DEVASTATIONS BY TEE SEA. 43 



towns petitioned James I. for a reduction of their 

 taxes, in consequence of 300 acres of land, and all 

 their houses except fourteen, having been de- 

 stroyed by the sea. Not half that number of acres 

 now belong to the parish. 



Dunwich, on the Suffolk coast, was in former 

 times a large seaport. Near that place two large 

 tracts of land which had been taxed in the time 

 of Edward the Confessor, are referred to in a 

 survey made by William the Conqueror a few 

 years afterwards as having been swept away by 

 the waves. Subsequently a monastery, several 

 churches, the old harbour, four hundred houses at 

 once, roads, town-hall, and various public buildings, 

 are recorded as having perished in succession at 

 different times, In the sixteenth century not a 

 fourth of the original town existed, and the 

 inhabitants continued retreating inland as the sea 

 gained upon them, and still retaining the ancient 

 appellation of their town, although its site had been 

 long obliterated. 



As we proceed southwards along the coast of 

 England, we discern that similar alterations have 

 from age to age occurred on the sea-shores. On 

 the coasts of Kent, Sussex, Hampshire, Dorset- 

 shire, and Cornwall, in a great many different 

 places, large tracts of land have been devoured by 

 the ocean, and in others great additions have been 

 made to the shores, probably by the deposition of 

 the materials swept off from other localities. 

 Mention has already been made of the devasta- 

 tions effected by the sea on the coast of the Isle 



