur we should make diligent search.

I would suggest Lassington, Highnam, Limbury, east side
of the Malvern range, Birth Hill, Bredon, and Cropthorne
Gravel Pits, the hills on both sides of Evesham, Welford Hill,
Broom, Stratford-on-Avon; and from there in the Northern
Drift Gravel above the Stour to Shipston, and on to Mickleton
and the Vale of Moreton.

When we know that Mr Royce was for many years at
Swell before he was aware of the existence of implements
in his parish or neighbourhood: and as they escaped the
notice of so well trained an observer, we must be careful not to
attach too much value to negative evidence: another instance

D2

36

of how ignorant we often are of the treasures which are within
our reach.

In the remarks I have made I have simply placed before
you the work done by competent observers, in the hope of
stimulating you to pursue a new branch of enquiry, which,
believe me, is full of interest. Should you take it up I feel
sure you will attain the same eminence in it as you have done
in those branches of Natural History of which your Proceedings
give evidence.

37
EXPLANATION OF PLATES.

Royce Collection.*
Puate I.

Fig. No. 1.—A large Celt of Dolerite, half natural size.

Figs. Nos. 2, 4.—Pear-shaped Spear or Javelin heads.

Fig. No. 3.—Leaf-shaped Spear or Javelin head.

Fig. No. 5.—An Arrow-head, with a long projecting wing at
the base of one of the angles, of like character to Figure
338, Dr Evans, and said by him to be common in York-
shire and Derbyshire Wolds.t

Puate II.

Figs. Nos. 6, 7, 8.—Knives; probably sacrificial.
Figs. Nos. 9, 10, 11.—Arrow or Javelin-heads.
Figs. Nos. 12, 18, 14.—Lozenge-shaped Spear-heads.

Witts Collection.
Prater III.

Fig. No. 15.—Celt. Fine-grained Quartzite. Locality:
Andoversford.

Fig. No.16.—Slate; probably a Javelin or Spear-head. Locality:
Leckhampton.

Fig. No. 17.—Large Flint Arrow-head, beautifully formed.
Locality : Birdlip.

Fig. No. 18.—Celt—Igneous: probably an aphanite. Locality:
Andoversford.

Fig. No. 19.—Opaque Flint Scraper. Locality: Leckhampton.

® Kindly drawn by Miss FRANCcIs.

+ One-barbed arrow-heads are frequently found on the Cotteswolds like
fig. 321, Dr Evans, and he considers that ‘‘ one of the barbs having been
broken off, possibly in the course of manufacture, the design has been
modified, and the stump, so to speak, of the barb, has been rounded off
in a neat manner by surface flawing on both faces. The one-barbed
arrow-head thus resulting presents some analogies with several of the
triangular form, such as fig. 338.”

38

Puate IV.

Fig. No. 20.—Polished Celt, found at the Wilderness Works,
Mitcheldean, about 5 ft. below the surface, July, 1888
(Colchester-Wemyss collection.)

Fig. No. 21.—Polished Celt, found at Westridge, Wotton-under-
Edge, 1884. (Gloucester Museum.)

Fig. No. 22.—An Axe of extremely dense fine-grained quartzite
(Witchell collection).

Fig. No. 23.—A Scraper: the butt-end has the appearance of
a handle, and is like Fig, 221 from the Yorkshire Wolds,
in Dr Evans’ book, Fig. 277. (Witchell collection.)

Oe

Plate I.

ROYCE COLLECTION.

ROYCE COLLECTION. Plate IL

’

WITTS COLLEC

Plate IIL

TION.

ebe
a id

<4

DEATH OF THE MALLARD

tte

—*"

Modern Falconry, by Major Fisuer
Read November 26th, 1889

[L’Envoi. Before submitting the following “paper” to
the honor of finding a place amongst the publications of the
Cotteswold Naturalists Field Club, its author desires to remind
his fellow-members that on the 26th of November, 1889, when
he undertook the task of essaying to read a paper on the
subject, he soon felt obliged to discard all notes and previously
arranged matter, and to deliver himself of what he had to say in
an entirely impromptu and extempore manner. The reasons
which compelled him to this course, were, Istly, the very short
space of time placed at his disposal—(there being a second, if not
a third, paper to be read on the same occasion) ;—and, 2ndly,
the fact that, whilst in the case of ordinary papers the exact
sciences obtain the most, in the case of such an one as this, it
is absolutely requisite that the Natural History treated of
should be rendered interesting and amusing as well. For the
dry details alone of the practice and knowledge of such an art
as Falconry from its first inception as a mode of obtaining
fresh meat for food, to its present state as a pleasing field
sport, could not fail to be tedious, and, moreover, are to be
found in most books on Falconry. The writer, therefore,
ventured to trust entirely to practical acquaintance with his
somewhat strange subject, and to rely very much on verbal
description, of actual facts, and flights within his own experi-
ence. He is therefore entirely ignorant of what he did say in
the whole course of the “ paper” he is supposed to have read !
and painfully conscious that he can speak more readily than he
can write. In fact, it is only because it would be churlish to
continue to refuse to comply with the flattering requests from

40

President, Secretary, and many of his fellow-members, that he
has consented to try to reproduce by the pen the following
‘lame and impotent conclusion ” of what he began “ by word
of mouth.”’]

As all modern Falconry is necessarily conducted very much
in the same way—and with the same sort of hawks—as it was
conducted by our ancestors, it is impossible to avoid some
reference at least to ancient times, though it will be convenient
on the present occasion to confine oneself as much as possible
to what is not only possible, but of constant and almost daily
practice by many amongst us, at the present day: and this the
more from the fact that from the necessity of the case, and the
greatly changed conditions under which Falconry, to be prac-
tised at all, must now be practised in this and most other
countries, it has long been very little ‘‘ en evidence” in public,
and is pretty generally believed to have all but ceased to exist.
This is not so. It has never yet ceased to be practised in
Scotland from the earliest times. And the Scotch school of
Falconers, represented by several distinguished Scotch families
and their professional falconers, using and flying their native
falcons at their native game, has long existed, and still
exists. In England, from the more general practice of shooting,
and the spread and increase of population, and enclosure of
open land, it appears to have fallen into disuse about the time
of the Commonwealth; whilst it lingered on the continent—
and often on a great scale—till the period of Napoleon’s wars.
About the close of the 18th century, Lord Orford (uncle to
Horace Walpole) and Colonel Thornton made a very consider-
able and successful effort to revive Hawking in this country,
to which end they introduced “‘the Dutch School of Falconry ”
into England, with, of course, Dutch professional falconers
from Valkenswaard, Eindhoven, Holland—the nursery place of
Dutch hawking, and where its practice as a profession has never
yet been extinct. This Dutch system of hawking had extended
into Scotland, which has always had its own native falconers :
the Seotch using eyesses, or nestling falcons, and the Dutch
necessarily passage hawks, or wild caught birds, since no falcon

41

,

breeds in the low lands of Holland, though nearly all varieties
pass over it yearly when migrating. Asa very sufficient know-
ledge of the importance and constant reference to falconry and
its practice, its own peculiar vocabulary, rights, dignities, etc.,
etc., amongst our ancestors, doubtless obtains amongst us, a
very short reference to Ancient Falconry must here suffice. I
cannot, however, well help recollecting in the City of Gloucester,
that King John, a great falconer, once sent his falconer, who
bore the name of Hawkinus de Haw-ville (of which more anon)
to Gloucester for the purpose, not then of using, but of moult-
ing or mewing his falcons when the time for shedding their
feathers had arrived. Moulting is a long and tedious and
dangerous process in the case of most trained hawks, and
specially in the case of that noble friend and companion of
nobles in all ages—the Peregrine falcon—the most docile and
useful by far of all hawks ever known to man. In short, the
only real fault that can be alleged against this hawk is the fact
that she is a slow and bad moulter, apparently even in a
wild state. Mews, though now the designation of stables in
London, were anciently the places of abode of falcons under-
going their annual process of moult, extending over 5 months,
and the professional falconers, valets, and servants of their.
owners employed in caring for them. King John sent his
servant to Gloucester, armed with a rescript to the Sheriff of
Gloucester, to provide proper food, lodging, and maintenance
for him, his men, and his hawks; and oddly enough some of
them are mentioned by name! viz., the King’s Gire (Jer) falcon,
“Le Refus” (so called doubtless from her propensity to refuse
to fly at the desired game: a propensity common to Jerfalcons
of the present day); “ Black-man,” and “ The foolish falcon.”
Oddly enough, too, the old family of Hawkins, of the Haw, near
Tewkesbury, have long been famous sportsmen, though I have
never heard of their being falconers of late years.

From the days of King John to the present time is a long
interval indeed ; but a remarkable succession of falconers from
father to son, for many generations, occurs in the ancient
Scottish family of the Flemings, of Barochan Tower, in

42

Renfrewshire. The present possessor kept hawks in India (as do
the officers of the Guide Corps on the frontier, 3rd Sikhs, etce.,
and many of our own officers, and multitudes of the native
princes and nobles). His father kept the Renfrewshire Sub-
scription Hawks until his death in 1819; and his grandfather
was acelebrated falconer. Peter Fleming, an ancestor, received
a hawk’s hood, set with jewels, from James IV. of Scotland, for
beating the king’s falcon with his tiercel. This interesting
relic is carefully preserved in the family. The falconers
employed by the Flemings have always been Scotchmen. No
list of amateur falconers can be produced for England from the
time of the last civil war to the close of the last century, from
which period to the present day a very perfect list is well
known. Notwithstanding this, the Dukes of St. Albans have
for ages been Hereditary Grand Falconers of England. The
last Under-Falconer of Scotland was Mr Marshall Gardener,
who retired from his office in 1840. It is now in abeyance.
As it is obviously impossible to do anything like justice to this
subject within the ordinary limits of “a paper,” I shall endea-
vour to avoid entering into details, and think it may be sufficient
for our present purpose to consider shortly—

1st,—The various hawks usually employed in all modern
as in ancient (European) falconry: those used more especially
in Eastern and North African sport being merely glanced at.

2nd,—The way they are caught, or procured.

3rd,—The methods of taming, training, and using them,
and the flights, chasses, or quarries for which each species is
most adapted and most used.

4th,—The kind of country required for the satisfactory
practice of these different flights.

5th,—Some general remarks on the modern practice of the
old sport; the very great and increasing difficulties attending
it; and, if possible, some of the writer’s own experiences, and
a short description of some of the flights he has seen and
enjoyed; and he regrets his entire inability to do this in a
better manner, or to his readers’ satisfaction, by means of the
pen alone: the subject requiring illustration by production of

ey

i i ie ee

43

the hawk and her paraphernalia, etc., which to some extent he
was able to do in the Lecture Room at Gloucester, but cannot
here.

1st, then, the hawks employed.

These, as formerly, are of course divided, in falconers’
fashion, into—“ Hawks, long and short winged ;” and a very
suitable division it is. In fact, Falconry proper means the
employment of some species of falcon, long-wiuged: Hawking,
that of some species of short-winged hawk. For all practical
purposes, the long-winged hawks employed, consist of the three
varieties of the great Northern falcons, called Jerfalcons, or
Gyr falcon, viz., the Greenland, Iceland, and Norwegian Jer-
falcons, the Hobby, and the tiny Merlin ; and last and best, the
well-known Peregrine falcon. This sheet-anchor of the falconer
in all ages and in every clime (for she truly deserves her name—
Peregine Pelerin or Pilgrimsfalk)—is found at various periods
of the year in most countries, where her peculiar and lovely
stoop has in every age been a terror, not only to the swift but
also to the strong. Yes, beloved bird, well may I praise thee!
Adorned with every good gift—beauty, grace, strength, and un-
matchable speed, courage, skill, and perseverance—to all these
dost thou add the tameness and docility that so admirably adapts
thee to be the companion, friend, and servant of man. Once
held in the highest esteem by prince and noble, and never far off
from thy owner, even when the day’s sport was done, thow hast
not changed. My friends and I have ever found thee exactly
what our ancestors found thee, and as all who seek shall find
thee, as long as thou art to be found. But what a change has
occurred in thy old relations to man, in England! No longer
legislated for, and defended by custom from all harm, thou hast
become a sort of common enemy, and the most ignorant of
gamekeepers, deems and treats thee as “vermin,” with the
sanction, and by the desire, of him who should know and treat
thee better, if for no other reason, then for the sake of
thy faithful services to his predecessors, over the very lands,
whereon I have had the pain of seeing thy poor skeleton
depending from a vile rusty nail on the keeper’s gibbet—thee

44

who once sat caressed on the wrist of Beauty! The coast and
inland precipices of the British Islands are some of the most
favorite breeding places of this fine falcon, though the incessant
persecution now bestowed on her everywhere, and the taking of
her eggs and young so constantly as to render the procuring of
young peregrine falcons to be trained for sport increasingly
difficult, year by year, is rapidly reducing her numbers. Still
the open downland country of the South, and the moorlands
of the North of England are frequently graced by the
peregrine’s flight; and long may they so continue to be, for
without her, falconry could hardly exist, though hawking would
remain. The Goshawk and Sparrow-hawk are both hawks
short-winged, and are easily to be distinguished from the
aristocracy of their race—the falcons proper—by the yellow
color of the iris of their eyes, those of all falcons whatsoever,
being very dark brown, approaching to black (so black as to be
little lighter in color than the black pupil of the eye itself).
Foreign falcons, such as Sakers—and Lanners—and the lovely
Indian variety of the peregrine falcon, called Shaheen, are all
used in Persian, Moorish, Arabic, and Indian falconry. A variety
of the golden eagle, called Bearcoot, is in use amongst the
Kirghis of the steppes of Asia; and the Goshawk and Spar-
hawk in enclosed countries, anywhere, where speed is not so
much required in the pursuer, as courage and determination.
2nd,—The way falcons and hawks are usually caught or
procured alive and unharmed for the purpose of being trained.
They are usually divided into Haggard—passage or wild
caught hawks; and eyesses, or nestlings taken by hand from
the eyrie or nest, before they can fly. It is needless to say that
the former are for all ends desired by the falconer but one (viz.
tameness) immeasurably to be preferred. The one, in fact, may
be roughly compared to a wild lioness or tigress, born and bred
up, and well taught her business, by her parents, as in very truth
she is. She is, therefore, of course, when caught by man and
tamed sufficiently to be trained and used for sport, most com-
petent to take, in the best of style, any fowl she may happen to
meet, within her compass. The eyess, or nestling falcon or

45

hawk, taken too young even to have once flown on the wing,
and deprived for ever of the invaluable teaching of her parents,
is entirely ignorant at first of any single thing she should know
or do, except to eat meat at the hands of her keeper. She cannot
even fly, without at least a month’s flying loose, (called flying at
hack, directly she is fully summed, or feathered.* Considerable
powers of speed, and the desire, and in time the ability, to prey
for herself do eventually come to the nestling’s aid. I have never
however seen or heard of any nestling falcon, however good and
however prized and successful, whose style of flying and stooping
came up to those of a wild caught hawk, whilst her powers of foot-
ing—(hawks all strike and catch with their feet alone, or by blows
from their powerful and sharp back talons, in the case of falcons
proper)—are for ever far inferior to those of her better trained,
and better practised and once wild, congener. So that she, in
turn, may be compared to a lioness, etc., born in a menagerie,
Wild falcons, goshawks and sparhawks, are sometimes trapped
unharmed, if great care is taken, on prey they have killed,
and so come into our hands. [If their valuable flight feathers
and tail feathers are not much damaged, their captor deserves
great praise. I have had three or four wild English peregrines
thus procured, and have one such now. I have also most grateful
memories of the services of one such—once an adult female
peregrine falcon,—wild on the Wiltshire Downs, and who killed
for me, in the grandest possible style, grouse after grouse daily,
in September and October, in Northumberland, in a style, from
a lofty pitch, and with the peculiar stoop, of the wild peregrine.

* This is usually effected by the young nestlings being provided with
jesses and a large and heavy bell, large enough to hinder her greatly in
attempting to take wild quarry. She is then set at liberty in any convenient
place, where she may be tolerably safe from harm for twenty miles round,
fed twice daily, and caught up as best she may be when she ceases to “come
in pretty regularly to evening feed.” I have even hacked hawks from
Stroud, in the past—absurd as it seems, in the present, time ! —and taken
them up, after a month’s good hack. I know of no place in England, where
this can now be done. I have, however, at the present moment, three
nestling peregrines from Dorset-—now flying loose at hack in the neighbour-
hood of Thurley, Ireland—(from an old ruin).

46

that no one who saw is likely to forget. Poor dear old
“Queen.” She did not escape, scathless, from the cruel trap :
her foot suffered thereby, and gout (unknown to her till
her acquaintance with man) rendered her useless, after one
season’s brilliant performances. I used to know her stoop from
all other a very long way off. As no dependence can be placed
on such a source of supply, and as no one who can procure wild
caught peregrines is likely to be contented long with nestlings,
we modern users of peregrines, have resource yearly to a
supply of this raw material for our sport, found, oddly
enough, in the village of Valkenswaard, Hindhoven, Holland.
No falcon, or no peregrine falcon, breeds in that flat land, but a
yearly migration of birds of prey of most European varieties takes
place there in November. This migration is, at that period of
the year, entirely from west to east, and the usual track of the
migration, appears to pass pretty centrally, over the barren
heaths, on the confines of Holland, and Belgium. As the
migration of birds is still very little understood by naturalists,
or even where they go, or whence they come, in countless
instances, conjecture isin vain. India is generally regarded as
the hawk’s goal, but it is but conjecture. What is certain, is,
that for a month or so, usually in November, a multitude of birds
of prey are then and there to be seen, at a vast height in
the air, and the circumstance has been taken advantage of
for ages past by the Dutch falconers. Dutch falconry had
never been extinguished until the final disappearance of
the Loo Hawking Club, formerly presided over by the Sovereign
and princes of the Netherlands. Valkenswaard has from im-
memorial times been the home of hawk catchers, and is so still.
Modern falconers yearly order of Adrian Mollen—formerly
one of the Royal falconers—such peregrines as they desire,
either adult—then called Haggard—or young, 1.e., birds of the
year, from their color called red, or passage hawks—(adult
peregrines are of a bluish color and totally different in hue
from those in the brown dress of the first year’s plumage).
According to the number ordered, Mollen “puts out,” or puts
in order, so many “ huts ” on the heaths, and mans them with

47

competent “catchers” for the brief migration or passage in
question.

The method adopted is intricate and interesting, and must
only be briefly described here. Moreover, our late lamented
friend, Mr Barwick Baker, has pretty fully described the pro-
cess, in a former number of our Society’s Proceedings. The
so-called “huts” are holes dug out, and walled with sods, and
roofed with boughs and sods, so as to be very undistinguishable.
The occupant, who is frequently by profession a cobbler, is pro-
vided with provisions, water, and Schnapps, and a sack of boots
and shoes to mend. As his vision is but circumscribed, he
depends greatly on a little living sentinel, who lives in full
sight of his hut, in a little turf cabin or cage outside. This
sentinel is the larger butcher bird or shrike, Lanius Hxcubitor
—(I have hitherto avoided Latin names)—which bird is gifted
with the most remarkable power of sight, and, as it would seem,
with a tender conscience. Be this as it may, the moment he
perceives any bird of prey, however far off—(I am told miles)—
and however high—(I am‘told out of the power of any glass)—
he begins to be agitated to a high degree, and calls and attracts
the attention of the dullest hut tenant, exhibiting a terror so
extreme and unusual, as really to suggest a sense of expecta-
tion of retributive justice, on himself, from the approaching
hawk, for the countless cruel, and dastardly actions, of his whole
life. Truly is this little beast named the Butcher bird, for like
all shrikes, his method is, to rend his victims—mostly small
birds—limb from limb, impaling them first carefully, on a long
thorn, or fixing them in a fork near his larder, which he thus
literally festoons with their remains. No one who has not seen
the neat way in which the English shrike, Lanius Collurio, thus
serves countless insects on a blackthorn bush, can have any
idea of the pain inflicted. In addition to this sentinel, the
hawk catcher is supplied with a pigeon, who lives in a little box
on the top of a pole, and which is attached to a cord working
into his hut. He has also another pigeon living in a box, or
turf hut, on the ground. Some 20 yards from his hut door a
carefully concealed bow net, working easily, and well, also from

48

inside the hut, completes his devices. The butcher bird’s
actions denote the approach of the migrating hawk—(species,
age, and sex unknown)—and the hawk catcher pretends to be
able to determine the distance and quality of the approaching
migrant by the different intensity of the terror of the
sentinel. When deemed sufficiently near, the hawk catcher
pulls the string of the pole pigeon, and causes him to flutter
forth from his shelter, but so that he can instantly regain
it at need. This lure is frequently sufficient to draw a
passing hawk, (probably sharp set) from the clouds, and
is often instantly followed by the rush of the lofty and
violent stoop—most grateful of all sounds, to the patient
ear of the concealed cobbler. In a moment the lure pigeon
is gone—safe once more in his box. The disappointed hawk
wheels round, whereupon the cobbler pulls the other poor
devoted pigeon out of his shelter, and leaves him exposed.
Down comes the hawk, very often, (seeing nothing wrong) and
kills and soon begins to eat his prey. It may here be paren-
thetically stated that nothing will induce a wild falcon to eat a
morsel of any live bird. She invariably kills it first with incred-
ible ease and swiftness, by two or three powerful bites at the back
of the neck, killing a pigeon, grouse, or partridge far faster
than any human being can with their hands, and usually
decapitating it as well. This finalé is arranged to take place
very close to the sweep of a bow net, but the hawk is not
disposed to relinquish her prey easily, and usually suffers
herself to be drawn slowly along with it into the reach of the
bow net. The line is fixed there, and the delighted cobbler
takes a good hold of the cord or wire that throws the bow net (a
most clever contrivance), and with one masterly pull, the hawk
and pigeon are therein, from whence there is no escape. The
taking of a wild falcon out of a net, without the slightest harm,
and without even ruffling a feather, is a feat requiring much
skill and practice; but it is soon done, and a curious arrange-
ment of canvas and strings, reduces the proud and noble captive
in a very few minutes, froma denizen of the air, to a motionless
mummy, lying on its back entirely helpless on the heath, with

SS

;
:
|
.
|
.
|

49

its wings fast pinioned to its sides, an easy hood on its head,
and its feet and legs manacled with soft list—a change as
strange as rapid, and one that must be seen to be believed.

One, two, or even three, such hawks, are occasionally thus
captured at a single ‘“‘ hut” in the day, though as often, whole
days pass, without anything to excite the restless vigilance of
the butcher bird sentinel. Buzzards, goshawks, sparrowhawks,
merlins, and even, I think, an occasional eagle have thus also
fallen a prey to the Valkenswaard falconers. In the evening
the captures of the day (still in the mummy state) are taken
from the hut to Valkenswaard, where a red, or young peregrine,
is worth about £4.

As neither falconry nor hawking are longer practised
in Holland, there is no need for the Valkenswaard hawks to be
trained there. They are all ordered previously, by English and
French falconers, and I think, at present, by no others, and
when ready for removal, servants are sent for these falcons, or
hawks, or occasionally a falconer or naturalist anxious to see
with his own eyes the singular process of capture, and to enjoy
the further sight of the long row of lovely peregrines (no
longer mummies,) but sitting bolt upright on the pole-screen,
with hood on head, jesses on leg, and attached by swivel and
leash to the pole, whereon they stand. However, as a fort-
night’s care and gentle handling are usually bestowed on the
captured hawks by Mollen and his sons (and I believe daugh-
ters) and his assistants, it may be well to mention the ordinary
steps for taming so wild a creature, and eventually rendering
her so docile and obedient as to “ wait on” high in air, wholly
her own mistress, and as free as when she first was observed by
our butcher bird, and herself observed the cobbler’s offered
pigeon: but this time for the purpose, perchance, of striking to
earth, with the self-same sort of stoop, a grouse or a partridge
even now lying perdue in front of her owner’s well-trained
and motionless dogs, amongst the Northumberland heather.
The newly caught hawk, when her furniture as above, has been
supplied, and the sharp point of her beak, and the yet sharper
points of her black talons have been slightly coped, or

E

50

shortened, by the falconer’s pincers (for the Dutchmen are very
careful of their hands and fingers, and these necessaries of her
wild life are not likely to be immediately wanted again) is pro-
bably replaced on the pole. Two such are also usually taken
in hand by one person, and are sedulously attended to
from morning to night, with very little intermission. The hood
used at first is called a Rufter Hood. It is large and easy, and
though preventing all sight, is one the hawk can eat through ;
and it is not removed night or day for a week, as she can easily
sleep in it, though if they could themselves do without sleep (as
truly they cannot) the Dutchmen would tame these falcons in
half the time, could they but keep them awake for three nights
consecutively as well as three days. For some reason, long-
protracted deprivation of sleep, appears to deprive the wildest

hawk (for a season) of her wildness, and seems to change her

nature. If followed up by judicious treatment, the change is
rendered permanent, but a very little inattention, and a very
little sleep soon changes the scene. “ Elle se ravisera,” says
old D’Arcussia, and all will have to be done over again. The
best method of taming a wild caught hawk (no such easy task
ordinarily I trow) is found to be, by carrying her about on the
gloved wrist, and stroking her occasionally with a soft wing or
feather. The unusual position and involuntary motion appear
to disconcert the wildest, much to our advantage. She has to
be broken to the hood also. Likewise none too easy. Some
hawks dislike this appendage; others seem to care less for its
inflictions. None like it, and all, unless skilfully handled
therewith at their first making, are more or less hood-shy, and
more or less disabled, for future usefulness. A wild caught
hawk is not inclined to eat, and some will not eat for many
days (always a bad sign of a wild, and shy, temper). However,
hunger is a sharp sauce, and F’. Peregrinus, having seldom known

it as a wild, soon acknowledge its power as a tame (or captive) —

bird. She soon discovers that meat is offered, by the feel of it
near her feet, and sooner or later will eat it through the hood.
It is many days before she will eat it bareheaded (always on the
falconer’s wrist be it noted); and first of all by candlelight

tom

rete

NAS INE Yai ESA, Met Bak Berg oa

~?t

Ate ey pa agra!

51

alone, afterwards in a room, and after that in the open air.

' Having fed, often and well, on and from the hand of man, she is

placed on the pole, her hood is struck and removed, and she is
tempted by something specially nice to step from the pole to
the falconer’s fist, to reach, and get it. Some are bold, others
shy ; some eager, others the reverse; but in time all (except
the occasional schellums, or rogues, whom none can tame) come
to, and finally jump, and then fly, quite long distances (in the
room) to the fist for food. This exercise is long continued and
maintained, by the food being good, but tough, and so the
banquet of the hungry hawk is long protracted, to her own
great improvement in tameness to her keeper and confidence
in his good intentions. The pinion of a pigeon, or part of an
oxtail, is excellent “ pulling.” Then the falcon is introduced to
the “lure,” the special engine of the falconer of all ages.

How long and how strong, was the feeling produced by the
love and practice of falconry on our fathers, is proved by the
presence to this day, of so many of the technical terms of
falconry, in our language. ‘‘Lure:” to attract, speaks for itself.
The substantive “lure” being the attraction offered by a
falconer to his distant hawk, to bring her back to him. Most
of us of the craft have had constant occasion to repeat poor
Juliet’s mournful cry—“ Oh, for a falconer’s Lure to call my
Tassell (or, as it should have been spelled) Tiercel gentle, back
again.” Tiercel, from tiers three, is the falconry word for the
male of all falcons and hawks, as they are invariably about one-
third less in size and strength, than their mates. In incubating,
the males of all falcons are observed to work ceaselessly to
supply their mate, and ravenous—most ravenous—young, with
food, whilst the stronger female spends her whole time close by
their side, for their defence ; and woe betide any prowling bird—
raven, jackdaw, or herring-gull, that ventures to approach the

- rocky shelf on sea-cliff, or inland precipice, where she abideth :

and I have myself known stout cliff-climbers, let down with
rope for the purpose, have to give it up, frightened by the
attack on their faces, of the infuriated old birds.

E2

52

A “lure” is or may be, any portable object, on which a hawk
has been fed—the dead body of the fowl it is more especially to be
used to capture, is of course, a good “lure;” but as this cannot
always be procured, and kept fresh, a dummy of iron, covered
with tow and leather, a loop for a swivel, and wings of any sort
(notably again those of the flight for which it is sought to use the
hawk when trained) are attached, and strings by which pieces of
meat, or bird, or even rabbit may be securely fastened. After
being often and well fed on this, on the ground, the hawk in a
creance or line is induced to come to it farther and farther, and
when she will come to it, and will not leave it, but stick to it, and
suffers herself to be taken up on it, rather than leave it, (of course
being well rewarded thereon for her goodness) she is held up
loose from all tether, and called to the “lure” from long distances.
If a bird, dead or alive, of the sort aimed at, be then substituted
for the “lure,” and she acts equally well therewith, little
remains but to introduce her to the serious business for which
you desire her services, for which nature has so well inclined
her, and for which, or some such work, her parents taught, and
she practised, the lesson required, before you obtained possession
of her, but which now (sweet docile bird) she is equally ready
to practise for you! Many a time has my eight years’ old
falcon (and friend) “‘ Lady Jane Grey,” loudly uttered her note
of chirping delight, by my side, when she has brought down the
desire of her heart—a grouse: the very self-same cry as she
whilom uttered thereon, in her wild state, when man was her
most dreaded foe, to be avoided on sight, at a quarter of a mile
off.

The “lure,” in teaching a falcon to “ wait on” for game
is withdrawn, and concealed, just before her approach. This
disappointment, causes her to circle round (exactly what you
want), to see where it is. Instantly it is produced. When
game is found in the field the same is done, and on the hawk
attaining any height it is flushed under her, and she is not long
in making her stoop: and let us hope that her first few efforts
will be successful, and that if so her master will reward her
most liberally thereon. (He had far best do so in fact.)

58

The noblest of all possible of flights, in which the powers
of a trained hawk could be employed, were confessedly those of
the wild kite, and the heron. Neither of these, of course, ex
necessitate rei, could be effected in the waiting on style, neither
kite, nor heron, allowing of that. In fact, nine times out of ten,
in flying at the heron (the only one of these two grand chasses
possible at the present day, from the simple reason of the
disappearance of the kite as a common bird, entirely from the
British Isles, and generally so throughout Europe) the hawk or
hawks employed, have to be unhooded, and cast off, at the
heron, high in air, and it is to be pulled down—if pulled down
‘this well-armed, strong-winged, fowl, is to be—simply and
solely by strength of wing and talon, of the far smaller falcon,
aided by her courageous heart. It were too long a task for me
here to essay to recount, how the princes and nobles of old, flew
“Falco milvus, regalis” of yore, for they had first to procure hawks
of sufficient strength and courage (Jerfalcons they, by prefer-
ence); next, “to find their hare”—viz., the crafty aerial
scavenger, with the forked tail, and powers of flight only a little
inferior to their own, but coupled with a craven spirit; and
thirdly, to bring him down from a speck in the blue, to a distance
possible to be reached, by his intended assailants. All this,
before the interesting struggle could even be begun—a struggle
which neither I, nor any living falconer has seen in this
degenerate age, nor ever will, I trow, unless some enthusiast
to whom the expenditure of time and money are literally “no
object” will spend not a little of both, in emulating the
deeds of his fathers, having first discovered kites enough, in
a country as open as the best part of Salisbury Plain was, 150
years ago.

The flight at the heron is universally esteemed, next: and
has been practised in perfection, by the English and Dutch
falconers of the Loo Club, at the Royal Palace of the Loo, in
Holland, under the presidency of Prince Alexander of the
- Netherlands, until within some 40 years ago, when the Club was
given up, and since then no heron hawking has taken place at
the Loo. I find in “ Fauconnerie par Schlegel et Wolverhorst,”’

54

that in the year 1842, the falcons of the Loo Heron Hawking
Club numbered 44, and the herons taken 148; in 1843, 40 and
200; in 1844, 36 and 100; about the same, until 1849, when
it was 14 and 128; in 1850, 16 and 137 respectively. I have
been unable to ascertain the annual expenses of this fine estab-
lishment, but from the number of falconers, and men and horses
required (the latter having to gallop their best on the sound,
holding, dunes, of heath land, surrounding the vast heronry
at Loo for miles) it must have been very considerable. Mr
Clough Newcome, one of the Club English members, long flew
herons at his home at Hockwold, and at Didlington, in Norfolk ;
and in 1843 he had the best possible cast of passage hawks, for a
heron flight, called “Sultan,” and “De Ruyter.” They were, of
course, taken at Valkenswaard, and trained and used at the
Loo, and during their third year they took at Hockwold and
the Loo 54 herons, and in 1844 57 herons!

The herons thus taken were, with few exceptions, released
very slightly harmed, but adorned with a ring attached to a
leg, with date of capture added, and (if they possessed them)
minus the black pendant feathers at the back of a mature
heron’s head—usually set with jewels and worn in the falconer’s
cap. I have never myself seen a heron flight, nor has there
been one attempted by the Old Hawking Club, which yearly
meets on Salisbury Plain. Their quarry is the rook, which, in
early spring on those open downs, with no mean powers of
wing (witness its evolutions in a wind sometimes) and aided by
a most sagacious brain, with plenty of law, makes a substitute
to-day, though a very poor one, for the noble heron of the past.
The hawks of the Old Hawking Club accounted for no less than
258 rooks in the spring of 1890. They are taken about from
place to place in a van, and the falconers are all well mounted
and ride very hard. Rook-hawking is thus performed, to entire
perfection :—

The nearest approach to a heron flight that I have ever seen,
occurred in this wise. In October, 1889, my old grouse hawk,
“Lady Jane,” was waiting on at a height so great, that
though she is upwards of three feet across from tip to tip of

55

expanded wings, she appeared in the sky, like a pin’s head,
over the moor, the dogs being unable for some time to find her
a grouse. Presently they stood, and on the men moving
forward to put them up for her, I perceived her in the act of
stooping. I called out, to prevent their purpose, and fixed my
glasses on the hawk expecting to see her in pursuit of other
grouse, raised accidentally. Presently she was down, and
instantly engaged with some large bird, which I deemed, and
the men asserted to be a carrion crow. As it looked large and
light-coloured, I said, “‘ then it is a hoody (Royston) crow ;” but
in a moment, as the excited couple rose high in air—at it ding
dong—I knew it was no crow. No; none of that ignoble
brood, ever flew, or held the air, like this strange quarry, which,
in a few seconds more, I made out to be “ Nwmenius arquata,”
the common or long-billed curlew. I know no instance of this
grand flier, having been taken by a trained hawk, and it is
generally deemed beyond the power of any such. Of course it
is occasionally slain by a wild falcon; but then, doubtless, the
worst wild falcon is far before the best trained one, and if
inclined and meaning it, can take most fowls that wing the
air with more or less ease. My poor trained bird (I should add,
the best I have ever had of her sex) was in very indifferent
plumage then, but she stuck to her work for more than twenty
minutes, during the whole of which time the curlew (in
desperate earnest) was quite unable to get away from her.
Stoop succeeded stoop, and, as I thought, too rapidly; and
when it is considered that the sole effort of the curlew was to
avoid the deadly blow, and mount higher than her adversary
after its failure, and that every failure placed the stooping falcon
60 yards and more below the curlew, rapidly mounting on the
best of wings, and that she had to regain her position, and get
100 yards above her hoped-for quarry, before she could again
return to the attack, the courage, ability, and perseverance
with which she kept at it, until both were out of sight of
two of the best pair of eyes I have known, fairly astonished
me. My excellent field glasses still shewed me two little
black dots in the clear blue sky: the falcon even then repeating

=}

56

her unavailing efforts, by ringing widely against the wind,
and so mounting laboriously over the curlew, whose upward
progression was accomplished by the most extraordinary
bounds (I can call her movements nothing else) I ever saw.
Only two, of these many stoops, “told” all through this long
contest. Twice I saw the curlew knocked round and up, and
twice her feathers floated in the air like tiny dust; but the
harm done was not enough, and the two dots finally separated,
and the disappointed falcon was slowly recalled to us (though
she needed no “ lure,” and seldom or never gets one shown, as
she is perfectly willing to stay and work with us. It may be
of interest to remark, that on looking round, we saw the pointer
and setter (which on another occasion stood for half an hour
by the watch) were still “‘on the point; ’’ and when the hawk
came over, still at a vast elevation, the long-suffering dogs were
relieved. The grouse (three or four) were sprung, and ‘ Lady
Jane,” tired as she was, stooped and killed one with her usual
ease. Needless, I hope, to say she did not go hungry to bed
that night, for want of a meal on grouse! We were all con-
vinced, that, with a companion to help her, (two falcons are
always flown together at a heron, as two greyhounds are usually
slipped at a hare), the curlew would have been taken in five
minutes, and with such a complete suit of new and good
feathers as the old falcon now possesses, I should myself
be very sorry indeed, to be a curlew in front of her. Shall
I mention again a singular flight I once saw worked at a
woodeock? This bird, when put to it, possesses remarkable
powers of flight, as its extended migrations, and splendid shape
and length, of wing, abundantly warrant. It occurred in this
wise, in October, 1866. I found myself, with hawks (eyesses),
dogs, gillies, a keeper, and my gun, on the moor near the
western end of Loch-Hil, in Argyl, at a place called Fassiefern,
not far from the place where Prince Charlie met his devoted
Highland clansmen in arms for his crown, only to lose the
day, and their lives, at fatal, and bloody, Culloden. I made
a line to beat out a wide bank of bracken, then brown with
early autumn, and saw a bird which I believed then to be

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57

a cock, and the keeper, a winged grouse, jump upin front. Had
I but had the courage of my convictions, and put my favorite
falcon, called “ Taillie” from her broken tail—a Welsh hawk
she, from the Glamorgan precipices, of the Worms Head, aloft,
then she would have probably been saved much trouble, and we
should have lost a glorious sight, and flight, for the day was
stilly, bright, and lovely, and the sea loch and its waves sparkled
in the sun. No; I took her on my fist, and struck her hood in
readiness, half disposed to believe in McPhee the gamekeeper.
Just where I saw the bird spring, suddenly up went a fine
woodcock. No winged bird she, but in full possession of the
excellent pair, that had not long before, brought her, (I suppose,
for we do not know) from Finland, or elsewhere in the North,
to Argyl. I unhooded and cast “Taillie” after her, and the
flight began. This woodcock would have much astonished
sportsmen only used to their actions in a thick cover. Up and
up she went in long zig-zags, and precisely the style and action
of her small relative, Scolopax Gallinago, the common snipe, but
mute. The falcon mounted rapidly in her train, though at a
considerable disadvantage at first. I saw it was going to be a
long affair, got out my glasses, and lay down on the heather,
and on one side, was my then falconer, Jamie Barr, one of
the well-known family of Scotch falconers. There were once
a father and three sons of that name (all falconers by
profession), with most acute and trained vision, and on the
other side the proud possessor of the best pair of eyes in
all Argyl, if not in the West of Scotland—the so-called
“‘foxhunter’s ” son, my gillie, Sandy Kennedy. This man got
much employment in seeking sheep lost on the hills and moun-
tains, and long practice had rendered his ancestral eyesight
(his father’s had been as good) equal to most glasses on the
moor. The woodcock, with the falcon below and behind her, did
not dare to come down or return—vestigia nulla retrorswm was
her motto—and soon the pair of dots were high over the sea
loch, there a mile wide, the cock’s point being evidently Morven,
on the other side of the strait. Soon I called out, “I can
see but one.” Presently from Barr came—“ I canna see them;”’

58

from Kennedy, “I ken ’em fine!” I hardly believed he could,
for my own eyes were then far above the average, and aided by
the best of Voightlcendevr’s field glasses, it was as much as I could
do. Presently, methought, that the single dot in the sky, which
I still discerned, became, instead of fainter, faintly more visible.
“They are coming back,” quoth Kennedy ; and before long the
spot had visibly increased, and the falconer Barr declared that
he saw them once more. So did we, and so did all, before long,
for the woodcock, finding herself over the water, and unable to
shake off her pursuer, or gain the distant haven of Morven, had
no alternative but to seek the shelter of the bracken on our
side, from whence she sprang; so the poor fowl turned tail, and
“went for it” in a long slanting descent from an incredible
altitude. As they both neared us, they presented the appear-
ance of two little balls falling out of the sky right towards us,
and quite straight, with the difference (fatal to the poor
woodcock) that “ Taillie,” that began below her, was now well
above. The hawk was evidently unwilling or afraid to stoop
over the water, but the moment the cock was over the land she
shot herself forward, and straight in air, instead of slanting,
half perpendicularly down, like her quarry (both moving with
incredible speed) turned over, and stooped. No one knows the
speed of a falcon’s stoop, but it must be very great, as I have seen
it bring a hawk up to old grouse flying hard down wind, just as
though they had been sitting still, with absurd ease, if only she
be but high enough. Anyhow, it was fatal this time to the wood-
cock, for, leaving a cloud of feathers behind, she tumbled head
over heels before us, into the very patch of bracken she came
from, and meeting there with an old ant hill, bounded off it,
many a yard, and lay still. The hawk soon recovered herself, and
dashed on to her well-earned quarry. Needless to say, I did not
disturb her thereon, but served out the whiskey, and drank her
health, all round. Then we, too, set to work at our lunch,
and when this very tame pet hawk, had nearly done hers, I
went to her and took her up, and having replaced the swivel in
her jesses, and the leash in her swivel, and cleaned her feet, and
wiped her beak, and kissed her, I fastened her to a stone in a

ii ROP 44.)

A edi te rts Pee

FOS YT. © ~~ =08

:

59

lonely burn hard by, and witnessed her bathe and dry herself
in the sun, preening her feathers to her own (and our) entire
satisfaction, and I trust to the satisfaction of the readers
of my tale.

As I presume that the account of flights will be found more
amusing, if not more interesting, than the drier details of
training a hawk, I am induced to try to describe a flight at
our finest bird of game—Tetrao lagopus—the well-known red
erouse of the British Islands. This fine bird, in the practical
absence of flights (save very occasional ones) at the heron, the
wild duck, and the woodcock, is certainly now (in my opinion, at
Iéast) the best flight remaining to “Modern Falconry.” A
most sporting bird, and, like Sir John Falstaff, the cause
of sport to others, endowed with strength, wildness, great
speed, and endurance, fairly plentiful, prized by all (especially
as an article of diet by the Peregrine!) and above all, to
be found and found only on the open moor—what better
quarry can a falconer wish? His falcon wishes for no better.
A grouse is entirely to her mind at all times, and she does her
very best when flying it. As long as grouse will sit to the
point of a dog—in some few parts of Scotland for a month in
the season; in my own case, in Northumberland, about two
days only—(though I have known them packed and inaccessible
on the 12th August!) we use dogs to find them, setters being
generally preferred, though my best hawk’s dog has been a
pointer for many years. Dogs used for this purpose, are trained
to range out very far and wide, and to be very staunch on
the point. I have known some, fully half an hour thus
motionless, or perhaps lying down at last like a dropper. (In
my young days dogs bred between pointer and setter frequently
used to “‘ drop” on the point ; nowadays very few setters ever
do so or “set,” and a great improvement it is.) On coming to
a firm point, I usually turn a fine glass on the dog, and as we
know each dog’s actions well on game, we can usually dis-
tinguish a point at game, from one where game has only been.
Grouse leave a strong scent, except in the middle of the day.
The report being favourable, off goes the hood, and the hawk

60

(let us call her “Lady Jane Grey,” my good old favourite
passage falcon of eight years’ service, the very highest mounter
I have ever seen fly in thirty years of it) is off my own or my
servant’s fist, the rest of the hawks that day to be employed
being carried by their attendant on the “cadge.” This is
depicted in Landseer’s “Return from Hawking.” It is a
wooden frame, very light, with four legs (those of mine
shut up on springs when required), the sides are padded, all
four of them. The man steps inside, when the hawks have
been secured to the sides, on which they stand. A pair
of braces are crossed over his shoulders, and taking hold
with each hand of one of the wooden sides, at a handle placed
in the middle thereof, he and his charges accompany the
hawking party all day long. In less time than I have employed,
since mentioning ‘“‘ Lady Jane” last, we may confidently hope
that she has made the best use of her time, and ascended to a
ereat altitude, either against the wind and then returning to
us, or in a calm day beating up, and up, with regular beatings
of her wings, in wide circles. This fine flier, at her best, will
often mount too high, if possible. At least, she has occasionally
gone up clean out of sight of eyes, however good, and field glass
also, in clear blue sky; but the game being found by the dog,
we are able to exhibit it to her just when we please. ‘ Now,
sir, now!” says James Rutford, my falconer, always impatient,
“she is high enough, plenty.” ‘ Do let her have it, Fisher,”
says some equally impatient friend. But I do like to see a
hawk high, and keep them often waiting. It is not well to
cause an impatient, or low flying, or young inexperienced hawk
to wait long. They straggle off, and eventually get badly served,
if at all. The hawk, to x1~tu game, is one that knows her busi-
ness, knows the dog and what his point means, as well as he does,
and will not leave him, on any account. Not “ Lady Jane.”
No “lure” needed for her. The standing dog is her “lure,”
and before long, with a falconer’s shout, James has at length
gone up to the dog and put up what grouse are before him.
Let no one think that grouse care much for a hawk over them,
after a time or two. They certainly do lie the better for her

ee ee 8 ee

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presence on the moor, but later on, in the season, they wont
have it, from the dog, at all. We then cast off a steady hawk
on reaching any likely place, or even on coming into sight of a
likely place, as the shaking of a plaid will cause wild grouse to
rise many hundred yards ahead. Well, the grouse have risen,
and one of them for the very last time, for here comes down
“Lady Jane”? Would that I could describe that singular
stoop of hers better. It appears to begin, by her throwing her-
self forward, some,—probably many,—yards, then over she turns,
and head foremost she flies down earthwards, moving her wings
rapidly with the most singular swiftness. Let the grouse rise
wild—let them even come unexpectedly over a hill and under
the hawk, and she is round, and down, and into the flying pack,
or covey, with ease, that seems portentous to men used to their
approach down wind, towards their huts, in a drive. ‘“‘ Lady
Jane’s”’ stoop generally brings her down, a few yards behind her
quarry: occasionally, but not often, on it. More commonly she
becomes level, almost too quickly for eye to follow, and in-
stantly is with the grouse she desires. *Tis all over with the poor
thing then. A cloud of feathers, the sound of a heavy blow—
if you were near enough to hear—and the grouse (dead, I think,
very often, then) is hurled many a yard through the air, and falls
on the ground. If this ground should be hard, I have seen a
grouse so struck, down wind, bound again (in one case 18 yards)
as they do when shot dead from the butts in a breeze. The blow
is given by the falcon’s strong hind talon on each foot, usually as
sharp as a needle, and driven at great speed by a bird weighing
2 lbs. This blow is not to be despised. No hawk that stoops
from a very lofty pitch can clutch or grasp her prey: she
rushes upwards like a ball from a trap, a couple of gunshots
high, turns over, and is on the grouse at once. There she sits,
and with two or three powerful bites the grouse is literally
decapitated, his head constantly lying beside him. The head
and the neck (though too much, I know) are usually ‘“ Lady
Jane’s” reward after every kill. She can kill four such grouse
in a day—three are, however, enough; and she will be well fed
on the last old grouse we may have taken, after her third

62

successful, or in fact unsuccessful flight. I may mention here
that I was once walking on the banks of the river Orrin, when
I rented Glenorrin and Glengowrie, in Argyl, and put up three
grey hens, old birds, and stouter and larger far than red
grouse. Down came a wild falcon, at the bird in the middle.
I saw and heard the blow. The grey hen staggered on, leaving
the usual tribute of feathers, behind her; up rose the falcon in
the grand and stately style so few trained hawks can ever adopt
or regain—so much do they lose by captivity ; over and down
she came, and down fell the quarry as though she had had an
ounce bullet through her. Down went my long rod, and off
went I. My distant shout sent off this falcon, though I fully
believe “Lady Jane” is ever well pleased, to see James
or I come up, approves highly of shouting, and will at any
moment leave a grouse and jump on the fist for the least bit
of meat and sometimes for none at all. I took possession,
somewhat meanly I trow, of the wild bird’s prey. This is what
I found she had done to it: the three first ribs on one side, were
cut clean through, and separated from the back bone, as by a
chop with a heavy knife, and strong hand, and one talon had
gone on and split the base of the skull, from which the brains
exuded !

Later on in the season, when grouse are wild, and full-
grown, fine, birds, say in October, the sport is the best. We
then make a wide line of five or six men abreast, and eighty
yards or more apart, the man bearing the hawk being usually
in the centre. He casts her off, and directly she is aloft a
whistle or hand wave, and wemove on. A dog ranges wide, but
is not much attended to, as he seldom now gets much chance
to point. Now is the time to see the grouse fly. Rising wild,
and good at either cutting through a head wind, with driving
wing, and close compact body, or careering down it, their
pace is good. A Yorkshire keeper, seeing a hooded hawk for
the first time with me, laughed the idea of her catching one to
scorn. ‘She canna speed the buds,” quoth he; though she soon
undeceived him as to this. Grouse are sure to be found sooner
or later, for though sadly packed I have always plenty. The

63

stoop comes from a high altitude generally, and much more time
having been afforded her the falcon, she either slays the grouse,
or “puts it in.” Every creature I know, and I believe every
insect, has some peculiar way (peculiar to its tribe) of escaping
from itsenemies. . Grouse, at all events, possess plenty of brains
in their small heads, and shift in air, from the stoop, towards the
end of the season, by a singular spring or shoot upwards, a few
inches before the hawk’s talon can touch them. Very much
surprised she usually seems at this mancuvre. Their usual
method is, however, to stop dead short, in their most rapid
flight, and hurl themselves to the ground instantly. This
should be seen to be at all believed. The very first time I ever
saw it performed, close to me, was over the stony and rocky
bed of a burn, into which an old cock grouse hotly pursued
precipitated himself. Well, he has done it now, methought—a
clear case of suicide. I'll pick up the little there can be left of
him. I marked the very spot; no grouse, no blood; not
a feather about. No; but to my astonishment up jumped
a grouse, well and strong, from the stone at my foot. Down
came the disappointed but now rejoicing hawk; and I have
just wiped my pen, on a pen wiper, ornamented by R. Ward,
with the stuffed head of a fine old Cheshire grouse killed by
this falcon “Islay,” belonging to my friend, the Rev. George
Karle Freeman (“ Peregrine” of the Field newspaper) in the
first week of December. If I add that my grouse have
developed a strange habit of flying into thick cover of young
and old fir trees on the moor, like black game, but unlike tetrao
lagopus, I have done with this fine sporting quarry. My
eyess falcon, “ Lundy,” six years old, killed in 1885, 70
partridges, and in 1889 64 grouse and a teal. The partridge is
a jolly little fowl, though not to be compared with the denizen
of the heather. (I have usually three covies of partridges on
my moor, where they appear to feed on the seeds of a rush, and
are smaller and darker than the type.) I hawked them
regularly for many years on the open downland arable expanse
of South Wilts, using good dogs, and possessing two of the best
partridge hawks—tiercels or males, and nestling peregrines—

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possible. Of course it is indispensable to possess or rent a
sufficient quantity of suitable ground, well stocked with
partridges, and the right to preserve them upon it: 2,000 or
3,000 acres is quite necessary, if not more, for good sport and
success. The fixed idea that “ hawking drives birds off the
land” is everywhere prevalent, and utterly unremoveable.
This prejudice militates heavily, against even renting grouse, or
partridge ground, for our present purpose. It happens to be a
perfectly incorrect idea, from a common sense point of view,
but it is useless to attempt to discuss it, nor will I write about
it here. Suffice it to say that the constant presence of two or
more wild peregrine falcons, living very much indeed on my
own and neighbours’ partridges, not only never drove our
numerous partridges away, but was not thought to do so;
whereas two or three miserably inferior tame hawks, not to be
named in the same week, with the wild ones, with reference to
their ability to take partridges, were believed to drive all our
game away. Luckily it did not. On the contrary, when hard
shot, it was our neighbour’s lands that were bare, whilst ours,
being kept quiet from the report of the gun, were a land of
plenty (for partridges) to our great content, and I hope to
our neighbour’s disgust. But they stuck to their text just the
same !

Every single flight, even at partridges, throughout the day
differs considerably from its predecessor and its successor. The
two best days I can remember were twelve partridges one day
and fourteen on the next (both in October). I once remember
killing a partridge with a nearly perfect game hawk called
“ Lundy,” from his birthplace in the Bristol Channel, and who,
before a bad neighbour killed him, to deliver a pigeon from his
clutches, had taken more than 400 partridges in his four years of
service, besides two kestrels, some falcons being desperately
fond of going at any wild hawk. This little fellow had done
enough one day, when a neighbour’s keeper came up and asked
to see a flight. Too late, said I, the other hawks being fed up.
Just then the dog employed, a ceaseless worker and finder, came
to a dead point in some high clover. Quite forgetting what I

65

was about [ struck the hawk’s hood and cast him off, but to my
horror with his swivel in his jesses, and the leash, a yard and a
. quarter long, and its button attached and dangling down. Few
hawks, I hope, thus adorned or encumbered, have ever been
asked to take partridges. But it seemed to make little differ-
ence to this old hand. Up he went in wide rings, and as fast,
apparently, as ever, with his ridiculous appendages, and when
high enough, the partridges were moved, and he stooped and
_ killed one (for the keeper) with little ado.

On another occasion, I may be said to have “shot at a
woodcock,” viz., a partridge, “and killed a crow,” viz., an old
female sparrow-hawk. This very unusual occurrence happened
on this wise. Late in the afternoon of an October day we
tried our last flight, using a powerful and very keen Irish
falcon called “Hrin.” She was very hungry, as usual,
and after a long wait, birds being scarce, got a bad chance
at distant partridges, and finally lost them in cover. The
only bird of any kind I had seen for half an hour previously
had been a female sparrow-hawk hunting for her supper,
and apparently not likely to get it. I lured up the hawk;
and “‘Here she comes,” I heard my servant cry. And
come she did; but in a moment, distant speck as she was,

_ my glass showed me her wings in the rapid action of desperate

_ speed, and not moving with the leisurely beat of a hawk coming
_ toa “lure,” which has no such attractions for her as the sight
_ of live quarry moving before her. What couldit mean? I felt
- convinced there were no partridges for half a mile, and I felt
- sure there was nothing else, save a wood pigeon, safe, in a distant
belt of Scotch firs. However, on came the falcon, straight for us,
(hence my man’s very natural mistake), and unmistakeably flying
something, for she passed very rapidly high over our heads,
utterly ignoring the offered “lure.” ‘‘ Whatever can it be?”
“Can’t imagine, sir.” Right in front of us, 300 yards off, and
- high in air, was the sparrowhawk, the only bird in sight, and
_ I felt convinced that the falcon, absurd as it seemed, was bent on
her capture! So I got on my horse (we always have one out,
and near) and rode off. And well I did, for I saw one of the

66

finest flights I ever have seen, wrought out entirely by strength
of wing and good footing, high in air, between two birds of
prey. No cover—not a twig—for an immense distance; her
wings alone the only hope, the old tyrant of small birds, then
possessed. Do what she would in the way of flying, within a
short time the falcon was high above her, and round and down,
in her first stoop. A clever shift, and the falcon was far below
her, and the sparrow-hawk fifty yards nearer the distant firs.
Another, and yet another stoop, all cleverly evaded; then passion
seemed to seize the falcon, for she ringed up to twice the height
she had hitherto deemed necessary, poised herself for the half-
second required, and stooped. This time she did better, and a
cloud of feathers followed in the wake of her stroke. This
was a settler. She was soon again above her quarry, and the
next stoop struck it dead 100 yards above my head. The
sparrowhawk fell into high turnips, and there (by the sound of
her bell) I found the Irish falcon coolly eating her hard won
and revolting meal, in the shape of an old female sparrow-
hawk, the destroyer of thousands of larks, and small birds in her
many years of rapine, with her head lying by her side. I took
up this “Erin” and gave her something better to eat, for the
flight was worth that of a score of partridges, and went home
with the only sparrowhawk I ever saw or heard of as taken by
a trained falcon.

It may truly be said that the sparrowhawk at her best is
no such great flier, but I suppose it will be admitted that the
merlin can fly. Well, I have twice seen the before-mentioned
tame “Lundy” tiercel (with all the disadvantages of a tame
and captive hawk so largely deprived of the proper daily
exercise of his wings enjoyed by his wild congeners, who
have to catch their food, instead of having it given to them
at the block) engage with a wild merlin in the open, and each
time with conspicuous ability and success. In actual speed he
was much the better of the two, whilst his stooping and footing
(he being very fond of flying at any wild hawk he met) left little
to be desired. The first merlin escaped into cover, after getting
it hot for five minutes, by the skin of his teeth. On the second

1

“er

rR AP gl me T

Piatt Ree A

67

occasion, no cover being nigh, I really thought we should soon
have had to boast of that all but impossible feat—the capture
of a wild merlin bya tame falcon! Three times did the tiercel’s
stoop beat the merlin down, on his way to a distant hedge—his
only hope. I was mounted, and saw it well. The last of the
three stoops, sent the sweet little ladies’ hawk rolling on the
dusty clods, and had I but been up, he would never have got
into the hedge a foot in front of our “ Lundy” as he contrived
to do.

Pulling out the leaden weight attached by a rope to the
horse’s bit from its pistol holster above my left knee, which all
falconers use, and dropping it on the ground, I soon had the
merlin out, to be again instantly dashed into the hedge by the
tiercel. Time after time did I do this, till my men ran up, and
if we could then have kept our heads cool, the merlin must
have been ours (or “ Lundy’s”), for the hedge ended on the
open down, and once driven out there, the who-hoop would soon
have sounded for him, as it has for so many a magpie under the
self-same conditions! Alas (for us) we drove the merlin the
wrong way! towards a building and yard, ornamented—but not
then in owr eyes—by a fine walnut tree. The ill-used merlin
just managed to get from the end of the hedge into the middle
of the walnut tree, which we were all far too done, to climb.
Needless to say, he was utterly indifferent to shouts, stones,
and sticks, as well he might be. And there we left him, quit
for the fright; for of course I turned a deaf ear to the vile
proposition of the bailiff, to lend me his gun. This proposition
seemed awful to me, and strangely enough, perhaps, for we had
but just before, been moving heaven and earth, to catch the said
merlin, by foot of another falcon! And there we will leave
“ Lundy,” whose performances as a game hawk I have seldom
seen surpassed. I saw him in Ireland once strike down no less
than three grouse out of one covey, at one time, and found him
with the third in his foot, and he wound up his day by joining
a wild female peregrine, and going three or four miles away
seaward with her. My man got him down to a pigeon eventu-
ally, and brought him home. If I say that I have many times

F 2

68

seen this little hawk strike down two partridges out of the same
covey in Gloucestershire, I think we may admit that he, at
least, did his best for ‘‘ Modern Falconry.”

One more specimen of Gloucestershire partridge hawking,
and I have done. Long ago, I was using a very steady old
pointer, my man carrying “ Tigress,” and I ‘“ Blanche,” two
good eyess falcons. ‘‘ Blanche” being specially fond of me,
but of no man else, no one else could use her, for no one else
could take her up, nor would she feed on my servant’s hand,
though she knew him well. In my absence her food had to be
given to her on the ground at block, or on her perch. The dog
had found birds in high turnips. I cast off ‘‘ Blanche,” who
was soon very high, and we two leisurely went up to the dog,
who was standing. The dog was her “lure,” and she followed
him regularly, high over his head. When within twenty
yards of the dog up got a fine covey, and down came the falcon.
She picked up a partridge in her foot (a partridge is nothing
for a falcon, and is easily carried even by a tiercel) and took it
under a distant hedge. ‘ Blanche” was so fond of me that she
never would eat until I came up to her, and very seldom would
even kill her quarry, if she thought I was absent. I forgot this,
and saying to my man, “ That’s the sort of hawk,” I pointed her
out with my gloved left hand. In a moment “ Blanche” let
the partridge go; the poor thing dashed off apparently quite
unhurt ; and in a moment the hawk was on my glove and look-
ing up in my face. I confess I felt like a fool, though I could
not help feeling also pleased with my pet, so I rewarded her
well, and walked about feeding her (we did not intend to use her
again that day, and “feed up” when that determination is
made). I did this leisurely, the day being fine; finally put her
to rights—swivel into jesses, leash into swivel—wiped her beak,
and put on her hood. As it was now the turn of the other
falcon, “Tigress,” I thought of the dog for the first time,
expecting to see old “Don” at the heels of my servant, as
usual after aflight. Not asignof him! “James, where is the
dog all this time?” ‘‘ Haven’t an idea, sir.’ ‘‘ Good gracious!
look for her, and whistle.” No result. The matter being

69

serious—for Gloucestershire partridge hawking needs the best
of dogs, and best of work, to killi—my trusty friend, my field
glass, was put to work, also with no result for some time. At
last it shewed me (fields are large at Coates, and near the
College Farm) a white speck in the deep turnips, which a bright
idea struck me resembled ‘“‘Don’s” nose! A nearer view
thereof, confirmed the fact, and “Tigress” was rapidly divested
of her swivel, leash, and hood, and set going. She, too,
mounted well in the breeze, and we retraced our steps, after
half an hour’s absence, to the very place from which our first
flight had started. There stood the pointer, just as before, and
as he had all along been standing, though we had heeded him
not, and at the self-same birds. Of course the birds that rose
for “Blanche” had not been his birds, for directly this hawk
came well up and over (she cared little for me or anyone, and
all we got out of her had to be extorted) right in front of old
“Don,” we raised another fine covey, one of which speedily fell
- into “Tigress’s” hands, and eventually into ours, for we did

not again find a hawk willing to let it go, as I never had before,
and never shall have again.

I will but add one more incident in the too short life
of this charming hawk “Blanche,” who killed my first wild
grouse, before my delighted eyes, on the Bala mountains, and
_ I will bring this long record of nothings to an end.

Suppose the same two of us, master and man, and near the
_ same place, on the same errand, on a lovely serene late autumn
day, just outside a huge cover near Sapperton and Pimbury
Park. Kept too long on the wing for half a mile, in hope of
_ the birds “ Fan” could not, or would not find, and rendered
desperate by a final false point, off set “ Blanche” over the
wooded valley in pursuit apparently of some wood pigeon or
magpie unseen. The country, unlike the Wilts Downs, is
hopeless in this case. No view to be had, nor any means of
getting one. ‘We have done it now.” “No use seeking
her; I shall sit down and eat my lunch.” And so I did, with
my back to a gate, and a lovely field of white clover in front,
full of its sweet perfume in the pleasant air, I enjoyed

70

my repast, and said so. Not so my grumbling attendant, who
declared he could not eat for thinking of his sufferings there on
the morrow morning, when his duty would be to come up by
the first train to seek the lost hawk, or to sleep at Tetbury
Road Station, which he dreaded more. Lost hawks, of which I
shall not here treat, are, as I think they were in old days and
in all climes, the bane of modern falconry! I had finished
my lunch; my man had finished his pipe; and “ Fan” had
finished the scraps. We were thinking of leaving for the
railway station, whence we had come in the morning, for ’tis no
use seeking a lost hawk in a series of deep wooded valleys—she
must be sought when soaring high in air, looking out for her-
self, above or outside of such country—when I heard a hawk’s
bell sound, and instantly, with a swish of her wings, lo
“Blanche” on the top of the gate-post over my head! I
had not found her—she had found me, as in fact she always
did, and as I was sure she would, unless she had killed, as I
was afraid in this case she had, from her protracted absence :
and to this day I do not know that she had not. It was certain
she had not fed, however, by the look of her; so taking
a partridge she had killed earlier in the day out of the bag, I
flung it out to her close by, and she in her turn took her lunch,
or, as our forefathers said, “her pleasure ” thereon, the old dog
crawling gently up to her and licking her feet.

Here my “paper” must needs come to an end. No one
can this time, call it an untimely one; and in the length
to which it has attained the writer admits he has taken
full satisfaction, for the hurry of the Lecture Theatre. He
regrets that this is not enough. Satisfaction should be given
to readers and sportsmen alike; and he honestly believes that
actually seeing, and taking part, in a well-managed, and suc-
cessful flight, with a trained hawk is needed, to interest
members of the Cotteswold Naturalists Field Club in so strange
a pursuit as ‘“‘ Modern Falconry.”

The frontispiece to this Paper, copied from one of Wolf's
‘illustrations in “ Knox’s Game Birds and Wild Fowl,” is used
with the permission of Messrs Gurney & Jackson, successors to
- Mr Van Voorst, the publisher of the late Mr Knox’s works,

1 Paternoster Row.

The Minerals of Gloucestershire : Observations on Celestite, read at
Gloucester, January 25th, 1890, by Frepx. Smuirue.

In the Proceedings of the Cotteswold Naturalists Field
Club for 1881—1882, at page 30, will be found a Paper written
by the President, entitled, ‘On the Minerals of Gloucestershire,

_ “with part of the adjacent counties of Somersetshire and Wor-

“ cestershire, compiled by Mr W.C. Lucy; also a list of Derived
“ Rocks found in the Northern Drift Gravel over the same area,
“by Mr W. C. Lucy.” This Paper includes a list of Minerals
from the neighbourhood of Bristol, by EK. Wethered, F.G.S., &c.,
of Cheltenham, in which is included the mineral Celestite, and
its allied species, Baryto-celestite. This paper was followed, in
the next number of the Proceedings (1883—1884) by a com-
munication, at page 112, with the title, “On the occurrence of
“the mineral Vivianite in the Cotteswolds, with remarks by
“Fredk. Smithe, &c.”’ So far it seems thus clear that Mr
WETHERED is quite correct in citing the mineral Celestite as
being in the neighbourhood of Bristol; but it is on the Somer-
setshire side of the Avon, and for this reason the author of this
paper scrupled to include it in a list compiled by him of the
Minerals of Gloucestershire, although he has had a specimen in
his possession of the Celestite, from Pyle Hill, for over 30
years. This specimen came out of the Red Marls of Pyle Hill,
just where the Avon separates it from the county of Gloucester;
in other words, the mineral occurs on the Somersetshire side of
the river at Bedminster, and at Pyle Hill. It is a pleasure now,
not only to record Celestite in the list of Gloucestershire
minerals, but also to claim its ally, Baryto-celestite, found lately
at Clifton, and onward to the North of Bristol through the
Midlands, as undoubtedly occurring in no small quantity in
some places, which we will mention.

72

Derams.—Celestine, 1815. W. Philips. Outlines of
Mineralogy and Geology (1818).
In this mineral, strontian, combined with sulphuric acid,

has obtained the name of celestine (celestis, celestial) from its ©

delicate tint of light blue.

Celestite is a word altered by Dana, from Celestine, and is
a native sulphate of strontian (SrO. SO3.) The word Celestite
appears to be superseding the older form, Celestine, and since
it has been adopted in the mineralogical collection of the
British Museum, Kensington, we employ it here; for Dana
justly remarks that words terminating in ine are chemical, and
should be restricted to the science of chemistry.

The tint of Celestite is generally of a cool blue, but this is
not invariably the case: often it is colourless; frequently
reddish; or again of a yellowish hue, which is sometimes varied
by a charming iridescence, or glancing play of light. Touching
the blue crystals, Wittstein finds that the colour is due to a
trace of phosphate of iron ; whilst Mr Stoddart, of Bristol, could
not discover it in the pale blue crystals from Clifton. This may
be explained by the fact that the Jena Celestite analysed by
Wittstein is of a peculiarly dark blue fibrous kind. Neither
strontium nor its oxide is met with in nature: the two minerals
having that metal as its base are the carbonate of strontium
(Strontianite) and the sulphate of strontium (Celestite). Stron-
tianite occurs principally in Saxony and Westphalia in veins
in cretaceous strata, now mined on the large scale as a
source of caustic strontia, which is used for recovering sugar
from molasses in refining. Celestite occurs normally in modi-
fied rhombic crystals, not infrequently flattened or tabular,
also in long prismatic needles, more especially in specimens
from Sicily—and in fibrous or massive varieties; but rarely in
a granular form. Further on we shall refer to some erratic
forms peculiar to the celestites of the sulphur deposits of
Sicily.

