210 Geology of the Stratts of Dover. (April, 
former extension across the straits, uniting England and 
France. We shall presently see that the strata immediately 
underlying the Chalk present similar resemblances, a fact 
which the old writers overlooked. 
Richard Verstegan was one of the oldest writers “who 
gave any good and sound reasons for this opinion.* Others 
had suggested it before, but, says Verstegan, ‘‘ These 
authors, following the opinion the one of the other, are 
rather content to think it sometimes so to have been, than 
to labour to finde out by sundry pregnant reasons that so it 
was indeed.” ‘‘ These cliffs on either side the sea, lying 
just opposite the one unto the other, both of one substance ; 
that is of chalke, and flint, the sides of both towards the 
sea, plainly appearing to be broken off from some more of 
the same stuffe or matter, that it hath sometimes by nature 
been fastened unto, the length of the said cliffs along the 
sea shore being on the one side answerable in effect, to the 
length of the very like on the other side, and the distance 
between both, as some skilfull saylers report, not exceeding 
24 English miles; are all great arguments to prove a con- 
junction in time long past, to have been between these two 
Countries ; whereby men did pass on dry land from the one 
unto the other.” Verstegan supposed that the separation 
has occurred since the Deluge, because all beasts were then 
destroyed but such as were taken into the ark. ‘“* But long 
after it could not be before the ravenous Woolf had made 
his kind nature known unto man, and therefore no man, 
unless he were mad, would ever transport of that race for 
the goodness of that breed, out of the continent into any 
Isles. . . . . But our Isle, as is aforesaid, continuing 
since the flood fastened by nature to the great continent 
these wicked beasts did of themselves pass over.” 
In following the chalk cliffs of England trom Dover to- 
wards Folkestone, we find that near the latter place they 
terminate as sea-cliffs, but strike away inland in a fine cliff- 
like range of hills, which is known as the Chalk escarpment. 
The outline of this at Folkestone Hill is shown in Plate III., 
the height here is 575 feet. Standing on the edge of this 
escarpment and looking westward, we see the steep face 
sink rapidly down into the lower ground to the south; the 
beautifully rounded forms which chalk hills assume can no- 
where be better studied than here. One of the most promi- 
* Restitution of Decayed Intelligence, in Antiquities concerning the most 
noble and renowned English Nation, &c. This work was published in Antwerp 
in 1628. The quotations here given are from the edition of 1653, chap. 4. 
