Id 6 on -6 ^ I "^r«!: ^^Onm ^/^AA. SS58a '/^HM^D ^i*^^§p^^m. MMn'MYit"-"»*g aaaa/b BOUGHT WITH THB INCOME FROM THE SAGE ENDOWMENT FUND THE GIFT OF mm Heni^g m. sagi^ Cornell University Library QE 262.N75W57 1893 The geology of south-western Norfolk and 3 1924 004 471 367 Cornell University Library The original of this book is in the Cornell University Library. There are no known copyright restrictions in the United States on the use of the text. http://www.archive.org/details/cu31924004471367 MElOmS OF THE OEOLOGICAL SURYEL ENGLAND AND WALES. THE GEOLOGY SOUTH-WESTERN NORFOLK AND OP NORTHERN CAMBRIDGESHIRE. (EXPLANATION OF SHEET 65.) W. WHITAKEE, B.A., F.E.S., F.G.S., Assoc, Inst. C.E., (Editor,) S. B. j; SKERTOHLT, F.G.S., AND A. J. JUKES-BROWJSTE, B.A., F.G.S. {Partly from Notes bij other Officers of the Survey.') PrBIISHED BT OKBEK OB THE LORDS COMMISSIOITEES OF nEE 3IAJE8TT S IBEA3FKT, LONDON: PRINTED FOE HER MAJESTY'S STATIONERY OEEICE, BT BYRE AND SPOTTISWOODB, PRINTBEa TO THE QlTBEIf'S MOST EXCELLENT MAJESTT. And tp be puroUased, either directly orthrougli any Bookseller, from ETRE ASD SPOTTISWOODE. East Haediho .Stbbet, Fleet Stkebt, B.C. ; or JOHN MENZIES & Co., 12, Hamovee. Steeet, Bi?lifBnEan, and. 90, "West Nile Stebet, Glaboow; or. HODGES, EIGGIS, & Co. Limited, 10-1, Geapton Stbbet, Ditelut. 1893, Price Three Shillings. UST OF MAPS, SECTIONS, AMD OTHER PUBLiCATIONS OF THE GEOLOGICAL SURVEY OF ENGLAND AND WALES. Thb Maps are those of the Ordnance Survey, geologically coloured by the GeolORical Survey of the United Kingdom. under theSupenntenden^^of^S^^^.^^^^^^^ ENGLAND AND WALES.— (Scaleone-inchtoamile.) 104»'l06 kw*. S-wXcNE'j.SliMOeNW, SW*,NE», SB*, 107 SWt, (NW»), (NE*), SE*. SW: IlffSEX niAPS :— (Scale 4 miles to 1 inch.) , ■WALES, &o.-Sheets 9 (1-inch Maps, 37, 38, 40. 41) ; 10 (36, 36, 42, 43) ; 14 (57-59) : 15 (55, 58, 60, 61) ; 19 (76-78) j 20 (73, J4, ' 79, 80), 3s. ed. each. „ . , ENGLAND AND WALES.— Sheets 6 (B. Yorkshire), 7s. ed. ; 12 (London and lower part of Thames Basin), 10s. td. 14 (Torquay to I. of Wight) 9s. ; 15 (Chichester to Hastings), 4s. 6d. HORIZOirTA.& SECTIOn-S, VBHTlCAIi SECTIONS, 1 to 147, England, price 5s. each. 1 to 79, England, price 3s. ed. each. COIKP^tBTED COVIffTXES OT ElTGIiAH'S AXnt VTAIiES, on a Scale of one-inch to a Mile. Sheets marked * have Descriptive Memoirs. Sheets or Counties marked t are illustrated by General Memoirs, ANGLESE It,— 77 N, 78. Hor. Sect. 40. BBDFOEDSHIBE,— 46 NW, NE, SWt, SEt, 62 NW, NE, SW. SE. BBBKSHIEB,— 7*, 8t, 12*, 13*, 34", 46 SW*. Hor. Sect. 59, 71, 72, 80. BBBCKNOCKSHiaEt,— 36, 41, 43, 66 NW, SW, 57 NE, SB. Hor. Sect. 4, 5, 6, 11, and Vert. Sect. 4 and 10. BUCKINGHAMSHIRE,— 7* 13* 46* NE, SE. 46 NW, SWt, 52 SW. Hor. Sect. 74, 79. CABl>;MAE,THENSHl]lEt,37,38,40,41, 42NW,SW, 56 SW, 57 SW, SE. Hor. Sect. 2-4,7,8; and Vert. Sect. S-6. 13,14, OAEKNABVONSHIEEt,— 74 NW, 75, 76, 77 N, 78, 79 NW SW. Hor. Sect. 28, SI, 40. CAMBRIDGBSHIBBt,— 46 NB, 47*. 61', 62 SE, 64*. CAEDIGANSHIREt,— 40, il, 56 NW, 67, 58, 59 SB, 60 SW. Hor. Sect. 4, 5, 6. CHESHIRE,— 73 NB, NW, 79 NE, SB, 80, 81 NW*, SW*, 88 SW. Hor. Sect. 18, 43, 44, 60, 64, 65, 67, 70. CORNWALLt,— 24t, 25t, 26t, 29t, 30t, 31t, S2t, & 3St. DENBlGHt,- 73NW,74,75NE,78NE,SB,79NW,SW,SE,80SW. Hor.Seofc.31,S5, 38, 39,43, 44; and Vert. Sect. 21. DBRBYSHIREt,— 62 NE, 68 NW. 71 N W, S W, SE, 72 NB, SE, 81, 82, 88 SW, SE . Hor. Sect. 18, 46, 60, 61, 69, 70. DEVONSHIRBt,-20t, 21t, 22t- 23t, 24t, 25t, 26t.&27t. Hor. Sect. 19. DORSETSHIRE,— 16, 16, 17, 18, 21, 22. Hor. Sect. 19, 20, 21, 22, 56. Vert. Sect. 22. ESSEX,— 1*. 2*, 47*, 48*. Hor. Sect. 84, 120. FLINTSHIEEt,— 74 NE, 79. Hor. Sect. 48. GLAMOEGANSHIRBf,- 20, 36, 37, 41, & 42 SE, SW. Hor. Sect. 7, 8, 9, 10, 11 ; Vert. Sect. 2, 4, 5, 6, 7, 9 10 47 GLOUOBSTERSHIRE,— 19, 34', 36, 43 NE, SW, SB, 44*. Hor. Sect. 12 to 15, 59; Vert. Sect. 7, 1], 15, 46 to s'l. HAMPSHIRE,— 8t, 9t, 10*, lit, 12*, 14, 15, 16. Hor. Sect. 80. HBREEORDSHIRB,-42 NE, SE, 43, 56, 56 NB, SE. Hor. Sect. 5, 13, 27, 30, 34 ; and Vert. Sect. 15, HBRTEOEDSHIRE,— It N Vf, 1', 46, 47*. Hor. Sect. 79, 120, 121. HUNTINGDON,— 61 NW. 52 NW, NE, SW, 64*, 65. KBNTt— It SW & SE, 2t, St, 4*, 6t. Hor. Sect. 77 and 78. LANOASHIEE,-79 NB, 80 NW*. NB, 81 NW, 88 NW, SWt, 89, 90, 91, 92 SW, 98. H. S. 62 to 68 85 to 87 V S 27 ** SUEFOLK,— 47,*48,*49*,50*, 61*, 66* SB*, 67*. ' • ■ • SURREY,- 1 SWt, 6t, 7*, 8t, 12t. Hor. Sect. 74, 76, 76, and 79. SUSSEX,- 1*, 6t, 6t, 8t, 9t, lit. Hor. Sect. 73, 76, 76, 77, 78 WARWICKSHIRE,-44*, 45 NW, 63*, 54, 62 NB, SW, SE, 63 NW, SW, SE. Hor. Sect 23 4S to Ri . v * o . WILTSHIEE.-12*, 13*, 14, 16, 18, 19, 34*, and 35. Hor. Sect. 15 and 69 " ' ^*'''' *«"*• ^^- WOECESTER8HIEE,-43 NE, 44*, 54, 66, 62 SW, SE. 61 SB. Hor. Se^t. 13, 23. 26, 60, 59, and Vert. Sect. 16. MEMOmS OP TKE GEOLOGICAL SrRYEL ENGLAND AND WALES. THE GEOLOGY SOUTH-WESTERN NORFOLK AND OP NORTHERN CAMBRIDGESHIRE. (EXPLANATION OF SHEET 65.) W. WHITAKEE, B.A., F.E.S., F.G.S., Assoc. Inst. C.E., ^ (Editor,) S. B. J. SKERTCHLY, F.G.S., AND A. J. JUKES-BROWNE, B.A., F.G.S. (Partly from Notes by other Officers of the Survey.) TVBLISHED BT OBBEB 0! THS XOBDS COMMIS3IONEB9 OF BEB MAJESTY S TBEASCBT.. LONDON: , PRINTED FOR HER MAJESTY'S STATIONERY OFFICE, BY ETEE AND SPOTTISWOODE, FBINXEB3 TO THE QUEEN'S MOST EXCELLENT MAJESTY. And to be purchased, either directly or through any Bookseller, from BYRE AND SPOTTISWOODE. East Haedino Sikeet, Fleet Street. E.G. ; or JOHN MENZIBS & Co., 12, Hanovee Stesbt, Edinbuegh, and 90, West Nile Street, Glasoow; or HODGES, FIGGIS, & Co. Limited, 101, Gbapion Street, Dublin. 1893. Price Three Shillings. PREFACE. The district represented in Sheet 65 of the Geological Surrey and described in the following Memoir, embraces the northern part of Cambridgeshire and the south-western portion of the county of Norfolk. It consists of two distinct areas, differing from each other in topography and in geology. The western and rather larger tract belongs to the flat level region of the Fenland, while the eastern district undulates in low hills and ridges, consisting of Cretaceous rocks, with for the most part a capping of boulder-clay, blown sand, or other superficial deposit. The western area was chiefly surveyed by Mr. Skertchly, and was described by him in the General Memoir on the Fenland, published in 1877. All matter in that work which refers to the geology of Sheet 65 has been made use of in the present Memoir, in the form and arrangement that appeared most suitable. The more varied eastern tract was mapped by Messrs. Whi taker. Woodward, Cameron, Bennett, Skertchly, Hawkins, Reid and Barrow, the portion of ground surveyed by each officer being ap- proximately shown by their notes of local details in the following chapters. The lists of fossils have been revised by Messrs. Sharman and Newton. The division between the Lower and Middle Chalk was traced at a subsequent time by Mr. Jukes-Browne, and on the north by Mr. Whitaker, both of whom had the advantage of the company of Mr. W. Hill and of his wide acquaintance with the Chalk. , Mr. Jukes-Browne has contributed most of the material descriptive of the TJppe d." etaceous formations. The work of the three officers whose names appear on the title- page, forms the chief portion of this Memoir, but the notes of the others whose names have just been mentioned have likewise been used, especially those of Messrs. Woodward, Hawkins, and Reid. The Preparation of the work was entrusted to Mr. "Whitaker who has arranged and edited it, most of the field-work east of the Ouse having been carried on under his supervision. He has like- wise contributed the accounts here given of the literature of the various deposits where the work of previous observers is fully acknowledged. Amoncf the features of geological interest4n the region described in the following chapters, reference may be made to two deposits B 75929. 500.— 11/93. Wt. 26335. E. & 3. a 2 of marine Drift, those of the Nar clay and the March gravel ; like- wise to the occurrence of channels filled with glacial Drift and extending to a great length, partly even below sea-level ; and to the presence of esker-like masses of gravel in the north part of the district. The phosphatic deposit in the Lower Greensand is perhaps the most notable geological feature in the southern part of the ground. In this southern tract also many stone implements have been found in the Drift. In connection with the occurrence of these relics of early man, we have to thank Sir John Evans for his continued liberality in allowing the use of many wood-cuts from his well-known book. The Council of the. Geological Society has also been so good as to permit the reproduction of some illustrations from the Society's Quarterly Journal. ARCH. GEIKIE, Director-General. ■Geological Survey OflSce, 15th September, 1893. CONTENTS. Page Preface, by the Director General - - - - - iii Chap. 1. Introductory. Area. Rivers. Geological Formations . Shape of the Ground. Note on the Recent Fauna and Flora of Brandon ........ I Chap. 2. Jurassic Beds. Oxford, Corallian and Kimeridge Clays (General Remarks. Details. Fossils) - - - G Chap. 3. Cretaceous Beds. Lower Greensand (General Remarks. Details, between the Little Ouse and the Nar. Details, between the Nar and the Middleton Drain. Details, between the Middleton Drain and the Leziate Stream. Details, north of the Leziate Stream) II Chap. 4. Upper Cretaceous Series. Classification. GouZi (General Account. Details, south of the Nar. Details, north of the Nar. Fossils) ... .... 20 Chap. 5. Upper Cretaceous Series. Lower Chalk (General Accouht. Details, south of the Wissey. Details, between the Wissey and the Nar. Details, north of the Nar. Fossils) - 28 Chap. 6. Upper Cretaceous Series. Middle and Upper Chalk (General Note. Zone of Rhynchonella Cuvieri. Chalk Rock. Chalk with flints. Fossils) - - - - , 37 ■Chap. 7. Glacial Dkift. General Remarks. Beds below the Boulder Clay (South of the Wissey. Between the Wissey and the Nar. North of the Nar) 45 Chap. 8. Glacial Drift. Boulder Clay (General Description. South of the Wissey. Between the Wissey and the Nar. North of the Nar. In the Fens, west of the Ouse) - 56 'Chap. 9. Glacial Drift, etc. Beds above the Boulder Clay. (Difficulties of Classification, etc. South of the Wissey, etc. Between the Wissey and the Nar. North of the Nar) ■ - 70 Chap. 10. Post-Glacial Drift. Doubtful Nature of Classification. Nar Valley Brickearth (General Note and Literature. Fossils. Details) SO Chap. 11, Post-Glacial Drift. Biver Gravel (General Note. Valley of the Ouse. Valley of the Little Ouse. Valley of the Wissey, Valley of the Nar. Gaytonthorpe Valley) - 90 Chap. 12. Post-Glacial Drift. Marine Gravel (General Note and Literature. Details. Fossils). Miscellaneous. Paleeolithic Stone Implements - - - - - -105 Chap. 13. Recent Beds. Alluvium. The Fens, including the Marshes of the Ouse and of the Nene (General Remarks. The Peat. Shell-Marl) 118 Chap. 14. Recent Beds. Alluvium. The Fens, etc. continued. ' (The Fen Silt. Sections. Fossils and Works of Man.) Tributary Valleys - - - - . . 133 Chap. 15. Economics. Building Materials (Stone. Lime, Whitening, etc. Bricks, etc.). Applications to Land. Fuel, etc. Water - 143 Appendix 1. Well-Sbctions. Cambridgeshire. Norfolk. Suffolk (Supplementary to other Memoirs) .... 154 Appendix 2. Trial. Borings. Cambridgeshire. Norfolk - 165 Index ....... 172 ILLUSTRATIONS. Page Fig. 1. Section in a Coprolite Pit north of West Dereham (A.. J. Jukes-Browne) - - - - - - 24 2. Section at Stoke Ferry (A. J. Jukes-Browne, from GeoZ. Soc.) 31 3. Section at Lingheath, Brandon. (S. B. J. Skertchly, Gun Flint Memoir) - - - - 42 „ 4. Section in the Northern Pit at Wilton High Barn, Hock- wold. (S. B. J. Skertchly) - - - - 47 5. Sketch- Section north-eastward of Brandon. (S. B. J. Sk-ERTchly, Gun Flint Memoir) - '- - - 48 „ 6. Section in a Pit at Broomhill Cover. (S. B. J. Skertchly) 47 ,, 7- Section at the Western Side of Botany Bay Brickyard. (S. B.J. Skertchlt) - - - - - 50 „ 8, Section on the Eastern Side of Botany Bay Brickyard. (S. B. J. Skertchly) - - - - . - 50 9. Section in a Pit west of Grimes' Graves. (S. B. J. Skertchly) - - ' - - - - 51 „ 10. Section near the House on Stanford and ToUington Warren. (S. B. J. Skertchly) - - - - - 52 „ 11. Section northward from near Mundford. (S. B. J. Skertchly) - - - - - - .53 „ 12. Section half a mile east of Tckborough. (S. B. J. Skertchly) - - - - - - 63 „ 13. Section in a Pit at Great Cressingham. (F. J. Bennett) - 58 „ 14, 15. Parts of the Section seen at Bawsey Brickyard in 1883. (W. Whitaker) - - - - - 65 „ 16. Section in a Pit near Washpit Farm, and south-westward of Rougham. (H. B. Woodward) - - - 68 ,, 17, 18. Sections across Butcher's Hill Island. (S. B. J. Skertchly, Fenland Memoir) - - - - 69 „ 19. Section in a Gravel Pit at White House, near Methwold. (S. B. J. Skertchly, Fenland Memoir) - - 73 „ 20. Section across a Pit on the North of Gayton Field. W. Whitaker) - - - - . ".79 ., 21. Section from Hockwold to the Fen. (S. B. J. Skertchly, Fenland Memoir) - - - . - 96 „ i;2, 23. Sections in the Gaytonthorpe Valley. (J. Trimmer) 101,102 „ 24. Section in a Pit at Eldemell, Eastrey. (S. B. J. Skertchly, Fenland Memoir) -''... jQg „ 25-28. Flint Implements from Saiiton Downham. (Sir J. Evans) 114, 115 ,, 29. Flint Implement from Broomhill, near Brandon. (Sir J. Evans) -.-.... ng „ 30. Flint Implement from Shrub Hill, Feltwell. (Sir J. Evans) 116 „ 31. Felstone Implement from Gravel Hill, Brandon. (Sir J. Evans) - - - - . . -117 „ 32. Quartzite Flake from Gravel Hill, Brandon. (Sir J. Evans) --..... jj^ „ 33. Section across Pear Tree Hill. (S. B. J. Skertchly, Fen- land Memoir) - - - . . - !27 vu Page. Fig, 34. Sections along Popham's Eau. (S. B. J. Skertchly, Fen- land Memoir) ...... 127 „ 35. Section at the Avenue on Popham's Eau. (S. B. J. Skertchly, Fenland Memoir) - - - 130 „ 36. Section along Popham's Eau. (S. B. J. Skertchly, Fen- land Memoir) ...... 131 „ 37. Part of Section along Popham's Eau. (S. B. J. Skertchly, Fenland Memoir) - . - - - 130 „ 38. Flint Arrow-head from Chatteris. (S. B. J. Skertchly, Fenland Memoir) ..... 