. The earth and its inhabitants ... eithHill . . Chiltem Hills, Wendover Hill . 1,134 feet. 1,498 „883 „973 „967 „905 „ GEOLOGY AND SUEFACB FEATURES. 13 dangerous by shoals and sand-banks. Marshes and shelving beaches are frequentalong it, and the cliffs being for the most part composed of chalk, clay, or sand,and unable to resist the assaults of the ocean, crumble away. In many places thésea gains upon the land rapidly. Very different are the features of the western coast. Its contour exhibits fargreater variety. In Scotland more especially it is indented by numerous sealochs, bounded by bold
. The earth and its inhabitants ... eithHill . . Chiltem Hills, Wendover Hill . 1,134 feet. 1,498 „883 „973 „967 „905 „ GEOLOGY AND SUEFACB FEATURES. 13 dangerous by shoals and sand-banks. Marshes and shelving beaches are frequentalong it, and the cliffs being for the most part composed of chalk, clay, or sand,and unable to resist the assaults of the ocean, crumble away. In many places thésea gains upon the land rapidly. Very different are the features of the western coast. Its contour exhibits fargreater variety. In Scotland more especially it is indented by numerous sealochs, bounded by bold mountains, reminding us of the fiords of Norway. Whilstalong the whole of the eastern coast there is but one island of any note, the westerncoast of Scotland is skirted by the double chain of the Hebrides, the Isle of Manoccupies the centre of the Irish Sea, and Anglesey lies off the coast of are not wanting low sandy shores and tracts of marshy land, but bold cliffs Fig. 7.—The Stack Rocks, South form its characteristic feature. Being composed of solid rocks, these headlands arebetter able to resist the wasting action of the sea than are the soft cliffs along theeast coast. Yet that waste, however slow, is going on here also is proved bythe detached masses of rock known as Needles or Stacks, which stand apartfrom the cliffs from which they have been severed by the erosive action of thetides and waves. The south-east coast of England resembles the east, but the western rises intobold cliffs of old red sandstone and granite. It is deficient in natural harbours,and cliffs of chalk alternate with stretches of marsh and fiat tracts of clay ; butimmediately to the west of Selsey Bill the safe roadstead of Spithead opens outbetween the mainland and the Isle of Wight, communicating with the spaciousharbour of Portsmouth and the well-sheltered estuary leading up to Southampton. 14 THE BRITISH ISLES. Farther west still, amongst the many bays which inden
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Keywords: ., bookcentury1800, bookdecade1880, booksubjectgeography, bookyear18
