GEOLOGY. 5 
inhabitants expected an attack from the French and Spa- 
niards, to form a breastwork along the sand hills, which 
then, as at Shelly Bay, skirted the coast. In doing so, they 
cut through the natural protection given by the sea-shrubs 
and creepers, which usually abound in such places. From 
that day the sand, supported by constant supplies from the 
sea, has steadily proceeded up the hill to the very summit, 
a height of about 180 feet.* There is another encroach- 
ment at Tucker’s Town, said to have taken place about 
sixty years ago, and has crossed the neck between Harring- 
ton Sound and the sea; but beyond this it does not seem 
inclined to move. The sand has not been stopped, at the 
eastern extremity of this beach, where the bluffs commence 
by their very considerable declivity; though it has been 
most effectually, at the crest of the slope, by a natural fence 
of sage bush (Lantana salvifolia), growing partly in the soil 
and partly in the sand; which, as it ascended, seems to 
have then rolled on with the seeds of this plant, and of de- 
struction to its progress, in its own bosom. 
“The same operations appear to have occurred through- 
out the sand tracts at and near Great Turtle Bay.” 
Colonel Nelson says the whole of the Bermudas, (and, 
perhaps, many of the older rocks,) may be called ‘Organic 
Formations, as they present but one mass of animal re- 
mains, in various stages of comminution and disintegration. 
From the most compact rock to the very sand of the shore, 
the materials of this group being universally fragments of 
shells, corals, &c. The Turbo pica and Venus Pensylvanica, 
are found imbedded in the rock in great quantities. We 
* It has long since crossed the brow of the hill. 