140 Figures 1, 4, 6-16, 20, are new. The work of the various authors is as follows, the numbers referring to the pages to which they have contributed : — W. Whitaker, 1-4, 6-9, 11-20, 24-26, 29, 30, 33-35, 37-39, 44-46, 52-60, 62-66, 68, 70-72, 74-100, 103-113, 118, 132, 136, 138-151, 154-171. H. B. Woodward, 6-8, 41, 55, 56, 66, 68, 71, 77, 78, 111, 144. A. C. G. Cameron, 30,59, 62, 63, 73, 74, 97, 129, 141, 143, 144, 146, 167. F. J. Bennett, 41, 51, 52, 56, 58, 59, 93, S. B, J. Skertch!ly, 4, 5, 8, 39, 40, 42-44, 46-53, 59, 68, 69, 71-73, 95, 96, 107, 108, 118-131, 133-138, 140, 143, 145, 146, 151. C. E. Hawkins, 16, 38, 41, 54, 55, 60-64, 66, 67, 76-79, 86, 8/, 91, 92, 97-100, 103, 104, 111, 141, 147, 149, 157. C. Reid, 14, 23, 63, 73, 74 109-111, 157, 159, 160, 162, 163. A. J. Jukes-Browne, 13, 20-39, 44, 58, 62, 63, 72-74, 158, 169. G. Barrow, 41, 53, 54, 66-59, 62, 74, 149. CHAPTEE I. INTRODUCTORY. Area, The area represented in Sheet 65 of the Geolo^;ical Survey Map, and now to be described, is about 820 square miles in extent. It comprises parts of four counties, as follows : the northern part of Cambridgeshire (except for the neighbourhood of Whittlesey, in Sheet 64), with the towns of March and Wisbech and the large villages of Chatteris and Littleport ; the south- western part of Norfolk, with the towns of Downham Market, Lynn, Stoke Ferry and Swiiffham ; the south-eastern end of the Lincolnshire Fenland ; a small part of the Huntingdonshire Fen- land ; and a small strip of the north-western part of Suffolk, with the border town of Brandon. More than half of this tract, on the west, belongs to the Fen- land, and has therefore been already described in the Memoir thereon, together with some of the border ; but the parts of that Memoir which refer to the geology of our district are now re- produced, with some additions and with such alterations as the new arrangement made needful. For an account of the history of the Fenland, of its rivers and drainage, of its inundations and of its meteorology, the reader is referred to the older Memoir.* Althouj^h the district includes some of the highest parts of the large county of Norfolk, yet nowhere is a height of 300 feet above the sea reached. RlVEES. The chief river is the Ouse, which crosses the district from south to north, from just above Littleport to just below Lynn,, along a canalized and sometimes a purely artificial channel, and it is tidal for half of this course, up to Denver Sluice, where the tidal action is artificially stopped; naturally the whole would be tidal. The Ouse is an important river, draining a very large tract of land, and within our boundaries it receives the following- streams on its right, or easterly, side : — 1. The Little Ouse, which enters the district at the south- eastern comer, flows westward for several miles and then, turning north-westward, joins the main river above Southrey. On its way from Thetford (just beyond our boundary) to the Fens, with the exception of a trifliug brooklet from Weeting, the Little Ouse receives no tributary, a fair illustration of the dryness of a Chalk-country. 2. The Wissey or Stoke River, a Chalk-stream, supplemented by some Drift-drainage, two branches of which enter our district on the east, at Little Cressingham and North Pickenham, joining at Hiiborough and then flowing southward for a few miles to * The Geology of the Fenland. By S. B. J. Skbrtchlt, pp. xvi., 335 ; 24 plates. 18V7. E 75929. \ A . 2 EIVERS. below Langford. Here a short tributary from Stanford, on the east, imposes its westerly course on the stream, and two miles further down another sliort tributary, also on the left side, from West Tofts, does the like, giving the river a slight northerly turn. This north-westerly course it holds for about 5 miles. Then three tributaries join, in about a mile, on the right or northern side : first the short streamlet from N.E. of Fouldon, then the brook from east of Cockley Cley, and then the combined, brooks from Beechamwell and Fincham ; and the result is that from Stoke Ferry the Wissey bends southward, but for less than two miles, when the little stream from Methwold joins on the left side, and gives the river its own westerly course, which it keeps across the Fen to the Ouse, west of Hilgay. 3. The Nar or Setchy enters the district on the east at East Lexham and flows irregularly westward, without tributaries, through the Chalk-tract, but beyond it receiving, on the right, the streams that rise from the basal part of the Chalk at East Walton and at Gaytonthorpe. On reaching the Fenland the Nar, which is canalized as far up as Narborough, turns north- ward, and, gradually nearing the Ouse, joins the latter at the southern side of Lynn, together with the stream in the Middleton Valley, which rises at the base of the Chalk at Gay ton. 4, On the northern side of Lynn the Ouse receives the stream that rises in the Chalk-springs of Grimston. The other drainage-system of the tract to be described is that of the Nene, which river flows across the Fenland from Eastrea, on the west, to Wisbech, in an artificial channel, and then turns northward across Marshland to Sutton Bridge, being tidal throughout. The changes that have been brought about in the rivers of the Fenland have been described in the Fenland Memoir. Geological Formations. The geological divisions shown on the Geological Survey Map are given in the right-hand column of the following table • — r Alluvium Cgenerally). Recent (Alluvial Deposits) - \ f^'^^'"'^ °^ *^" ^"'^ ^«^^'- L Fen Silt. f Marine Gravel (March, &c.). Loam (orBrickeartli). Post-Glacial Drift -■{ Marl. ) Eiver Gravel. [_ Marine Clay and Loam (Nar Valley), r Gravel and Sand, and Eskers. Glacial Drift - - i. Boulder Clay. [ Brickearth and Gravel. <■ Middle and Upper Chalk. fChalk . \ Lower Chalk. i L Chalk Marl. Cretaceous m sand, demented to an ironstone at the surface (P through water thrown out as springs), and in the clayey beds that occur here in the sand. The ironstone, a sort of bog iron-ore, is ^^esicular, and has been used in purifying gas. The idln seven eighths of a mile W.N.W. of Ash Wicken church is supplied from the same beds. The slightly purplish tint of the clayey bed is perhaps more marked here, and at the part where the base of this bed was seen it was marked by a ferruginous layer. At a later visit, in 1892, the pit had been cut bade, giving the following section : — Sand, with thin layers of iron-sandstone ; to lOJeet. Grey finely-bedded clay, partly ochreous, throwing out much water from the sand above ; to over 7 feet. The clayey beds were also touched in a small pit, near the top of thi? Common, round the hill northward, and in Bawsey Brickyard (see pp. 64, 65) ; but both LOWER GREENSAND. 19 here and at the place next to be noted, to the east, they are so thin that they can only be shown on the map by a line, and then for no great way. At the brickyard about half a mile N.W. of the church, and at a rather lower level, the following section was seen in 1883 ; — • rA little bi'own sand, partly in pockets or undulations. Lower J Grey loam, bedded, tut undulated with ferruginous concre- Greensand. I tions; up to 8 feet. I Light-colom-ed sand. At the farm about IJ miles W.N.W. of Gayton church the ground is very swampy, and there is some light-bluish-grey clay to be seen which belongs probably to the clayey beds in the Lower Greensand, which are here mappable westward to Leziate, though at last only by a line. Details, north of the Leziate Stream. The streams from the Sow's Head and Well Hall Springs are badly marked on the old map. They really join further east than is shown, and conse- quently, though the Lower Greensand crops out a little below their junction, I was obliged to draw the line of outcrop as above it. This line is here in a tolerably perfect flat. At the junction, along the stream, there is clay above clayey sand; and at the lane about half a mile S.W. of Grimston church there is green sand just below the Gault. The swampy flat south of Grimston Common was troublesome. The stream is not rightly marked on the map, and there may be some Drift gravel and sand both here and eastward, in which case there may also be Drift clay or brickearth beneath. This is so doubtful however that it was thought best to leave the tract as Lower Greensand, the clay in which may be the cause of the growth of oaks, etc., eastward of the Common, although there was no evidence to warrant the mapping of that clay. A pit on the Common, about a third of a mile south of the brickyard (see p. 89), gave the following section, in 1883 ; — r A little sand. Lower J Grey clay, weathering brown, and stained red and crimson in Greensand I the lower part ; hardly over a foot. L Firm buff sand. A small pit, near the' hill-top, nearly a quarter of a mile N.E. of Bawsey Spot H-ouse showed irregular carstone, with sand, the upper part much recon- structed (with hematitic nodules, phosphatic nodules, some decomposed, one being a piece of a large Ammonite, and a few flints). Nearly a quarter of a mile a little S. of E. a smaller pit, in a like place, showed the like thing. Addendum. "Whilst this was passing through the press, a. " Memoir of Caleb B. Rose," by Mk. H. B. Woodwa;bd, was printed,* with an account of his work and a list of his papers. To this the reader is referred for information about a pioneer- geologist of Western Norfolk, whose work is often quoted in these papers. * Trans. Norfolk Nat. Soc, vol. v. pp. 387-403, plate (portrait). B 2 20 CHAPTER 4. UPPER CRETACEOUS SERIES. . The flescription of this great Series has been undertaken by Me. Jukes-Bkowne, who has for some years been specially engaged with Cretaceous beds, the notes of various colleagues being worked in. Chap. 6 however is only in part by him. Classification. The Upper Cretaceous rocks of this area have usually been; described under two heads, the Grault and the Chalk ; but, so long ago as 1883, S. WoodWakd separated the latter into three parts, the Lower or hard Chalk, the Medial Chalk, and the Upper Chalk. C. B. Rose subsequently adopted these divisions and showed that each contained a different assemblage of organic reni.ains {Phil. Mag., 1835). [Mk. R. C. Tatloe seems to have had some such idea at an earlier date, for he says : — " The Chalk vx- the excavations around Swaffham belongs probably to some intermediate bed between the upper and lower strata."* — W.W.], In 1876 De. C. Baeeois published the results of his exami- nation of the British Chalk, and showed that the classification proposed by D'Orbigny and adopted in France was applicable to England also, the three divisions of Cenomanian, Turonian, and Senonian being well developed in the Eastern and Midland counties.t The work of the Geological Survey in Cambridgeshire, published a few years later,J confirmed Dr. Barrois' conclusions and disclosed the fact that these divisions were separated by layers of hard rocky chalk, the outcrops of which were traceable across the country and could be laid down on the map. To one of these the name Melbourn Rock was given from the village where it was first examined in that district, the other was found to be the representative of the bed previously named Chalk Rock. It was then proposed to call the divisions thus established the Lower, the Middle and the Upper Chalk, and this nomenclature has since been generally ^^dopted. Each of these divisions of the Chalk has a chronological value which is at least as great as that of the Gault, and probably much greater, while lithologically and palseontologically they differ from one another quite as much as the Grault does from the Chalk Marl. The whole series in fact constitutes one great calcareous formation, for the Gault of Norfolk is much more marly than the mass of that clay to the south of the Fen-district. In this Memoir therefore the Upper Cretaceous Series will be described as consisting of four stages or divisions : — 1. The * Trans. Geol. Soc , ser. 2, vol. i., pt. i., p. 378. (1824.) + Eecherches sur le Terr. Cret. Sup. J Greology of the Neighbourhood of Cambridge, by W. H. Penning and A, J, Juees-Bkowne, 1881. CLASSIFICATION, 21 Gault ; 2. The Lower Chalk, including the Chalk Marl and the Tottemhoe Stone ; 3. The Middle Chalk, based upon the Mel- bourn Kock ; 4. The Upper Chalk, the base of which however has not yet been determined in Norfolk (except perhaps at one spot, near Swaflfham), for the Chalk Eock appears to lose its special rocky character as it is followed northward, and its horizon has been identified to the north of the Lark valley only at the place alluded to. In reading the older descriptions of the Norfolk Chalk it must be remembered that our divisions do not correspond exactly with those of Woodward. His Lower Chalk included all that was hard, i.e., oui Lower and the greater part of the Middle Chalk ; his Medial Chalk was of considerable thickness but had no definite base or summit, and appears to have included the upper part of our Middle and a large part of the Upper or Senonian division. Gault. General Account. The existence of Gault in Norfolk was first pointed out, in 1835, by Rose, who seems at fi.rst however to have had some doubt whether it was actually the representative of the Cambridge- shire Gault. His hesitation was entirely dispelled by William Smith, who recognised it by the fossils it contained * ; so that we find De. Fitton accepting its existence as established. t Me. Rose afterwards succeeded in tracing the general course of its outcrop from West Dereham northward to West Newton (in Sheet 69). From Fitton's time no doubt was thrown upon the occurrence of Gault in West Norfolk until 1886, when Messrs. Shaeman and Reid raised the question and argued, from the character and con- tents of the bed, that it was the representative of the Chalk Marl and not of the Gault.J This suggestion was combatted by Me. W. Hill and the present writer, who proved it to be Gault by the the discovery of Ammonites interruptus in abundance near its base at Muzzle Hill, West Dereham, and of Ammonites rostratus, A. lautus, Inoceramus sulcatus, and /. concentricus in its upper and more calcareous part near Grimston. They also established the existence of true Chalk Marl in full force above the Gault at Stoke Ferry, and thus decided the age of the latter, not only by the test of organic remains, but that of actual infraposition to the unattenuated continuation of the Chalk Marl.§ In the southern part of the district the Gault is concealed by the Fen-deposits. It emerges fi:om beneath these west of Stoke Ferry, and has a surface outcrop as far as Crimplesham, where * PAi7. itfay., vol. vii. pp. 179, ISO. (1835.) t Trans. Geol. Soc, ser. 2, vol. iv. p. 312. (1836), j Geol. Mag., dec. iii., vol. hi. pp. 55-59. § Geol. Mag., dec. iii., vol. iv. pp. 72-74 (188GJ, and Quart. Journ. Geol. Soc, vol. xliii. p. 544. 22 GAULT. it passes beneath a broad mass of Boulder Clay. Emerging again near Fincham the outcrop can be followed by Shouldham and Marham, forming a strip of flat clayey soil between the Lower Greensand and the slope of the Lower Chalk. Thence it runs northward by Pentney and West Bilney, but its surface is largely covered by Post Tertiary gravels, sands and clays. Below Gay ton and Grimston, however, it forms a narrow, but continuous, strip of land. Near West Dereham the Gault is a marly clay, bluish-grey when freshly dug, but drying to a greyish-white, and then looking very hke soft Chalk Marl. Its total thickness here is nearly 60 feet, and the higher part seems to be still more calcareous than the lower. There is a layer of phosphatic nodules at the base, which has been worked for many years. By Shouldham, Marham and Pentney it is thinner, probably from 30 to 40 feet, but exhibits similar characters, being through- out a soft marly clay. The basement nodule-bed has not yet been found along this tract. At Narborough House a well-boring shows 20 feet of marly clay identified as Gault (see Appendix, p. 158). Near Gayton and Grimston its appearance is rather different, the lower part (indicated on the map by a darker tint) is darker and more clayey, while the upper part is very calcareous, containing 66 to 70 per cent, of calcic carbonate, and including layers of hard greyish-white limestone, in which the proportion of calcic carbonate is nearly 90 per cent. There is also a layer of red marl marking the beginning of the change into the Eed Chalk of Hunstanton. The following analysis of the red marl from Grimston was made by De. W. Johnstone.