Note 36 — Chapter II

Is it certain that an elevation of seventy feet would not have been enough to unite Britain with the Continent? For thousands of years the scour of the tides must have been deepening the Channel. [On April 11, 1906, I submitted to Mr. Clement Reid, in a conversation which I had with him at the Geological Museum, the gist of the argument by which I endeavour to show (pp. 20-2, infra) that during some part of the Palaeolithic Age Britain must have been continental. He virtually admitted its force, remarking that an elevation of seventy feet would have enabled animals to cross from Gaul to Britain, as the scour of the tides had doubtless deepened the Channel.]