8 GEOLOGICAL NOTES
pretty evenly, so that the stream must have been of nearly the
same depth everywhere. But where there were many bends the
gravel tended to become piled on one side. Thus, a few yards
westward of the Viking ship, the gravel was seen to be piled on
the more southerly side of the channel to within 3ft. of the top,
the opposite bank showing
Loam .. .. .. .. 3ft.
Peat, earth with mud, and here and there shell layers 5 to 6ft.
Gravel
Again, fifty or sixty yards further westward the gravel was
heaped up against the more northerly side of the channel.
South-west of the place where the Viking ship was found,
and a few yards eastward of the spot at which the channel made
a sharp bend to the south, the "steam navvy" cut away the
ground so as to expose a long section ranging nearly north and
south and crossing the old channel nearly at right angles to its
course there. In Fig. 5 this section is shown for a distance of
Fig. 5. New Reservoirs. 1. Surface Loam; 2. Peat; 3. Gravel and Sand.
The irregular dark patches are fragments of the Stems of trees and plants,
with other vegetable matter.
about 50 yards ; the spectator is looking eastward, and the dis-
used channel appears towards the southern end of the section.
Throughout there was gravel towards the base and loam at the
surface each retaining the same character throughout the section.
But the intermediate beds varied extremely. At the northern
end of the section there was a comparatively thick bed of peat
formed of the remains of water and marsh plants which had
grown in situ. About 10 yards from the northern end it was
found, as shown in Fig. 5, that the peat bed had been eroded
away and that in its place were gravel and sand more irregular
in stratification than that towards the base of the section. And
in this gravel and sand were irregular deposits of blackened
vegetable remains, from tree stems to a debris of twigs, leaves,
&c., which had been heaped confusedly together, just as they