* - Silica and silicates - OarboDate of lime - ,, ,, magnesia Sulphate of lime Peroxide of iron Alumina and phosphoric acid Manganese - Organic matter, etc. Details, south of the Nar. Some of the junction- sections of the Gault and the Lower Greensand have been already described (pp. 13, 17). We now consider those sections more strictly belonging to the Gault. In 1886, Mb. Eeid published the foUowingt : " The new Coprolite "Works lately opened at West Dereham show the best sections of the Phosphate Bed and of the Marl immediately overlying it ; but the Marl * Quart. Journ. Geol. Soc, vol. xliii. p. 588. (1887.) t In a joint paper with Mr. G. Sharman, Geol. Mag., dec. iii., vol. iii. p. sg. 22 69 6 5 - 9 66 3 4 - 1 6 - tra ce - 1 ■34 100 GAULT. 23 there is very thin, being partly cut out by. Boulder-clay. In October, "1883, the section seen in the well was :" Ft. In. 5. Boulder-clay, very chalky 7 4. Blue marl, drying bluish white - - 4 3. CoproliteBed - - - 9 2. Hard loamy nodular G-reensand - - 2 1. Running sand! " No. 3 is the bed for which the deposit is worked. It consists of a mass of phosphatic nodules in a greenish loamy or sandy matrix, partly derived from the underlying Neocomian Beds. Mixed with and occasionally imbedded in the nodules are numerous fossils. These fossils seem to be mainly derivative, for though most of them, as Mr. Teall has pointed out, belong to the zone of Ammonites mammillaris, there is apparently also an occasional admixture of older and newer forms, including some species, such as Dentalium ellipticum, probably belonging to the Gault." " The " Coprolite " occurs in'this bed in two forms. The more abundant i% a poor sandy phosphate in irregular nodules," the other is a smooth dark phosphate in smaller nodules. It is clear from this description that the two seams of nod^^le8 seen in the older working to the westward by myself in 1872, and by Mb. Teall in 1873 (see p. 13), run into one toward the north. I agree with 2>lii. Teall in thinking that the lower seam seen by us in the older working belonged to the zone of Ammonites mammillaris, and I believe that the occurence of only one seani in the newer workings, with a mixture of species, is due to current-erosion at the epoch of the Ammonites infcr- rv/ptus zone, whereby the fossils of the older bed were washed out and mixed up with those at the base of the Gault. Messrs. Beid and Shabman imagined that the Gault was here absent, and that the bluish marl was Chalk Marl with a basement-bed containing fossils and coprolites derived from the Gault and Lower Greeusaud ; but it was subsequently shown by Mk. W. Hill and myself that this suppo- sition is untenable, and that there is ample evidence to prove that the marly clay overlying the coprolite-bed is really Gault.* Ooprolites have been dug in the field by the main road five f urlo Qgs south- west of the church, and here also there is a single bed of nodules overlain by 9 or 10 feet of marly clay. In 1883 Mb. Reid noted that " the old coprolite-works near Dereham Abbey, and three quarters of a mile W.N.W. of the church showed no sections, but an abundance of specimens of Belemnites minimus. B. attenuatus and Ammonites were lying about." I visited West Dereham again in 1886 and saw ^ome new coprolite-pits in a field a mile W.N.W. of the church. At the north-eastern end of the trench the following succession was shown : — p , , r Bluish-grey clay ; 11 feet. ijauit j^ ]3ark sandy clay with phosphatic nodules ; 9 inches. Lower Greensand. Brownish sand. The division between the sand and the nodule-bed was clearly marked and undulating ; the phosphatic nodules were very dark but contained much quartz-sand. Fossils were not abundant, except fragments of Ammonites Bevdanti and fibrous wood bored by Pholades. For a certain distance, and over a tract of several acres as shown by trial-borings, the nodule-bed is cut out by a trough filled with Boulder Clay. The upper part of this clay is light-grey and full of chalk stones, while the lower part is simply re-constructed Gault and might be con- sidered Gault in place if it were not for the absence of the nodule-bed (see fig. 1, p. 24.) * Geol. Mag., dec. iii., toI. iv., pp. 72-74, and Quart. Journ. Geol. Soc, vol. xliii. pp. .547-549. (1887.) 24 GAULT. Fig. 1. Section in a Coprolite Pit north of West Dereham. ■■ 4 1. Boulder clay, -with, reconstructed Gault (2) at the base. 3. Gault, witli phosphatic ixodules at the base. 4. Lower Greensand. A small outlier of Gault occurs on the hill about a mile W.N.W. of West Dereham, and about half a mile in the same direction from. Muzzle Farm there is an old clay-pit, whence clay has been obtained for the purpose of marling the lighter land. The lower part of the face of the pit was hidden by talus, but there still remained a vertical exposure of 4 to 6 feet of marly clay containing many Selemnite^ and other fossils, but ijp Ammonites. However, by digging in the clay which forms the floor of the pit. Ammonites interruptus may be found associated with crushed Inocerami. The Ammonites are in the form of casts, the inner whorls having been, filled with a light-coloured mixture of phosphate and carbonate of lime and the outer whorls with clay, so that there can be no doubt about their belonging to the bed in which they are found. Small black phosphatic nodules occur throughout the clay, and Messes. Eeid and SHASMiu state that "several years ago a trial boring was made in this pit for the "coprolite bed," and it was reached three feet below the floor ; but only a few nodules were found and the bed was too thin to TTork." * This outlier was recognised as Gault by Fitton, who noted " several pita, in a patch, or cap of bluish clay, over the Lower greensand," and recorded the occurrence therein of fossils and phosphatic nodulea.f At Shouldham the only sections are in a few deep ditches, and these show a marly clay, full of small Belemnites, like that around West Dere- ham. In a ditoh by the side of the wood about half a mile south-westward of the church Me. Whitakbe noticed grey marly clay with two coloured layers (one bufi' and 6 inches thick, the other bufi' and pinkish and a foot thick) and specimens of phosphatic nodules. Belemnites minimus and an Ammionite from this place were sent to him by Dk. J. Lowe, formerly of Tjynn. Details, north of the Nar. The following notes are also by Ma. Whitakee (to the upper laart of p. 24). A small ditch, running E. and W., about half a mile S.W. of Pentney Hall, but the exact position of which it was impossible to mark on the map, showed, at the eastern end, a thin scattering of gravel and sand over pale grey or whitish marl. Westward some pieces of grey clay had been turned out, and then Belemnites, phosphatic nodules, and irregular red ferruginous nodules. Farther on the bottom seemed sandy, and then there was thin Alluvium over clayey sand, some of which was greenish. This section therefore serves to fix the junction of the Gault and the Lower Greensand. I understood that at Ashwood Lodge (? Pentney Hall of map) a thickness of 10 or 12 feet of blue clay [marl ?] was passed through before reaching carstone and sand. * Geol. Mag., dec. iii., vol. iii. p. 58. (1886.) f Trans. Geol. Soc, ser. 2, vol. iv. p. 312. (1836.) [Gault , cMefiy]* GAULT. 25 EosE has given the following section of a well at Pentney, but without stating the exact site, so that it comes better here than amongst the well- sections in the Appendix, as proving the Gault : — Feet. Soil . . . . .4 'Rubble chalk, succeeded by stiff blue clay, with Belemmites minimus - - 10 Hard grey limestone, with Terebratula hvplicaki J ^Very tenacious blue clay 2 [Lower Greensand.] Black sand ■- 1 He adds " From an old clay pit near Pentney church, I took two species of Belemnites "* (B. minimus and B. attenuatus). Rose also says " The well at the school-house at Biiney passed through the same series of strata [as at Pentney], but . . the gray limestone inclosed Innoeramus gryphoBoides and Belemnites miniwMS ; the clay con- tained the same Belemnite, and also Belemn. attenuatus. W. W. To the west of Gayton and Grimston the upper limit of the Gault is marked by the outcrop of the hard limestone from which several springs issue, and which forms the base of the Chalk Marl, while the lower limit is marked by the change from clayey to sandy soil. Along this tract the upper part of the Gault consists of a whitish marl which was at first taken to be Chalk Marl, and would have been so mapped had not a sub- sequent examination by Me. W. Hill shown the existence of fossils which proved to be characteristically Gault species. These fossils occur in two bands of hard limestone which are found at the base of the marl and have a bed of pink marl between them. The soft chalky marl is about 10 feet thick, and the limestone-bands include a thickness of about 2 feet. The clay beneath is dark grey, becoming almost black at the base, and the thickness of this is 7 or 8 feet, so that the whole of the Gault is here reduced to a thickness of 20 feet. The lower clay has been separately mapped by Mk. Whitakbk, for more than a mile : he says, however, that it was difficult to draw the line between it and the marly beds above. The succession above described can be seen in the watercourse below Sow's Head spring, which rises from the hard Chalk Marl, S. of Grimston. Below this there is soft marly clay, and a little distance down two bands of hard yellowish-white rock cross the stream, the marl between them having a dull brownish-pink colour j the lower bed contains Ammonites rostratus and Inoaeram/us concentricus. Me. Whitakee notes that " in a small pond at the cottage half a mile a little W. of S. from Grimston church, may be seen some 4 feet of pale grey marl, drying white, the bottom part with many small Belemnites and some pieces of a large Inoceramus. The top part seems firmer and contains some hard blocks of a sort of sandy chalk, presumably from the hard base of the Chalk Marl." " In a pond, at what seems to be an old brickyard, nearly half a mile westward of Grimston church, there are, on a mound (? remains of old png-mill) many small Belemnites, small ferruginous nodules, some phosphatic nodules, and at one place some dark grey clay, from the lower part of the Gault." The same beds as those seen below the Sow's Head spring are visible in the watercourse westward of Grimston. The outcrop of the lower hard bed occurs just by a small field-bridge about a quarter of a mile south-west of the church. This bed contains Inoceramus concentricus in abundance, together with Ammonites lautus, A. rostratus, A. varicosus and Belemnites minimus. Above it is a marly clay tinged with pink and full of the same Belemnite. The second hard bed was found above this, and higher up there is soft grey marly clay with occasional Belemnites, as far as the confiuence of a small stream with the main brook, a little west of the church, where the hard base of the Chalk Marl comes in. * Phil. Mag., ser. 3, toI. vii. pp. 180, 181. 26 GAULT. The following notes on ontliers are by W. Whitakbk. South-eastward of Middleton whitish marly Gault crops out from beneath the Boulder Clay, and has been worked. In saying that " on the heights between Middleton Tower and Devil's Bottom . . are patches of white and yellowish grey clay, containing many of the Grauit fossils. . . In fact most of the heights in this part of the country are thinly covered with gault,"* Dk. Titton is mistaken, the clay in question being either Boulder Clay or Drift brick-clay, except for the patch just noted. EoSe too speaks of Gault " at East Winch, to the west of the church."f Touching the high road, on its northern side, south of Ohilvey House and about three quarters of a mile westward of Leziate, is a small over- grown pit, in which were seen, in 1883, irregular patches of brown, grey, whitish and red clay, with phosphatic nodules and small Belemnites, overlying sand. This clay seems therefore to be a patch of Gault low down on the flank of the Lower Greensand slope, a good way below the outcrop of the middle clayey beds of the latter, to the south. Whether this occurrence has been brought about by great irregularity in the original deposition of the Gault, on an eroded surface of the sand, or by a fault, or whether the mass may be merely a boulder, due to the Glacial Drift, is uncertain. Rose speaks of an outlier of Gault " on a hill at Leziate, between the great road from Lynn to Gayton, and Pot Row, in the parish of Grimston "f ; but this is probably Drift, not the wee patch of Gault just west of Pot Row (a name not on the map), next to be noticed. In an old pit in the field on the hill-top over li miles west of Grimston church, there is, on the northern or higher side, a little clayey whitish marl ; in the ploughed part reddish patches are shown ; and in the bottom part dark grey clay. We seem therefore to have here both the marly and the clayey members of the Gault. At the south there may also be a little Boulder Clay. The clay in a little old shallow pit just north, by the cottage, is probably Gault. Just jr. of Grimston Lodge there are signs of a patch of marl (? with some of the stone-bed at top). This seems to be slightly lower than the highest sand-pit at the eastern end of Roydon Common, close by. 2.bout a third of a mile eastward of Grimston Lodge is a small old pit, on the eastern side of the track, some 8 feet deep in marl, which is in part broken up and disturbed. In the disturbed part there is an irregular layer of sand, about an inch to a foot thick, for a length of about 20 feet, in the marl, with some pinkish marl above, and, at one part, a broken-up stony layer. There is also a stony layer in the less disturbed part, lying horizontal, and going under the thin horizontal end of the sand-bed (which, where thicker, dips irregularly northward). The lower part of the pit was mostly hidden by fallen earth. In paii;s there are jambs of sand in the marl. Can this be a boulder, or a faulted mass ? A ploughed-over pit close by, separated only by the track, but at a higher level, seemed to show more of the stony bed in the marl, and also carstone. Fossils. T ^T^ar. rio,ni+ / D = West Dereham. JL,ower Ixault ^-^^ jj^^^j^ -g-^jj^ ^^^^ ^^^^ Dereham. Upper Gault G = Grimston, Brook. Pisces. Beryx J) Cimolielithys striatus, Ag. C Odoiitaspis gracilis, P. S( C. D Pycnodus - - D * Trans. Geol. Soc, ser. 2, vol. iv. p. 312. (1836.) t Proc. Geol. Assoc, vol. i. p. 234. GAULT. 