LIVEllPOOL AND WIEKAL. 



extends over all the flat land around Liverpool, especially 

 northward, and is extensively diffused over Wirral, occupying 

 all the hollows and depressions in the Aew red sandstone. 



The coast from Hoylake, in Wirral, to Southport on the 

 north, is low, and skirted by sand-hills and broad sands dry 

 at low water, whilst a little inland are found peat mosses, some 

 of considerable extent, remaining in a state of nature, and un- 

 cultivated. These contain many large trees and other re- 

 mains of extensive forests. The greater portion, however, of 

 the tract in which peat moss occurs is now in a state of culti- 

 vation, and almost daily the features of the country are be- 

 coming modified from the advancing state of agriculture. 

 There is little doubt that at some remote period a dense forest 

 extended itself from the borders of the Kibble southwards 

 along the coast, occupying the tract near the estuary of the 

 Mersey, and the northern and western parts, if not the whole, 

 of Wirral : at the present time may be seen, along the shore of 

 Wirral, at Leasowe, and near the mouth of the Alt, north of 

 Liverpool, a very considerable number of trunks and roots of 

 gigantic trees in the position in which they originally grew, 

 whilst extensive tracts of peat are found below the sand-hills, 

 and even down to low-water mark. There is reason to be- 

 lieve that there is going on along this coast a gradual subsi- 

 dence of the land — (Picton) ; and that very considerable 

 changes, in this as in other respects, have been effected even 

 within the historical periods. The author now quoted, thus 

 remarks, and probably with perfect truth, " That the sea has 

 here gained enormously on the land, is not a matter of suppo- 

 sition and hypothesis, but can be proved by the testimony of 

 many now living, and the recorded statements of others no 

 longer in existence/' 



The hundred of Wirral (the history of which has been ad- 

 mirably described by Mr. Mortimer) contains about sixty 

 thousand acres of land, consisting principally of clay and sand, 

 for the most part now artificially mixed together, except in 

 B 9 