Disrrisurion.—In the South of England the mineral in
question is but little known; say on the other side of Bristol,
though it has been reported from Weston-super-Mare and

ae) ry

73

Watchet, in Somersetshire. The fine crystallized specimens
for which Bristol was famous came from Pyle Hill, close by
the station, but south of the line, where the Celestite was
found by the workmen in considerable quantity, just below the
datum line, when making the Bristol and Exeter Railway and
goods sidings, and at a spot which will never be opened again.
My old friend, Professor Etheridge, informs me that of all the
best crystals, large pale blue tinted specimens, some are in the
Museum of Natural History at Bristol, but probably the largest
from that locality adorn the collection of the Museum of
Practical Geology in Jermyn Street, London.

Leaving Pyle Hill, and crossing the Avon, we are in
Gloucestershire, where, on Durdham Down, in 1874, some
curious forms of blue crystals of Celestite were obtained from
fissures in the Carboniferous Limestone.

At Clifton, which is near Durdham Down, large quantities
of Celestite were, later on, thrown up whilst excavating for
house foundations and drains between Alma and Oakfield
Roads; and at Cotham. The mineral was also found in small
quantities when making the Clifton Station Railway cuttings.
The late Mr Tawney, M.A., F.G.S., published an account of
this with full particulars ; and since that time a valuable paper
has been written by Mr Norman Collie, Student in the Chemical
Laboratory of University College, Bristol, with the title, “On
“the Celestine and Baryto-celestine of Clifton.”* It is interest-
ing to notice in this paper the information that Celestite has
long been known as one of the most abundant minerals in the
neighbourhood of Bristol. Also that, “in works written at the
“beginning of the century, Bristol is mentioned as one of the
“few localities where it might be found.” (page 292.)

In an account sent me in 1875 by Mr E. B. Tawney, he
refers to the celestite at Aust in these words :—“In the Aust
“« Cliff section the Red Marls, which come in below the Green
“Marls, are given by Sir Henry de la Beche as 102 feet thick.
“They here contain a great abundance of gypsum, both in

® Proceedings of the Bristol Naturalists’ Society, New Series, Vol. IT.,
Part III. (1878-79.)

74

“irregular strings, lying at all angles, and in lumps in layers.
“Tn one of the faults in this cliff is a vein of a pale bluish
“Celestite ; this mineral is abundant in the marls, both at
“Bitton and Wickwar.” Passing from the Keuper Marls of
Aust Cliff, we come to the mineral discovered in considerable
quantities in the vicinity of Yate, whence it has been largely
extracted ; the finest crystals of the Celestite from this neigh-
bourhood were yielded by the limestone, in cavities and fissures.
Some are massive: others in large crystals of modified rhombs,
tabular and often of ruddy hue. Specimens of fine crystals
from this part have been kindly given to the Gloucester
Museum by Mr Madan, M.A., &c., of Exeter College, Oxford ;
and to the British Museum by Lord Ducie, whose scientific
knowledge enabled him to develop at Yate the industrial ex-
traction of the mineral. At Wickwar the specimens show
small reddish crystals, comparatively poor, and often of a
saccharine character, owing to unfavourable thermic conditions.
At Tortworth, Celestite is but sparsely produced ; and passing
northward from this district occurs in lesser or greater quan-
tities, both in the limestones along the course of the red
marls as far as Northampton, and Elton, near Nottingham ;
again appearing at Knaresborough in Yorkshire ; also in North
Britain at Carlton Hill, by Edinburgh, where it is to be met
with in the marly shale and limestones that have been upheaved
by the protrusion of igneous rock; and again at Tantallon in
East Lothian, in the vicinity of trap rocks.

The distribution may be now further extended to other
parts of Europe, that by the short notes given, and the foreign
situations cited, the general range may be approached.

In France, this mineral is obtained at Condorcet on the
Dréme. The specimens thence are mostly from marls and
limestones, and are in hard compact masses, forming the gangue
of the rocks, which is 5 métres in thickness, consisting of
gypsum and marl.

Other places are—St. Béat in the Department of the
Garonne, where it is embedded in sulphur; and at Meudon it is
found in chalk flints,

75

At Montmartre, near Paris, it is in compact nodules, with
small needle-like crystals.

In the eastern part of France it is obtained in blue fibrous
masses in the lower chalk, or “‘ Neocomien.”

In Germany, at Dornberg, near Jena, where there is a blue
fibrous variety found in layers; and tabular crystals fill up the
crevices of the rock. At Jena we have a blue variety of
Celestite, which is pleochroic, occurring in marly limestone.

In Wurtemburg it pervades the Ammonite Beds.

At Weser, in the Oolitic formation, it fills the interior of
fossil bivalves. Near Ratisbon, at Pschow, on the Danube, the
erystals in the limestone are of rich tabular combinations. At
Scharfenberg, near Meissen, it is yielded in the red marls.

In Hungary, near Herrengrund, in small blue crystals in
limestone. Celestite occurs also in the Tyrolese Alps.

In Italy, at Montecchio Maggiore, in amygdaloid rock; and
in Sicily in the sulphur marls in bands and courses, named
“ Strontian Zones.” The crystals are beautifully white, when
not pellucid, with sulphur and gypsum. The Girgenti Valley,
at Caltanissetta, at Lercara, at Catollica. Also in the Valleys
of Noto and Mazzaro. Asa matter of caution we observe that
no heed is to be given to the word Girgenti, for as in the case of
shells, the dealers are ready, when asked, to proffer the word
Singapore, when they do not know whence the shell came from,
so the Sicilian gives the name Girgenti to every specimen of
Celestite.

In Switzerland at Bex, and in Spain at Conil, fine crystals
are produced. In the Seisser Alps it is in lamellar or in
radiated nodules.

In North America and Canada: at Kington and at Stron-
tian Island, Lake Hrie, large well-formed but complicated
crystals. Dana gives the names of several other places in the
United States, and in the Dominion, where the mineral is
obtained.

In Africa, among others, may be mentioned Mokattam,
near Cairo: it occurs in the nummulitic limestones in large
crystals, and in groups inclosing nummulites, and other

76

remains of marine animals, which become exposed, owing to
the gradual erosion of the crystals by water—thus showing that
the mineral is soluble in water, and particularly soin brine. A
crystal with bright faces was eroded in the same manner as
those of Egypt, by immersion in a saturated solution of salt for
18 months. Many of our specimens from Yate, in Gloucester-
shire, in possession of the writer, are eroded in the same
manner as those from Egypt. On the faces of some of these
crystals the erosive action has left markings in the form of
elliptical rings of about two millimétres in the axis major:
these marks in most crystals containing water of crystallization
are caused by weathering.

The erosion begins by a dull spot forming on a face. This
gradually spreads in a circle, or an ellipse, until finally it
occupies the whole face. Pape,* who has investigated the
nature of these figures, finds that they are circles on crystals of
the cubic system, but on the faces of rhombic crystals like
Celestite, they are ellipses.

Baryto-CeLEstineE.—Baryto-celestine of Walterhausen, is
an amorphous combination of both sulphates of these minerals.
From Greiner, in the Tyrolese Alps, the proportions of the
bases of the mineral are—Celestite 4, Barytes 38. Another
locality for it is Imfeld in Binnenthal, in Switzerland, Jocketa
in Saxony, where it is near Dolomite in tale schists. Also (see
page 1) at Clifton, in Gloucestershire.

The number of places mentioned as having credit for the
productions of the Strontian mineral will be considered fairly
sufficient thus far, without multiplying instances; but one spot
in particular, namely, Sicily, seems to throw more light upon
the subject than any other named. Celestite is nearly always
accompanied by one or more associates, namely, gypsum,
sulphur, and salt; and in that island, owing to the workings in
the grey marls of Tertiary age, ample opportunities are offered
to the geologist or mineralogist such as are not found anywhere
else. From the first the island has been the scene of volcanic

* Juke’s Geology (Geikie’s edition), Weathering, page 45 ; also Pogg.
Annalen., Vol. CKXIV., p. 329 ; and Vol. CKXV., p. 513.

a
& j

ae

SAS ay ea oe

ages Ms rriat

Sage

77

activity, leaving features diversified by ancient igneous rocks
and modern Java flows, mud volcanoes still in action, tripoli
beds, deposits of salt, lime, sulphur, and bitumen.

The mud volcano, emitting nauseous gases, is in this con-
nection worthy of a passing note. Near Aragona Caldare, the
junction railway station for the Girgenti and Catania main line
in a quarter of a mile walk westward—is an interesting example
of the marshy condition, acted on by chemical and volcanic
forces. The hill on which this volcano is situated consists of
marly soil ; its dimensions are about 120 feet by 140 feet with a
cone on the summit of 2 to 3 feet, filled with liquid mud, which
gives off a stench more or less strong of hydrogen sulphide, or
carbon dioxide gas. The face of the country all around is
desolation—not a blade of grass to be seen. A writer sends
from Japan the following graphic description of a similar
voleano :—‘“‘ This volcanic mountain is bald, bleak, treeless,
“whitening beneath the masses of cinders with which it is
“covered. The mountain is burning, and there are pits of
“flaming sulphur on its side. Also in one place called Usen,
“are deep pools of boiling water; and one deeper, and indeed
“unfathomable, instead of being filled with water, is full of
“sulphurous mud, that seethes and bubbles, and rises and
“splutters, in a dark abyss, emitting all the while a horrible
“stench. The Japanese call it ‘The Mouth of Hell,’ and it is
“said that drops from it blister the skin.” Sicily has many
of these Maccalubi, as they are called: one of them near
Caltanissetta, is considered to be of Plioceneage. These indica-
tions will be seen to have a bearing upon subsequent remarks
tending to ascertain the age of the sulphur-bearing beds of marl,
which contain Celestite, and are known as the Strontian bands or
Celestite deposits. The age of the sulphur and of the Celestite
is the same; and we cannot help remarking that it is not an
uncommon error to suppose that all sulphur comes from vol-
canoes. The Strontian-bearing strata are known by their
peculiar yellowish colour, which probably represents banks of
old sulphur deposits, either very poor or destitute of sulphur.
“Tn such rare cases,” says Signor L. Baldacci, Engineer of the
Royal School of Mines at Rome, “the position of the Strontian

78

“beds is between the gypsum and the limestone proper. These
“beds are generally in proximity to the sea.” *

We now adduce observations upon examples of Celestite
from the rich mines of Lercara Friddi, lying to the N. West
of the Girgenti Valley, with shafts of about 300 or 400 feet
in depth driven through strata of Hocene age, and into light
erey marls. The Professor of Geology at the Royal University
of Palermo, Signor Gemmellaro, kindly assisted the writer, not
only in his examination of the valuable collections of fossils and
minerals of that institution, but directed him to visit the works
at Lercara, which he found valuable in respect of gaining in-
sight into the exploration of the formation. From specimens
thus procured, the first example will be from the Calcedone (a
miner’s name), which forms the spoil banks of the workings.
In one mine here about 800 men and boys are at work.

1.—Calcedone: very pale grey, in colour verging on white,
lamellated ; the layers are of gypsum and pale sulphur alter-
nately, in contact. The marl about from 6 millimétres in
thickness to double that. thickness, or more, the light sulphur
not more than from 1 to 2 millimétres in thickness, deposited
regularly in films. The Celestite forms a capping of a dull
white, and semi-crystallization, exactly like our ordinary loaf
sugar. This specimen is exceedingly instructive, showing
plainly the bubbling of the hydrogen sulphide gas depositing
the sulphur in films, and leaving the incipient crystals of
Celestite as the top layer, separating out from the sulphur,
which forms amorphous blebs or clots, and has not begun to
crystallize. The whole piece is traversed by vertical fissures,
ending in holes, through which the gas issued, and has traces
as of bubbles of sulphur bursting and leaving concave films of
that substance. It is clear that this marl was mud.

2.—Calcedone. This specimen discloses an action of a
slower character. It may be gathered from the bright canary
yellow of the sulphur, and the sharpness of its crystallization ;
also from the thickness of the gypsum and its indurated
condition, traversed by cracks, that in this piece the hydrogen

* “ Memorie Descrittive, e Descrizione Geologica Dell’Isola di Sicilia di
L. Baldacci, &c., &c., Roma.” Tipografia Nazionale, 1886, page 286.

aes

gered Th a ep eee

“Fr,

ail 7 =

79

sulphide forced its way through the harder material by passing
through cracks lateral and oblique in direction until it reached
a flat surface, where sulphur crystals formed of two kinds—one
of very pale colour, the other of a rich yellow. The Celestite
separates on the top from the matrix, leaving the sulphur, and
encrusts in fine incipient crystallization, or deposited in dots of
various sizes on the faces of the sulphur crystals.

3.—Celestite. A specimen typical of most of the Sicilian
mineral. Like the preceding examples, it came from the
Jacomini mines at Lercara Friddi, and from the workings in
the Hocene marls. It consists of Celestite and sulphur, with
some lime sulphate. This is stalactiticin growth. The sulphur
is bright canary yellow, in secondary crystals, moulding them-
selves upon and in the recesses and drusy cavities left by the
stalactites, which are calcareous, and covered with finely
semi-crystallized Celestite, whilst here and there, at irregular
distances, shoot forth radiate groups of stout pellucid rhombic
prisms of Celestite; others are more needle-like, studding the
surfaces unoccupied by the sulphur. Some of these stalactitic
forms are of surprising beauty, both in form and purity of
colour, and the prisms cross and recross in delightful confusion,
throwing out here and there obliquely-crossed prisms of the
mineral as braces to strengthen and gird the compound group

of Strontian, gypsum and sulphur.

4,—Is a specimen in the Royal University Museum at
Palermo, that throws no light upon the origin, but is unique
and distinctive, on account of its form and purity of colour.
We can only compare the shape of this fine example to that of
a hedgehog, through its resemblance to the oval form of that
creature, also the fact of a distinct and remarkable symmetry,
each lanciform-shaped crystal of equal length, and as truthful in
position as the spines of the hedgehog: the colour, of pearly
white and purity. This example was either from sulphur marls
at the Caltanissetta workings (of Pliocene age), or from those at
Lercara Friddi (of the Eocene).

Summary.—A close scrutiny of these specimens, taken in
connection with the physical character of the island in the
Tertiary epoch, say in the Pliocene era, also including the

80

climatic conditions, would lead us confidently to pronounce the
age of the sulphur marls to be that of the Congeria beds*—
before the appearance of Etna as a voleano—for the sedimentary
deposits in the environs of Etna are always covered up by lava
flows and volcanic products, and the oldest lavas and tuffs yet
recognised as from the massif of Ktna are superior to the con-
glomerates of quaternary age. This was a period of immense
upheaval of the coast, even to 3000 ft.: what is now hill and vale,
the scene of sulphur mining, was then on a level, or accessible to
the sea—a sea rich beyond conception in organic life—animal
and vegetable in profusion—seething under the torrid zone, and
yielding from its decomposition of organic matter the hydrogen
sulphide, which in the case of briny marshes or shallow lagoons,
oozed through the calcareous bottoms, depositing its sulphur
film by film, between each layer of brackish mud. The chlorine
decomposing the hydrogen sulphide, and the gases bubbling
through, both nascent hydrogen and the sulphides becoming
free, and their bases deposited in fine layers of sulphur, the
Celestite separating, and the hydrogen sulphide rising and
escaping by percolation, and, as an Italian geologist remarked,
each film of deposited sulphur may have taken a year in the
course of its precipitation. Organic matter has such an affinity
for oxygen that it decomposes peroxides, and reduces them to
protoxides, and so the presence of organic matter is the
reduction of sulphates to the state of sulphides. Celestite is
thus decomposed into strontian sulphide, which in water readily
gives strontian carbonate and hydrogen sulphide, and the latter
by oxydisation leaves a deposit of sulphur. The same process
applies to calcium as a base. Layers of Calcite, Celestite, and
sulphur have thus been formed in Sicily and elsewhere, as seen
in the deposits of Tertiary age, and throughout all geological
time where the same chemical conditions exist.

* These Congeria Beds are very peculiar brackish water deposits, like
those of the Aralo-Caspian seas. On these beds the City of Vienna is built.
For interesting particulars and explanations of this sub-division of the
foreign Tertiaries, consult Phillip’s Geology, the edition with the valuable
editing of Prof. R. Etheridge, 1885, Part II., p. 664 ; also Von Hauer, Die
Geologie, &c., Vienna, 1878, p. 619 (et passim).

81

ArtiFic1aL Propuction or CELEsTITE.—Strontium sulphate,
_ or the mineral Celestite, may be produced artificially, as in the
case of Barytes. The procedure of Manross and Macé is
especially to be preferred. M. Behrens has shown that by
placing under the microscope a drop of liquid sulphuric acid,
containing a little strontian sulphate, delicate slender crystals,
crossing each other, can be seen, like those of barytes, only of
larger size, and less transparent. M. Frémy has obtained
erystals of Celestite by a slow double decomposition, by
operating upon solutions of different densities, separated merely
by a porous diaphragm, or a sheet of bibulous paper.

The method followed by Manross (Ann. Ch. Pharm. t.
LXXXII., p. 348) to obtain strontium sulphate is by melting in
a crucible, a mixture of potassic sulphate and strontium chloride.
After washing the product, a crystalline powder is obtained,
composed of small crystals of Celestite, identical both in form
and composition with the natural mineral Celestite.

Macé’s process is by bringing together two attenuated
solutions, one of strontian nitrate, the other of ferric sulphate,
by means of a wire plunged into each solution. Under such
conditions the contact of the two salts causes them to act upon
each other with extreme slowness, the result being that the
Celestite crystallizes as it is forming.*

Both Celestite and Barytes are classed as concretionary and
vein minerals: all the chemical synthetic methods prove the
fact, and coincide in explaining the way in which these minerals
are formed in nature.

Professor J. D. Dana mentions in his “System of Miner-
alogy, 6th edition, New York,” that Celestite has been obtained
_ by Dr Sullivan in lamellar crystals from solution in water at a
_ temperature of 300° Cent. by fusing a mixture of gypsum and
common salt, and treating the residuum with water.

The salts of Baryta are poisonous; those of Strontia are
innocuous. Strontian sulphate (Celestite) has now quite super-
seded the former as an efficient means of clearing sugar when
boiling, in the process of sugar refining.

* Macé, J. pour Chém. t. XXXXI. p. 825.

On the Sections in the Forest Marble, and Great Oolite formations,
exposed by the new railway from Cirencester to Chedworth, by
Auten Harker, Professor of Natural History, Royal Agri-
cultural College, Cirencester. Read 25th February, 1890.

The construction of the new line of railway from Ciren-
cester to Andoversford has necessitated a number of cuttings,
which on account of their great length and depth, have
exposed some highly important sections of the rocks forming
the eastern and south-eastern slopes of the Cotteswolds.

These cuttings have presented to the local geologist an
unrivalled opportunity for the study, not only of the beds
themselves and their relation to the surface configuration and
agricultural features of the district, but also of some general
problems in the geology of the Great Oolite formation, and
some special developments it exhibits in its eastward extension
in the Southern Cotteswolds.

In the present paper I propose to give a general account
of the sections between Cirencester and Chedworth, and as full
and detailed a description of each as I have hitherto been able
to make.

The deepest, and by far the most important cutting, is not
yet completely excavated, so that necessarily the account of it
must be taken as incomplete and tentative. On two occasions
the Club has visited portions of the line, as the sections have
been completed.

From Cirencester the line runs almost due north to
Andoversford, and a glance at the geological map (sheets N.E.
34 and N.E. 44) shows that it traverses the Forest Marble, the
Great Oolite and Stonesfield Slate, and touches the Fuller’s
Earth at Upper Chedworth. These several beds have in this
part of the county an outcrop almost due west and east, so that

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83

speaking very roughly, they are cut by the line at about right
angles.

The undulating character of the Cotteswolds of this
district, with its long bare rolling downs and deep dry sinuous
valleys or combes, through most of which no water appears to
have ever flowed, obliges the railway engineer to construct his
line by alternate cuttings and embankments. For the purposes
of the geologist nothing could be more fortunate, the cuttings
reveal the rocks in their stratigraphical relationship, the
embankments supply him with material for fossil hunting for
years to come. A glance at the reduced section on the opposite
page, (which I am enabled to give by the kindness of Mr
Shopland, the Engineer to the Railway Company) shows this
alternation of cutting with embankment, and is itself a fair
index to the physical character of the South-eastern Cotteswolds.
I have given local names to the various cuttings, obtained in some
cases from conversation with those who live near them, suggested
in others by well-known contiguous topographical marks.

The first cutting, about half a mile north of the Midland
and South Western Junction Station at Cirencester, is the
Norcote Cutting. It is also called by some of the local
labourers the “Beeches” Cutting. It is through the middle
beds of the Forest Marble. It was first excavated in 1885, and
- was visited by the Club on 20th July, 1886. From financial or
other causes an interval of some years elapsed between the
opening of this cutting and the rest of the line. It is inter-
esting from a botanist’s point of view to note how rapidly a
luxuriant growth of wild plants has spontaneously covered the
sloping sides of this cutting. A gorse bush, already from two
to three feet high is well established in one spot; the water
Figwort (Scrophularia aquatica,) and a great variety of Juncacee
(Rushes) and Cyperacee (Sedges) have established themselves
in the wet clay debris by the sides of the rails. Some of these
plants are unusual in the immediate neighbourhood, and it is a
matter of constant wonder how they so quickly appear on new
ground which suits them. This is especially so with the
Juncacee at this spot.

G2

84.

NORCOTE CUTTING.
ft. ins.
1. Soil, and weathered rubble forming sub-soil_... seen oats
2. Band of shelly impure tile-stone 0
3. Blue clay te 0
4. Coarse tile-stone, loedily called ‘Crap ” oe ee O
5. Blueclay ... = 522450
6. Yellow and Blue Gis Marble, with nibey pone 2
7 0
8
9

tol

Blue clay parting ae om ae dee
Blue Ostrcea Marble, with ie nego He re icoa ee
Dark clay, with much wood sc sac 0

Orwowdrevae

10. Close-grained pink speckled Marble, with Oolitic ‘pte

but no shells... oie je |
11. Alternate bands of clay and Fissile Slaty Beds, eich tots

one to four inches in thickness ; five bands of clay and

five of the tile-stone ... : : 2 65
12. Dark blue clay, with thin harder ae ae ccs |
13. Alternate bands (six in all) of clay and coarse shelly beds .... 1 113
14. Compact shelly stone, with abundant Oolitic granules Uae fi
15. Dark blue clay Fe en th ct cic “3 ne OTD

The beds of Blue and Yellow Ostrea Marble (Nos. 6 and 8)
are the typical shelly limestones which give the name of
“Marble” to the formation. They take a beautiful polish,
and, when compact enough, make one of the handsomest of
ornamental stones. I have seen several examples of them in
worked stones used in local buildings. A very interesting
“Capital”? worked from the blue bed, is in the possession of
Mr James, Builder, Cirencester. It is unfortunately very
difficult to get large blocks free from pockets of clay ; these of
course render the stones useless for polishing purposes. These
clay pockets are remarkable in having all the same shape,
that of a short elliptical spindle somewhat like a closed bivalve
molluse’s shell, though they are of different sizes. I make the
suggestion that they represent the fillings in of the closed.
shells of various Lamellibranchiata, whose remains make up
almost the whole bed, but I propose to discuss the question in
a paper on the paleontology of the local Forest Marbles as
a whole.

85

At the north end of this cutting, through a bridge which
carries a local road over the line, there is a very shallow section,
scarcely indicated on the plan, from three to four feet deep, of
a bed of sandy marl capped by a thin fissile slate a few inches
thick. It contains no fossils save a few branching polyzoa, but
it is of interest since precisely similar beds occur at various
places in the neighbourhood, and it appears to be a persistent
member of the otherwise very variable marls and clays of the
local Forest Marble.

The next cutting is just beyond where the Burford road
crosses the line, so I have termed it the Burford Road Cutting.
It is still in the Forest Marble, but is of a lower series than
that at Norcote, and contains a greater percentage of Oolitic
granules in its variable shelly limestones.

BURFORD ROAD CUTTING

ft. ins

1. Soil, very calcareous loam =, Onn
2. Fissile brashy rubble, with aescaied fetes rs or

patches of clay “6 cf At ee Zt o

3. Finer rubble beneath the clays ... eta cs

4. Clay or marl Or A

5. Hard fissile plank : 0 5

6. Very yellow sandy marl ... Oy°39

(Composition given hele)

7. Hard shelly plank aoe 0 3

8. ‘Tile-stones, imperfect with Racing of ‘a Ste Oke |S

9. Tenacious yellow clay... sos a8 oe as PP 1 lag 47

10. Tenacious blue clay fh. -36

11. Coarse, hard shelly limestone, with Ostr ea sisal 5a small
pockets of clay—Oolitic—and false bedded, splitting into
slabs ore ares
12. Tenacious blue clay, with ibid acon’ ‘bea natal: | caer
13. Compact shelly limestone, with abundant Oolitic granules and
clay pockets ; splits horizontally +; AS th) Pilon

13 4

The so-called “clays” and “ marls” are exceedingly vari-
able in colour and physical character, but all appear to contain
carbonate of lime to about the same amount, while the
proportions of silicate of alumina and quartz granules vary,

86

as the beds are tenacious or friable. The yellow sandy marl
No. 6 gave an analysis :—

Ca CO, ae ee bi ee 22
Sand... ee ee cs aes 34%
Silicate of Alumina ... ace ae 43 %

It would be valuable to have a complete analysis of each
of these beds, before speculating on the changing conditions of
their deposition. None of the beds in this section contain
perfect fossils, broken oysters and Rhynchonelle being all one
obtains.

The line next runs through a long shallow cutting which
we have called for convenience the

WIGGOLD APPROACH CUTTING.

ft. ins.
Fissile sandy slate SOc wae Bee eee i oe 0
Sandy marl re oon oe 6c ae gr .« i Oj = lao
Shelly slabs resembling roofing tiles of the district re oe (Ohne
Clay 580 ae ae “no sae Bee 3 5 Pree Ue
Shelly slabs 200 285 ses se eee ee Ec 1-2 0

This bears some resemblance to the Burford Road Cutting,
but it is not so falsely bedded.

The whole series of cuttings, magnificent as they are, fail
us in one particular. They nowhere give us a junction section
of the Forest Marble and the Great Oolite, a desideratum in
our local exposures. But if these beds of the Wiggold
Approach section be not faulted, and I see no indications of
such, they appear to constitute the bottom beds of the Forest
Marble series; for at a distance of three hundred and fifty
yards we enter the long Wiggold Cutting, which from its white
freestones with abundant perfect fossils (Lima and Brachiopoda)
appears to be in the upper beds of the true Great Oolite.

The Wiggold Cutting is three-quarters of a mile long,
cutting through a broad high “down.” It is crossed by three
bridges, which afford good landmarks in plotting the section,
and as some notable changes take place in the rocks here
exposed, it will be well to have separate sections.

87

WIGGOLD CUTTING.

At first a fine grained false bedded Oolite, nine feet; on
passing deeper into the “down” between the first and second
bridges, this is overlaid by higher beds, and gives a section as
follows :—

ft. ins
1. Thin fissile slates, much weathered by surface action rea OlanG
2. Marly clay st SEE ao AE ant or at a)
3. Fissile slates poe ie oh Re oe « 1 6-2 O
4, Clay ee ue 6 re EO} eG
5. False bedded fine Prien Oolite ax Sac a eee eo
6. Fine grained compact Oolite, with abundant shells of Lima 5 0

Between the second and third bridges an abrupt change
takes place in the character of the beds, and at the north end
the dip alters ata slight fault, from 1 in 160 to 1 in 100; the
false bedded fine grained Oolite, No. 5, rises quickly and

outcrops. A faulting brings down a thin bed of tenacious
brown clay with apparently much organic matter in it.

This cutting is specially characterized by its many exten-
sive “pipes” filled with sandy debris, probably of glacial
origin. Beyond this cutting, just before crossing the Foss
Way, there is a short section which I call

THE STOW ROAD CUTTING,

ft. ins.

1. Rubble 2 0
2. Marl 0 9
3. Oolitic freestone, partially Perfomted by oavition eG
4. Marly parting 5 net ar Or st
5. Loose rubbly Oolite 0 9
6. Brown clay 0 4
7. Loose rubbly Oolite 1 4
8. Marly partings 53 Oat
9. Thin compact Oolite with iris ee 2 0
ee

A little way into this cutting there occurs at the bottom a
very puzzling bed of shelly limestone of a bluish colour, with
abundant Oolitic granules, reminding one of typical Forest
Marble.

4

88

The puzzle in this case is not anything remarkable in
the stone itself, but in finding it in the position it occupies. It
adds to the difficulty always felt by the student of these
formations, in assigning a particular bed of Oolitic shelly
limestone, blue in colour, to its proper stratigraphical position,
since some such beds are undoubtedly in the Great Oolite
proper, though they closely resemble the higher formation.

There are two small and shallow sections on the north of
the Stow Road which give—

FIRST.—NORTH STOW ROAD CUTTING,

Brashy Oolitic rubble, full of fossils (casts of Lamellibranchs,)
with thin marly partings nee Fe es Bbc ... Sft. to 6 ft.

SECOND.—NORTH STOW ROAD CUTTING,

ft. ins.
White Oolitic rubble, with their marly partings above sas sie? apane
Compact hard Oolite, with irregular cavities (to bottom) all
dipping from N. to 8S. at about 5° Sec ae of Ses),
FOLLY BARN CUTTING,
1. Rubbly Oolite iat wae a 3 ads ea a an OO
2. Friable marl a aes aie wi a ag sce. | Su
3. Compact white Oolite ... , 1 Paes
4, Friable Oolite (marly), full of Fossils, anigy casts of ‘Tae.
branchs . nee a on aa 3 (OO
5. Hard brown Sanne bed 5 bottom ot 00 sour e 0 -4 0

Further on, the friable marly bed No. 3, is divided into
two separate bands by a parting of hard Oolitic freestone, so
that another section gives—

ft. ins.
Rubble... “0 50 $0: ia a Ses <i) SaeeO
Marl 5: 2 O
Greyish white sae Oolite wae 4°28
Marl full of brachiopoda and Lima and anes amatnueieene 2, 0

Highly compact granular stone, with occasional cavities in the
upper layers about one foot in depth. ... aa ta lt Se

(ES Pr yee ee

89

The main feature of this section is the two distinct marls
at the north end uniting at the south end, as the compact free-
stone parting thins out.

Here the line is carried over the Calmsden Valley by a
high embankment, sixty- one feet from the rail to the bottom of
the hollow.

The next cutting is a few hundred yards south of the Foss
Cross Station, and may be called the

ALDGROVE CUTTING.

Kh
fs
=
=]
77)

_ Rubbly Oolite a oa fee Mi se ah BAe bec
Thin sandy marl ...
Fissile planking bed : ap 2 as
Hard bed, perforated by numerous seiesecia cavities
Grey compact freestone, apparently without any corals
Second hard bed, with numerous cavities
Grey compact freestone, same as 5
Marl

Corse Stare to" bs See
wn Re oO
SaRMRSCRAASBaS

We note here that there exist two distinct bands of the
beds I term “ perforated,” the lowermost thins out to the N.
end of this cutting to one half its original thickness.

These so-called ‘‘ perforated ” beds have furnished a subject
of much controversy and debate among local geologists, and it
is admitted that they furnish the ornamental stone called
Dagham stone. I confine myself here to recording the fact
that there are several of them, and that they occupy different
horizons in the Great Oolite, but I abstain from discussing
their composition or possible origin. At one time I was aware
of only one such bed, and I used it as an index to the position
of the beds above and below it; but that idea is exploded by
the sections now exposed, as well in this as in succeeding
exposures.

In this cena in bed No. 7, there has been found a
remarkable organism, which I will only briefly allude to, as it
has not yet been thoroughly worked out. I have secured a fair
number of specimens. It occurs in spheroidal masses about
the size of a cricket ball, and is madé up of concentric shells,

90

or layers of different colour and texture. The alternate bands
or rings are coloured, one of a very delicate but pronounced
pink, and the succeeding one of yellowish white ; each band
one-third to one-half an inch in width. A preliminary micro-
scopic section reveals undoubted organic structure reminding
one of the stromatopora. A broken nodule is a very striking,
not to say handsome object ; and so far as I can learn it has
not been described or observed before from the Great Oolite
rocks. A full description is reserved for another communication.

A short way north of Foss Cross Station is the Stony
Furlong Cutting, called by the contractor and his men, the
“summit” cutting, from the fact that the highest point of the
line is here, and is six hundred and thirty-seven feet above sea
level. It isa little short of three-quarters of a mile in length,
and is in places over forty feet in depth.

I think it no exaggeration to describe this as the very finest
section of the Great Oolite exposed in the whole Cotteswold
area, and its investigation may profitably occupy the geologists
of the Club for some time to come. It is absolutely unique in
some of its features.

The following account of it must not be taken as more
than a rough preliminary survey, as at the time of writing
it is not completely excavated, and access to the bulk of it is
difficult, and to some parts of it still impossible.

The beds dip southwards as a rule at an angle of about
4—5°, and altogether a depth of strata of about sixty-five feet
is exposed. There are three instructive faults in the cutting
which are not quite clearly understood at present.

At some future time it will be necessary to supplement this
account, when a more carefully detailed examination has been
made. So far as it goes, however, it will be found fairly
accurate.

STONY FURLONG CUTTING.

ft. ins
1. Rubble mee see se a nse age ae 1 = 2)
2. Marl oe 4. e:. rae se ome a pe wile oe

3. Soft rag fissile noe ba ae are ree B-. ict Oana

91
STONY FURLONG CUTTING (continued)
ft. ins.
4. Sandy parting ae Sr ae a as Oo 4
5. Compact bed, very hard, “ perforated” 5 Sy ak, Oka U
6. Falsely bedded Oolite, with very thin partings bas rane 3
7. Well marked bench top, a soft friable grey Oolite, probably
two beds and parting caer 4 0

8. Compact rock, varying in character, but perforated through-
out and crowded with fossils is Ee
9. Sand parting :
10. Rock, “ perforated ”
11. Parting
12. . Rock, Freestone

wooo ®
Conon Fr Oo

Twenty yards north of the bridge these beds from No. 7
downwards are faulted ten feet down. There isa second and
most important fault at about fifty yards N. from the bridge,
i.e., thirty yards from the small fault. Apparently a quite new
set of beds are faulted either up or down, I cannot determine
_ which, but as it was only newly excavated a few days ago, the
following section is a rough one, and less likely to be quite so
correct as those at the two ends, which have been longer
accessible.

Section of faulted beds fifty yards N. of bridge.

ft. ins.
_ Rock ee ot ts =~ e i, ie a" 3 — 42 10
Parting clay or marl 8
‘Hard “ perforated” bed eG
_ Parting marl ee:
Rock not determined a 0
Clay parting eG
Rock “ seggregated ” 20
Clay parting... Ke 0 6
Very compact freestone 3&6
we eh 0 6
Hard compact Oolite, 4 feet thick at fault—but rising furtheronto 14 0

and isa dense white Oolite with thin sandy partings

Here apparently is the termination of the fault. Beneath
this occurs a remarkable band which is persistent hence forward
and easily recognized. It is absolutely unlike anything I am

92

acquainted with in the Great Oolites. It consists of the shells
of Lamellibranchs, chiefly Ostreea, embedded in a tenacious
brown matrix of clay, with some apparently organic vegetable
matter. The shells are all brittle, of calcareous material, crumb-
ling almost ata touch. It reminds one of some post tertiary
shell bands in the condition of the material. In working at the
section we always called it the “organic band,” though
properly it is a shelly clay bed. Mr Wethered who has
examined this bed chemically, tells me it does contain 10°/, of
organic matter, so that my naming of it was not altogether
inappropriate. The shells apparently preponderate over the
matrix in amount.

This most remarkable bed may, I think, be taken as the
lowermost extension of the Great Oolite proper, the beds below
it corresponding to the Stonesfield slates.

There is not in any of the sections anything like true
Stonesfield slates, but beneath this well marked shelly clay,
between it and the blue Fuller’s Earth are twenty feet of beds,
which may belong either to the equivalents of Stonesfield slates
or to the upper limestone beds of the Fuller’s Earth formation.
The absence as yet of well preserved fossils, and my want of
an intimate acquaintance with Fuller’s Earth, renders it imposs-
ible to decide at present.

The difficulty is felt most acutely in the next small cutting
through a hill in lower Chedworth.

THE LOWER CHEDWORTH CUTTING

ft. ins.

Oolite rubble... x ste 6-7 0O
Band of shelly clay, ‘ribderenatinat ptababi to the shell band

already noticed ac ae ae ee “0b ace - Toe OlaG

Marly Oolite 52 ; cs 484 sie : oooh ZO

Shelly limestones, with Oolitic sated and occasional soft pasty
masses of CaCO3, and remains of Ostrwa acuminata... 15 0-16 0

What these shelly Oolites are I will not here venture to —
determine. They resemble in petrological character the upper
beds of Great Oolite, but their fossils are different.

93

On the first visit of the Club to this spot, I pointed out
masses of blue shelly limestone made up of Ostrwa acuminata.
which the contractor’s foreman repeatedly assured me came
from this cutting. I never was fortunate enough to see them
in situ, but they are undoubtedly Fuller’s Earth limestones, and
I am inclined to think did come from this spot, probably at a
greater depth than is now exposed. They were said to occur
in irregular masses of large size, and a member of the Club,
Mr Smith, of Nailsworth, has exhibited similar rock specimens
from Fuller’s Earth, at Nailsworth.

_I have also compared my specimens with specimens in the
Jermyn Street Museum, of shelly limestones of the Fuller’s
Earth, and they are identical.

Across the valley of Chedworth about five hundred yards
from this cutting the line enters the Fuller’s Earth clays, and
the tunnel continues in it for some distance, emerging in the
upper beds of the Inferior Oolite. The clays are full of the
shells of Ostrea acuminata.

It is a matter of common remark that the rocky sub-soils
over the Cotteswold area bear a marked family likeness in their
physical characters. They are generally called “ brashy,”
consisting of rubbly masses of stone not unlike the rough
irregular masses of unbroken roadstone. I may best illustrate
this by quoting an observation frequently made to me, “ How
is it that the surface beds of stone in our quarries are all
alike?” It is noticed in walking through the various sections on
this line, that each bed as it rises near the surface and becomes
the immediate sub-soil deposit, takes on this character. It is
certainly due to the action of surface rain-water percolating
through the soil, and by virtue of its contained acids disinte-
grating the limestones, naturally first of all along fissures,
cracks and weak spots, thus gradually breaking a fairly compact
stratum of limestone into a mere layer of separate bits of stone.

I have not given any account as yet of the various fossils
which have been obtained from the rocks described in this
paper. Their consideration may occupy us on some future
occasion.

The Sections eaposed between Andoversford and Chedworth: a.
comparison with similar strata wpon the Banbury line, by

S. S. Buckman, F.G.S. Read February 25th, 1890.

The Railway in course of construction between Cirencester
and Andoversford has opened up a series of most interesting
sections. In a former communication* to the Cotteswold
Field Club, I gave an account of the Inferior Oolite between
Andoversford and Bourton-on-the-Water ; and, consequently,
the homotaxous deposits exposed in the cuttings between
Andoversford and Chedworth have attracted my attention. As,
however, I now reside some distance from the locality, and
have not too much spare time at my disposal, I could not, even
if I wished, give an exhaustive paper on the strata in these
exposures; but the chief idea of this sketch concerns the
agreements and differences between the Inferior Oolite on the
Cirencester Railway and the strata described in my former
paper.

Commencing at Andoversford, the first cutting is at the
new Station; and it shews nothing more than tumbled, and
much broken, freestone rock, and a quantity of rubble. All this
has slipped over upon some blue clay of the Upper Lias, which
is exposed at the bridge crossing the road.

The second cutting affords the following section :—

Section I.—Second cutting from Andoversford.
(Peagrit series to Upper Freestone)

ft. ins.

1. Whitish freestone, with numerous white grains ee
2. Loose, incoherent, yellowish-brown, sandy Oolite, enclosing

portions of harder white limestone __... ... about 23 0

3. Whitish freestone, with numerous white grains fe . - Oe
Hard, shelly limestone, with white, rounded grains, and some
larger flattened concretions. Ludwigia Murchisone,

Pygaster semisulcatus, Rhynchonella subdecorata ... about 20 0

46 6

* Proceedings, vol. IX, Pt. II, pp. 108-135, 1887.

rlodgt S/Ao7 138

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95

The series of beds put under the No. 4 are really the
representatives of the Peagrit series of the classic Cotteswold
sections. This series may be recognised not only by the fossils
it contains, but by the presence of the flattened pisolites.
Some of the beds are soft and sandy; but, in general, the beds
of this series in this cutting are hard and crystalline. Bed 2 of
the above section introduces a point of much interest. It is,
evidently, exactly the same as the beds which I described in
Section VIT of my former paper *—a cutting at Syreford about
three-quarters of a mile distant.

, At that time I thought that these sandy beds (Syreford
section, beds 1-4) represented the Harford Sands + resting on
Upper Freestone; and I was anxious to know how they were
connected with the Upper Lias. The exposure which I am at
present dealing with shews that this was an error. Bed 4 is
evidently the representative of the Peagrit series; and we may
suppose beds 5 and 6 of the Syreford section to be about the
same ; while the sandy strata (beds 2-3; Syreford section, beds
1-4) are evidently the same. Their position, therefore, is above
the Peagrit series, and below the actual Lower Freestone (bed
1 of the section). Similar sandy strata occupy the same
position at Cleeve Hill, as the following generalized section
will shew.

Section I1.—Generalized section of Cleeve Hill.}

; ft. ins

1. Ragstones E “nC ms vss oemaar ee

2. Sands and aitavonee= amerotd ‘mina ASE sab lw

3. Upper Freestone series Bsn & as $s 35-40 0

4. Oolite marl series = a 5x 50s eee eo LY

5. Lower Freestone series ... : ey : x tae SOr (0
6. A series of beds — mostly valleay et Sern Tabby rocks,

very conspicuous when fresh quarried _... so sv5, 20" =O

7. Peagrit series, beds mostly containing flattened pisolites ... 26 8

8. Thin beds, generally without pisolites, wee ies Was AQ

* Op. cit. p. 120

+ Op. cit. p. 113
{ This section is condensed from several very detailed sections made in
the company of Mr E. Wethered, F.G.S.

96

The No. 6 in this section indicates the beds which are on
the same horizon as the sandy beds in Section I.

The connection of these sandy beds, and the Peagrit series,
to the Upper Lias clay is shown much more clearly by the third
cutting from Andoversford. On account of an upthrust of the
Upper Lias clay causing the strata to assume an anticlinal
position, we are able to examine the different strata from the
Upper Lias by walking along the cutting. (See sketch).

Section III.—Third cutting from Andoversford.

(Upper Lias to Peagrit series)

1. Shelly and crystalline limestone, with large granules, Tereb.
submaaillata ae
2. Limestone mixed with ee ee ee Ce = cos, HOW
3. Several beds of yellow sandy limestone, Reh: subangulata,
Rh. subdecorata (large), 2h. cynocephala towards the base,
Tereb. perovalis, Tereb. Etheridgii, Pholodamya fidicula.

A line of Belemnites nearly at the bottom “a2 wo LSE 7e
4. Brown sands, passing into on es ua 50 2) Om
5. Blue sands 360 a a ae a Sct so 1 RG

6. Blue clay ...

It may very reasonably be concluded that bed No. 6 in the
above section represents what is known as Upper Lias, and
probably may be considered to be on about the horizon of the
Commune-zone. The blue and yellow sands (Nos. 4-5), measuring
altogether five feet, are the only representatives of the one-
hundred-and-fifty feet or so of the Cotteswold sands exposed
in the neighbourhood of Frocester. The line of Belemnites, and
Rhynchonella cynocephala at the base of bed 3, may be looked
upon as a faint indication of the so-called Cephalopoda-bed
developed in the same locality; and it may probably be said |
with safety that the base of bed 3 is on the horizon of the
Opalinwm-zone. The rest of bed 3 may be regarded as roughly
equivalent to the “‘sandy ferruginous limestone” of the Stroud
district, and as representing the upper part of the Opalinum-
zone, with perhaps the base of the Murchisone-zone. Bed 1

97

is the Peagrit series; and thus the connection with Section I is
obtained.

The fourth cutting introduces no new strata; but we have
about ten feet of white, softish limestone, resting upon hard
crystalline limestone, which is presumably the Peagrit series.
In that case the limestone above may represent the sandy strata
(bed 2 of Section I).

The fifth cutting is at the Withington Station, and is
entirely through blue and yellow clay.

In the sixth cutting we again meet with the beds above the
Peagrit series. Altogether about twenty-five feet are ‘exposed.
The arenaceous character appears to be less pronounced, and
the strata are therefore more compact, partaking more of a
freestone nature. It is quite a question how far the arenaceous
character of these strata in the Section I may have been brought
about by the solvent action of percolating rain water causing
disintegration.

We have now a considerable break in the sequence of
strata ; because nothing of the Oolite marl was to be seen in
the cuttings—at least during my visit. Neither did I detect
any trace of the Upper Freestone, nor of the Harford Sands,
which are both so conspicuous on the Bourton line. Appar-
ently the lowest beds which are exposed belong to the Lower
Trigonia-grit series, and are equivalent to bed G of the
Bourton line (Op. cit. p. 110). These beds occur in the eighth
cutting. It is, however, possible that the base of these beds
might represent the Upper Freestone, and that the Harford
Sands might be absent. The Oolite-marl series is not absent
from the neighbourhood; because some years ago I found
Terebratula fimbria in Withington Wood in an opening by the
roadside.

Leaving the seventh cutting for the present, we will pass
right into the eighth, and, commencing with the lowest beds,
work out the sequence of strata up to the Fuller’s Earth. This
cutting, which is of noble proportions, presents the following
section :—

H

98

Section I'V.—Highth cutting from Andoversford.

White limestone in compact blocks... 5 oP aeo.
Rubbly limestone, with Giryphea sublobata alonctieaith sar a2
Mar! parting 0
Hard limestone we ss ee iad S Dene
Marl koe ss ie Se me es 2 ee!

1

1

ate ad dst

6. Hard bluish- contfea limestone ...
7. Rubbly limestone es A tee
8. Two bands of yellowish ferneaiaree wih, en grains.
Several fossils especially Lamellibranchs :— Trigonia
formosa, Trigonia (costate form). Cucullea, Modiola
Sowerbyana, etc. ae eee i! 1)
9. Conspicuous blue, and bluish- icine ana of aly contaieine
a crush of broken shells, apparently Ostree, some of which
retain the nacreous colour... Sax ee ae woo oy OReeLO)
10. White limestone in large blocks. This was being worked
for use on the bridges, ete. ... ae ois ... Visible 9 0

The bed 10 I take, in the absence of evidence to the
contrary, to be the lower part of the Lower Trigonia-grit ; and
I should expect to find the Harford Sands immediately beneath,
that is, if they are developed in this neighbourhood. Above
this mass of limestone lies a thin clay-band with a quantity of
broken shells; and it is rather remarkable to find a clay-band
intercalated in such a deposit as the Inferior Oolite. Bed 8
with its mollusca undoubtedly belongs to the Lower Trigonia-
crit. The Gryphea-grit (bed 2) attains the very respectable
thickness of twelve feet—a thickness which is unusual, and is
only equalled by the development at Stroud Hill.*

The bed (1) above the Gryphza-grit is most interesting.
It is the equivalent of what I called the Notgrove Freestone
(Op. cit. p. 125). I was the first to point out the correct
position of this bed in my paper on the Bourton line.

To obtain the further sequence of the strata, it is necessary
to return to the seventh cutting. This gives the following
section :—

* Witchell, Geology of Stroud, p. 55.

ei eee

99

Section V.—Seventh cutting from Andoversford.

ft. ins.
1. Fuller’s Earth clay ac St ace se 2
2. Clypeus grit series 30 ae ... about 20 0
3. Hard shelly limestone, Upper Tripod sae ee one . 5 60
4. Bored bed on the top of a hard, somewhat pe whitish
limestone with white grains fs BA ..visible 3 6

Bed 4 in this section is a continuation of bed 1 in Section
IV; and the bored bed on the top of it may be compared with
the bored bed which I found so constant in a similar horizon in
the strata of the Bourton line (Op. cit. p. 118, ete.) ; but it
must not be correlated with the bored bed of the Stroud area—
a bed on the top of the Upper Freestone.

The Upper-Trigonia- and the Clypeus-grits (beds 3 and 2),
are strata so well known that I need not refer to them here.
More details concerning them, as well as concerning other strata
dealt with in this paper, may be found in my paper on the
Bourton line, already so often mentioned, as well as in the
numerous papers by Wright, Lycett, Witchell and others in
the volumes of the Club.

The connection of the Clypeus-grit with the Fuller’s Earth
can be seen in greater detail in the entry to the eighth cutting,
where a downthrow inclines the strata at a steep angle, and
affords the following section.

Section VI.—LHighth cutting from Andoversford. Enter
a downthrow of Fuller’s Earth clay and Clypeus-grit.

ft. ins.
1. Blueclay ... s #6
2. Hard, reddish limestone, with asin’ grains ... 0 7
3. Clayey marl x Shc oe Bee 0 4
4. Rubbly brown limestone, with coarse dark grains 3. 0
5. Brown decomposed paste 0 3
6.

Clypeus-grit, with Tereb. globata and eee Plottii ®

It may be convenient to speak of the beds 2 - 5 connecting
the Clypeus-grit proper with the Fuller’s Earth clay as “ tran-
sition strata ;” and they should be compared with a similar

* C. Plottii is abundant only at the very top of the Clypeus-grit.
H2

100

series shewn in the fifth cutting west of Bourton-on-the-Water
Station (Op. cit. p. 123). It will be noticed that there is a very
considerable difference between them, both in thickness and in
general lithological details.

There are two more cuttings before the tunnel is reached ;
but as these cuttings only illustrate again the strata from the
Gryphea-grit upwards, they afford no fresh details.

It may be advantageous to give a generalized section of
the strata which have been discussed in this paper. The letters
for the beds are, to a certain extent, the same as those used in
my paper on the Bourton line, so as to facilitate comparison.

Section V1II.—Generalized section of the strata between
Andoversford and Chedworth.

A Fuller’s Earth clay
B_ Transition strata oe 500 eae oer eee ae 4530
C Clypeus grit ap ote se bar “be a ae 20) 0
D Upper Trigonia-grit ... sep ie or 4G
E_ Bored bed and the white limestone, “ Notetave Shecutonttt 25 O
EF Gryphea-grit ae aa re 266 so a8 vicar lane 0
G Lower Trigonia-grit ... ote bec =r ss 2.) LOmnO
G White limestone ... one 0 Sec eas $i note, (Loe
H
I Absent
a)
K White BES I: ou 23 «(0
. Sandy limestone

L Peagrit series ce ivi a owe sais 2 a1) COMES
M “Sandy ferruginous limestone ”’ ses one awe ice LEO
N Brown and blue sands ... Her ote aoe aos «- go 80
O Upper Lias clay

160 6

ee Mie
Os 5%

a

Fig. 2

x 90 Diam.

x 44 Diam. x 15 Diam.

15 Diam.

x

On the occurrence of fossil forms of the Genus Chara in the Middle
Purbeck Strata of Lulworth, Dorset, by Epwarp WETHERED,
F.G.S., F.C.S., F.R.M.S. Read April 1st, 1890.

1

' Among the plants included in the group of Alge are those
_ of the Characeew. They are described by Professor A. Nicholson
and Mr Lydekker* as a “class comprising a number of fresh-
_ water or brackish-water Algze, of a green colour, and remarkable
for having lateral appendages corresponding with leaves. The
thallus consists of a central stem giving off whorls of leaves at
intervals, which in turn give off secondary leaflets.” The same
authors state that fossil forms of the genus Chara occur in the
Trias, Jurassic and Cretaceous formations, and are abundant in
parts of the Tertiary series. Reference is also made to the
& currence of the genus in the chert of the Purbeck formation.
In Morrison’s catalogue of British Fossils, published in
1854, (p. 4) the author mentions two species of Characee as
occurring in Purbeck beds, in the Isle of Purbeck. The
authority for the statement is Forbes, and the reference is
“Records of the Geological Survey,” but the page and number
_ of the volume is not. given. The reason of this omission is that
the record of the finding of the fossils, and the descriptions,
_ existed only in manuscript, and has never been published. I
am also informed that the fossil specimens cannot be found.
_In the summer of 1888, I collected Purbeck limestone from
‘Lulworth Cove, Dorsetshire, and on making thin sections, I
discovered numerous vegetable remains, some of which proved

* Manual of Paleontology, Vol. 2, p. 1497, 1889.

102

to belong to the genus Chara. The names given to the two
species discovered by Forbes were Purbeckersis and Valdersis.
I cannot, of course, say that any two of those I have met with
are identical with Forbes’, seeing that his types cannot be
found. I also think that it would be unwise to give names to
these I am about to describe, as they may be fructifications of
one and the same plant. At any rate I shall leave that to some
person more capable than myself, and be content with simply
recording the find and brief description of the specimens.

Fic. 1. This is the most common form of the genus which
occurs. It consists of an axial cell and twelve cortical ones.
The central cell is the largest, and the cortical ones consist of
six superior and six secondary ones, with well preserved walls.

Fic. 2 This fossil shows a large or central cell, and
twelve cortical ones of practically equal size. This figure may
represent a section of a cerpogonium.

Fic. 3. This is much the larger specimen of the three,
and the general arrangement of the cells is different from what
we find in the specimens previously referred to. The axial cell
is small and is surrounded by six large sized cortical cells, and
at the points where these diverge from one another, there is a
very small secondary cell.

The specimens were obtained from a crystalline light
coloured limestone, largely made up of calcified vegetable
remains, Figs. 4and 5. The limestone also contained remains
of Planorbis and occasional valves of Ostracoda.

On treating the rock with hydrochloric acid the usual
evolution of carbonic acid takes place, and a residue is left
consisting of crypto-crystalline silica and some grains of detrital
quartz. The crypto-crystalline silica consists of fragments of
casts of the organisms in the limestone, and also portions of
Characee, the organic structure of which has been replaced by
the silica.

With regard to the mineral conditions in which the
Characee are preserved, I may say that in Figs. 1 and 3 the
cells are in part filled with crystalline calcite, and in part by a
dark substance containing some carbonaceous matter.

103

DESCRIPTION OF PLATES

Fies. 1 and 2. Sections of Chara x 90 Diam.
Fig. 8. <A sections of Chara x 15 Diam.

r Fic. 4. Sections of Purbeck limestone containing Characee
and fragmental remains of calcareous organisms x 44 Diam.

Fie. 5. Section of Purbeck limestone containing calcified
vegetable remains, a small shell, and a section of Chara x 15

ane

Diam.

a7 ie:

=

PARTE

| _—s« PROCEEDINGS

Cotteswold Ulaturalists
= FIELD CLUB

For 1890—1891

President
Rett Me Cy. F.G.S,

| Vice- Presidents
a ee he. SMITHE, M.A., LE.D., F.GS.
. JOHN BELLOWS

Proressor HARKER, F.L.S.
Rev. 8. WINWOOD, -M.A., F:G.S.

Honorary Creasurer
jd. JONES

; Honorary DAecretarp
meOWARD WETHERED, F.G.S., F.C.S., F.R.M.S.
x CHELTENHAM

2 Contents |

‘he PRESIDENT’s ADDRESS at the Annual Meeting at Gloucester, 1891. .

seological Notice upon the Forest of Dean, by H. D. HoskoLp, M.E,, F;G:S.,; ete,

D or General of the National Department of Mines and Geology, Buenos Aires,

Argentine Republic.

a.

n the Geology of Cirencester Town, and a recent discovery of the Oxford Clay in a

deep well boring at the Water Works. By ALLEN HarkER, Professor of Natural

History at the Royal Agricultural College. |
.

Abury and its Literature. By the Rev. WILLIAM Baze.ey, M.A.

Some Remarks on the Geology of Alderton, Gretton, and Ashton-under-Hill. By
_ FREDERICK SMITHE, F.G.S., &c., and W. C. Lucy, F.G.S.

PUBLISHED BY JOHN BELLOWS, GLOUCESTER S 172639
& AUTHORS MUST TAKE THE SOLE RESPONSIBILITY OF SEEING THEIR OWN PAPERS
CORRECT FOR PRESS.

He

“~
< 3 :
ih -. : ae
Pe }
Ld ,

Annual Address to the Cotteswold Naturalists’ Field Olub, read at
Gloucester, April the 30th, 1891, by the President,
Mr W. C. Lucy, F.G.S.

The Annual Meeting was held at the Bell Hotel, Gloucester,
on the 29th April, 1890, when the President, Vice-Presidents,
and Officers of the Club were re-elected.

Mr Jones, the Hon. Treasurer, presented the accounts,
shewing a balance in favour of the Club of £57 2s. 10d., which
were passed and ordered to be printed.

The following Field Meetings for the year were arranged :—

Lydbrook and Symond’s Yat ... 27th May
May Hill ... Jy: ch ... 24th June
Eastnor and neighbourhood ... 29th July
Swindon and Avebury .. ... 26th August

The members adjourned to the Lecture Room of the
School of Science and Art, where the President after reading
his annual address, made a departure from the usual practice
of his predecessors by giving a paper on “A slight History of
Flint Implements, with especial reference to our own and
adjacent areas,” and which is printed in the last number of
the Proceedings.

The members dined at the Bell Hotel.

Alas! how time is thinning our ranks! It is again my
painful duty to record the death of another old and valued
member. Dr. William Henry Paine, after a long illness, died
on the 13th June last, at the age of 66, and was buried on the
18th, at the Stroud Cemetery. He became a member in 1860,
succeeded me on my retirement as Hon. Secretary in 1866,
and resigned this office in 1888, when he was elected a Vice-
President. The Hon. Secretary of a Field Club requires
- courtesy, much tact, and judgment, all of which he possessed

in an eminent degree. From a natural diffidence of manner,
B

106

only those who were on terms of intimacy with him were
aware of his sound and varied knowledge, and we have to
regret that he did not contribute to our Proceedings. His
arrangements of the Field Meetings were judiciously made,
and their instructive and pleasurable character was mainly
owing to his careful forethought; and I feel, as I am sure
you all do, that in him we have lost an old and never-to-be-
forgotten friend.

LYDBROOK AND SYMOND’S YAT MEETING

On Tuesday, the 27th May, the members left Gloucester
for Lydbrook wid Berkeley and Lydney, and in passing over
the Bridge the President exhibited and explained an elaborate
section of the western side of the Severn estuary, made by Mr
John Jones in 1858, during an excursion with Sir Wm. Guise,
the Rev. W. 8. Symonds, and the President.

On arriving at Lydbrook they were met by the Rev.
F. J. Aldrich-Blake, the Rector of English Bicknor, who took
them to the Church, a modern structure, erected in 1858 on
part of the site of one built in the Fourteenth Century. The
Church is dedicated to St. Margaret, supposed to be in honour
of Margaret, Lady of Welsh Bicknor, the great grand daughter
of Edward I., who married Lord Montacute, and who was the
mother of the third Earl of Salisbury. There is an na in
the Church said to be to her memory.

At the Rectory Mr and Mrs Aldrich-Blake gave an exacted
luncheon, with some of the celebrated styre cyder for which
the parish is justly celebrated.

Mr Aldrich-Blake shewed the members his very fine
collection of paintings, including works by Rubens, Raphael,
and other old masters, and also many works of the best modern
school of painters.

Thence to Bicknor Court, the residence of the Rev. EH.
Machen. Mr Machen conducted the party through the cele-
brated Coldwell Woods, the most beautiful scenery in the
Forest. Openings are made in different parts of the wood,
from which the Wye below is seen to great advantage.

107

At Symond’s Yat Mr E. Wethered gave an address on
the Geology of the neighbourhood. He said we were standing
upon the Carboniferous Limestone, and wherever it occurs in
river districts, as Clifton, parts of Derbyshire, and elsewhere,
it forms magnificent cliffs like those before us.

As to the origin of the limestone, each bed was formed
underneath the sea, in which lived countless multitudes of
organisms, with shells or skeletons of carbonate of lime, and
their remains formed beds of limestone. In some beds he had
found a remarkable organism named Mitcheldeania, which had
puzzled him much, as it did not seem to belong to any other
known form. At present it was classed with the Hydrocoralline,
a name suggested by Professor Moseley for two groups of
marine hydrozoa which produce a regular skeleton of carbonate
of lime, and which were formerly referred to the true corals,
the Actinozoa. The basement beds of the limestone resting on
shales were mainly made up of foraminifera. Another re-
markable feature in the Carboniferous limestone of the Forest
of Dean he discovered in an examination made some years
since. It was found to contain only 54 per cent. of carbonate
of lime and 37°11 of carbonate of magnesia, while the usual
proportion would be 85 per cent. of the former and less than 1
_ per cent. of the latter. This proved that the limestone had
undergone chemical changes, and had been converted into and
_ had become dolomotized, entirely altering the original character
_ of the rocks.

Briefly alluding to the formation of the Wye gorge, which
he attributed to several agencies, he referred to the Bone
Caves which had been found at the Doward and other places.
_ After a few remarks on Mr Wethered’s address by the Rev.
_H. H. Winwood and Mr F. D. Longe, the members returned
toa secluded spot, where the Misses Machen had provided a
_ most acceptable tea, with refreshments.
The President thanked Mr Machen and his daughters for
_ their kind hospitality.
. In replying, Mr Machen wished to avail of the opportunity
of Berrescing his desire to protect the woods, and also the rare
B

108

plants, in all their natural beauty. A few years ago they
suffered much from tourists, and he felt bound to impose a
limited restriction by the charge of twopence for each person,
and the money collected was given to the Children’s Hospital
at Gloucester.

The President said he thought Mr Machen had acted
wisely—a remark applauded by the members of the Club.

MAY HILL MEETING

Tuesday, 24th June—The members left the Gloucester
Station for Longhope, where a quarry in the Ludlow lime-
stone, near to the station, was examined. It was found to
be highly fossiliferous, and some fine specimens of Rhynconella
nucula and Chonetes striatula were picked up.

The Hon. Secretary, by the aid of diagrams, explained the
position of the Ludlow beds in the Silurian system, and also
the lower beds of the same formation, which would be in-
spected during the day.

From there to Dursley Cross, where a halt was made at
some Crystalline Schists which form the core of May Hill, and
the President requested Dr Smithe to explain what is known of
their history. He said there was a cunflict of opinion amongst
Petrographers as to the origin of these changed rocks, and he
referred the members to the researches of Messrs Bonney,
Judd, and A. Geikie, as given in the Journal of the Geological
Society.

Metamorphism in minerals and fossils afford an insight
into the changes that had operated in the more ancient rocks.
For instance, consider the change by which a fossil shell—once
consisting of molecules of carbonate of lime—becomes altered,
and the lime partly replaced by silica. The alteration may go
on until every original particle is completely changed, the
shape only being left.

This metamorphism is known as isomorphism. The difti-
culty in the case of rocks is two-fold—l, change of form; 2,
change of molecular action.

109

The party then proceeded to the summit of May Hill,
where Dr Smithe referred to the graphic remarks made there
by Mr Hugh Strickland just forty years ago, and which will
be found at page 19 in the History of the Club, by the
President.

Dr Smithe called attention to the strongly marked cause
of disturbance, as shown by the igneous rocks, faults, upheavals,
contortions, foldings, and thrusts, as were seen in May Hill
and Huntley Hill quarries.

He also referred to Salop, where the Brown and the
Titterstone Clee Hills, with their Diorites piercing the coal
measures and scorching the coal seams into cinders when they
were in contact. Then the Abberley Hills, with their trap
rocks; the igneous rocks at Malvern (of granulite) leptinite,
of diorite and Syenite, upheaval and heavy faulting of the
sequence of beds; next May Hill, with its dome formed by
upheaval—showing no trap rocks, but enormous denudation of
the upper Llandovery beds.

To the S.S.W. occur the amygdaloid rocks at Damory
Bridge, Tortworth, and an extension of the same action in the
igneous rocks of Charfield. But the direction of the force
deflects at Tortworth, plunges under the Severn, and re-appears
on the N.E. coast of Ireland.

The subject of the Upper Llandovery beds, or May Hill
sandstone, was then dealt with, which he said were now con-
sidered by our own and Continental Geologists as the base of
the Upper Silurian system. Their apparent unconformity with
the Lower Llandovery, as well as the proof from the fossil
contents, combined to shew great lapse of time—lost pages of
the record.

He then referred to the rich fossil remains of the Upper
Silurians, especially in Brachiopods.

The President remarked it was the determination of the
beds of the hill upon which they were standing which led to
the unfortunate estrangement between Sir Roderick Murchison
and Professor Sedgwick, and he thought it was a fitting place
to read part of the touching letter by the Professor to Sir

110

Roderick, on hearing of the death of Lady Murchison, which
produced the reconciliation so long sought for by Sir Roderick.

“ Sunday morning, Jan. 21st, 1869
“ Dear Sir Roderick Murchison,

“T did not wish to intrude myself on your sorrows so soon. Indeed,
such has been my life of solitude for the last two months, that incidents of
the greatest interest to my heart have more than once passed away for a
full week or ten days before their report reached me.

“ You will, I know, believe me when I say that the first news of your
beloved wife’s death filled me with very deep sorrow. For many years Lady
Murchison was one of the dearest of those friends whose society formed the
best charms of my life. How often was I her guest! How often have I
experienced her kind welcome, and been cheered and strengthened by it!
In joy or in sorrow she was my kind and honoured lady friend ; and have I
forgot those bright and, to me, thrice happy days, when she and you.were
my guests at Cambridge ?

“The present has comparatively little forme now. Hope I have for the
future, and I trust that God will give it to me in the last hours of this
world’s life, whenever they may come. But an old man necessarily has his
thoughts carried to the past.

“ But, oh! how many of the dearest and sweetest remembrances of my
life are now blended with clouds of sorrow! It must beso. It is nature’s
own law. May God teach you to bear your sorrow like aman. Of this I
have no fear ; but more than this, may His grace be given you to bear it
like a Christian. His sustaining power is His precious gift, and it must be
humbly sought for, by prostration of heart, while under God’s afflicting
hand. May He give you the comfort of Christian hope ; compared with it -
all other comfort vanishes into mid-air, and if it indeed be given you, sorrow
will lose its bitterness, and even be tempered with joy.”*

I am indebted to Mr B. Matthews for the following list of
plants found during the day :—

Ophrys apifera. (Bee orchis)
Chlora perfoliata

Onobrychis sativa

Vicia cracea

Potentilla anserina

Cotyledon umbilicus

Echium vulgare.
* Life of Sir R. Murchison, by Professor Geikie, Vol. II., page 337. At

the time the letter was written Professor Sedgwick had nearly completed his
86th year.

111

The members, after visiting Mr and Mrs Miles at the
Rectory, dined at the Red Lion, Huntley.

LEDBURY MEETING

July 29th—The members proceeded by train from Glou-
cester to Ledbury, where carriages were at once taken for
Eastnor Castle, visited by the kind permission of Lady Henry
Somerset.

The fine Hall and Flemish armour, said to have belonged
to the body guard of Charles V., were much admired.

An early luncheon was partaken of at the Somers Arms,
which is conducted on temperance principles. Carriages
were then taken for Bronsil Castle, of which very little
remains. It has, however, two moats, and from the inner
one Mr G. H. Piper, of Ledbury—who is an authority on
the Archeology and Geology of the neighbourhood— gave
an instructive address. He considered the Castle to belong to
the middle ages, and was probably the most recent of that
period in the County. It was taken in 1644, after a brief
resistance, from Mr Thomas Cocks, by a small force of Round-
heads under a younger son of Sir R. Hopton. Hopton’s
triumph was of short duration, for in a few days a party of
Royalists from Hereford invested the place, to whom in less
than twenty-four hours he was obliged to surrender, and with
40 foot and 20 horse was carried prisoner to that City, before
General Massey could send aid from Gloucester.

On leaving Bronsil, en route to the Hollybush Pass, and
_ close to the road, an old lava flow was examined. Mr Wethered
remarked the Geology round Eastnor was of great interest
- from the antiquity of the rocks, and explained the views of Sir
_ Roderich Murchison, who considered the axis of the Malvern
Hills was of Syenite, but later investigations by Dr Holl
shewed it to be Metamorphic, an opinion since accepted by
- Geologists.
P An ascent was made of Hollybush Hill, from the summit
of which is a grand view of the country, and Mr Piper read

112

a paper on “The Camp and Ancient British Town on the
Midsummer and Hollybush Hills.” He referred to an earlier
race inhabiting Wales, and whose existence has only lately been
made known to us by the discovery of their relics. He men-
tioned the notice of Great Britain by Herodotus and Aristotle,
but he believed the Phcenicians traded here for metals long
before the Greek historians wrote.