27 MOLLUSCA. Cephalopoda. Ammonites interruptus, Brug. „ lautus, Sow. „ rostratus. Sow. - „ varicosus (?), Mich. Belemnites attenuatus. Sow. - „ minimus, List. Hamites Nautilus D M — G — G — — G D M 1-) M G D il Gasteropoda. Aporrhais Dentalium ellipticam, Brug. ... Xam ellibra nchiata. Anomia luooeramus concentricus. Park. „ „ var. Crispii, Mant. „ suluatus. Park. - Lima Nucula pectinata, Sow. Ostrea ourvirostris, Nills. „ yesicularis. Lam. „ or Exogyra - Peoten orbicularis, Sow. „ (Janira) quinquecostatus. Sow. Plicatula pectinoides. Sow. Brachiopoda. Kingena lima, Defr. - ■ - Terebratula biplicata, Sow. Tar. dutempleana, d'Orb. Terebratulina gracilis, Schloth. E CHINODEEMATA. Pentacrinus Fittoni, Aiist. - - . Pseudodiadema (spines) D D D D M G . — — G D M — M G D D M D D M D D D D M M D M G M G D M 28 CHAPTER 5. UPPER CRETACEOUS SERIES. Lower Chalk. General Account. As liinited by the classification now adopted by the Geological Survey this division is that part o£ the Chalk which lies below the Melbourn Rock. Palseontologically it can be subdivided into three zones; I. That of Ammonites varians ; 2. That of ^oZa^fer subglohosus ; 3. That of Belemnitella plena. The first corre- sponds to the Chalk Marl, the second includes the Totternhoe Stone and the blocky chalk wliich overlies it, the third is a thin zone consisting principally of yellowish marl with discontinuous layers or broken lumps of hard white chalk. The base of the Chalk Marl is generally glauconitic, but the number and size of the glauconite grains decreases rapidly to the north of Cambridge. It is stilL glauconitic at Stoke Ferry and at Shouldham, but the green grains are of very small size ; north of this the glauconitic basement-bed appears to "thin out and a white limestone without such grains rests directly on the Gault : it is this bed which forms the base of the rising ground by Gayton and Grimston. The remainder of the Chalk Marl consists of alternating beds of hard and soft chalk or marl, but the hard beds preponderate northward, or rather the marls appear to thin out. At Stoke Ferry the total thickness of the Chalk Marl is 75 feet, but near the northern border of the district, by Gayton and Grimston, it can hardly be more than 40 feet. The Totternhoe Stone is represented by a band of tough grey and gritty chalk, with a layer of green-coated irregular-shaped nodules at its base, like those which form its basement-layer at Burwell, in Cambridgeshire. Its apparent sandiness is due to the presence of comminuted fragments of shell, which form from 60 to 70 per cent, of the mass ; the percentage of quartz grains is very small, but grains of glauconite are present in some quantity. At Stoke Ferry it is about 4 feet thick, but it has not yet been seen at any other locality in this district. Above the Totternhoe Stone there is some thickness of hard greyish chalk, irregularly bedded in the lower part, but blocky above, and passing upward into harder blocky white chalk. In this part of Norfolk this subdivision has a total thickness of from 40 to 50 feet. At the summit of the Lower Chalk, and immediately under- ,lying the Melbourn Rock, is a thin layer of yellowish marly chalk containing lumps of hard white chalk. This is taken to be the attenuated representative of the zone of Belemnitella plena, though the only fossils yet found at this horizon are Rhynchonella plicatilis and Tercbralula semiglobosa. LOWER CUALK. 29 As it was not found possible to lay down the course of the Totternboe Stone through this district, and as the pit-sections are not very numerous, especially on the south, it will be most con- venient to take the exposures from south to north and to indicate the probable horizon of each. Details, south of the Wissey. •There seems to be a small outcrop south of the Little Ouse, for in the ditch on the high road at Lakenheath Station, Me. "Whitaker found marly- chalk, partly buff and a little pink ; but this outcrop seems to be confined to the small island at the station. The LoTrer Chalk then emerges. from beneath the Fen along the tract between Hockwold and Hockwold Grange, being probably brought up by an east and west fault along the Talley of the Little Ouse. There is a quarry by the main road a quarter of a mile north of Hockwold Ohuroh, exposing some 12 feet of uniform blocky greyish chalk without fossils ; from its general characters and position this doubtless belongs to the zone of Holaster sitbglohosus. On the northern side of Hockwold Grange (two miles west of the village), there is an old pit with a small weathered exposure of hard grey chalk, containing Ammonites varians and Inoceramus latus (orbicula/ris) in abundance, and this we have no hesitation in referring to the OhalkMarl, so that the outcrop of the Totternhoe Stone is to be sought for over the tract between these two pits. By the roadside aboait a quarter of a mile northward there is a new quarry and lime-kiln, showing about 20 feet of blocky grey chalk, which has a greater resemblance to that which overlies the Totternhoe Stone than to any part of the Ohalk Marl, and the only fossil found was Ammo- nites rotomagensis , which is not common in the Chalk Marl ; this chalk may therefore belong to the zone of Holaster subglobosus, but if so there must be a cross-fault between this and the last pit, as the difference of level is very slight and the line of strike is nearly north and south. Nearly half a mile farther north (beyond White Dyke) there is another shallow pit exposing hard grey chalk, in thin beds with lumpy irregular surface^, which has a certain resemblance to Totternhoe Stone, probably because it is 'largely composed of comminuted Inoceramus shells. Minute green grains are fairly abundant in these beds, and a specimen of Armnonites Mantelli was found, facts which favour their relegation to the Chalk Marl. Similar beds are seen in a quarry at the lime-kiln south of Feltwell St. Nicholas, but a better section is here exposed, as follows :-— Feet. Chalky soil - ■ ■ . - - 1 Greyish-white chalk, rather hard - - 10 Hard grey chalk in thin irregular beds, mottled with pipings of darker tint , . . - . about 5 Softer and lighter-coloured blocky chalk - seen for 10 Adits or tunnels have been driven into the blocky chalk, the lower part of the hard beds being also removed, leaving the hardest beds to form the roof. No recognisable fossils were found here, but microsco^cal exami- nation shows that green grains are present throughout, though not so numerous as at White Dyke. If these beds are the same as those at White Dyke, we must again infer, the existence of a fault or flexure to account for their position at Feltwell, on a higher level and more than a mile to the east of the former place. At Feltwell St. Mary, in the bank of a dry pond by the roadside, a quarter of a mile north-east of the church, there was a small but interest- ing exposure showing a band of pink chalk weathering yellow, beneath which is a course of very hard nodular ohalk, overlying soft whitish chalk. 30 LOWER CHALK. This succession is the same as that found at West Eow, near Mildenhall, in Suffolk, where a band of pink chalk, 4 feet thick, is underlain by- hard and soft chalk in alternating layers.* The West Eow beds are believed to belong to the zone of Rolaster suhgldbosus, and the similar beds at Feltwell may therefore be referred to the same zone, and conse- quently would be above the horizon of the Totternhoe Stone. There are small exposures of soft marly chalk near the border of the Fens, north-east of Feltwell and just southward of Methwold Hithe, and again in the small low island in the Fens, on which stands Northwold Fen House, but no other pits in the Lower Chalk were found over the tract lying between Feltwell and "VVhillington. At Whillington there are quarries of some size, exposing a good section of the upper parr of the Lower Chalk and the basement-beds of the Middle division. The beds here seen are as follows : — Feei. Gravelly sand and rubble - - - " about SJ Hard whitish rough rocky chalk, weathering into nodular lumps - - " ■ ' J Band of buff marl, enclosing loose lumps or nodules of hard chalk - - - - - - --I2 Yery hard white lumpy chalk, breaking along vertical joints -.----- about 3 Hard white chalk, passing down into creamy-grey blocky chalk, which is nearly white when dry - - 12 There are no hard and fast lines , between any of these beds, but the marl band forms a marked line of separation. The rocky chalk above has the structure of the Melbourn Eock of Cambridgeshire, and consequently the maiiy layer may be regarded as the representative of the Belemnitella Marl of that county, and the chalk below as the equivalent of that in the highest part of the well-known Cherry Hinton quarries ; it is, however, very much harder than the corresponding beds near Cambridge. (It shows the curved fracture distinctive of Lower Chalk, and in contrast to the bedded chalk above. W. W.) The only fossils found in it were Holaster trecensis, Discoidea cylindrica, Terebratula semiglohosa and T. squcimmosa. Mk. Cameeon notes that the Lower Chalk (Chalk Marl ?) has been quarried in the island of How Hill, in Northwold Fen. , Details, between the Wissey and the Nar We find a good section of the central part of the Lower Chalk in the quarries north of Stoke Ferry, and the only one in this part of Norfolk where the Totternhoe Stone has been seen. Eose probably refers to this stone in saying : — "A grey bed at the base of the Lower Chalk denotes the position of the Chalk -marl ; it may be seen in the large quarry at Stoke Ferry. "t Mk. Whitaker, however, was the first to definitely recognise the occurrence of the Totternhoe Stone here, in 1882, but he did not publish any description' of the section. The writer, accompanied by Mr. W. Hill, visited the locality in 1886, and their observations were published in the paper already referred to. They obtained permission to have a boring made from the floor of the principal quarry, to ascertain the total thickness of the Chalk Marl, the nature of its basement-bed, and the depth at which the G-ault occurred. The complete section, obtained by uniting the results of this boring with the measurements taken on the face of the .quarry above, are shown in Fig. 2. * See Memoirs of the Geological Survey. The Geology of Parts of Cambridge- shire and of Suffolk, pp. 39, 40. (1891.) ■f Proc. Geol. Assoc, vol. i., no". 8, p. 232. ^1862.) LOWER CHALK. 31 Fig. 2. Section at Stoke Ferry. ^Keproduced, by permission of the Ootmcil of the Geological Society, from QflMTt. Jowrn. Qeol. Soc, vol. xUii., p. 556. Scale, 20 feet to an inch. Q:uarrii. Feet Soil and gravel about - .... 4, Zone of Solaster subgloiosuSi 16 feet seen. Hard whitish chalk passing down into greyish bedded ' chalk - - - . - - - -11 C Tough grey sandy looking chalk, becoming harder I J below and containing many yellowish phosphatic j ) nodules* at the base (Totternhoe Stone) '^jjr~^'''^_'^l ^ LBand of mottled grey and white chalk Hard whitish chalk without definite bedding, weather- ing to a rough lumpy surface with a yellowish tinge - 22 jES^^Ba \ Bubble of broken chalk Boring. rHard greyish shelly chalk, with interbedded softer ' layers ... . . u . The like with buff stains or blotches, hardest in the L lower three feet - . - . - - 12 ) Softer chalk, grey and marly, mottled with paler bluish- ' grey material - . - . . 2 Hard light buff chalk, shelly, with black streaks (? oxide of manganese), passing down into less hard and less shelly dull grey chalk - - . - - 10 i^l I, Soft whitish marl, with a harder lump here and there, ^^crr ! / but mostly cutting like cheese - - - - 11 C Tough grey sandy marl with yellowisn streaks, con- < taming glauconite grains and small phoipbate- C nodules Stiff dark blue clay Gault 24 proved to 1^ * I should describe these rather as cream-coloured, and some are partly greenish outside Tlie stone weathers out somewhat, though not very well-marked, and shows a slight easterly dip. W.'W. 32 LOWER CHALK. The chief interest of the boring centres in the discovery of a definite glanconitio basement-bed resting directly on the Gault and consequently analogous to the well-known Cambridge Greensand, with which it is in all probability absolutely continuous. If a few borings were made through the Pen deposits along the line of strike the gradual change from one type to the other would doubtlessly be demonstrated. The basement-bed here differs from the Cambridge Greensand chiefly in its fineness of grain, and in the absence of large phosphatic nodules ; Mk. W. Hill, who examined its microscopical structure, describes it as a marl " containing an abundance of glauconitic grains, with some mica-fiakes and fine quartz-sand, but these materials, particularly the glauconitic grains, are smaller and finer than in the greensands of Bedfordshire or of Cambridge." Only one phosphatic nodule was brought up in the cores, and that was a small specimen of Avicula gryphceoides in dark phosphate. The overlying 11 feet of soft marl does not call for any comment except that it seems to die out northward. The succeeding 10 feet is hard, especially in its upper portion, and has a yellowish tinge and a compact texture. Mr. W. Hill reports that foraminiferal cells are abundant in it, but that grains of glauconite are very few and small, though they are abundant in the beds above and below ; it has in fact a special structural aspect which is different from that of ordinary Chalk Marl and bears a greater resemblance to the chalk of the higher part of the Holaster suhglohosus zone. The middle portion of the Chalk Marl consists of alternating beds of hard shelly chalk and softer more marly material ; the shelliness is a microscopical structure hardly visible as such to the naked eye, but making itself felt in a grittiness or sandiness to the touch. The highest part of the zone consists of hard blocky dull white chalk, which has-a yellowish tinge on the weathered surface, is hard enough to resound under the hammer, and is about 24 feet thick. Ammonites varians, Inocera-mus latus, and other fossils occur in this compact chalk, and a specimen of Holaster svhglohosus was found, this being the first locality north of the Thames Valley where that species has been obtained from the representative of the Chalk Marl. Still further north, where all the Chalk Marl becomes hard and shelly, it is common. The rock exposed at Stoke Ferry is seen to contain many minute shell-fragments and a fair sprinkling of small glauconite-grains, when examined under the microscope. The Totternhoe Stone has no definite base or top. It passes down into the hard chalk beneath by a kind of interdigitation, the darker grey material of the stone being piped into the light-coloured rock ; the limits of the two materials are well defined, as if the latter had been drilled into deep irregular holes before the deposition of the Totternhoe Stone. The whole forms in section a band of mottled chalk about 12 Inches thick, which splits into large blocks, together with the homogeneous grey stone. In the layer of yellowish nodules at the top of this mottled chalk Sihynchonella mantelliana and Terebratulee are common. In microscopical structure the mass of the stone is similar to that of Cambridgeshire, con- sisting mainly of comminuted shell-fragments, with many glauconitic grains and only a small percentage of fine quartz-sand. Above the Totternhoe Stone there is a graduated but rapid change into greyish-white bedded chalk, and the proportion of shell-fragments rapidly lessens. The ridge formed by the hard beds of the Chalk Marl, with the Tottern- hoe Stone above, runs north-westward for some distance from Stoke Perry ; but near "Wereham it is capped and partially masked by a thick deposit of Glacial gravel. About three furlongs N.N.E. of Dereham Church a quarry gave the following section, the Drift, having been - LOWER CHALK. 