ON THE PHYSICAL FEATURES OF THE HUMBER. 43 



years after it is embanked. Before dismissing the subject of Sunk Island, I 

 would make a remark on the new accretions. When the land, or rather 

 mud-bank, has nearly reached the usual surface elevation, the first vegeta- 

 ble life it exhibits is that of samphire, then of a very thin wiry grass, and 

 after this, some other varieties of marine grass ; and when the surface is thus 

 covered with vegetable life, the land may at once be embanked ; but if it is 

 enclosed from the tide before it obtains a green carpet, it may be twenty 

 years before it is of much value for agriculture, for scarcely anything will 

 grow upon it. There is another feature of interest, particularly to agricul- 

 turists, which I will take the liberty of naming, — I refer to the productive- 

 ness of accretions in this locality, viz. that within a very few years after the 

 land has been embanked, a natural and luxuriant covering of white clover 

 makes its appearance, giving an undoubted proof of the richness and capa- 

 bility of the soil. 



In addition to Cherry Cobb Sand and Sunk Island, about 400 acres of 

 new accretions have been added to Patrington, and a considerable portion to 

 Ottringham, Welwick, and other places in the immediate neighbourhood ; 

 and though I have not been able to ascertain the exact quantity added to 

 those places, I know it to be considerable, so that in round numbers we have 

 an increase between the year 1668 and 1850, when the last embankment was 

 made at Sunk Island, of about 10,000 acres, accumulated between Paull and 

 the Spurn. It is a question. Where does it come from ? Some are of 

 opinion that it is brought into the Humber by the flood-tide, being the soil 

 washed down by the sea along the Holderness coast ; while others are equally 

 confident that the soil from the sea-coast never enters the Humber, but that 

 it is brought down from the shores of the Humber itself. From the best 

 observations I have been able to make, I find that the deposit does not take 

 place either at the flood or at the ebb-tide, or yet at any time when the water 

 is in motion ; but only at high-water, when it is in a quiescent state, and the 

 quantity left is just in proportion to the depth of the tide at the time. Now, 

 if the deposit be brought down the river, the only quiescent state it could 

 have when so brouglit down, would be at the turn of the tide at low water, 

 and therefore no accumulation could take place such as we have been de- 

 scribing, at least from that direction ; for immediately the current begins to 

 form with the flood, the whole of the loose deposit is again set in motion. 



Taking, therefore. Sunk Island as the point for consideration at the time 

 of high water of spring-tides, where is it likely the mud could come from 

 which is found in suspension above the surface of the land ? We have seen 

 that the ebb could not deposit it, because of the current and the lowness of 

 the surface of the water ; then finding that the deposit does take place, and 

 can only take place at high water, if it does not come from the sea, whence 

 can it come ? Somewhat further to illustrate this theory, I will make one 

 other observation. I have already shown that the accretions of Sunk Island 

 and the immediate vicinity amount to about 10,000 acres. Now, according 

 to the statement made in the valuable publication by Professor Phillips, ' On 

 the Rivers, Mountains, and Sea Coast of Yorkshire,' 2^ yards on an average 

 are lost by the incursion of the sea annually, between the Spurn and Brid- 

 lington ; and this I fully believe. I have during the present year tested the 

 waste at Hornsea, and found that during the last forty-four years the average 

 loss was 7 feet 1 inch and three-tenths. Taking the length of coast so acted 

 upon at 40 miles, we have a loss during the 182 years prior to 1850 of up- 

 wards of 6000 acres ; and making the allowance due to the difl^erence in 

 cubic contents, the clifl" along the sea coast being much higher than the 

 depth of the bed of the Humber, where the Sunk Island accretion has taken 



