Page:Quarterly Journal of the Geological Society of London, vol. 35.djvu/806

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the latter part of the summer of 1878 I heard from Mr. Griffith, of Christ's College, Cambridge, that large bones were being met with in a "coprolite-pit" at Barrington, on land belonging to Trinity College. Accompanying him there, we found the workmen had reserved for him fragments of three canines of a Hippopotamus, with some of the molars, a tooth of Rhinoceros, and other specimens. Further discoveries were made; and in September, when the work had been discontinued for harvest, I went there with two friends, and, armed with no tool better than a knife, obtained an excellent specimen of an incisor of the Hippopotamus. Upon this I advised Mr. Keeping, of the Woodwardian Museum, to get permission to commence a regular search for fossils, which, term not having commenced, and the Professor being in the country, he took upon himself the responsibility of doing, and through the kindness of Messrs. Smith and Badcock, the lessees of the coprolite-works, began a systematic exploration of the deposit. This was carried on after the Professor's return under his authority, and has been rewarded with great success.

The locality is easily recognized upon the Ordnance Map as being just south of where the final n in the word Barrington is printed. It is on the edge of a nearly level tract of ground at the foot of the hill between Haslingfield and Barrington, at an elevation of about 20 feet above the alluvial ground of the present stream of the Rhee. This tract of ground does not, however, form quite a flat terrace, but falls again very gradually northward towards the small streamlet, which, lower down, is crossed by the road near the church. The streamlet is not marked in the Ordnance Map, which wrongly represents the slope of the hill as extending to the lane which leads to the pit. The pit is nearly on the highest part of this tract; and consequently the bone-bearing deposit does not belong to the existing drainage-system, but, though at only a small altitude, may be still considered a high-level gravel.

The exposed section at present extends from north to south about 70 yards. The "coprolites" have been obtained in the deepest part at 22 feet. The section presents a superficial covering of soil and fine gravelly "trail," which, in the southern half, rests immediately on disintegrated chalk-marl; but towards the centre of the pit a thin bed of coarse gravelly silt with large pebbles comes in (see fig., p. 671), dipping slightly towards the north, and when it has descended to about 8 feet from the surface it rather suddenly expands downwards, forming a mass of grey gravelly silt, with many large stones towards the bottom, some of which may weigh from twelve to sixteen pounds. Above the stony bed the material is without large pebbles, otherwise of a similar character. Throughout these