33 noted by Me. Whitaker, who remarks on the general broken-up appear- ance of the chalk (1883) :— Feet. Drift. At the higher part two hollows of sand, with a little gravel, also a clayey layer and flints. At the base of another hollow, close to the road, a little grey bonlder clay. Soil and chalk rubble - - . . . 3J Bather hard grey thin-bedded gritty chalk - - - 3 Hard marly ohalk, weathering yellowish, with a rough' ' lumpy surface, some of the lumps being very hard up to 12 One of the workmen said that he had dug a hole to the bottom of the Ohalk, through hard rocky marl, reddish marl, and soft greenish-^grey marl ; but this was filled in, so that the beds could not be seen. The lower beds seen resemble the hard Ohalk Marl of Stoke and the higher have some resemblance to Totternhoe Stone, but they are thin- bedded and there are no phosphatic nodules at the base, such as invariably ■occur at this horizon in Norfolk, Suffolk, and Cambridge. It is probably therefore one of the hard shelly beds of the Chalk Marl (as .BosE. con- cluded*) like those passed through in the boring at Stoke. Holaster sub- gldbosus, Pecten orbicularis, Plieatula inflata, Inoceramus latus, and'a small species of Avicula were obtained here, and Mrs. Eopeb, of Wereham has other fossils said to have come from this quarry, among which is Pecten Jlssicosta. To the north and east of this quarry there is a wide spread of Boulder Clay, but the upper part of the Lower Chalk is exposed to the west of this, and the Ohalk Marl emerges from beneath it on the northern side of Pihcham, extending thence toward Shouldham, where its basal beds form the ridge on which the church stands. A small pit by the roadside about a sixth of a mile south of the church shows some 6 feet of rather hard yellowish chalk in lumpy irregular beds, overlying 2 feet of soft grey shaly marl, which is full of small green glauconite-grains, and contains in the lower part many small green-coated phosphatic nodules, together with Avicula gryphceoides in some abundance. This glauconitic marl is similar in all essential points to that found at the base of the Chalk in the Stoke Ferry boring, and there can be little doubt about its being a continuation of the same bed. It will be noticed, howeveii',. that the basement-bed is not here overlain by soft marl, as at Stoke Ferry, but by hard bufE chalk, such as occurs from 16 to 21 feet above the glauconitic marl at that place ; it would therefore appear as if this soft marl had thinned out northward, or had changed its character, and, by the diminution in the quantity of fine silt, had passed laterally into a more purely calcareous and solid rock. Sliced and placed under a microscope the rock is seen to consist largely of fine amorphous material, that forms a matrix in which single spheroidal cells are conspicuously abundant ; with these are some perfect Foraminifera and a few fragments of shell; grains of glauconite are absent. [On account of the dry summer, in 1886, this pit was dry, the lowest part being a pond in ordinary times ; so that the bottom could be seen, and then many phosphatic nodules were found. The hardness of the Ohalk Marl here seems not to have escaped the notice of Ma. 0. B. Bosb, who said that at Shouldham " blocks of an exceedingly hard nature are irregularly distributed through the softer marl j their solidity defies the blows of the quarrymeUj and they are not convertible into lime by the heat of the kiln."t W. W.] The glauconitic basement-bed has been seen also west of Marham. Returning now, to follow the upper part of the Lower Chalk, we find this exposed in a quarry south of Barton Bendish, the wesxem face of which shows from 26 to 30 feet of greyish chalk, becoming whiter upward. Some 10 feet from the base a band of harder grey chalk occurs. There is a slight dip eastward, bringing in higher beds with the rise of * Proc. Geol. Assoc, vol. i. no. 8, p. 232. (1862.) t I'hit: Mag., ser. 3, vol. vii. p. 277. (1835.) E 75929. • C 34 J,OWBR CHALK. the ground in that direction, and at the north-eastern corner the section is as follows : — Febt Thin soil, with hard nodular rocky chalk below, weathered into rough lumps - - - " . " . * ^ Yellowish gritty nodular rock, passing down into whiter nodular rook, with marly chalk and greyish marl at the base --------li Very hard rough white chalk (about 8 feet), passing down into greyish-white chalk which has a smoother fracture - 12 The marly layer contains Shynehonella plicatilis, and is identical with the layer which was taken to be the representative of the Belemnitella plena zone at Whillington. The other species noted in the list on p. 36 are from the white chalk below. At the lime-kiln about a mile south of Marham the section is almost an exact repetition of that at Barton Bendish. The band of yellow chalk and marl is just the same thickness, and the hard white rock below forms a cornice which overhangs the greyish bloeky chalk into which its lower part passes ; at the northern end of the quarry the white and the grey portions are separated by a marked layer of haird nodular rock, but this is not continuous, dying out southward. A little north of this quarry are the two cottages, for which the well, noticed on p. 168, was sunk. As the cottages are very little below the level of the Melboum Eock we may estimate the thickness of the Lower Chalk here at about 90 feet, which is probably 30 or 35 feet less than its thickness at Stoke Ferry. No trace of the Totternhoe Stone was seen in this neighbourhood, but we should expect that bed to occur about 50 feet below the Melbourn Rock, and its outcrop should run along the slope of thje hill toward Marham Church. South-eastward of that church there is a large quarry which shows the same succession as to the southward, the section being as below (partly from Me. Whitakee's notes). Fossils are very scarce. / Hard rocky chalk, fissile, with cream-coloured layer at base. \ Soft marl and marly chalk, pale greenish. r Projecting band of hard white chalk ; 8 or 9 feet, passing down into < the next. L Greyish chalk, less hard than the above. The upper part of the Lower Chalk is exposed in a pit half a mile south of Bast Grate, between Marham and Narborough, and in another south- east of Narborough. Details, north of the Nar. Over the low ground northward of Narborough no exposure was seen before reaching Gayton. Here are several quarries on the northern side of the village, the one principally worked being on the eastern side of the lane, rather more than a quarter of a mile N.N.W. of the church. It is in two levels, which, though separated by a considerable interval, form a really continuous section of nearly 50 feet in depth. The ifpper white part is here thicker than it is to the south, and is separated from the grey by a bed of marked character. The section is as follows : — TTpper Pit. Fbei. Soil and rubble - ..... i Dull white, thin-bedded chalk, rather tough and weathering into thin platy or flaggy pieces - - - - 20 Lower Pit (beneath a foot of rubble). Firm white chalk, in thicker beds - - - - 12 Hard chalk, forming thick beds, but parting, along greenish marly lines - - - - • - -2^ Greyish marly chalk, in massive beds - - - - 12 LOWER CHALK. 35 Mb. Whitakek says of this pit that " its great interest lies in the fact' that small boulders of granitic, gneissic and trap rocks are fonnd in the chalk, an occurrence of most exceptional kind, unique in our district, and far beyond ; though a great variety of stones has been found in the nodule-bed, at the base of the Chalk, round Cambridge. There were in 1882 a few large pebbles, np to 9 inches in length, lying in the pit. These are said to be found in the Chalk, at some depth, and there is certainly no other apparent source for them, the Chalk being quite bare. The workmen use them as anvils whereon to break up the chalk, for lime-burning. I took away one, and on a later visit several others, which are now in the Jermyn Street Museum." Mr. WHirAKEE also notes that " The disused large pit to the west, on the other side of the lane, is in hard chalk, to water, which is touched in a hole in the lowest part." The lowest chalk seen is hard, greyish and gritty, and as it proved, when examined (by Mk. Hill) under the micro- scope, to contain green grains, it is probably close to, if not actually the top of, the Totternhoe Stone. The basal bed of the Chalk Marl is exposed in the watercourses just below the spring-heads at and south of G-rimston. At the Sow's Head spring the water issues from a very hard solid limestone in thick beds, which weather to a creamy-yellow tint. This limestone contains small Belemnites in some abundance, and a small Rhynchonella, a variety either of Guvieri or mantelUana. Me. W. Hill reports that under the micro- scope the structure of this rock is seen to be fine-gi'ained, the mass of it being a fine amorphous calcareous paste or consolidated ooze. Single spheroidal cells and more or less perfect Foraminifera are abundant, but these and a few shell-fragments form hardly 25 per cent, of the material. It is in fact a still purer and more compact form of the rock- which overlies the glauconitic marl of Shouldham. Nothing like this marl is to be found at Grimston, the hard limestone resting directly upon the soft whitish marls of the Upper Gault, without any marked plane of division, though the change from one kind of rock to the other is rapid. The same hard creamy limestone is seen at the confluence of the water- courses west of Grimston Church. At the main spring-head to the north there is a hard grey bedded rook, very gritty and shelly ; thus resembling the shelly layers in the Chalk Marl at Stoke Ferry, and still more the hard shelly chalk known as the Inoceramus Bed at Hunstanton, which occupies a similar position. About half a mile south-east of Grimston Church an old quarry was noticed by Mr. Hill and Mr. Whttakee, showing hard smooth white chalk overlain by very hard and rough yellowish chalk ; the latter has the structure of the Melbourn Rook and the former would therefore- appear to be the uppermost part of the Lower Chalk ; but nothing like- the horizon of the Belemnitella plena zone was visible. As, however, this; zone certainly disappears in the dist riot to the north it may be absent here, for, as will have been gathered from the preceding account, the general tendency of the change in the Lower Chalk, when traced toward the north, is to lose its marly beds and silty ingredients, becoming more and more purely calcareous and pcquiring a harder and more consolidated structure. C 2 36 liOWBE CHAIiK. Fossils. B = Barton Bendisli. S = Stoke Ferry. D = "West Dereham. W = WMUington (North-wold). Chalk Marl. Totternhoe Stone. Grey and Wbite Chalk. — S B? B Cephalopoda. Ammonites lewesiensis (?), Mant. - „ ManteUi, Sow. - also from Marham and Shonldham (according to Kose). „ varians, Sme. - — S Lamellibranchiata. Avicula gryphaeoides, Sow. - Shouldham Exogyra haliotoidea. Saw. - Iiioceramus latus, Mant. - D S „ mytiloides, Mant. Lima globosa, Sow. Ostrea frons. Park. - D „ vesicularis, Laia. - D Pecten fipsicosta, Etheridge D „ orbicularis, Sow. D Phcatula inflata. Sow. - D Brachiopoda. Eingena lima, Defr. BhynchoneUa mantelUana, Sow. D „ plicatilis. Sow. Terehratula biplicata. Sow. — S „ semiglobosa. Sow. - D S „ squamosa, Mant. Echinodermata. Cidaris Bowerbankii, Forb. Discoidea eylindrica, Xam. - Holaster subglobosus, Leshe „ trecensis, Leym. - In addition to the above the following fossils have been found ; but their horizon cannot be given. They are either recorded by De. Weight {Palceontograph. Soe.) or by Messes. G-. Shaeman and E. T. Newton, from specimens in the Lynn Museum, or are noted by Kose {Froc. Geol. Assoc, 1862) :— Lamna subulata, Ag., S. Macropoma (coprolite), S. Notidanus microdon, Ag., S. TurriUtes tubercnlatus, Bosc (Rose) ? from Totternhoe Stone, S. Lima echinata ?, Schloth, S. Ostrea vesicularis, Lam., Gayton. Pollioipes acumiuatus, Darwin, S. ,, glaber, Boemer, 8. B B B S w ~" w B s w B s B — w Serpula antiquata P, Sow. Discoidea subucula, Klein., very conimon (Eose), S.W. Me. Eose also said : — " In the lower beds of Chalk at Marham have been found two claws of Astacus Sussexiensis and part of a striated tooth with fragments of bone of some Saurian animal." {Phil. Mag., ser. 3, vol. Til., p. 277.) 