geologists' association in essex. 97
road and the stream west of Butts Green displayed more or less London Clay at
the base over the greater part of its length. The cuttings between the stream
just mentioned and Romford were too little advanced at the date of the excursion
to be worth visiting, and they are but little more developed now (April 23rd).
A full account of the Upminster and Hornchurch cuttings, by the present
writer, and more especially of that containing the Boulder Clay, will appear in
the Quart. Journ. Geol. Soc. for August. T. V. HOLMES.
WALTHAMSTOW.
On May 7th Mr. J. Walter Gregory, F.G.S., conducted a party to some
cuttings at Walthamstow, on the new railway now being constructed between
Forest Gate and Tottenham. Alighting at St. James' Street station on the
Chingford Branch, the visitors proceeded to a cutting about half a mile east of
the reservoirs of the East London Waterworks, and a few yards S.E. of the Royal
Standard public-house, which stands at the junction of Ferry Lane with Black
Horse Lane. East of Black Horse Lane, and on the northern side of the houses
known as Stonydown and Stonydown Cottage, an excellent section appeared,
disclosing an irregularly channelled surface of London Clay covered by old river-
gravel, which here and there attained a thickness of 10 to 12 feet. The con-
tinuity of this gravel was slightly interrupted in one or two places by the existence
of narrow necks of London Clay, which presented a somewhat squeezed-up
appearance between the gravel on each side. Some hollows in the gravels itself,
which looked, a short distance away, as though they might be the result of
contemporaneous erosion, turned out, on nearer inspection, to be the sites of
shallow gravel-pits, which, after the removal of the gravel, had been filled up
with earth and rubbish.
Leaving this excavation, and proceeding in a south-easterly direction, a walk
of about a mile brought the party to another cutting on the same line. When
the railway is completed these two cuttings will form but one, though at present
there is about three-quarters of a mile of ground between them still to be ex-
cavated. The position of this second cutting was found to be a few yards south
of Grosvenor House, a mansion on the southern side of Hoe Street, and it ranged
in a north-westerly and south-easterly direction, its course being nearly parallel
with that of the street just named. The sections seen consisted of old river
gravel and loam, the subjacent London Clay not being visible. Between the
grounds of Grosvenor House and the Lea Bridge Road the cutting disappears,
and the line will cross that road on arches on the southern side of the Bakers'
Almshouses. In fact, the only cutting will be the long one at Walthamstow, the
line east of Grosvenor House ceasing to afford any geological information beyond
what may be attainable from diggings for the foundation of bridges, etc.
The gravel seen at Walthamstow appears to belong rather to the Lea than to
the Thames. The height of its surface above Ordnance Datum is from 40 feet to
a little above 50 feet, the greatest altitude being at the Grosvenor House end.
It is thus of lower level and more recent date than that on the course of the line
between Upminster and Romford. T. V. HOLMES.