434 NORFOLK BOTANY. {February, 



sooner or later, by the continuous operation of tlie same causes, 

 "will be united to the continent, i. e. the adjoining shores, and 

 the present deep channels, or the navigable parts of the sea, will 

 become rivers. Yarmouth Denes will then have a river on each 

 side, viz. a new stream on the east, and on the west, the Bure, 

 which now forms the western limit of this tract, and the sea the 

 eastern. The supply for the new river will be derived from 

 Horsey, Hemsted, etc. ; and it is not improbable that in a series of 

 ages that portion of the sea conterminous to the Denes will be 

 dry land, and a new Denes, or barrier of sand, will appear se- 

 veral miles to the east of the existing shore-line. 



When the whole of Norfolk was submerged, when Ely was 

 truly an island, and long after, when the Danish king Knut 

 (Canute) turned his ship's head to the shore to hear the matin 

 song of the holy brotherhood, the fens adjoining the three rivers 

 which enter the sea at Yarmouth were covered with water, and 

 were great estuaries like the Wash. They would as easily now be 

 laid under water as the unfortunate parts of the flat country 

 about Lynn and Wisbeach. 



Since those remote times, long before the arrival of the 

 Danes, and before the Roman dominion, or about two thousand 

 years ago, some miles have been added to this part of the 

 coast. These changes, however, are often produced in briefer 

 periods, Caistor stands on the extremity of the elevated spot 

 where are now the parishes of Mautby, Ormesby, etc., or, in 

 other words, it was at no very distant period (though probably 

 there are no historic proofs extant of its being in this state) an 

 insular spot surrounded by the ocean, and a calamity similar to 

 that which has befallen the country about Lynn would reduce it 

 to its original insular condition. Suppose the Runham and Caistor 

 marshes were under water, and the Filby broads united to the 

 ocean ; this part of the county commanded by Caistor Castle, 

 and containing the churches of Filby, Mautby, the Ormesbys, 

 etc., would be an island, and the most fertile land would be 

 covered with water to the depth of several feet, if not several 

 yards. 



The luxuriant vegetation of the brinks, and even the bottoms, 

 of the present ditches, inform us that in a not very long series of 

 ages the present peaty formations of the fens have been pro- 

 duced. The action of the waves on the shores of the sea tell us 



