Page:The Ancient Stone Implements (1897).djvu/615

Rh have a fine kite-shaped specimen of the type of Plate I., No. 6 (5 inches), that was found at Gould's Heath, East of Wallingford, and two from Turner's Court, rather nearer the town. In all three cases the flint has become more or less whitened. I have another large flat ovate implement more like Plate I., No. 16, that was found at Cholsey, on the other side of the river. It is more lustrous and not so much whitened. Another was found on the surface at Ipsden, 3 miles S.E. of Wallingford.

In the neighbourhood of Oxford a fair number of palæolithic implements have been found, some of which are in the University Museum. The first of these was a fine specimen with a heavy butt and pointed tip (broken off), procured, in 1874, by Sir Joseph Prestwich from gravel on the left bank of the Cherwell, at Marston Ferry, not more than from 4 to 5 feet from the surface. Another, ovate (3 inches), was obtained by the late Professor Rolleston from the foundations of the New Schools in the High Street, in 1878, and two more of ruder workmanship came from the site of the Girls' High School in the Banbury Road, in 1880. Yet another was found below Oxford by the side of Bagley Wood, opposite Iffley. The principal discoveries have, however, been made at Wolvercote, about 1 miles north of Oxford, whence many have been collected by Mr. A. M. Bell, from whose account of the discoveries I have been quoting. Among the specimens in his and other collections are pointed and ovate implements, a fine example of the shoe-shaped type, like Fig. 429 (8 inches), trimmed flakes and a hammer-stone. One of Mr. Bell's pointed implements has been chipped out of quartzite. The brick-earth and gravel deposits lie in what appears to be an old river-channel, which has been cut into the Oxford clay and the superimposed Northern Drift to a depth of about 17 feet from the surface. It is at the base of this channel that the implements are found. In the sand near the base nine or ten species of land and freshwater shells occur, and in a peaty bed immediately above the sand and gravel the remains of various plants; but both the testaceous and vegetable remains belong to species still found in the neighbourhood. Mammoth, rhinoceros, and hippopotamus as well as Corbicula fluminalis have, however, been found in the Oxford gravels. The beds at Wolvercote above the peat consist of clay and sand deposited evenly in successive layers, but towards the surface they are