130 Geology of the South East of Dorsetshire. 



in the text relating to them, I must be allowed to quote a few 

 words in favor of the "wood-cuts," from a high authority. — 

 Professor Sedgwick, alluding to them in a private letter, says, 

 "Your little plates, published in the memoir you sent me, 

 seemed also extremely good. I say this without any wish to 

 natter you." Had it been my intention to point out how 

 many beds of flint there are, I would have counted them; 

 but my object was of a character more general than this, and 

 had no reference to such minute details ; for the phenomena 

 I have tried to explain, are not affected by any consideration 

 of the kind. 



The re-examination of the whole coast, which I have made 

 in consequence of Dr. M.'s paper, has led me to retract my 

 assertion respecting the inclination of 19° at Old Harry, but, 

 at the same time, to mention some circumstances not before de- 

 scribed by any one. All my previous passages round Old Har- 

 ry, had been made when the sea was too rough to approach 

 near enough to the cliffs, to measure them by the clinometer. 

 But on the last occasion, I was enabled to land at various 

 points under the cliffs, where there are patches of shingle 

 lodged in the hollows at the bottom. Had I ever approach- 

 ed, as Dr. M. did, from the south, I should have declared that 

 the beds were horizontal ; — but on coming round from the 

 north, the appearance is, at a little distance, as I described, 

 and as I thought, justly. The fact is, that the beds at Old 

 Harry are extremely broken, and the bedding lines are not 

 horizontal, but sometimes sloping ; combined with these, the 

 .dip of the beds to the west, on the sides of Old Harry and 

 his wife, and the other projecting masses, gave the appear- 

 ance, when the offing was such as to conceal the projection, 

 of a regular inclination, amounting to 19°. Had I followed 

 " too implicitly" other writers, I should not have fallen into 

 this error, for they all say the beds are horizontal ; it is true 

 the flint lines are so, but not the chalk. I wish then to re- 

 call, (and with thanks to Dr. M.), so much of my previous 

 remarks, and the tendency of the lines to the N. in fig. 38, 

 and fig. 36, as convey, what I now acknowledge to be, a 

 wrong impression * At the same time, I must, in my turn, 

 again comment upon Dr. M.'s remarks, in introducing some 

 new matter into this illustration of the coast. He is correct 

 in saying that " the lines of flint descend in a curve, and soon 

 become" nearly? "horizontal." But he is not correct in say- 

 ing that "the bending lines of flint are exactly twenty-two in 



* The editor will do me the justice to say, that I wished to correct the 

 wood-cuts before the paper went to press ; which I was not permitted to do. 



