4. Approximate Coast-line at the period of the lowest Submerged Forest 40 CHAPTER I INTRODUCTORY Most of our sea-side places of resort lie at the mouths of small valleys, which originally gave the fishermen easy access to the shore, and later on provided fairly level sites for building. At such places the fishermen will tell you of black peaty earth, with hazel-nuts, and often with tree-stumps still rooted in the soil, seen between tide-marks when the overlying sea-sand has been cleared away by some storm or unusually persistent wind. If one is fortunate enough to be on the spot when such a patch is uncovered this “submerged forest” is found to extend right down to the level of the lowest tides. The trees are often well-grown oaks, though more commonly they turn out to be merely brushwood of hazel, sallow, and alder, mingled with other swamp-plants, such as the rhizomes of _Osmunda_. These submerged forests or “Noah’s Woods” as they are called locally, have attracted attention from early times, all the more so owing to the existence of an uneasy feeling that, though like most other geological phenomena they were popularly explained by Noah’s deluge, it was difficult thus to account for trees rooted in their original soil, and yet now found well below the level of high tide. It may be thought that these flats of black peaty soil though curious have no particular bearing on scientific questions. They show that certain plants and trees then lived in this country, as they do now; and that certain animals now extinct in Britain once flourished here, for bones and teeth of wild-boar, wolf, bear, and beaver are often found. Beyond this, however, the submerged forests seem to be of little interest. They are particularly dirty to handle or walk upon; so that the archaeologist is inclined to say that they belong to the province of geology, and the geologist remarks that they are too modern to be worth his attention; and both pass on. Should we conquer our natural repugnance for such soft and messy deposits, and examine more closely into these submerged forests, they turn out to be full of interest. It is largely their extremely inconvenient position, always either wet or submerged, that has made them so little studied. It is necessary to get at things more satisfactorily than can be done by kneeling down on a wet muddy foreshore, with the feeling that one may be caught at any time by the advancing tide, if the study is allowed to become too engrossing. But before leaving for a time the old land-surface exposed between tide marks, it will be well to note that we have already gained one piece of valuable information from this hasty traverse. We have learnt that the relative level of land and sea has changed somewhat, even since this geologically modern deposit was formed.