310 HISTORY OF 



similar inundation, with which I will take leave 

 to close this chapter. " In the neighbourhood of 

 St Paul de Leon, in Lower Brittany,* there lies a 

 tract of country along the sea-side, which before 

 the year 1666 was inhabited, but now lies desert- 

 ed, by reason of the sands which cover it to the 

 height of twenty feet ; and which every year 

 advance more and more inland, and gain ground 

 continually. From the time mentioned above, 

 the sand has buried more than six leagues of the 

 country inward, and it is now but half a league 

 from the town of St Paul ; so that, in all appear- 

 ance, the inhabitants must be obliged to abandon 

 it entirely. In the country that has been over* 

 whelmed, there are still to be seen the tops of 

 some steeples peeping through the sand, and 

 many chimnies that still remain above this sandy 

 ocean. The inhabitants, however, had sufficient 

 time to escape ; but being deprived of their little 

 all, they had no other resource but begging for 

 their subsistence. This calamity chiefly owes its 

 advancement to a north, or an east wind, raising 

 the sand, which is extremely fine, in such great 

 quantities, and with such velocity, that M. Des- 

 landes, who gave the account, says, that while 

 he was walking near the place, during a mode- 

 rate breeze of wind, he was obliged, from time 

 to time, to shake the sand from his clothes and 

 his hat, on which it was lodged in great quanti- 

 ties, and made them too heavy to be easily borne. 

 Still further, when the wind was violent, it drove 



* Histoire de 1' Academic des Sciences, an. 1722. 