37 CHAPTER 6. UPPER CRETACEOUS SERIES. Middle and Upper Chalk. General Note. In the Middle Chalk of Cambridgeshire two zonal divisions were recognized in 1880, the zone of Rhynchonella Cuvieri, identical with Barrois' zone of Inoceramus Idbiatus, and the zone of Terebratulina gracilis. Subsequently certain alterations were made; the Melbourn Rock was included in the zone of Rh. Cuvieri, and it was thought that the upper part of the Ter. gracilis zone might be separated as the zone of Holaster planus. In Norfolk the lowest of these zones can be easily traced, but no attempt has yet been made to trace the higher zones or to draw a line of separation between the Middle and the Upper Chalk, except quite locally. A. J. J-B. At only one place, throughout the Norfolk outcrop (in Sheets 65 and 69 of the map), has the Chalk Rock been seen, and there only to the thickness of a foot. This, together with the absence of any marked feature along the escarpment (which is a more or less gentle slope), made the drawing of a line between Upper and Middle Chalk a matter of great uncertainty, and therefore it was left undone. W. W. Zone of Rhynchonella Cuvieri. (A. J. J-B.) The lower part of the Middle Chalk borders the Fen south-east of Lakenheath Station, and a small quarry three furlongs from the station shows thick-bedded hard chalk in which Mb. Whitakek found Inoceramus mytiloides and Echmoconus svhrotv/ndus. This chalk is probably from 10 to 20 feet above the Melbourn Bock. On the northern side of Brandon Fen the Middle Chalk lies at a higher level, and the ridge above Hockwold and Wilton is probably due to the outcrop of the Melbourn Bock, but no exposure of this was found. Northward all the country as far as Methwold is covered by a drift of blown sand, even where Glacial deposits are absent, and there are no chalk-pits ; so that the line drawn for the outcrop of the Melbourn Bock is purely conjectural. At Methwold, south-east of the church, there is a large quarry, nearly 40 feet deep, exposing the hard rocky chalk of this zone, overlain on the western siife by stratified sand and gravel. At the northern end there is less gravel and the section is as follows, the thickness being only roughly estimated : — Feet. Soil, gravel, and disturbed chalk - - - - 4 Hard lumpy chalk, with two thin layers of greyish marl at tli6 base - - - - - ". . ■ ^ Hard yellowish nodular chalk, with Bhynchonella Cuvieri and other fossils - ■ - - - - -20 Talus below where lowest - - - - - 5 38 MIDDLE CHAT,K. The bedding is nearly horizontal ; and at the base a hole cleared of talus showed very hard rough and nodular yellowish rock, full of fragments of Inocerami and closely resembling the upper part of the Melbourn Eock of Cambridge and Herts. At the western end of Northwold, and close to the high road, is a pit in the very highest pari of ^/his zone. It shows about 36 feet of much softer and whiter chalk with several thin layers of grey marl. The lower part is quarried for building-stone, which is said to stand very well if dug and squared when dry in the early part of summer, and many houses in Northwold are built of it. The uppermost 12 feet are soft and crumbling and contain many scattered flints, developed sporadically and not on any one horizon. The lower beds contain Echinoeonus subro- iimdus, several species of Inoceratnue, and a small circular variety of RhynchoneUa Cuvieri (not the typical- form). The whitening-works at Whillington are supplied with chalk from this quarry. The next exposure is by the side of the road from Methwold to Wiiil- lington, and about three quarters of a mile S.E. of the latter place, where ^ pit shows about 12 feet of hard yellowish nodular chalk, Uke that at Methwold, and containing most of the same fossils; it cannot be far above the Melbourn Rock, which, as already mentioned, is exposed at the top of the quarries at Whillington (see p. 30). The rock there is hard, compact, and of a creamy white colour when broken, but weathering yellowish, with a rough nodular surface. Mb. Rose has recorded the occurrence of Ammonites peramplus, Mant., at Whillington, one specimen with a diameter of 2 feet. This species must have come from the Middle Ohalk of the pit. The rock and the overlying chalk then pass beneath alluvium, and on the northern side of this they are covered by Boulder Clay, but iu an old pit by the roadside north of Oxborough Fen there are lumps of hard yellowish chalk containing ShyncJwn^la Cuvieri and Inoceramus myti- loides, and evidently belonging to chalk near the horizon of the Melbourn Rook. The strip of Boulder Clay which flanks the eastern border of Barton Fen seems indeed to be banked against a ridge formed by the hard chalk of this zone, and thence it may be traced to the quarry south of Barton Bendish, where the base of the Melbourn Rock is actually exposed (see p. 33). North of Barton Bendish the hard chalk of this zone caps the bolder and higher ridge which runs to Marham, and the basal part of the Melbourn Rock is exposed in the chalk-quarries at and south of that place (see p. 34). Me. WHiTAKEa has noted an old pit, three quarters of a mile E.S.E. of Marham church, in weathered chalk without flints, rubbly at top, and with Rhynchonella. From Marham the ridge bends eastward and sinks to lower levels, but the line of outcrop can be followed, and a small exposure of the rock occurs about two miles B.N.E. of Marham. Beyond this as far as Xarford ihe feature is obscure and the line is conjectural. Between West Acre and East Walton there are several pits in massive white chalk without ■flints, and below them is a slight ridge which probably indicates the harder chalk of the Melbourn Rock. ' Ms.. Hawkins found a quarry in similar chalk without flints in V/'alton Field, seven eighths of a mile a little S. of E. of East Walton church. To be more precise, Ma. Whitaker and himself saw but two flints in it. He also noticed the absence of flints in a pit about three quarters of a mile S.B., and in another a quarter of a mile N.E. of West Acre church. The base-line is again flxed at Gaytonthorpe, where an old pit just S. of the church exposes hard nodular yellowish chalk without fossils (Mel- bourn Rock) to water. A large Ammonite [Am. perampJus ?) was foucd hei e by Mk. W. Hill. The ridge is continued east of Gay ton, and near its summit half a mile south-east of Grimston church an old pit exhibits hard smooth white chalk in the lower part, overlain by very hard and rough yellowish chaik. Microscopical examination by Me. W. Hill showed the latter to have the structure of the Melbourn Rock. MIDDLE AND UPPER CHALK. 39 Chalk Rock. (W. W.) The description of the solitary section of the Chalk Eook in Norfolk falls into place here, before we turn to the Chalk-with-flints. The railway-cutting west of Little Friars Thorns and 2J miles and more "W. of Swaffham is in Chalk-with-flints. About 70 yards east of the first (more easterly) bridge over, a hard cream-coloured semi-crystalline bed rises up, from beneath a layer of tabular flint. This bed is about a foot thick, of nodular character (like the Chalk Eock), and passes down into hard chalk, with another continuous layer of flints about 2J feet below the top of the rook, which rises, beyond the bridge, to a point about 150 yards off. The following fossils were found in the rock by Mb. W. Hill and myself: — Lamna tooth. '. Terebratula, p camea and Inoceramus (pieces). Rhynchonella plicatilis (large var.). E. reedensis or mantelliana ? semiglobosa. Micraster. Coral. Sponge. Mr. W. Hiil has examined this hard bed microscopically, and he tells me that it has the usual structure of the Chalk Eock, except that it con- tains no green grains. The chalk below the rook is harder than that above, for some depth. More flint layers come in, some very promiuent, nntil, at the next bridge over, Chalk with only here and there a flint (rarely seen) rises up, the ending of the flint-bearing Chalk being marked. ChaU -with- Flints. To the east of the tract vchich has just been described the Chalk contains flints in fairly frequent layers, and this belongs partly to the Middle and partly to the Upper Chalk ; but as the line of division has not yet been traced, it is impossible to do more than give such notes as were taken by the oflScers who surveyed the country. Their notes have been arranged by Mr. Whitaker, chiefly ii-om published descriptions by Me. Skertchly (in the Gun Flint Memoir). A. J. J- B. Mr. Skertchly has left some further notes on the Ling- heath pits^ a mile south-east of Brandon, whence flints were formerly obtained in large quantity for the flint-knapping in- dustry, and these are incol-porated in the following account, to the end of page 40 and pages 42-44 (top). The flint now used for gun-flints at Brandon is obtained from Lingheath, about a mile south-gouth-east of the town, but it has, until of late years, been dug at Santon Downham, three miles further up the river, and at Broomhill about a mile from the town on the Norfolk side of the river. The flints occur in the Upper Chalk. Lingheath is completely honey- combed with new and old pits, from Brandon Park, on the west, to the slope of the Ouse 'Valley, on the east. The pits in the latter situation are now worked out ; they were shallower than those high up on the heath, a necessary consequence of their position. They are known as the Fleet Pits from this- circumstance, fleet being a local term signifying near the surface, as distinct from gain meaning near at hand in a horizontal direction ; fleet refers to vertical, gain to horizontal distances. These terms express two distinct ideas for which our cultured language has only the one word near. The flint has been worked on Lingheath for about 160 years (1879), prior to which time the stone was obtained from Brandon Park near the Elms. 40 CHALK WITH FLINTS. Fig. 3 is a section of a flint-pit measured by myself on the summit of LingheatVi, in the Poor's Plantation, to which is added, from the informa- tion of old diggers, all the beds below the Floor-stone. The chalk in this pit, which was the deepest worked for gun-flints in 1875, was dry, and the men found it drier among the trees. Boots of flrs went down 1-5 feet into the chalk, in small pipes, not more than 6 inches across ; and they seemed to dissolve the chalk by means of carbonic acid (in solution in water), the sand falling in as the pipes go down. The chalk was fairly firm and the burrows never timbered. As usual the chalk hereabouts is intersected by many small faults ; so. that though the general dip is very small, being only about 1 in 88, the^ depth of the flint in adjoining pits varies 10 feet and more. The beds however are pretty persistent, and the layers of marl give a safe guide to the depth of the flint. The flint-pits, no longer worked, were on Santon Downham Warren^ opposite the Warren House, and near a barrow locally known as Blood Hill. There is another mound on Eriswell Babbit Warren, near High Lodge Farm, which goes by the same name. The pits are on the slope of the valley-side, and are consequently shallow. The general section was as follows, in 1875 ; an explanation of the workmen's terms used will be found, on pp. 42, 43: — Feet. Sand and gravel - - - . 'S Dead lime [decomposed chalk] , with a few floor- stones edge-ways, or on end, most of which had brown, glazed coats - - 5 Third pipe-clay .... Trace. Hard chalk .... 2 Floor-stone ; very large flints, rich in " egg- shaped gulls," or Paramovdras ; some of the stone milky in colour, like black flints changed by the sun. They were, however, good stone, and made good gun-flints - - . i to 3 Soft chalk - - . - . - ' 3 Flint was dug formerly between the neolithic pits known as Grrimes*" Graves and Broomhill Plantation. The section in the modern pits is like- that of the ancient; indeed very little variation can be traced in the sequence of the beds anywhere round Brandon. The pits were deSp, but the chalk commenced below the horns. The following section was taken, in 1876 : — Ft. Iu. 1. Sand and gravel, with a few palaeolithic imple- ments ...... 30 2. Dead-lime, with a few brown-glazed edgeways flints - 5 3. Soft, white chalk - =...30, 4. Toppings flint ... .05- 5. Soft, white chalk . . - . . .SO' 6. First pipe-clay . . . . . - 1 7. Moderately hard, grisly chalk, with red stains ,- - 3 8. Upper crust flint - - . . "- 2 ft. to 8 9. Soft, white chalk . . . - . .3 0- 10. Second pipe-clay - . - - - 1 11. Soft, white chalk - . - - 3 12. Wall-stone - - . . - IJ ft. to 1 13. Soft, white chalk, full of horns . - - - 2 6 14. Soft, white chalk - . - - - 2 6- 16. Third pipe-clay - - - . . q j 17. Hard chalk . . - . . -30 18. Floor-stone (flint) - - . - 3 in. to 0- 4 Bed 3 in this section is the same as No. 5 at Lingteath. Bed 5 is. thinner at this place, and beds 7 and 9 are thicker at this place than the coJTesponding beds at Lingheath. CHALK WITH FLIJSTS. 41 At Didlington a pit, half a mile east of the Hall, showed a hollow of sand and gravel over chalk with few flints. Abont Bodney and Little Oressingham there are several pits, in all of which the chalk contains flints. One is rather over a mile south-east of Bodney. Another, nearly half a mile due east of Bodney Hall, Mr. Bennett notes as "showing 20 feet of rubbly chalk." There is another abont three quarters of a mile east of the last, and a fourth about 20 feet deep, a mile south of Little Oressingham. Me. Eose has noticed that " exceedingly thin seams of flint are seen at . . Hilborough."* Mb. Gr. Babkow notes that "the large spread of Ohalk south and west of Swaffham is largely covered by sand and stones, in part the result of decomposition [of Boulder Clay] and in part drifted from other areas. The Ohalk rarely comes quite to the surface, except on the brows of the hills. South of Pickenham Warren there are plenty of pits in chalk, which gets rather harder westward, toward Cley Hall (Oockley Oley), and contains fewer flints. In a pit near Gooderstone the chalk is still harder, and contains a yellowish clayey band some 4 to 6 inches thick. At Oaldecote it is decidedly hard " [? Middle Ohalk]. , Mb. R. 0. Taylor remarked that the Swaffham Ohalk " presents one peculiarity in the disposition of the layers of flint, two layers, forming a pair, being set at the distance of a foot apart, and each pair at the distance of several feet from the next pair,"f and Mh. Eose noticed that at Swaffham " the tabular flints are of great magnitude, many of them being eight or more feet in length, and from nine to twelve inches in thickness."J At the lime-kiln by the southern side of the railway two miles west of SwaffTiam Station fossils have been found, and specimens may generally be got from the workmen, Micraster coranguimim and Inoceramus being plentiful. Many large flints occur in the chalk, and a large nodule of iron-pyrites was seen wrapping round a flint. A little bit of Boulder Olay, seen on the north, maybe "tip" from the railway; but there is much rubble at top of the chalk, more or less festooned, in section. Me. 0. E. Hawkiu's notes that " Ohalk-with-flints may be seen in a pit half a mile N.N.E. of Great Friars Thorns ; in another, in Narford Field, half a mile N.E. of the little wood marked 'Eye trap' on the map ; and on Massingham Heath, a quarter of a mile N.B. of the 32nd milestone on the high road." The following notes on the north-eastern corner of the district are by Mr. H. B. Woodward (1882 ?) :— " There are many pits near the Lexhams, Castle Acre, and Eougham, where the Ohalk was formerly worked, but few pits now show a clear face of it." ' ' One of the best sections is in a pit about three quarters of a mile W.W. of Massingham Common, by the road leading from Great Massing- ham to Castle Acre. Here we find hard bedded chalk, with nodular flints, and clayey seams." " A deep pit, in a plantation east of Fincham Farm, 'N.'N.W. of Eougham, exposed chalk beneath the Boulder Olay ; and in the same way it was shown in pits south of Weasenham Heath, and at West Lexham. Westward by Emmanuel Common the Ohalk appears bare at the surface up to much higher elevations than it does to the north-east." 0. B. Eose says : "The black oxide of manganese is met with at Oastleacre. I found this black powder lying in the natural separations of the chalk, about twenty feet from the surface ; it occupies both the oblique and horizontal clefts, but is most abundant in the latter ; it is accompanied by and partly mixed with brown oxide of iron and loose chalk." ♦ Proc. Geol. Assoc, vol. i. p. 231. t Trans. Geol. Soc, ser. 2, vol. i. p. 3?8. (1824.) t Phil. Mag., ser. 3, vol. vii. p. 370. (1835.) § Ibid., p. 373. (1835.) 42 CHALK WITH FLINTS. Fig. 3. Section at Lingheath, Brandon. (S. B. J \ni / /»,( — at . If - . _^ ->-,rt — — 1///,,- 3. 