Page:Submerged forests (1913).djvu/76

62 The peaty deposits and old land-surface here seen between tide-marks are rapidly being destroyed by the sea and are now much thinner than they were a few years since. The soil on which the trees, here mainly oaks, are rooted consists of a blue clay full of small pebbles and fragments of the Culm Measure grit. Among these stones are numerous flint-flakes made by man; but metal implements and pottery, so common in the later deposits at Glastonbury, have not been found. This ancient land-surface lies several feet below high water; it shows therefore that the latest movement of depression dates from a period between this Neolithic deposit and the Celtic lake-dwelling of Glastonbury.

The possibility of fixing an approximate date for this submerged forest, through its numerous flint-flakes and the accompanying bones of domesticated animals, makes its contents of great interest, for it shows how recently the movement has ceased—probably not more than 3500 years ago. It will be worth while therefore to give a fuller account of the contents of this soil and its overlying peat-bed.

As regards articles of human workmanship, I have seen nothing but waste flakes of flint and perhaps flint knives; and though good implements may at any time be discovered, neither chipped nor polished tools seem yet to have been found. Human remains are represented by a clavicle.