Page:Quarterly Journal of the Geological Society of London, vol. 26.djvu/321

1870.] LLOYD AVON AND SEVERN VALLEYS. 213 localities in question. On the east lies the gravel-pit near the New Inn, separated from it by a small valley, through which a brook runs ; the brick-yard near Bricklehampton Bank faces the river on the west ; whilst to the south is seen the shallow valley in which the pits near Little Comberton and Wick are situated. As may be seen from the Table (p. 216), the elevation of the drift in the gravel-pit on Cropthorne Heath is 33 ft. above the mean height of the freshwater beds in the four localities just named.

Section in Gravel-pit near the New Inn, Cropthorne.

Surface of Ground. ft. in.

Light-coloured earthy clay, with a few pebbles 1 8 Red cohesive clay 1 6

Quartzose flinty gravel, with chalky -looking seams and layers of red and light-grey sand (whitish) 3 0

Quartzose flinty gravel, with layers of red and whitish sand (no chalky seams) 1 10

Light-red sand, obliquely laminated with a seam of gravel 1 inch thick 1 0

Red sandy clay, adhesive when moist 1 0 Light-grey sand (whitish) 1 0 Blue Lias clay. 11 0

A considerable number of large quartzose pebbles were mixed up with the finer gravel. A rounded boulder of Felstone, measuring about 2 ft. 2 in. x 1 ft., was found lying on the surface of the Lias clay.

The gravel-pit near Little Comberton, remarkable for having yielded a very fine tusk of Hippopotamus major, now in the Worcester Museum, is situated at a distance of about a mile from the present river. A section in it was as follows : —

Surface of Ground. ft. in.

(1) Light-coloured marly earth, with a few pebbles 2 0 (2) Fine, quartzose flinty gravel, with seams of light- red sand... 4 0 (3) Light-red sand, with small pebbles (chiefly of flint) 0 3 (4) Fine, quartzose, flinty gravel, and red sand 1 0 (5) Whitish-coloured sand 0 6 (6) Fine, quartzose, flinty gravel, and red sand 2 6

Blue Lias clay. 10 3

In the bed no. 5 I found numerous specimens of freshwater shells enclosed in streaks of light-red clay. The surface of the basement clay was very uneven. In another part of the same pit, now filled in, the Rev. W. Parker, of Little Comberton, informed me he had found the lowest stratum composed of mud containing fresh-water shells and remains of aquatic plants, lying on an uneven surface of blue Lias clay. For a description of the brick-earth and gravel near Bricklehampton Bank, I must refer my readers to the Strickland Memoirs, page 98, and the ' Silurian System,' pages 555, 556).

Boulders are occasionally met with in the freshwater gravels, occurring on the surface of the basement clay. The largest I have seen was found in the ballast-pit near Charlton ; it was composed