6 4 3 6 Skebtchlt.) Ft. In. Sand and Grravel - - - 3 Dead Lime : decomposed chalk, into whioli the sand penetrates, and with which its upper part is generally mixed. Friable above but lumpy below ; small flints, with natural coats, are scattered through it. In fleet pits, where it intersects a layer of flints, the large flints are always edge- ways, or stand on end, and often have brown glazed coats. The junction with the chalk below is more or less abrupt - Soft white Chalk of the ordinary character, and said not to make such good lime as the dead lime, which is always preferred for mortar. This applies also to 5, 7, 14, 21 and 24 4. Horns flint ; an irregular layer of flints, which are nearly all small and finger-shaped ; they seldom run to more than 3 inches in length, and half an inch in breadth. Thickness included in the following : — 5. Soft white Chalk - 6. Toppings Flint; the first regular layer of fiint, more or less con- tinuous, or forming, as the work- men say, a sase or sese. They are "hobbly" stone, that is, covered with " paps " or knobs on the top, but flat below. They break " grisly," that is grittily, and do not "run," or flake cleanly, and are " coarse work- ing stone," that is to say, they do not cut clean, and will not make " best " g^n-flints. Good pieces are occasionally found, and these are not hobbly but flat like floor-stone. Toppings are nearly always burrowed for in filling up the pit, and are worked from beneath, and they seldom come out in lengths of more than a foot 7. Soft, white Chalk, like 3 - 8. First Pipe-Clay. The pipe-clays are thin seams of marl, and are pretty constant, especially the lowest or third, which the work- men say rules the floor-stone ; that is to say, when it is reached the floor-stone is known to be only 3 or 4 feet distant - 9. Hard, white Chalk ; a hard, sub- crystalline limestone, which rings and strikes fire under the strokes of the pick: so hard that it cannot be picked Sh the solid face, but has to be worked from the joints. This applies also to 13 - - 1 4 CHALK WITH FLINTS, 43 Fi. In. 10. Upper Crust Flints ; generally round and lumpy, and do not form a regular sase, but are dotted here and ttere in the layer ; nearly always grey, without paps, and double coated, that is they have two distinct layers of cherty matter on the outside, which break away sepa- rately: these coats are sometimes parted by a thin layer of flint. Only used as building-stones, and merely taken out in sinking the shaft, but when building-stones are in demand they are burrowed for. They are not faced, but used rough, and are known as rough builders - 8 11. Soft, white Chalk, like 3 - - - - - 1 12. Second Pipe-Clay (see 8) - - - - - 2 13. Hard, white Chalk, one jointless bed - - 10 14. Soft, white Chalk, like 3 - - - - - 2 15. Wall Stone; always continuous or forms a "sase"; has "paps" above, and horn-like projections below called " legs," which are sometimes a foot long, and make the stone very difi&cult to raise. The pieces come away in long flat masses sometimes a yard square, generally black, but sometimes grey or spotted, and occasionally with a bluish "plumage," whence it is aptly termed " jackdaw " coloured. Nearly always of good quality, flakes well, with little waste, and hence only leaves small cores for " builders." Is burrowed from the top, as the legs would prevent it being worked from below 1 16. Very soft Chalk, fall of Horns so thick that the pick can hardly be used ; often stained yellow. It is sometimes mixed with sand to render it stifier, and is shovelled out 2 6 17. Soft, white Chalk - - - - - - 2 6 18. Third Pipe-Clay (see 8) 2 19. Hard, white Chalk, sometimes only 2 feet thick, in which case 6 inches of soft chalk overlie the floqr-stone - 3 20. Floor Stone ; the bed to which the pita are sunk; and from which most of the gun-flints are made. It is generally continuous, but sometimes in ovoid masses which are called "heel-pieces," but even then the "heels" of adjacent stones are in contact. In some places paps are found on the top of the flint, but these are roagh, and in this respect different from _ the paps of the toppings ; such stone is called "rough-topped." Another variety has an undulating surface; such stone being called " hobbly-topped." These are very seldom heeled, and are easiest to get, because when they break away they always leave a face to work upon, and therefore no time is lost in picking chalk. Nearly always flat-bottomed, and thinnest when there are many heel-stones. When over a foot in thickness it is generally grey in the middle. Very rarely runs into great "harp-like " pieces 4J feet across, which I take to be Paramoudras. They are so exceptional that when my informant found one, he sent for other diggers to look at the " curosity." He got a "jag " of stone from his curosity, that is, a one- horse cai'tload, about equal to a ton. More commonly, but still rarely, similar stones are found just below the floor-stone, which are described as "like gret eggs," and from each of which half a jag of stone can be got. They are called "gulls." Floor-stone is always burrowed for, and gulls too when they can be found - - - - - 8 21. Soft, white Chalk, like 3 - - - - - 7 6 22. Hard, white Chalk, of similar material to 13 ; never worked into except along the burrows beneath the floor-stone ; but trial-pits were sunk many years ago in search of flint 16 44 CHALK. WITH FLINTS. Ft. In. 23. Eough and Smooth Blacks ; large detached flints found 10 feet below the floor-stone in trial-pits sunk many years ago. They occur too sparingly to be remunera- tive. The smooth blacks were some of the best working stones eyer raised ; good in colour, clean-cutting, and of good running quality. The rough blacks were grisly and only fit for common gun-flints. The surrounding chalk is described as very hard - - - - 4 24. Soft white Ohalk, like 3 - - - - — Fossils. The zonal divisions of the Middle and Upper Chalk of West Norfolk not having been worked out we are unable to give any lists of fossils, except the following, which includes such as have been recoi'ded frona the neighbourhood of Swaff ham and to the north : — Long lists of Upper Chalk, of Medial Ohalk, of Hard Ohalk, and. of Chalk Marl Fossils are given Ijy S. Woodwaiid (Outline of the Gfeology of Norfolk, pp. 46-53), and by 0. B. Rose {Phil. Mag., ser. 3, vol. vii., pp. 278, 279, 374-376) ; but it is often difficult to translate the old names into modern palseontologic language. 0. := Castle Acre. Prom specimens in the Lynn Museum, determined by E. T. Newton, and from S. Woodwakd (G-eology of Norfolk). L. ^ LexJiam. 0. B. Bosb {Phil. Mag., ser. 3, vol. vii.) and S. Wood- wakd. S. = Swaffham. Prom the collection of the Geological Society, from the Lynn Museum (determined by E. T. Newton), and from the collection ot Mr. J. King, of Norwich. Mk. Jtjkes-Browne writes that "the Swafi'ham list contains the names of the' characteristic fossils of the lower part of the Upper Chalk, not far from the horizon of the Ohalk Bock. W. = West Acre. Prom the Lynn Museum, determined by E. T. Newton. BeryxP. W. Bnohodus lewesiensis, Mant., (halocyon, Ag) S. Lamna (Otodus) appendiculatus, Ag. S. Btychodus mammilaris, Ag. S. W. Nautilus elegans. Sow. L. Pleurotomaria depressa. Sow. S. Inoceramus Brongniarti, Sow. S. ,, Ouvieri, Sow. S. W. ,, involutus, Sow. L. ,, Lamarckii, Parle. S. Lima Hoperi, Sow. S. ,, spinosa, Sow. S. W. Ostrea normaniana, B'Orh. S. ,, vesicularis. Lam. S. Pecten nitidus, Mant. S. Plicatula. S. Spondylus. S. Crania. S. Khynchonella limbata, Schlot. (Terebratula subplicata.) Q. Serpula. S. Terebella lewesiensis, Bavies. W. Cardiaster ananchytis, Leshe (noted by Wright as from Middle Chalk). S. Cardiaster excentrious, Bose. S. Cidaris perornata, Forbes. 8. Bchinocorys vulgaTis, Breyn. (=Ananchytes ovatus.) S. Micraster breviporus, Ag. 8. „ coranguinum, Klein. 0. 8. Oamerospongiasubrotunda, Mant. (Gephalites constrictus, SmtiA). S> Coscinopora (Ventriculites) quincuncialis, Smith. 0. S. 45 CHAPTER 7. GLACIAL DRIFT. General Remarks. In our district the Glacial Drift consists chiefly of Boulder Clay, an undoubted product of ice-action ; but there are also gravels and brickearth, which, either from underlying the Boulder Clay, or from being more or less associated with it, are classed as Glacial, though in themselves yielding no evidence of glacial action. In some cases the classification is doubtful, and must be taken aa the best that could be done, rather than as a dogmatic statement : it simply seems more likely that various isolated patches of gravel, etc., belong to the Glacial Drift than to any other part of the Drift Series. This Drift not only covers a large part of the higher grounds, butj with a marked disregard of level, reaches down many of the slopes,- and occurs also in the lowest ground, underlying the alluvial beds of parts of the Fenland and of the Marshland, where indeed its extent is unknown. In places too there are deep channels filled with Drift, wjiich, in the lower grounds, go to some depth below sea-level, and it is in these probably that the deposit reaches its greatest thickness ; the sheets on the higher lands being, as a .rule, of no very great thickness, as far as our information goes. The greatest recorded depth is 100 feet, in a well at Stow Bardolph, omitting the doubtful record at Swaffham (p. 61). In the case of many patches of gravel it is impossible to be certain whether they are older than the Boulder Clay or not, as none is found either above or below them, some too being far from any Boulder Clay. Sometimes also, where a thin bed of that clay underlies a loam or gravel, we cannot tell but that it is one of those laj'ers that occur here and there amongst those members of the Glacial Drift that underlie the great Boulder Clay of our Eastern Counties, and there is reason to expect the presence of such a layer in parts of our district. It must be understood therefore, that in attempting to classify the members of the Glacil Drift it is quite likely that gravels, etc., may be classed as older than the Boulder Clay, which really are not so : in some cases it is simply more convenient to take them under that head. Indeed some gravel that has been coloured as Glacial may be of somewhat later age. Beds below the Boulder Clay. South of the Wissey. In that small part of the district that is in Suffolk, and south of the Little Ouse, but one patch of Drift that can be safely classed as below the Boulder Clay has been noted. 46 GLACIAL DRIFT. Me. Skbbtchlt, writing in about 1876, says that " at Santon Downham there was a brickyard nine years ago, which is about to be re-opened. The section was as follows " : — Sand and gravel, 3 to 4 feet. r Boulder Clay, 13 feet. Grlacial Drift, -j Blue clay, 4 inches. L Fine chalky gravel, 14 inches. Chalk. And in another note, referring perhaps to the same place, he says:— " Around the brick-kiln a mile south of Santon Downham Church there is a quantity of brickearth, sometimes at the surface. It has been dug to a depth of 10 feet, and good bricks have been made ; but it lies in veins and cannot be mapped." There is indeed no note of the section on his working-map. Patches of gravel in this small tract have been coloured as Glacial, but the largest two, westward of Brandon, would seem rather to belong to the Ancient River Series, to which a separate colour has been given in the map to the south (51 N.E.). It was thought, however, inadvisable to introduce that classifica- tion into Sheet 65, though the long line of gravel-cappings &om our southern margin at Gravel Hill (Grave Hill of the map), by Methwold and Wereham to Crimplesham, is suggestive of an old watercourse. It may be well, therefore, to treat of these gravels after the Boulder Clay, the same colour having been used for Glacial gravels whether under or above that clay. At Wilton High Barn, about IJ miles north-eastward of Hockwold church, the beds below the Boulder Clay seem not to crop out to the surface, presumably from being overlapped by the latter. The section is of interest as showing a lower bed of Boulder Clay. The following description is from Mb. Skektchly's notes. " At Wilton Brickyard, on the hill-top at High Barn, there were two principal pits (P 1877), one south and the other north of High Barn." " The southern pit showed sandy wash, from 2 to 3 feet thick, resting on red sandy clay, with small flints, about 8 feet seen,. This clay is like the Norwich Brickearth or Lower Boulder Clay [a stony loam]. It is generally unstratified, but contorted in places, and contains, here and there, masses of buff false-bedded and contorted sand with black specks, which, is interesting from containing a few fragments of marine shells, apparently of the genera Tellina and Cardium. i the western side of the pit Boulder Clay was seen overlying the sand and clay to a depth of 3 feet." " The northern pit showed the relation of these beds very clearly, the section being as in Fig. 4, p. 47." We now come to the consideration of some important sections, mostly in beds of a loamy character, and which Mr. Skertohlt wished to name Brandon Beds, from the neighbouring town. As, however, the sections are of like kind to others, and often finer ones, elsewhere, there seems to be no good reason why a new name should be given where the term Glacial Loam is really enough. Moreover, were a local name needed, that of Brandon would hardly be the best, the sections being some way from the town. The following description is by Mb. Skertohlt, who thought the sections of more especial interest from the occurrence of flint implements. GLACIAL DEIFT. 47 " The sections are in a continuous strip of loam, along a line from Broomhill, about a mile N.E. of Brandon, to beyond the neolithic flint-pits known as Grimes' Graves (wrongly marked on the map : they are not by the bouse, but in the wood some way to the N.E.). The loam has been worked for brick-making since Saxon times, and pits have been opened at different times all along the strip, so that there can be no doubt of the beds being of the same age throughout." " The general relation of the sections is shown in Fig. 5 " (p. 48). Fig. 4. Section in the Northern Pit at Wilton High Barn, Hockwold. a. Sandy soil. &. Boulder Clay, very chalky. c. Buflf loam and clay. d. Red clay. e. Hidden by talus. /. Boulder Clay, light-blue (like Gault in colour), full of large unworn septaria and with plenty of scratched chalk stones. Seen to a depth of 10 feet in a pit dug at the bottom of the great pit. Fig. 6. Section in a Pit at Broomhill Cover. a. Sand and gravel, say 3 feet. "^ b Boulder Clay, almost entirely composed of fine chalk, with few scratched stones, but with some good specimens of glaciated chalk, say 4> feet. e. Buff loam, finely laminated (with partings of sand) ; in (places much contorted, say 10 feet. 48 GLACIAL DEIFT. 0) f. 6 f-H s § K [Q o o •C ^ &« ^^•^ It ^ M« ^>5. O I— ( § o ID IS bo GLACIAL DRIFT. 49 The section at Broomliin was tolerably clear, thongli the pit had not ibeen worked for two years (? 