The intercourse with foreigners naturally increased the
wealth, civilization, and population. The people formed many
tribes, and we learn from Cesar they were no mean enemies,
being trained in the arts of war. This would probably arise
from their frequent conflicts with each other, as they had no
foreign foes to encounter. This constant state of turmoil
involved the use of entrenched camps, or fortified towns, and
the spot we are standing upon is one of them, large enough to
contain a whole tribe.

To treat such positions as this, Thornbury, Walls Hill,
and many places in Herefordshire as merely military camps, is
a great error—they were also places of refuge for the whole
people. They were probably strengthened by stockades of
timber, large gates guarding the entrances, the post holes of
which are now traceable.

To assign a date to this Camp or Town, or say by which of
the past races it was constructed, is at present impossible, but
there are good reasons to believe that future exploration may
throw much light upon the subject.

The length of the Camp is 2,000 feet, and its cireumference
5,700 feet. The site of the old British Town, lying in the
hollow between the hills, and over-lapp2d and protected by the
Camp, is about 1.200 feet.

The height of the Midsummer Hill is 958 feet. It has on
the Eastern side ten or eleven terraces, whereon as many as
244 hut hollows are visible.

Others may be seen on the Hollybush Hill and in the hollow
between the two eminences. There is water here, rising from
two springs, which was used by the people, and stored in four
different tanks connected with each other.

115

On Hollybush Hill, within the walls of the Camp, is a
barrow of symmetrical form, 150 feet long by 32 feet broad,
and about three feet high, lying North and South, with a
slight trench round it. In September, 1879, I was the means
of having this barrow partially excavated.

Although on the top of the hill, where usually little soil is
found, in every part opened it was four feet deep. It could
not have accumulated upon such a spot, and evidence of this
was seen by the fact that many pieces of quartzose grit, pro-
bably from Rowick, and some large angular pieces of Laurentian
rock were found. Ten feet from the West side, at a depth of
three feet, fragments of charcoal, two small pieces of burnt
brick—one having the impression of a dog’s foot—and a thin
copper ring were discovered embedded in the black earth.

A few days after the excavation General Pitt-Rivers
arrived here, who stated he had been present at the opening of
similar mounds in Oxfordshire and elsewhere without results.

_ At Dartmoor he had seen raised mounds which had been

thrown up by rabbits in burrowing. Whatever may have
been the case at Dartmoor, Mr Piper did not believe that at
any period of the word’s history men could have been found so
foolish as to carry to the top of Malvern Hill sufficient soil to
construct an earthwork 50 yards long, 10 yards wide, and three
feet deep for the beatification of rabbits. He said Mr John
KH. Price, F.S.A., remarks that some significance must be

attached to the relics in the long barrow, and the mound and
_ its contents may be Roman—an illustration of a Botontinus, or
one of the terminal marks which it was the practice of the
surveyors of old to construct at the confines of territories. In
defining the boundaries of land the Agrimensors, or land
surveyors, selected various signs, the future discovery of which
would make the lines of demarcation clearly significant.

My opinion that the Barrow is Roman or post Roman is
unchanged, and, as history tells us, a great battle was fought
on the Malvern Hills in the Tenth Century, when Athelstan
drove the Cyrmry beyond the Wye, and the battle probably
took place within these entrenchments.

114

The Science of these places has yet to be learned, and I
quite believe a series of patient and careful diggings would
reveal and make plain, much that at present is doubtful and
obscure.

Mr Piper’s remarks were followed by some discussion on
the points he had raised, and a cordial vote of thanks was
passed for the instructive information he had given during the ~
excursion.

A descent was made to the Hollybush quarry, which con-
tained some fine examples of igneous rock (Diabase.)

Carriages were resumed to Ledbury, which place was
reached in time to catch the 4.31 train to Gloucester.

AVEBURY MEETING

The 26th of August was the last meeting. It had pre-
viously been visited in the early days of the Club, May, 1849.

The members arrived at Swindon at 10.37, and drove over
the Marlborough Downs to Avebury, where they were welcomed
by the Vicar, the Rev. Bryan King, who shewed and explained
to them his very interesting Church. In it are Saxon remains,
and on entering the porch some blocks of that age of carved
stone are seen embedded in the walls. One represents the
Father giving benediction to the Son, who is embracing the
Cross.

In the aisle is a window of the Saxon Church, never
glazed, and has a “rebate” cut round it in stone for a shutter,
and the external stonework is “axed” for the purpose of
enabling the mortar, by which Saxon buildings were coated, to
adhere to the stone.

The font, according to Mr Loftus Brock, is distinctly
Saxon in its character, with Norman ornamentation subse-
quently added. On its West side is the figure of our Lord, or
of a Bishop, holding the open Gospels upon his breast with the
left hand, and “ bruising ” the head of a serpent with a pastoral
staff with the right hand; whilst a serpent on the left is
“bruising ” his heel—an obvious allusion to the fall of man, and

115

to the recovery of his lost estate through the mystical washing
of Holy Baptism.

The Chancel is Fourteenth Century work, and there are
some beautiful paintings of the Reredos lately executed in
Munich. They are copies of paintings in Florence, by Fra.
Angelica, and are framed in the remains of carved work taken
from a Jacobean pew.

A brief historical description of the Church is given ina
small pamphlet, written by the Vicar, of which I have largely
availed.

Before inspecting the wonderful mound, camp, and large
stones, a paper upon them by the Rev. W. Bazeley—who was
unable to be present—was read by. the President.

This paper Mr Bazeley has since amplified in the one he
read at our last evening meeting.

A short walk brought the party to Silbury Hill, the largest
_ artificial mound in Europe, more than equalling in size the
second Egyptian pyramid.

When the Club visited Silbury in 1849 Mr Hugh Strickland
said he had been on the top of the largest artificial mound
known—the tomb of Halyattes, in Asia Minor, described by
_ Herodotus—and Silbury reminded him very much of it.

The President gave a short account of the Geology of the
district, with special reference to the Sarsen, Saracen, or
_ Heathen stones. It had been suggested to him that the
_ etymology of the word Sarsen is probably ses, plural sesan,
Anglo-Saxon for a rock.

For a long time there was a good deal of speculation as to
_ where such large blocks could have come from, and also by
_ what agency they were brought. Even Stukeley’s remarks
shew how primitive scientific knowledge was in his day. He
_ says “that this whole country hereabouts is a solid body of
chalk, covered with a most delicate turf. As this chalky
_ matter hardened at creation, it spew’d out the most solid body
of the stones, of greater specific gravity than itself; and
assisted by centrifugal power, owing to the. rotation of the
globe upon its axis, threw them upon the surface, where they

116

now lie. This is my opinion concerning their appearance,
which I have often attentively considered.”

The literature upon the subject of these stones is volu-
minous, but probably the most exhaustive paper is by Professor
Prestwich, in Vol. X. Quarterly Journal. He there shews that
they occur in the Reading and basement beds of the London
clay, but they are mostly derived from the Bagshot sands, and
at one time the Kocene strata extended over the Chalk Downs
of the South and West of England, and the Sarsen stones have
been left by denudation not far from their parent source.
They are formed of concretionary masses of hard Saccharoid
Sandstone, full of small grains of quartz, and vary in colour
from white, a pale grey, to brown.

Professor Rupert Jones mentions in the Geological Magazine
for 1876 that one of the enormous upright sarsens (standing
among the ricks of a farm) abounds with peculiar perpendicular
rootlets, together with numerous horizontal casts of stems and
other plant remains.

Mr W. Carruthurs, the distinguished fossil botanist, also
states in the same work for May, 1885, that he has observed
some roots of palms in the Avebury stones, but they are gene-
rally unfossiliferous, and contain some flint pebbles and stones
only slightly rolled. Sarsens are used extensively for building
purposes, as may be seen in the Parish Church and other build-
ings in the neighbourhood; part of Windsor Castle is also built
of them.

Mr Ernest Sibree, of the Indian Institute, Oxford, was
one of the party, and when on Silbury some discussion took
place with him, the President, and the Vice-President (Mr
John Bellows) as to the history of the hill and Avebury, and
the President requested Mr Sibree to supply him with a few
remarks on the subject. There is so much difference of opinion
among Archeologists that any new light is gladly welcomed,
and I thankfully introduce Mr Sibree’s notes—

“NOTES ON AVEBURY AND SILBURY

“The name Avebury is probably connected with Avington, the name of
a village lower down the Kennet, Av or Ave being possibly an ancient word

117

for river. Abury is the shortened form of the name. Avebury would then
mean the ‘bury,’ ‘ earthworks’ (not necessarily a camp) on the Ave. Stukely,
in his description of Avebury, has the following :—‘ This town is wrote
Aubury, Avebury, Avesbury,sometimes Albury; ’tis hard to say which is the true.
The former three names may have their origin from the brook running by,
au, aux, water awy in Welsh: the Old German aha (sic). The latter points
to Aldbury or old work, regarding its situation within the vallum. Nor is it
worth while to dwell on its etymology. The Saxon name is a thing of so
low a date, in comparison of what we are writing upon, that we expect no
great use from it, unless Albury has regard to al, hal, healle—a temple or
great building.’ These different spellings of the name may be accounted for
as follows :—We may start by assuming that there were two names for the
place—Aubury and Avebury. Aubury would pass into Albury by the
analogy of such place-names as Aldbourne, Aldworth, and more especially
Oldbury, which are met with in that district. Avebury would become
Avesbury by the analogy of Amesbury.

“With regard to Silbury the following points should be observed :—In
discussing the etymology of English place-names it must be remembered
that they are Saxon in form, that is, that where the name is descriptive the
adjective precedes the substantive ; whereas in Keltic districts the converse
is the case. Names ending in ‘bury,’ which is a Saxon word, may be classed
as English. The first part of such names is asarule Keltic, as in the case
of ‘ Avebury,’ and may be regarded as an independent Keltic word. This is
the case with Silbury. The question is what is this word? It is improbable
that it is an adjective, according to the general rule. It is more likely that
it is a noun, and that the ancient name was Sil—(the hyphen representing
some unknown formative suffix, which has disappeared). Now there is a
wide-spread root in the Keltic languages, sel, sil, syl, sul, sol, &c., which
means to see, behold, look, gaze at, &c., and in all probability the name Sil
meant ‘the post of observation.” The English who invaded Britain, not
knowing the meaning of the name, affixed to it the syllable ‘ bury,’ meaning
‘earthwork,’ and called the mound Sil-bury, and when ata later period the
meaning of the word ‘ bury’ was lost, the name was further augmented by
the addition of the modern word ‘hill,’ the result being the extended form
‘Silbury Hill.’ Another Keltic root ‘edrych,’ meaning ° to see,’ was used in
the same sense, and supplied the first part of the name ‘ Drakestone,’ indi-
cating the point of observation on Stinchcombe Hill (Bellows’ Forest of
_ Dean.) The Scandinavians introduced the root ‘ tot,’ having the same mean-
ing, and which is seen in such names as Toots (Selsley Hill,) Mythe Toot
(Tewkesbury,) and Tothill. It is evident, however, that Silbury was not
intended originally as a mound of observation, though standing, as it does,
close to the Roman (or Romano-British) road, it may have been used for
that purpose, as the surrounding high ground, such as Waden Hill, would

118

afford ample means of observation. Consequently, we find attempts made
to explain the name with reference to the rites performed at Avebury.
Canon Taylor (Word and Places) refers the name to ‘sel,’ the root of the
German word ‘selig’ meaning ‘blessed, sacred, &c.’ giving the signification
‘holy-bury.’ He sees the same root in Selly Oak, near Birmingham,
‘sacred oak.’ This etymology is apparently justified by the following con-
considerations :—Stukely’s explanation of the plan followed in laying out
the temple and avenues at Avebury may be taken as substantially correct,
namely, that we have here the representation of a serpent, the head of which
was at East Kennet, at a place which is still known as the ‘Sanctuary,’ and
the end of the tail at Beckhampton, while the Temple at Avebury represents
the coiled-up middle of the body. But there are two circumstances left
unexplained: (1) Why does the head lie at Hast Kennet and the tail at
Beckhampton? (2) How is the direction of the head and tail determined ?
The answer to both these questions is, 1 think, to be sought for in the
assumption of a certain connection between sun-worship and serpent-worship.
Before going into the question as to the direction assumed by the head and
tail, it may be conjectured that on the occasion of a great religious ceremony
connected with sun-worship, the procession would be formed at East Kennet,
where the first rites would be observed at sun-rise, and would then proceed
to Avebury, where the chief ceremony would be performed when the sun
at mid-day stood directly over Silbury Hill, finally making its way to Beck-
hampton, where the last rites would be gone through. The times at which
the great ceremonies were held may be conjectured to have been the summer
and winter solstices, and the vernal and autumnal equinoxes. The chief
ceremony at Stonehenge, judging from the direction in which the temple
stands, namely, due East, would take place at the vernal and autumnal
equinoxes. At Avebury, where the avenues lie to the South-EKast and
South-West respectively, one of the chief ceremonies would be performed
at the winter solstice. In support of the theory that a great ceremony was
also observed at the vernal equinox, it may be remarked that Stukely makes
the following interesting observation :-—‘The country people have an
anniversary meeting on the top of Silbury Hill on every Palm Sunday,
when they make merry with cakes, figs, sugar, and water fetched from the
Swallow-head or spring of the Kennet’ (p. 43). In this it is easy to observe
the survival of a pre-historic custom in connection with sun-worship, point-
ing conclusively to the time of the year at which one of the chief ceremonies
was performed at the temple of Avebury. On calculating geometrically the
point on the horizon at which the sun rises on the 21st of December in
latitude 51°5°, I find it to be approximately 5° E. of S.E., that is, about 50°
to the E. of the meridian. Now Stukely says that ‘Silbury stands exactly
South of Avebury, and exactly between the two extremities of the two
avenues, the head and tail of the snake.’ If then we take Silbury as the

A SE

119

meridian point on the horizon, it will be found on calculation that the
Sanctuary at East Kennet is 47° E. of that point, corresponding very nearly
with the above figures. It may be conjectured, therefore, that the position
of the minor temple at East Kennet, and of the end of the avenue at Beck-
hampton, was determined by the position of the rising and setting sun in
reference to the greater temple at Avebury at the time of the winter solstice
(Dec. 21.) The curve in the avenues may have been suggested both by the
conventional forin of the serpent and by the apparent course of the sun.”

May we not hope that in course of time Archeological
research will place the object for which Avebury and Silbury
were erected on as firm a basis as our knowledge of where
the Sarsens stones were derived from ?

The members drove back to Swindon, and became dis-

agreeably conscious of the force of the wind when it is blow-
ing a gale over the Marlborough Downs.

Time only admitted of a cursory examination of the
Swindon section, and it was resolved that it should form one
of the meets for next year. Dinner at the Goddard Arms.

The first Winter Meeting was held on Tuesday, the 25th
November, when our Hon. Secretary gave a paper on—
“ividence of the process of the formation of the Inferior
Oolite deduced from Microscopic Examination,” of which the
following is a resumé :—

He referred at some length to the structure of the oolitic
granules, which he contended were, in the main, of organic
origin, and not concretionary, as generally supposed. This was
illustrated by micro-photographs, in which some of the granules
showed a tubular structure around nuclei. These Mr Wethered

explained were the tubuli of the very interesting organism or

plant known as Girvanella. The nuclei of the oolitic granules
consisted of fragments of calcareous organisms, and round these
the Girvanelle collected, forming a granule. In some granules
this tubular structure could not be seen, and then the

_ granules showed either a granular or a crystalline structure.

A concentric arrangement around the nuclei was sometimes

Seen, but not often. In these instances it might be contended
that the chemical or concretionary origin of oolitie granules

might be maintained, and possibly this might be so in some

120

instances, though he doubted even this. He contended that in
the granular and crystalline granules the original structure
had been obliterated by molecular changes. This was found
in some instances where the tubercles could be traced passing
into the granular condition.

As to whether Girvanella was a plant or some other
organism was a matter of doubt, and he would leave that part
of the question to be decided by Botanists and Zoologists. It
was, however, clear that the Girvanelle had played a most im-
portant part in building up the oolitic rocks of which the
Cotteswold Hills so largely were made up.

Reference was also made to the other organic remains
which appeared in the Jurassic limestones in the hills. At the
base, the remains of Echinodermata were very numerous. —
They were less in the beds above, and in the Gryphite Grit
polyzoa had largely contributed to the formation of the rock.
This fact could not be ascertained unless the sections of the
limestone were placed under a microscope. To the eye the
Gryphite Grit seemed to be full of the shells of Gryphea sub-
lobata, but the microscope showed that the apparently structure-
less grey limestone in which the shells were embedded was
full of the remains of life. This was also true of many other
beds in the Cotteswold Hills, and illustrated that there was
still plenty of work to be done before we understood how the
rocks of the Cotteswold Hills had been built up.

On Tuesday, the 27th Jan., 1891, Mr John Bellows read a
paper—‘‘ The Roman Villas of Gloucestershire.”

Professor Harker occupied the Third Meeting on the 24th
Feb., with two papers—

1,—“On the Geology of Cirencester Town, chiefly as
revealed by a deep boring by the Cirencester Water Company,
and the local water supply generally.”

2,—“On the discovery, in a Cotteswold stream, of one
large Oligochaete, new to Britain; and another unrecorded in
the County.

The Fourth and last Meeting was on the 24th March.

The first paper by the Rev. W. Bazeley was on Avebury.

121

The second by the Rev. Dr Smithe and W. C. Lucy—
Sections, Field Notes, and Remarks on Alderton Hill, Ashton-
under-Hill, and Gretton.”

The only reason why my name appears is that I accom-
panied Dr Smithe on the occasion of our visit there many
years since, and assisted him in making notes, but the paper is
really his.

As the valuable papers read at the three last meetings are
all published in the Proceedings, I do not give an epitome of
them, but I would call especial attention to the important
discovery mentioned by Professor Harker of the occurrence
of the Oxford clay at Cirencester.

- The President’s address appears to me a fitting place to
record objects of interest which have come to his knowledge or
been exhibited at the Club meetings, and which do not form
part of an especial paper. .

This year the following are of value, and were exhibited at
the evening meetings :—

A Bronze Axe, sent by Sir James Campbell, which was
found in the Forest of Dean some years since, about four to
five feet below the surface, near Lydbrook, when a quarryman
was “ridding” his ground to get at the stone beneath.

Also a bronze instrument, found at Lydney in a clayey
soil, three feet below the surface, in front of the present offices
of the Severn and Wye Railway Company, shown by Mr G. W.
Keeling. It corresponds with the Palstave, figured in Mr
Boyd-Dawkins’ “ Harly Man in Britain,” page 350, fig. 117, and
which he refers to an early period of the Bronze age.

We are indebted to Mr G. Embrey, the County Analyst,
for a careful analysis of the composition of these bronzes, the
metals in which proved to be of unusual purity.

The results are as follows :—

LyYDNEY LypBROOK
Copper... ee ae a, .. 200
an... hey Se | a. ee a5 wv ASS

Loss te , Aa ele... se wee 2
100-00 100-00

122

An artificial Cone of Flint, exactly like fig. 188, p. 247,
in Dr Evans’ “Ancient Stone Implements”: lent by our
member, Mr A. E. Smith, of Nailsworth: found at Haslewood.

Our Field and Evening Meetings were never so largely
attended, the discussions at the latter were full, and I trust
the reputation of the Club has been well maintained.

Geological Notice wpon the Forest of Dean, by H. D. Hosxoxp,
M.H., F.G.S., etc., Director General of the National Depart-
ment of Mines and Geology, Buenos Aires, Argentine Republic.

The Forest of Dean Mineral Basin has a favored position,
and is situated in one of the most pleasant, interesting,
romantic, and healthy districts of Gloucestershire, its surround-
ing scenery being varied and highly picturesque, and perhaps
unequalled in any other mining part of the kingdom. It is, in
fact, a place of great name, as well as fame, and history tells
how, long centuries ago, its surface and mineral privileges were
contended for and enjoyed by some of the great favorites during
various reigns, and that its natural resources added, in a con-
siderable degree, to national strength and security; indeed, so
famous had the history of the Forest become in Europe, that
blinded bigotry and jealousy were aroused to such an extent
as to finally induce an attempted ignoble war, resulting in the
defeat and destruction of the grand Armada, and humiliation
and dishonour of the Court of Spain.

Here in a primitive forest, in obscure dells and mountain
retreats, roamed in wild liberty and security—from an unknown
date and during an unascertained period—the ancient British
rulers, fathers of the Silures, and here also reigned the Romans
and successive conquerors of the British Islands. But, no
longer is the rush of armies, the wild battle cry, and the
clashing of arms heard: no longer does the invincible Cesar
direct and encourage his valiant cohorts, or do Saxon or
Norman warriors, Kings and Forester Fee—with his Knights

3 _ in Green—range through tangled dell, sounding the horn and

bending the bow in the wild excitement of the chase. All these
grand old customs and charms of bye-gone ages have introduced

a more peaceful era, leaving us to profit by the records of the
2

124

past, and as the British, Romans, Normans, as others did, so
can we, but in another form, enjoy and contemplate the grand
old Forest of Dean amidst its varied associations. Some of the
trees still mark ancient sites, and the rocks and monuments are
still there ; the Naturalist and Antiquarian may therefore enter
upon those interesting and important researches as would best
conduce to the personal recreation and utility of the age in
which we live.

Unfortunately, however, the Geologist and Mineralogist
will find that the elements for study in such useful branches of
science are comparatively limited; still they are of an interest-
ing and valuable character, because they form links of connec-
tion with the surrounding mineral districts, the whole of which
must be studied in an extended form in order to understand
and define the natural phenomena presented.

The Forest of Dean is no exception to the rule, %.e., that
in no given locality or district can the Geologist find all the
known strata in a conformable condition or succession.

The whole has consequently to be studied, understood,
and made up of the patch-work—so to speak—of the rocks as
they exist and are presented under different forms and condi-
tions, and in other places.

Doubtless all the recognised rocks forming the crust of
the earth, from the most recent, or Pleistocene, down to the
Cambrian and Laurentian, once existed over the whole of the
British Islands, but the immense thickness of the Carboniferous
strata, from the coal measures upwards, have been broken up
and denuded to form other and newer strata. Consequently,
those great periods or divisions of formations known as Tertiary,
Secondary, and the upper member—Permian—of the Paleozoic,
are entirely absent in the Forest of Dean, evidencing those
forces which were exerted, probably over millions of years, in
producing these changes.

From a general consideration of the circumstances and
conditions which are presented in the surrounding districts,
we are led to form the conclusion that the Forest of Dean
Mineral Basin is only a small portion of the Mineral Basin

1
|

125

of South Wales, once of greater extension, and that its preser-
vation is mainly due to its having remained in a finally depressed
condition in the form of a basin, and the eroding effects were
reduced to a minimum.

It is an accepted fact that the Forest of Dean Mineral
Basin was originally joined to that of Bristol and South Wales,
and probably to other areas which extended to and beyond
Gloucester.

Tt ig not necessary at this moment to search for evidence,
neither can it be attempted, in detail, but a few references can
be made, in passing, bearing directly upon this question.

_ Professor Etheridge has shown that the Carboniferous Lime-
stone exists at the base of his celebrated section of the Trias,
Rheetic, and White Lias at Aust Passage, but the Permian,
about 300 feet thick, the coal measures, and the Millstone Grit,
which should be found to intervene between the Trias and
Carboniferous Limestone, are absent, the New Red Sandstone
being, in fact, in contact with the Carboniferous Limestone.

The Keuper marls of the Trias are again visible in the re-
markable section at Garden Cliff, Westbury-on-Severn, and there
the Rhetic, being capped from the upper portion with thin beds
of White Lias, which latter probably extends under Gloucester.
Vestiges of Permian rocks have been discovered at the Malvern
Hills, and also at May Hill.

A portion of the New Red Sandstone is also to be found in
the neighbourhood of Flaxley, deposited unconformably against
intruded Silurian; consequently we have inferential evidence
at least, that these measures extended over the Forest of Dean
and far beyond. The Keuper and Rheetic beds incline in a
South-Eastern direction from Garden Cliff, and ata very low
angle of from two to three degrees, so that there ought to be a
correspondence between the strata, or at least some portion of
it, on both sides of the river Severn, and therefore if we place
all the strata in an imaginary sense, conformably one above
another, we could realize the depression and denudation they
have undergone.

From these considerations, it is reasonable to infer that many
of the known rocks were originally superimposed, and it is not
difficult to conceive how these were removed in succession down
to the present level during the many changes which have occurred
during past Geological epochs.

The grand old historical Severn, with its varied but fertile
valleys, is an interesting and graphic example of the final result
of such active changes as were due to natural phenomena con-
nected with the earth’s history.

The Mineral Basin of the Forest of Dean is of an oval
form, the narrowest part of which is situated near to Lydney.
Nearly all the seams of coal contained in it are generally ina
regular form, having their outcroppings pretty clearly defined,
except at such places on the surface where sudden change of
level and displacement by faults have more or less obliterated
their continuity. The Trenchard seams are the deepest, and
extend over the largest area, but whether others were formed
below, we have, at present but little or no evidence.

The Coleford Hill delf seam is more general in its con-
tinuity, and more valuable than the Trenchard, but its out-
croppings are within those of the latter, and consequently its
area is somewhat less. All the other succeeding seams upwards
have diminished areas until we arrive at the upper series,
the Woorgreens. A cross section of these seams of coal, in-
cluding the rocks, is very similar in appearance to a nest of
irregular tea-saucers of various sizes and depths, fitted one into
the other, the intervening spaces representing the beds of rock
and shale which separate the seams.

The iron-ore measures extend beyond the limits of the
coal formation, and have been estimated to extend over 39
square miles, or 25,000 acres, but another estimate made ‘by
the same party makes it equal to 16,000 acres.

The late Sir Warrington Smyth stated that the coal basin
is about 34 square miles, or 21,760 acres.

Some years since, the writer made an estimation, using
one of the Government maps for the purpose, and found that
the Coleford Hill delf seam of coal extended over an area of

127

16,780 acres. It is probable that various maps may have been
consulted by those who made the estimation of the area pre-
viously referred to, and this may have occasioned a disagree-
ment between the various calculations.

The coal seams, generally speaking, are conformable to
one another, and to the iron-ore measures below them, and dip
at variable angles from all points of the outcroppings.

The iron-ore measures dip from the outcroppings on the
Eastern side of the district at angles varying from 60°, 65°,
and to 70° towards the centre of the basin, where the strata
and coal seams are nearly horizontal for a considerable distance.
_ The various beds are proved to be very regular in all the parts
explored; we therefore know from experience the structure
and constituents of the strata and minerals contained in them,
even where no explorations by boring or pits have, as yet, been
made.

The angles of dip of the measures are much greater on
the Eastern than they are on the Northern, Western, and
South-Western portion of the district. The maximum dip will
be found to exist from a point half a mile or so to the North
of the Howbeach Valley, passing through Shakemantle and to
Westbury Brook Iron Mine.

There are, however, one or two other places on the
Western side of the Forest where the dip is rather severe for
limited distances.

The coal measures to which we shall refer more particularly
further on, the strata in which the coal is found, consists

q principally of various beds of arenaceous and argillaceous sand-

stone rock, shale, and indurated clay. The thickest part of
the sandstone called Pennant rock is situated in the Lower
Series, resting upon the Trenchard coal and its associated sand-
stone shale and clay beds, all of which repose upon the Millstone
Grit.

The Millstone Grit, the upper part of which consists of
the Farewell rock, as it is sometimes called, is composed of a
variety of beds of sandstone, conglomerate, shale, indurate
clay, and a species of yellow ochre or coloured earth of no value.

128

Some of the beds of rock are coarse grained, while others
are of a finer texture, and in the upper part of the series thin
beds of conglomerate exist similar in nature to those found in
the Old Red Sandstone, from the debris of which, doubtless, it
was formed. The rounded pebbles of Quartz and Felspar con-
tained in them are cemented together with fine particles of silici-
ous, argillaceous, and ferruginous elements of a very tenaceous
character. The shale, clay, and marle beds of this series pre-
dominate to a greater extent in some parts than in others.
The thickness is also variable as we proceed in depth, for we
find that some of these beds are in a more compact and rocky
condition at deeper levels. The prevailing colours of the shale
and marle beds are reddish, brown, dark purple, dingy yellow,
chocolate, and claret. The distribution of a very large quantity
of peroxyde of iron, held in solution during the period of the
formation of these rocks, imparted the colours we now observe
in them. This is beyond doubt, for we find deposited Hematite
iron-ore of an excellent quality in this series and at some places
such as at Saint Annals Iron Mine, China-Blind Meend, and to
the Southern extremity of the Lower Oakwood Iron Mine
level. In former years, ore of a poorer quality was also worked
at the Southern extremity of Ruspidge Meend, near to Shake-
mantle. It has not, however, been worked in a general
manner, or even searched for, a circumstance which has arisen
chiefly because immense deposits of Hematite iron-ore have been
found, and worked all round the Forest in the Carboniferous
Limestone, situate at the base of the Millstone Grit.

Comparatively little water finds its way into the Mill-
stone Grit series, because the beds of clay and shale act as a
dam, throwing off the greater portion of the water periodically
due to rainfall. The thickness of the Sandstone or Millstone
Grit series varies in different parts of the Forest, and it has
been stated to be from 273 to 455 feet.

At the Parkhill Colliery adit the thickness of the Millstone
Grit, measured from the Lower Trenchard coal to the upper
side of the Carboniferous Limestone, is 612 feet.

129

Near to Shakemantle Pumping Pit, on the Eastern side of
the Forest, a portion of the Trenchard measures are exposed in
a section of the railway cutting, and the thickness of the Mill-
stone Grit in this neighbourhood, taken to the top of the
Carboniferous Limestone, is 780 feet; this railway cutting
exhibits a beautiful section of the upper beds of this formation.
In the upper portion of the series beds of a very pure fireclay
exist, and have been worked at some points. Similar beds also
exist above the Trenchard seam of coal, and have been exploited
for the manufacture of bricks at the Southern extremity of
Ruspidge Meend and to the West of Shakemantle Pumping
Pit, as also at Darkhill and Milkwall Meend. The same belt of
clay is visible between the upper and lower Oakwood Mine
levels on the South-Eastern side of the Forest.

At a point in the Millstone Grit, towards the South-East
from Lambsquay House, and North-East from Gattles Cross,
there exists fine beds of pure limestone which have been
used for lime for many years. A bluish thin bed of lime-
stone has also been worked at Oldcroft, near Soilwell House,
but whether this is the remains of the Millstone Grit has not
been ascertained. A sufficient number of sections do not exist
by which it could be proved whether these limestone beds are
general, 7.e., continuous in the Millstone Grit.

At a considerable distance to the South-West of Shake-
mantle Iron Mine, the Millstone Grit commences to thin out
towards the Howbeach Valley, where there is no appearance of
it, but the Pennant rock seems to rest upon the limestone.

The Carboniferous Limestone succeeds the Millstone Grit
_ in a descending order, and the junction of the two series is
distinctly marked by shale and a bed of limestone of from
eight to twelve feet thick, of a tine texture, and slightly red in
colour. This rock is the upper portion of the upper Carboni-
ferous Limestone, and is locally known as the “ Lid-stone,”
because it forms a cover to the iron-ore deposits, in fact, iron-
ore is never found above it unless this rock had suffered
fracture, and so formed an open joint into which ore may have
intruded itself. Immediately below this bed of rock, a thick

130

atratum of rock, from 80 to 40 feet in thickness, exists, called
“ Crease,”’ in which the great deposits of Hematite iron-ore of
the district occur.

This “Crease”? consists principally of silica and limestone,
is rough in texture, and frequently streaked with a reddish
colour.

The particular bed of rock upon which the iron-ore is
deposited is from 3 to 15 feet in thickness, and is very compact
and highly crystalline. Iron-ore is never found below this
rock unless cross joints exist in it. This base of the iron-ore
measures is locally called ‘‘Underedge.” From this point
downward, the great mass of the Carboniferous Limestone com-
mences, consisting of a series of hard compact beds of varying
thickness, and of an imperfectly formed crystalline character.
The general colours are mixtures of red, brown, and grey; the
red colour, however, predominates in the upper and thicker
beds down to the first shales.

In the Memoirs of the Geological Survey, Vol. I., p. 128, a
section of the Carboniferous Limestone is given, and is said
to have been obtained from near Lower Purlien. It is as

follows :—
SECTION No. 1
Totals in
Thickness tt ai
Description of Measures ge once iene
inches | e020
ft. in.”| ft. “ine ieee
Marl us eal) NG
Gray impure and sandy limestone... Ah owe)
Mar! wee Be ewe ate ne ees|) O28
Impure limestone... ine Soc ag wach wagon)
Mar! seal) ol sO)
Red sandstone, with calcareous matter.. 2 ./ <9-n0
Marl me bas sas a gOe 3S
Gray and red sandstone . 21770
Sandstone, with intersir atified beds of shale . Bef KU
Red and soft sandstone ... wee|' 20" 10
Soft sandstone, with thin beds of of clay... eee OP 0
Hard sandstone ... Sach Leen,
Sandstone, red with hematite veins... «| 49 0 193 10 | 193 10
White, gray, and red limestone.. 90) 0
Limestone, with intermingled hematite exten-
sively worked ... 56 ae 5p ...| 60 0

131

SECTION No. 1—Continued

Totals in
Teicteot (ft. and ins.| rota
Description of Measures between be
and aack depths
inches | division

TT ee ad ee eee

ft. ft in. | ft. i.
Gray, white, and blue compact limestone... 330 480 0| 673 10
Shale and limestone alternating “6 .-.| 107
Gray argillaceous limestone... 5: es
Gray shale... ite eee of os pec ieea!)
Shale, limestone ... a Ac Wes veel ed
Shale aa ee dos, ses ite sali
Limestone .. ae i

Gray shale, ‘With thin beds of limestone
_ Argillaceous limestone ...
- Shale, with thin beds of limestone
_ Argillaceous limestone
Shale and limestone alternating
Limestone .. :
Shale
_ Limestone...
Soft black shale
Limestone ..
‘Limestone and shale
Shale
Limestone ...
_ Shale
Limestone ...
Black shale
Limestone ..
Black shale
Brown ae “With shale partings ...

-

‘Sandy marl
Limestone ..

SOOCAUDDOSCOCHAPARORAORBDOABKRDOHANSDOOOSOHARS©S os

=
DE ROR HONWHERONONOOCONHOOCOPNHHEHS

164 9} 838 7

On page 121 of the Geological Memoire it is stated that—
« From this section we learn that a total thickness of 2,338 feet
“obtained on the Avon has diminished down to 791 feet; and
“the lower shales, about 500 feet thick, near Bristol, are about
“165 feet deep at Dean Forest ; and that the upper mixtures of
“sandstones, marls, and limestones of the Avon, 400 feet thick,
“are represented at Purlien by sandstones, limestones, and

132

“marls, 146 feet in thickness. Thus the central portion of the
“ Carboniferous series, 1,438 feet in depth at Bristol, becomes
“480 feet at Dean Forest.” The depth of 480 and 165 feet
are to be seen in the section, but it is not clear where we are
to find the “146 feet,” as the first division of the section is 194
feet nearly, or 48 feet in excess of the number stated. There
does not therefore appear to be an exact agreement between
the numbers in the section and the description appended to it.
I apprehend the former has to be taken as being correct.

The late Mr David Mushet, whose memory is much revered
in the Forest of Dean, published a section of that district in
the “Transactions of the Geological Society of London,” as far
back as 1824, but he had not then the means at hand to con-
struct an accurate section in all its details. It is as follows :—

SECTION No. 2

ey)
Q

1— Porcelain limestone
2— Dark grey limestone .
3--Ball limestone in clay matrix..
Upper lime- | 4—Small blue beds ;
stone shale | 5—Grayish blue limestone, with
purple joints
6 —White limestone
Limestone 7—Iron-ore and marl, from 10 to
8—Great white cliff bed of lime-
stone . Se
9—Yellow clay limestone Be
10—Great blue limestone oolitic to
the N.W. of Coleford, with
clay ... 8 0
11—Sparry limestone oolitic near
St. Briavels, and slightly so
near Coleford : all
12—Brownish red iron-ore, ‘Swan-)
Pool or Cherry Orchard
limestone a
Lower lime- | 13--Beds of brownish red ‘marl ...
stone shale | 14—Straw coloured shale ...

me COP o>

76 0

oo

—
, an) ooo Or
CoO coo ooooLs

me Om

Limestone

The late Mr Atkinson also published a section of the Forest
in 1851, and seems to have taken the thickness of the Carboni-
ferous Limestone at about 710 feet. There is no agreement
between the authorities quoted, but the data employed may not
have been obtained from the same places in the district, and

133

| this may account for the difference. The Carboniferous Lime-
stone may be traced as a continuous belt round the Forest of
Dean, from the Howbeach Valley to Wigpool on the North,
| North-Western, Western, and South-Western outcroppings to
Lydney Park, and is continuous half-way between the Red
Hill and the Leech Pool.
14 From this neighbourhood, and along the South-Eastern
croppings of the coal field to Howbeach Valley, the limestone
is absent.
. The lower coal measures overlap and repose upon the older
_ rocks. Near Soilwell Farm, the Trenchard outcroppings are
- found nearly in contact with the Old Red Sandstone.
i Buckland and Conybere, in a paper entitled “‘ Observations
on the South-Western Coal District of England,” published in
the Transactions of the Geological Society in 1824, considered
| that the absence of the limestone is due to a fault, but they do
not explain how it was brought about. Maclauchan, in his
_ paper published in 18338, took the same view, which appears to
have been derived from the late Mr David Mushet.

It is very likely that the strata of the limestone along the
line of the country mentioned was much dislocated in past
Geological periods, and it is possible that a fault may also exist,

but the entire absence of the limestone is more particularly
due to the influences exerted throughout a very long period by
denudation.
| : How far in perpendicular depth the limestone has been
| removed is a matter of conjecture at present.
Mr Maclauchlan’s section shows it at a depth of over 300
_ yards below the surface, but whether he had sufficient reason
for such an hypothesis is doubtful. At whatever level denuding
influences ceased, there we may expect to find the limestone,
and it is possible that the difference of level between the lowest
point in the Old Red Sandstone, South of Lydney, as it existed
at that time, and its outcroppings along the neighbourhood
referred to, may give some clue to the probable depth.
_ Probably the limestone was thinned out from the Howbeach
Valley along the ancient site now known as Cockshoot

134

Enclosure, and on towards Lydney, whilst the corresponding
more massive part of it, from Howbeach Valley Northwards,
passing through Shakemantle, and on towards Wigpool, re-
mained less affected. Consequently great pressure exerted
from the North, South, East, and West would tend to contract,
fold, and break up the limestone in the line of least resistance,
and so form dislocations and faults. This may have occurred
when the beds of rock were comparatively horizontal, and
possibly before the final uplifting of the Hastern boundary of
the Forest Mineral Basin.

When the beds of rock from Howbeach to Lydney were
raised their condition would have rendered them more suscept-
able to denuding effects.

The mass of Mountain, or Carboniferous Limestone has
been divided by the Howbeach Valley, and in the open quarries
there the action may be seen. At a distance of a few hundred
yards Northwards, in Stapledge Enclosure, the limestone strata
is conformable to the general direction or strike ; consequently
it must be somewhere from that point towards the Howbeach
Valley where the contortion of the strata had its centre, or hinge
upon which they have been folded out of their course. When
the limestone beds are in their proper order, the average direc-
tion of the strike is about North 30° East, and South 30°
West, but the limestone beds in the Howbeach Valley strike
North 60° to 64° East, and South 60° to 64° West, dipping at
an angle of from 70° to 75°. The rocks have consequently been
thrown out of their proper course by an horizontal angle of 34°.

The displacement is, however, somewhat confused, render-
ing it difficult to determine the average direction. Supposing
that all the forces which produced this effect were exerted from
an Hasterly direction, affecting the rocks at right angles from
their present dip, we should expect to find the Old Red Sandstone
rocks immediately below affected in a similar degree. We can-
not, however, see far down into these, but an inspection of the
section from Howbeach Valley to Blakeney does not appear to
confirm such an idea, for the rocks are not contorted to
correspond with the limestone.

taal

135

This is a remarkable circumstance, and before coming to
a definite conclusion it would be necessary to examine upon the
ground itself all the existing sections in the Old Red Sandstone
and other rocks from Blakeney to Lydney.

The whole of the iron-ore measures proper and the Mill-
stone Grit series are absent in the Howbeach Valley, and there
the Pennant rocks belonging to the lower coal measures rest
immediately upon and are in contact with the Carboniferous
Limestone. It is, however, curious to note that the direction
of the strike of the Pennant rocks is about North 30° East,
and South 30° West, and consequently are conformable to the
direction of the general measures when not affected by dis-
placement. There seems to be, therefore, strong evidence that
the Pennant rocks, Trenchard and Coleford Hill delf seams,
were deposited long ages after the Millstone Grit and iron-ore
measures were removed by denudation.

The horizontal width of the Carboniferous Limestone is
less from the Howbeach Valley to Wigpool Northwards, than
it is in any other part of the district; for instance, if we drew
a line to the West of the Lydbrook Valley, or in a Southern
direction from Welsh Bicknor, to the coal measures, the lime-
stone would be found to be spread out from the river Wye for
a distance of 24 miles, but if taken across the measures, at
right angles to the dip, the width from Stowes Field to the out-
croppings of the coal measures would be 1} miles. The nearest
approach of the river Wye to the coal field, taken in a line
from Court Field to High Beach, is about 580 yards. Drawing
a line through Blackthorns to Goodrich Cross, in Herefordshire,
_ the distance from the coal measures to the river Wye is about
_ 440 yards, and from the same point in the coal measures to the
commencement of the Carboniferous Limestone, the distance is
_ about 225 yards.

} Taken along the same line the width of the limestone is
_ about 1,100 yards.

If we produce a line from Blackthorns to Doward Camp,
_ the distance from the commencement of the Carboniferous
_ Limestone is about 320 yards; from this point to the river

136

Wye the distance is 220 yards; and from the latter point to
the extreme edge of the limestone the distance is about 14
miles.

The Wye crosses the edge of the limestone Westward at a
point half-way between Doward Camp and Little Hadnock.
At Staunton the width of the limestone is about half a mile.

Producing a line through the Beaches and Cherry Orchard,
the distance from the outcroppings of the coal measures to the
limestone would be about half a mile, and from the latter point
it will be found to spread out to a distance of 14 miles.

At Newland, Lower Redbrook, Lodges Farm, near Scatter-
ford Wood, up to Ostridge Grove, by Bircham Grove, and as
far South as Clearwell, a portion of the Carboniferous Lime-
stone has been broken up, and denuded in an irregular patch
down to the Old Red Sandstone, which latter is connected to
the great mass of that series in Monmouthshire.

The continuity of the limestone adjacent to the coal
measures has not been destroyed, for, opposite to this denuded
patch, we find the limestone against the Millstone Grit, half a
mile in width. The very irregular and horned appearance of .
the exterior edge of the limestone, from Howell’s Hill to the
neighbourhood of Hastridge Wood and Coxbury, is sufficient
evidence of the effects produced by denuding influences. It is
very remarkable that the isolated patches of limestone at
Highbury and Penalt Common withstood such influences, and
remains as proof of the extension of the limestone into Mon-
mouthshire. These two patches of limestone are entirely
surrounded by the Old Red Sandstone. Half a mile South of
Clearwell the limestone attains a great width on account of its
slow dip or flattened position, and if we were to draw a line
through Elwood and Lodges Barn, the distance from the out-
croppings of the coal measures is about 550 yards, and from
this point the limestone spreads out 2} miles. Producing a
line from Oakwood Mill Level to St. Briavel’s, the distance
from the coal measures to the limestone is about one-
quarter of a mile, and from this point the limestone will have a
width of 24 miles. The limestone is again broken up and

137

denuded about a quarter of a mile North of Bream’s Lodge,
where the Old Red Sandstone comes in, extending to Priors
Meend and Aylburton Common, and is separated into two
irregular branches. The South-Western portion extends to
the North of Bream’s Lodge and St. Briavels, to Hewelsfield,
towards Tintern, Chepstow, and Caerwent, where it occupies a
considerable area, and continues still further to the South.
The Eastern limit of the limestone nearly coincides with a line
drawn from Bream’s Cross through Tidenham House, as far as
Tidenham. The other portion of the limestone branches off
near Bream, and follows the coal measures as a narrow regular
strip about a quarter of a mile in width to a down throw fault
at Lodge’s Kiln; it then extends a little further Southwards,
and terminates at the place before referred to.

The connection that once existed between Dean Forest
and the Monmouthshire and South Wales coal fields was
destroyed, and the intervening limestone and Millstone Grit
measures were swept away, except in a few patches marking
the ancient or continuity connections of the districts.

The Old Red Sandstone entirely surrounds the Forest of
Dean Mineral Basin, and upon it, as a base, the Carboniferous
series repose. It may be traced to Lydney, Aylburton,
Alvington, Woolaston, and Southwards to Tidenham, where it
terminates against the New Red Marls on the East, Dolomitic
Conglomerate on the South, and Carboniferous Limestone on
the West. From Aylburton it runs Westward to the limestone
for a distance of 24 miles; from Lydney it extends in an
irregular manner to Nass Cliff, on the Severn where it spreads
itself Northward and forms the left bank of the Severn for a
distance of 3} miles, and is separated from the Lower Lias
Clay and limestone by a fault. Taking a Northern course, the
Old Red occupies a considerable area in Herefordshire, Mon-
mouthshire, Brecknockshire, and surrounds the greater portion
of the Glamorganshire coal field. On the Hast, the Old Red
is bounded by a fault commencing at a point previously re-
ferred to.

D

138

This line of fault takes a line through Paulton, Oakland’s
Park, Hayden Green, Culvert House, Elton, and passes a little
to the right of the turnpike gate at the juncture of the Newn-
ham and Flaxley turnpike roads. ~

Little to the West of this place it branches off to the
North-West, still bounding the Old Red, and passes about a
quarter of a mile Kast of Flaxley Abbey. It may then be
traced through Woodgreen, Velthouse, to a point a quarter of
a mile East of Longhope, and in the direction of Blaisdon and
Huntley Hill.

This fault, with others, which branch from it, enclose a
patch of Upper Silurian, consisting, in an ascending order, of
May Hill Sandstone or Upper Llandovery rock, Woolhope
Limestone, Shale, Wenlock Limestone, and Upper Ludlow
beds. It is believed that the Old Red Sandstone is over 2,000
feet thick in the Forest of Dean, although near Tortworth it is
only about 300 feet thick. This facts speaks eloquently as
to the effects of denudation, and the general direction which
it had.

A fine section of some of the upper beds of this series
may be seen in the railway cutting at Soudley. Some of the
middle beds are well exhibited in the open quarries at Bradley
Hill, and they were further laid open in the railway tunnel
driven under May Hill Estate. This tunnel commences on the
Forest side, near the blast furnaces formerly belonging to the
Great Western Iron Company, in the Soudley Valley, and
terminates on the Eastern part of the May Hill Estate.

At a point a little to the North of the Hawthorns the
turnpike road leading from Drybrook to Ross has been formed
through the Old Red Sandstone for a considerable distance,
and nearly at a right angle with the dip of the beds, which
incline in an Eastern direction. Here the different beds of
Rock, Shale, Clay, and Micaceous Sand may be traced to a
point of contact with the lower limestone beds belonging to
the Carboniferous series. This section offers a fine treat to the
Geologist, as the conditions are somewhat unusual. Certain it
is that there are but few places to be found where such a long

139

length of section is laid open up to the superimposed limestone
itself.*

The Old Red Sandstone has been much flattened and
thinned out in the neighbourhood of Yorkley, Soilwell Farm,
and Lydney.

If we construct a section from the Ebury River, in Mon-
mouthshire, and continue it across the Forest of Dean towards
the Severn, it will be seen that an anti-clinal line exists to the
East of the outcroppings of the lower Carboniferous Limestone,
and this same line of upheaval can be traced through the
country for a considerable distance.

Buckland and Conybeare considered that an anticlinal line
passed the middle of the valley of the Severn, and that it was
the cause of separating Dean Forest from the Bristol coal field.

Murchison and Phillips concluded that the principal dis-
turbance passed through Flintshire, Malvern, and then South-
ward into Somersetshire, and that the elevation of the Malvern
Hills, the Eastern portion of the Forest of Dean, and the

greater portion, if not all, of South Wales, is due to this cause.
The axis of the Malvern Hills is composed of Syenitic
rock, and, according to the late Rev. W. 8. Symonds, it is eight
miles long and half a mile in width.t It is very probable that
this upheaval took place after the formation of the Lower
Silurian beds, and may have terminated with the close of the
Carboniferous period. The general effect produced must doubt-
less have led to a series of elevations and depressions of the
ancient sea level at a very early epoch.

The upheaving force exerted on the Hastern side of the
Forest must also have been enormous, for if we construct a
restored section of the removed strata we should find that the
top of the Carboniferous Limestone was raised more than
5,500 feet above the present level of the water in the river
Severn. The coal measures were consequently elevated as
much as 8,000 feet above the same level, and the Old Red

* See section by John Jones and W. C. Lucy, Vol. IV. Cotteswold Club.

¢ See the works on the subject by Phillips, Hull, Rutley, and Callaway.
D2

140

Sandstone must have had an elevation of 4,500 feet. Accord-
ing to this, the Silurian may be expected to be found at a
small depth below the present level of the Severn, and it is
possible that some portions of it may, upon a close examina-
tion, be visible. The course of one of the anti-clinals on the
Eastern side of the Forest, and nearest to the mineral field, is
fairly represented by the elevated ridge of Blaize Bailey, and
there, at a distance of about a mile to the West, the Old Red
Sandstone will be found to dip towards the Forest, or to the
West on the one hand, and towards the river Severn or in an
Easterly direction on the other. Former observers, among
whom may be mentioned Mushet and Maclanchlan, have
asserted that the Old Red Sandstone dips towards the Forest
from the river Severn. This may be so, but not in a con-
tinuous order.

If we produce a line from Cinderford Bridge through the
Temple on Blaize Bailey, we shall find that the distance from
the exterior outcroppings of the Carboniferous Limestone to
the anti-clinal line referred to is about 1,600 yards. The anti-_
clinal line is so well defined at the place named, that it may
be seen to run nearly in a parallel course to that taken by the
line of fault before described. LHxisting sections made of the
strata are, however, too few to enable us to decide the course
with certainty. The Geological section from Edge Hill, taken
through Abinghall Church to Taynton House, shows the Old
Red Sandstone to be much contorted, especially at a point near
Brimpshill, but no anti-clinal line is shown, although it may be
expected to run near this place.

At a distance of about 34 miles from the exterior out-
croppings of the Carboniferous Limestone, measured on the
same section, an anti-clinal is shown running under May Hill,
and the May Hill Sandstone, or Upper Llandovery rocks, are
consequently much contorted and elevated. The rocks dip
towards the Forest of Dean and towards the Malverns, the
Upper Silurian, Woolhope Limestone, Shale, Wenlock Lime-
stone, and Upper Ludlow beds dipping on both sides of the
anti-clinal in succession. At the North-Eastern side, however,

141

the Silurian is much broken up by faults. The great axial
force being thus exerted so near the present outcroppings of
the limestone is the primary cause of the very severe dip of
the strata on the Eastern side of the district. The force of the
upheaval on the Western side of the district seems to have
been comparatively weak, unless, indeed, ultimately the rocks
were depressed more on the Western than on the Eastern
portion of the district.

Near Bircham Grove Hill, a distance of a little over a
quarter of a mile from the Carboniferous Limestone, and at the
axial line of force, it is not elevated more than 1,600 feet above
the present level of the Severn, but the top of the coal
measures at this point was elevated about 4,300 feet above the
_ same level. The Old Red Sandstone was also raised to a
height of about 900 feet. The coal measures were 3,700 feet
higher on the Eastern than they were on the Western side,
and the Carboniferous Limestone was also elevated 3,400 feet
higher on the former than on the latter side.

About 14 miles West of the river Usk, the principal axial
force which raised the Eastern outcropping of the Monmouth-
shire coal field was apparently exerted, resulting in the up-
heaval of the Carboniferous Limestone to a height of 10,000
feet above the present level of the water in the Severn, but
this main axial force was exerted at too great a distance from
the Western outcroppings of the limestone in Dean Forest to
affect it in a similar degree to that on the Eastern side. At
the point referred to, West of the Usk river, the top of the
coal measures must have been raised to a height of some 12,300
feet; the Silurian itself was thrust up some 3,200 feet above
the same line of reference.

From this axial line, there has consequently been removed,
by denuding and other influences, the astounding mass of
material of 11,800ft. in thickness. This influence has extended
along the line of country from the Monmouthshire coal-field
towards the river Severn, and further to the East and South-East.
The materials removed from the Eastern side of the Forest by
similar agencies must have amounted to 7,500 ft. in thickness.

142

It has been considered by Geologists that the central
portion of the Monmouthshire and Dean Forest coal fields have
not suffered to any great extent, and as far as the exploitation
has gone in the latter this theory has held good.

The central portion of the Monmouthshire coal field is
about 1,500 feet, and that of the Dean Forest 800 feet above
the level of the Severn.

Similar Geological causes as those previously referred to
have separated the Bristol coal field from that of Dean Forest,
so that the identity of the corresponding seams of coal in these
districts is a difficult question, and requires further investiga-
tion in order to arrive at correct deductions.

The late Sir R. I. Murchison considered that the sandstone
from the Lower Trenchard coal to the Lower Churchway coal
were identical with the central sandstones’of Pontypool; and
also that the beds above the central sandstone represent the
Upper Shales of the Bristol coal field on the South, and appear
to be equivalent in position to the various beds above the
central sandstone of Neath, Swansea, and Llanelly; still there
is not sufficient evidence collected to enable Geologists to
decide this question definitely.

There are two patches of coal measures to the South-West
of the Forest of Dean, and to the North-East of Chepstow,
called Tidenham Chase and White Wells, but hitherto a diffi-
culty has been experienced in determining whether the sand-
stone occurring there belongs to the Millstone Grit series or to
the upper portion of the Carboniferous series. No particular
attempt has been made to compare these small outlying patches
with the measures of the Forest of Dean with a view to their
identity. They are, however, marked on the Geological Map
as Millstone Grit.

At Howell’s Hill, to the North of the Forest and Bishop’s
Wood House, and on the West of Hope Mansell, another small
patch of coal measures occur extending about 1} miles, and of
an average width of about } of a mile, and some coal has been
worked from these measures, but they are now abandoned, A
very peculiar feature connected with this patch of coal

143

measures is, that it is found to repose directly upon the
Carboniferous Limestone, except on the Eastern side, where
there is an overlap, and in contact with the Old Red Sandstone.
Mr Maclauchlan’s section shows this, and his map also indicates
that the limestone is absent for a distance of half a mile. The
Geological map, however, does not show that it is missing for
so great a distance. These coal measures are considered to be
identical with those found in the Millstone Grit series of the
Central and North-Western portion of Great Britain.
It has hitherto remained a question whether the Carboni-
_ferous Limestone, and consequently the coal measures of the
Forest of Dean, have extended to Newent and the Malvern
Hills. The patch of coal at Newent is hid for the most part by
the New Red Sandstone, and is known to repose directly upon
~ the Old Red; but whether it was deposited there anterior to
the formation of the Carboniferous Limestone, or subsequently,
has not been determined with any degree of certainty. The
late Sir R. I. Murchison was of opinion that there was no
destruction of the Carboniferous Limestone towards Newent
before the deposition of the coal measures, but whether he
believed that the limestone extended so far, or not, nevertheless
there is strong evidence that it extended much farther. No
traces of the Millstone Grit existed at Howell’s Hill according
to Maclauchlan, but it is marked upon the Geological map.
Personally, however, the author has no evidence, but if ever it
existed there, it must have been carried away, like we have
shown is the case in other parts of the Forest. The same cause
has partially removed and thinned out the Mountain Limestone,
for the coal measures appear to be deposited partly on the
limestone and partly on the Old Red, the remaining portion of
the former coming in from the West like a wedge, and dying
out towards the East, half way under the coal measures. It is
evident that Murchison inclined to the opinion that the patch
of coal at Howell’s Hill belonged to the Millstone Grit series.
If this theory could be fully established we should be justified
in inferring that a similar deposit of coal took place over the
entire Forest after the close of the Carboniferous Limestone

144

period; but, in such a case, the coal must have existed in the
first or upper beds of the Millstone Grit series, and that it was
afterwards removed by denudation, with the exception of a
small patch at Howell’s Hill, which, however, remains as a
remnant of what existed more generally in earlier times.

If we could determine with absolute certainty that the
coal measures at Newent were originally deposited upon the
Old Red Sandstone before the period assigned to the deposition
of the Carboniferous Limestone, a point of no small interest
and importance would have been gained. ‘The late Rev. W. 8.
Symonds was of opinion that the Carboniferous Limestone ex-
tended to the Malvern Hills, and we have previously stated
that the evidence is stronger for than against that theory, and
consequently it must have covered the whole of the Newent
district. The coal in the Newent patch is dissimilar to that in
the Forest of Dean. We must therefore refer its formation to
a different epoch. Coal appears to have been extracted from
this field at different periods.

The Coal-field.—Hitherto shafts have not been made in
any particular place in the Forest of Dean, directly through
the whole of the coal measures; the sections therefore which
have appeared have been constructed as previously noticed
from data obtained from several different points of the district,
but as the thickness of the strata varies with the locality, it is
necessary that a general series of sections should be taken over
various portions of the Mineral Basin before sufficient informa-
tion can be obtained upon which an estimate of the average
thickness of the strata can be made.

The appended section, No. 3, is a record of actual sinking
at the Lightmoor Collieries, one of the deepest in the Forest,
and fairly represents the strata in that neighbourhood.

The iron-ore deposits in the vicinity of Wigpool, situated
in the Northern portion of the Mineral Basin, occupies the
form of a horse-shoe or projection towards the North-KHast
from the other parts of the mineral field, for a distance of at
least 2,000 yards, taken from a point in the restored curved
form, which it should have presented to join the outcroppings
traced from Ruardean Kastward.

145

The iron-ore outcroppings are ill defined in the Lydbrook
Valley, also to the North of Joyford, Farmers’ Folley, The
Hobbles, and further to the North-West, where apparently it
must have curved to the Slaughter House. The iron-ore field
between the two last preceding mentioned places seems also to
have projected in the form of a horse-shoe, but as the out-
croppings cannot be traced, how far this projection extended
cannot be determined. The irregular form of the Mineral
Basin existing in the Northern portion of the Forest, leads to
the inference that the limestone and iron-ore measures once
extended over a considerable area Northwards, also towards
the East and West, and that the whole has been removed by
the natural influences previously indicated. Some portions,

however, had a greater tenacity and power of resistance than
’ others.

When the Pumping Pit at Wigpool Iron Mine was sunk,
a thin seam of coal, believed to be the Trenchard, was dis-
covered at about 15 yards from the surface, and proved to be a
good steam coal, but the roof consisted of hard clod, containing
water, rendering it difficult and costly to work; consequently it
was abandoned. At a little distance to the South of the
Pumping Pit, a smaller shaft was sunk to a depth of 150
yards, but as the measures were much confused the seam of
coal could not be traced.

Considering that this patch of coal is situated at a distance
of about 14 miles from the well-known outcroppings of the
Trenchard seam on Harrow Hill, and at comparatively such a
short distance from the outcroppings of the iron-ore measures,
it is highly probable that the seam of coal in question is not
identical with the Trenchard, but is more likely to belong to
the Millstone Grit series, and possibly may have had some con-
nection with the seam of coal at Howell’s Hill. At all events
this is the most North-Westerly point in the Dean Forest
Mineral Basin where coal has been discovered. Iam of opinion
that seams of coal existed in the Millstone Grit measures over
the entire Forest area, and this idea seems to be corroborated
by the fact that in other English coal fields the Millstone Grit

146

seams of coal have been worked extensively. For example, it
has been proved that some of such seams of coal in Yorkshire
had a thickness of from three to five feet. The Millstone Grit
caps the hills of Yorkshire, and there is also evidence that
coal has been worked in these measures from Silkstone to
Chatsworth.

The writer has had no opportunity to examine the coal
measures at Wigpool, and cannot therefore determine what
period it belongs to; but the section No. 15 of the Geological
Survey produces some evidence.

From the extreme Northern portion of the outcroppings of
the Lower Limestone measures, the Millstone Grit measures
have been completely denuded for a distance of 650 yards at
least towards the South, but at that point it comes in as a thin
edge of a wedge; attaining its maximum thickness further
South, at the intersection of the Trenchard coal on Harrow
Hill. The perpendicular thickness is about 480 feet, but near
to Wigpool pit its thickness is no more than 120 feet. Re-
storing, therefore, the coal measures to their proper position on
the Government Section referred to, the Lower Trenchard seam
would have occupied a position of 360 feet above the present
surface line. This, therefore, seems to prove that the seam of —
coal found at the Wigpool Pumping Pit exists in the lower part
of the Millstone Grit series, and consequently must at one time
have extended over the entire Forest.

It should, however, be observed that the deduction thus
arrived at depends entirely upon the accuracy of the Geological
Survey Section referred to. Future observers may, however,
be able to verify existing data and determine the question.

In every mining district faults or dislocations, more or
less extensive and troublesome, exist, but in the Dean Forest
mineral field the known faults are of no very great extent, and
the only effect has been to break up the continuity of the
mineral deposited for limited distances. The most curious of
these faults is that called the “ Horse,” first discovered in the
Coleford Hill delf seam, on the Western side of the district.
It seems to have first made its appearance below ground at a

147

place called the ‘“‘ Whitehall Pool,” the South-Western limits
passing under the boundary stone No. 98 on the Government
map, and then runs in an irregular and slightly curved form to
New Fore Pit, continuing under the Lodge, crossing Hope-
well Colliery, in Whimberry Bottom, Perch Enclosure, and
onwards to the deep pit on Vallet’s Level Colliery. It is again
intersected by the Workings in Vallet’s Level Colliery in Bram
Hill Enclosure.

There is no certain evidence that it has been traced further
than this, because no workings have hitherto been carried on
in the Coleford Hill delf vein in the deeper parts of the basin.

The North-Eastern limits of this fault runs almost parallel
with its other line of direction described, but it appears to be
-narrower as it penetrates the measures more in the deep.

It varies in width from 180 to 340 yards, and appears to
be running in a South-Easterly direction, or towards the How-
beach Valley. A fault, also called the “Horse,” is shown to
be crossing the North-Western boundary of the New Fancy
Colliery, having the same direction as that previously indicated,
but I am of opinion that it is not the same fault.

Another fault exists between the Southern part of the
Foxe’s Bridge Colliery and the Northern portion of the Light-
moor Colliery, and has an average width of 300 yards. Traced
from the Western portion of the district, it passes through the
Rose-in-Hand Colliery; the line of its Northern limits runs

under the boundary stone No. 125 on the Government index
_ map inthat Colliery. It then takes a South-Western direction,
passing between the Foxe’s Bridge and Lightmoor Collieries
before referred to, and onwards towards Cinderford Bridge.
The line forming the Southern limits of this fault runs nearly
parallel with the line marking its Northern limits. That part
of the turnpike-road opposite Lightmoor Colliery marks a
perpendicular point in the fault below. This fault has a dis-
placement, or down throw, of the measures of 96 feet, but
there has been no opportunity to prove whether it extends to
the lower coal measures, i.e., Coleford Hill delf, &c.; but as
such faults are known to affect all the seams in other coal

148

fields, we cannot consider that the fault under consideration
will prove an exception to the rule. Workings were formerly
carried downwards in the Coleford Hill delf seam from a pit
sunk at Quidchurch, in Stapledge Enclosure, a little to the
West of Shakemantle Pumping Pit, and at a point a little to
the South of Cinderford Bridge a fault of considerable thick-
ness was reported to have been discovered running in nearly
the same direction as the last preceding fault referred to,
between Foxe’s Bridge and Lightmoor Collieries, but the
administration in connection with the working of the Quid-
church Colliery was not of such an order to permit of accurate
observations, and as the works have been abandoned and are
now full of water, no verification of facts referring to this fault
can now be made. If the fault existing between the Lightmoor
Collieries and Foxe’s Bridge should continue in a perpendicular
plane to all the coal measures below, which is highly probable
separating the middle and lower series of coal seams as it has
done in the upper measures, it would prove of great service,
tending to dam back the water existing in the lower measures
of the Northern portion of the Forest of Dean coal field, and
consequently the drainage of the seams of coal existing in the
deep in the Southern portion of the coal field would be
diminished to a very considerable extent. Notions of insuper-
able difficulties in reference to a proper and economical drainage
of the coal measures South of the Lightmoor fault would
doubtless become more visionary than real.

A little to the North of the China Engine Pumping Pit,
on the Western side of the Forest district, and at a short dis-
tance from the lower boundary line or fence of Heaven’s
Meadow, a fault or dyke filled with a reddish foreign rock,
locally termed Duns, was found completely displacing the iron-
ore measures in the China Engine workings, which were carried
Northwards. Shallow exploring pits were made at various
points along Heaven’s Meadow, Northward, and at a few feet
the top of the fault was laid open in each pit. The fault
appeared to be running from the North-West to the South-
East, crossing the iron-ore measures almost at right angles,

149

and as its width was found to be very considerable, and taking
into account that the great body of water retained or damed
back towards the North as far as Coleford, by this fault would
have flooded the works if they had been continued through the
entire fault, the exploring headings for iron-ore, Northwards,
were abandoned, and up to the present time have not been
resumed.

Whether any connection exists between this fault and the
dislocation of the strata in the Carboniferous Limestone at
Howbeach, may, perhaps, never be determined, but it certainly
does seem to run in that direction.

At St. Annals Iron Works, near Cinderford, the contortions
of the strata were so great that the pit sunk there passed
through the same bed of rock two or three times, which, with-
out explanation, would appear to be very anomalous. The
general dip should have been in a Western direction, taken
from the outcroppings, but at certain depths the beds of lime-
stone rock and iron-ore measures were perpendicular, and at
others it had a reverse order of dip, or towards the Hast for
limited distances in depth. For example, at a perpendicular
depth of 175 yards, a cut-out or horizontal gallery was driven
from the pit Eastward for a distance of 117 yards to the inter-
section of the iron-ore measures, but at a further depth of 44
yards, or a total from the surface of 219 yards, a second cut-out
was also driven from the bottom of the pit towards the East
_ for a horizontol distance of 118 yards, also intersecting the
_ iron-ore measures. Thus it will be seen that for the last depth
of 44 yards the dip was one yard out of the perpendicular
towards the East, or equal to an angle of 1° 18’ 0”. Thisisa
__ very curious example of the lateral folding of the rocks caused
_ by the immense forces which produced the anti-clinal lines
previously referred to. It is probable that its occurrence was
identical in point of time with the dislocations formed in the
_ same measures in the Howbeach Valley, but of less violence.
Some distance to the West of St. Annals Iron Mine
excavations were made in the Millstone Grit rocks, and there
it is seen that the contortions in the limestone have also been

150

communicated to this series. These beds of rock are affected
in a similar manner as far Northward as Edgehill Iron Mine,
but as we proceed still further North it has a diminished
effect. Some portion of the Coleford Hill delf seam, worked
in a colliery to the deep of Haywood Level Colliery, has been
denuded seriously over limited areas; but the coal measures do
not seem to have been affected by the contortions found in the
limestone and Millstone Grit rocks at the St. Annals Iron
Mine. These displacements must consequently have taken
place long before the deposition of the coal seams.

Curious phenomena exist in reference to the formation of
the Forest of Dean coal seams, but a full discussion of the
subject would require more space than can be devoted to it in
this communication. The elements contained in my appended
sections are of the greatest utility, interest, and importance
both to the Mining Engineer and the Geologist.

A comparison of these exhibits that a thinning-out of some
of the intervening beds of rock and coal seams have occurred
in various parts of the district, but such changes are, for the
most part, local, and consequently confined to small areas.
Sometimes the hard Argillaceous beds upon which grew the
immense forests of trees and plants—from which the coal
beds were formed—present sudden difference of level for
limited distances, but in others they are less pronounced and
more prolonged, causing a difference in the continuity of the
thickness of some of the coal seams after they were deposited.
Generally, such effects were produced by erosive action.

