Geology 



the beach deposits and of the line of low cliffs to the 

 east of the town. 



On reaching the sea we found that there was a great 

 accumulation of rounded stones forming a shingle beach, 

 and that below this were wide stretches of sand, covered 

 at high tide, but at the time exposed to view as it was 

 dead low water (Plate I.). 



The sand was yellow in colour, and consisted chiefly 

 of small grains of quartz, but there were also some 

 grains of a heavy black mineral, which was strongly 

 attracted by a magnet, and this we concluded to be 

 magnetite, an oxide of iron. These grains of magnetite 

 had accumulated in the hollows of the ripple-marks left 

 by the outgoing tide, and were also to be seen in little 

 patches here and there in the courses of the rivulets 

 which were flowing down the sandy shore. They had 

 evidently accumulated in these positions owing to their 

 being heavier than the quartz grains which formed the 

 bulk of the sand, as once they had got into the hollows 

 the feeble currents of water had been unable to move 

 them, although still able to move the lighter grains. 

 The sand also contained numerous broken shells and 

 small white particles, which upon investigation proved 

 to be tiny shell fragments which had been washed up 

 by the waves from some oyster bed or cockle bank 

 farther out to sea. 



At the water's edge the sand was much finer than 

 higher up, and it was also somewhat muddy, while the 

 brown colour of the water led us to suppose that a little 

 farther out the bottom consisted of mud. 



Returning to the shingle beach, we found that it was 

 arranged in several terraces one above the other, like 



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