1877). When clear it was as in Fig. 5, the unconformity between the gravel and the Boulder Clay, and that between -the latter and the loam being well-marked. " The Botany Bay brickyard is at the spot marked Grimes Grraves on the old Ordnance Map. It was here that I got the first flint implement from these beds, and the chief interest of the place is the occurrence of impleraents. I have got altogether about a dozen implements and ■several flakes from this pit, some of which I dag out myself. They are, however, very rare. They are found scattered throughout the entire section, and frequently deeper than is shown in the figures. No shells have been found, but I got a fragment of a mammalian bone from a gravelly seam about 20 feet down." " The beds are about 30 feet thick, and rest on the Chalk. The pits are worked to a considerable depth in winter, and are partly filled up again with waste material." " No Boulder Clay was to be seen at first, but the brickmaker told me that patches used to occur, and this statement is borne out by the glaciated stones lying about. It was said to have been found near what is now the western face of the exposure, and the probability of this being the case is further strengthened by the crumpling the beds hav% been •subjected to at that place, as shown in Fig. 7. It may be objected to this that the overlying bed is not contorted ; but I will only remark that the undisturbed beds are mostly gravel, while the disturbed beds are clay, and that sands often seem unafi'ected whilst clays are contorted. On a visit with me, Me. Whitakeh at once recognized the beds as of Glacial character, saying ' there must be Boulder Clay close at hand.' 1 have since (1878) seen patches of undisturbed Boulder Clay lying upon the loam, and Herb. A. Helland, who was with me, recognized its undisturbed condition and 'Glacial character." A.nother note by Me. Skeetchly seems to describe this section as on .the southern side of the pit, and from it the thicknesses given are taken. This note continues thus : — " The first two implements I got were from this side of the pit, and the workman who foand them told me that they came from depths of 16 and 20 feet respectively. Pkof. J. Gbikie and myself took an undoubted flake from the loam, at a depth of about 16 feet, .and I have since found more than one, so that the occurrence of chipped stones in this bed is beyond question. The gloss upon their surface is distinct from that upon stones from the gravel." " The implement in the gravel 6iwas rolled, and probably derived from older beds. This gravel belongs to my Flood Gravel." In another account this section seems to be described as on the northern ■.side of the pit. From this note some particulars have been added in .brackets ; but instead of the lowest bed,- the section is given thus : — Fine chalky gravel, say a foot. Cream-coloured loam. The differences may be accounted for by the cutting-back of the pit, through which variations in thickness, &c. would be shown. Of the implements found here Mk. Skesichly writes as follows : — " The first implement I obtained from the loam, at Botany Bay, measured 10 X 3 ■ 5 X 1 • 7 inches. It is oval, of a rich glossy brown, and Jias been formed from a pebble, traces of the original surface being observable at the butt-end. It is boldly, but not unskilfully chipped, the -cutting edge having been re-chipped, and it is much rolled.',' " Of others, from the same place, one measuring 4 X 2/ 5 X 1 inches, is a peculiar implement, made from a naturally-fractured flint, by ■chipping along one side, to make a cutting-edge. Another, 3 ' 5 X 2 x " 7 inches, is an ovoid implement, made from a very coarse flake, by a few bold skilful chippings. Another, 3 " 25 X 2 X " 75 inches, was made by :boldly chipping the back of a thick flake, the original flat side remaining intact. A long oval implement, 6 ' 5 X 3 X 2 inches, has been skilfully fashioned by a few bold strokes." E 75929. D 50 GLACIAL DEIFT. Fig. 7. Section at the Western Side of Botany/ Bay Brickyard. •:^V;V -,;. a. Sand and gravel (3 to 5 feet). 6. Very stony clay (4 feet). c. Cream-coloured loam, with implements at the spots marked x (15 feet). Fig. 8. Section on the Eastern Side of Botany Bay Brickyard. o / •t •-■.■•- I- a. Sand (and fine gravel, 1 foot). 6. Sandy gravel, with flints (3 feet). c. Red coarsely laminated brickearth (4 feet). d. Carbonaceous layer. e. Cream-coloured loam (with layers of sand, and with black specks here and there, 6 feet). ^ f. Sand and fine gravel. X Implements, in o and e. GLACIAL DRIFT, 51 Fig. 9. Section in a Pit west of Grimes' Graves. a. Sand and gravel. 6. Boalder Clay, very chalky ; striated stones not common, but well striated septaria occar. c. Boulder of chalk. d. Buff loam, with sand. " The old pit west of G-rimes' Graves, now disused (1877 ?) was dug for the loam, and I had the face cleared, so as to find the lie of the beds where they had been hidden by talus, with the result shown in fig. 9." " The chalk boulder on the right ha9 been dug through, and Boulder Clay has been found beneath it. It was thought to be Chalk in place; by Messrs. Whitakeb, Woodwabb, Hakmbk, Fisheb, Beit, etc., notwithstand- ing the facts which I pointed out as conclusive as to its erratic nature, namely that it was more or less broken up, and contained flints of kinds never found together in place, but belonging- to different layers that are' separated by many feet of chalk. Large chalk boulders are common around Brandon." " Good Boulder Clay was seen overlying the loam, at the eastern end of the pit." Mb. F. J. Bennett notes that " at Croxton, there is an outcrop of loam- from under the gravel, comparatively broad on the west of the village-.' The loam, in which there are old pits, rests sometimes on Chalk, some- times on Boulder Clay [probably a lower bed]. A mile S.W. of the church is another old pit in the loam, and all these pits were made for raising earth to dress the land, a practice that has been left off." The sections just south, near Thetford, have been described in the Memoir oa that part (1891). , Of the overlying gravel he notes that "there is a pit a,botit a mile south-westward of the village, near the high road, Bhowing about 4 feef of subangnlar gravel." It is convenient to note here the patch of gravel nearly three mile? to the north, of which Mr. Bennett says that the pit, marked on the map " a mile and a quarter S.S.E. of West Tofts, shows 10 feet ' of very' coarse gravel." Of the associated loam north of Croxton Heath he adds, " on the eastern side of the road, aboutamile S.E. of Warren House, a,pit, about 20 feet deep, showed buff sandy loam resting irregularly on stiff blue clay, and about three quarters of a mile S.S.E- of that house were two pits in buff loam." " About a mile and a half west of Mouse Hall was a pit sho-wing coarse gravel in a matrix of fine gravel and sand." • The relation of these beds to the Bouldbr Clay is doubtful, but the loams are like those that elsewhere underlie it, so that the clay beneath may be a lower bed. The following note is by Mr. Skerichlt, and the place seems to be about 1 J miles E. of Langford : — " The Boulder Clay digs into and mixes up the loam below in a very instructive way. Above the spot marked X (fig. 10) it has the appearance of having been rolled over on itself, a not unnsnal thing." ' ' The loam passes from the usual buff kind into the mottled-and-sandy- parting variety, and, by the thinning out of the clay, into a fine sand. It is much contorted in places, and, as might be expected, has yielded much D 2 52 GLACIAL DRIFT. of its material to the overlying Boulder Olay, into wMoh it seems to pass insensibly in some places." Fig. 10. Section near the House on Stanford and Tollington Warren. Depth 18 feet. a, Sandy soil. n i IT) 'ft- -f ^' ^°^^^^^ Clay, with fold above X (middle). The patches of gravel at and nearBodney again are doubtful : of these Mr. Bennett says : — " The church stands on a hillock of buff sand, and there are three like sandhills southward." ' ' A mile and a quarter E. S.E. of the church was a pit in the bottom of a hollow showing 8 feet of very coarse much-worn gravel, with beds of sand in places." " About a mile E.N.B. of the church is a small hillock of coarse cannon- shot gravel, seen to a depth of 4 feet." The mapping of the strip a little northward points to the outcropping of the gravel from beneath the Boulder Clay. At Crimplesham gravel has been found in or beneath the clay. (See p. 63.) Between the Wissey and the Nar. In the first place the tract south-eastward of the Gooderstone Valley will be noticed and then the neighbourhood of SwafFham. At Fouldon the Drift occurs at a low level (see p. 60), and beds below the Boulder Clay seem to crop out for some length, though for only a slight width. The presence of Neocomian phosphates in the gravel shows that this, Drift probably comes from the westward, where beds of that age crop out. The old pit a little east of the farm (marked Barn on the map) about a mile westward of the church was mostly ploughed over in 1886 ; but one part, on the north, at the hedge-corner, showed the following beds : -, Soil. Pale grey sandy Boujder Clay, up to 4. feet thick, split on the east by a wedge of gravel, the clay beneath whch was somewhat paler. Chalky gravel. From here the outcrop of the gravel spreads eastward, with but a slight gap, round the spur and back westward to Fouldon Fen House Some small shallow pits on a slight rise at the southern side of Fouldon Common, and a quarter of a mile north of Fouldon Fen House, were in chalky rubble (with sand and stones), sand (stony and chalky) and rubbly chalk, all more or less jumbled, or squeezed together. At the most northerly part some gravel, that came on suddenly, consisted chiefly of chalk pebbles, flmts, and small dark phosphatic nodules (derived from Neocomian beds). No definite order could be made out. GLACIAL DRIFT. 53 A pit about three quarters of a mile N.N.E. of Fouldon church was about 8 feet deep in chalky grarel, with flints, lumps of chalk, a fossi- liferons Neooomian boulder, pieces of fissile Kim eridge Clay, layers of saad and a finer gravel (one such well marked and with many dark Neocomian phosphate-nodules). At the eastern end some beds were mostly of chalk, and the bedding was in the form, of a hollow. The following notes and figures (11, 12) are by Mb. Skebtchlt : — "A patch of loam has been mapped north of Mrindford, the only good exposure being at Didlington brickyard. The relation to the Boulder Clay was not clear in the pits ; but it comes out readily on mapping the adjacent area. The loam, etc. occurs over an area of about two square miles, and a section from the river near Mundford, northwards along the high road to Hilborough, would show the lie of the beds to be ae in Fig. 11." Fig. 11. Section northward from near Mundford. S. N. a. Valley gravel. 6. Flood gravel, a name given by Mr. Skertchly to some of the gravel above the Boulder Clay, c. Boulder Clay. d. Grlacial Loams. e. Chalk. " The Boulder Clay is here seen to occur at the low ground, near the stream [as well as at the high ground], and I have dotted what seems to have been the original position of that deposit [across the tract between], showing how the loam has been exposed by denudation." " That this lower patch of Boulder Clay does not crop out from beneath the loam is proved by the section shown in Fig. 12." Fig. 1 2. Section half a mile east of Ichhorough. About 6 feet deep. "T nr a. Sand and gravel. c. Loam. h. Boulder Clay. S.- Chalk. " East and west the loam runs under and dies away beneath the Boulder Clay." Two miles a trifle west of south from Swaffham Railway Station I saw gravel, sand and Boulder Clay over chalk ; but presumably the Drift here could not be mapped." Writing of the tract just southward and eastward of Swaffham IVTe. G. Baekow says :-^" The sands and gravels in this area have few points of interest. The beds consist mostly, of rounded flints, generally small, interbedded with sand, often somewliat loamy. Chalk. 54 GLACIAL DEIFT. With the exception of the Cannon-shot gravel they seem to pass under the Boulder Clay, and the soil they make is for the most part like that made by decomposed clay." " Near Snail's Pit Farm, about a mile S.S.W. of Swafltam, Ihere was a large pit, the gravel in whicli rests on the Ghalk. It is very irregularly bedded and some coarse lenticular masses are used for road-metal." " An interesting section was seen at the cross-roads westward of South Pickenham, about half a mile N.W. of The Hall, where, in the field on the S.W. and touching the road, sand and gravel were clearly seen beneath Boulder Clay. The Drift abutted against the Chalk with a vertical junction, toward which the sand and gravel rose up beneath the Boulder Clay, but without reaching the surface." "In the railway-cutting near North Pickenham there was a ballast- pit on the southern side, at the two ends of which there was some 20 feet of gravel, whilst in the middle chalk rose up and formed the floor. This chalk seems to continue eastward along the base of the cutting. On the opposite (northern) side of the railway chalky clay was to be ■seen ; but a few yards west gravel comes on again in such a way as to suggest that it passes under the clay, though the junction of the two is nearly vertical. The gravel shows signs of contortion and contains many large flints : above it is what looks like decomposed Boulder Clay, to the thickness of two feet." I have seen Boulder Clay, with a loamy soil, clearly under- lain by gravel in this cutting. " S. and S.W. of Necton Hall there is a considerable spread of laminated clay, or brickearth. This bed underlies the surrounding gravel, for in several cases 2 or 3 feet of the latter have been pierced to reach it, and, taking into account the mode of occurrence and the surroundings of this clay, it seems probable that the deposit is older than the Boulder Clay." Mk. Hose has remarked that " on Necton Common . . the gravel beds contain so large a quantity of decomposing iron-pyrites, that the water percolating the gravel is sufficiently charged with iron to cement the sand and stony fragments together, and form a coarse breccia.'"* Mk. Hawkins notes as follows:^" At Sporle, north-eastward of Swaff- ham, the Boulder Clay has been cut through, and consequently gravel and sand crop out for about three quarters of, a mile along the bottom of the valley. Gravel was formerly dug on the eastern side of the road." " At Farmers Wood, south-eastward of Sporle, gravel seems to come out from below the Boulder Clay, in the bottom of the side-valley. It may trend south-eastward across the high road into Necton Park, and gravel may be seen round the lake, though the ground not far ofi' seems clayey." Other patches northward of Swaffham seem, for the most part at all events, to be newer than the Boulder Clay, and it will be convenient to notice them together as such. Whether the gravel W.N.W. of Stoke Ferry is older than the Bi)iilder Clay or not is uncertain ; but though at one place Boulder Clay seemed to occur over it, as noted by Mr. Cameron ; yet, from this patch being in line with that by Wereham and Criniplesham, to the north-west (greater part of which is certainly newer than ihe Boulder Clay) and with the southerly continuation of patches by Methwold toward Brandon, of the age of which there is no evidence, it seems probable that the whole is more allied to the " Ancient River Gravels " of the tract to the south, f and it has * Phil. Mig., ser. 3, vol. viii. p. 29. (1836.) t Sse " The Geology of Parts of Cairbriclgesbire and of Suffolk, pp. 72-75.