At Lightmoor Colliery we see by the section that the
Churchway Hill delf had a thickness of 2ft. 10in., and that
from the Breadless to the Churchway seam the intervening
rock is 35ft. in thickness; but the thickness of the same bed
of rock, as exhibited in Mr Mushet’s section, or No. 4, is 60ft.
At some of the collieries the Churchway seam is divided into
two distinct beds of coal of about 2ft. 5in. each, with 36ft. of
rock between them, but at others they are found to be almost
in contact.

151

At the Old Churchway Colliery, now abandoned, the
partings between the Churchway seams were very thin, and at
the Trafalgar Colliery the thick or double seam of Churchway
coal existed as a single bed, extending over a considerable
portion of its area. When the line passing through the
boundary stones Nos. 27 and 28, marked on the Government
map, and Cinderford iron furnaces, is approached from the
workings in Crump Meadow Colliery, the bed which separates
the two coals commences to thicken, rendering it difficult to
work the lower and upper seams simultaneously. The increase
in the thickness of the land of Argillaceous matter and shales
separating the coal is gradual Southwards until we arrive at
the New Fancy Colliery, where it amounts to 30ft. in thickness.
At that colliery the Churchway seams have, according to
“repute, an aggregate thickness of 4ft. 6in., 2.e., 2ft. 3in. each.

It is also a curious circumstance that at this colliery the
Lowery or Parkend Hill delf seam exists as a solid bed, but as
it is traced Northward, or as far as Crump Meadow Colliery, it
is divided into two distinct seams, so that in the two collieries
mentioned we have an effect produced in different seams of
coal of an opposite nature. So marked is this feature, that a
little to the North of Crump Meadow Colliery the thickness of
the debris between the Lowery seam is so great as to render it
impossible to extract the two seams at the same time.

If we suppose that a given thickness of Argillaceous
_ matter had been deposited upon a seam of coal which had been
previously formed, and that a certain area of it had been
denuded, leaving the remainder as a slow inclined plane, or in
a wedge form, down to the seam of coal, any forest of trees
growing upon it at that period would also have been carried
away; then the coal formed upon the thin or wedge end of any
such inclined bed of Argillaceous matter must have been
derived from the margins of such parts of the forests on higher
ground not washed away, the vegetable matter of which must
_ have descended and been sufficient to cover the denuded
_ Argillaceous area, and also that part of the preceding formed
seam of coal from which the Argillaceous matter had been

152

removed, and so from the thin end of the inclined plane, and
consequently it would have united to form a seam of coal of
greater thickness at some parts. Considering the present
received doctrine of Geology, and accepting the general theory
of the formation of coal, it would be difficult to explain this
curious phenomena satisfactorily in any other mode. In one case,
however, the extreme thinning-out of the Argillaceous matter
between the beds of coal occurred towards the South, but in others
it was towards the North. Doubtless this was occasioned by the
continued action of floods descending into valleys or low levels
which may have been formed, and resulting in rivers which were
confined to one locality at one time, changing their positions and
directions at other times. Various washing out examples of this -
class are on record, occurrences delightful from a Geological point
of view, but disastrous in a mining sense. One of these wash-
outs occurred in the Black Bed coal in Derbyshire, 250 yards
in width, and has been traced for two miles. It was found on
another occasion that a river wash-out of this class had heaped
up the coal on one side 6ft. thick, and there was evidence that
afterwards it had become squeezed down. We therefore see
that the water that formed the channel in the coal measures
had great force and velocity. From recent explorations it is
known that this river extends a mile and a half. In other
places, such as at Aldwack, the denuded part is more in the
form of a lake. It would be untenable to suppose that
vegetable matter, forming an upper seam of coal, grew upon |
the denuded parts of previously formed and lower seams with
which it is now found in contact.

In the Bowson Colliery, section No. 5, the Upper Church-
way coal had a thickness of 2ft. 6in., and the bottom part of -
the seam was reduced to 5in., the hard marl between the coal
being 4ft. 6in. thick. The Geological Survey, section No. 6,
exhibits another curious difference in the formation of the
seams of coal, for the upper seam is divided into two parts by
two thin beds of shale and marl. The lower seam is also
divided into two parts by a thin bed of Carbonaceous shale,
6in. in thickness.

153

The Starkey coal also exists in a similar condition. It is
not very clear what portion of the Forest is represented by
this section, but it is highly probable that it has been made of
portions of the measures from different localities, because the
seams of coal referred to are not found in exactly the same
form at the Lightmoor and some other collieries. It is very
evident that the seams of coal were deposited at various periods,
otherwise the intervening veins of shale could not exist. It is
also clear that consequent upon denuding action the thinning-
out effects of the same beds of rock have been variable, in fact
they are formed as already indicated from a mere line in some
places to 86ft. in others. It is difficult to form a correct
opinion of the entire effects produced by denudation upon all
the other intervening beds of rock and coal seams in all parts
of the Forest; but if we assume that its influence lessened
upwards from the Upper Churchway seams, then we should be
obliged to conclude that the interval of time which elapsed, and
represented by the thin beds of coal between the upper beds of
rock, must have been too short to permit of the growth and
decay of a sufficient amount of vegetable matter to produce
thicker seams of coal.

On the contrary, it could be urged that the beds of rock,
shale, and coal seams may originally have had any other thick-
ness, and that a series of reductions or thinning-out may have
taken place. The first assumption, however, is most probable,
but in either case the question is as interesting as it is im-
portant, and the co-relation of the coal beds of the Forest of
Dean with those in the surrounding coal fields of Bristol and
Wales, is rendered all the more difficult, because we cannot
suppose that vegetable growth has been subjected to any
_. particular variation in places so closely situated.

There are more workable seams of coal in the South Wales
coal fields than there are in the Bristol or in the Dean Forest
district, and that fact alone ought to be sufficient evidence
that similar conditions of coal beds once existed over the entire
~ area of Gloucestershire, and their absence can only be accounted

_ for, as we have previously indicated, on Geological grounds.
E

154

The South Wales coal-field is divided into three series,
i.e., the Upper Pennant, 500ft. thick in some places, but as
much as from 1,200 to 3,000 in others. The Lower Pennant
series average about 1,500ft. thick in the neighbourhood
between the Taff River and Llanelly.

The third or White Ash series is estimated to have a
thickness of 1,000ft. in the centre of the basin, but thins out
to about 500ft. towards the Eastern side. If the distance
between the South and North Wales and Bristol coal fields
were too near the Forest of Dean to cause any difference in the
vegetable growth for the formation of coal seams in the latter,
then the explanation already given would have to be accepted,
or some other theory sought for in order to agree with some of
the phenomena presented to us.

There are various well-defined and interesting faults in the
South Wales coal-field, some of which seem to run generally in
an Eastern and Western direction. The North basin synclinal
portion has two such prominent dislocations of the strata, and
the coal measures on the Northern side of the most Northern of
these faults has been elevated ; but according to a section which
has been consulted, on the opposite or Southern side of it they
have been depressed as much as 450ft.; thus in remote Geological
epochs some of the seams of coal in the Upper Pennant series were
raised to the then surface, and afterwards denuded. More to the
North on the line of section this effect is still more notable, for
long before we come to the Dowlais great fault the Upper Pennant
series of coal seams have vanished altogether. The Northern
and North-Eastern portion of the South Wales coal field in the
direction of the Forest of Dean has apparently suffered the
most from denudation. The great fault, or anti-clinal, known
to exist at Risca on the East, runs through the entire length
of the coal field into Pembrokeshire, where it only affects the
lower and older strata. Probably it had an augmented effect
upon the measures to the North and North-East, and may have
passed close to, or between the Bristol and Forest of Dean coal
fields.

155

The Farewell Rock or Millstone Grit, of marine origin,
occurs at the base of the lower coal measures in the South
Wales coal basin. In fact, the lowest seams of coal in the
White Ash series rests immediately upon it; then succeeds in
depth the Millstone Grit series. The beds of coal correspond-
ing most in position in the Forest of Dean appear to be the
Trenchard seams, which are situated not far above the Mill-
stone Grit series, but whether there is any analogy between
the elements contained in the series referred to in the two
districts, has not, as far as I know, been attempted to be proved.

Doubtless it would be exceedingly difficult to form a
proper basis for correlation, but if it is ever attempted in a
serious manner a larger number of accurate sections must be
formed in each mining district, the petrographical character of
all the beds of rock, shale, and clay determined, as well as an
exhaustive chemical analysis of all the coal seams in each
district. Such a work would be of great interest and value,
supposing no definite correlation could be made. Probably it
would be most convenient to take a well-defined point in the
Mountain Limestone, or other rocks above corresponding in
the various districts from which vertical measurements for a
series of sections should be taken for correlative purposes.

It is probable that the middle and Southern portions of
the Welsh coal field were much depressed, whilst that portion
of it to the North-East and the Dean Forest may have been
much more elevated, and consequently exposed to the severest
effects produced by denuding and other natural influences long
before a general equilibrium, and the present line of surface
resulted.

The upper part of the coal field of Dean Forest must con-
sequently have been swept away during the epoch when the
anti-clinal or higher ridges of the Carboniferous Limestone
appeared, and were broken up, which also had been planed
down and remained in its present condition.

It is natural to infer that there were a series of anti-clinals
and syn-clinals, producing a series of basin-like forms, the
lowest part of which would consequently have been more or

E2

156

less protected, whilst the higher ridges, as has been previously
indicated, suffered most. The limestone ridges now existing
in the Northern portion of the South Wales coal field rise some
1,200ft. above sea level, but on its Southern outcroppings it is
only about 500ft. The highest point in Dean Forest is also
about 1,000ft. above sea level.

Geological evidence proves that the coal deposits existed
in a more general form than is commonly supposed. It must,
in fact, have extended over a considerable portion of England,
Scotland, and Ireland before the intervening space between
the two islands, and also that to the South-West of Land’s
End, became depressed as table-land a little below the sea
level. Without doubt the French and Belgian coal-field, at
least, were at one time joined to those of Great Bitain, the
connecting link having been severed by various natural causes.

There is ample evidence to prove that in the time of the
Ancient Britons the whole of the island now called England
was covered by dense forests. If therefore that is an admitted
fact referring to a thing which existed not further back than
2,000 years, how much more dense and general must have been
those forests which existed during the latter part of the
Devonian, Carboniferous, and more recent periods, when the
surface of the earth and atmosphere offered better conditions
for the growth of vegetation. It is difficult to accept the
theory of some Geologists, which assumes that the isolated —
existence of some of the coal fields is due more to mere patches
of forests—which they think were not continuous and general
—than to any other cause.

The recent borings carried on at Dover to prove the nature
of the rocks in connection with the formation of the proposed
Channel Tunnel are said to have been carried into the coal
measures, but of what age has not been stated. However, it
has been reported that workable seams of coal were discovered,
but this requires proof. It can easily be conceived that the
discovery of such a coal field would prove to be of the greatest
importance, not only in a commercial sense, but also as a
scientific victory, which all true Geologists would hail with the
greatest enthusiasm.

|
.

157

The period of duration of the English coal fields would
then extend beyond the estimated period of 300 years, and the
long night of decay and final extinction of many, if not all, the
manufactures, and English commercial dominancy would be
prolonged indefinitely. However, if the world continues as it
is, long enough, such a calamity must eventually fall upon
England, for without the ancient forests, as in the time of the
British and Saxon periods, and at the Norman Conquest, and
without a supply of coal, she must naturally descend to a con-
dition similar to that through which she struggled for so many
centuries, and before becoming the grand signal and guiding
post in the advancement and civilization of the world.

If we estimate the total amount of coal to be extracted
from the workable seams over one foot in thickness, there
would exist in the Forest of Dean, in the year 1888, the
quantity of 248,643,640 tons available for use. The amount of
coal raised in that year amounted to 817,818 tons, being an
increase on the production for 1883 of 93,936 tons.

At the same-date the coal remaining for future extraction
in the South Wales coal field amounted to 36,174,294,777 tons,
and during that year the total output amounted to 19,594,507
tons.

This field therefore contains 145 times more coal than the
Forest of Dean, and its output being 23°95 times greater.

Although the Bristol coal field contained at the same date
24-5 times more coal than the Forest of Dean, nevertheless the
output from the latter was nearly double that of the former.

Supposing the general increment in the future to be con-
stantly the same as it was between 1883 and 1888, the time of
duration of these coal fields may be calculated to a considerable
degree of accuracy, but if it should vary, then the time of
duration would be extended or diminished according to circum-
stances.

However, I apprehend that the supply of the Dean Forest
coal field will commence to fall off long before the South
Wales coal field. The thicker, more accessible, and profitable
seams of coal will naturally become exhausted first in Dean

158

Forest, and unless the deeper seams of coal are won before this
occurs, it is highly probable that the falling off in the supply
of coal will commence in about 30 years. Much, however,
depends, as previously noticed, upon the average rate at which
the coal field is worked.

When mineral elements are held in solution and suspen-
sion, as in the water of a lake or sea, the particles having the
greatest specific gravity generally settle in the deepest part, the
lighter ones floating longer, and finally settling at higher
levels, or in places of repose in the ratio of the difference of
their specific gravity ; consequently it must depend upon the
proof of this, or some other more rational theory of the deposi-
tion of metallic elements, whether a general mass of iron-ore
will be found to occupy a large area in the centre of the Forest
of Dean Mineral Basin or not. At present the workings in the
Carboniferous Limestone have not been carried to a sufficient
depth to definitely prove this question one way or another.

Formerly an idea was entertained by individuals residing
in some parts of the Forest of Dean that the water from the
River Wye percolated into portions of the iron-ore and coal
field towards the North; but, considering the effect of the
various beds of indurated shale and clay which are known to
surround the entire mineral basin, it must be clear that such
notions emanated from persons who had not studied or com-
prehended the Geological features of the district, and conse-
quently such notions could have no foundation in fact.

All the water percolating into the belts of iron-ore and
Carboniferous Limestone measures, as well as those belonging
to the sandstone and to the coal measures, is derived from
rainfall, and the quantity to be encountered in any given area
underground can never be more than a certain proportion of so
many rainfall inches annually falling upon a given percolating
area at the surface, after making such deductions as may be
necessary for areas of inclined ground, which, like so many
inclined planes of different angles, tend to throw a considerable
quantity of the water into the low level valleys and to the sea
before it has had time to percolate.

159

The force of evaporation, with various other circumstances,
would also affect the quantity of water to be pumped from any
given depth and over a fixed area.

From this it is evident that the quantity of water likely
to percolate into a given area of mineral land, and to be
encountered below ground, may be determined with great
approximation to the truth, and the power of the machinery
necessary to drain it may also be ascertained before any work
has been performed. The want of such determinations, based
upon prolonged Geological and Engineering studies, have fre-
quently led to the ruin of good mining adventures.

Circumstances have not permitted any reference to be
made to the Paleontology of the Forest of Dean district, but
the writer’s views as to the value of that science may be
gathered from the following quotation, which has been ex-
tracted from pp. 67 and 68 of the Spanish, and page 72 of the
French editions of works, published by him in 1889, upon the
Mines, Geology, Mining Laws, and Mineral Resources of the
Argentine Republic :— '

“To a man of Science it is to be lamented that the rocks
“of the regions of Tamatina present so few traces of organic
“remains of former epochs, because Palzontology is a Science as
“‘profound in its bearing as it is useful, important, interesting,
“and beautiful. In fact, it must in all truth be considered as
“the twin sister of Geology, and consequently marches hand-
“in-hand with it, illuminating the intelligence and dissipating
“the dense obscurity surrounding the past and present, rending
“asunder the dark veil which obscured the great truths of
““Nature’s secrets.

“Hach page of the stupendous rocky book of God’s creation
“present to us in glorious and imperishable characters, brilliant
“as the diamonds, transmitting the sublime history of the
“creation, life and death of all the varied organic forms, the
“existence of which has been preserved as fossil remains in
“evident and palpable forms through the long lapse of those
“obscure and mysterious periods of the past, the duration of
“which can only be compared to the eternity of the future, the
* sublimity of which transcends the capacity of the human mind.”

SECTION No. 3
Section of Strata at Lightmoor Colliery

Description of Measures

Surface clay

Red clod

Soft clod Ae ae ee
Red clod ... oe ACC den
Soft stone... , Nee

Hard stone

Red clod

Blue clod .

Rock Se

Stone and shale ‘ee

Stone, with clod in middle of it

Little coal...

Clod 3

Hard stone

Purple ground

Purple ground and ‘clod, ‘mixed...
Rock andclod ... eae
Clod ground o8 es

Rock, with water in it

Hard rock .

Soft clod ...

Rock and clod, mixed

Strong drift ground ai

Rock, mixed with clod ...
Strong drift os

Soft ground aot coh
Purple ground :

Red ground

Blue shale, on top of the Big Stone
Big Stone, with water in it :

Strong clod

Clod ground a

Strong blue ground 50
Under earth = aes eve
Purple ground : SoC
Blue ground

Blue clod ...

Clod ground

Coal a
Shale ace
Crow delf rock ...
Coal (Hanfulls) ...
Under clod... ee

Coal (20 inch)

160

Thickness| between
in feet | each coal| ,2otal
and seam and| depth to
inches water bear- ditto

ft.

Distance

53 4) 655 11

ing strata
am. | £0; “ani etea
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
4
0
8
0 148 0| 148 0
7
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0 275. 7-| 423) 57
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0 179 0} 602 7
8
0
6
2
0
0

161

SECTION No. 3—Continued
Section of Strata at Lightmoor Colliery

——— an LE EEEEESEECIEET GESEEEEEEEEEEET EERE

Distance
Thickness| between Total
Description of Measures sp pect east depth to
inches |waterbear-| ‘tte
ing strata
a Se ee ee EEE eee
fHearine |e fhe im. |) ft. in:
Rock ground co soe Pe cet halter sO 19 0| 674 11
Top foot coal Stir a ne a a ret a
| Rock and clod_ ... weiz Ses Ses eee aoe 26 2{| 701 1
Lowery coal ahs aoe aoe ast eG
. Re eoclcantdataly cs. ses ce > wf BDO
j Starkey Rock rAd one a be g22|), Be O 47 10 | 748 11
Starkey coal Ao “cf a5 Pe beet ole be
Rock and hard clod ip AG Ao Sr en (ae) 8 53 757 43
Little coal.. a: ae Bus eee) COMO)
Under-earth ‘and clod nee a3 aac sal LO
Rock and clod... io Aer ose eel 0 37 10 | 795 24
Rockery coal co a sx ase eee ee iO
Hard drift rock ... fed ye “00 zeupeakseO 23 0} 818 23
Coal (Breadless) .. se Sar eae ..| 0 10
Hard drift rock a ise Slop) (0 35 10 | 854 O8

Churchway high delf coal ee one Peele gaze lO
Rock to no coal ... 43 ce os ...| 34 0 36 10 | 890 103

eee ee ———— eee

SECTION No. 4
Part of Vertical Section of the Strata of the Forest of Dean
(Published by the late Mr Davip MusuEt, in 1824)

ga ar Tee nial

= in fee etween fo}

Description of Measures and each depth
inches | coal seam

ft; I:,||) £t., in.)|) ft...
Depth from surface to point where sec|tion com|mences...| 1258 6

12 6|1556 4
12—Shifnil’s coal...

1—Stone bind ... ae Pres Rs ...| 180 0
2—Hittle delf coal Ae ea es ed 0 4
SB Olitt.* ... eee Bee = = ay 240
4—Crow coal... Sea ae nae <a PEW)
5— Cliff and stone bind... aoe tee Pal ee oas <
6—Smith coal ... “we See ves Ae 2°.6

7—Cliff and stone bind... one ue eo 9 0} 241 10|1500 4
8—Foot coal xe a2 aie ies Ae 1 6

9—Cliff and stone bind... Res ws soa}, «42, 0 43 6 |1543 10
10—Parkend high delf ... ee “6 oc 3 6
11—Cliff and stone bind... ee 9 0
0 6

162

SECTION No. 4—Continued
Part of Vertical Section of the Strata of the Forest of Dean

(Published by the late Mr Davip MusHeEt, in 1824)

