254
A NEOLITHIC FLOOR.
The specimen from Hamborough Hill has two somewhat heavy con-
centric rings, which is unusual.
DESCRIPTION OF PLATE XV.
Fig. 1. Leaf shaped arrow-head.
2. Flake worked to a point.
3. Tanged Arrow head.
4, 5, 7, and 10. Scrapers,
6 and 9. Knives.
8. Hollow scraper,
11 and 13. Pointed flakes or borers.
12. Portion of ground axe.
HULL-BRIDGE.
We were next conducted to the
more important site at Hull-bridge,
a river-side village, on the south
bank of the Crouch, about 3 miles
to the north of Hamborough Hill.
(See Plan Fig. 5.).
This investigation was a much
more serious undertaking. In the
first case, the deposit we had come
to see was on the opposite side of the
river and was exposed only at low
water. Under these conditions, the
river at this part is too shallow for
a boat to be of any assistance. So
there was no other recourse but to
wade the stream. We were fortunate
enough to be provided with wading
boots, though even these did not

No. 3.
Fig. 4 —BASE OF POT FOUND
AT HAMBOROUGH HILL.
entirely remove difficulties from the
expedition.
The tidal clay of the Essex river
estuaries is hardly an ideal material to walk on, even in wading
boots, as occasionally it is found to be much easier to draw the
leg from the boot than it is to extract the boot from the clay
mud. The clay possesses the good quality, however, of being
soft in the event of a fall. The centre of the river has a gravelly
bottom and walking was comparatively easy, but on gaining
the opposite bank our way lay along the sloping clay-mud,
between the low-water channel and the salting. (Figs. 6 and 7).