44 SEASIDE DIVINITY. 



of Sheppey ; but in many other parts of Kent 

 the same process has from age to age been going 

 on. Thus at Hythe several encroachments of the 

 sea are recorded ; while towards Dungeness the 

 level tract called Eomney Marsh has received 

 considerable accessions. To the south of Komney 

 Marsh, the town of Rye was once destroyed by 

 the sea ; but by the additions made by the waves, 

 it is now two miles distant from the beach. In 

 the reign of Queen Elizabeth, the town of 

 Brighton was situated on the tract where the 

 chain pier now extends into the sea. In the be- 

 ginning of last century there still remained under 

 the cliff more than a hundred houses, all of 

 which were swept away from 1703 to 1705; and 

 no traces of the ancient town now remain. 



The Isle of Wight affords a remarkable instance 

 of similar changes. Sir Harry Englefield, in his 

 work on that island, states that a great and 

 singular alteration occurred within no very distant 

 period in the shores of the Solent, near Ryde; 

 and that in 1753, the town is said to have been 

 totally inaccessible by sea except at or near high 

 water, as the shore was covered with a vast extent 

 of mud too soft to bear the slightest weight. This* 

 mud-bank is now entirely covered with a stratum 

 of fine white sand, smooth and firm enough to 

 bear wheel carriages, and rendering bathing at all 

 times safe and agreeable. This bed of sand now 

 reaches to Binstead, having covered at least two 

 miles of the shore within the last half century; 

 and the inhabitants say it is still extending west- 