; Thickness | Distance
Description of Measures mi. : neseee Feuer
; inches | coal seam
Ets me) 60. ||nb aaa
13—Cliff and stone bind... ic ss vee coum O 30 6 | 1586 10
14—Starkey coal . On oc 50 ae 1 10
15—Cliff and stone bind... pee 320 Peep) aaa) 13 011600 8
16—Shifnil’s coal... acc see A Rees Be OMG
17—Cliff and stone bind... Soc Sct «| 30 0 | 30- G)\1Gaiae2
18—Rockey coal . so oo ee si 2 0
19—Clff and stone bind... sor aa so 12) 0 14 0/1645 2
20—Breadless coal con ae 308 oe 1 4
21—Cliff and stone bind... ae Sec st 60, 0 | Gl. 4) 06RR6
| These two coals] °
99 Upper Churchway, or / unite and form 2 3
~~~) Oakenhill coal see High Delf,
or Churchway
23—Cliff and stone bind... ay nee =|, 060 0 38 311744 9
24—Lower Churchway coal_... ne ac 2 3
25—Cliff and stone bind... a ide | 42 0| 44 3/1789 O
26—-Strong straw coloured rock cic pop i)
27—Cliff and stone bind... ioe aca ond oa) 21 0/1810 0
28—No coal ae cic ele ee ee eG -
29—Stone and cliff oa %c wae vee] LBS Or)! 136°” bx] 1986S
30—Brazzily coal... 200 sas soc “he 2 0.
31—Brazzily rock... aes bac a ...| 150 0} 152 012098 6
32—Nameless delf coal ... 240 cae 308 0 4
33—Nag’s Head Hill rock as sae ...| 240 0} 240 4 | 2338 10
34—Yorkley coal .. sas mes ae yes
35—Gray rock or Pennant aes ney .-., 150: 0 | 152° 9) 249g
36—Whittington coal ... 50 ae sae 2 6
37—Gray rock... ae “on Soo ---| 185 0 | 137 6 |) 262008
38—Coleford High Delf coal ... aa aes 6 O
39—Argillaceous shale, with iron-ore ... coef ton O
40—Trenchard : Gray ‘rock 500 «| 78 ©] 126 0, \276)iee
41—Upper Trenchard coal oo no 3.0
42—Gray rock and marl.. sc one .| 45 0

163

SECTION No. 4—Continued
Part of Vertical Section of the Strata of the Forest of Dean
(Published by the late Mr DAvip MusHET, in 1824)

Thickness| Distance

Description of Measures ti Bebnecn donth

inches coal seam

fiesins |) eb, ins) Eb, mm.

' 43—Gray rock, with alter seis beds of clay,
fire- clay, &e. pias 24 0 12) 0/2833. 1

44—Lower Trenchard coal wae sais aus DAG 2226 2 6

MILLSTONE GRIT SERIES—

45—Fire-clay, red gritstone, or Farewell rock...| 30 0
46—Red sandstone, with ‘layers of red and
white indurated marl ... 7d 0 |\o9-
47—Upper limestone... 30 0 ee. a
48—Pure silicious red ert “With beds of
pudding stone... 90 0
49—MOUNTAIN LIMESTONE SERIES—
to Old Red Sandstone ... a 705 0 |3765 7

Mr Mushet states that this section was constructed from
actual sinkings, and from observations made at the surface,
but unfortunately he does not state where the sinkings were
made, or to what part of the Forest his surface survey was
confined.

The details of the limestone measures in Mr Mushet’s
Section No. 2 have already been given at page 132.

SECTION No. 5

Section of Strata sunk through at Bowson Colliery, in the Northern
portion of the Forest of Dean.

6—Drift .

Thickness | Distance Total
Description of Measures autert ee sep
inches seam seam
Eton. | ft. 1.) ft. io
1—Clay and shale Soc ac ice eee] Ae 3%) 127-3
2—Coal ... ee eid = ou mee 0 10 | jg 2s ee a
3—Rock . 3 es ae As EE ws bis Bea 8,
4—Drift . we ie aes baa HEA ae Bee 23.7
5—Coal crow delf can wee ae tee 1h 152 10
wale sie nee 60 6 0

164

SECTION No. 5—Continued

Section of Strata sunk through at Bowson Colliery, in the Northern
portion of the Forest of Dean.

Thickness | Distance Total

ave in feet between | depth to
Description of Measures Fal Gach each

inches coal seam seam

ff. eae ett
LRG
6 0
24 11

sc)
is
a
i=}

Ty
RPOoOF CORRE RHE OQDHO'
_ eo

OFF OCOCOSNO!:

7—Coal ...
8—Sand ...
9—Coal, twenty inch
10—Shale and marl
11—Coal Foot coal ac
12—Strong drift and shale
13—Coal, Lowery No. 1.
14—Loamy sand, with shale
15—Coal, Lowery 2 No. 2.. 080
16—Strong drift . s5e nee see
17—Coal ... = Sng
18—Soft clod
19—Coal
20—Strong drift .
21—Hard rock ...
22—Coal, pres Starkey
23—Hard cl yon dees
24—Coal, Lower Starkey.
25—Hard clod...
26—Rock .
27—Loamy sand .
28—Rock .
29—Drift and shale
30—Coal, rocky ...
31—Soft rock
32—Hard rock partings ..
33—Strong drift . mee 500
34—Rock, with coal leaders oct oe
35—Drift . 5
36—Coal, Churchway high delf..
37—Under- earth . Boe
38—Coal, Lower Churchway
39—Drift .
40—Rock .
41—Coal, No coal
42 Rock S06
43—Coal, Branly ..
44—Under- earth .
45—Gray rock...
46—Hard shale and clod..
47—Soft drift Bon
48—Gray rock
49—Soft drift
50—Gray rock
51—Hard clod
52—Gray rock
53— y
54—Blue rock

bo
pa

—
_

Nore
AOTISOON WWE KAO

48 11
306

SAHMNDMRAwWORD*AIDHOORWOMQ0
~I
@o

ee bo
_

363
368

DH
Ree CoO > bo

=

AIAN OoNnocodonwnonwncdounnwonae

37 10
51 9

407 10
461

on

=

bo
MO DWRrTOAWRMMMWR eH

165

SECTION No. 5—Continued

Section of Strata sunk through at Bowson Colliery, in the Northern
portion of the Forest of Dean.

Thickness | Distance Total
Description of Measures =. | between fein +0
inches | coal seam seam
ft. sine ets im: || fb. Im:
55—Gray rock 8 8
56— " aan ea ae Bele ate g Nap 5
57— " aa8 ave ay ae Be 30 11
58—Blue rock See 43 ae old
59—Gray rock ... Ae S50 6 ai 4 7
60—Red clod ois ae. acy veal aelon. 2
61—Blue and gray rock . aes Hc zene ooo
62—Hard Pennant rock .. Boke son ...| 168 0} 355 10
63—Coal ... a 6 He Ara 1 6 818 8
64—Fireclay or under-earth ... aes See 1 6
¥ 65—Gray Pennant rock .. Sc see | 40 0
: 66—Hard Pennant rock ... ae ie ss 6 0 866 2

SECTION No. 6
Section of the Coal Measures of the Forest of Dean
Taken from the Memoirs of the Geological Survey, 1856, Vol. I.

Thickness

E Distance Total
Description of Measures uuteee eee depth to
; inches | coal seam ditto
ft. i ft. in. | ft. in.
1—Sandstone ... 48
2—Red argillo arenaceous shale ‘and ironstone 30
3 —Red argillo arenaceous shale sts | OL
4—Sandstone... nee ooh ies om 3
5—Blue and red shale ... ae ope Seale oe
6—Gray sandstone oe eae os 2
7—Red argillo arenaceous shale "ie ciel ee I)
8—Sandstone ... Roe ace ae ve 2
9—Argillaceous shale ... “¢ oe realy LD
10—Hard red arenaceous shale .. dp 2c 9

11—Soft argillaceous shale aoe — oe 9
12—Reddish sandstone ... aos Soe ca orale
13—Argillaceous shale ... ioe wee =|
14—Red and gray sandstone... set xe 2
15—Argillaceous shale ... aa ae Bs
16—Gray shale... as ae see eel gto

17—Coal ...
18—Under-clay

270 6) 270 6

4 3| 274 9

SOM] Ow] OMMOOCOSCSODSCSOROSCSCSOOB

0
4
19—Coal ... a Soc aoe sO os 0
20—Under-clay ... ac 4

’ 166

' SECTION No. 6—Continued
Section of the Coal Measures of the Forest of Dean
Taken from the Memoirs of the Geological Survey, 1856, Vol. I.

. Thickness | Distance pial
Description of Measures ped betweun depth to
inches | coal seam oh

ft; am. |! fh ime figs

21—Argillaceous and arenaceous shale | 135 0/ 1389 6 | 414 38
22—Coal ... 0 6
23-—-Under-clay ... 4.10

24— Argillaceous shale 12 0) 165.6 a30eg
25—Coal ... 0 8
26—Under-clay Ses 4 0
27—Arenaceous shale and sandstone ... 4 0
28—Sandstone 2 i)
29—Argillaceous shale 3 0
30—Sandstone 5 0
31—Gray argillaceous shale 6 0
32—Red argillaceous shale L6G
33 —Sandstone wes 4 9
34 Greenish arenaceous shale ... ee)

35—Argillaceous shale 30. (O 69 11 | 500 8
36—Coal ... one ae anc cen hic OFS
37—Under-clay ... sec nee cB 2 9

38—Shale and sandstone. 468 Bes veel GL 0] — 94 “ba 5osmem
39—Coal hk XG)

40—Under-clay 1 6 2. 6 a9 aa
41—Sandstone and shale.. 560 oa ay) tell th
42—Argillaceous shale... x eealie, Land)
43—Hard gray thick-bedded sandstone eel eo, JO
44—Arenaceous shale... ext Soh SLU) SG,
45—Sandstone ... ne ic 262 See ileal

46—Coal (Crow Delf) ... Sh 53 “ioe 0 8] 234 8] 832 3
47—Under-clay ... ec boi AGC 3 0
48—Black argillaceous shale... aa cea? OU AO)
49—Sandstone ... hic Sct a see ko) 0
50—Coal and shale 500 sh ee fac ie
51— Under-clay ... aes de Se 2Ge 3 0
52—Argillaceous shale ... os 5 20 a0

53—Black carbonaceous shale ... aes | 30 (0.| 91 2°) O25maa
54—Coal (Dog Delf)... Adc 580 oe ee
55—Under-clay ... eee an Yfic Be)

56—Gray i Pee shale... 6 «| 44 OQ]. 4% 11 | Via
57—Coal (Smith coal) ... 659 Au ste 2 6
58—Under-clay ... pc ms ef ae an (0)

59—Argillaceous shale ... oct ok | 29 0] 34 6 |1015 10

167

SECTION No. 6—Continued

Section of the Coal Measures of the Forest of Dean

Taken from the Memoirs of the Geological Survey, 1856, Vol. I.

Description of Measures

60—Coal (Little ee

61—Under-clay ..

62— Sandstone :

63—Argillaceous shale ...

64—Sandstone ..

65—Argillo arenaceous shale
66—Argillaceous shale ...

67—Coal (Parkend High apes
68—Under-clay .. x
69—Argillaceous shale .
70—Gray soft sandstone
71—Argillaceous shale ...

72—Coal .
73—Under- ‘clay ..
74—Sandstone .
75—Argillaceous shale .

76—Coal . ae
77—Carbonaceous shale.
78—Coal . Ree
79—Under-clay 2a 4
80—Argillaceous shale ...
81—Soft under-clay_...

. } Starkey
0 coa.

82—Coal (Little coal) ...
83—Under-clay ... ua
84—Coal ... ae

85—Under-clay ... oe
86—Argillaceous shale ...

87—Arenaceous shale ...
88—Argillaceous shale ...

89—Coal (Rocky Delf)... Be

90—Coal and coir bonaccaan shale
91—Under-clay ..
ee ee iacoane shale .

93—Coal .. od

94—Under- clay .. ass
95—Argillo arenaceous shale ...
96—Under-clay .. c
97—Sandstone

98—Marl ...

99—Sandstone

Thickness

in feet

an
inches

Hh
ct
~
B

(—
DO Donwwr’

bat S
COnMnoocoFrO:

—

|
|

wonrnww
oooo-!l

Ke |
Aarwo
CODD

|
|

a
meow bk
ooo &

| oor
| one

a
no = bo
| (==) on

—
co} owor

Qo

mMmoonwnww
onmnooon| oonms

_

Distance
between
each
coal seam

ft. in.

1066 2

1091 5

1122 9

1142 3

1144 5

1150 11

1175 11

1191 10

168
SECTION No. 6—Continued

Section of the Coal Measures of the Forest of Dean

Taken from the Memoirs of the Geological Survey, 1856, Vol. I.

Thickness| Distance

J Total
Description of Measures tudeet ee de h @

inches | coal seam

£i, anil» fh. se eee eee

100—Under-clay ... “ue ace oo 45¢ 2 0 | 58.7 1250585
101—Coal . 0 8

102—Carbonaceous shale... 0 9 Upper

103—Coal . oe 0 6} Church- 42

104—Under- clay 1 6 | way Delf

105—Coal . or 9

106— Under- clay .. : 1540

107—Soft argillaceous shale. ea oF 4 2

108—Arenaceous shale ... Ae aoe “Be ee!

109—Argillaceous shale ... wa af wec| 28) O)}, 53) 8) 12S ome
110—Coal . 1 0) Lower

111—Carbonaceous shale... 0 0 ol Church- 2 0

112—Coal .. ae .. O 6) way Delf

113—Under- clay .. Als “Bc aus 3 6

114—Argillo arenaceous shale ... aoe eel, OOO),

115—Sandstone ... fon 50 ss| 12°°.0

116—Argillo arenaceous shale ... se Ses 9 0)), 59) (G3) 1245aaa
117—Coal (Shafnels te oF e Ace, 0 6

118—Under-clay ... S20 ae 0c 2 0

119—Sandstone and shale oes 5x ase] 90 0.) 92, Gy 1S4 iia
120—Coal oecgn ee ee as ioe A
121—Under-clay .. “ec oak a was 2 6

122—Sandstone ... , s-.| B00) 10

123— Arenaceous and argillaceous shale wea| tol 0

124—Sandstone ... : c ; 18 0

125—Arenaceous shale 9 0| 432 3/1773 4
126—Coal regs ae 70,

127—Under-clay .. ae ad ass 3 0

128—Sandstone ... os9 ae ae .-.| 150 0} 155 9 | 19298
129—Coal mee thee a 2 6

130—Under-clay .. nes oe see 3.0

131—Sandstone ... eee ae ees ««.| 134.07) 139 6)/)2068eag
132—Coal ee ne ee a 5 0 :
133—Under-clay .. afr re 4 0

134—Sandstone ... aoe cee BAe .2.| 120° 0) 129) 0) 2197 am
135—Coal (Upper pees eo 2 0

136—Under-clay .. we ay es 3.0

137—Sandstone ... toe ae Soc sce) 26. 0

138—Marl ... os ree sce ees roc 1 0

169

SECTION No. 6—Continued
c Section of the Coal Measures of the Forest of Dean

Taken from the Memoirs of the Geological Survey, 1856, Vol. I.

Thickness | Distance Total
Description of Measures 3B Eee Between depth to
- inches | coal seam tto

fain pectin. ch. <n.

139—Sandstone ... a8 wae tee cea AZ* (0 TA 0 | 2271 7
140—Coal (Lower Trenchard) .. ase se 1 4
141—Under-clay ... ie Se E> bey 2 0
142— Hard pa a pan Bom ates eae. 0
143—Red marl ... aan os se nee 1 6
144—Red sandstone te ess es teh OOR IO
145—Marl.. bas oh nee 1 6
146—Hard gray sandstone me eb ...| 30 0
147—Soft sandstone ie ee as se) 39 0
148—Sandstone ... wae kg — fc 7 0
149-—Marl ... a Hee a ne ied 1 6
150—Sandstone ... Ae ae oe Becl) yll! 0
151—Marl .. = eee eee Ties:
152—Gray and white sandstone ar | 54 0
153—Marl and sandstone fas in bee 116
154—Sandstone ... zis ee ore von 9 ASO
» 255—Marl.. a we Bs is wee 1 6
; 156--Sendstone 20
= 157—Marl ... aaa oe wen 0 6
— -158—Light gray s sandstone 5p we oe 8 0
~ 159—Marl. net ioe aos in es
160 —Sandstone Site es ocal. eo 0)

_ 161—Gray and red i impure limestone ... : 8 0] 277 0 |2548 7

(SEE OVER)

170

SECTION No. 7

Compiled from a Section published by the late Mr JoHn ATKINSON, taken

at about the centre of the Forest of Dean.

oo ee ——

Thick
HiskTes Depth

Thi from

Name of Seams of Coal, Iron-ore, ete. beens heeeae surface to

each seam| from ottom

another | Of each

source seh

ft. in." ft. (anes chteeeen

Smith coal... He av ae aes eed 2 0: | 735 0
28 10

Little Delf... wes oe see Sas ase lb 2 765 0
22 4

Parkend Hill Delf or Lowery .. 2 8 790 0
48 2

Starkey 110 | 840 0
38 0

Rockey 2 0 | 880 0
62 4

Lower Churchway 2 8 945 0
38 8

No Coal Ie A 985 0
50 6

Brazilly 2 6 |1088 O
249 6

Yorkley 2 6 |1290 0
127 6

Whittington 2 6 |1420 0
120 6

Coleford 4 6 |1545 0
98 0

Upper Trenchard ... 2 0 |1645 0
73 8

Lower Trenchard ... 1 4 |1720 0
125 0

Sandstone vein of iron-ore 5 0 |1850 0
40 0

Upper side of Mountain Limestone 1890 0
90 0

Upper Limestone vein of iron-ore 30 0 |2010 0
164 0

Lower Limestone vein of iron-ore Ae wes 6 0 |2180 0

Blue Limestone ... sea se aee on 2250 0

Black Limestone ... a se wae aa 23307 0

Lower side of Mountain Limestone ... sat 2510 O

171

SECTION No. 8

of Mineral Basin.

Section of Dean Forest Coal Field, taken at the lower point

Thickness gi
Thi Ss poe
Name of Coal Seams eee of euch iron tg
coal seam| eam of each
seam
ft. in.| inches | ft. in.
Unproved—about... 80 0}
Upper Woorgreens seam... ee 24 82 0
Lower Woorgreens seam... 24 142 0
Unproved—about... 260 5
Coal 11 387 4
73 0
Coal 4 460 8
122210
Coal ty oa eee 8 583 4
é 57 0
Coal aoe i33 2 5 640 9
119 1
Crow Delf or Dog seam ... ar 18 761 4
Smith coal... 24 TRB)
: 18 0
Little Delf... 14 812 6
, 24 0
Lowery Delf an 32 839 2
i 33 0
Starkey Delf =< aes 22 874 0
39 (0
Rockey seam 24 915 0
60 0
Churchway High Delf Sr 32 977 8
No coal 16 1033 0
= 54 0
Brazilly seam 30 =| 1089 6
-. 261 0
_ Yorkley seam 30 =| 1353 (0
120 0
~ Whittington seam 30 1475 6
132 0
- Colefordseam ... Peo 54 |1612 0
126 0
Upper and Lower Trenchards ... 30 |1750 6
’ 144 6] ft. in.
_ Sandstone vein of iron-ore ote cae 2 5 0 |1900 0
_ Upper side of Mountain Limestone Axo 2000 0
_ Upper Limestone vein of iron-ore_... ee 30 0 |2100 0

F2

172 —

SECTION No. 8—Continued
Section of Dean Forest Coal Field, taken at the lower point

of Mineral Basin.

Thick trove
ickness Thi kn ‘om
Name of Coal Seams benwers of saatin ee
coal seam se2ue of each
seam
fis. 1. ||| ft. Im.a| besser
Lower Limestone vein of iron-ore Bes ers 6 O |2200 0
100 0
Blue Limestone 2300 O
100 0
Black Mountain Limestone 2400 0
200 O
Lower side of the Mountain Limestone 2600 0
400 0
Old Red sandstone a aes = seu 3000 0

SECTIONS OBTAINED FROM ACTUAL SINKING AT
THE UNDERMENTIONED COLLIERIES

Section No. 9—PILLOWELL LEVEL PIT

Depth
ickue Thickness Sor
etween suriace to
Name of Coal Seam ~ each necae Dee
of each
seam

ft. -6t. in.) aiteeine

Yorkley seam... are oe cae ear ano 164 9
Us) 8)

Whittington seam Bod soc e's “pe 2 6 245 6
144 6

Coleford High Delf ese aie sas aa 4 6 394 6

Section No. 10—SPEECH HOUSE HILL PIT

RUADRERRGNI, “-Sa- ane ee 2 6 | 251 6
Rockey seam coe 506 ioe Res oe 2 0 311 0
Churchway High Delf seam _.... act Soe 3. 8 +| 393" 3

~ 173

SECTIONS OBTAINED FROM ACTUAL SINKING AT THE
UNDERMENTIONED COLLIERIES—Continued

Section No. 11—FOXES’ BRIDGE PITS

tien | the in. || <b. im

Twenty-inch seam a a cee “A etn 657 0
90 6

Lowery seam 2 6 750 0
40 8

Starkey seam 1 4 fo2e 0
46 0

Rockey seam 2 0 840 0
62 4

Churchway High Delf seam _... ae “be Dass | 906500

Section No. 12—FLOWER MILL PIT
tes alten cs, nese oth. ine

Yorkley seams... af sae oe sce 2 8 42.0
178 6

Whittington seam ae o xe ae 26 223 0
178 0

Coleford High Delf 9h as ane eee 20", | 404,50

Section No. 13—PARK HILL PIT

Thee as Dew
etween | Thickness .
Name of Coal Seam each of il
seam of seam of each
coal
seam

Yorkley seam... see af +e =e 210 | 240 10
169 2

Whittington seam wae mi ase ac Doe 412 9
155 3

Coleford High Delf ies ae ar zee 4 6 572 6

135 6

Trenchard seam ... Bi ag ae = 3 11 711 11

Section No. 14—TRAFALGAR PITS
finn) ) fh. cine ft. in.

ES 222 ee 1 6 | 391 6

16 6
Smith coal... awe awa See we ee 2°10 410 0
22 0
Lowery... has aoe ne 45s we 211 | 434 11
4 Bi}! ee
_ Starkey... Ho e08 ais tee re 1504 475 4
40 8
Rockey... aes age Ban aac see 2 2 518 2
59 10

Churchway High Delf ... ss = ae 2'T* (A 590wae

174

SECTIONS OBTAINED FROM ACTUAL SINKING AT THE
UNDERMENTIONED COLLIERIES—Continued

Section No. 15—HORSE ENGINE PIT

ft. in.| ft. in. | ft. im

Smith coal... ane = ie AL ae 26 62 6
12 0

Little Delf... Shc de Poe oe st Lecak 75 10
51 0

Parkend High Delf 310 129 10
36 0

Starkey 2 6 168 4
54 0

Rockey ... Aor on isi 0 30 1 6 223 10

Section No. 16—NEW ENGINE PIT

fts.in.} “£t.;in.9)|) cetee ine

Lowery... Ah Sr noe anc ae 2 10 257 10
42 2

Starkey... Soe ies os a ey, 2a S02na2
57 10

Rockey _... ae iss A Ao nce 1% 361 7
88 5

Oaken Hill, or Churchway bt ach ont ts 451 8
64 4

Brazilly ... pac ser an ans ane 2 8 518 8

Other useful data for comparison may be obtained from
the appended Sections not specially referred to in the body of
this paper.

The connection between Geological studies and Mining
Engineering is very close, and has an important bearing, for
whilst the former science explains the mode of occurrence, age,
and change of the different formations, being, in fact, an index
to the nature and extent of mineral deposits, the latter exhibits
the proper and economical modes of extracting and determining
the commercial value of each class of mineral, Probably, there-
fore, no apology is needed for the introduction of a peculiar,
and at the same time interesting mining legal case, which took
place in the year 1875, in Dean Forest, upon which a diversity
of legal and mining opinions were expressed.

In the case referred to the writer was called in as one of
the principal technical witnesses, but when it was introduced
before a Circuit Judge, at Gloucester, he suggested that it was

.
*

175

more proper that the parties should agree to send it for arbitra-
tion; and this advice was accepted by the litigants.

The dispute arose between two mining proprietors, whom
we will call, for convenience, No. 1 and No. 2, the former
claiming under the Dean Forest Mining Award all the iron-ore
mineral from a certain defined water line drainage level, or
Horse Road, in the Parkhill Iron Mine, situated in the South-
Western part of the Forest, up to a similar water drainage line
in the Lower Oakwood Mill Level Iron Mine, 220 perpendicular
feet above the former, No. 2 proprietor claiming all the iron-ore
mineral under the same Award from the last-mentioned drainage
line upon the inclination of the strata up to the surface (see
diagram) No. 1 upon which the outcroppings of the Underedge
and lid-stone are represented. In each case the drainage level
tunnel becomes the working road by which the extracted mineral
was transported to the surface.

In a technical, or mining engineering sense, No. 1 pro-
prietor had, under the said Award, absolute right to extract
the mineral from his deep boundary line, 7.e., the Level, or
Horse Road in Parkhill Iron Mine, for 220 perpendicular feet,
up to the level water drainage line, or Horse Ruad in Oakwood
Iron Mine.

Diagram No. 1 represents a lateral or cross section of the
iron-ore measures, taken from the Western outcroppings to-
wards the East, or in the deep, and supposing that the iron-ore
measures existing between the Underedge and Lid-stone were
full of deposits of mineral, all such deposits of iron-ore would
be exhausted by extracting the triangular area of mineral
marked A, corresponding to each deposit, but this would result
in the destruction of that part of the Level Horse Road belong-
ing to proprietor No. 2 resting upon each mineral deposit.

Consequently a serious impediment would arise, interfering
with the rights of No. 2 proprietor in the transport of his mineral
to the surface, and bring about an action for damages.

This being the case, very able, ingenious, and long legal
arguments were advanced, and a number of technical witnesses
called in to prove that both sides were right.

176

It will be observed that the Dean Forest Commissioners
made no provision in the Award to protect the drainage level
or Horse Road when it rested upon any iron-ore deposits be-
longing to a proprietor immediately in the deep, as in the case
of No. 1 already cited. One of the Counsel for the plaintiff
argued in very forcible terms that the limits of each property
below the water level should be determined by a perpendicular
line, which in the diagram is marked as the ‘assumed deep
boundary line.” This would have given a triangular area of
iron mineral, represented by A, to the proprietor No. 2, although
under the Commissioners’ Award it belonged to No. 1.

In evidence the writer pointed out that as the angle of
depression of the iron-ore measures below the horizon was very
variable, such a definition of the deep boundary line would have
an injurious effect upon mining generally in the Forest of
Dean, being, in fact, against the terms of the Commissioners’
Award. For example, at the Oakwood Heading above the
horizontal line at a, above the triangular area A, the angle
is 20°, but if it were 55°, as exhibited at Oakwood Heading
at a’, above the line and triangular area B, then the assumed
deep boundary line would intersect the Underedge at c, or at a
considerable depth below the drainage level, and the triangular
area at A would have been changed in form and occupied that
at B, taking away a large area of mineral merely to support
the Oakwood Heading above it, belonging to proprietor No. 2,
and further that when any Geological contortions of the strata
occurred, such as were experienced at the St. Annals Iron Mine
(see diagram No. 2), then in certain extreme cases the triangular
area of mineral at B would be exchanged for that at C, and thus
the whole of the property belonging to proprietor No. 1 would
be entirely lost if such an argument were to hold good, because
a perpendicular boundary line let fall from the East side of
the Oakwood Heading situated at a” above the “‘assumed deep
boundary line,” would intersect the Underedge at the point d
below the Level Horse Road in Parkhill Iron Mine.

Thus it was proved that such legal opinions were not only
in conflict with the Commissioners’ Award itself, but also with

*
a

PARKHILL HEADING '

\
»

INI NOL/ GOOMMYQ NI avoYy ISYOY FO INIT 7FIAFT7

AVYOVIG

issumMiD DEEP Rovwoarr LINE

Oakwoop HEADING .

INiff NOLf THHHYYY NI GVOY FSYOf 40 TIATT GIWNSSY

8)
oT

>
=
3
=
™
~~
Ss
.

ParnHitt HEADING

‘.
QR

N,

i
Dor,
‘ FQ 2
Ja
So
| ' Fz
: Ne
8
| J
Qe,
Pare S
; “4

re

DIAGRAM 2.

ST ANNALS MINE.

D

S7Awwats Fir

/75 Karos

W7 Yaros

1/8 Yaros

SCALE. 60 FoR YARDS

177

the proper usages of modern mining engineering, and conse-
quently were untenable; but it was with the greatest difficulty
that the legal gentlemen, as well as the arbitrator, were at last
convinced that difference in the angles of depression and con-
tortions of the strata, such as those which occurred at St.
Annals Iron Mine, could affect the boundary lines of iron mines
in the Forest of Dean.

The sectional headings, a, a’, and a”, in the Oakwood Iron
Mine are identical, but might occupy either of these positions
as indicated laterally in the same mine, depending upon the
variable angle of depression of the strata. The same remark
holds good with reference to the heading 5, b’, and b” in the
Parkhill Level Iron Mine.

On the Geology of Cirencester Town, and a recent discovery of the
Oxford Clay in a deep well boring at the Water Works. By
Auten Harker, Professor of Natural History at the Royal
Agricultural College. Read 24th February, 1891.

The town of Cirencester, looked at from the physical
geographer’s point of view, is situated on the gently sloping
floor of an expansion of the Churn valley, which here widens
out into a long irregular spindle shape, bending near its centre
towards the South-West. The pre-historic course of the river
through this plain can now only be guessed at. Its old bed is
probably hidden beneath the ruins of the many cities that have
stood here since paleolithic man hunted the mammoth through
the reeds and osiers by its banks, and left his rude flint imple-
ments on the slopes at Trewsbury, or the tusks of his game in
the gravels of the stream by Siddington and South Cerney.

The river has been diverted, certainly many times, to suit
the exigencies of former inhabitants—Celts, Romans, Romano-
British or Saxons, and has finally been treated in a character-
istically modern fashion, and covered out of sight for a great
part of its course. It is only by laborious reference to old maps
and histories, and to the memory of “the oldest inhabitant,”
that one can follow the underground branches and their devi-
ations, though they are of great interest and importance in a
study of the water supply.

All around this expanded valley floor (on which the town
is built), except at the entrance and exit of the stream, which
are comparatively narrow, the ground rises by more or less
gradual and gentle slopes to the higher downs on the North
and West, and the more gentle undulations to the South and
Kast.

A 6in. ordnance survey map, with the contours marked,
and the rising grounds around the town coloured, leaves the

179

spindle formed valley itself well marked off, and amply illus-
trates its physical geography. [Such a map was exhibited at
the reading of this paper. ]

The general trend of the hill slopes is 8.S.E., and the dip
of the beds which compose the hills is similar in direction,
though at a greater angle. On this account we rise geologically
the further we descend the Cotteswolds towards Swindon, suc-
cessive higher beds outcropping as the lower ones dip under
the horizon. The main body of the rocks composing these
rising grounds around the town is Great Oolite, but all the
hills around are capped by Forest Marble, or by those junction
beds between these horizons, which present constant difficulties
to the local student.

Our evidence of this paramount importance of the Great
Oolite around is abundant, but I lay exceptional stress on it in
this part of my argument for a reason which will be presently
developed.

The evidence is afforded firstly, by the quarries, and
secondly, by the well sinkings in the neighbourhood.

Avoiding for the moment the question of what exactly is
Great Oolite, and what Forest Marble, we may say generally
that all the heights around the town are Great Oolite, with
cappings here and there of true Forest Marble. The various
quarries have been described and sections given from time to
time, chiefly by the late Professor Buckman (in an important
paper to be presently alluded to), and subsequently by Hull,
Witchell, and myself.

The evidence afforded by the deep wells in the neighbour-
hood, so far as I can ascertain, has not been collected or recorded
in any way. It may prove useful to some future workers at
Cotteswold Geology to have what is known placed on record.
I refer solely to wells which undoubtedly cut through the Great
Oolite and find their water supply in the Fuller’s Earth below,
and the situation of these wells on the rising grounds around
the town gives their history an important bearing on the sub-
ject of the Geology of the town itself.

180

WELL at THE R.A. Cottece Farm.

We have some brief account of this well in our own trans-
actions. In the annual address on Jan. 27, 1857 (Proceedings
of Cotteswold Club, Vol. II.,) Professor Buckman, describing an
excursion to the College Farm buildings, says :—

“The Geologists examined the well-sinking through the Great Oolite
into the Fuller’s Earth, a depth of 140ft. The whole of this shaft was
carried through beds of a more or less porous oolite, without a break either
lithological or paleontological, a circumstance which gave rise to some dis-
cussion between Mr Hull, of the Ordnance Geological Survey, and the
Secretary—the former gentleman considering a large portion of the shaft as
representing the Forest Marble ; the latter considering it as wholly belonging
to the Great Oolite, and contending that certain clay beds which occur higher
in the series, where the true Bradford clay is absent, present a natural divi-
sion, and one which can be carried out through a wide extent in this district.
Ata later period of the meeting the Secretary presented a section of this
well, with others of the neighbourhood, and read a paper on the geology of
the water bearing beds about Cirencester.”

It is very much to be regretted that no record appears to
have been preserved of the paper here alluded to, or of any of
the sections, for after careful search and enquiry I am unable
to find any such. The depth mentioned, 140 ft., is somewhat
greater than other evidence would have led one to expect; but
we are ignorant of how far into the Fuller’s Earth the sinking
was carried.

Wet at FurtHer Barron.

This well is about 120ft. deep. There is no record of the
actual section, but most systematic records have been kept over
a long series of years of the varying height of the water in the
well. There can be no doubt, from these records, that it taps
the Fuller’s Earth at about the same depth as the R A.C. Farm
well. It has never been dry.

WELL at THE Bacon Factory.

A plentiful supply of water is here obtained at a depth of
89 ft. The well itself is 73 ft. deep, and there is a further bore
of 16ft. The height of the water was 11 ft. above the well
floor three days ago.

181

Wet at OaxuEy VILLAS.

This is from 80ft. to 90ft. deep, and affords a never-failing
supply. Mr James Habgood, of Cricklade Street, Cirencester,
to whom I am indebted for much valuable information on old
wells, says this well was cut through solid rock. It has a high
local reputation for purity on account of its great depth; but
is “suspect”? from surface contamination.

Karu Baruourst’s Trrat Borine at tHE Barton, 1872.

This section is very fully described in Mr Taunton’s paper
in the Hydrology of the Cotteswolds, and is reproduced in the
accompanying illustrations.

WELL At THE BEECHES.

Mr W. Newcombe, builder, &c., of Cricklade Street, kindly
informs me that this boring reached a total depth of 96 ft.
From an examination of the triturated material of the boring,
which Mr Newcombe allowed me to see, I am of opinion that
the boring went through a greater thickness of Forest Marble
Clays than any of the previously described borings, and finished
still in the freestone of the Great Oolite.

I have several other accounts of old deep well borings in
the town and neighbourhood, but no specimens or particulars
of the materials obtained in excavating them: their value as
evidence is therefore but slight.

GENERAL TESTIMONY OF THE WELLS.

Taking these various wells and sections, the information
they supply corroborates that of the neighbouring quarries,
and, as a general summary, we may conclude that they indicate
a thickness of Great Oolite of about 100 ft., overlying the im-
pervious strata of the Fuller’s Earth, whence their water is
obtained.

We now come to the consideration of the sub-strata of the
town itself. What rocks fill and form the floor of the valley ?
If we suppose for a moment that the valley did not exist at all,

182

or was but a narrow combe, like scores of others on the Cottes-
wolds, the strata of Oolitic rocks continuous from side to side,
then the town’s foundations, the bottoms of its deepest cellars,
would be occupied by the white beds of the Great Oolite; and
assuming there were no break of continuity, the lower part of
the valley towards Siddington would run over the Forest Marble
on to the Cornbrash. Well, this is certainly not the case, as
may be seen on a consideration of the wells and water supply
of the town itself. I draw a sharp distinction between the
“town” wells and those already described, which are all on
the outskirts of the town, beyond the area of the valley floor.

The opportunities of getting a general section in the bottom
of a valley on which a town is built, are necessarily few; they
are exceptionally so in the case of Cirencester. The excavations
for solid foundations for masonry fail to carry us much below
the debris of Roman Corinium. The strata explored are only
those of ancient civilizations. The sinkings of the town wells
are almost our only data. These are, however, numerous and
instructive.*

Taking first the public pump in the Market-place. This
water supply has a history and a reputation of an honourable
character. Artistically, the pump is not a thing of beauty, but
its water is pure and unfailing. In the course of many enquiries
and much conversation on the subject of local water supply,
I have heard many stories of the reliability of this source, a
matter of no small consequence in times of drought in such a
district, and especially in days when general artificial supplies
of water were less common.

I have been told of times of drought when the supplies of
water in the surrounding country villages having given out,
crowds of vehicles, with all manner of water-carrying utensils,
have filled the streets in the vicinity of this pump, waiting
their turn to fill up with the precious liquid from its perennial
fount. The depth of the well is 25 to 26 ft.; after passing through

* Tam indebted to Mr W. H. James for a valuable list of the shallow wells
of the town, and for much other useful information regarding its water supply.

i

Se ae

he 4a EAE I Rae Hs Pe ee

183

7ft. to 8ft. of made ground, there is about 20ft. of gravel (which
holds the water) resting on thick beds of impervious clays.
The history and reputation of this well constitutes it an im-
portant piece of evidence in any study of Cirencester waters.

Not far away—150 to 200 yards—in the Brewery of Messrs
Cripps, a well of 25ft. in depth supplies an equally pure and
unfailing quantity of what is doubtless the same water. There
are reasons for supposing that this was originally a Roman well.

‘The bed of gravel, with its succeeding clays, appears to
underlie the whole town. Deep excavations show the Roman
houses and walls to be built upon it. Much of it has been dug
and carted for use, but almost anywhere it would seem that a
well sunk to depths of from 7ft. to 25 ft. will fill with water
and give a more or less continuous supply. The shallower ones
give out soonest in dry weather, and the quality of the water
varies considerably, no doubt from local contaminations. On
some other occasion I propose to endeavour to trace these
shallow well waters to their origin, and will then give the in-
formation collected on this head.

It is, however, quite plain that at a depth of not more
than 25ft. below the present level of the valley floor a great
subterranean water supply, well filtered by the beds of local
gravels, has for many generations, probably for centuries, proved
continuous, and is now existing. A consideration of this most
important fact, for such I think it is, first led me to the in-
vestigation of the problem presented by our local geology, here
followed out.

Buckman, in his important paper on the Geology of the
neighbourhood (Quarterly Journal of the Geological Society, May,
1858, p. 118), speaking of the Forest Marble generally, says :—

‘In the neighbourhood of Cirencester nearly all the heights are capped
with this stratum.”

He then goes on—

“And as the town rests in a valley of depression—to be more fully ex-
plained hereafter—it will be seen that Forest Marble clays are the water
bearing beds-of the town, as shown in the sections through Cirencester.”

Unfortunately, he does not appear to have ever “more fully

184.

explained” what he actually intended by this expression.
Certainly not in the paper in question; nor can I find any
further allusion to the question in his subsequent writings.
We have fortunately his admirable section from Birdlip to
Swindon, passing through Cirencester, the lines of which are
taken along the Roman roads through the town. [The original
coloured drawing is in the collection of diagrams and sections
of the Royal Agricultural College. |

This section represents the fault at Stratton as throwing
down the Great Oolite and Forest Marble some 25 ft. to 40 ft.

It seems pretty clear that by thé term “valley of depres-
sion” he intended no more than to graphically describe this
faulting down of the clays of the Forest Marble to form the
floor of impervious rock beneath the gravels that underlie the
town.

For the past eight or nine years I have been gradually
collecting materials for a more exhaustive study of the Forest
Marble of the district than has yet been made, and the clay
floor of the valley has always presented an unsolved puzzle.

The opinion of Buckman, as expressed by his general
section, is that which hasheen-generally followed by subsequent
writers, though there has always been a minor conflict on the
question of the Junction Beds of the Great Oolite and Forest
Marble. I have been informed by a student of the late Prof.
John Morris that he held the view that the shallow subterranean
water of Cirencester was derived from the Fuller’s Earth, and
that this opinion was founded on the chemical composition of
the water. He has, however, left no writing on the subject,
and in the absence of reasons we are precluded from entertain-
ing this idea. It may be that he felt dissatisfied with Buckman’s
explanation. Whether that be so or not, I had for some years
formed a strong opinion that the faulting down of the Forest
Marble alone was not a satisfactory explanation of our shallow
town-well supply. My reasons were chiefly these. The more
one becomes acquainted with the Forest Marble, the more
variable and unstable do its numerous clay beds appear. At
Kemble, as described by Buckman (loc. cit.), the top-most bed

SECTIONS AT LEWIS LANE, CIRENCESTER.

PROF HARKERS SECTION, from Cores. Jan 1891.
361-00 Mip- Tie Levee

Tia MALE CROUND
geo: GRAVEL

Polat 24 FINE SAND

Ee DARK BROWN CLAY

Be ae BLUE CLAY

HARD BLUE ROCK

(Z TERNATING BANDS OF HARD STONE ANC CLAY
WITH BHYNCHONELLAE iN THE STONE.

WERT CRUMELING CLAY FULL OF SHELLS
TEREEPAT, HOMOMYA, PECTEN dec~

VERY WARD COMPACT ROCK WITH INTERBEDDED
POCKETS CLAY AND FOSS

VERY HARD LIMES © WITH INFILTRATED
lerscwrorooe SHOWING OM OUTSIDE
ALTERNATING BANOS Cat, TEX?S.

yN GW wAS

CLAY, FULL OF SWELLS, CROWDED 14 RAAT
WITH ONE SMELL — UPPER (7).

Seo HARD SHELLY LIMESTONE
I { WITH MUCH WOOD - FISH SCALE.
VERY COMPACT LIGHT CLAY

8 OS BLE BLACK SPECKLED BAND.
(a WITH SMALL OSTREA PoLYIOR (2)

65-6

(2) CORNBRASH.
ANNELIO TRACKS, BORINGS, &c.
(REMINOING OF UPPER CLAY FM
AT CAS W)

6 INTENG MiG MANO DEEP BLUE CRYSTALLINE
2 EE SEC MANA INE 2 BANOS STONE Ane Cear

_4 ee | SOFT CLAN, HARDER AT TOP
SS

95 ye Hot hy Ap pec STONE

“g an, Ors At 1, Vaal

HARD BLUE CLAY

BLUE GREP CRYST LIMEST, FULL OF SHELLS
AWD OSTER LINE NACRE

GREY CRYST“! ROCK WITH MANY
WOOD PART

CLAY 3
DENSE BLUE CRYST® FULL OF SHELLS

& Ns SNS

a

OF WOOD, AVICULA, CORBULA, &c

(een YELLOW AT TOF, BLACK PATCHES
VEGETABLE MATTER.

BLUE ROCK (/3)
GLUE GREEN CLAY

~
os

FINE BLUE LIMESTONE LIKE FINEST
BLUE HOUSE

SOFT BLUE CLAY - BLACK PATCHES
BLUE GREEN OARK CLAY, FeLL OF WOOD
AND FOSsiis

OARSE BLUE-BLACK STONE, LIME THE ROUGH
ABLvE House”
BFINE BLACK SPECKLED STONE

{ COARSE SHELLY ARCILLACEDUS BEO

ty

DIRTY BLUE GREY FULL OSTREA SHELLS
HARDER AT TOP

GREY SPECKLED GRANULAR O. LARGE
(SSr0e0 wacne

MIXED WHITE & GREY R

DARK BlvETOSOFT GREY R WITH CLAYEr
LOOK, SPARKLING CRYST

ea yectow GRANULAR O.

130.0

CROWDED WITH SMALL FOSSILS,
(AND RESEMBLING PITHCRE)

BLUE AND WHITE O.
[-—————]soFwwe Granutar 2.

COARSE, GRANULAR CRERM- COLOURED
MERGIMC INTO BLUE, EXTENSIVE FISSURE
FILLEO WITH CALCITE GRYSTALS

cN WwW GSn £
'

wa
G&S Bh GF Waa BF «em OH S

ALTERNATING AND MIXED
10.

S

FINE GRAINED WITH EXTENSIVE VEINS
OF CALCITE.

DARK GREY FR. WITH BLACK CRAM.
VEINS CALCITE

COARSE GRAINED REDDISH CREAM-
-COL? O VARYING IN GRANULATION.

—_— — Oi

BLUEISH FO SHELLS.
COARSE CRAINED YELLOW O.

FINE GRAINED YELLOW O.

“FP 77 . 6 End oF Bore.

(72638

CREAM-COLOURED AND ELVE GREY ROCK,

M" Taunrons SECTION, 1884

(ere) MADE GROUND .
42.0 GRAVEL
FOR FINE SAND ‘
fin 6 DARK BROWN CLA
42.10 BLUE CLAY
Ve ROCK, Blue.
6.1 CLAL, Blue.
/#. 6 FROCK and CLAY Blue.
OP age HARO BLUE STONE,
eons BLUE ROCK gad CLAY
9.10 HARD STONE, Blue.
Fe A CLAY, Blue.
4#@.0 WHITE ROCK
ee es ROCK, Cream Colour
Ff 139. O

185

of Forest Marble Clay is 17ft. thick. But at Ampney Crucis
I find this bed varying from only 4 ft. to 6 ft., and elsewhere it
becomes still thinner. It is true, on the other hand, that just
below the gas works there is a thick bed, from 18 ft. to 20 ft.,
of this upper clay. The section has never ‘been described, and
it is the only one on this line that has escaped record: so that
its insertion here will not be out of place.

Section on Mipuanp anp Sovurs-WeEstTERN JuncTION Rartway

(S.E. of tHE CrreNcEsTER Gas Works).

ft. in.
Cornbrash, crowded with characteristic fossils, at S.E. end of

8 0

cutting... “en fr nee ino 5c ave aa
Forest Marble Clay, very dark grey, no fossils found except bits
of branching Polyzoa or Hydroids, at N.W. end of cutting 18 0

I could not regard these irregular clays as sufficiently
accounting for the practically impervious support of so large a
body of water. Yet I had up to last year no other hypothesis
to suggest.

About 1882-3, our fellow member, Mr Taunton, informed
me that he was boring at Lewis Lane, close to the old brewery-
well there, and was passing through beds of clay. This was an
ordinary chisel boring, but I procured a large quantity of the
triturated material brought up, and with the aid of some of my
students carefully washed and decanted a good deal of it, and
submitted it to a thorough examination. We found nothing
but broken fragments of Ostrea and other shells, and remained
still in the dark as to what these clays actually were, though
their presence tended to confirm my suspicions that Buckman’s
explanation did not satisfy all the conditions of the problem.

Tae We tt at Lewis Lane (Bowty’s WEt1)

which I have purposely held over for consideration, was sunk

some fifteen years ago, (in consequence, I have been told, of

doubts having been thrown on the purity of a former shallow

supply,) and was a chisel boring to the depth of 130ft. A con-

stant supply of water had been obtained from this source; the
G

186

further borings being carried out by Mr Taunton, were for the
purpose of obtaining an increased supply. The proprietorship
of the well had, I believe, changed hands, and was now vested
in the Cirencester Water Works Company. In 1885 Mr Taunton
published in our Proceedings (Vol. IX.) his paper on the
Hydrology of the Cotteswolds. Although this paper is mainly
occupied with a valuable and careful record of observations on
the varied problems embraced rather by a hydrological than a
geological aspect of the question, I acknowledge my great
indebtedness to it for assistance in attempting to unravel the
geological clue which the case presents, and desire to testify
to its very great interest and value as a work of reference.
It contains the section at the Barton, “ Trial-boring, 1872,”
already referred to (p. 52), and also the new and important
section at Lewis Lane, the chisel boring from which the clays
I had examined, were obtained.

A reference to this section shows beneath the surface sand
and gravel, 120 ft. of alternating blue clay and rock before a
white rock is reached. I believe Mr Taunton, quite naturally
following Buckman and his successors, took this to be all
Forest Marble. I could not, however, regard it as resembling
any development of those beds of which our district furnished
examples, and it tended to confirm the view that the “valley
of depression”? meant something more than the faulting-down
shown in Buckman’s section. Mr Taunton told me he had kept
some fossils taken from a new shaft which he had sunk near the
old boring, and about June, 1890, I paid him a visit, mainly for
the purpose of examining them. In my diary of that date I find
this observation on these fossils :—“‘ Struck at once by the fact
“that these fossils are Kellaway’s Rock and Oxford Clay, and
“not Forest Marble at all. Jf this be correct, then the town of
““ Cirencester is situated on an extensive down-throw of the Oxford
“ Clay.”

This quite unexpected discovery, if such it should turn out
to be, would, I saw at once, explain all the difficulties, and
would also harmonize with Buckman’s views, his “valley of
depression” only being some 60ft. to 100 ft. deeper than he

187

anticipated. It would also explain Mr Taunton’s chisel-boring
section, as the samples of triturated Kellaway’s Rock and Oxford
Clay would sufficiently closely resemble Forest Marble to be
taken for it. Mr Taunton was good enough to send his speci-
mens at once to the Geological Survey at Jermyn Street, and
their determination by Mr G. Sharman, which Mr Horace B.
Woodward was good enough to send me, confirmed most fully
my opinion of them. They were the following :—

feet
Avicula inequivalvis ... sib ... 80-34
Ostreea or Gryphea (young Founs) wae ... 30-34
Myacites recurva... Hee lee eta ie On
Ammonites macrocephalus bias ze ses= 0,
Belemnites Oweni ee see ae ooo gate
Modiola bipartita wis fe “ge ... 39-45
Waldheimia ornithocephala_.... oe AB

Terebratula intermedia, fragment
All are known from Lower Oxfordian—Oxford Clay and Kella-
way’s Rock. The lithological character of the rock also favoured
this view, as Mr Woodward pointed out.

At about this time it was in contemplation to make an
extensive diamond boring from the bottom of the new shaft at
Lewis Lane, and as this would be sure to confirm or modify my
conclusions, we agreed to wait for such revelations as a study
of the cores would afford.

In July last the boring (8}” diam.) began, and I watched
daily with keen interest the progress through the alternating
clays and blue and black limestones, and at 128 ft. to 130 ft.
was rejoiced to see the fine cream-coloured freestones of the
_ Great Oolite. The boring was carried on to a total depth from
the surface of 177 ft. 6in., and for several reasons, which need
not here be related, was abandoned. It may be noted that
some short time afterwards a plentiful supply of water filled
the well, and has since continued very regular. The task now
remained to work out systematically the cores brought up
by the borer. These represent 132 ft. in depth, and weigh
about eight tons. The long and often repeated examination of

these cores would have been impossible without not merely the
G2

188

permission to inspect them, but the elaborate facilities for
numbering, placing in boxes, and subsequently storing them,
which has been generously carried out by the Chairman of the
Water Works Company, EH. W. Cripps, Esq. The thanks of all
Cotteswold Geologists are due to Mr Cripps for placing these
cores at my disposal, for without such assistance this investiga-
tion could not have been completed.

There is still much work to be done, microscopic and
chemical, on the abundant material furnished by these cores,
but the following section, the result of examinations carried
out in conjunction with some of my students, may, I believe,
be taken as generally correct. A comparison of it, with Mr
Taunton’s chisel-boring section shows almost complete identity
in broad outline.

SEcTION THROUGH THE FLOoR OF THE CIRENCESTER VALLEY,
FROM THE SHAFT aND Diamonp Borine at Lewis LAne.

ft. in
a Made ground ... ee ae ae = ie 5c
= ro Gravel ce, aes ay sisey, Mevas 2 _ asec ing avian’ (@u SoeumREeaa
= 8 Fine sand Eo Fe3 Abe wes tee a ape OL)
5 & | Dark brown clay oo oa en so ae 0 Le
) Blue clay ALD ae see a oe be ase, 22

In this were found the fossils pended at page pre-

ceding. A typical specimen has been presented by Mr

Taunton to the Gloucester Museum.

1.—Hard blue limestone 1 2
2.—Alternating bands of one: Ae ee full of Rh sohokes ia 30
3.—Crumbling clay, full of shells(Terebratule, Homomya,Pecten,) 3 0
4.—Hard limestone, with clay pockets ; many fossils +o oe 2

5.—Very hard blue limestone, with Brachiopoda shells, fant

hollow or infiltrated with carbonate of lime, resembling
Kellaway’s Rock at South Cerney . 4 0
6.—Clay, crowded with imperfect bivaive yard C Milodiola) 6 6
7.—Hard shelly limestone, with much wood—a fish scale a OME
8.—Compact light clay... si Ke an 32
9.—Bluish-black speckled rock ais 0 8
10.—Clay, with Ostrea, Polyzoa, tracks and ious 6 6

This bears a close resemblance to the Upper ee
Marble Clays at the Gas Works. If it should be the
equivalent bed the Cornbrash above is not well re-
presented.

189

11.—Intensely hard blue crystal. limestone
12.—Alternating bands clay and limestone
13.—Soft clay .. = fo
14. ei gernntarig clay and naan eet st ove
15.—Clay, with Rhynchonelle oon “ce
16.—Very dark limestone tee ae aoe
17.—Hard bluish clay eas “rc one oe
18.—Blue grey crystalline limestone, with shells and nacre
19.—Grey crystalline limestone, with much wood

Clay parting... vee toe soa
20.—Compact blue iereastaig: full of shells “en

21.—Yellowish clay, with much wood and broken shells
22.—Blue limestone ... wees) Ailnas ose aoe
23.—Bluish green clay se ae Bee
24.—Blue limestone of fine texture, ssdantili a foraintiifarat
limestone at Blue House...
25.—Soft blue clay me Ree
26.—Bluish green clay, with wood ao fossils ne
27.—Rough blue shelly limestone ... aa BS oa
These last four or five beds very diealy resemble the
section at Blue House.
Clay parting... oes sc ay

28.—Blackish speckled limestone ... 200 sss
Clay parting... ae oo
29.—Coarse shelly limestone, full of fomien, oyster hati.
Clay parting... Asn aa ace Se
30.—Greyish Oolitic bed, with fois frat
31.—Mixed cream coloured and grey Oolitic rock eee

These two beds appear to mark the advent of the einen
Oolite, or the Junction beds.
32.—Dark blue limestone, sparkling with Calcite crystals
33.—Coarse yellow granular Oolite, with innumerable broken
shells... Ay vee oes
This is a Wanna neat in an district, and marks the
upper beds of the Great Oolite.
34.—Variegated blue and white Oolite ...

35.—Fine yellow freestone ... te Re a9 eee
36.—Compact bed, with fissures filled by Calcite crystals, cream
coloured to blue or mee ove tee oes AY:
Parting ... cn “ot <

37.—Variegated cream coloured Oolite, with Calcite veins
Parting ... feo wae wee

—
~~ ©

mmo oO or

=anwNpooo rk OC O&O

KROWNrFOOrRN Ye Oo

CAwWwWrnN HMO WWRORN ODF

own o

ww wmw wo w

oow sc

190

ft. in
38.—Dark grey Rock, with black gran. veins Calcite... ee hee
39.—Coarse grained reddish cream-coloured Oolite, varying in
granulation Con 5 0
40.—Bluish Rock, no shells ... 3 6
41.—Coarse grained yellow O. 2 0
42.—Fine grained yellow O.... 7 0
177 6

The fossils obtained in the first 15 ft. from the bottom of
the shaft—45ft. to 62ft.—are chiefly Myacites recurva and
Modiola bipartita; the rest, which undoubtedly are of the
Forest Marble and Great Oolite, are still to be worked out.
The horizon, which is not yet satisfactorily identified, is that
of the Cornbrash. It may be necessary to break up the whole
cores in that part of the section to define its exact position.

There appears to be no further room for doubt that the
retentive clays of the valley floor are those of the Kellaway’s
Rock and Oxford Clay, and that a down-throw fault of not less
than 100 ft. in vertical extent exists along probably both sides
of the valley. In the future the local Geologist will look with
eager interest for any opportunities that may arise for corrobo-
rating the data here recorded, and for observing the extent of
the area affected by this fault.

Ligut THrown on Forest Marste.

Besides what I will venture to call this slight addition to
our knowledge of the stratigraphy of the South-Eastern Cottes-
wolds, and its bearing on our water supplies, the section furnishes
us for the first time in this district with a complete view of the
Forest Marble Beds, on which a few considerations seem worthy
of note.

The many writers on the Geology of the Cotteswolds have
generally travelled no further South-Eastwards than the edge
of the Great Oolite.

The writings of Murchison, Wright, Buckman, Hull, Lucy,
and Wethered on the Inferior Oolite, and Lycett and Witchell
on the Great Oolite, are familiar to the Cotteswold Club.

—————

191

Buckman, in 1858, remarks that the Jurassic Rocks up to
the Great Oolite inclusive may be considered as having had no
small share of attention bestowed on them by different observers.
But the Forest Marble has met with too scant a treatment at
our bands. The paper of Buckman to which I have frequently
referred, and a short allusion by Witchell in a paper in our
Transactions (Vol. VIII., p. 265), are almost all the authentic
observations on the subject. Buckman makes the Great Oolite
and Stonesfield Slate 110 ft. in thickness, proved by well sinking
in the neighbourhood of Cirencester. But of the Forest Marble
he gives no section of more than 16 ft., except at Kemble Junc-
tion, where he makes it 39 ft. Hull, in his Geology of Chelten-
ham, gives 45 ft. T had long ago come to the conclusion that
60 ft. to 70 ft. more nearly represented the local development of
this horizon, if it could be seen in its entirety. This section
gives such a view, and bears out the conclusion. It further
affords an opportunity for studying, with thoroughness, the
junction beds of the Great Oolite and Forest Marble at this
spot. The actual source of the top water supply, as well as the
deeper storage remains a problem still to be worked out; but
its solution is simplified by the facts furnished by this im-
portant boring.

There are still many aspects that have not been touched
upon wherein the local Geologist may find this fortunate boring
fertile in suggesting new directions for investigation, or throwing
new light on uncompleted researches.

Abury and its Literature, by the Rev. Witu1am Bazexey, M.A.
Read March 24, 1891.

In accordance with the wish of our President, I have
endeavoured in the following paper in the first place to describe
Abury as it appeared to the members of the Cotteswold Field
Club who visited it last summer; and secondly to epitomize the
opinions of some eminent writers with regard to the purposes
for which this and similar ancient monuments were erected.

A level space of about 28 acres is enclosed by a ditch 28 ft.
deep [Mr Long says 33ft. deep*] and 9ft. wide at the bottom.
‘Outside the ditch is a mound or rampart raised from 25 ft. to
85ft. above the level of the surrounding fields. At Stonehenge
the mound is inside and the ditch outside. The mound or
rampart does not abut on the ditch; a belt of the original sur-
face of the ground, in some places 12ft. wide, has been left
between the ditch and the foot of the mound, thus forming a
kind of terrace half-way up the incline.

The area enclosed by the ditch is not quite circular, being
1,170 ft. wide from N.W. to S.E., and 1,260 ft. wide from N.E.
to S.W.

Scattered in all directions on Abury Field and the Marl-
borough Downs are countless Sarsen stones, unhewn and of
varied size and form.t These stones were formerly known as
“The Grey Wethers,” from their likeness to sheep in the dusk
of evening. Those which remain in Abury Field are but a scanty
relic of the menhirs which were seen by John Aubrey 250 years

* Abury. By W. Long, Esq., M.A., Zhe Wiltshire Archeological and
Natural History Magazine, Vol. IV., p. 327.

{ For the origin of these stones, and their name, see History of the
Sarsens. By Prof. T. Rupert Jones, F.R.S., Wiltshire Archeological and Natural
History Magazine, Vol. XXIII., p. 122.

———— —

PISS

——

ȴ

193

ago; for fire and water, the crowbar and the spade, have never
ceased destroying, removing, or concealing them.

Within the area surrounded by the ditch may be seen at the
present time twenty-nine Sarsen stones, seventeen upright and
twelve recumbent; but many of these are little more than stumps.
It was thought a few years ago that these were all that remained
of three, or, I may say, five circles. But this is fortunately not
the case ; for although many Sarsens have been broken up and
removed [the church and the houses of the village, to say

‘nothing of the walls and highways, are constructed of menhirs]

eighteen more Sarsen stones have been lately discovered lying
several feet below the surface.. And in addition to these, the

able explorers of Abury—the Rev. A. C. Smith and the Rev.

W.O. Lukis—have found pits containing fragments of destroyed
Sarsen stones to the number of thirty-three.* Thus the posi-

. tions of eighty stones are now known. These recent discoveries

all tend to confirm the surmise of Dr Stukeley, of whom I shall
say more directly, that there was an outer circle of stones, one
hundred in number, erected at an average distance of from
27ft. to 30ft. from the inner edge of the ditch,*and that
within this outer circle there were two smaller groups: the
group to the North consisting of an outer circle of thirty,
an inner circle of twelve, and within this inner circle three
stones, forming an obtuse-angled triangle, and standing upon
an are of a circle; the group to the South consisting of two
similar concentric circles, composed of thirty and twelve stones
respectively, with a menhir in the centre.

Mr Lukis has discovered the fact that these inner groups
were of unequal size, the Northern measuring 270 ft. and the
Southern 320 ft. in diameter.t

Two roads, one running S.W. to Beckhampton, and the
other running S.E. to Kennet, now cross one another within

* 4 Hundred Square Miles round Abury. By Rev. A. C. Smith, M.A.,
pp. 137-148.

+ See Report of Rev. W. C. Lukis, F.R.A., on the Prehistoric Monuments of
Stonehenge and Avebury: Proceedings of the Society of Antiquarics, Vol. IX.,
pp. 141-157 and pp. 344-346.

194

the enclosed area, and the visitor’s view of the remaining
Sarsens is obstructed by the houses and gardens of the village
of Abury.

On the West side of the road leading from Abury to West
Kennet are a dozen upright or fallen menhirs, and there are
others beyond West Kennet, between the main road from Bath
to London, and the brook Kennet. These are believed to be
the relics of one hundred Sarsens which formed an avenue ex-
tending from Abury S.E. to West Kennet, and from thence
in a more Easterly direction to a circle on Overton Hill, close
to the spot where an ancient trackway, running due South,
meets the Bath and London road.

Stukeley believed that another avenue ran along the
North side of the road which leads from Abury to Beckhampton
and terminated in a menhir. Only four stones of this sup-
posed avenue remain, and Ferguson, Lukis, and others have
been very sceptical as to its existence. Nearly one mile to the
South of Abury, and midway between the supposed extremities
of the two avenues, rises up Silbury Hill, the largest artificial
mound in* Europe, and equal in cubic dimensions to the second
Egyptian Pyramid. Three miles and a half South of Abury,
Wansdyke passes from East to West, following the bends of
the hills, and joining a Roman road on Calstone Hill.

Such is Abury at the present time. The questions which
at once suggest themselves to the mind of the inquiring visitor
are :—What was it in the past? What was the object of its
builders? For what purposes was it used by our forefathers ?
Was it a fortress, a temple, a place of popular assembly, a
burial place, or a memorial of some great victory ?

In Leland’s Itinerary, written about 1542, he says :—
“Kenet risithe N.N.W. at Selberi Hille Botom, where by
hathe be Camps and Sepultures of Men of Warre, as at Aibyri
a mile of, and in dyvers Placis of the Playne.”’*

I think we may at once dismiss the notiun of a camp,
although Leland, 350 years ago, probably heard such a tradition.
A fortress would have had its ramparts inside its ditch.

* Leland’s Jtinerary, Vol. VII., fol. 66 b.

C£9ZL/

2 oted 20 n
pod B, of ji aot
aioe aah tm

*seoeete spipy = j, (moe ae Ss=22====> a

ecceccesoce=® aocecoeoc coe soo ew

Wecsce*s er ececmoceceocoee cca a coca o oso oe
so

NanTgeny

i} aivid

195

Drayton makes no allusion to Abury or Silbury in his
Poly-olbion, and Camden does not seem to have been aware of
_ their existence; but Dr Philemon Holland, the first translator
of Camden’s Britannia, in 1637, says :—‘* Within one mile of
Silbury is Abury, an uplandish village, built in an old camp, as
it seemeth, but of no large compass. It is environed with a
fair trench, and hath four gates, in two of which stand huge
stones as jambs, but so rude that they seem rather natural
than artificial, of which there are some others in the said
village.”’* .

In January, 1648-9, John Aubrey, the celebrated Wiltshire
Antiquary, happened to be staying at Marlborough with Mr
Charles Seymour, and to be hunting with him in the country
of the Grey Wethers. In 1663, King Charles II., who had
heard John Aubrey’s account of Abury, and his statement that
. “it doth as much exceed Stonehenge as a Cathedral does a

f _ Church,” paid a visit to the place on his way to Bath, and

commanded Aubrey to write a description of it.
Aubrey made some rough sketches of what he saw. These

_ sketches are reproduced in Mr Long’s exhaustive paper on

Abury in the 4th volume of the Wiltshire Archeological and
Natural History Magazine. [See Plate I.] It will be seen
that he gives thirty-one stones of the outer circle, and forty-
one of the two inner groups or concentric circles. The three
menhirs, forming what Dr Stukeley calls the Cove of the
Northern group, and the single one, which he calls the Obelisk
_ or Ambre of the Southern group, were then standing. Aubrey
also gives an account of the stone circle on Overton Hill, and

_ of the avenue, or “Solemne Walk,” which connected it with

¥ Abury. He suggests that Abury was a corruption of Oldbury—
_ the old borough; and expresses his belief that this antiquity
_ was an Arch Temple of the Druids.+

* Wiltshire Archeological and Natural History Magazine, Vol. IV., p. 310.
t+ The Topographical Collections of John Aubrey: Edited by Rev. J. E.

_ Jackson, for the Wiltshire Archzological and Natural History Society, 1862,

pp. 314-330.

196

Pepys relates in his diary that he passed through Abury in
1668, and was told by “a countryman of that town” that Silbury
derived its name from one King Seall, who was buried there.
He also noticed the circle on Overton Hill.*

Mr Thomas Twinning, in 1723, published a work entitled
“ Avebury, in Wiltshire, the remains of a Roman work erected
by Vespasian and Julius Agricola during their several com-
mands in Brittany.” He believed Abury, with its avenues, and
Silbury to form a temple to Terminus. From its form of a
wedge he called it Cunetium. Twinning gives a plan of this
temple, which has afforded much amusement to Antiquaries on
account of its evident inaccuracy and absurdity.t The Roman
Cunetio, moreover, stood between Mildenhall and Savernake
Forest, seven miles East of Abury.

It remained for Dr Stukeley, in 1743, to give to the world
a plan upon which, as he believed, the Temple of Abury was
constructed. He frequented the place for years and took care-
ful measurements of every detail. The whole figure he believed
represented a serpent—the enclosed space at Abury being the
body, the Kennet avenue the neck, the Overton circle the head,
and the supposed Beckhampton avenue the tail. [See Plate II.]

He believed that the three large stones within the Northern
group formed the Adytum or Cove of the Temple, and that the
victim to be offered up in sacrifice was fastened to the holed
menhir which formed the centre of the Southern group.t

A survey of Abury was made by Mr Crocker for Sir Richard
Hoare, in 1812, and appears in his “ Ancient Wiltshire.” At
that time the three stones of the Northern group and the single
one of the Southern group were still standing. ||

Mr Long published his account of Abury in 1858. I gather
from it that he accepts Dr Stukeley’s theory of a Temple in

* Memoir of Samuel Pepys, Esq., M.D. Chandos Ed., pp. 520-1.

+ Wiltshire Archeological and Natural History Magazine, Vol. IV., pp.
319-321.

{ Wiltshire Archeological and Natural History Magazine, Vol. IV., pp.
322 et seq.

|| Zd., pp. 324-326. [For a Restoration of Abury see Plate III.]

PLATE Ii

broad Ainton

8 } ae =

p— a

: = == Monkton
———— aa a ee a A nner 2

— re
—ie

—
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ene}

anon ~=} Ee a ee ee Ny ine) -

~~ —
~—~s.

Hennitspr

by us

7@ ve OL// a J] {9087 2) e/ dg a7 Vv 7a 2] 7 A 14 7 (Gs
ao ZL 279 [2] ale tL 7 772, et AMANO ‘0 ab: VL 72 2229 Dak 2.
te 7; f i UO uacalr 22 429 ’ FT zZ oC “yo}1 aY2 UY FAM ie 2 47°

29 ‘er mp x

aR
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— een

ae os Fare vi

SS SSS

SS

SS

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SSS:
=S SSS

See Oe a tee

HI] aavwtd

197

the form of a serpent, and his supposition that the spectators
_ stood on the terrace or sat on the mound, and beheld from
thence the sacred rites performed by the priests within the
great circle.
5 In 1872 Ferguson published his well-known work entitled
“Rude Stone Monuments,” in the third chapter of which he
_ treats of “Avebury and Stonehenge.” This author favours the
_ opinions of those who have considered Abury to be a burial
_ place, and quotes a charter of King Athelstan, dated 939, in
which the boundaries are given of the manor of Overton—
_ “Then by Collas barrow, as far.as the broad road to Hackpen,
_ thence Northward up along the Stone Row, thence to the bury-
ing places.”* There is no doubt that the “Stone Row” refers
to the Kennet avenue, and “the burying places” to the great
enclosure of Abury. We may certainly gather from this passage
that a.p. 939, as in Leland’s time, 600 years later, Abury was
traditionally a burial place.

Ferguson also quotes, in favour of this opinion, a statement
of Dr Stukeley’s, that when the vallum or rampart near the
_ Church was levelled by Lord Stowell at the beginning of last
_ century large quantities of bones were found. Dr Stukeley,
_ however, adds: ‘‘They were the remains of sacrifices.”” Another
fact is in favour of Ferguson’s opinion: outside the concentric
_ circles on Overton Hill were discovered, in 1678, a vast number

of skeletons lying close together, skull touching skull, with
_ their feet towards the so-called Temple. Dr Toope, of Marl-
_ borough, who records this discovery, says: “I really believe
_ the whole plaine on that even ground is full of dead bodies.”
a But, in opposition to Ferguson’s theory, when the enclosed
_ area of Abury was carefully excavated by the Rey. A. C. Smith
_ and the Rey. W. C. Lukis, in 1881, not a human bone was dis-
covered.

Ferguson ridicules the idea of Abury being a Temple, as it
is, he says, utterly unlike any known Temple in the whole

* Codex Ae. Sax., v., pp. 238, No. 1120.

198

world. He rejects also the theory of a place of popular
assembly. The population on these downs, he says, could
never have been greater, or so great, as that which now exists;
how unlikely then that a Temple or a Meeting-place would be
constructed, capable of holding 250,000 within the enclosure,
and half a million standing or sitting on the mound.

Ferguson believes Abury to be the burial place of those who
fell in a great battle. He says that it is just such a monument
as a victorious army of 10,000 men, with the assistance of their
prisoners, could erect in a week with a few rollers and ropes.
He suggests what battle it was, 7.e., the last and greatest battle
fought by King Arthur against the Saxons at Badon Hill,
A.D. 520.*

The Rev. W. C. Lukis, the well-known writer on the
megalithic remains of the Channel Islands, Brittany and Corn-
wall, in a paper read before the Society of Antiquaries in 1882,
rejects the serpent theories of Stukeley, but refrains from
bringing forward any of his own.

The Rey. A. C. Smith, the author of A Guide to the British
and Roman Antiquities of the North Wiltshire Downs in a
Hundred Square Miles round Abury, published in 1885, quotes
the opinions of these writers to whom I have referred, and
declares that he is not shaken by anything hitherto adduced
against the theory that Abury was a Temple of the Ancient
Britons. Then he proceeds to give a very careful account of
the researches and discoveries made by the Rev. W. C. Lukis
and himself, in 1881.

The latest contribution that I have seen to the Archeology
of Abury is a Public Lecture, given in the Ashmolean Museum,
Oxford, on December 6th, 1888, by Mr A. J. Evans, and printed
in the Archeological Review, Vol. II., pp. 312-330. Mr Evans is
of opinion that Abury and similar megalithic circles are closely
connected, directly or indirectly, with the burial of the dead
and the religious rites which followed. He believes that each
of the two concentric circles at Abury had central cists, which

* Rude Stone Monuments. By James Ferguson, B.C.L., 1872, Chap. ii.

—————- re a

—E—— OO

199

were used for interments. This opinion of Mr Evans is sup-
ported by the fact that Mr Pratt, whose garden at Abury now
occupies the site of the Southern circle, found in 1880, near the
centre of the circle, an urn full of bones.*

Mr Evans believes that the stone circle surrounding a central
dolmen or stone cist which once contained the remains of the
dead, such as may be found in every part of the world, had its
origin in the subterranean dwellings of man during the epochs
of the Cave Bear and the Reindeer. In the Lapp Gamme such
dwellings are still in use, with ring stones propping up the
turf-covered mounds, and low entrance galleries leading to the
chamber within.t+

The Native Australians are constructing sepulchral monu-
ments at the present day of a similar type.

Mr Evans suggests that the ring of stones, placed round
the grave mound, became a stone circle; and the subterranean
cist an exposed dolmen. The avenue is a lineal descendant of
_ the underground gallery which led to the sepulchral chamber.

It has been often noticed that our stone circles have an
opening to the Hast or North-East. This orientation, as time
went on, may have become connected with the worship of the
sun; but we find its origin in the Laplander’s house. In the
far North, where during a great part of the year the hours of
daylight are very few, and therefore very precious, it is a
common custom to construct the openings toward the Hast,
so that the inmates of the subterranean dwellings may be
_ awakened by the first rays of the rising sun.

But if the megalithic circles were originally sepulchral,
and such is the universal tradition, they may also have been in
some sense Temples, not for serpent worship, but for the cult
of the dead. An incense cup was found at Stonehenge, near

* A Hundred Square Miles round Abury. By the Rey. A. C. Smith, p. 142.

+ Compare the ground-plans of subterranean dwellings extant at Chapel
Euny, in the parish of Sancreed ; at Chysoister, in the parish of Gulval; and at
_ Bosporthenis, in the parish of Zennor, in Cornwall. Prehistoric Stone Monwments
of the British Isles, Cornwall, plates xxxv.-xxxix.

200

one of the triliths, and from a barrow at Abury came a beau-
tiful specimen of what is known as the Nodulated or Grape
Incense Cup.*

On removing part of the rampart at Abury a vast quantity
of bones of domestic animals was found which appeared to
have been offered up in sacrifice. +

These discoveries are evidence in favour of Mr Evans’
theory.

Mr Evans, following in the footsteps of Mr Petrie, whose
notes on Stonehenge I have not seen, is of opinion that the
large stone circles were constructed gradually, and at intervals
of time.

The Khasis of North-East Bengal, whose stone circles have
been described by Dr Hooker and Major Godwin-Austen, build
their monuments piecemeal, raising a batch of stones now and
again to appease the spirits of the dead, just, I suppose, as
pilgrims throng to the shrine of some popular saint in Italy or
France, and hang up around her image their votive offerings,
when her special aid is needed, or some new wonder has been
wrought by her intercession.

Aristotle tells us that the Iberians set up pointed stones
around the grave of a departed hero, each stone representing
an enemy that he had slain. We find a similar tradition at
Carnac, in Brittany. The avenues of grey stones stretching
away towards the sea are, in the minds of the Bretons, a flymg
host of pagans whom St. Cornelly has thus transformed.

Mr Evans returns to the old explanation of Sarsen, and
connects it with Saracen, 7.e., Pagan. The name of the Breton
dolmen, known as Four du Sarasin, shows that the word is not
peculiar to our country. At Ashdown, on Salisbury Plain,
amongst the Derbyshire hills—wherever we find these rude
monuments—traditions are lingering amongst the inhabitants
of pagan armies turned to stone.

Of course, as time rolls on, traditions change, and accom-
modate themselves to new phases of social and religious usages.

* See Drawing and Description in the Rev. A. C. Smith’s Abury, p. 145
+ Page 197.

ee eae

“A $

201

The Paynim of the Carloman age, and the pagans who fought
with Alfred at Ashdown, took the place of foes who had long
been forgotten.

I may mention that there is a tradition connected with the
stone circle at Bolleit, in Cornwall, which cannot be more than
three hundred years old in its present form. The nineteen
stones which once surrounded a sepulchral cromlech or dolmen
are nineteen maidens who were turned to stone for dancing on
the Lord’s Day; and two menhirs, the relics, it may be, of an -
avenue, are the pipers who played the inviting tune. The
same tradition is attached to the circles of Boscawen-Un,
Tregaseal, and Wendron. But nowand then the older story crops
up; and the unshapen granite pillars are the foes with whom
Good King Arthur contended, or giants who lived and fought
in Britain before the coming of Brutus and his Trojan crew.

Mr Evans winds up his very able lecture with the sugges-
tion that the central object of worship within these megalithic
circles was an oak tree. He gives examples in Greco-Roman
art of triliths like those at Stonehenge, or rude unshapen
stones, such as we have at Abury, standing in front of a sacred
tree. At Rome Jupiter Feretrius was worshipped on the Capitol
as a lofty oak; before it stood an altar, and around the tree and
the altar was the sacred enclosure. The special sanctity of the
oak amongst Celtic races, and hence the origin of the name
“Druid” for a Celtic priest, is often referred to by ancient
classical writers. Maximus Tyrius (Disc. 38) says:—Kearos ceBoucs
piv Ala, dyadrwa de Aros xedrindy obyay Spis. The Celts worship
Zeus, and the Celtic form of Zeus is a tall oak.

As in religion, as in dress, so in Archeology it would seem
_ that every new phase is to some extent a return to what has
gone before. The challenge of Ferguson is at last accepted.
The conceits of Borlase and Stukeley are not altogether so
_ mythical as we have lately been taught to consider them.

Until another and more brilliant theory develops itself, we
may cling to our Druids, and our Mistletoe, and, as before,
let the weird Sarsens and Granite boulders conjure up the
shades of heroes who fought and died before our English fore-
fathers had left the primeval forests of central Germany.

H

Some Remarks on the Geology of Alderton, Gretton, and Ashton-
under-Hill, by Freperick Suirue, F.G.S., &c., and W. C.
Lucy, F.G.S.

In the summer of 1879 the Lias quarries of Alderton and
of Gretton were examined by the Geologists of the Cotteswold
Club, and afforded instructive sections ; and some time after a
visit was made to the exposure of Lias rock at Ashton-under-
Hill. All these quarries were then being worked, and the notes,
sections, and observations made by the authors on the spot, have
helped to contribute to this report of the geology of at least Alder-
ton, less so of Gretton, and least of Ashton-under-Hill, the
varying proportion of time given to each place being mainly
due to circumstances, such as untoward weather. The excur-
sion made to Alderton was immediately after a heavy fall of
rain the previous night, the water well nigh filling the quarry
to the brim, and cutting off, to some extent, access to the upper-
most strata of the shales of the Upper Lias, and of the junction
line underlying them, which was a point of special moment.
Against this drawback, two advantages were scored in favour
of the working Geologists—one was, that close by the quarries
stood some large and inviting stacks of the Marlstone of the
Spinatus beds, rich in fossils, as well as a goodly spoil bank of
the overlying seams of Upper Lias shale, which the quarrymen
had removed to enable them to get at the solid Middle Lias
rock. Besides this gain, it was no small advantage to observe
- the manner in which the water was percolating through some
20 ft. to 30ft. of the Paper shales, working through the joints
of the rock, and over the cleavage planes, so that the beds were
dripping and streaming in every direction, the whole forming
an imposing and instructive sight, which we shall have occasion
again to refer to. Notes have been made on the spot, and have
since been put together, and that jointly, as it has been sug-
gested that they may be of service to those who have not had

.-. Ae

BUFF & GRAY

CLAYS.

(CoNCHOIDAL)

PAPER SHALES

; (HARPOCERAS 5/FRONS)

| COMMUNIS BEDE.
(STEPHANOCERAS COMMUNE)

COURSE oF L/MESTONE
ASH BED, CEODES
GUSH SCALES &
CRUSTACEA)

1

THESE SHALES ARE
CAPABLE OF
DISTILLATION, AND
WHERE MOST
BITUM/NOUS, THEY
ASSUME A DULL
CHOCOLATE TINT.

141! wh

Ws in

i /

ae

,

|

STEPHANOCERAS
COMMUNE.

- HARPOCERAS

- BIFRONS ZONE.

|
e

(HARPOCERAS 5/FRONS)

SHALES
| LAMINATED &

“Tell
\| | {wif

coi ww |

“ifn

(STEPHANOCERAS COMMUNE)

"nif

| avruminous.

THE OFL SHALES

(WARPOCERAS SERPENTINUM)
OF SOME

INOCERAMUS DUBIUS &
MONOTIS: SUBSTRIATUS
; ) APPEAR TO RUN
|| GéoLocrsrs. g | \ THROUGHOUT THE
' } SHALES /N NO
SMALL WUMBERS.

#H. PYGMEA
ae ae Z LIGHT GRAY
LEPTAEWA BANO TER. GLOBULINA ey

CLAYS or DENSE | - —= LEPTIENA P , CLAY, NOT
y ere => LAMINATE 0.

| WOURATED ROCK “3 HARD ROCK
OFTHE AMALTHEUS SPINATUS BEDS. - COMPACT 2) DIVISION
; IN PLACES,- ON TOP CONCRETIONWARY BEING
SS. BROWN SAND -STONE. eas BLASTED

| AMALTHEUS =

a =

203

the opportunity of working the upper portion of our Lias. It
is a consideration of some weight that many quarries—formerly
worked for fairly useful stone, whether for road metal, or for
building—are now abandoned, especially in our own neighbour-
hood, having been superseded by stone brought from a distance;
so that Lias Marlstone has been re-placed, successively, by
Carboniferous Limestone, and this last material has been set
aside for the Clee Hill basalt for road making. We may learn
from these facts that where instructive sections of our Jurassic
rocks can be obtained and studied by the geologist, they should
be duly recorded and appreciated, and, however slight and un-
pretending, be found, if useful, a place in the “ Proceedings.”

1.—ALDERTON

The position or orientation of the hill is peculiar from
the fault which traverses it between the quarry in question
and the Alderton Woods. Its course is N.W. to 8.E., running
parallel to the heavy faulting of the’ Southern range of the
Cotteswolds below Guiting; .and_ with | a small throw, and
these faults are repeated, alwaxa “preserving the same parallel
direction Southwards to the important heavy fault through
Cranham to Brimpsfield and Renwick, leaving its mark upon
the oolitic quarries at Cooper’s Hill, and powerfully shattering
them. Much rolled and broken oolite is met with South of
Bredon Hill, and the oolitic capping beds of Alderton Hill, like
those of Chosen Hill, have been sheared off. At the village of
Alderton is a pit with about a foot of oolite gravel resting upon
8ft. of quartzose sand, and both extend to Little Washbourn and
Beckford, resembling the skeins and seams to the N.W. of the
hill of Churchdown. Broadly speaking, Alderton has about
30ft. of the Upper Lias clay reposing upon the uppermost
beds of Middle Lias, known as the Spinatus beds. The break
between these divisions is evidenced by paleontological as well
as lithological proofs. These will be again referred to. Through
the lowermost clay beds, Commune Zone of the Upper Lias,
conchoidal in texture, and contiguous to the Spinatus rock,

runs a course of concretions termed the Fish bed or Insect bed
H2

204

of P. B. Brodie, F.G.S. This course of geodes is persistent,
equally occurring at Churchdown, and with the same contents :
broken bits of shells and of crustacea, containing also fish re-
mains and insects in some places, though none of the latter
were met with at Alderton.

LITHOLOGY

The so-called “Paper Shales,” forming the capping of
Alderton Hill, are of a dark puce colour, nearly black; their
origin is clearly from the “‘smatches ” of the coal measures up
country from the Clee Hills and Forest of Wyre district. They
are more or less bituminous, as well as carbonaceous, and uni-
formity and regularity of the thin films would denote a quietly
deposited sediment, free.from disturbing currents. It has been
noticed by Sorby that fine grained mud obtained from a depth
of 2,600 fathoms in the South Pacific, possesses the following
remarkable property, which throws light upon the formation of
the concretions known as the Fish bed, or by Brodie as the
Insect bed. The grains of sand do not separate from the finer
mud and subside, but gather the finer particles about them into
a compound granule, and this process rapidly clears the water.
It has been determined by experiment that the solid matter
in such muds only amount to eleven per cent., while in shales
the solid matter is at least seventy-five per cent., so that when
pressure squeezes the water out of these clays they may be
reduced to one-sixth of their original thickness; and this change
would tend to develop in the bedding planes exactly such a
fissile structure as we witness in the “ Paper shales” of Alder-
ton Hill. These shales are traversed by joints, which are not
quite vertical in direction, but which cross each other at a small
angle. The cause is due to the direction of the mechanical
stresses, and the result is clearly seen in the section of the
blocks of clay, the blocks forming neither cubes, nor parallelo-
grams, but from the oblique direction of the stresses the
result is, that the forms produced by their intersections give us
rhombs or rhomboidal figures; and these, together with the
jointings as apart from cleavages, also common to the Marl-
stones below, powerfully contribute to shoot off and discharge

205

the waters of the rainfall. It is from the circumstance that
these corresponding beds of the Upper Lias at Churchdown
or Chosen Hill are of such a slight thickness, together with the
jimited area of the catchment forming the upper strata, that
the water supply of Churchdown is so often deficient, and
occasionally on the S.E. side of the hill and around it the
ground is at times really parched up.

The section of the Upper Lias clays indicate on the top
6 ft. of Buff and Gray clays, and at the base, lying on the upper
rocks of the Spinatus Zones, 4ft. 6 in. of Leptena clays. In
both instances the fracture is conchoidal, a fact attributed to
impressed force from above acting upon the mass of clay when
it contained next to no moisture, approaching to a rigid con-
dition of the substance. In any case, the conchoidal fracture
would imply a changed set of conditions, tantamount to such a
break inferred from paleontological proof, which latter would
signify lapse of time. /

PALHZONTOLOGY

The following tables of the fossils of the Alderton section,
although procured in the face of difficulties, are fairly repre-
sentative. Of the leading genera some few only of the five
ammonites that now assert themselves for the first time are
here entered. Access to the faces of the shales having barred
_ our work upon the “ Paper shales.”

~

(SEE OVER)

206

ALDERTON HILL, GLOUCESTERSHIRE
TABLE I.—FOSSILS OF THE UPPER LIAS

(THE COMMUNE AND SERPENTINUM ZONES)

PISCES.

Dapedius, scales

MOLLUSCA.
CEPHALOPODA.
Ammonoidea.
Stephanoceras commune (Sow):

Harpoceras serpentinum (Sow)
y annulatum (Sow)
" bifrons (Brug)
u lythense (Y. & B.)
u radians (Rein)
Aptychus. H. lythense. (Y. & B.)
BELEMNITID 2.

B. cylindricus (Simp)
v paxillosus (junior) (Schloth)
BRACHIOPODA.

Ter. globulina (Davids)
Rhyn. pygmea (Moore)
Thecidea.

Leptene (Casts)

GASTROPODA.
Euomphalus minutus (Schiibler)
PELECYPODA.
Tnoceramus dubius (Sow)
Plicatula spinosa (Sow)
Harpax calvus (Desl)
Lima toarcensis (Desl)
Limea acuticosta (Goldf)
Cardinia levis (Y. & B.)
Leda ovum (Sow)

« galathea (@’ Orb)

” ‘ainor (Simps)

» subovalis (Goldf)

Monotis substriatus (Mist)
MISCELLANEA.

Crushed members of small crustacea,
and hooklets of the arms of cepha-
lopods, found in the geodes, with
bits of shell. These fragments were
the rejected food of fish of pre-
daceous habit.

REPTILIA.

Fractured rib of Saurian.

CRINOIDEA.

Extracrinus subangularis (Miller)

MOLLUSCA.
CEPHALOPODA.
A mmonoidea.

Amaltheus spinatus (Brug)
-Philoceras Zetes (d’Orb)
Harpoceras aalense (Ziet)
Amaltheus margaritatus (Mont)
u Engelhardti (d’Orb)
BELEMNITID&.

B. paxillosus (Schloth)
» breviformis (Voltz)
GASTROPODA.

~ Pleurotomaria amalthei (Quenst)
Pitonellus sordidus (d’Orb)
Turbo cyclostoma (Ziet)
BRACHIOPODA.

‘Ter punctata (Sow)
_ #« Edwardsi (Davids)
_ Waldheimia Marie (d’Orb)

" cornuta (Sow)
Bhynch. acuta (Sow)
» tetrahedra (Sow)

| PELECYPODA.

Ostreacymbium (mk)

_# submargaritacea _ (Brauns)

207

ALDERTON HILL, GLOUCESTERSHIRE
TABLE II.—FOSSILS OF THE MIDDLE LIAS .

(THE SPINATUS AND MARGARITATUS ZONES)

Avicula inzequivalvis (Sow)
” species
Modiola subcancellata (Brug)
” scalprum (Tqm)
Pecten equivalvis (Sow)
” — priscus (Schloth)
” substriatus (Rim)
” lunaris (Rém)
” acuticostatus (Goldf)
” — species
Unicardium globosum (Moore)
Lima gigantea (Phillips)
Hinnites tumidus (Ziet)
Myaconcha decorata (Goldfuss)
Modiola numismalis (Oppel)
Saxicava spec.
Gresslya ovata (Rom)
» Intermedia (Simp)
» Seebachii (Brauns)
« donaciformis (Phil)
y striata (Brauns)
Pleuromya costata (Y. & B.)
Arcomya arcacea’ (Seebach)
Pinna Hartmanni (Ziet)
Pholadomya ambigua (Sow)
Gervillia zrosa (Simps)
Protocardium truncatum (Sow)
Ceromya bombax (Quenst)
u petricosa (Simp)
MISCELLANEA.
Fucaceee—stems, such as of Lami-

naria

Drift wood of exogeneous and of
endogenous structure

Calamites spec.

208

In addition to the preceding list of fossils, a specimen of
Nautilus astacoides (Young and Bird) must be included as
found in the Stephanoceras commune Beds. Also, the writers
have to thank many members of the Society for working with
such alacrity and spirit to collect in so short a time, at one
visit only to the quarry, such a rich illustration, in quantity
and kind, of the life of the periods of the Middle and Upper
Divisions of our liassic deposits. The paleontological evidence
of the fossils points to a great flux of geological time that must
have elapsed between the close of the deposition of the Amal-
theus spinatus Beds, followed by erosion to an enormous extent,
and then to the deposition under new conditions of the dark
grey clays above those beds, derived from the coal measures as
before stated under the heading of Lithology. And with the
new sediments, there followed modified forms of life, as is
always the case. The subject is tempting to linger on, but
passing from it to touch upon the visit to Gretton, and subse-
quently to Ashton-under-Hill, we would call attention finally
to these points:—(l) The line on the section parting the
Ammonites Beds, namely, that of the Amaltheus spinatus,
and that touching the base of the Stephanoceras commune
Zone. This line marks clearly the great planes of erosion of
the upper portion of the Middle Lias deposits. (2) Besides
the physical changes that ushered in the re-appearance of an
ancient brachiopod, viz., Lepteena (Dalman), which migrated
from its Carboniferous home, and is so strangely met with in the
Leptena Band of the Upper Lias (first discovered in Somerset-
shire by a member of the Cotteswold Club, and afterwards in
Gloucestershire by another member of the same Association),
(3) We would not omit the considerations of physical geology,
instanced in the formation of the singular course of geodes or
of ovate concretions which, known as Fish Bed, or Insect Bed,
is so constant in its occurrence, though not unique, for a similar
course of concretions is found very constantly present in the
Aegoceras Ibex Zone of our Middle Lias. One example at this
moment is near the writer: it is an ovate concretion from the
Ibex Zone, which contains a large and fine gastropod, Eucyclus

Wal

pepe

r=

ey i co OP emer tee

Serks

ee ee ee

Cert

Kak) ine

AM mie i pel wet

209

undulatus (Phill). The geodes of the zones of the Upper Lias
more often enclose light objects, frequently bits of the armature
of young cephalopods, or fragments of small bivalve shells,
portions of fish, or of small ammonites, which have been crushed
between the palatal teeth of predacious fishes, and after due
suction of the soft parts the hard fragments have been rejected.
A curious instance in point, as peculiar, is from one of the lias
beds in Normandy, correlating with those of our present section,
namely, the Stephanoceras commune Zone. These beds con-
tain large oblong or ovate concretions, which the peasants name
“Miches,” from their likeness to the cakes of their country
bread. These geodes not infrequently enclose small fishes, and
amongst the contents of their stomachs certain tiny ammonites
are frequently met with; the species is the young of Harpoceras
cecilia (Reinicke)—perhaps the young of Harpoc. serpentinum.
The writer has a similar example from the concretionary course,
or Fish Bed of the Stephanoceras commune Beds at Chosen
Hill, but the French species of ammonite referred to were de-
voured by fishes, and the young ammonites are found inside
them, with the last whorl or body chamber of their shell often
exceptionally well preserved, which is a feature much prized
by the paleontologist. Before quitting the subject, we would
adduce here—but also as exceptionally abundant in the con-
cretions at Gretton in the Upper Lias—the little Kuomphalus
minutus. This small gastropod literally swarms at Gretton.
We take them to be the young of that species, not many days
old, especially as they are crowded together in groups, and are
tiny things. It is probable that the fry was deposited on the
surfaces of delicate algz, like the membranaceous fronds of the
genus Ulva, a tender seaweed, which has decomposed and left
the young Euomphali to vouch for its existence ; because the
_ young of all the genera of the Turbinide feed on alge.

GRETTON

There is a good exposure of the Spinatus Zone in a quarry
a little distance from the Inn; here we find the Upper Lias
beds of the Stephanoceras commune reduced to comparatively

210

small dimensions, still presenting in the Fish Bed concretions
the minute fossils usually found in them, and conspicuously, in
