S88 Mr Stevenson on the Wastiiig Effects of the Sea 



present Leasowe Lighthouse, formerly the landward light, which 

 he had assisted in building, became the sea-light. He could not 

 condescend upon the distance between the two original lights, 

 but was certain that it must have been several hundred yards; 

 that he knows that, in the course of thirty years, the shore of 

 the Leasowe lost, hy measurement^ eleven Cheshire roods, or 88 

 yards; and verily believes, that, since he knew this shore, it has 

 lost upwards of half-a-mile of firm ground. To the correctness 

 of these statements, the other two aged men gave ample testi- 

 mony ; Henry Youd having also worked at the Lighthouse. 



As to the present state of things, the party alluded to were 

 eye witnesses of the tides, on the IBth, 17th and 18th of Feb- 

 ruary 1828, having exhibited a very alarming example of the 

 encroachments of the sea upon the Leasowe shore. At high- 

 water it came over the bank, and ran in a stream of about half- 

 a-mile in breadth, surrounded the lighthouse, and continued its 

 course through the low grounds toward Wallasea Pool, on the 

 Mersey, thereby forming a new channel, and threatening to lay 

 several thousands of acres of rich arable and pasture lands into 

 the state of a permanent salt lake. The present Leasowe Light- 

 house, which, in 1764, was considered far above the reach of 

 the sea, upon the 17th of February last was thus surrounded 

 by salt water, and must soon be abandoned unless some very 

 extensive works be undertaken for the defence of the beach, 

 the whole of the interior lands of the Leasowe being considerably 

 under the level of high-water of spring-tides. 



This coast, with its sand banks in the offing ; its submarine 

 forest, and the evidence of living witnesses as to th^ encroach- 

 ment of the sea upon the firm ground, is altogether highly in- 

 teresting to the geological and scientific enquirer. The remains 

 of forests in the bed of the ocean occur in several parts of the 

 British coast ; particularly off Lincoln ; on the banks of the Tay, 

 near Flisk ; at Skiel, in the Mainland of Orkney, and in other 

 places, noticed in the Transactions of this Society, and are 

 strong proofs of the encroachment of the sea upon the land. 

 However difficult, therefore, it may be to reconcile the varied 

 appearances in nature, regarding the sea having at one time oc- 

 cupied a higher level than at present, yet its encroachment as a 

 general, and almost universal principle, seems to be beyond 



