OF SELBORNE. 229 



that a pond near the cottage had undergone a strange reverse, 

 becoming deep at the shallow end, and so vice versa; that 

 many large oaks were removed out of their perpendicular, 

 some thrown down, and some fallen into the heads of neigh- 

 bouring trees ; and that a gate was thrust forward, with it's 

 hedge, full six feet, so as to require a new track to be made 

 to it. From the foot of the cliff the general course of the 

 ground, which is pasture, inclines in a moderate descent for 

 half a mile, and is interspersed with some hillocks, which 

 were rifted, in every direction, as well towards the great woody 

 hanger, as from it. In the first pasture the deep clefts began: 

 and running across the lane, and under the buildings, made 

 such vast shelves that the road was impassable for some time ; 

 and so over to an arable field on the other side, which was 

 strangely torn and disordered. The second pasture field, 

 being more soft and springy, was protruded forward without 

 many fissures in the turf, which was raised in long ridges re- 

 sembling graves, lying at right angles to the motion. At the 

 bottom of this enclosure the soil and turf rose many feet 

 against the bodies of some oaks that obstructed their farther 

 course and terminated this awful commotion. 



The perpendicular height of the precipice, in general, is 

 twenty-three yards ; the length of the lapse, or slip, as seen 

 from the fields below, one hundred and eighty-one; and a 

 partial^ fall, concealed in the coppice, extends seventy yards 

 more : so that the total length of this fragment that fell was 

 two hundred and fifty-one yards. About fifty acres of land 

 suffered from this violent convulsion; two houses were entirely 

 destroyed ; one end of a new barn was left in ruins, the walls 

 being cracked through the very stones that composed them ; 

 a hanging coppice was changed to a naked rock ; and some 

 grass grounds and an arable field so broken and rifted by the 

 chasms as to be rendered, for a time, neither fit for the plough 

 or safe for pasturage, till considerable labour and expense had 

 been bestowed in levelling the surface and filling in the 

 gaping fissures*. 



* [On this interesting phenomenon, so graphically described, Mr. 

 Bennett has given an elaborate note, from which 1 quote the following 