great abundance, the young shells of the gastropod before men-
tioned, Euomphalus minutus (Sow.) In the coarse foxy Marl-
stone of the Amaltheus Spinatus division the contents are fairly
representative, and first we cite the ammonite often found at
Gretton, the Phylloceras Zetes (d’Orb.) Our specimen from the
sandstone of this quarry is five inches in diameter, and is a
shell that some paleontologists have confounded with the
Phylloceras heterophyllum (Sowerby). We transcribe from a
note made many years ago the following :—“ Quenstedt (Der
Jura, I., p. 172): A. heterophyllus. Wen. d@’Orbigny zu trauen
wire (Prod. I. page 246, &.)” Prof. Quenstedt is altogether
wrong, and Alcide d’Orbigny right about A. Zétes. I have
compared true A. heterophyllus, from Whitby, with the A. Zétes
of d’Orbigny, fine specimens of which have been yielded by the
Middle Lias of Gretton, near Winchcomb, and the differences
between the two shells are distinct and specific:—1. In the
sutures. 2. In the umbilicus. The management of the points
at issue is cleared up in a succinct and masterly way in the
monograph of our late friend, Dr Wright, after whom we may
write cadit questio, so far as this subject is concerned. See
pages 422 and 424 of the Monograph of the Lias Ammonites of
the British Islands, and carefully examine the excellent plates
of the respective species. Paleontographical Society, 1883.

Amongst other fossils gathered on this occasion from the
Amaltheus spinatus beds we note: Phylloceras Zétes (d’Orbigny),
Amaltheus spinatus (Brug), Arcomya longa (Buvignier), Pleu-
romya granata (Simpson), Pecten lunaris (Roemer), Gervillia
cerosa (Quenstedt), Rhynchonella tetrahedra (Sow), Pleuro-
tomaria rotellaformis (Dunker), Gryphea cymbium, var. depressa
(junior), and Myoconcha decorata (Munster); also many common
characteristic forms of the spinatus beds. We must not omit
the number of smaller crustacea, Ostracods, that appear in this
part of the Middle Lias at Gretton, and also at Ashton-under-
Hill; Cytherea and Cytherina, genera which also occur on the
same horizon of the Middle Lias in Germany, at Liebenburg,
and Salzgitter.

yy Tew artes

211

ASHTON-UNDER-HILL

This hill, lying uxider Bredon Hill, has not retained any of
its Upper Lias deposits. They have been completely swept
away, though the quarry we visited had been lately worked, and
- some quantity of the Marlstone of the Spinatus Zone of the
_ Middle Lias was stacked, and easy toexamine. The inclemency
of weather prevented our taking advantage of the opportunity,
and we can only observe that the brown rock of the Spinatus
2s beds contained numerous leading fossils of the upper beds of
_ the Zone, comprising good specimens of Amaltheus spinatus,
and also swarms of Ostracoda, examples of which we preserved ;
and it was with reluctance that we beat a retreat from Ashton-
~ under-Hill.

ree

> as

£4 OCT. 92
BVOL. X PART III

PROCEEDINGS

OF THE

Cotteswold Waturalists’
FIELD CLUB

For 1891—1892

President
WILLIAM C. LUCY, F.G.S.

a Vice- Presidents

_ Rev. FRED. SMITHE, M.A., LL.D., F.G.S.
q JOHN BELLOWS

a Proressor HARKER, F.LS.

Rev. H. H. WINWOOD, M.A., F.G.S.

PHonorarp Creasurer
J. H. JONES

Honorary Dccretarp
vi EDWARD WETHERED, F.GS., F.C.S., F.R.M.S.
CHELTENHAM

HE COUNCIL OF THE CLUB WISH IT TO BE DISTINCTLY UNDERSTOOD THAT THE AUTHORS
ALONE ARE RESPONSIBLE FOR THE FACTS AND OPINIONS CONTAINED
IN THEIR RESPECTIVE PAPERS.

<.-

) g Contents

g PRESIDENT’S ADDRESS at the Annual Meeting at Gloucester, 1892.

s on certain Superstitions prevalent in the Vale of Gloucester. By the late JoHN JONES.
rd Ping and its Scientific Teaching, By C, WITCHELL.

the inves of Heredity, and their Application in the case of Man, By S,S, BUCKMAN, F.G.S
otes on the Dynamic Geology of Palestine. By J. H. TAUNTON.

PUBLISHED BY JOHN BELLOWS, GLOUCESTER 5S 177037

Annual Address to the Cotteswold Naturalists’ Field Club, read at
Gloucester, April the 30th, 1892, by the President,
Mr W. C. Lucy, F.G.S.

On Thursday, April 30th, 1891, the Annual Meeting took
place at the Bell Hotel, Gloucester ; and after passing the Hon.
Treasurer’s Accounts, shewing a credit balance of £57 3s. 8d.,
the retiring Officers of the Club were re-elected.

_ The Field Meetings for the year were fixed as follows :—
Woolhope... re May 21st
Silchester... oe sa weds June 23rd
Midland and South Western

Extension Railway (Cirencester) July 28th
Newland and St. Briavels wae September 17th
A large party of the Members afterwards dined at the
Bell Hotel.

WOOLHOPE MEETING

This Meeting was held on the 22nd of May—a day after
the date fixed at the Annual Meeting.
The weather in the morning was most unfavorable, but a
small party—not deterred by the elements—left the Gloucester
Station for Hereford, where they were met by Mr H. C. Moore,
the Hon. Secretary of the Woolhope Club, and Mr G. H. Piper,
of Ledbury, who were the guides for the day.
Carriages were taken, and the first place visited was
Bartestree. In a quarry of Old Red Sandstone there, is a
considerable upthrust of Trap Rock “ Diorite,” and where it is
in contact with the Old Red beds they are altered so much by
heat, as to make them friable. The Trap Rock seems to have
escaped the observation of the Geological Survey, as it is not
marked in the map of the district.

I

214

About two miles further, Mr Moore directed attention to a
remarkable land-slip which occurred in 1844, carrying forward
three acres of ground—with forty oak trees upon it—a distance
of 200 yards.

In Perton Lane, the cutting through the Aymestry Lime-
stone beds of the Upper Ludlow was examined. In places
the beds are nodular, and when the nodules are broken open
there is generally found in the centre of each, either the fossil
Lingula Lewissi or Atrypa reticularis, which forms the nucleus
of the nodule.

Through the kindness of Lady Emily Foley, the members
were permitted to go by her private drive to St. Ethelbert’s
Camp, on the summit of Backbury Hill, where, according to
tradition, Ethelbert, King of the Hast Angles, went to “ Offa
the Terrible,” King of Mercia, at Sutton Wells, and while
there, courting Offa’s daughter, he was murdered A.D. 792.

Mr Piper pointed out that the Camp was doubly entrenched
on the North side, and was more oblong than circular in shape,
with an area of about four acres, and the highest point was
767 feet above the sea. Standing upon what is called Adam’s
Rock, Mr Piper—with the aid of some beautifully executed
diagrams—gave a very clear explanation of the Woolhope
Dome, and referred to the works of Sir Roderick Murchison
and Mr Symonds on the subject. He especially called atten-
tion to the enormous denudation which must have taken place
in removing and carrying away the central dome.

So much has been written upon Woolhope in all the best
text books, and it is so classical a spot in Silurian Geology,
that I do not think it necessary to enter into details. I would,
however, remark that the Trap Rock at Bartestree may be
found to have an important bearing in determining the time
when the beds were uplifted from the horizontal position in
which they were deposited.

Thence through some narrow lanes to Mordiford, where
Mr Piper gave the following history of the village :—

“ At the Norman invasion the Manor was held by Almit—

a free Saxon—by lease from Ethelstan, Bishop of

215

Hereford, to which See it belonged. William the
First gave it to Henry de Ferrers—a Norman Baron
of great wealth and position—who fought at Hastings,
and was one of the seven Commissioners who had
charge of the great Domesday survey in the year 1086.
His son, Robert de Ferrers, for valiant services at the
battle of Northallerton in 1138, when King Stephen
defeated David, King of Scotland, was created Earl
of Derby. In the reign of Henry the Third, Robert
de Ferrers, having displayed persistent animosity to
the King, his Castles and lands were forfeited and
given to Prince Edward. After he had been imprison-
ed three years the Prince restored the Castles and
Estates, on payment of £50,000, which sum was guar-
anteed by eleven great Barons, to whom the Karl
conveyed his Estates as a security. One of these
friends was Sir Bartholomew de Sudeley, of Sudeley
Castle, near Winchcombe, then High Sheriff of
Herefordshire; and, as money was not forthcoming
for the redemption of the Estates, they eventually
became fully vested in the Prince, and some still form
part of the Duchy of Lancaster. Sir Bartholomew
was instrumental in conveying the Manor of Mordiford
to Henry de Hereford, whose descendants, bearing the
same name, still own the Manor and Estates; and
therefore the Herefords have been in possession of the
property for more than 500 years.

“The Advowson of Mordiford Rectory was given to the
Abbey of Gloucester, and to its Priory of St. Guthlac,
by Henry de Hereford ; and on the suppression of the
religious houses was granted to John ap Rice, a
member of the Royal Household. At the close of the
17th century it was purchased by Paul Foley, Esq.,
M.P., with whose successors at Stoke Edith the
patronage has since remained.”

The Rector, the Rev. Robert Hereford, met the members

at the Church, and pointed out the place where the Dragon of
12

216

Mordiford was depicted, and which was obliterated when the
repairs were made in 1811. Mr Piper gave a full account of
the story, and those who are curious to know more should
consult an article by Judge Cooke, in Duncumb’s History of
Herefordshire. The tradition of the Dragon is still believed by
some of the Villagers. The Vicar said that quite recently two
old women in the parish, having seen a newt, came to the con-
clusion that it was a seed of the Dragon, and forthwith killed it;
and there is still in the Village a lane called Serpent’s Lane.
In the Porch of the Church is a slab recording a tremendous
storm which occurred on the 27th of May, 1811, between 7 and
9 p.m., by which the little River Pentaloe was swollen in some
places 180 feet in width, with a depth of 20 feet. It swept
away a large barn, cider mill, and a cottage adjoining, in
which were four persons, who were all drowned. Above the
village, just on the road leading to Woolhope, many hundred
tons of rock were torn up and carried through the Mordiford
village, by which several houses of the inhabitants were much
injured, and their gardens nearly destroyed.

Carriages were resumed to Hereford, where the party dined
at the Green Dragon.

SILCHESTER

On Tuesday, June 23rd, the Club made an unusually
distant excursion by visiting the old Roman City of Calleva,
which is situated a few miles from Reading. We were fortun-
ate in having the guidance of Mr George Fox, F.S.A., who
kindly went over the ground, and by his lucid explanation
enabled us to realise how important a place this must have
been during the Roman occupation of this country.

Mr Fox, in conjunction with Mr W. H. St. John Hope,
M.A., has written a valuable paper entitled “Excavations on
the Site of the Roman City of Silchester, Hants, in 1890,”
which was communicated by them to the Society of Anti-
quaries.

To do justice to Silchester, requires more knowledge
than I possess, and I shall therefore confine myself to a few

:

217

brief observations, mainly gathered from Mr Fox’s paper, and
a notice which appeared in the Times on the subject.

The situation is well chosen, being on elevated table-land,
occupying about 100 acres. When Lord Jeffrey visited it many
years ago, he wrote :—

‘Tt is the most striking thing I ever saw, and the effect of
that grand stretch of shaded wall, with its antique
roughness and over-hanging wood, lighted by a low,
autumnal sun, and the sheep and cattle feeding on the.
green solitude at its foot, made a picture not soon
to be forgotten.”

Now much of the old city, which was covered up at the
time Lord Jeffrey wrote, has been laid bare, and the plan of the
principal buildings, characteristic of a Roman town, as the
Forum, the Basilica, the lines of streets, and basements of the
houses, can be clearly followed. The Gates are most interesting
as they are the only ones of a Romano-British City which have
been thoroughly investigated, and the Gate of the West shows
a striking resemblance to the Stations of Cilwrnum (Chester’s)
and Ambloganna (Birdoswald) on the Roman wall.

The great eastern gateway, being the main exit to the
- London road, fell back in a curve from the wall abcut 9 feet,
: within the thickness of which were guard rooms, and the
_ opening measured 28 ft. 6 in., wide enough for two chariots to
pass each other abreast. Outside the walls there was a fosse,
or ditch, of about 100 ft. in width ; and therefore it must have
_ been a strong fortress. There is a Museum on the ground, in
_ which everything of interest is carefully placed, to be ultimately
_ removed to the one at Reading. An inspection of the museum
_ revealed the articles used by the Romans in their every-day life,
as Samian ware, lamps, grid-iron, or portable cooking stove,
scale-beam, axes, hammers, gouges, chisels, plough coulters,
_ blacksmith’s anvil, tongs, files, rasp, a so-called hippo-sandal,
_ carpenter’s plane, pins of bone and bronze, an iron stylus,
fragments of glass vessels, querns, bones of the horse, ox (bos
~ longifrons), sheep or goat, of the pig very abundant, and of the

218

shells in great numbers. The plane, grid-iron and lamp are of
rare occurrence in Roman remains. Perhaps the most valuable
discovery was a Roman Legionary Eagle, now in the Duke of
Wellington’s possession.

The white of the tessere, Dr Woodward thinks, was de-
rived from beds of white lias, or Great Oolite, but I believe it is
from the latter, and it is probably, as Mr Witchell suggested,
from the compact limestone of Sapperton or Bussage, which
he recognised when the Club visited Uriconium and Cranham.
as occurring at those places.

A great deal of ground is still unexcavated, but owing to
the interest taken in the work by the Proprietor, the Duke of
Wellington—who has entrusted what has to be ‘done to the
Society of Antiquaries, who, in their turn, have the loving
services of Dr Fox and Mr St. John Hope—we may rest
assured that every care will be given in the further prosecution
of the excavations.

In comparing Silchester with our Roman remains or
Woodchester, Lydney, and Chedworth, it appeared to me from
the coarser character of the tessere, that in the former
we have the remains of a large station, whose inhabitants
belonged more to the trading class; whilst the latter, from
evidence of greater luxury, were occupied by those of a higher
rank.

With regard to its older history, it was a city of the
Atrebates—a Celtic tribe of Gauls—who had dispossessed the
earlier British inhabitants, Segontii. The Chief, or King, was
Cornmius, Cesar’s friend, whose coinage is still in existence.
Caer Segont became Calleva, and Calleva, Silchester, but how it
became the latter there is much difference of opinion. The
prefix, ‘ Sil’, was ably dealt with in the notes on Silbury, given to
me by Mr Ernest Sibree, which will be found at page 117 of our
last proceedings. The writer in the Times suggests that “its
source is to be sought in Saxon rather than in Roman times,
This would make the etymology of Silchester “Sel Caestre,” of
the Camp in the woods. And whosoever has visited the place,
hemmed in on one side by the dark pine forests of Tadley, and

+h haa ee

219

on the other by the broad oaks and noble elms of Strathfield-
saye, will acknowledge the appropriateness of the name bestowed
by our Teutonic forefathers.* ”

The members drove back to Reading, and dined at the
Queen’s Hotel.

MIDLAND AND SOUTH WESTERN EXTENSION
RAILWAY (CIRENCESTER)

The third Meeting took place on July 28th, and the
Members were met at the Station at 10.25 by Professor
Harker, who was the guide for the day.

Close to the Station is the Ashcroft Estate, now being
laid out in new streets for building, by Mr E. W. Cripps.
The ground lies within the walls of the old Roman City
of Corinium, and in the excavations several streets, pieces of
tesselated pavement, and the columns of a Temple have been
found—also large quantities of Samian ware and pottery of
almost every known make, many bronze ornaments, bone pins,
counters and coins—the latter representing nearly the whole of
the Roman occupation from Claudius to Arcadius.

A brief visit was made to the excellent Museum, the
contents of which were explained by Mr C. Bowly.

From there to the Brewery where, through the kindness
of Mr Cripps, Professor Harker shewed the 8 inch cores taken
from the well-boring at Lewis Lane, to a depth of 177 feet, of
which he has given a section in the last number of our

Proceedings at page 185.
It will be remembered it was owing to this boring that the

Professor was able to shew conclusively the presence of the

Oxford Clay, underneath the town of Cirencester.

The next visit was in brakes to Chedworth, vid Baunton
and Rendcombe, passing over high ground, which enabled
Professor Harker to point out and explain the Physical aspect
of the country. Several sections were looked at on the
_ Midland and South Western Railway, some of which have been

; * John Bellows suggests the meaning as “ Boundary” Camp: as in Silures,
the “Borderery ” [in England.]

220

described in our Proceedings by Professor Harker and Mr
Buckman.

It may safely be assumed that the formation at the mouth
of the tunnel is the upper part of the Fuller’s Earth; the
rubbly beds which overlie would then be Stonesfield Slate.
Then succeeds a bed, much broken up, of a sandy nature, and
in the cutting there is a slight anti-clinal, the beds dipping on
either side away from each other, and this continues more or
less until a short distance into the long cutting. Afterwards
the Great Oolite comes in, but the question is do the beds
below belong to that formation or the Stonesfield Slate? This
leaves an interesting piece of Geology to work out.

The Members then drove to Cirencester, and dined at the
King’s Head Hotel.

NEWLAND AND ST. BRIAVELS

The fourth and last meeting was held on September 17th,
and it attracted the large number of 30 members, who travelled
by the Great Western Railway to Lydney, where a special train
was in readiness to convey them over the Severn and Wye line
to Coleford. In driving to Clearwell Meend a rude roadside
cross was examined, of the history of which little is known,
but it has suffered from some jovial Foresters having got the
shaft out of it in the hope of finding gold.

Thence to Clearwell to see the “‘ Scowles””—a name given
in the Forest to hollows and fissures, where iron ore was worked
during the Roman occupation, if not at an earlier date.

Mr W. H. Fryer, who has considerable knowledge of the
Forest, and experience in mining, gave the following explana-
tion :—

“The ore occurs in crystalline limestone, belonging to the
upper part of the mountain limestone. The beds vary
from 10 to 20 yards in thickness, and are locally called
the ‘crease’ or vein. The ore is found in chambers,
termed ‘churns.’ They are very irregular in shape
and extent, often widening into caverns, and narrowing
to very small strings or ‘leads.’ ”

nn oI

221

The ore shews from 15 to 60 per cent. of metallic iron in
the form of a hydrated peroxide. It was deposited by infiltra-
tion from above, and very often the excavation of the channel
and the deposition of the ore went on concurrently—a view in
which Mr Wethered and I concurred. To enable the ore
nearest the surface to be raised, the overlying soil is removed,
and as the deeper deposits become worked the surface subsides,
or as the Foresters say ‘scowls in ”—hence the term Scowles,
derived from a British word meaning a hollow.

Within historic times the men who worked the ore were
called the King’s miners. They seemed to have been liable to
military service in part consideration for their tenure of the
mines; and among other services they rendered they were
_ employed by Edward III. at the siege and taking of Berwick.
Mr Fryer suggested that they may have been the originals of
_ our sappers and miners. Even now miners, born within the
" hundred of St. Briavels, may qualify themselves to be registered
_ as free miners by working a year and a day in the mines, which
entitles them to a free grant of mineral ground from the
Crown.

The early history of the working is involved in obscurity,
but it probably dates as far back as the Celts.

Thence to St. Briavels Castle, the residence of Mr Hinton,
by whose kind permission it was inspected. The Rev. W.
Tapnell Allen here became our guide. He said there is no
romantic incident attached to the Castle, and historically its
_ chief interest is rather connected with the people who have held
it. There are no records to shew when it was erected, but the
date is generally fixed at 1131; and Walter Fitz Milo, of
Gloucester, is believed to have been the builder, and it was
designed to check the inroads of the Welsh. In later years the
Constable of the Castle was also Warden of the Forest of
Dean, and amongst many eminent men who have held the
: office were the Duke of Bedford, Regent of France, whose
widow became the wife of Sir Richard Woodville, and the
mother of the Queen of Edward IV., and Warwick, the King
maker. In a room formerly used as a prison, and on the splay

222

of the windows rude inscriptions have been cut or scratched by
prisoners, and the following is one :—
“My glas is roon, tis time twas gone,

“ For I have lived a gret space,
“ And I am weary of the place.”

The prison is mentioned by Howard, in his work on The
Lazarettos of Europe.

He relates that a man had been imprisoned here a year
for a debt of only 3/-, which had been heavily increased by
costs. At the beginning of the present century the Court and
Jury Rooms were used for the parochial school.

On the way to Newland a circular Camp leading to
Bigsweir was inspected. It is described by Mr G. F. Playne in
Vol. 6, page 236, of our Proceedings, as follows :—

“The position is well suited for defence, the headland
having a steep back round it, but the plateau is under
cultivation, and there are no traces of entrenchments
left.”

It was from the summit of this hill that Wordsworth com-
posed his beautiful poem, “On revisiting the Banks of the
Wye a few miles above Tintern Abbey in 1798,” and as the
first few lines describe so accurately the appearance of the
country, I am sure you will pardon my giving them :—

“Five years have passed ; five summers with the length
Of five long winters! and again I hear
These waters, rolling from their mountain springs
With a sweet inland murmur. Once again
Do I behold these steep and lofty cliffs,
Which on a wild secluded scene impress
Thoughts of more deep seclusion ; and connect
The landscape with the quiet of the sky.
The day is come when [ again repose
Here, under this dark sycamore, and view
These plots of cottage ground, these orchard-tufts,
Which, at this season, with their unripe fruits,
Are clad in one green hue, and lose themselves
Among the woods and copses, nor disturb
The wild green landscape. Once again I see
These hedge-rows, hardly hedge-rows, little lines

223

Of sportive wood run wild ; these pastoral farms
Green to the very door ; and wreaths of smoke
Sent up, in silence, from among the trees !

With some uncertain notice, as might seem,

Of vagrant dwellers in the houseless woods,

Or of some Hermit’s cave, where by his fire

The Hermit sits alone.”

At Newland the celebrated Oak was the first object of
interest visited. The girth at its base is 46 feet in circumfer-
ence, and at six feet from the ground it is 43 feet.

Thence to Newland Church, where the Rev. W. H.
Bagnall-Oakley, Lecturer of Jones’s Almhouses, read a paper
giving its history. He said :—

“Tt is a noble edifice, consisting of nave, chancel, two nave
aisles (or chanting chapels), a chanting chapel on the
south aisle, a porch and tower. There is no Norman
work which is easily accounted for, as the parish was
not formed until the reign of Edward I., when
Newland was a dense forest. The styles of architecture
are Decorated and Perpendicular, and, with the
exception of a few trifling additions, the Church now
stands as it left the hands of its builders, about the
end of the fourteenth century. It is the mother
church of Coleford, Bream, and Clearwell, and these
parishes originally formed part of Newland, and were
only provided with chapels for their religious services.
King Edward I. gave the advowson of the Church
to the Bishop of Llandaff, and on the 9th of February,
1304-5, he granted him license to appropriate it to
himself and his successors for ever.

“The great tithes remained in the See of Llandaff until

- 1856, when an exchange took place whereby St.
Wooler, Newport was transferred from Gloucester to
Llandaff, and Newland to Gloucester Diocese, and the
Bishop of Gloucester has now the patronage of the
living.

“The font is of great interest, being a good specimen of
very unusual date—1661. When the Gloucester and

224

Bristol Archelogical Association visited this Church in
1881, Mr Middleton drew their attention to an aumbry
existing at the west end of the north aisle, which
probably shewed the original position of the font.
The use of the aumbry was to hold the salt and oil
used at baptism.

“Tn the churchyard, on the north-east side, lies the
effigy of Jenkin Wyrall, a Forester-of-fee of the 15th
century, which—with the exception of one at Pershore
Abbey—is the only effigy in hunting costume in the
Kingdom. He wears a peculiar loose cap, folded in
plaits, and tied together towards the top. A small
portion of an inner garment appears under a loose
frock or jupon with full sleeves, and a short skirt
which was put on over the head—it is slit at the sides—
as there is no opening down the breast. He has trunk-
hose fitting closely to the legs, and low boots which
are only open at the ankles on the outside. The horn
is of the usual shape, but small, and the hanger or
hunting sword, which is slung by a double strap, has
what appears to be a small scabbard or knife attached
to the “larger.” Jenkins’ feet rest on a brache or
hunting dog. The inscription on his tomb is :—

‘Here lythe Jenk (in) Wyrall Forester of Fee, ye which
dysesed on the VIII day Synt Lauroc, the year of our
Lord MCCCCVII. on His Soule God Have Mercy.
Amen.’

‘“<Tt is remarkable the inscription should be in English at
this date.

“On the south-west side of the churchyard cross stands a
monument of a cross-bowman. The figure is nearly
life size, incised on a slab in a dress of Jacobean type.
As a bow-bearer it was his duty to attend His
Majesty with a bow and arrow, and six men clothed in
green whenever His Majesty should be pleased to hunt
within the forest, and it is interesting to note that at
the present time the body-guard of Her Majesty in
Scotland consists of archers of the guard.”

225

Mr and Mrs Bagnall-Oakley entertained the members to a

sumptuous afternoon tea, and shewed them their fine collection

of coins found in the neighbourhood, and their beautiful
_ garden most picturesquely situated.

CELTS

Only one has been brought under my notice, which was
_ shewn to me by Professor Harker. It is a fine beautifully
_ worked Javelin or Spearhead, and was found in a field near the
bacon factory at Chesterton, just outside the town of Cirencester
onrising ground. It measured 23 inches in length.

EVENING MEETINGS

Were well attended, and we are indebted to the following
members for excellent papers on the subjects upon which they
. treated.

4 On December Ist the Hon. Secretary gave the first: “A
_ Microscopie Study of the Carboniferous Rocks,” which was
illustrated by Lantern Micro-Photos shown by Mr Embrey.
The second, on January 12th, was by Mr C. Witchell:
“Bird Song and its Scientific Teaching.”

On February 23rd, Mr S. S. Buckman’s paper: “The
Laws of Heredity, and their application in the case of Man.”
At the concluding meeting of March 22nd, the Rev. Dr
Smithe gave an “ Account of the Bucklandi Beds of the Lower
Lias at ee Hill, their position Se to the over-

eposits,” and which was followed by Mr J. H. Tana, “Notes
on the Dynamic Geology of Palestine.”

‘These papers, with the exception of part of Mr Buckman’s
and a condensed account of Mr Taunton’s, are published in
the Proceedings, and I think it more courteous to the Authors
1 io refer you to them than to offer any abstracts of my own.
In conclusion, I wish to call your attention to a paper in
tl e proceedings by the late Mr John Jones, which was read at
the Tewkesbury Meeting, on the 9th May, 1854, being “ Notes
on certain Superstitions prevalent in the Vale of Gloucester.”

226

From some unexplained reason the paper was published
separately, and I feel sure you will be glad that, through the
kindness of Mr Ernest Hartland, of Barnwood, from whom I
obtained a copy, it now forms part of our Transactions.

In the address last year I mentioned at page 121 that
Mr Bellows’ paper on ‘‘The Roman Villas of Gloucestershire ”
would be found in the proceedings.

The author, with that modesty which forms so pleasing a
part of his character, thought it was too fragmentary to be
published, but I have prevailed upon him to allow me in some
measure to supply the omission by including the following
epitome in this address :—

He began by pointing out that rightly to understand the
Roman Villas in Gloucestershire we should divide them into
three classes. Firstly, the Government farms for the supply of
horses to the posting stations, and the official residences of
officers in charge of signal stations. Secondly, the stations
along the roads for the government service of posting, and
similar, but less important buildings for the use of private per-
sons travelling. Thirdly, farms that belonged to private owners.

The great building at Woodchester must be classed apart
from either of them, its proportions making it evident that
it must have been the palace of some man of high rank; such
as, perhaps, the governor of the province, or the comes stabult.

In support of the idea that some of these Villas, like
Witcomb or Chedworth for example, were government farms,
a rescript of Valentinian was instanced, which ordains the
establishment of such farms at convenient spots not far from
the road stations; the latter being placed at distances of every
5 or 6 miles along every main road in the Roman Empire. At
every such principal posting station not fewer than forty
horses were to be ready at call day and night; and to ensure
this number being bona fide and not a mere list on paper, very
stringent rules were made, forbidding any employment of the
government horses for private purposes: even the governor of
a province being forbidden to use them except officially.

This Valentinian rescript gives curiously minute details to
be observed at the stations to facilitate the journey of express

rea

227

messengers and officials; the provisions to be found for an
Imperial Envoy ; or in case of the Emperor’s own passage, for
himself and his suite; one item in the latter case being one
pound by weight of oil of cloves for the Emperor’s bath. A
temple was required as one of the buildings in the official
hostelry, in which on the Imperial progress seven little pigs
were to be sacrificed for the Monarch’s safe journey.
In the light of Valentinian’s rescript for establishing farms
everything becomes clear in a Villa like Witcomb, which
situated in the midst of good pasturage and beautiful scenery,
within a mile of the horsing station at Birdlip, or that for the
“Cheval de renfort” at the foot of the hill, fulfils all the
required conditions of such a farm, with its small suite of good
apartments, and numerous rooms of a lower class for slaves or
labourers. The temple at Witcomb, noticed by Lysons as if it
corresponded to a chapel in one of our private mansions, is fully
accounted for by the order just alluded to: while at Chedworth
the pigs of iron indicate smith’s work connected with building
or repair of carriages; and, probably horse-shoeing. He
touched upon this as a disputed point, but mentioned recent
discoveries of horse-shoes in Romano-British buildings, as in
Bucklersbury, London; or as described by William Ransom,
of Hitchin; by our late colleague, J. D. T. Niblett, ete.
Besides these proofs he instanced a Roman equestrian statue at
Orange, in France, where the upturned foot of the horse shows
__ the marks indicating the shoe nails. The usual argument against
_ the theory that the Romans shod their horses is that no word
_ for horse-shoe is found in Classical Latin: a weak point which
really disappears if we refer to Suetonius’ Life of Vespasian,
in which a story is told of a muleteer in the Emperor’s train

_ stopping the Imperial party in order to afford a friend of his an

opportunity of handing Vespasian a petition: the protest
_ being that one of the mules needed a smith to attend to him.
- It seems whimsical to contend that mules were shod, but not
horses: especially when we remember the speed at which the
express messengers drove along the hard paved roads; a treat-
ment that would quickly destroy the hoofs of any animal
unless they were so protected.

228

A number of details were given showing the working
of the posting system, which was brought to a high degree
of perfection. The changes were next described that must
have taken place in the military system, consequent on the
revolt of Carausius: and the evidence of coins shows that
the re-conquest of Britain by Constantine was not a complete
one; the mining district of the Forest of Dean, excepting
Lydney affording no sign of occupation, later than that of the
Carausian period.

Passing on to the withdrawal of the Roman Government
from Britain in the fifth century, J. Bellows showed how the
system they had left determined the forms of the one that
followed it; the autonomy of great towns like Gloucester
enduring through the several changes of Saxon and Norman
occupation: while in the country districts the larger Villas,
which under a settled government needed no other protection
than that of the law, would in the period of unrest only retain
their existence by fortifying themselves and becoming “ moated
granges,” of which we still have so many traces.

The part of the paper which ‘elicited the most discussion
was that in which J. Bellows inferred a very large effect on the
composition of the nationality of the English people from the
number of troops sent here and maintained here from the
Continent. In Professor Hiibner’s Rémische Heer in Britannien,
there is a summary given of some 90 different Cohorts or Alae
or other military bodies, concerning whose connection with
Britain we have epigraphic or other evidence; and John Bellows
maintained that if we take into account the Roman system of
deportation of the young men, natives of this Island, for foreign
military service, while for hundreds of years bodies of men of
nearly every nationality in Europe settled here in permanence,
we cannot but see that the parentage of the British people
must have been largely affected by the mingling of such
nationalities with the Celtic stock inhabiting the Island.

The paper was illustrated at several points by diagrams
and the use of the black board.

Notes on certain Superstitions prevalent in the Vale of Gloucester,
read to the Cotteswold Club, at the Tewkesbury Meeting, May
9th, 1854, by Joun Jonus, Gloucester.

The favor with which the papers upon Archeological
subjects were received, at the last Cirencester Meeting of the
Club, induces me to offer it one of the same character.

The rapidity with which the superstitions of our land are
beginning to disappear, and the interest they possess in an
ethnological or psychological point of view, render it desirable,
that those which can still be procured, should be preserved in
a tangible form.

The nature of the superstitions to which I would direct
_ your attention, may be most briefly exemplified by the relation
of two somewhat remarkable instances, which have fallen
under my notice within the last few years.

Calling upon a person who had just removed to a new
residence, I found him in his garden, and amongst other
alterations, ordering a bed of parsley to be immediately
- removed from the place where it then grew to another. This
~ order, it appears, had before been given more than once, and as
the person addressed still seemed to pay no attention to it, he
_ was asked the reason, and at once replied that he had no
intention of doing anything of the kind. He was quite
_ willing to root it up and destroy it entirely, but transplant it
he would not, and said, moreover, that he did not know
anyone who would willingly take upon himself the consequences
of such an act. Such effect had his remonstrances, and so
contagious is superstition of this kind, that the bed was
allowed to remain undisturbed, and I have no doubt that, if in
_ the same possession, it so remains to the present day.

We, of course, cannot ascertain, or expect to know all that
_ the ancients believed of the properties and virtues of sacred

230

plants, nor why these should have been attributed to them,
but in the case of that under consideration, we have consider-
able information derived from themselves to guide us. Parsley
was chiefly used by the Greeks in the garlands with which they
decorated tombs, and was also eaten by them at funeral
feasts; its use upon these occasions having given rise to a
saying in reference to anyone sick past hope, which has come
down to us “ deicbas Ledrwov,” “ He needs nothing but
Parsley.”

The purposes to which it was applied, prepare us to
expect, that auguries deducible from it must be of sinister and
disastrous import, and we find accordingly that Timoleon
ascending a hill near Syracuse, to obtain a view of the
Carthaginian army, having met some mules laden with
Parsley, his soldiers regarded the event as most unfortunate
and ill-boding, and declined to attack their enemies.

I am not aware of any positive authority upon the point,
but I think it probable that this herb was dedicated to
Persephone, as Queen of the Dead, presuming her to be
identical with Hecate or Selene, the resemblance of its Greek
name—Selinon—to that of the last named divinity at once
suggesting its direct derivation from her and the correctness
of this supposition is supported by other etymological consider-
ations.

On examining the appellation of this plant, in such
languages as I have at the moment an opportunity of referring
to, I find that with remarkable uniformity, its old Greek name
is preserved, with the prefix of Peter or its diminutive, thus
excepting the

Archaic Greek. Dedivov.

ITS OTHER NAMES

Latin Petroselinum

Romaic TlerpoceAsvoy

Italian Petroselino, Petrosemolo
Petrosillo

Portuguese Perrexil

tye

231

Spanish ; Perejil
Illyrian Petrussin
German Petersilie
Danish Persilie
French Persil
Welsh Perllys *
English Parsley

may be all freely translated as “Peters” Moon Plant, &c.
The connection of the name of Peter with it, is suggestive of
the policy, by which the established prejudices of the rude
people amongst whom Christianity was first introduced were
met and modified, in the transference of objects of reverential
4 regard from the tutelage of long honoured Pagan divinities to
that of Christian Saints.

As St. Peter, in his character of door keeper of Paradise,
and receiver of souls, must naturally have been regarded as the
successor of Charon, and the offering of pence is still made to
_ him in the same manner and with the same object as was that
_ of the Obolus to his gloomy prototype, it is not altogether
_ strange, that the plant under consideration, evidently consecra-
_ ted to some of the deities who presided over the death of
mankind, should have been assigned with others of their
attributes, to him.

I am imformed by Greek, Illyrian, and Dalmatian friends
that this superstition exists in their respective countries in as
great force, and as commonly as in the Vale of Gloucester.

The other instance to which I referred was the following:
Some men were employed in removing an old hedgerow,
partially formed of Elder trees. They had bound up all the
_ other wood into faggots for burning, but had set apart the
_ Elder, and enquired of their master how it was to be disposed
_ of. Upon his saying that he should, of course, burn it with
the rest, and ordering it to be faggoted, one of the men said
_ with an air of undisguised alarm, “that he never heard of such

_a thing as burning Ellan Wood ;” and, in fact, so strongly did

**“ Per” a diminutive of Peter, as in Perkin.—“ Llys,’”’ a plant, herb.

32

232

he feel upon the subject, that he refused to participate in the
act of tying it up.

The name used by the man here referred to for this wood,
is worthy of remark, as being pure Saxon; and is, I believe,
the ordinary word for it, through a considerable portion of the
Vale of Gloucester.

This fact is sufficient to indicate with precision the
ethnological source of the superstition ; and what Grimm in his
“Deutsche Mythologie” says of it is so interesting, that I
translate and give it entire, embodying, I may remark, some of
his notes in his text.

After mentioning the reverence paid to other trees in
Scandinavia and Germany, he says :—

“The Elder (Hollunder) also received distinguished honour.
Hollan, indeed, signifies a tree or shrub, as in the
Anglo-Saxon Cneovholan. Russius. Butcher’s broom.
In low Saxon the Sambucus nigra is called Ellhorn.
Arnkiel unsuspectingly relates, ‘Our forefathers also
held the Ellhorn holy, wherefore whoever need to hew
it down, (or cut its branches,) has first to make the
request: ‘Lady Hllhorn give me some of thy wood,
and I will give thee some of mine, when it grows in
the forest;” the which with partly bended knees,
bare head, and folded arms, was ordinarily done, as I
myself, have often seen and heard, in my younger
years. Thereafter are mentioned superstitions res-
pecting Elder wands, Elder trees before stables, the’
shedding of water under them, and the Elder-mother,
a Danish superstition.

“The God Puschkait, a Lithuanian Deity, dwelt under this
tree, and the Letts laid bread and beer for him near
it.

“The Saxon canons published during the reign of King
Edgar, speak of the magic practised in “‘ Hllenum and
e4c on odrum mislicum treovum (Ellan, and oak, and
various other trees.”’)

233

To say nothing of the virtues still attributed to the juice
of its berries as a wine, of its flowers as a cosmetic, and of its
pith and bud as a cure for ringworm, which are generally
known: by favour of Lord Ducie, another of its valuable
qualities, of which I was not previously informed, has come to
my knowledge. <A small piece of it cut from a young shoot
just above and below a joint, so as to leave the bud projecting
at each end of it after the fashion of a rude cross, borne
constantly about the person, is a most certain and effectual cure
for Rheumatism. I produce two pieces of the proper form,
of which, anyone is quite at liberty to take notice; but, in
order to prevent any contention for them amongst gentlemen
afflicted by that very distressing affection, I. will at once state
that, these pieces, although perfectly orthodox in cut, are not in
the slightest degree to be depended upon, as they did not grow
in a churchyard; only the trees growing in consecrated
ground, being endued with the property indicated.

As Lord Ducie’s neighbourhood is highly favoured by the
existence of such a tree, applications have been repeatedly
_ sent to the person who gave me these slips, from a considerable

distance for the like; and some of their recipients it is said,
are able and willing to give it a good character, of fourteen or
fifteen years standing,

The reason why supernatural power or influence, should
have been ascribed to any plant or tree, does not at first con-
q sideration, appear to be very near the surface; but, if we go
back to the Anti-Christian era, and examine the various forms
of religion then prevailing, the mystery will soon, to some
extent, explain itself.

The idea appears to have been once almost universally
entertained, that all nature was animated, and endowed with
sensibility, in fact, it almost forms the soil in which mythology
is rooted.

The grand old Gods of Egypt, for example, with their
Meaning attributes, and majestic titles, which for our purpose,
_ may be regarded as the archetypes of all which followed them,
: resolve themselves under the searching gaze of modern

234

criticism, into mere deified powers of nature, the active vivifying
principles, and the passive media of reproduction, which, in the
vain attempt to render comprehensible to pure intellect,
confined on every side within material boundaries, the infinite
and inscrutable, are shadowed forth to us, in the guise of male
and female forms like our own. Although the higher orders of
priests, amongst the Egyptians, probably never lost sight of
the true origin and signification of these symbolical forms,
that the system degenerated into mere idolatry with the
masses, cannot be doubted, and many inferior divinities were
introduced, but these were few indeed, when compared with
those adopted by the nations who took the lead in pore and
civilization, upon their decadence.

The extent to which the lively imagination of the Greeks
led them in this respect is so beautifully pictured in Schiller’s
poem on Die Gotter Griechenlands.*

Da der Dichtung zauberische Hiille

Sich noch lieblich um die Wahrheit wand—

Durch die Schépfung floss da Lebenfiille

Und was nie empfinden wird, empfand.
* * * ¥*

Wo jetzt nur wie unsre Weisen sagen,

Seelenlos ein Feuerball sich dreht,

Lenkte damals seinen goldnen Wagen

HELIOS in stiller Majestit.

Diese Héhen fiillten Oreaden,

Hine Dryas lebt’ in jenem Baum,

Aus den Urnen lieblicher Najaden,

Sprang der Stréme Silberschaum.

Then did Poetry its magic veil,

Gracefully o’er the True and Actual throw,
Then did all things within creations pale,

Now senseless deemed with life and feeling glow.

* * * *

Where we but now as modern sages say,
A lifeless soulless Fireball behold,
HELIOS in tranquil majesty,

His golden chariots career controlled ;

*T venture to translate these lines as literally as possible.

one yee Tila

235

By Oread’s were filled the heights of heaven,
A Dryad dwelt in every tree of earth,

And from a lovely Naiads urn,

Every silver-foaming stream had birth.

This state of things existing, it was not difficult to believe,
as Grimm remarks, that “‘to animals comprehension of human
language ; to plants sensibility ; and to all creatures, power of
manifold changes of form might be attributed, and that some
should be invested with higher qualities (werth) than others,
until they were at length elevated to an idolatrous degree
of veneration. Gods and men were changed, or changed
themselves into trees, plants, or animals; spirits and elements
took upon themselves material forms, and it was in the spirit
of the system of which they were part, not to deprive their
manifestations of their attributes, though changed in appear-
ance. Under these circumstances the adoration of plants or
animals seems nothing strange, and becomes unintelligible,
only when the higher being, vanishes from human conscious-
ness behind its assumed form, and the latter alone, remains as
its substitute.”

In proof of the universality of the idea respecting plants
and trees, which is all I at present wish to call your attention
to, I need only refer to the mysterious trees of life and know-
_ ledge, connected with the fall of man; the ash Yggdrassil
under which the Gods of the North held their court, and
which appears to be identical with those just named; the
_ sacred groves of Baal so frequently mentioned in Scripture ;
_ those of the Western nations, Celtic, Germanic, and Scandi-
_ navian; the Oaks of Dodona; the sacred lotus of Egypt,
India, Tibet, and Nepaul; the Pine Cone and sacred tree of
the Assyrian sculptures; the Verbena, or sacrificial plants of
the Romans, (one of which was peculiar to every God); the
fable of the Golden Bough; the sacred tree of the Lombards,

destroyed by St. Barbatus; and other instances of such
_ superstitions, recorded by various authors. In the 96th
Psalm, I may make the passing remark, occurs also this
curious passage, relating to my subject, after a similar invoca-
tion of the heavens, the earth, and the sea, and “all that

236

therein is.” ‘Let the field be joyful, and all that is in it;
then shall all the trees of the wood rejoice before the Lord,”
and in the 148th Psalm again occurs, “Praise the Lord upon
earth ye dragons. Fire and hail, snow and vapour, wind and
storm, fulfilling his word.”

“Mountains and all hills, fruitful trees and all cedars,
&e., &c.”

In fact, not to needlessly multiply quotations, we may
refer to portions of our own liturgy, adopted in the time of
St. Athanasius, if not long before, as for example, the “ Bene-
dicite omnia opera Dei,” otherwise known as the “‘ Song of the
Three Children,” of the morning service, or the 98th Psalm,
“Cantate Domino,” of the evening service, which contain
invocations enough to various natural objects, to join in the
praise and glorification of the Supreme Being, to satisfy the
veriest Pantheit, and it is difficult to imagine, that such an
offering of praise and thanksgiving, as the canticles named,
could have been made to the purely spiritual God of Christians,
by persons to whom the phraseology, if not the idea clothed in
it, was not familiar. As these canticles are now very seldom
used, it is not unreasonable to suppose that they have been
practically withdrawn, from an intuitive sense of their want
of harmony, with the feelings of enlightened and spiritual
worshippers.

If other members of the Club are acquainted with any
superstitions, however apparently ridiculous, of similar char-
acter to those which I have brought before them this day, by
collecting and collating them in the same manner, I imagine
that they may render good service.

To those who have paid no attention to the subject, and
have unthinkingly esteemed them to be merely fantastic in their
origin, and unworthy of notice, I take the liberty of endeavour-
ing to show that they are not so, but that they originated, in
the highest feelings of veneration which could be inculcated,
by the legitimate teachers of those religious systems, which
once prevailed, in all those countries where the Christian faith
now predominates ; systems of which the traces have been so

el

Se ee ee

» mes,

a4)

237

nearly swept away by the dispersing floods of centuries, that
the best epitome of our knowledge of them will probably be
formed from collections made in our own times, of such
imperfect and mutilated relics as those which I have presented
to your notice this day.

By such labours it can be demonstrated that, despite the
teachings of Christianity, the spread of intelligence, and the
cultivation of the intellectual powers amongst all classes, the
dread of the malign influence of discarded deities and demons
of the old world, whose names alone were probably never heard
by their present votaries, is still exhibited in adherence to im-
memorial customs by professed, and doubtless sincere Christians,
to whom it has been handed down from periods beyond the
reach of history, not by the loud voice, but by the low and secret
whisper of tradition; it can be shown that despite the great
changes and refinement which our language has undergone
during the time required for the amalgamation of the various
tribes of which the population of England is composed, in some
of its quiet vales, may still be heard from the lips of sturdy
husbandmen, the accents of the mighty sea-roving vikings,
for echoes of which, the dales of their own Scandinavian
homes have listened in vain for ages; we can even show, on
consideration of our peculiar provincial modes of speech, that
_ in the clumsy attempts at a refinement of language generally

_made by our yeomen and country folk while addressing
_ superiors, instantly abandoned for a different and well marked
_ dialect of uncouth phrases, and other grammatical forms,
amongst themselves and their dependants, we have a striking
instance of the enduring sympathy inherent in race, and an
infallible mark, wherever it may occur, of a people once

_ numerically predominant, but eventually subjugated and incor-

porated with another. I think the facts by which we arrive at
these conclusions are as interesting, and as remarkable, in
connection with the history of human kind, and human mind,
as any which are ordinarily cared for by students of nature,

and therefore do not hesitate to lay them before the “ Cottes-

wold Natural History Club.”

Bird Song, and its Scientific Value. By Cuartes A. WITCHELL.
Read January 12th. 1892.

The habits of animals are equally with their construction
worthy of investigation, for movement, especially aberrant
movement, is the forerunner of new habits, and may therefore
be termed the parent of physical development. It forecasts a
possible future, just as structure recalls a certain past. Habit
is also valuable as indicating the extent to which the multipli-
cation of certain species may affect human interests; and in
this it excels physical structure. It is better for us to learn
what are the seeds devoured by finches, rather than the number
of feathers of which their tails are composed; yet the books,
while scientifically accurate in regard to the last feature,
usually give no more than a vague generalization on the
former. Aberrations of habit, or even the usual specific signs
of anger, love, or of hunger, have not generally been recorded
by ornithologists, who, nevertheless, have pursued with fatal
activity any specimen which differed, however slightly, in
colour or in form from a common type.

We know that during comparatively recent years a change

of habitat, partial or general, has occurred in certain animals; .

e.g. the beaver in North America has become solitary; the
house-sparrow has become parasitical on the abode of man, and
in that of the martin; the house-mouse is generally dependent
upon man for food; and the meadow-vole and long-tailed
field-mouse have adopted walls for a residence.

But there is another feature in a change of habit, which is
much more important than its effect upon the distribution of
species, and this is its suggestion of a mental process akin to,
or identical with, that which we call reason. The Nuthatch
(Sitta Europea) affords an illustration. This bird is said to
crack its favourite food, a nut, after placing it in a crevice, as
in a vice, for convenience of fracture ; but I have observed this

Sad al

239

to be not its invariable habit. Less than a month ago I saw
one, a8 I had previously seen another, engaged in striking a
small spherical object, probably a nut, which was held by the
bird’s feet against the perch. The question therefore arises:
is the nuthatch’s use of a cleft for a vice an accidental
occurrence, or the result of a more or less direct mental
process ?

The object of investigating fauna is not, surely, the mere
recording of occurrences, or destruction of individuals, or an
elucidation of the physical history of creation; it must also
embrace the character of the relationship between man and the.
so-called lower animals. I am aware that this is a subject of
which there is no record in the Proceedings of the Club; but
an aberration of habit in some Garganey Teals which lived at
Elmore, was made the subject of a paper by the late President,
Sir William Guise. I venture to express a hope that notwith-
standing the distinguished position which the Club occupies in
the geological world, it may be the means of inducing some of
its members to observe the habits of animals more closely
than is at present customary.

The anatomy of these creatures may reveal to us the
exact physical processes by which they move, but it is move-
ment, free from the trammels of habit, which suggests the
animal will or mind; and which indicates a possibly existent
evolution of habit and consequently of body. One of the chief

_ features of interest in fossils or other relics of animals, is the

_ evidence they afford of the habits of the creatures which they
represent ; just as the physical characteristics of existing
species derive half of their importance from their suggestion
_ of corresponding characteristic habits.

a. It can be only by observing and recording the habits of
animals that we shall ever acquire accurate knowledge of
animal psychology; and let us hope that before the approach-
ing extinction of some of our rarer animals has been
_ accomplished, observers will have recorded not only the bare
: incidents of their local distribution and nidification, but also
something of their domestic life and manners.

240

By such means only shall we discover the degrees of
mental elaboration which guide their actions, and—an infinite-
ly more valuable fact—man’s true position in regard to them.
I venture to suggest that the Club should annually devote one
or two pages of its transactions to a record of aberrant habit in
animals. There is always passing from our memories a rich
harvest of such experiences, from which none glean.

Twenty years ago, I was familiar with the habitual songs
and cries of the commoner birds, such as finches, crows, thrush
and blackbird, wren and hedge-sparrow, &c. In the year ’81
I listened, on 18 almost successive nights, to a nightingale
which sang about two miles from Stroud, and I clearly detected
in its song certain notes which were closely like those of other
wild species of my acquaintance. Before this time I had been

‘quite familiar with the imitativeness of several kinds of caged
birds, and especially that of the thrush and blackbird, both of
which I had trained.

In the spring of 1885 I was helping to nurse a sick
relation, and all day long a thrush sang in the top of an acacia
tree in the garden. I had abundant opportunities of watching
this bird, and of timing its periods of song, which, in one day,
amounted to the enormous extent of sixteen hours. The bird
watched for food from its perch; it generally flew at once to
the spot where it fed, and often began to sing when only half-
way back again. This thrush imitated freely notes of the
partridge, brown wren, linnet, greenfinch, house-sparrow, and
chicken. Guided by this experience, I listened for and readily
detected a great number of imitations, by various birds, of
cries which I knew very well; and in the autumn of 1887 I
began to record what I heard, by writing down the names of
the singers, and the notes which they reproduced. This I did
at every opportunity, from dawn to midnight, and by giving up
usual summer amusements I made such opportunities occur,
outside of office hours, almost daily. After working in this
way for eighteen months, I began, for the first time, to make
comparisons between my records; and they afforded clear
indications of local variation in bird songs. In many instances

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the variations were in accord with local variations of habitat.
I then wrote a statement of the whole matter and sent it to
Professor Harker. He was most kind, and spent several hours
going through it with me, and showing me how to arrange it
scientifically. Mr S. 8. Buckman also looked over the M.SS.
This paper appeared in the Zoologist, for July and August,
1890, and was quoted by the Globe, and the Pall Mall Gazette.
I have read very carefully the following works, and have
concentrated in a ledger the whole of the information upon my
subject which they contain.

It is impossible to become acquainted with the whole
literature of the subject: this is infinite; and the greater part
of it absolutely worthless. It often consists of nonsense,
_ which describes how some bird, say a lark, sings; how it soars
on eager, or some other kind of wings; and how it sings to its
_ loving mate; but the story never relates how, in early spring,
the lark concludes his song with long-drawn whistled notes,
which are almost exact, though prolonged, reproductions of the
call-notes of the young, and which therefore suggest that the
song is then a call to the mate; it does not say that the lark
flies during song, more often in early spring than when the
young are hatched—after which event the song is frequently
uttered from the ground; nor are we told how the lark imitates
_ more than any other bird the songs of its frequent companions,
_ the yellow bunting and common bunting, and even the bleat
of the sheep. These things are not mentioned; we are told
instead that the little bird is full of admiration for the dawn:
4 so he may be, but he also utters a chattered song when he
fights.

The works which I have studied are these: ‘“ Animal
Intelligence,” by Komanes; Bechstein’s “Natural History of
Caged Birds”; “‘The Birds of Sherwood Forest,” by Sterland ;
“Birds of Herefordshire,” by Dr Bull; “Birds of Middlesex,”
by Harting ; “A Familiar History of Birds,” Edward Stanley;
“The Expression of the Emotions,” by Darwin; Sir W.
_ Jardine’s “Birds of Great Britain and Treland” ; ‘‘Our Rarer
Birds,” by Charles Dixon; Morris’ “ History of British Birds,”

242

2nd Edition ; “‘Our Summer Migrants,” by Harting; Yarrell’s
“ British Birds,” 1st and 4th Editions ; Adam White’s “Popular
History of Birds,” “ Domestic Habits of Birds,”’ by the Society
for Diffusion of Useful Knowledge; White’s “Selborne” ;
Knapp’s “Journal of a Naturalist”; Layard’s “Birds of
South Africa”; Wilson and Bonaparte’s “ American Ornithol-
ogy ” ; Gould’s *‘ Handbook of the Birds of Australia”; Bree’s
“ Bird’s of Europe, not found in Britain” ; Wood’s “Illustrated
Natural History,” Vol. II. (Birds); several other ornithological
works which contained nothing worth noticing; the Zoologist
from 1862 to 1874. The Field for the last ten years; and some
other and less important publications.

Few people have been at the trouble to attempt any
scientific investigation of bird-song; and nearly all of those
persons have erred in generalizing from observation of a few
individuals. Let me give three illustrations of this defect.
The first relates to the distinctive cry of the Marsh Titmouse,
(Parus Ater). Sterland, in his “Birds of Sherwood Forest,”
p- 86, says “their cry resembles the words ‘chika, chika,
chika,’ repeated 4 or 5 times in succession, and ending with a
shorter syllable, ‘chike.’”’ Dr Bull, in the “ Birds of Hereford-
shire, p. 31, quotes Mr Johns as saying: “the double note of
the Marsh Tit may be compared to the syllable ‘if he, if he,’
rapidly uttered and repeated in the imitation of a sob.”
Dixon, in “Our Rarer Birds,” p. 68, alludes to its “ peculiar
ery of ‘tay, tay, tay,’ a note unlike that of any other bird.”
Yarrell, in his first Edition, Vol. I, p. 347, has “the call-note
of this species is a single sharp chirp, like that of the other
tits, and this bird is only to be distinguished from them by its
voice when it puts forth a rapid succession of notes, more
remarkable for chattering gaiety than for quality of tone.”

Bechstein says that during the pairing season its call is
“diar, diar, hitzi, ailtz, ailtz,” “Nat. H. C. Birds,” 280.
White, of Selborne, remarked that about February, “it
begins to make two sharp notes which some people compare
to the whetting of a saw.” Hach of these descriptions differs
somewhat from the others, and conveys to me but slight

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suggestion of the note by which I recognize the Marsh Tit in
this district, and which is either a cry like “‘ cheeuu-ha-ha-ha,”
(Example 1, Post,) or a full, rapid upwardly swerved whistle,
(Ex. 2) oceupying about the interval of a major fifth. Thus
far the call-note of the Marsh Tit. What do writers say
of the Chaffinch ?

The Rev. J. G. Wood, in his “‘ Illustrated Natural History,”
Vol. II. p. 465, observes: “the call-note is very musical and
ringing, somewhat resembling the word ‘pinck,’ which has
therefore been applied to the bird as its provincial name.”

Yarrell, (Ist Edition, 1, 462) mentions that “the common

name of ‘Pink’ by which this bird is known provincially, has
reference to the sound of its call-note.”
F My observations on this bird invariably tend to show that
_ the ery “pink, pink,” is not the call-note. There are, appar-
- ently, three call-notes. The most important of these is a quiet
ery, closely resembling the common ery “ chirri,” of the male
_ house-sparrow. This cry is used as a call between the sexes
at pairing-time. It is the call for food,-&c., by the fledged
_ young to their parents. Another call-note of the chaffinches
is, in spring, often used during flight, the great occasion on
_ which calls are employed by birds ; and it is not addressed only
_ tothe mate. It may be pronounced “twit,” or whistled in a
_ rapid, upward swerve in the interval of a major sixth. (Ex. 3,
b post).
4 The other cry is used generally in autumn, and descends
briefly in the interval of a 2nd (Ex. 4).

The cry “pink” is sometimes, at any rate, a battle-cry ;
twice I have heard it used in winter by chaffinches when
fighting ; it is a note of alarm employed when chaftinches are
disturbed, and in the winter it is employed more particularly
during the first few bright hours. Mr Herbert Playne
informs me that it is employed as a menace to the owl, and as
an expression of alarm by chaffinches disturbed on the
nest.

The author of “Domestic Habits of Birds,” (p. 248)
records that some chaffinches cried “pink, pink” at a

244.

pine-marten which they had discovered in some bushes. An
adult female chaffinch, saved by me from starvation, uttered the
same cry when I approached her cage. The bird was then
much alarmed. Mr H. C. Playne informs me that the same
ery is uttered when the bird is driven from its nest.

Bechstein, (p. 2) alludes to “two or three species of
shrike, which, from their surprising memory can imitate the
songs of other birds, so as to be mistaken for them.” Yarrell,
(1 Ed. 1 p. 151) repeats what may be termed the story that the
butcher bird imitates the notes of other birds for the purpose
of attracting the species upon which it preys. In contradiction
to these remarks, J. R. in “ Domestic Habits of Birds,” p. 325,
states, “‘we have now ascertained that the flusher (red-backed
shrike) utters no call that has the most distant resemblance to
that of any other bird.” I have heard it utter notes closely
like some of those of the brown linnet and house-sparrow. It
then appeared to be singing.

Lastly, the Rev. F. O. Morris, in his “ British Birds,”
(2nd Ed., Vol. III. p. 23) says of the starling: “Even in the
wild state they have been known to endeavour to imitate the
notes and cries of different birds and animals.” He does not
say that he has observed this endeavour, hence we may conclude
that either he had listened to no starlings, or was by no means
familiar with the notes of common birds, which are always
imitated by the wild starling.

These inaccurate statements are quoted from standard
works: they suggest very plainly that bird song, as I said, has
received but slight recognition as a study by ornithologists, who
have in this matter generalized from limited observations.

It may be urged against the discussion of variations in
bird-voice, that the human ear is not capable of detecting all
the inflections which may actually occur; but against this
plausible statement may be adduced the fact that sometimes
the birds themselves are deceived, or at least attracted, by the
imitations of their cries, which bird-catchers employ. It may,
however, be replied that the birds do not necessarily mistake
the imitation for the voice of their race, but for that of some
bird which is secure and without fear; hence, in desirable

245

circumstances. The fact of birds of different species being

mutually aided, as they are, by their various alarms, when
_ danger approaches, is evidence of their being influenced by the

utterances of their unrelated companions. If influenced by

alarms, why not by songs ?

There is one fact which speaks volumes in favour of

_ diversity and meaning of tones in the voices of birds, and this

is the wonderful amount of vocal exercise, or possibly of vocal
_ expression, which exists amongst gregarious species. House-
sparrows, titmice, linnets, and starlings in flocks chatter for
hours every day, and it is utterly nonsensical to suppose that,
while every habit of body serves some purpose in the lives of
individuals, this abundant interchange of sounds between birds
is a meaningless consequence of an instinctive impulse.
Though we shall never be able to translate all the
- inflections in the voices of birds, yet there are certain widely
distinct recognisable character-sounds about which we may be
tolerably certain, and upon these principally have my observa-
tions been founded. For example, the common domestic fowl,

when extremely terrified, utters a loud, repeated yell, “cah,
eah, cah.” We may fairly say that this cry is a character-
sound which, when uttered by any fowl excited by extreme
fear of death in the hands of man, has always practically the
same intonation. Yet even this cry is modulated in an infinite
variety of degrees of vehemence. The young chicken utters it
_ when looking closely at a bee, or a wasp; the adult hen, when
_pecked by another, expresses alarm or distress by the ejacula-
tion of this cry, but with a degree of force directly propor-
tionate to the extent of suffering endured; and the adult
barn-door cock employs the same yell to signal the approach of
a flying bird of which he is afraid. Thus there is every grade
_of this cry, from a chirp to a loud yell; yet in every individual
the yell sounds much the same, and conveys to our minds the
idea that the bird which utters it is greatly afraid.
In my papers in the Zoologist I stated that the voice might

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towards the preservation of the individuals by which it was
employed. If an outcry increased the chance of victory in
combat, the inclination and ability to exclaim would become
permanent, and cries would be habitually uttered in the tones
most easily produced, or most effectual in its result.

My suggestion that voice was produced by contortion was
founded on my own observations on the three common newts
and the snake. The newts are always silent unless writhing
in the grasp of some enemy, upon which occasion a distinct
croaking sound is emitted. Air is retained in their lungs, as in
those of snakes, by the contraction of the glottis: hence, in
both animals, the escape of air from the lungs is attended with
some frictional vibration at this point.

In Vol. 1 of “The Naturalists’ World,” pp. 160 and 180,
will be found letters from four persons who had heard newts
squeak when held with the fingers. Under other conditions the
newt is silent. Further, on two occasions I have heard an
immature frog, which could not croak, scream when seized by
a snake; and here we have another instance of vocal sound
being first produced during what may be termed combat.

Darwin says (“ Expression of Emotions,” p. 83), “‘ When
the sensorium is strongly excited, the muscles of the body are
generally thrown into violent action; and as a consequence,
loud sounds are uttered, however silent the animal may
generally be, and although the sound may be of no use.
Hares and rabbits, for instance, never, I believe, use their
vocal organs except in the extremity of suffering; as when a
wounded hare is killed by a sportsman, or when a young rabbit
is caught by a stoat. Cattle and horses suffer great pain in
silence, but when this is excessive, and especially when
associated with terror, they utter fearful sounds, (Page 84).
Involuntary and purposeless contractions of the muscles of
the chest and glottis, excited in the above manner, may have
first given rise to the emission of vocal sounds.”

It may be remarked generally that animals do not, when
enduring internal pain, utter vocal sounds, unless such may
possibly be of use; they are silent when poisoned: hence we

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may infer that the utterance of sound was first occasioned by
combat, in which it is, at the present time, most widely
employed; and that it was used, if not as a defiance, at least
as a plea for mercy—like the cry of a fowl or that of a dog
defeated in fight. We may be certain that the perception of
a threatened attack was only a mental anticipation of the
combat which experience—personally acquired, or inherited—
suggested to be a probable consequence of the approach of an
enemy: thus a combat-cry might well be uttered before the
fight was commenced, and it would then be a danger-cry, or
alarm-note. The influence of mutual aid amongst gregarious
species would have tended to a variation of the danger-cry,
which would have been constantly employed for the protection
of the community; and would thus have been varied in degrees
of force co-extensive with the danger which called it forth.

The call-notes, which I consider to have arisen partly from
the retention of distress-cries uttered as calls for food by the
young, would in the past have been, as they now are, similarly
varied, especially for the purpose of expressing desire for the
companionship of another bird.

It is probable that the emotions have played an important
part in the development of bird-voices. In solitary birds, fear,
unless acute, always produces silence; and it may account for
the lack of song amongst the larger kinds of birds, which are
always so conspicuous that they are compelled to be vigilant.
_ Love obviously has brought about the abundant use of call-
notes; these, in the breeding-season, are uttered with great
frequency by the males, sometimes continuously, and so as to
constitute a phrase or song. They constitute the entire songs
of some species. Call-notes are also uttered in the songs of
_ several other birds.

The influence of hate or anger is seen in the defiant cries
of many rasorial birds. Many birds of this order are poly-
_ gamous, and among such the selection of mates is greatly
_ dependent upon combat. But vocal defiances are not confined
_ to birds of this order: the songs of the robin, thrush, hedge-
_ sparrow, and wren, at least, are occasionally of this character.

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Gregarity has a great effect on the frequency with which com-
mon cries are uttered by birds, as the manners of our starlings,
sparrows, finches, and hirundines clearly prove; but this may be
counterbalanced by fear, as it is in the columbide, which
survive by the agency of their timidity and great fecundity.
Isolation has an equally apparent effect in limiting the cries of
birds. The lonely bird may sing, but he never is garrulous.
These facts greatly support a hypothesis that the voice, and
especially in the production of call-notes, is generally employed
as a means of inter-communication between birds.

The influence of population and its relation to difficulty of
obtaining food, is indicated even in the notes of birds; for
these creatures, when not periodically destroyed by cold, as
they are in temperate climates, are kept in check by enemies,
or by lack of food; in either case they lose that abundant
leisure or opportunity to sing, which is necessary to the
development of all songs.

The development of the eye in the search for food may,
when not counterinfluenced by size, have disposed certain
species towards the preferment of brilliancy of colouring rather
than excellence of voice in their mates; and conversely, bifds
dwelling in the obscurity of thick foliage would detect by ear
rather than by eye the approach of their enemies; and they
might thus acquire a delicacy of hearing which would be
gratified by sweet songs.

Darwin perceived that the language of some birds is
artificial, in relation to certain enemies.

The Hon. Daines Barrington educated or rather reared
young linnets under various birds, for the purpose of discover-
ing whether their songs were hereditary, or were acquired by
imitiation ; he found that they were perpetuated through the
latter agency. He mentioned many instances which, as he
says, “seem to prove, very decisively that birds have not any
minute ideas of the notes which are supposed to be peculiar
to each species”’; and that the notes descend from parent to
fledgling, because of “the nestlings attending only to the
instruction of the parent bird, while it disregards the notes of

249

all others which may perhaps be singing around him.”
Barrington found that a young house-sparrow, taken when
fledged, and placed with a linnet, but where it could also hear
a goldfinch, uttered a mixture of the linnet’s and goldfinch’s
songs. His other experiments showed “it to be very uncertain
what notes the nestling will most attend to, and often their
song is a mixture, as in the instance I have before stated of
the house-sparrow.” There is not any doubt that each of his
trained birds, if brought up by parents, would have had only
their proper notes. :

These experiments, and the fact that the young of certain
wild birds, (e.g. the nightingale) acquire the idea of their
songs while yet unfledged, proves that the receptivity of such
fledglings must be very great: may it not be related to things
as well as to sounds, and account for the perpetuation of modes
of nidification ?

Both call-notes and alarm-cries have sometimes diverged
from common types. Particular sounds are sometimes em-
ployed to suggest the approach of a certain kind of enemy.
Darwin observed that when the mother turkey sees a kite
approaching, high in air, “she shows her fears by her gesture
and deportment; she uses a certain exclamation, ‘ koe-ut,
koe-ut,’ and the young ones afterwards know that the presence
of their adversary is denounced, and hide themselves as before.”
(Syst. Nat.; D. H. B., 250).

4 The common cock announces the arrival of a bird
of prey overhead by uttering his loud yell of distress,
and not by the cackle employed to tell that a dog or cat
approaches. I have observed that in Gloucestershire the house-
_ Sparrow announces the similar discovery of a hawk by uttering
a cry “tourrr,” which is distinct from every other of its notes.
When I hear starlings utter a particular cackle, which I know,
Iam sure, from experience, that they see a hawk. This cry is
- quiet distinct from their ordinary call, but often is uttered by
them when fighting. However, it is probable that the sug-
_ gested relation of alarm-cries to particular enemies is due to
_vehemence, and that a cry may, by reason of its violence or

250

intensity of meaning, suggest the approach of some much-
dreaded enemy, not necessarily of any particular kind.

Now, having regard to fact that the young of certain
musical and also of certain unmusical species learned their
notes, not by any influence of heredity, but purely by imita-
tion; and to the importance of alarms, and of call-notes,
which I have elsewhere shown to be the foundation of many
songs. Is not the prevalence of a peculiar cry among the birds
of species physically allied but living apart, perhaps in different
hemispheres—valuable evidence that these allied species des-
cended from a common ancestor? It may be asked: do such
widely diffused cries exist? Here are instances of their
occurrence: The American Ferruginous Thrush (Turdus rufus)
utters notes which Wilson says “have considerable resemblance
to the notes of the song thrush of Britain.” Am. Ornith.,
Vol. I, 234.

The Cape robin, or Cape chat thrush (Cossypha Cafra)
sings like our robin, and has similar manners in hopping and
flirting its tail. Layard, “ Birds of S. Af.,” 224.

The southern grey-headed sparrow, closely like our
common bird, has a note which resembles the “ chissick” of
the English sparrow. Layard, id. 480.

The European rock sparrow (Passer petroina) has a tone of
voice similar to passer domesticus. Bree’s “ Birds of Europe,
not found in Britain,” Vol. 3, p. 128.

The shore-lark of America, when in flocks in autumn,
“at this time,’ Wilson says, “they have a singular cry,
almost exactly like the skylarks of Britain.” Am. O. 1,
p- 85.

The Abyssinian larks are said by Bruce to sing like those
of Europe. “Dom. Hab., Bds.,” p. 300.

The South African black and white cuckoo, (Coccystes
jacobinus) “has a true cuckoo’s note.” Layard, id. 164.

The pigeons of Europe, America, and Australia are
equally persistent in cooing, and equally limited to that tone.
Vide Works of Yarrell, Bree, Wilson, and Gould.

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251

The Australian swamp-quail, Synoicus Australis, of Gould, is
said to be a nearer ally than the quail to the common partridge,
which it resembles in many points of its economy. He says:
“Tts call is very similar to that of the common partridge.”
“ Handbook of Birds of Australia,” IT., p. 193.

The American snipe (Sc. gallinaga) has the same flight as
that of Europe, the same bleating note and occasional rapid
descent. Wilson 2, 223.

These are one or two instances picked from some hundreds
recorded by the writers above mentioned.

My personal observations convince me that the cries of
allied young are more closely alike than those of adult birds ;
that the voice is generally, but not always, employed much
_ more by the male than by the female, and that in the male it
diverges most from specific types.

A similarity existing between the cries of most birds
which are physically allied, is a matter of common observation;
_ butit is a subject which appears to have never been investigated.
In the Corvide, we hear a low croak in the Raven, a loud
_ “corrr” in the crow; a somewhat similar “caw” in the rook;
all of which are habitual sounds. The jay has also a loud
“caa,” much modified, which appears to be always an alarm;
_ the jackdaw utters a low, prolonged “cah,” as an alarm to its
fledged young: its ordinary notes are short, much varied, and
often resemble the words “jack” and “jock.” The starling
employs a loud “cah” when tending its nestling young; and
it is important that the young call to their parents in a cry
which very closely resembles the nest-cry of the young rook,
and which differs much from the ordinary call-notes employed
between adult starlings; but the adults employ “cah” as
their most vehement alarm. Macgillivray renders the note of
the hooded crow as “ craa,” (Brit. Bds. 1, 352), and he employs
“khraa” (id. 544) to represent that of the rook; we may
therefore infer that the cries are alike.

Yarrell (4, 2, 239) describes the ordinary notes of the
nutcracker as sounding like “crah, crah, crah,” or “cri, cru,
eri”; and he adds that “when alarmed, it has a harsh cry,
which by many is compared to that of the missel-thrush.” I

252

have heard a missel-thrush utter “cah,” (like a jay) when
carrying food, apparently for its young. We have thus in the
Turdide a trace of a cry, common to the Corvidee; and prob-
ably that trace might be increased by more extended observa-
tions.

The starling has a singular song-note, dissimilar to those
of its closest allies, but resembling fairly the migratory call of
the redwing, which is a typical cry of the British true thrushes.
During the breeding-season the starling always ends his
phrases with some harsh, high, squealing, but unmusical notes,
which are then almost invariably accompanied by a flapping of
the wings. He utters these sounds when his mate flies towards
him, or when he approaches her—that is, when he is disposed
to sing, and not on every occasion. These sounds are like the
call of the migrating redwing, and constitute another link,
however slight, between the species; for they are common
to every starling (S. vulgaris) which sings, although they are
rarely uttered in August or September, and only occasionally
until February.

The cry of the redwing is heard almost exactly repeated
on the same occasions by the blackbird, and it is replaced by a
much shorter note, but one similar in tone, in the song-thrush.
The blackbird, when suspicious of danger, utters at intervals a
very abrupt whistle, almost like the bark of a dog; the
redwing, upon the same occasions, utters an almost precisely
similar sound. Sometimes the blackbird, as his fear increases, —
slowly quickens the repetition of this sound, which under the
influence of vehemence betrays the common feature of a rise
in pitch ; and we then see that the whole of the blackbird’s
rattling alarm is insensibly graduated from this intermittent
sound. The alarms of the missel-thrush, fieldfare, and ring-
ouzel are all of much the same character as that of the
blackbird: that of the ring-ouzel is practically identical with
it, but is less varied in pitch.

When the blackbird’s nest has been disturbed he utters a
prolonged, very high, wailing note, which evenly descends
about a half-tone in pitch. This cry is also uttered occasion-
ally before heavy weather in autumn, or during severe frost.

253

In the same circumstances, the robin utters a note differing
from this one only in lack of force, and perhaps also in its higher
pitch. The rattling alarm of the robin is uttered on precisely
the same occasions as that of the blackbird, but is less often
uttered during flight. In both birds it is often accompanied by
a flirt of the tail. The common ecall-note of the robin is a
short, somewhat plaintive squeak, never rapidly repeated ; and
this sound is continually employed towards the young. The
common flycatcher employs towards its young a squeak so
similar that I have often been unable to identify it, when both
species with their young were in close proximity. The fly-
catcher also employs towards its young a short, sharp “ chick,”

_ closely like the “chick,” often doubled to “chick ick,” which
is used by the redstart to its young.

The last species prefixes the cry with a little whistle,
which may be written “tewy,” (Ex. 5). This whistle is an
alarm of the whitethroat; it is the alarm of the chiffchaff and
willow warbler, and is likewise the call-note of the last two;
it is uttered in the songs of the nightingale, redstart, blackcap,
_ whitethroat, and sedgewarbler.

. The nightingale sometimes elaborates his well-known long
notes from a repetition of this ery. (A representation was
_ given, and Mr John Bellows immediately confirmed the state-
_ ment, he having observed the same incident. See Ex. 6).
Rennie remarks, “ We have ourselves, in many instances,
observed what might be not inappropriately called a different
dialect among the same species of song birds in different
counties, and even in places a few miles distant from each
other. This difference is more readily remarked in the
-ehaffinch, dunnock, and yellow hammer, than in the more
melodious species.” (Edin. Mag., Jan., 1819).

I have observed local differences in the songs of the
starlings, chaffinches, and dunnocks or accentors.
Numerous authors record occasional variations in the notes
of birds ; these are a few species mentioned: the nightingale,
by Barrington and Bechstein, N. H. Bds., 214 and 219; Robin,
by C. F. Archibald, of Rusland Hall, Ulverston, letter to me;

254

Willow Wren, Bds. Middlesex, 52; Chiffchaff, 53; Redstart,
White of Selborne, 55; Blackcap, Bds. Middlesex, 49; Bottle-
tit, Wood II., 306; Marsh Tit, Dixon, Rarer Bds., 68;
Hooded Crow, 1 Yar., 2, 85; Rarer Bds., 120; Fish Crow,
Wilson, Am. O., 2, 119; Chaffinch, Bechst. N. H. B., 185;
Cuckoo, B. Middlesex, 119.

I am enabled to bring before the Club a notable instance
not only of imitative variation in a bird’s song, but also of the
falsity of an important authoritative statement.

In the “ Domestic Habits of Birds,” p. 319, may be found
this remark upon the supposed imitativeness of the sedge-
warbler: ‘and among some hundreds of these birds which we
have listened to in the most varied situations in the three
kingdoms, all seemed to have very nearly the same notes,
repeated in the same order ; a fact which appears to us to be
fatal to the inference of the notes being derived, not from one,
but a number of other birds. For if this were so, it is not
possible that these imitated notes should all follow in exactly
or very nearly the same order in the song of each individual
imitator in distant parts of the country. The close similarity
of the notes thus alleged to be imitated cannot be denied; but
taking all circumstances into account, we think it much more
probable that these remarkable notes are original to the song
of the sedgebird, and that we might, with equal justice, acuse
the swallow and the skylark of borrowing from it.”

This careful statement is sufficiently rebutted by a letter
received by me from Mr O. V. Aplin, M.B.O.U., and author of
“The Birds of Oxon”; he says: “In May, 1889, I listened to
the most accomplished sedgewarbler I ever came across. It
began several times with the ‘tut-tut-tut’ of the blackbird,
and produced the following: green woodpecker, call—starling—
blackbird, alarm and call-notes—corn bunting, (H. miliaria)
song, exact (N.B.—This bird is fairly common there)—lark,
song,—chaffinch, song and ‘pink’—greenfinch, double and
single,—sparrow, call,—swallow, song,—redstart, alarm-note,—
partridge, call,—nightingale, full bubbling notes.”

Mr Aplin continues: “Over and over again I listened to
these notes produced with the utmost fidelity. It was almost

255

impossible at first to believe that the birds themselves were not
there. It is almost needless to say I made quite certain
that it was the sedgewarbler which produced them all. The
odd thing about it was that we have no nightingales in this
parish, (Bloxham) but it might have heard them in a pre-
vious year elsewhere. The other birds imitated are all
common. The sedgewarbler does carry notes from year to
year, because I heard one once giving the notes of Ray’s wag-
tail very accurately, immediately on the arrival of the
former in spring. I noticed this because, although the sedge-
warbler always imitates a good many birds, I never before
heard it produce this particular note.”

In a subsequent letter he adds that he must have heard
thousands of these birds.

My records of the sedgewarbler’s song are somewhat
- similar to those made by Mr Aplin.

I have observed many instances of variation; not only in

musical species. A male house-sparrow living near my bedroom
took up with a note like the “twit” of the chaffinch, but very
loud ; it appeared to be a kind of shout; and the bird continued
_ to utter it during about two weeks. He seemed to be very
_ pleased with the performance ; while chirping he looked about
with an air of consequence. I have twice heard a chaffinch,
_ once at Stroud, and once at Dursley, utter many times in slow
_ succession a cry so closely like the common call, “chissick,” of
_ the pied wagtail, that I was for a short while completely
_ deceived. At Chalford, on May 31st, 1890, I heard a chaffinch
interrupt its song with a phrase exactly like the full song of a
-greenfinch, which then repeatedly sang near it.
; Mr A. H. Macpherson has heard great tits in Scotland
_ utter the “ pink, pink” ery of the chaffinch; in Gloucestershire
they have the same cry, and I have heard it uttered by five
