282 VACATION XOTES. 



bees, or over the willow aits, and seem trying their wings for a farewell 

 flight. This season has been somewhat an unequal one. The heat during 

 July was very severe, as many a bronzed countenance attests; but there came 

 a change, and the farmer was fain to watch the shocks growing dark 

 beneath pelting showers, and hope for better weather. 



Having undergone a severe trial, which rendered change, and quiet, and 

 sea-air requisite, we found them here. It is not a quarter of a century 

 since a few dwellings formed the whole of this town, now scattered and 

 unfinished, but extensive; bathing was carried on suh dio, and where now 

 some quarter of a hundred machines stand ranged, not one was to be 

 seen. The neighbourhood to the east, however, has long been known as 

 the scene of a geological phenomenon, displaying what is called the '^descending 

 cause," namely the encroachments of the sea upon the land. Who has 

 not heard of the "Reculvers?" the ghostly sisters that stand forth, pale and 

 mysterious, in the dark sky, as mementoes of by-gone times! There has 

 always attached a certain deep interest to this structure — an almost super- 

 stitious feeling of awe, from the peculiarity of its circumstances. Once, 

 and that not so long ago, this was a church in which service was performed, 

 standing inland, some say two miles, of Roman and Saxon origin, and the 

 burial-place of one of our earliest rulers. It is invested with the character 

 of a structural record of Time's stern work, as it now hangs on the verge 

 of the precipice, with the billows of a vaster extent of water than any 

 other part of our coast can shew, beating perpetually at its very door. 

 Had it not been for the position it occupies, so prominent and so important 

 in a maritime point of view, doubtless decay had long since done its will; 

 but the further progress of this ruthless invader had been stayed, and all 

 that mason's art could do to preserve it, the brethren of the Trinity house 

 have done, and seamen look for *'old Reculvers," the pale sisters, as 

 regularly as for any of the buoys or lights that float so frequently on 

 our hazardous coast. 



I visited this place some nine years since, and trace, in that time, that the 

 hand of encroachment has not been idle. The soil is a strong loam, in some 

 parts mere clay, in some mingled with gravel; where there was then a 

 beach, upon which large masses of earth and sandstone lay scattered, the 

 waves now beat upon the clifi^ itself, for many hundred yards tottering to 

 its fall; walk along the summit and you perceive the same thing, the path 

 that led along the edge ever and anon makes a detour, by reason of a 

 fall of earth breaking in upon its line; and even beyond this cracks and 

 fissures meet you at every step. It would probably be a fruitless task to 

 endeavour to explain why the sea encroaches here and not elsewhere, or 

 ■why, in other localities it recedes; the latter more fraught with difficulty 

 than the former, for it is easy to see how a yielding soil may be washed 



