THE DEVELOPMENT OF BRITISH SCENERY. 285 



loops as Start Bay, Torbay and others to the east, and the 

 same thing is noticed with the other bays. 



Enough has been said to show that the topography of 

 coast lines is a fertile subject for research. Two papers 

 have recently been published by Dr. Gulliver (10) and Mr. 

 Vaughan Cornish (11), which bear directly upon the topo- 

 graphy of our coasts and further work will no doubt follow. 



The shape of England is roughly an isosceles triangle 

 with a base extending from Northumberland to Cornwall 

 and the apex on the coast of Kent. The position of 

 the base is due to the uplift of Palaeozoic rocks, to the 

 west and north of England, whilst the position of the 

 two sides is owino- to the strike of the Mesozoic and later 

 rocks, with a general northerly trend to the north and a 

 westerly trend to the south, caused by the presence of 

 the Pennine and Devon ridges or horsts. Along the strike 

 of these Mesozoic rocks strike-rivers carved out valleys in 

 the old continental plateau, which after depression were 

 •occupied by the North Sea and English Channel, giving 

 England its present outline. As denudation progresses, 

 should no further uplift occur, the Mesozoic rocks of the 

 east and south, and the new Red Sandstone of the Central 

 Plain and the lower parts of the Dee and Mersey basins 

 will be denuded and our island will be broken up into an 

 archipelago of Palaeozoic rocks, bearing few or no signs 

 of the possible modern origin of the whole as land. 



BIBLIOGRAPHY. 



>(i) Gilbert, G. K. Geology of the Henry Mountains. U. S. 

 Geographical and Geological Survey of the Rocky Mountain 

 Region. Second edition. Washington, 1880. 



'(2) JUDD, J. W. The Secondary Rocks of Scotland. Third 

 paper. Quart. Journ. Geol. Soc, vol. xxxiv., p. 669, 1878. 



(3) MARR, J. E. The Waterways of English Lakeland. Geo- 



graphical Journal, June, 1896. 



(4) GEIKIE, Sir A. Trans. Royal Soc. Edin., vol. xxxv., part. ii. 



(5) DAVIS, W. M. Geographical Journal, vol. v., No. 2, p. 127. 

 «.(6) Ramsay, Sir A. C. The Geology of North Wales. Mem. 



Geol. Survey. Second edition, vol. iii., chap, xxxiv. 