of them which were fighting together.

Birds vary their songs, not only towards imitating the
notes of others, but also in intervals of pitch, constructing as
_ it were, a kind of music, which is, I believe, often derived by
imitation from musical notes heard in the gurgling of streams,
or sometimes from human music. A friend who is much

256

interested in birds informed me that a parrot in his possession
learned to whistle the four notes of the common chord, (Ex. 7);
and that a wild starling which lived upon the same premises
reproduced the notes, being heard by several people to utter
them in the same time and with the same accent as the
parrot.

Mr Arthur H. Macpherson informs me of a starling which
sang near the Quadrangle at Oxford, and which not only
imitated the sound of the chapel bell, but also swayed its body
from side to side in imitation of the movements of the
bell.

In 1888 a pair of blackbirds reared their brood in a nest
within a few feet of my dining-room window; and the young
must have heard for an hour or two every day the notes of a
piano, and sometimes those of other instruments which were
played there.

In 1889, in the garden, a blackbird born in 1888, sang
hardly more than one phrase, which he would repeat for
minutes together without variation. (Ex. 8).

Mr F. A. Chambers, of the Thrupp House, Stroud, when
staying with a friend, was told that in the garden a blackbird
sang the first two bars of “‘Two lovely black eyes,” a song
which was frightfully popular a few years ago. Mr Chambers
saw and heard the bird sing them so incessantly as to be un-
pleasant. (Ex. 9).

The occurrence of such instances as these is very frequent,
and the recital of them might be much extended; I trust,
however, that I have said enough to show that bird song is a
subject which hitherto has been undeservedly neglected, and to
suggest the value of vocal utterance in birds, as bearing on the
theory of a common origin of species, and an equally wide
subject, mind in animals.

The following examples are referred to in the preceding
paper. They are intended to represent intervals rather than
actual pitch, which, in the cries to which they relate, is always
an octave higher (sometimes much more) than the notes here
given. They should be whistled with the mouth.

257

Since this paper was read, a work on bird song (by Simeon
Pease Cheney: Boston) has appeared. This treats elaborately
_ of the musical intervals sung by American birds ; but it accords
only the most scanty references to imitation ; and resemblances
between the voices of allied species are even more neglected.

Some Laws of Inheritance; and their application to Man, by
8. 8. Buckman, F.G.S. Read February 23rd, 1892.

PREFACE.

The substance of a considerable portion of the first
part of this Paper was written early in the year 1891;* and
the Paper itself was read before the Cotteswold Field Club,
on February 23rd, 1892. In the subsequent discussion, objec-
tion was taken by Professor Harker that I had not considered
the views of Weismann; and I have accordingly added at the
end a short argument concerning his theories. Some other
additions, the result of fresh observations, or to make the
arguments clearer, have been incorporated in the Paper since
it was read before the Field Club. All such additions have
been enclosed in square brackets; and these brackets will shew
that, in works studied since the paper was read, I have found
confirmation of several of my surmises.

In the main, the laws of Heredity set forth are based on a
study of the morphological phenomena of Ammonites; but —
they have had to be extended, in many cases, to meet the
necessities of a wider field.

The laws of ‘earlier inheritance and its limitations”
have from time to time been stated in a condensed form in my
Monograph: here they are all fully considered together.

*See Monogr. Ammonites ; Paleont. Society. Vol. for 1891, p. 290

259

Although these laws were given as the result of my own
observations on Ammonites, I can claim no originality as
regards the law of earlier inheritance; having, as it happens,
been anticipated both by Hyatt,* and by Wiirtenberger, who
had also independently arrived at the same conclusions—the
former from a study of Liassic, the latter from Upper Oolite
Ammonites. Even they, however, had been forestalled by
Professor Cope (teste Hyatt).

It is curious that an extinct group like Ammonites should

EI TE (Gs (neem Fa eee WER Eaeoncerree |) Da 14 a

ERRATUM.
COTTESWOLD FIELD CLUB, VOL. X.

In page 258, line 1, for “ Inheritance” read “ Heredity.”

LA AAAA LAVAL SOO

PART I.—THE LAWS.

HEREDITY.

b In regard to Heredity the usual formula is “ Like produces
4 like.” This is true enough in a general sense; it is decidedly
untrue in a particular sense. Not only are “‘ sports” of various
kinds directly contrary to the law that “like produces like ;”
but, even in homogenesis, the offspring is never exactly like its
_ parent was at the same time of life. Neither is it exactly like
other offspring of the same parent. Nevertheless there is a
definite tendency on the part of the offspring to exhibit the

*Tn addition to the works to which reference is made in this Paper, I must
acknowledge my indebtedness to Professor Hyatt’s grand volume, “The Genesis
of the Arietide ;” Smithsonian Contrib. Knowledge, 1889.

Some Laws of Inheritance; and their application to Man, by
8S. S. Buckman, F.G.S. Read February 23rd, 1892.

SS EI oe kU EOE Chee OE Tan ee = eye
additions, the result of fresh observations, or to make the
arguments clearer, have been incorporated in the Paper since
it was read before the Field Club. All such additions have
been enclosed in square brackets; and these brackets will shew
that, in works studied since the paper was read, I have found |
confirmation of several of my surmises.

In the main, the laws of Heredity set forth are based on a
study of the morphological phenomena of Ammonites; but
they have had to be extended, in many cases, to meet the
necessities of a wider field.

The laws of “earlier inheritance and its limitations”
have from time to time been stated in a condensed form in my
Monograph: here they are all fully considered together.

*See Monogr. Ammonites ; Paleont. Society. Vol. for 1891, p. 290

fit

259

Although these laws were given as the result of my own
observations on Ammonites, I can claim no originality as
regards the law of earlier inheritance; having, as it happens,
been anticipated both by Hyatt,* and by Wirtenberger, who
had also independently arrived at the same conclusions—the
former from a study of Liassic, the latter from Upper Oolite
Ammonites. Even they, however, had been forestalled by
Professor Cope (teste Hyatt).

It is curious that an extinct group like Ammonites should
have yielded such important results; but it must be remembered
that they offer exceptional facilities for the study of
Heredity. They not only preserved their own ontogenetic
record in a most complete manner, but they developed very
quickly, lasted a fairly long time geologically, are very diversi-
fied in form, and are preserved in considerable numbers in
- fairly complete sequence.

The importance, in the origin of species, of the law of
earlier inheritance which they illustrate will, I hope, become
apparent from a perusal of this Paper.

May 31st, 1892.

PART I.—THE LAWS.

HeEreEpIty.

In regard to Heredity the usual formula is “ Like produces
like.” This is true enough in a general sense; it is decidedly

' _ untrue ina particular sense. Not only are “sports” of various

kinds directly contrary to the law that “like produces like ;”
but, even in homogenesis, the offspring is never exactly like its
parent was at the same time of life. Neither is it exactly like
other offspring of the same parent. Nevertheless there is a
definite tendency on the part of the offspring to exhibit the

., *In addition to the works to which reference is made in this Paper, I must
acknowledge my indebtedness to Professor Hyatt’s grand volume, “The Genesis
of the Arietide ;” Smithsonian Contrib. Knowledge, 1889.

260

parental form in a general way, even down to very minute
characteristics which may be peculiar to the parent as an
individual. 7

Theoretically, then, it may be assumed that like ought to
produce like, for after all the offspring, whether the product of
fission or of sexual union, is but a detached portion of the
parent ;* and according to Darwin’s theory of pangenesist there
is no real distinction between reproduction by fission or
by sexual union—the latter is only the former more specialized.

When, however, the new organism is in the smallest
degree unlike its parent it can be assumed that the failure of
“like to produce like” is due to some change of environment
affecting either the parent or the offspring. It may then be
supposed that “like produces like if the conditions of environ-
ment be absolutely and continuously uniform;” but since the
conditions of environment never do absolutely conform to these
requirements, and sometimes very widely depart from them, it
may be said that “like produces like so far as the conditions of
environment will allow.”{ The differences between parent and
offspring may, then, be presumed to depend on the greater or less
diversity of environment, and the greater or less susceptibility
of the organism.§ It follows from this that there is more

[*The phenomena of alternation of generations do not conflict with this state-
ment. Neither in homogenesis nor in heterogenesis is the offspring at once like
its parent—it only becomes like by passing through successive cycles of changes
similar to those by which its parent was produced. The correspondence of the
cycles of the offspring to those of the parent fulfil the statement of “like
producing like.’’]

[tIn his “Essays on Heredity,” Weismann rejects Darwin’s theory of
Pangenesis. It may be a faulty theory ; but it seems to fit in very intelligibly
with observed facts. The consideration of this matter must be left over for the
present. ]

[{ Professor Harker remarked to me that the little difference in the species
of the genus Lingula from the Cambrian to the present day might be ascribed to
the practical uniformity of pelagic conditions.]

§ And in the product of sexual union the heterogeneity of the parents would
be another factor.

261

chance of difference between parent and offspring in highly-
developed than in lowly-developed organisms. It may also be
remarked that great change of conditions—as for instance,
cultivation—causes considerable diversity among the descen-
dants of a common ancestor.

VARIATION.

I wish to define Variation in a very restricted manner, and
to confine the term to the difference between parent and
offspring, when exactly the same age of each is compared.

3 [Many phenomena are roughly classed as Variation, and it
_ becomes necessary to make adistinction. Usually it is regarded
as a departure from a normal standard, or from a given specific
_ type; but this idea is entirely unsuitable when a phylogenetic
series is under review. Paleontology illustrates a wonderful
_ inconstancy among species. It impresses one with a sense of -
_ constant change on the whole—a change slower in some groups
_ than in others—and slower at some times than at others in
_ the same genetic series. In a quickly developing group like
_ Ammonites anything like the same form can only have endured
for comparatively few generations, except in the case of the
_ radical stocks.

Practically speaking there was no normal type—practically
speaking there was change in every generation. The same
may be supposed to be theoretically true in slow-developing
_ series—only the changes may have been and may be so slight

as to be hardly perceptible.

4 Little or great, it is these differences between parent and
offspring at the same age which I wish to define as Variation.
Why I insist on the same age is that the youthful offspring
may differ very considerably from the adult parent, but such
_unlikeness is not Variation, as now defined. In the course of
its ontogenetical development an individual may change very
considerably, passing through the same cycles of changes as its
parent did. Such changes may be distinguished, not as
“variations due to age” as is sometimes done, but as ontogenetic

262

changes. These ontogenetic changes may so exactly correspond
and synchronize with the ontogenetic changes of the parent
that there may be no Variation between parent and offspring at
the same age.

I fear that in many cases ontogenetic changes are confound-
ed with Variations—the differences due to inequality of age not
being properly considered. The unlikeness between non-coeval
individuals is often due to their not being in the same
stage of ontogeny. Differences between coeval individuals of
different parents might be due to a slight disproportion in
relative development from a phylogenetic point of view (negroes
and Caucasian, agricultural labourers and peers); and such
differences might be termed phyletic unlikeness.* This avoids
any argument as to whether the parents belong to different
species, sub-species, or incipient species in any cases.

Between different offspring of the same parents, between
different members of the same litter, there are differences:

1.—Sexual, as between the two sexes.

2.—Individual, as between members of the same sex.
Differences from the same-sexed parent at the same age would
be Variation as I wish to define it.

Changes in the plumage of birds in connection with the
breeding-time, as in the Ruff, are sometimes called Variations ;
but if such changes are inherent in all individuals of the species,
they are not Variations, even if the term were used in its
widest sense. They may be called “ genital changes.”

*In a field of daisies it may be noticed that in some flowers the petals are
much more strongly tinged with pink than in others, in some cases the younger
flowers are more pink than the older, in some cases the petals are scarcely
tinged at any age. These are not variations, even if the term were used to
indicate departure from a normal type ; because it would be impossible to indicate
the normal type. The fact is that the differences are, in part, ontogenetic as
regards different-aged flowers of the same plant, and, in part, phyletic unlikeness
as regards different plants. The daisy is probably retrograding from an entomo-
philous to a more complete anemophilous condition—the red petals being the
remains of a more perfect entomophilous stage—the “ phyletic unlikeness”’ indi-
cating differing degrees of retrogression.

263

Genital changes are not uncommon in the animal kingdom;
and the flowering of plants ought to be put in the same
category.

Moulting in birds, change of leaf in trees, white winter
coats of Arctic animals might be called “ periodic or seasonal
changes.” *

Changes which are not genital, and not seasonal, such as
the voluntary change of colour in the chameleon, and in
certain frogs, and the involuntary change of colour in Man—
blushing—might be termed simply “occasional” or “‘ temporary”
changes.

The above phenomena will suffice as illustrations of what
I wish to class as otherwise than Variations. The paleonto-
logical illustrations of the inconstancy, in so many cases, of what
are termed “species” lead to the assumption that change from
. generation to generation is the rule, only that it differs in
degree—in some cases is so slight as to be unappreciable even
in very extensive genetic séries. In any case I can only define
as Variation the amount of difference between offspring and
parent when compared at the same age.t]

Such Variation may be considered under different headings
in relation to the the causes by which it is produced.

I.—Abnormal Variation. This may be subdivided :

(1) Variation due to disturbance of the economy of the
parent. This is further divisible into :

(a) Very extraordinary distwrbance. (Monstrosities,
and to a less extent supernumary digits and the
like).

(b) Less extraordinary disturbance.. (Birth marks and
any alteration of disposition or features.

* White hair in man is a senile ontogenetic change. Instances of white hair
in adolescent man or in children are pathological cases due probably to
general constitutional debility, or to local disturbance of economy.

+ In Heterogenesis the number of the generations would also have to be taken
into account.

L2

264

(2) Variation due to disturbance of the economy of the
individual, in consequence of sudden changes of
environment. Such changes may be considered as
favourable,* and as unfavourable; and the un-

favourable changes may be divided into those -

oveasioned by disease, and those brought about by
injury and mutilation.

Il.—Normal or developmental Variation, that is, gradual
functional modifications induced in the individual by the
necessities of its environment.

The ontogenetic changes by which an organism reaches
maturity, or even later, are really developmental Variations
inherited from the parent; the further ontogenetic changes, by
which an organism responds to its environment are, strictly,
developmental variations proper to the organism.t

To a great extent the difference in the lines of thought
adopted by Darwin and Spencer in regard to the origin of
species, is that the former lays the greater stress on Abnormal,
or as he calls it, Spontaneous Variation having suddenly
produced some feature which gave its possessors superiority in
the struggle for existence; while the latter regards Normal
Variation (use and disuse) as the important factor. I shall
have something to say on this point presently.

Tae Law or Haruier INHERITANCE.

I have said that it may be assumed “like produces like so
far as the conditions of environment will allow;” but this
does not meet the facts of the case, because the offspring only
becomes like its adult parent by continual growth and change.
Therefore it might be said: “the offspring at its various stages
of life tends to assume what was the parental form at these

* The luxuriant growth of wheat when top-dressed with nitrate of soda—
the broader leaves and the darker colour.

[ t Ontogenetic changes refer to the individual’s stages in relation to each
other ; developmental variations refer to them in their relation to the parent]

at i il ell at eal) or a ateg a .

265

various stages of life, so far as the conditions of environment
will allow.”

If this were absolutely true—if the organism were like
what its parent was at exactly the same age—it is difficult to
understand how the dictum that ontogeny repeats phylogeny
can be true.

In order that ontogeny should repeat phylogeny it is
evident that there must be a concentration of development. If
the various phases of ontogeny represent the various develop-
ments of the generations of species included in the genealogy
of the individual, it is obvious that to find the various phases
successively exhibited in the immature stages of the individual
implies that they must have been inherited at an earlier and
earlier time in the lives of individuals in successive generations.
The more highly developed an organism is, the more stages
must it pass through in order to reach maturity; and if
these various stages each represent mature stages of less-
developed forms it follows that the mature stages of earlier
species become the immature stages of later species—in other
words, that the adult stages of earlier species become adolescent
stages of later species, and embryonic stages of still later
species.

What obtains in the successive species of a phylogenetic
series must obtain, too, in the successive generations of a
species. At the same time, it must be remembered that
earlier inheritance would only be perceptible where there are
developmental changes. In an organism which shews, practic-
ally, no difference between, say, its adolescent and adult stages,
except in the way of size, it is impossible to mark earlier
inheritance; but for all that, it is reasonable to assume that
the same law holds good as in the case of an organism in which
there are marked differences to distinguish the various stages
of life. Similarly it is an obvious fact that if the law of
earlier inheritance be admitted to act in the phylogenetic
series it must also be admitted to act in the generations of the
species.

266

Granting then that the law of earlier inheritance, as
illustrated in successive Ammonite-faunas, is a fundamental
assumption for the doctrine of evolution, this law may be
defined as follows *:—

The offspring tends to exhibit the various successive phases of
the parent’s life at a slightly earlier age, provided that the envi-
ronment be somewhat approximately the same.

Ture Uneguat Action or Haruier INHERITANCE.

If the law of earlier inheritance acted with equal force
with regard to every stage inherited by the individual, we
should find that in accordance with the law just laid down,
there would be, in the development of a phylogenetic series,
a gradual and successive replacement of the various stages,
that is to say, the embryonic characters of the earlier species
would gradually disappear from the later species, the infantile
characters of the earlier species would become the embryonic
characters of the later species, and the adolescent, adult, and
senile characters of the earlier species would become infantile,
adolescent, and adult characters respectively of the later
species.

Again, if there were such a gradual and successive
replacement as this, ontogeny could not repeat phylogeny,

[*In order to afford a better understanding of this law of earlier inheritance,
it is necessary that I should introduce two terms. The features of an adult, A,
become by this law adolescent in the later species, B, infantile in C, and so on.
Therefore I wish to call the adolescent B the ‘‘ morphological representation” of
adult A, and infantile C the “ morphological representation’ of adolescent B, or of
adult A. In the opposite manner, adult A may be spoken of as the “morpho-
logical prefiguration”” of adolescent B, or of infantile C,and so on Thus with
Hyatt’s “morphological equivalent’ we obtain three terms in connection with
the relations of the individual. It is a ‘morphological representation” with
regard to the past, a “morphological prefiguration”’ with regard to the future,
and a ‘‘morphological equivalent’’ of other species of other genetic series which
have reached the same degree of development. The accuracy of these terms is
not impaired by the limitations to the law of earlier inheritance which I am now
going to discuss. ]

—— <r Te

a ee a

ach Ge

267

except in part. A highly-developed organism would shew in
its embryonic stages no trace of the lowly-devoloped form
from which the phylogenetic series had originated ; but it would
exhibit the adult stage of a later—and therefore more-
developed—being. In fact, instead of ontogeny being an
epitome of phylogeny, it would be only a record of the fag-end
of the individual’s genealogy.

Since, however, there is no such successive replacement in
this manner, it is necessary to suppose that “the earlier inher-
itance of a given character is always diminishing ;” and since
ontogeny shews how a most highly-developed organism com-
mences with a most simple form—since, in fact, there is a
remarkable fixity of the embryonic form, while there may be
no such fixity in the mature form in a phylogenetic series,
it is necessary to suppose an “unequal action of earlier
inheritance.” It is necessary to imagine that earlier inheritance
acts most strongly upon the latest-acquired characters, and
gradually decreases in potency in respect of earlier-acquired
characters. Therefore, while the earliest embryonic stages are
practically unaffected by the law of earlier inheritance,* there
is a tendency of the earlier infantile stages to become later
embryonic stages; there is a greater tendency for the earlier
adolescent stages to become the later infantile; there is a
still greater tendency for the earlier adult stages to become the
later adolescent ; and so on increasingly in proportion to the
lateness of the stage. As it is impossible to mark earlier
inheritance, except when different characters accompany
different stages, the law may be stated as follows :—

The earlier inheritance of a given character diminishes from
generation to generation.

Under these circumstances, however, it is reasonable to
conclude that though ontogeny repeats phylogeny in a general
way it cannot repeat it with truth ; because if, in the phylogen-
etic series, a short but very pronounced stage were followed

* The starting point being always the same,

268

by a stage during which no great change occurred for a long
time, the latter stage would, in successive generations, encroach
upon the former stage more quickly than the former stage
encroached upon its predecessor; and ultimately the short
stage must disappear. Thus there would be gaps in the
ontogenetic record of phylogeny.

Tue Eximrnation or Dissruinar Staces.

The unequal action of the law of earlier inheritance would
appear not to be the only cause of such gaps in the ontogenetic
record. The influence of economy also plays a part. When
the phylogenetic series, by some developmental change—as for
instance, reversion—acquires characters different to its last
stage, but approximately similar to some preceding stage—
when, say, the adolescent and senile stages are practically
similar, while the adult stage is dissimilar—there is a tendency
in the later members of the phylogenetic series to dispense
with the dissimilar stage by the law of economy of growth; and
in the course of their ontogeny, by passing directly from one
similar stage to the other similar stage, to avoid the double
change which would be required by the production of the
dissimilar stage. This tendency becomes very potent when
the dissimilar stage has been considerably shortened by “the
unequal action of the law of earlier inheritance.” This phe-
nomenon may be referred to shortly as the “elimination of
dissimilar stages.”

Tur Mopirication oF Haruier INHERITANCE.

There is yet another phase of the laws connected with
earlier inheritance to be alluded to; and it obviously depends
on a similar force to that which governs the “ eliminiation
of dissimilar stages.” Ontogenetical investigations have shewn
me that although the embryonic and infantile stages of life
are the morphological representations of what were the adult
stages of some more or less remote ancestors, yet that, in
certain cases and under certain conditions, they do not represent
these formerly-adult stages with complete accuracy.

ef

269

It happens that certain characters of these formerly-adult
stages are suppressed in the embryonic and infantile stages,
although the other features of these formerly-adult stages are
faithfully reproduced. Such phenomena may be explained by
supposing that such suppression was due to a modifying or
controlling action guided by the requirements of the individual ;
and that such action was therefore adaptive, and to the advan-
tage of the individual at the time. These ideas may be ex-
pressed as follows :—

“ The embryonic and infantile stages may not always exhibit
all the characters of the stage of development of which they should be
the morphological representations, but they may only exhibit such
features as are suitable to the individual’s requirements, sup-
pressing those unsuitable, especially when such suppression, whether
temporary or permanent, is to the advantage of the individual on
the score of economy.”

The conclusions now arrived at may be summed up as
follows :—

So far as the conditions of environment allow, the offspring
tends during development to exhibit the various phases of its
parent’s life at an earlier age than the parent exhibited them*—
the tendency to earlier exhibition increasing in proportion to

_ the lateness of the character; that the offspring tends to

direct development by eliminating dissimilar stages of growth

on the score of economy; and for the same reason it is wont to

suppress or modify, in its embryonic and infantile stages,

_ characters unsuitable or not absolutely necessary to its develop-
_ ment at the time.

PROGRESSION AND RETROGRESSION OF DEVELOPMENT.

Developmental variations may be divided into progressive
and retrogressive, as Ammonites very conclusively shew.
When a phylogenetic series is developing successive new

: *In the case of one or a few generations the “earlier inheritance’? may
_ be practically disregarded. Heredity may be summed up as “Ontogeny should
repeat ontogeny.”

270

features which are further elaborations of former features, and
when such developments indicate greater and greater vigour,
the inference is that the members of such a series are in a
progressive state. On the other hand, when a phylogenetic
series shews continued reduction and loss of those features by
which it was formerly distinguished, and when such reduction
is accompanied by appearances of decreased vigour, the mem-
bers of such a series are assumed to be retrogressive or
degenerating.

It may be advisable to briefly consider the causes which
would affect progression and retrogression.

When vitality is maintained by the lowest possible
expenditure of force, and there remains over a considerable
surplus of force beyond what is required to sustain life,
progression would be the result; while under opposite condi-
tions there would be retrogression.

Change in the temperature, and change in the composition
of the medium by which the organism is surrounded may
entail upon it a greater or less expenditure of force in order
to maintain life, and so may affect it favourably or the reverse.
Similarly the quantity and quality of the food supply, and the
difficulty or ease with which it is obtained entail a greater
or less expenditure of force favouring retrogression or pro-
gression as the case may be.

Without, however, assuming any great change in the
environment of an organism, the laws which would govern the
appearance or elaboration of a new character may be stated
as :—

1.—Increased use—the character is of advantage to its

possessor for use or ornament. Increased use
means that more than its due share of nourishment
must be received by the part used, and greater
nourishment means increased proportionate growth.
2.—The transmission of the character in accordance with
the laws of heredity laid down, and with the laws
which regulate the transmission of variation.

271

On the other hand, the laws which govern the degeneration
and disappearance of a character are :—

1.—Decreased use—the character being less serviceable

requires a less amount of nutriment; and a less
amount of nutriment being received the character
is not elaborated in proportion to the other charac-
ters of the organism.

2.—Economy—the character being less serviceable or

ornamental it is deprived of nutriment in order
that such nutriment may be more advantageously
used elsewhere.

3.—The transmission of the character in accordance with

the laws of heredity laid down, and with the laws
which regulate the transmission of variation.

It may be remarked that among Ammonites progressive
features occur in a definite successional order; while retro-
gression which may commence at any time is the reversal of the
order of progressive acquirement—an individual or a phylo-
genetic series as it grows older, losing the progressive features
one by one, in the reverse order to which they were acquired.
There may also be retrogression in certain features and pro-
gression in others going on at the same time; and, further,
retrogression and progression may be alternately shewn in the
phylogenetic series.

When retrogression and progression go on together, the
loss of features, in the reverse order to which they were
acquired in progression, takes place of course only in relation to
the part affected by the retrogression, or rather, degeneration.
I shall notice the operation of this important law in the case
of the hair of Man—the hair of the body being in a progressive
state, and the hair of the head retrogressive: it is the hair
of the head which degenerates in reverse order to acquirement
—that is, “the last to come is the first to go.” This is, in fact,
the law of retrogression, only it is necessary to distinguish
_ local retrogression from general retrogression:

Local retrogression may be due to alteration of habits
and environment, or may be the economical accompaniment of

272

local progression in another direction; but general retrogression
arises from impaired vitality, and is usually—at least so
Ammonites shew—the prelude to extinction. But when retro-
gression is local and arises say from disuse, while there is
progression in other features more suitable to the organisms
environment, a higher degree of development may thereby be
obtained. It is reasonable to suppose that the more complex
the organism the more likely is it to shew simultaneous
progressive and retrogressive features.

The laws which govern progression and retrogression
among Ammonites are certain to hold good in evolution
generally, although they may become more complex in relation
to more complex organisms. Some illustrations of their
operation I shall give presently.

On THE LAWS GOVERNING THE TRANSMISSION OF

VARIATIONS.

From the facts given by Spencer* concerning the trans-
mission of such abnormal Variations as supernumary digits, it
may be gathered that there is no certainty in regard to their
appearance in the offspring. They may not be transmitted at
all; they may appear in the next generation in some members,
and not in others; and they may skip a generation entirely, to
reappear in some members of the next. Further, these varia-
tions when transmitted are not confined to one sex, but may
appear in either sex.

Of pathological variations I have mentioned two classes—
one due to injury, the other due to disease. Whether
variations due to injury—mutilation for example—are inherited
there is little evidence to shew. Darwinf has one or two
remarks on this head, which are not altogether convincing.
I may say that among Ammonites are many cases in which

*« Principles of Biology,” p. 258 ; quoted from an Essay by Dr Struthers.

“Descent of Man,” 2nd Ed., p. 60.
t

le ae

|
:
:
:

273

injury has altogether altered the ornamentation of the shell.
Such injury has invariably caused reversion—the ornaments of
a fairly remote ancestor appear in consequence of the injury ;
and this has led me to say in my Monograph that Atavism is a
consequence of diminished vitality, whether such enfeeblement
is due to old age or to injury. But so far as the inheritance
of variations due to injury is concerned I have not yet noticed
anything of the kind.

Of variations due to disease—the word being used in a
wide sense to include the effects of any suddenly unfavourable
conditions of life—-Ammonites furnish several examples ;
although it is not always easy to distinguish between the effects
of disease and long-continued retrogression. In the latter,
however, there are definite stages to be passed through; but
if some of these stages be omitted and the Ammonite shews
any abnormal features it may be considered as influenced by
suddenly unfavourable surroundings. Oecotyptius refractus ap-
pears to be an instance of variation due to disease being
inherited.* Concerning Occotraustes cadomensis (d’Orbigny) I
am not so certain; because to produce this form retrogression
had proceeded regularly, and the abnormal whorl-shape may
only be the further continuation thereof. The lopsided Ammon-
ites of the Lias, which d’Orbigny called Turrilites, are certainly
variants due to disease or unfavourable conditions; but whether

this peculiarity was inherited, or whether it was simply the

[*I extracted the following from the 50th Report (1891) Bristol Distr.
Institution for Deaf and Dumb, p. 14, Bristol, 1892, (kindly sent by Mr Lucy.)
It is of interest in connection witk Abnormal Variation and its inheritance.

“From cases investigated it was found that there were 46 children born
whose parents were pupils at the Institution, and none of those suffered from
the physical infirmities of their fathers or mothers. There were 12 instances of
deaf and dumb couples, 13 where the husband only was deaf and two where the
wife was deaf and dumb. Out of 138 cases enquired into of pupils received at
the school it was discovered that with one exception their parents were not
similarly afflicted. The causes of this sad affliction are various, but 60 % are born
deaf and dumb. Variation I.,1,p. 263. And the next most prolific cause is
scarlet fever.” Variation I., 2, p. 264. ]

274

effect of the same unfavourable conditions on the various
members of the species cannot be stated definitely.

Coming to normal or developmental variations everything
seems to point to the conclusion that they are regularly trans-
mitted from one generation to another—that, in fact, develop-
mental variations are regularly inherited—subject to the laws
of earlier inheritance which I have laid down. There is,
however, a limitation attached to this. The transmission of
developmental variation is apparently confined at first to the
sex in which it appears, but, afterwards, that is when by the
operation of the law of earlier inheritance it has come to
appear early in life, it is transmitted to the other sex also.
At what time of life it makes its appearance in the other sex
in consequence of such transmission I cannot say, but I am
inclined to think that it would be late in life. It would then
tend to become earlier and earlier in that sex also, and would
in course of time become a fixed character, transmitted to both
sexes equally.

The above surmises are warranted by the facts which
Darwin has brought forward in “Descent of Man,” and
especially by the conclusions which he has derived from those
facts; although he seems to have been guided by the idea that
a variation nearly always appeared at the same time in succeed-
ing generations.

The law of transmission of variations which he lays down
(p. 232, 2nd Ed.) is: “the variations which first appear in
either sex at a late period of life tend to be developed in the
same sex alone; whilst variations which first appear early in
life in either sex tend to be developed in both sexes.”

The latter remarks apply, in so far as they relate to
first appearance, to abnormal variation about which I have
remarked above (p. 272); but considering the laws as a whole,
especially in connection with the facts Darwin gives about the
time of appearance of horns, I think developmental variations
would be transmitted as I have said. Such transmissions
would, so to speak, account for several facts—for sexual
characters such as horns being confined so often to one sex—for

|

275

their appearance in both sexes by supposing that they had
been acquired earlier in the phylogenetic series, and had been
transmitted for a longer time than those which appear in
one sex only—for the occasional appearance of male characters
in aged females, as the cock’s crow and feathers in an old hen,
or the more than incipient hairiness of the chin and lips
sometimes shewn by women of our race.

That in Man the mental qualities of the male are superior
to those of the female is explained by the sexually-limited
inheritance of the latest-acquired characters; that on the other
hand man has not become “as superior in mental endowment
to woman as the peacock is in ornamental plumage to the
peahen”* may be explained by equal transmission of characters
which have come to appear early in life. If this law—sexual
limitation in the transmission of adult characters, equal trans-
mission of earlier characters—hold good, it will be of consider-
able importance in predicting the future development of
species.

How THE TRANSMISSION OF VARIATION WOULD AFFECT

THE ORIGIN oF SPECIES.

It isnot difficult to understand the origin of species if the
surmises that I have submitted, concerning the transmission of
developmental variation, are correct. The greater and greater
elaboration of any particular features, in, say, an adult male,
as functional modification necessitated by environment, are
transmitted to the male sex alone, and appear earlier and earlier
in that sex. The greater and greater elaboration of these
features results in the course of time in the formation of a
marked and distinguishing character in the male sex; and this
character being transmitted in accordance with the law of
earlier inheritance ultimately appears early in life in the male.
Then the character tends to appear in the female sex also,

* Darwin, “ Descent of Man,” 2nd Ed., p. 565.

276

though why it does so is not clear. By such process, however,
there arise both males and females which possess characters
different to those which their ancestors possessed.

By the time that this character, influenced by the law of
earlier inheritance, appears at an age early enough to be
transferred to the female, the male has probably either further
elaborated this character—which further elaboration is at first
transmitted to the males only—or he has elaborated some-
thing else so much that it seems like a new character, which
is transmitted in the same way. In course of time this further
elaboration, or this new character as the case may be, is
transmitted also to the females; and so it becomes plain how,
merely by the gradual transmission of developmental variations,
both sexes of what may be called an incipient species, beginning
with a slight variation in one sex alone, are able to diverge
wider and wider from the original stock.

The same laws of transmission would of course hold good
if the developmental variation arose in the female in response
to changes of environment; while if both sexes were exposed
to the same changes of environment necessitating the same
functional modifications to be acquired to bring them into
better adaptation with their surroundings, it is reasonable to
conclude that the result would be the production of a greater
difference in a shorter space of time.

Thus it is clear that the gradual accumulation of slight
developmental variations transmitted in accordance with the
law of earlier inheritance would be sufficient to cause the
origin of various species; and at the same time there can be
little doubt that this cause has also been assisted by both
Natural and Sexual Selection in the production of diverse species
from one original stock. Iam inclined to think that develop-
mental variation has been more important in the origin of
species than has abnormal, or as Darwin calls it “spontaneous”
variation. The transmission of such abnormal variations as
supernumary digits seems to be so much more uncertain than
the transmission of developmental variation; while practically
speaking the origin of Ammonite-species seems to be almost
entirely attributable to developmental variation.

'

277

Specialized structures like the long neck of the giraffe and
the proboscis of the elephant, to take familiar instances, are, in
my opinion, developmental variations. They did not arise, in
the first place, in certain members of the pre-giraffian or pre-
elephantine species, as abnormal or “spontaneous” variations

which gave their possessors such great superiority over their

fellows in the struggle for existence, that those possessors
survived by the law of Natural Selection. These features
began imperceptibly—the neck and the nose grew more in
proportion to other features during the lives of the individ-
uals, on account of the habits of the animals; and they may
be compared in this repect to the enlarging skull of civilised
Man.

As the features of the adult become in course of time
features of the adolescent by the law of earlier inheritance, the
elongation of nose and neck would become exaggerated from —
one generation to another. I do not see any reason to suppose,
at any rate at first, that the giraffian or elephantine ancestors

were the favoured individuals of the community, and that the

other members died out because they did not possess elongated
necks or noses. I do not suppose that all the members of the
species possessed these features in the same degree; but I

do imagine that a gradually increasing elongation was more

or less common to all the members of the pre-giraffian or

q pre-elephantine species as a result of their habits.

To take the case of the giraffe alone, for the sake of

clearness—it is hardly necessary to suppose occasional droughts
during which those members of the community with the

longest necks would survive, while others starved because they
were not able to reach such high branches as their longer-

necked fellows. An extra inch or so of neck could not make
go much difference as this.*

[* The adults would have the best of it in a drought on account of their

larger size. Therefore if there were a long-necked “sport” among the young

pre-giraffes it would have no chance against the adults unless its neck were of a

_ preternatural length.]

M

278

I do not say that the giraffe or its ancestors have not had
the best of it when there was a struggle for existence, and
that natural selection has not played its part; the fact of the
giraffe’s existence is proof enough that it was better adapted to
its environment than some of its competitors; and the longer
the neck grew doubtless the greater superiority the animal
would possess.

As to the short-necked forms which would connect the
present giraffe with the stock from which it originally came,
their dying out is not difficult to explain. The law of earlier
inheritance allows us to imagine a small beginning becoming
more accentuated in all members of a species as time goes on;
and as the shorter-necked forms were really the parents of the
longer-necked forms the disappearance of the former would be
due, as the lawyers say of a lease, to effluxion of time.

Arising from and co-existing with developmental variation
there seems to be another factor important in differentiating
species ; and this is the time when the offspring is produced.

Offspring produced early and offspring produced late in the
life of a parent shewing considerable developmental changes
between early and late maturity, or between early maturity and
senility, would in all probability differ to a certain extent. It
is, I think, reasonable to suppose that if there were, say, a
decline of vigour after a certain period of the parent’s life, the
offspring produced after this time would be more likely not
only to be somewhat less vigorous altogether, but would
probably exhibit declining vigour at an earlier age than those
produced before any decline of vigour set in.

This seems to be a reasonable deduction from what is
observed in phylogenetic series of Ammonites, where from the
same stock arise one series which continue to progress, another
series which retrograde, though both lived together and were
presumably subject to the same environment.

More marked still would be the effects if from any cause
there arose a difference among members of a species as to the
time in their lives when offspring were produced. There is the
case in Man—the professional classes defer marriage till late
in life, agricultural labourers marry very early.

]
1
4
;

279

These surmises illustrate what may be supposed to be
accomplished in the differentiation of species by the trans-
mission of developmental variations in accordance with the law
of earlier inheritance. Further consideration will shew that, if
some members of a species acquire, on account of environment,
habits necessitating the increased use of one part, and other
members acquire other habits with different results, and so on,
there would, in course of time, arise from one original stock
two or more species very different to each other or to the
parent form—simply because their small initial differences had
been constantly increased by the action of the law of earlier
inheritance.

m2

PART II.

THE APPLICATION TO MAN.

Cuaracters oF Man—Hatr.

I have now given some laws which seem to govern inheri-
tance: I wish to apply them to Man. Just as I should take an
Ammonite in hand to point out its ancestry from a study of
its earlier whorls, and its posterity from observation of its later
whorls, so would I take Man with the same intentions. There
is, however, this difference—a very important difference. Man
does not, like an Ammonite, furnish the record of his own ontog-
eny. It is necessary to have specimens of all ages; and this
introduces a danger—that the differences may be phyletic and
not merely ontogenetic.

To trace Man’s ancestry it is necessary to study the earlier
stages of his life, because by the law of earlier inheritance they
should be the morphological representations of adult ancestors
of earlier periods—though there would be limitations as I have
pointed out, (p. 268); to speculate on his future the later
stages must be examined, because they are the morphological
prefigurations of future adolescent, and other stages—in fact,
what are senile stages to-day will in process of time be the
adult stages presently, will become the adolescent stages of a
more distant future, and the infantile stages of a very remote
time to come—if the race last long enough. Natural selection
may check but cannot stop this inevitable process.

The human fetus, then, becomes the first matter for
consideration ; but, as this is necessarily a subject beyond my
experience, I can only refer the reader to Darwin’s remarks

rc

——

281

thereon in his “Descent of Man,”’*—to the analogies which
he finds between the human fotus and the foetus of animals,
and to what he says of the development of the fotus gener-
ally. One fact, however, I would notice—that the foetus
during the sixth month is covered by a fine wool-like hair—“the
whole surface including even the forehead and ears is thus
thickly clothed, but it is a significant fact that the palms of the
hands and the soles of the feet are quite naked.” +

Turning now to our infants, a most curious series of facts
with regard to hairiness is met with. The infant is rarely
born with long hair, though cases are recorded, Darwin says.
Generally the infant is more or less covered with a fine short

' down, which is noticeable on the face, forehead, and shoulders;

but there is variability in this respect. On the scalp, sides and
back of head there is usually found a distinct covering of hair,
sometimes as much as an inch in length.

Within about three months after birth very appreciable
changes in the hairiness take place in our infants. There is a
most decided reduction in the hairiness or woolliness of the
body—so much so that only by very close attention can any hair
be detected on many parts, for the skin appears to be smooth.
On the forehead, however, there is a distinetly woolly coat;
there is also a certain woolliness on the shoulders, and the back
is more woolly than the chest and abdomen, but scarcely so
woolly as the shoulders.

In the first or second month after birth there is a very
perceptible reduction of the hairy covering of the scalp—in
fact the hair is sometimes shed to such an extent that the
scalp appears quite bald, and this is the condition in which our

[ * Also to Haeckel’s ‘“‘ Anthropogenie,” for very full details. ]
t ‘Descent of Man.” 2nd Ed., p, 19, 1888.

[ {In the two-months’-old female child of a neighbour the forehead was rather
thickly clothed with short hair, which grew upwards; by the side of the temples
it grew sideways. The eyebrows were little more hairy than the forehead.
There were short black whiskers reaching to the lower jaw. The forearms were
singularly hairy inside. ]

282

infants are generally noticed by the public. But the hair on
the sides and back of the head is not shed in this manner—so
that there remains a hairy band which starts from just in front
of the ears, and passing above them continues round the back
of the head. The shedding of the hair from the scalp and the
persistance of this hairy band give to the infant’s head the
same appearance as that of a bald old man.

Soon after the shedding, in fact almost before it is com-
pleted, a second growth of hair can be detected. This second
crop, which is usually regarded as the first, grows with consid-
erable rapidity; but, while it is growing, there is a very
noticeable difference between the hair of the scalp and the hair
of the sides and back of the head. The scalp-hair grows
quicker than the rest, and soon becomes longer. It is
brought to a point over the forehead; but for some months
after birth there is nothing more than down on the temples.
The covering of the temples with hair is a much later process.
The growth of eyebrows, I may remark, corresponds with the
second growth of hair—in a very young infant there are
usually no eyebrows noticeable.

Observations on some children between one and ten years
old has brought to light the following curious facts about
hairiness. Up to about six years old the back and shoulders
are decidedly woolly, while the legs and arms are almost com-
pletely bare; and the front of the body is decidedly smooth.
After this age there is a noticeable decrease in the hairiness of
the back and shoulders, while the arms, backs of hands, and the
legs are becoming hairy. Beneath the arms it is noticeable
that there is a complete absence of hairiness or woolliness.

Continuing the subject—I believe I am right in saying
that hair appears under the arms rather before sexual charac-
ters and accompanying puberty are acquired. In the males
only, still later in life, the masculine character of hair on the
face is obtained. The hair on the lower limbs and trunk still
continues to increase, and last of all hair grows on the
chest.

283

Before all this progressive growth has been completed the
male begins to lose hair from the head. It starts at the
temples, on which, as I remarked, it appears last in an infant,
thus illustrating the law of retrogression; then the scalp
gradually becomes more and more bare; and finally only a
fringe of hair is left round the lower part of the head. The
resemblance, between the bald head of old age at this stage and
the head of the infant after what may be called its moult, is
extremely curious ; and it illustrates the law of retrogression—
the part affected loses the latest acquired characters first
(page 271).

From the variations of hairiness above detailed, the
following surmises may be made. The very complete hairiness
of the fcetus points to descent from an animal completely
clothed with hair. The loss of hair during early infancy is a
retrogressive character, indicating the fact that the hairy
ancestors of man lost their hair. This loss of hair was no
doubt analogous to the baldness of the head at the present day.
Now baldness presumably arises from the increased use of the
brain—the extra nourishment required by the brain is afforded
at the expense of the hair and scalp. Possibly for the same
reason—some correlations of growth on the score of economy—
man’s hairy ancestors began to lose their coats. It would
commence as a developmental variation in maturity; it would
pass by the law of earlier inheritance to immaturity, and
presently to infancy. Such loss of hair may have been assisted
by sexual selection—it may have been the fashion to prefer
husbands or wives distinguished by being less hairy; but,
without sexual selection, developmental variation and earlier
inheritance would have caused this loss of hair in time.

It is possible to surmise the places from which this hair
went first. The front of the body in children is conspicuously
smooth, while the back is hairy. Now although Man is
descended from an animal completely covered with hair, yet
going further back, the abdomen and chest of quadrupeds—
the underside of the body—is nothing like so hairy as the
back—which is the upper and more exposed side. It may be

284

assumed then that the hairy front of man’s ancestors became
more completely coated when it became exposed to the elements
equally as the back; and in that case the hair on the front—
supposing it to have been as thick as on the back—is the more
recent character so far as regards any great quantity. In
retrogression the latest acquired characters disappear first.

Following this law again, it may be assumed that the hair
on the front, the insides of arms, and of legs disappeared first,
then the hair from the limbs generally, then probably the hair
from the face; while on the forehead, back, and scalp, the hair
became very much reduced, but apparently there was a band
of hair remaining over the ears and on the back of the head.

Somewhere in the history of the human phylogenetic series
these changes were probably spread over the life-time of
individuals—the loss of hair from the chest and belly, which
had once been an adult character,* had come, by the law of
earlier inheritance, to belong say to late infancy; and the other
changes followed, in order, to, say, late maturity.

Then a change occurred.t For some reason—evidently
the reason which makes the body and chest of an adult
male become more hairy with advancing age at the present
day—the scalp of Man became more hairy again. That the
hair on the scalp has a different history to that at the sides of
the head may be known because, when it reappears after the
infant’s temporary baldness, it grows very considerably quicker
than the hair at the sides, and soon passes that in length. A
friend tells me that in some members of his family the hair on
the scalp grows upright, whereas the hair at the sides of the
heads grows in the usual manner—another piece of evidence to
the same point.

[ *In an adult Gorilla in the British Museum, and in an old Yellow Baboon
in the Zoological Society’s Gardens, the chests are considerably denuded of hair.
These facts also illustrate the law of retrogression. |

{The following remarks only apply to our own race. Other races, though
obviously progressing in the same manner, have not preserved the same relative
proportional development of characters.

.
fe:

285

This reversion—growing hair again on the scalp—was, at
first, an adult feature; and it became earlier as the phylo-
genetic series progressed. Not improbably it was aided by
sexual selection. Later still, hair made its appearance on other
parts of the body and limbs—notably, however, where hair had
probably been very feebly developed in the earlier members of
the phylogenetic series. As an instance of this take the hair
beneath the arms—a place very bare in quadrupeds.*

Still later in the phylogenetic series the moustache and
beard reappeared in the male. Finally, there is an appearance
of hair on the chest; and a loss of hair from the head.
The latter is principally confined to the male, which fact
makes it possible that the female first acquired this ornament.
The hair departs from the head where it appears latest in the
infant, and, therefore, presumably latest in the phylogenetic
series—namely, the temples. Then the scalp becomes affected.

In considering the various appearances and disappearances
of hair from Man it is worth noticing how little the popular
explanations of baldness—wearing hats, machine-brushes, and

other absurd reasons—can have affected the matter. Not only

do the classes—who are bald—wear hats much less than the
masses, who are but little affected in this way; but in spite of
wearing a continuous covering like clothes, Man becomes
decidedly more hairy on the body as he grows older.

Tae Direction In wuicH Harr Grows.

- I have a few words to say concerning the arrangement of
hair in Man. In the first place, however, it is necessary
to consider the laws which would govern the direction assumed.
These would be :—

1.—Gravity.

2.—Influence of surrounding media.

3.—Muscular action, and the amount of secretion.
4,— Heredity.

[* It is curious that the parts almost bare when the others where hairy
should become hairy when the others are bare. The inside of thighs is another
example, It looks like compensatory development. |

286

Gravity requires little explanation. That, in the absence
of other influences, hair would tend downwards, on account of
the ever-present force of gravity is obvious; but, as hair is a
light substance, the pull of gravity would not be strong, except
in the case of long hair. The influence of surrounding media
must be considered under two headings :—

1.—The direction either through air or water which the

animal usually takes.

2.—The direction which air or water takes with regard to

the animal.

It is obvious that an animal moving head-first through air
or water would have its hair arranged to point backwards.
Whether the hair always retained this direction would depend
on the constancy of the motion and the potency of conflicting
influences. The direction of the hair on a rabbit plainly
accords with its motion through the air—even the hair on the
ears grows towards the tips.

Under the second heading, if an animal were to be

“stationary and retain the same position, at any rate frequently,
with regard to the direction of wind, or the flow of water, its
hair would obviously become directed the way of the wind or
water. But the influence of rain must also be reckoned as flow
of water, and, as rain flows off an animal in accordance with
gravity, it is obvious that the assistance of rain will tend to
point the hair in the same direction as gravity tends to
pull it.

Roughly-speaking, then, rain and gravity pull the hair —
perpendicularly ; while motion through the air tends to arrange
the hair horizontally. If one set of forces be in the ascendant
the hair will assume a position in accordance ; but if the forces
are nearly equal the hair would assume a curve, either hori-
zontal-perpendicular, or perpendicular-horizontal, according to
conditions.

Muscular action can overcome other influences, and give
to the hair, say, an upright position, as in the familiar instance
of an angry cat, or the human being under influence of fright.
But it would require a great amount of force to be expended to

287

overcome the opposing influences permanently ; so when this is
necessary extra secretion is brought into play, and the hair
is made of sufficient stiffness in proportion to its length to stand
the strain of a position contrary to incident forces. The
so-called whiskers of the cat, rabbit, etc., are familiar
examples: they are made of sufficient strength to withstand
the pull of gravity, while the animal has the muscular power
to turn them so that they may not impede its movements.

In the same manner the ornamental arrangement of hair
on the top and around the heads of certain monkeys must be
sustained in its position contrary to the pull of gravity, and
contrary to the flow of rain by the strength of the secretion.

Lastly, to come to Heredity. The hair, having on account
of the various forces by which its direction is controlled, assumed
a definite lie with regard to the body, would retain that position
by the force of heredity, even when the animal’s descendants
had permanently acquired a different carriage of the body,
which changed the relationship of the hair in with regard to
incident forces. It is, however, plain that as the strength of
heredity would be a diminishing quantity, while the strength
of other forces would be constant or increasing, the hair would
in time tend to assume a direction in accordance with the
newer conditions to which it might be exposed.

In Man the position of the hair would not be affected by
any motion through air or water in a general way, nor, except
in very savage nations, would it be influenced greatly by the
flow of rain. On the other hand, in Man’s pre-human ancestors
such forces must have acted upon the hair, and influenced its
direction ; and such direction would have become hereditary.

On Man’s head the hair grows, roughly-speaking, from the
crown to the forehead, and from the crown to the nape of the
neck. The latter is in the direction which would be expected ;
but the former is, to a certain extent, opp»sed to gravity—at
any rate, in regard to such hair as lies between the crown and
the top of the skull.

In a woman the hair is made to grow in one direction,
namely, from the forehead to the neck; but this is not what

288

would be called its natural position. It has been made to
assume this position in order that it may not cover the face,
which it would do if it grew in the same direction as in the
male. A woman’s long hair is so much under the influence
of gravity, on account of its length, that it would fall off the
head in any direction in which it might be placed.

A female infant shews that the hair growing from the
forehead is a recent acquirement, because here the hair grows
from the crown over the skull to the forehead, as in the
male. (See Plate, fig. 1.)

The growth of the hair towards the forehead is directly
contrary to what would obtain in any quadruped which had to
run swiftly; and as the contrary direction—namely, from the
forehead—is found in such different animals as the rabbit, cat,
cow, dog, pig, ete., I am inclined to think that the backward
direction must have become a well-established character. On
the other hand, the forward position must have been acquired
for ornament. It may be an hereditary mark of a time when
the hair came to the forehead and then rose up in a frill (for
ornament), or some such arrangement as shewn in Darwin’s
“Descent of Man,” 2nd Ed., p. 549, in his figures of monkey’s
faces. The notion of the frill is supported by the fact that
with little persuasion children’s hair assumes such a position,
known as a “brutus”’—a word of which I will not venture the
etymology.

The fact that the short hair on a child’s forehead grows
upwards further supports the idea of a frill, That the hair
grows upwards, which is contrary to gravity, is due to inheri-
tance—to grow from the eyes backwards must have become a
firmly established feature in quadrupeds owing to windage;
and it would be retained by inheritance in slow-moving descend-
ants, unless altered for ornament or by gravity.

The reason why hair should grow in a kind of circular
manner as it does on what is called the crown of the head is not
clear to me. It is the result of the hair growing different
ways; but why the hair should not radiate from one point
instead of assuming a kind of circular twist is not obvious.

dates

LE ——<x<&x« -

289

There is such a crown on a cow’s face, between the eyes,
and the circular growth is often strongly marked. The hair
below—on the nose—grows downwards to the nostrils ; the hair
above—on the forehead—grows up and back to the horns. The
hair grows the same in a cat, but there is no definite crown.*

Darwin has remarked on the growth of the hair on the
arms—that it grows upwards to the elbow on the hinder part
of the forearm; and he suggests “that this is due to a habit
of Man’s ancestors sitting with their hands over their heads
to keep off rain, as some monkeys do who have the hair arranged
in the same way.”

In quadrupeds the direction of the hair on the limbs
should be downwards, in obedience to flow of rain; but on the
forearm of a dog and a pig there is a very similar arrangement
to what obtains in man—in the former, in fact, quite a slight
upward turn at the equivalent of the elbow.t

It may be that Darwin is to a certain extent correct in
his surmise, but the explanation hardly seems sufficient. It is
necessary to explain the direction of the hair on the dog’s and
pig’s legs; and rain does not seem the cause for this. t

Further, in Man the downward growth of the hair on the
inside of the arm and back of the hand does not accord with
this idea of the hands clasped over the head, for in such a
position the hair ought to grow on the backs of the hands in
the same direction as on the forearm.

[ * In the Bonnet monkey there is a very distinct crown on the back of the
head ; on the forehead and scalp the thin hair falls sideways from a central
parting. ]

[ft There is on the forearm of Cebus fatuellus, Capuchin monkey, the same
arrangement of hair as in Man. |

[ { Motion through the air having more effect than rain, on account of its
greater frequency, or any habits of seeking shelter might be a cause. |

290

CHARACTERS OF INFANTS, AND WHAT THEY POINT TO.

In early infancy the baby is distinguished by its receding
forehead, pouch-like cheeks,* and protruding jaws,t in fact, the
whole face slopes outwards from the top of the forehead, so that
the jaws are really the most prominent feature. The nose is
short, much depressed, almost flat with the face,t except the end
which is rather suddenly protruded. The end is well described
in popular language, which compares it to a little button; it is
obliquely truncate; the nostrils are large and open, rather
widely separated from one another, so that the end of the nose
is very broad comparatively.

When born, our infants have rather large heads; their
shoulders and arms are much more pronounced in proportion
to their size than in an adult; while on the contrary the buttocks
and legs are of miserable dimensions. It is noticeable that
growth is most pronounced in the legs after birth—which is
not surprising, considering the shape the child has to attain.

Dr Louis Robinson in a recent number of the “Nineteenth
Century” § has given some curious facts with regard to infants.
As the result of experiments on about 60 infants he found that
“in each case, with only two exceptions, the child was able to
hang on to the finger or a small stick three-quarters of an inch
in diameter by its hands, like an acrobat from a horizontal bar,
and sustain the whole weight of its body, for at least ten seconds.
In twelve cases, of infants under an hour old, half-a-minute

* See Plate, fig. 1.

[tCertain African monkeys (Cercopithecus) have cheek pouches each side of
the lower jaw, in which they stow food, as visitors to the Zoological Gardens
may often notice, The baby’s cheeks may be relics from a monkey which had
cheek pouches rather higher up. ]

[ {In young infants there is very little bridge to the nose. Throughout
life there is a progressive elevation of the bridge of the nose, (see Plate) while
there is practically no growth in width. ]

§ Nov., 1891, p. 838.

291

passed before the grasp relaxed, and in three or four nearly a
minute.” The strength increased with age up to two or three
weeks, one infant of the latter age hung on “for two minutes,
thirty-five seconds.” He further remarks that “invariably the
thighs are bent at right-angles to the body.” *

The difficulty of opening an infant’s closed hands is a
matter of common knowledge; and, in the light of the above
detailed experiments, the account of the infant Hercules
strangling the two serpents sent to kill him in his cradle is
not so mythical as might be supposed. It is noticeable than in
early infancy the baby always keeps its hands either very tight-
ly clasped with the thumb inside, or half-closed in the form of a
broad hook. Its fingers are nearly all of the same length, the
length of the hand is short compared to the breadth—in fact
the length of the middle finger is equal to the width across the
knuckles, while in an adult it equals half as much again.
Further, the power which an infant has over its hand and fingers
is extremely small, so far as flexibility is concerned. It cannot
flatten its hand out, but can only open it to a semi-clasped
position; it appears to have no ability to spread out its
fingers or to bend its wrist to any degree. Itis very awkward
in moving its arms; and has so little power to guide them
that it is unable to put its food directly into its mouth: it first
hits itself in the eye and then turns the head to bring the
mouth up to the hand.

Turning to the feet and legs, which are, so far as size is
concerned, really in what might be called an undeveloped
condition, it is remarkable to find that with them the infant
can perform movements of which an adult is practically incap-
able. In fact, the infant has more power over the muscles of
its toes and feet, and greater flexibility in its joints than an
adult, yet it is unable to support even part of its weight on its
legs. Without moving any other part of its legs the baby can
so twist its foot that the outer edge shall be in a direct line,

* The whole article is worth reading, but the facts in connection with infants
acrobatic performances are extremely curious.

292

transversely, to the legs—the soles of the feet being brought
flat together.* Further, the baby can move its toes one by
one, it can spread its toes out fan-like, it can move each toe
laterally to make a V between any of them—a movement
which many an adult cannot accomplish with his fingers—it
can separate the big toe particularly far from the next—there
being already a well-marked space between them; it can
retract the big toe with the last joint bent in the same way as
an adult can retract his thumb; in fact, it can move the big
toe just as an adult can his thumb.t

Now the ability to perform all these varied movements is
lost as the child grows older, instead of becoming more marked
as it gains in strength; and just in proportion as the ability
to move the toes decreases so does the power over the muscles
of the hand increase.

If we make enquiry among people in general as to why a
baby differs so much in structure, intelligence, and habits from
an adult one receives answers not altogether to the credit of the
general intellect. ‘‘ Because it is a baby”; “because it must
have shape and habits of some kind”; “because if it did not
differ it would not be a baby,” are some of the answers I have
obtained. Such answers are no explanation at all.

If, however, the law of earlier inheritance hold good
among the human race as among Ammonites—and if it does in
the latter it must in the former—the explanation of the baby’s
difference in structure, habits, etc., are, as in the case of
the infantile Ammonite: the various phases of babyhood are
approximately the morphological representations of various
adult ancestors; these phases acquired the characters of these
ancestors by the law of earlier inheritance.

*The shape of an infant’s foot should be noted. The toes nearly all of the
same length—the second, however, being longest of all—the front part of the
foot almost square across; while, behind, the heel is extremely small and
attenuated.

[ ¢ The big toe and the thumb are the only digits in which normally the last
joint can be moved independently of moving other joints. ]

293

The hairy coat, the short tail, and the arms as long as the
legs* of the human fcetus point to a quadrumanous or quadru-
pedal, tailed, hairy ancestor—in fact, a monkey. Much
of the hairy coat is shed before birth;* but very much
of it remains to be shed in the next three months. The lower
limbs are rather longer than the upper when the infant is
born, but are in an undeveloped state compared to the adult.
The short tail has disappeared, but a rudiment exists in the
skeleton. Nowhere, however, have I seen it stated that when
the infant is born it bears on its body what must be regarded
as excellent evidence of descent from tailed ancestors; but
such is the case. At the very base of the vertebral column,
exactly where the continuation of the vertebre—the tail—
would be protruded through the flesh, there is a small, deep,
circular depression, extremely noticeable in newly-born children.
This depression is exactly like the scar which would be left
if an animal’s tail had been amputated at the root—when
the wound had healed. That this circular depression marks
the place where the tail protruded is shewn by its position;
and that it is due to the muscles not having occupied the
space left vacant by the withdrawal or loss of the tail is very
plain. This circular depression, or tail-mark, which is some-
times quite a quarter-of-an-inch deep in the infant, becomes
shallower as the child grows older. In a girl of five years,
however, what I may call the tail-mark is still very notice-
able; but in older children it has practically disappeared.t

It may be concluded that in Man’s ancestors the tail was
considerably shortened before the hairy coat was lost; and that
in later generations, when the body became smooth, the tail
had practically disappeared. The loss of the tail no doubt
began with disuse.

* Louis Robinson, op. cit.

[ tInan adult female Gorilla, in the British Museum, the tail-mark is as
large as a florin. Its persistence is probably accounted for by the Gorilla not
having attained the upright carriage. ]

N

294

I cannot agree with Darwin’s method of accounting for
the loss of the tail—that the monkey found it in the way when
it sat down, that the tail became injured and abraided in
consequence of its sitting-down habits; and that such mutila-
tions were inherited, resulting in a shorter and shorter
tail.*

The effects of disuse, including what I may call non-
requirement—the tail from some cause, not growing in full
proportion to the rest of the body—possibly also economy of
growth on account of the material being required elsewhere—
would account, by the law of earlier inheritance, for the
gradual shortening and final disappearance of the tail in the
generations of ancestors preceding Man.

Loss of hair I presume to have arisen, as I said before,
as a correlation of growth on account of changed habits; +
but the loss of hair might very likely have been accelerated by
sexual selection. Iam also ready to admit that the tail may
have come under the same influence.

It must, however, be remembered particularly that in
neither case would sexual selection be the first cause of failing
hair or shortening tail. Sexual selection would certainly not
come into operation until some other causes had reduced the
hair and tail so as to render certain members of the community
conspicuous in these respects.

If sexual selection did come into play it would cause those
who exhibited tail and hair in full vigour to be looked down
upon by their less well-furnished companions. The compliment
would, no doubt, be returned; and then contempt might
become active in inducing hatred and feuds between the rival
parties. In this connection it is curious to notice that beings
for which Man wishes to express scorn, as well as those which
he hates because he fears them, are represented as having tails.

* Darwin, “ Descent of Man,” 2nd Ed., p. 59, 1888.

+ Or from economy—the material which maintained hair being more
urgently required elsewhere, as in adult Man’s scalp to-day.

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295

The devil of the Christian religion will at once occur to mind;
but the Satyri of the Roman religion are still more interesting:
They are represented with bristly hair, pointed ears, and a tail
among other features; they inhabited woods and were greatly
feared by travellers. Not at all improbably there was constant
war between the smooth-skinned, tailless ancestors of Man,
and their less-changed, hairy cousins, whom they looked upon
with contempt for their shape, as well as a wholesome fear
for their wilder ways; and the memory of these wild cousins
has very probably been handed down and become the foundation
of such creatures as Satyrs and Devils, though lapse of time
has altered and added to their characteristics somewhat.

I have remarked on the ability of an infant with its toes.
Such ability is lost among our children in less than eighteen
months, even if the child have never worn boots; but it is im-
possible to think that this ability was always confined to the
infantile stage. It is of no possible use to the child; and
many of the movements are those which would not be performed
in walking. But these itovements become intelligible by the
theory of earlier inheritance. Looking at monkeys and their
manner of using their hind limbs explains the child’s move-
ments. The power to twist the soles sideways would be
necessary in tree-climbing; the use of the big toe as a thumb
and other movements have been often enough explained.

No doubt as the monkey-ancestors grew older they
became more and more expert with their feet, just as we
become more and more expert with our hands; and the ability
of the adult monkey with its toes has become the ability of the
human infant to-day.*

The loss of this ability, and the movements of a child
before it can walk correspond to the manner in which the pre-
human, tree-climbing quadrumana gradually lost their cunning
with their hind-hands, through using these more and more
as their only means of support. When the infant is first stood
by its mother on her lap, it always stands on the outer edges

* An infant monkey, it is asserted by many writers, is a helpless animal.

n2

296

of its feet, or rather of the front part of the foot—the heel is
not put down; and when the child first tries to walk it always
does so on its toes—the ankle and heel which correspond to the
monkey’s hock and os calcis being elevated and kept off the
ground, as in monkeys walking on a branch. Further, the
child is more or less bow-legged—the result of its ancestors’
tree-climbing habits; it turns its feet in, and it curls its toes,
especially the big toe, as if to grip the carpet—just as a
monkey would have to do to grip a branch. Often at this
stage the child will progress for a while and then support
itself on all fours. Only at a later stage does the heel touch
the ground, while the feet are turned straighter in front. By
this time our children have almost entirely lost that peculiar
ability to move the toe- and ankle-joints, which they had
just after birth.

All these processes represent the manner in which the
adult monkey-like ancestors must have acquired the power of
walking. Just asa man does not acquire the character of a
definitely-formed hand-writing until nearly mature—and even
after that gains greater and greater speed with practice—so
it is reasonable to imagine that the monkey-ancestors, or what-
ever one calls them, were, at one stage of the phylogenetic
series, unable to bend their hocks sufficiently to touch the
ground until they became mature, and had had much practice.
So to walk as we are able to do now must have been an accom-
plishment only acquired by adults at a still later date in the
phylogenetic series.* During all these stages, too, there
would have been a gradual reduction in the length of the
metatarsus, as the enormous leverage would be very unnecessary.

The gradual loss of power over the muscles of the toes
and ankles has, among our own children, been accelerated by
the practice of wearing boots. Even in this matter, however,
earlier inheritance is exemplified; because when boots first

{* This is proved by the adult Gorilla, which, though a very powerful
animal, is unable to walk freely on its hind legs—it helps itself with its arms.
In power of walking the adult Gorilla is a morphological equivalent of a twelve
months’-old human infant. |

297

came into use this early loss of power could not immediately
have been the result. Such loss would have been gradual, and
would become, as in fact it does now, more pronounced the
older the individual. It may be reasonably assumed, therefore,
that at one time, even in adults, there was greater flexibility
of these muscles than there is now in our own children ; and, if
such were the case, our own children can only have obtained
this loss of power by earlier inheritance.

In savages the toes are said to be much more perfectly
articulated than in civilised man; and this would bear out the
argument. It would also shew that the loss of power has been
accelerated by boots, though correlation of growth may also
have played a part.

Turning from the feet to the arms and hands, the remark-
able facts recorded by Dr Robinson prove undoubtedly the
descent of Man from arboreal quadrumana. Infants are able
to perform a feat which, as he remarks, “ would tax the strength
of many an adult.” This power has been gained, in my
opinion, from adult monkey-ancestors, in accordance with the
law of earlier inheritance: for it is presumable that when, far
back in the phylogenetic series, monkey-like animals* first
took to an arboreal life, their young would not have possessed
such power as this. In course of generations, however, the
young obtained at any rate some of this power by earlier
inheritance. The same law would hold good in the case of
human infants in relation to adult monkey-ancestors ; but at
the same time, though the babies of the phylogenetic series
have acquired this strength from their adults by the law of
earlier inheritance, yet the reason our children retain any
portion of this strength is due to the habits of young monkeys.
(See page 305).

With this strength of arm, however, there is a want of
flexibility in the hands. In very early infancy the hands have
a semi-clasped hook-like shape which ancestors might have
developed from the habit of constantly grasping boughs—

[ * Like the Lemuroidea, for instance. ]

298

especially if they used the hands for that purpose and for no
other. That such an idea is not unreasonable anyone may
know by the difficulty experienced in unclasping the hands after
having subjected them to severe muscular strain in a clasping
position; and, further, Darwin tells us that certain species
of monkeys, from habitually using their hands as hanging
hooks, have developed hands in which the hook-like form
is permanent—the fingers have partially grown together, or in
some species the thumb is absent.*

SomE FURTHER CHARACTERS OF CHILDREN.

I may in this connection notice some other characters of
infants and children. When, after birth, infants are placed on
the knee they have an instinctive dread of falling, and will cling
on to the arm or anything with a very strong grip.t Later,
when carried on the arm they will, apparently quite unneces-
sarily, support themselves by grasping, preferably, the mother’s
hair; they take a great delight in clutching their father’s
beard, and, in fact, anything of a furry nature. Several
observers state that monkeys hang on to the mother’s hair to
be carried about; and this may also explain the pleasure which
children take in being ridden pick-a-back. The delight a baby
feels in getting its clothes off—the joy of babies and children
at being tossed in the air or jumped about—their pleasure in
coming downstairs head-first—the fear of even small babies for
strangerst—the fondness of children for noise—their liking

* Darwin, ‘‘ Descent of Man,” 2nd Ed., p. 51.

+ This happens even when first washed—about an hour after birth. My wife
has many times remarked to me that the baby could grip her hard enough to be
painful—this would be at about ten days old.

t The power to recognise strangers is exhibited in babies very early indeed ;
and they are generally frightened at them. They express their fright by a
scream, and by trying to turn away. It may be noted that the infant’s scream
of fright or of pain is very shrill and entirely different to the ordinary cry or yell
when it requires food or wants to be nursed. Infants also possess another cry—
a sort of cooing noise of pleasure ; but this is not developed so early.

299

for sweet things—their capacity for fruit, even the most hard
and unripe—their love of stealing, of hiding away in corners
to eat—these are not the result of mere cussedness on their
part, but are characteristics inherited from monkey-like
parents—characteristics which would have been the natural
accompaniment of life in the woods, where they would have to
spring from tree to tree, to get what food they could and how
they could, and to possess, advisedly, a wholesome fear of
strangers.

Further, take the manner in which our infants are got off
to sleep—by rocking them in the arms or in the cradle. This,
it seems to me, is an inheritance of monkeyhood ; and the fond
mother, while scorning the very idea of her darling being in
any way connected with a monkey, gives you fair excuse for
coming to a contrary conclusion when she imitates the to-and-
fro swaying of the branches, and rocks her baby to sleep in the
cradle, singing the while—

“ Lull-a-by baby on the tree top
When the wind blows the cradle shall rock,”

“Whether some lingering tradition of a former arboreal
life inspired the idea of this ditty I cannot say ; but, undoubt-
edly, it fairly describes the kind of rest a monkey would have
among the swaying branches. And the swaying of the
branches would have become as important and absolutely
necessary for the sound sleep of a monkey, as the motion of
the vessel becomes to the repose of sailors—they make com-
plaint of their inability to sleep soundly on land after a long
voyage.

There are numerous other actions and habits peculiar to
children which we call natural, simply because we are so
accustomed to see children perform them, though why they
should do so is not a question very often put. If, however, we
consider that infants and children are the morphological repre-
sentation of monkey-like ancestors and of savage Man, and if
we think that some of the habits of the earlier stage would
persist into the later stage partly by inheritance, partly by

300

imitation, and partly by the same cause being potent, we can
fathom the reason for nearly all the actions and habits of
infants and children, and even for some of the strange ways
of older persons (the fear of women for snakes). We shall
thus see that the popular voice which applies the term “young
monkey” to children is much nearer the truth than most people
are inclined to admit; and if again we ask why these various
habits arose in these ancestors it can easily be answered that
they were the necessary results of environment, in the same
way that the habits of adults at the present day are moulded
by the exigencies of their surroundings.

Some of the habits of children seem to point not so much
to monkeys as even to a lower grade in the scale. There can
be no doubt that such characters are not spontaneous but have
been inherited. For instance, the fondness of children for
bones is curious. A child, I believe, seldom refuses a bone,
even after the very fullest meal; and if it be allowed to run
out of doors to gnaw it, its delight is increased tenfold. More
remarkable still however is the fact that a sick child will
greedily gnaw a bone when it refuses all other food—yet this
is but an illustration of the law that atavic characters are
more developed in a feeble state of the body.

It is well known that animals have a considerable distaste
to eating or drinking after one another. Domestic animals,
horses, sheep, and cattle, unless driven by hunger, will exhibit
this tendency—in fact, horses are extremely particular about
not drinking water touched by another horse. Children shew
the same trait of character—they are extremely particular
about not eating or drinking one after another. This cannot
arise from any habit of cleanliness, as in their elders; for in
the matter of want of cleanly habits children approximate
closely to lower animals. It seems to me however that Natural
Selection strengthened this character in the lower animals—that
