On the Age of the Suffolk Valleys; with Notes on the Buried Channels of Drift

T he main watershed of Suffolk follows generally the Chalk outcrop, but keeps rather to the east of it, running in a north-easterly direction from Haverhill, in the south-west of the county, to Diss, on the borders of Suffolk and Norfolk, where it turns north, or a little west of north, until it finishes at the Cromer ridge. It thus runs roughly parallel to the Chalk escarpment, changing in direction with it. This more easterly run of the watershed appears to be due to the covering of Glacial Drift upon the Chalk. The valley-system of Suffolk is, in consequence of this change of strike of the Chalk and change of direction of the main watershed, of a palmate or radiating form, the rivers which have carved the chief valleys, taken from north to south, being:—(1) The Waveney, flowing east-north-eastwards and entering the North Sea at Yarmouth; (2) the Alde, flowing generally east-south-eastwards to Aldeburgh, but only reaching the sea at Orford; (3) the Deben, flowing south-eastwards to the coast at Bawdsey; (4) the Gipping (with its estuary, the Orwell), also flowing south-eastwards; (5) the Brett, flowing southwards into the Stour estuary; and (6) the Upper Stour (as distinct from the Stour estuary), flowing southwards into the wide east-and-west estuary of the same name. The Little Ouse, rising close against the source of the Waveney at Lopham Ford (where a small low bank of gravel forms the only present watershed), flows westwards, and forms part of the northern county boundary. At Thetford