Page:The Ancient Stone Implements (1897).djvu/601

Rh finding in them some relics of human workmanship; and his search has been rewarded by the discovery of the undoubted palæolithic implement, which through his kindness I am able to exhibit in Fig. 450. It is 4 inches in length and has been formed from a brown quartzite pebble which, by dexterous chipping, has been brought into a nearly symmetrical form with a sharp point and edge. It much resembles one from the Robin Hood Cave, Creswell Crags, Fig. 413.

Fig. 450.—Saltley.

The valley of the river Rea runs at Saltley in a more or less N.N.E. direction, and is about a mile in width. Several stretches of gravel are found at different heights on both sides of the valley, but especially on the southern side. The highest and oldest gravels on this side are exposed in a clay-pit just in front of Saltley College, and are about 3 feet in thickness. They consist in the main of small quartzite pebbles in a light-brown sandy matrix, though some large pebbles and a few broken foreign flints also occur, and below the sandy beds is a layer, 3 or 4 feet thick, of Glacial clay and sand, with pebbles and boulders (Arenig felsite, &c.), and below this again come the Keuper marls, which are used for brick-making. The level of the top of the gravels is 395 feet above Ordnance Datum and that of the river is about