8 



Kent a similar invasion had taken place with 

 equally reiimrkable results, but by sand instead 

 of shin-^le. The chief agent was what had been 

 termed by Professor Burrows the *' Law of 

 Eastward drift," that was, the ascertained pre- 

 valence of south-west winds in the Channel, and 

 the remarkable fact that the flood tide np Channel 

 moved faster than the ebb, under certain 

 conditions which occurred with frequencj'. The 

 result of these two xinited agencies was that more 

 detritus was brought up Channel than returned. 

 It was obvious that all the heavy shingle that 

 came up Channel was now intercepted by Dunge- 

 ness or carried past the point into the open 

 Channel while the curve of the shore afforded 

 protection from the south-v.est winds and allowed 

 the north-east winds and the ebb tide to exert 

 their forces on the shingle bank in the opposite 

 direction. The same thing was happening at 

 Hythe and Sandgate, and the same difficulty was 

 experienced in keeping up the foreshore. Up to 

 Dover it was the same story — the old material 

 being washed out and no new material coming 

 in. So far as he could see, that unfor- 

 tunate condition of things must continue to 

 increase, and an increasing amount of artificial 

 resistance would be required in proportion to the 

 outward gro" th of Dungeness. That growth was 

 of great rapidity, amounting to an average of 

 seven feet per annum. The whole process seemed 

 to provide a curious instance of the inconsequence 

 of natural forces. Centuries had been spent in 

 blockading the coast-line, and all the work was 

 being undone again. Though no shingle 

 passed through the Straits of Dover, yet the finer 

 particles held in suspension were still carried 

 through and were deposited, as they had been 

 probably since the Channel was first opened, in 

 the form of sand, and the growth of the Goodwins 

 had done something to atone for the difficulties 

 they put in the way of navigation by providing 

 Deal with an admirable shelter. The reason why 

 those sand banks formed at that particular spot 

 was that two tidal waves met there and so formed 

 a sort of equilibrium which allowed the suspended 

 particles to sink. It might be interesting to note 

 that Deal owed its immunity from the sand plague 

 to the fact that it had no river outlet and the 

 current which passed at high .'jpeed between the 

 Goodwins and the main land was not diverted or 

 checked by an estuary. The causes which had 

 effected the silting up of the Wantsume and the 

 practical eifacement of Sandwich were closely akin 

 to those which had operated at Romney Marsh, 

 being partly the work of nature and partly of 

 man. The soil of the Marsh had been proved to 

 be entirely of marine silt, and it had been found 

 that this soil at the west side of the Marsh was 

 no less than 90 ft. in depth and some 5 ft. deeper 

 at the e-tst end. How long would be required for 

 such a 'leposit to be made could not be deter- 

 mined, but with an open waterway at both ends 

 Lewin c.iloulated the average deposit at one-tenth 

 of an inch annually, which would give a period 

 of 10,000 years. If, on the other hand, one half 

 of the suspended silt was deposited, which was a 



fair estimate for an enclosed area, the required 

 time would be only ^60 years. One thing wa& 

 quite certain : it must have been before the 

 Roman occupation, or at least be.'ore the building 

 of the Rhee wall. The Romans certainly either 

 made the Marsh dry land, or found it so, for the 

 whole area was rich in Roman remains, which 

 were found notably at Ivychurch, in the centre 

 of the Marsh, [and at Dymchurch. That fact 

 disposed of the fallacy that the Portus Lemanus 

 lay, as some held, at the foot of Lympne hill, 

 on which the castle of btutfall was built, for 

 had the sta penetrated to that point, the whole 

 of the Marsh must have been several feet 

 ttnder water at every high tide. The ex- 

 cellent harbour which Romney once had 

 through the cutting of a fine straight channel 

 which provided a direct waterway between Apple- 

 dore and Romney, might have remained to this 

 day but for the selfish land-grabbers (Archbishops 

 and other ecclesiastics), who proceeded to 

 enclose or "inn" the land on the west of the Rhee 

 Wall either ignorant of or disregarding the value 

 of a good harbour so long as they could embank a 

 few more acres. Twice had that district been com- 

 mercially ruined by that stupidity. The river 

 was diverted from the Rhee channel to the old 

 devious coui-se, spoiling the direct in and outflow 

 of the tide and reducing the amount of incoming 

 water on which the proper scouring of the river 

 mouth depended. Nature, assisted by that short- 

 sighted policy completed the disaster at a stroke, 

 for in 12^7 a great tidal wave overflowed the 

 shingrle barrier and again entirely altered the 

 course of the Rother, forcing it westward till it 

 found its present outlet at Rye. It was more 

 than probable that had the Roman river bed not 

 been banked off, the river would not have been 

 diverted by that storm. At Rye a highly 

 efficient port might have been maintained with 

 a navigable river up to Rubertsbridge but for the 

 same suicidal policy. The evidence in connection 

 with Rye Harbour given before the Tidal Harbour 

 Commission of 1845 showed conclusively the 

 fallacy of entrusting the care of what were really 

 national interests to purely local bodies. Individ- 

 ualreports and actual evidence before the Com- 

 mission almost unanimously in attributed the 

 deterioration of the harbour to the innings of land 

 and the building of dams in the waterway. 

 The whole question of the entrance to the 

 harbour depended on the amount of tidal 

 water admitted, and if a special example wa& 

 needed it was to be found in the history of Scots' 

 Float Sluice which dammed theRother-as it did to- 

 day-about a mile above the S.E.C.R. Bridge. That 

 sluice remained, said the lecturer, a momument of 

 human folly .waitingfor some hand to carve upon it. 

 " Here died Rye Harbour, and the hope of a 

 sheltered water-way between London and the 

 Channel." As a fact that was hardly an exaggera- 

 tion, he said, for plans were actually prepared for 

 deepening the river above Robertsbridge and 

 making a connection between the upper waters of 

 the Rother and tho Medway. In that case they 

 would have had a waterway to London without 



