loS Sir H. C. Englefiei,d's ObfervAttons 



rior the flints to be difpofed fo much in beds as at Carifbrook. They 

 were however extremely broken and lliattered, and apparently the 

 rnoft fo where they lay moft in flrata. The ftrata had alfo a great 

 inclination or dip to the north. 



- Although it would .be rafti to attempt to account for this very 

 fingular ftate of dcftruftion of the flmts in the Carifbrook pit, yet 

 it is impoffible not to offer fome conje6lurcs on the lubjed. There 

 can be very little doubt that the' ftrata, though now fo inclined, 

 were originally formed in a horizontal pofition. When the tre- 

 mendous convulfion' took place which funk them to the fituation in 

 which they now appear (at which time the channel which fepa- 

 rates the Ifle of Wight from the main land wasperhaps formed), 

 the ftrata of chalk, in the a£b of fubfidence, had a tendency to 

 Aide on each other, and this would be exerted moft fenfibly where 

 from the admixture of the flints the cohefion of the parts of the 

 chalk was the weakeft. This motion, or rather ftrain, of fo enor- 

 mous a weight, might in an inftant fhiver the flints, though their 

 refiftance flopped the incipient motion ; for the flints, though crufhed 

 to powder, are not difplaced, which mufl have been the cafe had the 

 beds Aid fenfibly. This conjefture is perhaps ftrengthened by what 

 I obferved in a few detached nodules of flint in the chalk flrata 

 which did not appear to have fufFered as thofe in the beds of flint 

 have done. I may here add that it feemed as if in fome places the 

 fine powder of the flints had run down, and invefled the nearer parts 

 of the fiffure with a thin coatingofthe agglutinated dufl; but this 

 may poflibly have taken place fince the face of the fiflfure has been 

 expofed to the weather. 



. Perhaps it may not be totally foreign from the prefent fubjedl, to 

 mention that in a very great chalk pit at the village of Prefton, a mile 

 north of Brighthelmftone, in which the flints lie in very regular 

 nud nearly horizontal ftrata, but which has alfo vafl perpendicular 

 3 fiflTures 