those who were particular not to eat or drink after others
thereby escaped contracting diseases. Inheritance has pre-
served this trait in our children.

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301

It is a matter of common knowledge that children almost
habitually kneel up to go to sleep, and so bring all their limbs
beneath them in a quadrupedal fashion. Dr Robinson has
noticed this in the paper quoted. All my children have slept in
this fashion as soon as they could shift for themselves, until
they were about three years of age.* I know, however, of cases
of adults who habitually go to sleep in this quadrupedal
fashion ; although they usually turn in their sleep. Some fond
parents, thinking their own reason superior to the child’s
instinct, have gone to great lengths to break the child of this,
as they thought, unnatural habit: more probably their efforts
did much injury to the child’s nervous system.

On RoupiIMeEnts.

I may, perhaps, add a few notes on rudiments, although
they have been elaborately treated by Darwin in his “ Descent
of Man.”

The ear is rudimentary so far as the outside portions are
concerned—which are but remnants of the large ears possessed
by animals. Darwin has called attention to the “projecting
point,+”? which is common in man. It may be noted that the
overhung ears of terriers afford us a very good idea of the
process by which this point would come to be the only indi-
cation of a formerly upright fold—first, the drop-over owing
to disuse—second, reduction in size for the same reason.

The power to move the ears which most animals possess in a
very marked degree has been lost through disuse in the case of
Man and the Anthropoid apes;{ but the muscles are present,
only in a rudimentary condition. Sometimes they are slightly
efficient in Man. I have a striking instance of this in the

*When a baby is cross, nurses often quiet it by turning it on its stomach
across their knees.

+“ Descent of Man,” 2nd Edition, p. 11.

¢ The external ears of many of the Anthropoid apes are smaller and more
rudimentary than those of Man.

302

case of a member of my family circle, who possesses the power
to move her ears in an unusual degree. More curious still,
when she wishes to listen intently she instinctively moves her
ears, so that she actually and literally “pricks up”? her ears in
order to catch a sound. I have noticed that the upper portion
of the ear is moved from the lower, though the whole ear is
elevated.* The upper posterior part of the ear is moved
towards the head, and the anterior part of the helix is moved
forwards as well as slightly projected. There was also a
circular movement of the whole ear. [As Professor Harker
informed me that it had been stated the human ear could not
be moved without the scalp, we arranged an exhibition for
him showing that the ears could be moved quite independently. |

The senses of hearing, sight, and smell are possessed by
Man, especially civilised Man, in a very inferior condition,
merely because it is not of vital necessity that these senses
should be kept at the high level of efficiency maintained by
the agency of Natural Selection in the case of wild animals.
That animals use the sense of smell more than sight in recog-
nition of anything is proved by the way in which a dog
recognises his master, and an ewe her lamb. The dog recog-
nising the master tends to shew that each individual of the
human species possesses a scent peculiar to himself,t although
we are not able to recognise more than a general odour.{ It
would appear, however, that children have the sense of smell
more developed than their elders; and they make use of it like
animals. They are very particular not to wear each others
clothes, which they declare to stink; but one of my girls, if
asked whether a certain one of the various night-shirts be hers
or not, does not recognise it by sight or touch, but says: ‘“ Dib

* The top part of the ear is elevated between three and four mm.

+ There are probably also racial peculiarities of smell—Chinese asserting that
the smell of Europeans is most distasteful to them ; the Europeans returning

the compliment.

+ Negroes and Indians, however, can recognise persons in the dark by their
odour, (Darwin, “ Descent of Man.” )

303

it me and let me ’mell it.” One sniff; and she either rejects
it with scorn if it be the wrong one, or complacently admits
that it is hers.

The furrow which exists between the nose and the upper
lip, and the point projecting from the upper lip are much more
marked in children than in older persons. These are really
vestiges of a former condition; for, to my mind, they obviously
indicate that certain ancestors, somewhere in the phylogen-
etic series, possessed’a divided lip—commonly known as the
hare-lip, from the animal shewing it—and that the two parts
of this lip have grown together again to form the single lip as
we possess it. This idea receives further confirmation from the
fact that in two of my children there is a distinct scar down
the middle of the furrow.*

The mammae in the male are rudimentary, but curiously
enough they are more developed in young boys than in young
girls. Also at birth boys possess more milk than girls—in one
boy it lasted for more than a fortnight. The toes are certainly
in a rudimentary condition, and all but the big toe are probably
on the high road to disappearance. So far is the rudimentary
condition sometimes carried that I know a case in which the
little toes are mere lumps of gristle, without bone. For the
little toe to be without any joint is not an uncommon
occurrence.

Man’s CHARACTERISTICS IN REGARD TO HEREDITY.

The evidence which Man furnishes in support of the law
of earlier inheritance is not so clear as in the case of
Ammonites; because it is not possible to obtain as with the
latter a successive series of the various phases of development,
extending over such a space of time as is represented by Lias
and Oolite. It may, however, be advantageous to briefly sum
up what Man shews in this connection. The flexibility of the

[*In Hiickel’s “ Anthropogenie,” Vol. II., 4th Edition, p. 670, fig. 329, the
human embryo is represented with a slit lip—the slit divides the nostrils too. ]

304

muscles of the feet and toes must have been acquired by
ancestors, aS the result of taking to an arboreal life. Such
flexibility would become more perfect in the adults by constant
practice, and would be transmitted to their descendants earlier
and earlier, so that those descendants would be able to reach
still higher degrees of perfection. The same would be the case
with the subsequent loss of the ability, owing to the abandon-
ment of an arboreal life and consequent use of the hind limbs
as mere supports on a flat surface. The young of such animals
would still retain the old tree-climbing abilities and propen-
sities; and only in later life would they, by constant practice,
be able to assume something like the erect attitude. The
ability to assume the erect attitude and to walk on the feet
would be inherited earlier and earlier, and would in course of
time appear as a character of the infantile stage—as in the
human baby.

It is the same with the loss of tail and the loss of hair. It
is impossible to imagine that these characters arose as spon-
taneous or abnormal variations in the infants of certain quad-
rumana, and that these characters gave to these possessors
such preponderating advantages that they ousted all their
rivals in the struggle for existence. But if it be impossible to
believe this, how is it possible to account for the disappearance
of hair and loss of tail in the infant about the time of birth,
except by the law of earlier inheritance ?

A case analogous to the loss of body-hair is going on at
the present day—namely baldness; and as this occurs during
maturity—even in some cases while physical strength may be
at its maximum—we may assume that the loss of body-hair
occurred in the same way at the mature stage of life in our
ancestors. Then it was transmitted by the law of earlier
inheritance—gradually, at the same time, becoming no doubt a
more perfect and extended process in the adults—until at the
present day the human infant loses the greater portion of its
hairy covering by the time it is three months old. The same
arguments may be applied to the other characters which I have
enumerated ; but I think these suffice to illustrate the evidence
of earlier inheritance which Man affords.

305

Of “the unequal action of earlier inheritance” and of the
“elimination of dissimilar stages” I cannot give any satisfac-
tory proof from Man’s ontogeny;* but I shall refer to these
later when I treat of Man’s future. Of “the modification of
earlier inheritance,” however, the human infant furnishes
excellent examples. Although able to support the weight of
its body by the arms directly after birth, it is unable to do the
same with its legs; yet this want of strength cannot have been
shewn by itsadult ancestors. My theory supposes that this want
of strength is, to a certain extent, adaptive—that since the young
of Man or of monkey has not had to get upon its legs in order
to suck the mother, strength of leg is not an absolute necessity
of existence, and it has therefore been temporarily lost by
disuse. At the same time the material which would have been
employed to supply this strength is more advantageously and
economically used elsewhere. If it were an absolute necessity
that the baby should walk, it would be able to do so directly it
is born, like calves and lambs.t

It may be objected that if the loss of leg-power is an
instance of “ modification of earlier inheritance,” why has not
the strength of arm been lost also since the human infant does

*Embryology would furnish proofs. Among Ammonites the proofs are
numerous, and the reader is referred to my Monograph, published by the
Palzontographical Society, 1886-1892, et seq.

+ Kittens, puppies, and young pigs are very awkward in their movements, and
quite unable to escape from any foe ; these facts may be regarded as instances of
modification of earlier inheritance. There has been no necessity for them to be
nimble, as their parents are able to protect them, These animals, too, suck the
mother when she is lying down, so that they have not even any stimulus to urge
them to exertion. It would probably be found as a universal law that the young
of preying animals are ungainly ; while the young of those preyed upon and who
save themselves by flight are very nimble—like a foal to whom flight is a
necessity of salvation—unless the mother has some means of carrying, protecting,
or hiding her young. The same law applies to birds hatched in nests on trees,
etc,, and to birds (partridges, fowls, etc.) hatched on the ground. The former are
helpless, unfeathered, and require to be fed, the latter are downy, able to run
about, and to feed themselves. That the young of dogs, cats, etc., are unable to
see for some days after birth is again an illustration of the law of modification.
It arises from these animals having aboriginally been born in caves.

306

not use its arms to support itself while sucking the mother.
I have previously remarked that the reason why the strength
of arm is retained by infants must be sought in the habits of
young monkeys. Now baby-monkeys have not to stand on
their legs in order to suck their mothers, and so modification of
earlier inheritance has deprived them of strength therein; but
they have to use their arms in order to hold to their mother’s
hair, that she may have her arms free to get from branch to
branch. The human infant, however, has not to do even this
much; and modification of earlier inheritance will, in time,
deprive it of the strength of arm now left. Such strength of
arm has doubtless become greatly attenuated already—it can
be a mere nothing compared to the strength of an adult
monkey, it can be but a tithe or less of that possessed by baby
monkeys. The reason, however, why modification has left
some strength in the arms is simply that it is a slow process,
and that it has not had so long to act as in the case of the legs.
Modification of arm-strength can only have commenced after
our ancestors abandoned an arboreal existence; modification of
leg-strength is a well-marked feature among monkeys them-
selves.

The fact that the human infant is born without teeth must
also be regarded as a modification of earlier inheritance. If
the law of earlier inheritance acted thoroughly in every way,
the human infant ought to be born with its teeth in full
vigour; because it is impossible to conceive the adult monkey-
like progenitors of Man as being toothless, any more than to
imagine them unable to use their legs.

Modification of earlier inheritance plays a most important
part among Ammonites; but it seems to have entirely escaped
observation. Many excellent workers in Ammonite-genealogy
have, to my thinking, been led astray by not making due allow-
ance for this phenomenon; and I have myself been misled in
the same way. A too strict adherence to the details of onto-
geny has resulted in genealogies with too many branches and
too many gaps—at least so it seems to me in the light of this
law of modification.

ee ee

307

ConcEerRNING THE Later Sraces in THE Evouurion or Man.

T have said that the early stages of Man’s life shews that
he is descended from a quadrumanous, arboreal, tailed ances-
tor—in other words from a monkey. It then becomes
important to consider if it be possible to define his parentage
more closely than this.

Monkeys are divided into two groups—the Platyrhini,
with nostrils more or less wide apart and separate, and the
Catarhini, with nostrils close together, situated each side of a
septum which protrudes below them.*

Man, as Darwin says, agrees in his dentition with the
Catarhini ; and he brings forward various arguments to support
his conclusion that man is simply a development of one of the
Catarhine apes.t

Among his arguments he mentions Man’s nostrils. Now
certainly the shape and structure of the nostrils of the adult
European are like those of the Catarhine monkeys; but the
nostrils of a baby are wide apart, and considerably unlike
them. The baby’s nostrils, it is true, are separated by a
septum, but this septum is very broad, and not at all promi-
nent; and the nose is obliquely truncate—in fact, the baby’s
nose stands between the noses of the Catarhine and Platyrhine
monkeys in point of shape and structure.

The developmental changes which transform the infant’s
nose into the adult’s nose during the individual’s life may be
stated to be an elevation of the bridge, an elongation of the
cartilage, a certain lateral compression of the nostrils, and a
certain attenuation of the septum. The stages of change may
be supposed to have occurred in Man’s phylogenetic history as
adult characters.

[ * The Catarhini have 32 teeth, the Platyrhini, 36.]

[ t+ In the British Museum Man and the higher monkeys are placed together
as Catarhini.]

[{ An adult negro is a morphological equivalent of an European baby so far
as the nose is concerned, ]

308

These changes certainly would not evolve the nose of an
adult Huropean from a Catarhine monkey, because the nose of
a Catarhine monkey is more developed (further removed from
a Platyrhine) than that of an infant. To change the nose of
a Catarhine monkey into the nose of a baby it would be
necessary to suppose a reversion of development, followed by a
renewal of the development which produces narrow-nosed adult
from broad-nosed infant.

On the other hand, to suppose the Catarhini and Man
both the descendants of a Platyrhine monkey—to consider
Man, not as a descendant, but merely as a development homo-
plastic of the Catarhini, only requires one to imagine that
under certain conditions a Platyrhine nose develops into a
Catarhine nose; and that this is the order of developmental
change is seen by the fact that the broad-nosed baby becomes
the narrower-nosed man.

There is a curious piece of evidence which seems to support
the contention that Man is a descendant of the Platyrhine
monkeys. I have mentioned the furrow beneath the nose—so
very conspicuous in young children; and I hav> said this
furrow probably represents the divided lip grown together
again. I was curious to know which of the monkeys shewed
this furrow, and I asked a friend to inspect the specimens in
the Zoological Gardens for me. The answer I received was :—

“In Cebus fatuellus, the Capuchin, the only Platyrhine
monkey I could see, there is a distinct groove which passes
from between the nostrils to the upper lip, increasing in inten-
sity downwards. In none of the Catarhini that I saw, namely,
Maeacus, various species, Cercopithecus, and Cynocephalus is
there any trace of a median groove—instead the nasal septum
passes downwards towards the lip below the level of the
nostrils. In “Sally,” the Chimpanzee, there was, as in other
Catarhini, no median groove.” This absence of the furrowed
lip in Catarhine monkeys is certainly very important.

[Since this paper was written, I have, by the kindness of
Dr Gunther, for which I return my best thanks, been able to
handle specimens from the cases of the British Museum ; and I

309

have inspected the monkeys in the Zoological Gardens with the
following results.

The divided lip which is in perfection in the Marsupalia
and Rodentia, and in different degrees of retrogression in the
Carnivora and the Lemuroidea* is unrepresented in the
Catarhine monkeys—the lip being perceptibly plain; but it is
represented in certain Platyrhine monkeys, notably in Cebus,
by a furrow. In the specimens in the Zoological Gardens the
furrow was very noticeable. There is a great facial likeness
between Cebus and a baby—a slight elevation of the space
between the nostrils being almost all that is required to
complete the resemblance; for in babies the nose is sometimes
as broad across the nostrils as it is long, and there is practically
no bridge.] That such an elevation is in the normal process of
development may be seen from the changes in shape of nose
during a human individual’s life.t

Further about Cebus is the shape of the ear—it is certainly
the most like a human ear of any that I could see. Also in
Darwin’s figure of Cebus vellerosus the hair grows from the
front to Uhe back of the head—the same as in Man; and
although I’have shewn that presumably in the ancestry of
Man the hair was lost from the head for a time, yet when
it re-appeared—being a reversion—it would probably assume the
direction it possessed before.

To my mind, Cebus is the nearest morphological equivalent
to the ancestors of Man that has been found. It is beginning
to be recognised in biology, although it has not yet had much
effect on classification, that similar characteristics may be

[*In the dog and cat it is in a half-joined condition—in the Lemuroidea
the two side pieces are separated and partly joined to a depressed septum. ]

[+In many specimens details of the nose and lip had been obscured in
stuffing. |

} The developmental changes necessary to convert the nose of Cebus into the
nose of a baby are hardly more striking than the changes necessary to convert the
obliquely truncate, broad nose of a baby into the elongate, narrow nose of an
adult ; and the latter we know to be possible, as they occur during life in ourselves.

Oo

310

homoplastic but not homogeneous. The fact that Mau agrees
with the Catarhines in his dentition is no proof that he is not
descended from an independent stock, the members of which
have died out ; because decrease in number of teeth has been a
developmental process started long before the Platyrhines, and
this developmental process would continue in separate stocks,
producing homoplastic results.* On the other hand, though it
seems curious to place more stress on the furrow in the lip than
on the teeth, this furrow once lost would not be evolved again
except for some very special reason.t The possession of this
relic by Man and its absence in the Catarhine monkeys points
to the latter being, so far as this feature is concerned, more
advanced than Man, and shews that Man and the Catarhine
monkeys are independent homoplastic developments from a
Platyrhine ancestor.{

Looking at the various races of Man it may be seen that
the flat nose with broad nostrils prevails much more than the
elongate nose with narrow nostrils. Certainly the Fuegians—
usually considered a very low type of mankind—have very
elongate noses; but the broad nose of our infants differs
entirely from that, nor can the Fuegians’ nose have developed
into the nose of our infants, except by supposing a complete
reversal of the developmental change observable in ourselves in
the course of life.

On the other hand, another very low race of men, the
Bosjesman or Bushman of South Africa, have the broad, flat
nose. The description of them by the Rev. J. G. Wood$
I summarize as follows :—

* And is in continuance in the present day. The Carnivora too are examples
of similar reduction in number of teeth.

[+A furrow divides the nostrils and lip in the human embryo six weeks
old. Haeckel “ Anthropogenie,” Vol. II,, Ed. 4, p, 670, fig. 329. The nose and
lip have a facies something between that of the Lemurs and Platyrhines. ]

[ t The furrow becomes obsolete in adult and senile man—more noticeable in
the female, because of the absence of moustache. This shews that it is in a
retrogressive condition. The absence of the furrow in senile man and in the
Catarhini is thus shewn to be homoplastic but not homogenous, ]

§ “Nat. Hist. Man.” Vol. I., p. 265, et seg.

ee

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\

ee tae te

311

“Imperfect language, they can hardly understand one
another; true physiognomy of small blue ape of Kaffaria; about
five feet high; scanty tufts of hair, short bristly beard ; sight
as good as an Huropean’s with a telescope ; wide flattened nostrils
very sensitive ; trusts as much to his nose as his eyes. Children
(p. 273), skull projecting exceedingly behind; short, woolly
hair growing so low down on forehead that they look as if
they were afflicted with hydrocephalus.”

I presume the hair is thinner in adults than in children
from these remarks, and the beard to be a mere rudiment of that
possessed by his quadrumanous ancestors.

As to the size of the animal from which Man came it seems
most probable, from the short stature of the Bosjesman, as well
as from the fact that the human foetus shews legs only about
as long as the arms, that Man came from a small form of
monkey. This is supported by another fact, that increase of
stature is a developmental variation in Man under favourable
conditions; and Darwin says that the social habits of Man
would more likely arise from his ancestors being small and
having of necessity to band together for protection from
common foes. This very banding may have been the cause of
the increase of intellect and improvement of speech, which
gradually made a monkey into Man.

Now the various steps by which Man has been evolved—in
fact the ancestry of Man as shewn by part of his own ontogeny
—may be summed up as follows :—

1.—A quadrumanous animal with body and face covered
with hair, which hair shewed an inclination to become
thinner in later life: and with a tail of which he
made no great use. LHarlier inheritance of these
features in time produced—

2.—A quadrumanous animal without a tail and without
hair on the front of the body, while the rest of
the hair became thinner with age. This animal
was beginning to favour the erect position. The
earlier inheritance of the above for many genera-
tions produced—

02

312

3.—An animal in which the erect position had become a
settled mature character. The body generally with-
out hair; but some on the head and forehead, and
perhaps a little on the back.

These steps are only an expansion of Man’s ontogeny; and

I have shewn in discussing the changes in hairiness the reasons
for supposing these steps. The further development of the last
stage would seem to lead directly to the Bosjesman; and from
such a stock it would be possible for the various races of Man to
have branched off somewhat in this fashion.

1.—Races with woolly hair, slight beards, and monkey-
like faces with broad noses. They are, perhaps, a
derivation from and improvement of the Bosjesman.

2.—Races in which the hair became almost lost ; and these
seem to have further developed and split up into—

(a) Races which acquired by reversion, hair on the
head, but little or no beard.

(b) Races similarly advanced, but in which the nose
has considerably developed and has become
very prominently elongate, or as I might say,
of the catarhine type.

8.—Aryan race, which also acquired head-hair by rever-
sion; and still later obtained much hair on the face.
The nose tends to become elongate in adult age.

4.—Native Australians, which in the matter of hairiness
seem to be still further advanced than the Aryans.

“Their faces so heavily bearded that scarcely the

nose is perceptible among the mass of hair which

covers the cheeks nearly up to their eyes. Several
of the elder men are very remarkable for the de-
velopment of the hair, which covers the whole of

the breast and arms with a thick coating of pile.” *

As I have remarked this hairiness of the breast is exactly the
last acquired feature in Europeans, and by earlier inheritance
it will become more pronounced in time, provided, of course,
that vitality is sufficient to maintain it.

*J. G. Wood, “ Nat. Hist. Man,” page 2, Vol. II.

=

313

Straighter faces with more prominent foreheads, and hair-
iness of face and chest are developmental features in adult life
of the Aryan race. It follows that a broad-nosed, oblique
face, and want of hair indicate men which are lower in the
scale than the Aryans. Now the Fuegians are, as I have said,
generally considered the lowest type of mankind; yet their
prominent elongate noses as well as hair of the head indicate
that they, are biologically, above the Bosjesman, and also that
they are not ancestors of the Aryans. It is evident, on the other
hand, that a form like the Bosjesman or at any rate an adult
form of which the young Bosjesman may be considered the
morphological representation would have been the parental form
of the Aryan and of Man in general ; for this form would shew in
a less developed degree just those features which distinguish
our infants from ourselves.

Man’s Furuse.

It may be interesting to note, very briefly, the direction in
which development is tending, according to the changes
observable in life, and according to the laws of Heredity
laid down.

The changes necessary to transform a monkey something
like Cebus into a human infant must have been somewhat as
follows:—A reduction of prognathous face by decreasing the
jaws in correlation with an increasing skull—the very feature
of development being an increased use of brain and a decreased
use of the jaws—the growth of a more and more distinct nose
_increased use of the hands—decreased use of the feet as
organs of prehension, but increased use of the legs as organs
of locomotion—and consequent increase in length of the leg
from the thigh to the ankle (hock) correlating with decrease
in length from the ankle to the toes.*

Now it may be observed that for the infant to become
the Man by actual developmental growth all these same
changes are continued in the same manner, and become more

* And loss of tail ; but this is practically completed.

314

accentuated—the reduction of the jaw and the increase of the
skull being the most marked features. The prognathous face
with receding forehead of the infant gradually elongates during
life, and assumes a less and less prognathous character, owing to
the great amount of growth in the upper portion of the face—
the forehead especially. (Compare the figures in the Plate.)

In adult Man, age, say twenty, the face may be called
almost upright—the nose is longer and narrower than in the
infant, the toes are not separately articulated.* Soon after this
time physical strength begins to decline, but the brain-power
increases, and the increased brain-power demands increased
skull, which grows more and more over the eyes.

Soon after twenty in some cases—I take extreme examples
the better to illustrate the development—the hair, the teeth,
and the sight begin to fail. As years progress they decline
more and more, and in adyanced age they fail altogether.
Another feature of advanced age is the extreme beak-like
elongation of the nose.t

* The feet certainly do not grow so large in proportion to the increased size
of the man as they did formerly, while the legs are probably longer. The toes
become more and more useless and less under control ; with the exception of the
big toe they are really rudimentary, and no doubt the tendency is to develop a
one-toed foot.

[+ By the law of earlier inheritance we are advancing to being a longer-nosed
race; but why, is not clear. That it is an inherent property among the
Primates may be inferred from the independent development of nose in such
different stocks as adult Europeans, Jews, Fuegians, and Semmopithecus nasicus
(the Nose-ape), Among ourselves the long nose which is an adult feature is corre-
lated with other adult features—decline of physical strength and increase of
brain-power—therefore the appearance of pronounced nose early in life among
ourselves would probably be accompanied by one or both of these characters.
Among the Jews—a race which may be considered to have longest maintained a
high civilised standard, the nose isa very prominent feature ; their intellectual
activity and disinclination for manual labour are well known. Among the
Fuegians and Semmopithecus nasicus the nose has not been acquired in conjunc-
tion with these features ; and therefore among them ‘“‘nosiness” would not have
the same significance, Among ourselves, the poorer classes in London seem the
most long-nosed on the average, and they are exposed to conditions which we
call the most unnatural, and are least able to escape the effects thereof. Among
us, men of all classes are, on the average, more ‘‘nosey” than women—a snub-
nosed man being a rarity.]

315

Now by the laws of earlier inheritance, supposing these
individuals to leave a long line of progeny continuing for many
generations, these features of old age would become features of
immaturity, and then of infancy. In this case the two toothless
periods—now infancy and old age—would be brought closer
together ; and by the law of elimination of dissimilar stages
(page 268), which works to obviate useless changes, the result
can be appreciated.

Perhaps, however, it is of little advantage to speculate on
the future of the present quick-developing classes. Nature
shews the same law everywhere—the quickly-developing forms
die out—the slowly-developing forms live on; they propagate
again and again series after series which go through the same
quick-development and die out in turn; while still the slowly-
developing forms live on, and, in time, very, very gradually pass
through the same changes as the quick-developing forms
did—ultimately perhaps to reach a higher stage of development.

In time—a distant time truly, but none the less certain—
the European, the quick-developing race, will disappear alto-
gether.* The average physical strength of the race is
diminishing. Life is certainly prolonged to a greater age, but
only too frequently on the principle of the cracked cup often
outlasting the sound one. Medical Science and Philanthropy,
though admirable for the individual, absolutely necessary for a
high degree of civilisation, and indispensable for the evolution
of scientific thought are decidedly detrimental to the race.
They keep alive and allow to multiply just those weakly
members who would be so surely and summarily weeded out by
that rotigh-and-ready process known as Natural Selection. In
the distant future, when that over-population which they do so
much to cherish, (teste India at the present day) precipitates
a genuine struggle for existence, the races in which Natural
Selection has been checked the most will assuredly go to the

* Great fertility may accompany very considerable retrogression, as Ammon-
ites often shew—the almost sudden disappearance of an extremely prolific stock
being a well-known feature. As a whole the Ammonites were far more prolific
than the Nautili; yet the former are long ago extinct, the latter still survive.

316

wall, A race in which a high level of physical vitality is main-
tained by a constant struggle for existence, under arduous but
healthy conditions—a race able to subsist on a sparing quantity
of food from the same cause—a race unaffected by so-called
civilization—and a race sufficiently prolific withal, is the one
which is destined to occupy the place of the European. Strange
as it may seem, the Chinese appear to be fitted for the work.
SuppLeMENTARY Nore.

[As the whole of the foregoing paper is directly opposed to
the theory of the non-heredity of what are called acquired
characters, it is advisable that I should briefly notice some of
the points of this theory as put forward by Weismann* and
Wallace.t

In the first place Weismann confounds under the heading
of “acquired characters”? what I have separated as Abnormal
variations (mutilations) and as developmental variations. This
seems to me a considerable mistake; for there is a great differ-
ence between them. Mutilations may not be inherited—a
view to which Ammonites lend support; but this is no evidence
that developmental variations—reactions to the stimulus of
environment—are not inherited. A mutilation could only be
inherited by a great violation of the law, which may be stated as
“like breeds like stage for stage,’ or ‘“‘ontogeny repeats
ontogeny” (p. 269); and it would therefore be an abnormal
variation. For instance, the young are born with a tail, and
this is amputated so many, say six, hours or days after birth.{
If their young shewed no tail, ontogeny would not have repeated
ontogeny, which is the normal rule; because these young ought
to have a tail which ought to come off six hours or days after

* “ Hssays on Heredity’ English Translation. Oxford, 1889.

+ Wallace, Darwinism. It may be noted that the last chapter of this
work (p, 461 et seg) really furnishes the strongest arguments in favour of the
ideas of this paper, and against the Weismann theory, It is a strongly-written
essay, shewing that the intellectual qualities of Man cannot have been due to
the agency of Natural Selection. The author’s explanation of their origin is
very interesting as a relic of pre-Darwinian ideas, From a sentimental point of
view it is ingenious ; but as a scientific theory it is illogical and unconvincing,

~ The tails of lambs are usually amputated about two months after birth ;
though some farmers do it a very few days after.

———— er ee

317

birth. Even if the amputation were performed directly after
birth, there would be the pre-natal tailed stage to be repeated.

On the other hand, if, on account of lessened use, which
involves a lessened blood-supply to the tail, and therefore less
nutriment being received by it, the tail is 1 mm. shorter, the
repetition of ontogeny by the offspring would repeat this 1 mm.
shortness, and the continuance of the same causes would detract
another 1mm. This would be normal development.

The basis of Weismann’s theory is that every change
must come from a spontaneous variation of the germ; but I
may say that to be recognised as spontaneous a variation must
be appreciable in immaturity, because if not manifest till
maturity, the variation might reasonably be claimed as the
result of environment, and its spontaneity denied. Such is the
evidence of Ammonites. They show that the different species
arose from variations which did not appear till maturity, and
that these variations gradually became embryonic by the law
of earlier inheritance. By the Weismann theory, however, we
must suppose an infinite number of spontaneous variations,
each one in exactly the right direction, each one making the
particular feature manifest a little earlier and earlier than
before in order to achieve this result. I need scarcely remark
on the intricateness of this theory.

I will examine some statements made against the inherit-

ance of those acquired characters which, for the sake of

distinction, I have called normal or developmental variations.*
(p. 264).

* This term was first proposed in reference to the cyclical development of
Ammonites, which may be illustrated by the following table :—
4

spinous
aaa
3 costate costate 3
2 striate striate 2

Y

1 smooth smooth 1

This development may be varied
in any number of ways, as for
instance, 1, 2 2,1. 123321.
12343234321, or 123438
then extinct, and so on.

Progressive
PATSSOLSOIIOY

318

‘The children of accomplished pianists do not inherit the
art of playing the piano: they have to learn it in the same
laborious manner as that by which their parents acquired it ;
they do not inherit anything except that which their parents
possessed when children, viz.: manual dexterity and a good
ear.” *

“Chinese women not born with distorted feet.” +

These statements show that their authors are absolutely
unacquainted with the law of earlier inheritance. Do they
mean to say that only the characters with which the offspring
is born are inherited, and that those which appear later in life
are not inherited characters? Let me apply the same reason-
ing to other things and see where it leads.

The human infant is born without eyebrows, and without
teeth—therefore eyebrows and teeth are not inherited cha-
racters. The offspring only inherit what their fathers had as
infants; and they have to get their teeth in the same laborious
manner as that by which their parents cut theirs.

The male infant is born without a beard; calves are born
without horns; birds without feathers; plants first appear
without flowers; and so on. Therefore all these features—
beards, horns, etec.—cannot be transmitted by the parents.

Why, however, should the period of birth be taken as the
time when transmitted characters are to be seen. Birth is
not the beginning of life, but only an episode therein. One
might with equal reason take the very first stage of life and say,
“Man begins life as an unicellular organism, and since this
does not shew sundry characters which might be named, these
certain characters are not transmitted by the parent ”—a
reductio ad absurdum.

Looking, however, at the cases quoted above, we see that
by the law of earlier inheritance all we have a right to expect
is that ontogeny shall repeat ontogeny. Weismann admits
that the child would inherit what its father had as a child.

*Dr August Weismann, “Essays on Heredity,’ English Trans.; p. 269;
Oxford, 1889.
+ Dr Russell Wallace. ‘‘ Darwinism,” p. 440.

i

ni

319

But to suppose that it would when immature inherit its father’s
mature talent is as irrational as to expect it to exhibit the beard
at that age.

On the other hand, here is a case of the inheritance of an
acquired character. The wearing of boots has resulted in the
crumpling of the smaller toes—particularly the little toe—in a
curved manner, so that they grow somewhat over one another.
This feature is now very common—most people shew it more
or less; and it can only have been acquired since compression
was applied. As this compressing begins very early in life—as
soon as the child wears boots—it would not be surprising if—
allowing for earlier inheritance—the infant were born with toes
of this shape. In none of my children was this the case: their
feet were always extremely broad across the toes, which were
all perfectly straight. About six months after birth, however,
a very distinct change began to be apparent—the curling up
of the little toe became noticeable. One of my children
went without shoes or boots for 18 months after birth; and
though running about on his bare feet would tend to spread the
toes, yet the force of heredity was too strong—they assumed
the curled up position, though not quite to the same extent as if
he had worn boots.

Having always learnt from Darwin’s works that such
characters were inherited, I had taken no exact record of this
case, but on mentioning the fact to Professor Harker I learnt its
importance. We could not then refer to this child, as he had
just taken to boots; and although it might be safely asserted
that boots would not have produced such an effect in the time
if no such character had been inherited from the parent, yet the
negative was open to sceptics. Fortunately, however, there
was the baby, which had never worn boots: she was then
seven months old. For some time after birth her toes were
remarkably -straight,* but at the age mentioned the curling

* I can be very positive on this point, having noticed it, not only in her, but
in all my children; besides, most of the movements of toes, etc., detailed in the
early part of this paper were obtained by continued watching of her feet, though
the other children had also received much attention in the baby-stage.

320

under of the little toe* had become very noticeable, and I drew
Professor Harker’s attention to it.t

Even from Weismann’s own works there is evidence of
the inheritance of acquired characters. ‘‘ When horses of
normal size are introduced into the Falkland Islands, the next
generation is smaller in consequence of poor nourishment and
the damp climate; and after a few generations they have
deteriorated to a marked extent.” {| Weismann’s attempt to
reconcile this with his theory is nothing more than an admission
that the change of environment has produced a change in the
offspring—produced an effect on the body of the individual, and
the effect reacted on the germ; but this must always be the
manner in which acquired characters are transmitted: they
must of necessity produce a change in the molecular constitu-
tion of the germ. According to Weismann, however, this
ought never to be the case. “A small portion of the effective
substance of the germ, the germ-plasm, remains unchanged
during the development of the ovum into an organism, and this
part of the germ-plasm serves as a foundation from which the
germ-cells of the new organism are produced.” § Therefore, as
the germ of the new generation was present in the parents
before they were imported into the Falkland Islands, and as,
according to Weismann, this germ is totally unaffected by any
external conditions of environment, there ought to have been
no change in the offspring.

Short sight is certainly an acquired character. To my
mind it is very doubtful if, in a normally good-sighted race, it
has ever arisen as a spontaneous variation, totally unconnected
with any habits of the individual or his parents. That the
short sight now so prevalent cannot all have arisen as spon-
taneous variations is certain. Weismann admits it is hereditary

* The curling becomes fixed—the child has no power to straighten it,

+ As both sexes in this country compress their toes, the effects would be more
marked than if done only by one sex. (See page 276.)

t Weismann, Ibid, p. 99.
§ Weismann, Ibid, p, 266,

52]

in some cases. Does he wish us to believe that there are two
kinds of short sight—one which arose as a spontaneous varia-
tion and is hereditary, and the other acquired by the individual
from study and not hereditary ?

The degeneracy of slave-making ants * is explainable on
the theory of the inherited effects of use and disuse, but not on
the Weismann hypothesis. That Natural Selection should have
preserved every spontaneous variation which shewed a less and
less instinct to feed itself, and should have eliminated the more
capable members until the different species had entirely lost the
power of self-feeding, seems an incredible idea. What over-
powering advantage, either in economy or any other way, could
have accrued to the individuals unable to feed themselves so
that they survived while their neighbours perished ?

The further discussion of this subject I must leave for
another time; but in conclusion I may say that the “ change-
induced-by-environment ” theory does not exclude the action of
Natural Selection. Such action must always have exercised a
controlling and selective influence on the results which environ-
ment produced, just as, at a school, the boys in whom the
conditions of environment—lessons—have produced the most
effect are selected by the examiner for promotion to a higher
class. |

* Lubbock “ Ants, Bees and Wasps,” p. 82, 10th Kd. 1891.

322

EXPLANATION OF PLATE

Fig. 1—4. Homo SAPIENS

Fig. 1.—Profile of the head of a female infant, three months old, to
illustrate the peculiar features of babies’ faces, namely, the large and pro-
jecting jaws, the short projected obliquely-truncate nose, the depressed bridge
of the nose, the very low position of the ear, and the large development of
the back of the head. The mouth is obscured by the large pouch-like
cheeks. This drawing is the copy of a photograph ; and shews how the hair
grows towards the forehead.

Fig. 2.—Profile of the head of an adult female—the mother of the
infant depicted in fig. 1—reduced to about the same scale, to shew different
relative proportionate development of the various features between in-
fancy and maturity, namely reduction and recession of the jaws, elongation
of the nose, elevation of the nose-bridge, projection of the forehead over the
eyes—where the intellectual faculties are situated, the reduction in the size of
the ear and its elevation in relation to the whole head, and the reduction of
the back of the head. This drawing is a copy from a photograph, which,
with the original of No. 1, was exhibited when this Paper was read.

Fig. 3.—Profile of a senile female to shew the further proportionate
development of the features, namely the further recession of the jaw, the
growth of the nose, its elongation and the elevation of the bridge. The ear
has been dragged out of shape by the wearing of earings. Copy of a
photograph.

(These three figures, the exact size of the photographs, from which, in fact,
they were traced, were purposely taken, as nearly as possible, of the same
size, to shew the proportionate development of features during the ontogeny
of senile female Man. Fig. 1 may be regarded as the morphological repre-
sentation of an ancient adult ancestor, while No. 3 may be considered the
morphological prefiguration of the adult of the future, or of the infant
of a still more distant time to come.)

Fig. ‘4.—Profile of the head of Miss Julia Pastrana, remarkable for the
characters of reversion displayed. She was a Spanish dancer, and when she
died her stuffed skin was exhibited. Copy of a wood-cut (originally a
photograph) in Haeckel, ‘‘ Anthropogenie,” p. 363, Ed. IV.

Fig. 5.—CERCOPITHECUS NASICUS

Fig. 5.—Profile of the head of the Nose-Ape, shewing as regards the
nose a much higher development than is obtained even by senile Man. The
figs. 1—3 illustrate that during life Man makes very considerable progress in
the direction of nose-development shewn by this fig. 4. From a wood-cut
in Haeckel, “ Anthropogenie,” loc : cit.

Fig. 6.—CEBUS CAPUCINUS

Fig. 6.—Head of a species of the genus frequently alluded to in the
text. Copied from Darwin, “ Descent of Man,” Pt. II., Chap. XVIII.,
p. 549, fig. 74.

Fig. 7.—CEBUS VELLEROSUS

Fig. 7.—Profile of the head of this Platyrhine monkey, shewing the
projection of the jaws, and the growth of the hair towards the forehead—to
compare with fig. 1. The different position of the ear and the more lateral
position of the nostril should, however, be noted. Copy of a wood-cut in
Darwin, loc: cit.

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Read at the Meeting of the Cotteswold Club, March 22, 1892, by
J. H. Taunton, M. Inst. C.E. F.G.S.

Before proceeding to the Syrian Coast and Palestine, I
must take you for a little while to Egypt, in the neighbourhood
of Cairo, with reference to the nummulitic and underlying
cretaceous limestones at the Mokattan Quarries there, or at the
old Pyramids and their plateau at Gizeh, in either of which
you will see good sections of the Nummulitic Limestone, and
have evidence of the variations of level that have taken place
at the opening of the Tertiary period which witnessed the
development of the present distribution of land and sea, and
the upheaval of most of the mountain chains of the globe, and
subsequently in a less degree in the pleistocene age of similar
movements that will assist us when we get to the study of
Syrian Geology, for as the sketch map* shows, the Geology of
Egypt (as its history) is linked with that of the Holy Land.
With this distinction, however, as noted by Sir John Dawson,
that while the hills of Palestine are so largely comprised
of cretaceous limestone, and the later eocene limestones
(nummulitic) are represented there only by small patches. In
Egypt, on the contrary, a grand development of the Eocene
and less of the cretaceous limestones is found. He says :—
<T am of opinion that there was an original difference, thicker
deposits having taken place in the cretaceous period in Syria
than in Egypt, and precisely the reverse in the Eocene age.
Much of the physical difference between the two countries
depends on this circumstance.”

* The sketch map referred to was an enlargement of Dr Hull’s Geological
Map of Palestine, &c., published by the Palestine Exploration Society, from
which the accompanying map is a reduced copy.

324

The evidences of the changes of level both at the Mokattan
‘Hill and at Gizeh is afforded in the former locality by terraces
500 ft. and 200 ft. above sea level. Former sea beaches with
pleistocene shells, borings of lithodomous mollusks, oysters
adherent to the old sea cliff and other recent shells in its
crevices.

At Gizeh plateau there are not only numerous oyster
shells but a very marked old sea beach with large stones.
These facts (which are confirmed by M. Lartet, Dr Fraas,
Dr Schweinfurth, Sir John Dawson, and other eminent
geologists) prove that in the Pleistocene age all this part
of Africa was submerged to a depth of more than 200 feet,
and this for a long time, while the higher terrace shows a
submergence to the extent of at least 500 feet.

We now proceed to Alexandria Harbour and get on board
a Turkish steamer, the “Romania,” at 11 a.m., on the 16th
April, 1891, proceeding to Jaffa. This harbour is silting up
and kept open only by constant dredging, but outside we are
soon in 50 and 100 fathoms water, which increases in depth to
upwards of 600 fathoms not many miles off Jaffa. The depth
of the Mediterranean between Alexandria and Crete is very
great, for a considerable extent it ranges from 1600 to
1800 fathoms. The vessel was fairly comfortable, with a
respectable-looking old Turkish Captain, who sat at the head of
the table at lunch and dinner, drank his wine, looked smiling
and agreeable, and spoke the best English he could. On the
fore part of the deck were numerous parties of pilgrims from
almost every country in Europe: Greece, Italy, Germany,
Russia, France, &c., proceeding on pilgrimages to Jerusalem at
the approaching Easter, kept some three or four weeks later
than ours. Greek and Latin, Arminian and Coptic Church
Christians were there, Jews from all parts going to keep
their Passover at Jerusalem. I have no doubt Mohammedans
also from many countries, for next to that of Mecca and
Medina the pilgrimage to Jerusalem is most esteemed by
Mohammedan devotees. These pilgrims were of varied classes,
ages and sex, men and women, families with young children,

:
F
'
]
:

325

mothers with their husbands and babes. They placed carpets
or mats on the deck on which different families congregated,
took their meals and slept, the men smoking a good deal.

On approaching Jaffa what first strikes the eye is the
bright line of sand along the Philistian and Samarian coasts.
The sands there, according to the ordnance survey, attain
a height in some places of 200 feet, or even more. They are
enormous accumulations of fine sand, advancing inland, driven
by westerly winds. The ruins of ancient Gaza and Askelon
are now covered by them. Possibly the sand has been largely
drifted from Arabia and Africa directly, or under cyclonic
action, as may be readily understood by anyone who has
experienced a sand storm in Egypt or Palestine, which I had
the misfortune of doing on two occasions, first in the neigh-
bourhood of Cairo and afterwards at Jerusalem. To form an
idea of the distance which sand is carried, even over the sea, I
may mention the experience of a friend who was proceeding by
Royal Mail Steamer from London to Brazil, on engineering
business. He says that off Cape de Verde, about 200 miles
more or less from the African Coast, the deck of the ship
and the rigging were covered one morning with a layer of
fine red sand, which the officers of the ship considered had
been blown from the African desert, carried along in the
upper air, the phenomena does not appear to have been one of
uncommon occurrence when passing that locality. They
expressed gratification at getting clear of the desert. Dr Hull
observes that the soft calcareous sandstone, which, according
to his section, is shewn to line the shore, and form the sea
bed along the coast of Western Palestine, affords alone by its
disintegration sufficient material for these advancing sand
hills.

On nearing the shore the backgrounds of mountain and
highlands of Philistia and Samaria come into view, and here
before proceeding to describe the geological section it may be
well to make a few remarks on the mountain range which
extends about 70 miles, running nearly north and south almost
midway between the Mediterranean coast on the west and the

P

326

River Jordan and Dead Sea on the east. This line of upheaval
forms a saddleback or anticlinal. The stratification of cretace-
ous and nummulitic limestone of which the mountains are
composed dipping in opposite directions, 7.e. west towards the
Mediterranean Sea and east towards the Jordan Valley. The
mountain range of Judah has many points exceeding 3000
feet, and culminates at Yuttah, 3747 feet above the sea, being
the reputed birthplace of John the Baptist. It has a some-
what less elevation in Samaria, although Mts. Gerizim and
Ebal attain heights of 2800 and 3000 feet respectively. The
range is broken by the Great Plain of Esdraelon. North of
which and around Nazareth the country is irregularly mount-
ainous, whilst further north are the lofty mountains of Upper
Galilee, mainly of volcanic origin. Jeb Jermuk, in the neigh-
bourhood of Safed, attaining an elevation of 4000 feet nearly.
Further north on the Chain of Lebanon, Jeb Sannin is 8500 feet.
Anti-Lebanon 8700 feet at Tal’ at Misa, and snow-capped Her-
mon 9200 feet above the Mediterranean Sea. The Carmel Chain
which trends to the N.W. broken by the Milheh and Daliyeh
Streams attains at Esfia 1729 feet, ending at Cape Carmel,
which shelters Haifa Harbour from the 8.W. and W. These
mountains are capped by nummulitic limestone. Major Corder
speaks of having discovered a volcanic crater at Carmel,
. previously unknown. The Range of Gilboa and Little Hermon
which block the Esdraelon Plain on the east attain each an
elevation of about 1700 feet, and Mt. Tabor to the north of
them of 1820 feet. As to the extent of Palestine proper
(exclusive of the possessions in Moab, Syria, and Arabia, held
in the days of King David and Solomon) the distance from Dan
to Beersheba is but about 120 miles, and Palestine proper
extending between these places and west of the Jordan to the
sea, which is the portion of the country that has been accurately
surveyed, occupies an area of about 6000 square miles, being in
round numbers but one-tenth of the area of England and Wales.*
The Mediterranean Coast forms the western boundary—

* The total kingdom of King Solomon would be in extent about the same as
that of England and Wales, 58,281 sq. miles.

OE OO <= LULU

327

on the south is the Desert of Beersheba, forming part of
the Plateau of the Tih. On the north the mountain district
south of Hermon, and the Highlands of Upper Galilee. It
only remains to refer to the eastern boundary, which is the
Valley of the River Jordan. This river, rising at the foot of
Mt. Hermon, with tributaries from Banias (Cesarea Phillipi)
where the Jordan springs forth a full-grown stream, joining
the Hasbany River, which geographically but not historically is
the true head water. Some ten miles further south the River
forms the Lake of Huleh, four and half miles in length by three
and a half broad, in the neighbourhood of which other tributaries
join. The Lake of Huleh is seven feet above the sea level, pass-
ing south the Jordan enters the Sea of Gennesareth or Galilee
or Tiberias, which is twelve miles long and eight at its broadest
measurement east and west. It is 682 feet below sea level, so
that the River between Lake Huleh and this has fallen at the
rate of 68 feet per mile. The fall proceeding south to the Dead
Sea, which is 1292 feet below Mediterranean Sea level, and in
direct line about 60 milés distance, being only at the rate of
10 feet per mile. It is to be remarked that the change of fall
to a diminished inclination takes place below the locality
of volcanic agency, as marked by the outburst at Safed and the
great basaltic flows of the Jaulan.

Proceeding southwards the length of the Dead Sea is
approximately 46 miles, extreme width about 10 miles, maximum
depth between 1200 feet and 1300 feet. The volume of water
brought down by the Jordan and evaporated during the sum-
mer months in the Dead Sea makes a difference of five feet
between the summer and winter surface of that sea over an
area on the average of 360 square miles. The flow is greatest
when the snows on Hermon begin to melt, about the time of
Passover, when “ Jordan overfloweth its banks all the time of
harvest,” for harvest in this deep valley is much earlier than
even in the Sharon Plains.

The distance from the south end of the Dead Sea (Jebel
Usdum) to the Gulf of Akabah is 115 miles. The bottom of
the Wady el Arabah being about 660 feet above the Red Sea
at its summit, and 1952 above the Dead Sea.

P2

328

As to the Watercourses in Palestine, the Leontes rising
from the Anti-Lebanon Range, flows into the Mediterranean
Sea 4 miles north of Tyre. There are 12 perennial streams, of
which 8 flow into the Mediterranean and 4 to the Jordan. The
principal affluents of the Jordan are the Jalid and Farah from
the west, and the Jermuk and Jabbok from the east. Besides
these two main streams the Calirrhde and the Arnon from the
east flow into the Dead Sea which also receives the drainage
of Wady el Jeib from the south and of several Wadies
from the west. :

We come now to the Geological Section attached hereto,
the levels on which are taken from the Ordnance Survey of
Palestine, on a scale of 6 miles to the inch _ horizontal,
and 2000 feet to the inch vertical. Commencing from
the deep water of the Mediterranean Sea off Jaffa, we have,
according to Dr Hull, the strata thereon called by him
Calc Sandstone of Philistia, dipping to the west to form
the sea-bed, resting thereon are the raised sea beaches, or
maritime beds, as shewn on Sections given by Sir John W.
Dawson and Mr Hudleston, admitted by all as Pleistocene
Beds, and it becomes immaterial whether the so-called
Cale Sandstone is of earlier origin and distinct, or should
be treated with the overlying pleistocene formations or not.
Dr Hull’s authority is so great that I have prepared the section
in accordance with his views where it cuts into the Mediter-
ranean. He says :—

“At Jaffa the raised sea-bed stretches far inland from
Jaffa, and may be traced along the Jerusalem road to beyond
Ramleh, at Jaffa the shell sands rest on the more ancient sand
stone, which forms the foundation of the city, and supplies the
copious springs necessary for the extensive orange and lemon
groves there; further inland about Ramleh, this fine gravel
and sand gives place to beds of calcareous conglomerate
formed of lime, stone pebbles of all sizes and well water worn.
This is undoubtedly an ancient sea beach, which appears to
rise to a level of considerably over two hundred feet, formed at
a time when the waters of the sea extended over twelve miles
inland beyond their present limits.”

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329

A natural breakwater of calcareous sandstone at Jaffa
projects outwards into the Mediterranean from the ancient
walls at the south end of the town, outside this all large ships
are obliged to anchor, the landing from which is effected in
shore boats, which frequently have to breast a heavy surf, the
rock under the lens is seen to consist of comminuted shells, pieccs
of coral and other marine forms, apparently of recent formation,
raised when the whole sea-bed was being elevated.* A similar
formation appears to be still in process of consolidation, along
the shore farther north as I noticed at Haifa, (near Acre), it is
quarried just under the sands at the margin of low-water, the
shells of which it is composed are those which strew the shore in
immense numbers, and are chiefly those of pectanculus glycineris.
The evidence of these raised beaches is incontestable, they have
been recognised by Drs Hedenborg and Lartet, who attribute
their position when at or near sea-level to the recent slow eleva-
tion of the sea-bed which may be still in progress.

Mons Lartet says: Page 227, ‘‘ Essais sur la Geologie de Palestine,” We have
seen that on the Mediterranean Coasts of Egypt maritime deposits are found
filled with actual shells. It is the same on the coasts of Phenicia, and the Plain
of Sharon presents the aspect of a raised beach. The hills of reddish sands that
prevail at Jaffa where gardens are planted as well as orange groves are covered
with numerous shells, Pectunculus violacescens murex brandaris Columbella
rustica Purpura hemastoma—identical with those we meet with on the coast, and
this formation extends far in the interior, into the environs of Ramleh. Beyrout
is built on a coarse limestone, filled with shells, Capulus Cerithiwm Trochus, &c.,
which assume in some places a pisolithic structure as those at Alexandria, &c.

* * * * * * Sd *

Such are the maritime deposits of the coasts that appear more recent than
the Tertiary deposits—older than of the historic period, and we believe should
be classed as Quaternary.

Sir John W. Dawson in his popular work on “ Egypt and
Syria,” describes the rocks on which Jaffa stands as extending
under the whole maritime plains as a soft sandstone, traversed
with vermicular-cylindrical holes, perhaps the work of marine
worms, &c.

* Owing to the kindness of Prof. S. Hayter Lewis, F.S.A., I am able to show
a piece of this rock, broken off by himself, and the sides polished, the top
being purposely left rough to show the formation.

330

It is sometimes coarse and pebbly, containing shells now
living in the neighbouring seas; the cementing material of the
stone being carbonate of lime. It is sufficiently hard for
building purposes. In some places on the road to Ramleh it is
seen to pass into a conglomerate or pebbly rock, composed of
rounded fragments from the hills. On the authority of Dr
Paulus, of Jerusalem, he gives a boring made near Jaffa, which
passed through 174 feet of the sandstone, with clay containing
marine shells especially a species of cardium, below. The
maritime plains which are undulating may be taken at 25
miles wide near the frontier of Egypt, constituting the plain of
Philistia, towards Jaffa, near which diminishing to 12 to 15
miles wide thence they constitute the Plain of Sharon and run
to a point at Carmel.

The Plain of Esdraelon which lies between the range of
Carmel and the hills of Lower Galilee is included by Hudleston
among the maritime plains. It has been the great battlefield
of Palestine, where warriors of almost every nation of the old
world under Heaven have pitched their tents from the days of
Barak to Napoleon,* and which may again become the scene of
great military events, as being the lowest valley of approach
from the Mediterranean to the Jordan Valley, with a good
harbour at its north end. Its average height is 250 feet above
the former (sea) with a summit about 35 feet higher near Jezreel,
where the watersheds of the Jalud and Kishon are parted. Its
summit is lower by 375 feet than that in the Valley of Arabah,
so that were it practicable to bring the waters of the Mediterr-
anean into the Jordan Valley there would be an intervening
anticlinal with a base of 115 miles and summit of 375 feet to
get over before reaching the Red Sea—which of itself sufficiently
shows the impracticability of the once talked of Jordan
Valley Canal scheme. This plain, as that of Sharon, is rich
and fertile, I was much struck by the great depth of soil

*On 10th May, 1799, Napoleon, who had taken Jaffa on the 6th March,
having marched along the coast, assaulted St. Jean d’Acre (Accra). The British
Ships lying in the roads of Carmel. He was defeated by Sir Sidney Smith, and
the siege raised on 20th May.

331

observable at the sections of the streams and rivers that we
crossed, in particular the River Kishon showed banks certainly
10 to 15 feet thick of rich black soil, and as the same thing
was noticeable near Tiberias both localities being in the neigh-
bourhood of volcanic outbursts it is probable that such richness
is derived in a great degree from the decay of Basalt.

Esdraelon Plain has a fine harbour at its Mediterranean
end, the Bay of Acre sheltered from the south and west by
Mount Carmel. There was a French Steamer there which had
brought some hundreds of Pilgrims from France whilst
I was at Haifa. It is a little town on the south side of the Bay,
where a colony of some 500 Germans have established them-
selves. A railway is projected from this Port to Damascus. The
Haifa route promises to become the high road to the centre of
Palestine.

From the plains, taking the line of the section, we pass to
the lower hills, “ The Shephelah,”* about 500 to 1000 feet above
sea level, a tolerably fertile district, as in the plain of Ajalon,
where, according to Scripture History, Joshua having effected
a rapid flank march from Gilgal, near Jericho, made his
furious attack on the five Canaanitish Kings who had combined
against him and destroyed them.

The Shephelah, according to Conder, consists of a white
softish limestone with bands of brown quartz. Its escarpment
faces the west. The Mountains rising to between 2000 and 3000
feet above the sea consist of harder limestone (shown in Hull’s
section as nummulitic) capped in parts with chalk. They are
intersected by numerous ravines, marked by great meteoric
denudation.

Carriages passing from Jaffa to Jerusalem (about 37 miles)
usually stop at Ramleh, Bab-Elwad, and Kolonieh. The plain
of Sharon is passed before reaching Ramleh, and the Shephelah
between that place and Bab-Elwad, which is probably 17 or 20
miles from Jaffa. After passing Bab-Elwad the ascent to the

* The Shephelah or Lowlands was the great battle ground of the Israelites
with the Philistines and invaders from Egypt, Assyria, &c. The biblical division
of Plain Shephelah and Mountain being distinctly marked in this locality.

By

hills commences with ascents and descents that appear to have
no ending. The description given by Dr Fraas is so graphic
that it deserves quotation: “‘ Chalk marls, hard white limestone,
“and beds of dolomite alternate with each other and form
“creat steps on the mountain sides, such as I have nowhere
‘else seen in equal beauty. The edges of the beds, three to
“ten feet thick, stand out like artificial walls, enclosing the
“hills. Olive trees and shrubbery overhang these natural
‘‘ramparts, while the softer layers form slopes covered with
“oreen herbage, which is still richer in the moist hollows.”
The ascent to these hills is usually through narrow valleys on
the sides of which here and there are beds filled with char-
acteristic cretaceous fossils. In the section, see page 328, I
have followed Sir J. W. Dawson and Mr Hudleston in showing
no line of demarcation between the cretaceous and nummulitic
series.* The summit before reaching Jerusalem is somewhat
under 3000 feet. ‘To the south it obtains, near Hebron, 3300
feet. The nummulitic limestone is well defined at the top of
Mount Gerizim, which I visited after leaving Jerusalem, where
I stayed for nine days. At the junction of the upper beds of
the cretaceous with the lower beds of the nummulitic lime-
stone there is a large aggregation of flint in the rock, which is
particularly marked at Gerizim.* Sections of both rocks are
found at Carmel, near where the range terminates at the sea
and the road approaching the convent and lighthouse there.
The section shows the dip of the strata towards the east in the
direction of the Dead Sea on one side and towards the Medit-
erranean on the west of the anticlinal under Jerusalem.

I produce specimens of stones from the cretaceous forma-
tions on which Jerusalem stands, their local names being :—

1. Gaklile (soft stone)

2. Nahre (means fireproof, will not calcinate—this is
under Golgotha.)

*Mr Hudleston remarks: “that these two formations being so closely
“‘connected by physical if not by biological ties, it is exceedingly difficult to
“‘separate them.”

333

8. Meleke—the Royal stone, found in the Haram and in
the great quarries.

4, Misse (Jehudi=hard.)

5. Misse (Helu=soft sweet.)

6. Misse (Achmar—red pink.)

I had not the opportunity of seeing the Nubian sandstone,

in siti, owing to the extreme heat, which prevented my

going to the Dead Sea, as I only saw it ata distance, I have

extracted from M. Lartet’s book some of his remarks thereon.

NUBIAN SANDSTONE
Lartet “ Eysai sur la Geologia de Palestine,” p. 127.

The sandstone first appears near Wady Ghuweir, where it
has a red colour, with a weak dip towards the south. Between
Wady Ghuweir and Wady Munshallah is seen whitish sand-
stone overlying reddish shales, of which we are about to speak.
These sandstones follow uninterruptedly from there to the
- Wady Zerka Main, with a continually increasing thickness
that attains more than 330 feet. The Wadies Hamara, Meredjeb
Hanr el Hamma, have all their openings cut in these rocks,
which in the Wady el Hamma present the following succession
in passing from bottom to top :—

1st. Red Sandstone.
2nd. Greenish do.
3rd. Red Sandstone and Greenish Shales.

Zerka Main appears to run in a small Fault in the midst of
these sandstones.

From the Wady to the Plain of Zara these (beds) loose
their horizontality and dip towards the south. The cliff
presents at this point the following succession of arenaceous
deposits.

At the base white sandstones to which succeed alternations
of sandstones and mottled shales of red and green, separated in
little layers by very thin beds of clay. Then come red sands,
after that white sandstones, covered by the débris of Basalt,
which has descended from the flow of which the hill is
capped.

334

The sandstones are then covered by incrustation deposits,
forming the Plain of Zara, where gush out the hot incrusting
springs.

They are seen again to the south of this plain and consti-
tute the cliffs from this point to the Wady Mojib, there
resuming their former horizontality. They appear covered in
many places with saline incrustations and palm-trees are
frequent wherever the sandstones are smoothed (or levelled.)

The Wady Mojib runs in a narrow gorge, deep and tortuous,
in the midst of rocks to which atmospheric denudation has
given odd and picturesque forms, the sandstones here have
most varied colours, yellow, red, and black, (from bitumen no
doubt). This Wady is one of the lowest valleys in the district,
and the River (Arnon) runs in the midst of sandstone rocks,
from the heights of Schihan, 2629 feet above the Red Sea,
(in its valley near which place according to M. Lartet’s map
are large deposits from thermal and mineral sources as well as
Gypsum).

From Wady Mojib towards the Lisanthe Nubian sand-
stone dips slightly towards the south, and disappears on
approaching that peninsula. Further south again it rises and
forms the foot of the Eastern Escarpments to the Southern
Ghor. Here are beds met within it that are nearly black,
which owe their colour to an excess of manganese that they
contain. In the environs of Petra the Nubian sandstone
attains its greatest development where it occupies the summit of
Mount Hor, having been uplifted 5332 feet above the Dead
Sea there.

Mr Hudleston says:—“<I will now mention some of the
‘characteristics of the Nubian sandstone. Firstly: it is the
‘seat of considerable mineral wealth, especially near its junc-
“tions with the older rocks. It is largely developed in the land
“of Midian, where Burton speaks of the western wall of
“Neyd Plateau as consisting of a sandstone remarkable for the
“beauty of its brick red precipices and castellations. The
“copper mines of Wady Nasb, and the turquoise mines of
‘‘Sarabit el Khadim and other localities are associated with

335

“this formation. The turquoises of the Wady Maghera occur
“in two beds, the rock being a soft coarse-grained quartzose
“sandstone of a light yellow colour. The best stones are
“found in the solid sandstone a short distance from the joints
‘“‘ where they usually occur in the centre of small red marly and
“ochreous nodules. The Arabs were working the turquoise
“mines of Sardbit el Khadim quite lately, and, according to Mr
“ Holland, have destroyed by blasting many of the hieroglyphic
‘inscriptions sculptured upon the blocks of sandstone.”

M. Lartet has classed this formation as cretaceous, but sub-
sequently to his investigation there has been found in Nasb
Valley undoubted evidence in the lower beds (called by Hull
desert sandstone) of carboniferous fauna. The few fossils found
by Bauerman were so dubious, one authority referring them to
the carboniferous whilst another said they belonged to the new
red, but Captain Wilson procured a block of limestone from
the valley section from which one fossil Orthis Michelini was
found well known in the carboniferous limestone. This was
confirmed by Mr Davidson. Mr Hull also confirms its carbon-
iferous character at this horizon. The base of the Nubian
sandstone is not visible in the eastern cliffs of the Dead Sea,
nor I believe where it is associated with limestone as in the
Lebanon ranges. Mr Hudleston remarks: “no named fossils
“have ever as far as I know been found in the Nubian sand-
“stone of Eastern Palestine, though certain vegetable impress-
“ions have been observed. But there is a note in M. Lartet’s
“earlier work which, seeing what has been found in Wady
“‘Nasb, becomes of considerable interest. He noticed traces of
“corals (polypiers) in the sandstone near the junction of
“the Wady Haimen with the Wady Akaban, similar to some
“collected from Sinai and from the vicinity of Nasb.”

Mr Hudleston in his “Further Notes on the Geology of
Palestine,” admits the accuracy of Hull’s Desert Sandstone
with its associated limestone, found by that Geologist, not only
at Wady Nasb but also on the banks of the Hessi, south of
Kerak, as being carboniferous. He says Hull’s party have traced

336

the lower or carboniferous series much further than previous
explorers, since they show an important carboniferous zone in
the flanks of Mount Hor, and right into the Mountains of
Moab.

He adds—Professor Hull has gone the length of constitut-
ing this into a separate formation, under the title of Desert
Sandstone, along with the overlying limestone it forms a
strip on the borders of the crystaline rocks, and is about 400
feet in average thickness.

Such are the observations of the eminent geologists I have
quoted in reference to this wonderful formation, Nubian Sand-
stone, thousands of feet thick in many places, as at Mount
Hor, and very unfossilliferous with the Wady Nasb Limestone
and Desert Sandstone of Hull sometimes traceable at its base
in either case resting on the old crystaline or metamorphic
rocks, the surfaces of which are observed to be level below the
sandstones as shewn in Mr Bauerman’s section, with nothing
intervening above between the Nubian Sandstone and the base
of the cretaceous limestone, such is the case south of Mount
Hermon, there, however, Neocomian or Jurassic Fossils are
freely met with, and Mr Hudleston’s map shows a locality in
this mountain or its flanks of one of such formations.

I was prevented by indisposition from proceeding north-
wards to Damascus, according to my programme, but one of my
party obtained from the Arabs at the side of this mountain the
fossils produced, which Mr Etheridge has kindly named, viz.,
Rhynchonellide Substrahidra and Quadriplicata, &c., being
Jurassic and the Ammonites Luynesi, &c., Spines of Cidaris
Glandaria-Cretaceous.

I rode some 100 miles to Tiberias, which is a scattered old
place in a volcanic district, and stayed some days at the Latin
Convent there. To the north of it rise the basaltic hills of
Safed, to the east the volcanic plateau of the Jaulan, to the
west the Horns of Hattin,* (where the Crusaders made their last

*Kurn Hattin 1178 feet high above the sea, from which streams of lava
(Basaltic) have flowed to Tiberias.

3387

stand, under King Guy, of Lusignan.) The strand of the lake
is interesting, covered with fine gravel formed of small pebbles

-of limestone basalt and rolled flint, polished by the incessant

movement of the waters, and mixed with innumerable dead
shells produced, belonging to the Genera Neritina Melania
Melanopsis Cyrena and Unio. In 1834 there was much
trembling of the earth in this locality, and upwards of 20 tons
of Bitumen were ejected near the south end of the Dead
Sea.

In 1837 one of the greatest earthquakes took place that
has ever been experienced in Syria. The trembling of the
earth occurred from one end to the other of the Jordan Valley,
following the direction of the mountains which bordered it.
and that of the great axis of dislocation of the basin. This
earthquake was felt over a zone 184 leagues long, and 32
leagues wide. Six thousand persons perished in this catas-
trophe. The town of Tiberias was entirely destroyed, and in
the environs new hot springs burst forth, and deep fissures were
produced in the rocks. After this earthquake the Arabs saw
floating on the Dead Sea a mass of asphalte as an island or
like a house. They drew from it about 3000 dollars in selling
it at the bazaar of Jerusalem at 100 francs the quintal (about
2 cwt.)*

There is a mineral spring about a mile below Tiberias or a
little more, with a very high temperature, 143° Fahrt., so
hot that where it is emitted I could not put my hand in it to
take out this little pebble, which has as you will see a
volcanic appearance, also a bath used on alternate days by Arab
men and women, of course the water must become cooled
greatly there before anyone could safely get in it, even an
Arab. The bath is of the dirtiest character. The analysis of
this spring taken from the United States official reports (Lynch
Expedition) is as follows :—

* See p. 274 Lartet “ Essai sur la Geologie de Palestine.”

338

WATER OF EMMAUS

Grains per Gall.

Sodium Chloride .., Ae ae 1200°5
Potassium Chloride ee ae 11:2
Calcium Chloride ... ae ae 620°9
Magnesium Chloride ie Bes: 142°1
Calcium Sulphate ia as 50°4
Sodium Sulphate wae ae 43°4,
Magnesium Sulphate sets ye 11-2
Calcium Carbonate ot ie 25°2
Magnesium Carbonate... sia 6:3
Alkaline and Earthy Sulphides Not
Free 3 D. 2 8. Bromine, Organic ( .44:mated
matter
2110°2

Sea water contains 1444 grains of common salt (Chl. Sodium) to the gallon,
or say one lb. of salt in 5 galls,

Hudleston remarks the total saline residue is about equal
to that of the Mediterranean, but exists in very different pro-
portions. It is about double that of the Old Sulphur Well at
Harrogate.

The hills on the shores of the Sea of Tiberias are much
covered with basaltic débris, over and around Tiberias the rocks
are very bold, showing in places an admixture of cretaceous
limestone and basalt, where the hill side is grass land, as on the
road to Nazareth I observed a considerable depth of rich
loamy soil, arising doubtless from the decay of the basalt.*

No doubt the main features in the dynamic geology of
Palestine are the raised beaches adjoining the Mediterranean
Sea on the west, and the great fault that runs down the Ghor
or Jordan Valley on the east, the course of which is inferential

* Between the Sea of Tiberias and the base of Hermon at Banias the traveller
marches for two entire days over sheets of basaltic lava.

339

from the neighbourhood of Safed to the south end of the Dead
Sea, but determined and shewn on Mr Armstrong’s map
through the Wady Arabah with the geological details of
Professor Hull marked thereon. The Valley of the Jordan and
basin of the Dead Sea is one of the most remarkable on the
earth’s surface; “‘as observed by Murchison it is the key of the
Geology of the whole district.” It will be noted that the height
of the summit at Jerusalem above the sea is about the same as
the depth to the bottom of the hollow of the Dead Sea below
it in both cases about 2600 feet.

The fault so far as it can be illustrated is upwards of 3000
feet as indicated on the section.* That it arose at the close
of the Eocene Period may be concluded from the section which
shows the upheaval of the cretaceous and nummulitic lime-
stones of Western Palestine, both marine formations then
converted into land areas. Then it was that the fracture of the
formations became developed by the contraction of their
constituent materials in this great fault which brings into
contact as shewn the limestones with the Nubian sandstone.
The period of upheaval is also arrived at as stated from the
fact of no Miocene of a marine character being found in Pales-
tine. It is probable that at this period of change and
disturbance the mountains in Western Arabia in the Sinaitic
peninsula and in Moab arose, and the main confirmation of the
country as existing at the present day was established. It
would seem from the numerous terraces which may be traced
on the sides of the Ghor and the cliffs and escarpments
adjoining the Dead Sea that a very extensive lake existed in
the valley of the Jordan, the waters in which were maintained
by a heavier rainfall than at present exists, which rainfall is
quite insufficient to account for the great denudation apparent
in the wadies and ravines that has been previously referred
to.

*The maximum displacement is at the south end of the Ghor opposite
Mount Hor. ;

340

I have remarked at the commencement of this paper that the opening
of the Tertiary period witnessed the upheaval of most of the mountain chains
of the globe, and here I need only again refer to the level surfaces which
according to Bauerman’s sections the older crystaline rocks and metamorphic-
schists exhibit where the Nudian Sandstone rests on them (notwithstanding that
they are both much pierced by dykes) indicating a gradual upheaval noticed
by Mr Hudleston, who says: “It is of course well known to those who have
paid any attention previously to the subject that the great physical break which
fell upon these regions took place towards the close of the Eocone period,
After that all was changed, and a marine area became a continental one.”

THE DEAD SEA

The superficial area of this sea may be taken at about
360 square miles or 10,036 millions of square feet. Mons.
Lartet says that the estimated flow of the River Jordan into
it may be stated approximatively at certain seasons of the year
at 6,500,000 tonnes (French) during the day, which would be
equivalent to 229,534,510 cubic feet. The evaporation to
account for such a volume of water would be *0228 of a foot or
somewhat over a quarter of an inch, or 6°9 millimetres. This
is exclusive of the numerous other affluents that flow direct
into it, the total of which he assumes may equal but cannot
surpass that of the Jordan. His figures, are I think, large, but
he refers to the calculations of Professor Zech, of Stuttgart,
whose calculations show a necessary evaporation of 13 milli-
metres in depth from the surface of the Dead Sea to account
for the maximum flow of the Jordan, and I presume the whole
of the affluents into the sea. This agrees materially with my
previous figures. Taking therefore 13 of an inch or a little over
3-inch as the water to be accounted for without admitting the
hypothesis of the Arabians that there is a subterranean outlet.
We will consider the facts :—

1st.—That the occasional variations before referred to in
the surface level of the Dead Sea is an argument against such
an hypothesis, and shows a physical capability and tendency
for retaining the affluent waters.

- 2nd.—The saliferous gypseous and other deposits now

known to be forming in the bed of the sea is another.

341

3rd.—The uprise of the numerous mineral volcanic springs
to high levels hundreds of feet above the surface of the sea is
another.

4th.—The evaporation required to account for the whole
affluent waters does not exceed what may be expected, having
regard to their location in the latitude, say 31°30’ in the
deepest hole in the earth’s surface (i.e. nearly 1300 feet below
the Red Sea), wherein the air having traversed large tracts of
tropical waterless and desert land is deprived of its moisture
and rapidly imbibes that from a large expanse of exposed
surface. In England, lat. say 51’ 30”, after long summer
drought we find an evaporation of one-tenth of an inch per
diem, a little above sea level. In India, at the large reservoir
at Ambajhari, (containing 1500 million gallons) that supplies
Nagpur, about lat. 21° 9”, situated 519 miles N.E. of Bombay,
the evaporation stated by Mr Binney between October, 1872,
and June, 1873, (clear of the monsoon months, viz., June,
July, August, September, and early part of October) was
"0289 feet, somewhat over one-third of an inch per diem.
This reservoir being situated from 975 to 1015 feet above
sea level.

In the proceedings of the American Geological Association
there is important information on the subject of evaporation
from the large Salt Lakes in that country. Mr George Karl
Gilbert, the Geologist in charge of the report on Lake
Bonneville, having an area nearly 20,000 square miles, says
that he has estimated that 80 inches are usually removed by
evaporation from this Salt Lake annually, and Mr Thomas
Russell has computed from annual means of temperature
vapourtention and wind velocity that in the lowlands of the
great Salt Lake basin the annual rate of evaporation from
water surfaces ranges from 60 inches at the north to 150 inches
at the south. The total area is 210,000 square miles. The
boundary of the great basin is Columbia on the north, Colorado
(of the west) on the east, and the basins of Sacramento River
on the west.

342

About five miles from the south end of the Sea of Galilee
the Yermuk affluent joins, from the east, the Jordan, below this
point the waters of the river cease to be bright. Its bed is
cut through the salt marls (deposited formerly by the Dead
Sea) in its downward course, these somewhat resemble in
appearance the Loes of the River Rhine. From this neigh-
bourhood and the salific properties of the Terraces on the sides
of the old lake basin the waters of the Jordan may be expected
to have derived some saltness, although not sensible to the
taste this is found to be the case on analysis. At seven miles
above the Dead Sea M. Lartet found ‘873 grains saline residue
in a litre of the Jordan water, 13 pint. In consequence of the
density of the Dead Sea waters 1162 at the surface and 1256
near the bottom, whilst that of the ocean is represented by
1027, the’ human body does not sink in them even under
complete immobility.

The water at first does not appear different from that of
the ocean, but if the hand is put in it a pronounced oily
impression is felt, and after prolonged contact pustules arise in
the skin, which are persistent while remaining on the lake.
The water is rich in chlorides and bromides, and it is no doubt
from the abundance of these salts that is to be attributed the
complete absence of animal life, such as generally exists in
sheets of salt water, as at Lakes Balkash, Urimiah, Van, &c.,
in Asia Minor.

Dr Hull says “no fact in physical history has been more
clearly established than that the waters of the Jordan Valley
Lake originally had a level somewhat higher than that of the
Mediterranean, and considerably over 13800 feet above its
present surface. At such a time this great inland lake would
have had a length of about 200 miles, with however no connex-
ion with the Red Sea or Mediterranean Sea being separated
from the former by an anticlinal in the Wady el Arabah, 660
feet above its water level, and from the latter by an anticlinal
upwards of 300 feet in the Plain of Hsdraelon, the lowest
enclosing bank west of the Jordan, as before described.”
Dr Hull gives an account of Terraces up to 630 feet above

343

water level, and Mr George Armstrong has given me an inter-
esting account of his ascent up the cliff (near Engedi) and has
been good enough to lend me the specimens produced, (which
Mr Etheridge has very kindly named) that he then collected on
the Terraces.

It will be at once evident that the water level in this
mighty reservoir without an outlet would be dependent as much
on evaporation as on the amount of inflow. In post-glacial
times the latter would be in excess and the former at its
minimum, as the inflow diminished and evaporation increased,
with warmer atmospheric conditions there would be a tendency
to reduce the water level, but this would be a slow process in
such a reservoir, and would occupy a long lapse of time before
desiccation to the extent of 1300 feet of depth was effected.
As Mr Hudleston observes a succession of Dead Seas were all
dried up in the Jordan Valley before the days of Abraham.

In regard to the period of the volcanic outbursts that have
been mentioned, Professor Hull says “ Recollecting the manner
in which both in Moab and the Jaulan the basalt streams flow
along depressions, hollowed out of cretaceous and eocene lime-
stones, it is clear that the basaltic eruptions are of later date
than the depressions themselves, and we shall probably not be
in error if we assume that the earlier manifestations of volcanic
action began during the epoch of the Pliocene. I have already
referred to the evidence from hot springs and recent earthquake
in the neighbourhood of Tiberias, that vulcanicity is not yet
effete in these regions. This is equally if not more decidedly
marked in the Zerka Main Ravine, towards the N.E. end of the
Dead Sea, wherein the steaming sources of the Calirrhée Flow
having a temperature of 142° Fahrt., much the same as those
at Emmaus, near Tiberias, before referred to. Major Conder
gives a graphic account of his ride down this ravine, a depth of
some 1700 feet, and describes the outbreak of basalt that
almost blocks it as resembling the high spoil heaps of an
English coal mine.*

*See Hath and Moab, by C. R. Conder, R.E., p, 149.

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