CHAP. xvii. IN THE ISLAND OF MOEN. 343 



of the Isle of Wight in Hampshire, or of Purbeck in Dorset 

 shire. The whole displacement of the chalk is evidently 

 posterior in date to the origin of the drift, since the beds of 

 the latter are horizontal where the fundamental chalk is hori 

 zontal, and inclined, curved, or vertical where the chalk dis 

 plays signs of similar derangement. Although I had come 

 to these conclusions respecting the structure of Moen in 

 1835, after devoting several days in company with Dr. Forch- 

 hammer to its examination,* I should have hesitated to cite 

 the spot as exemplifying convulsions on so grand a scale, of 

 such extremely modern date, had not the island been since 

 thoroughly investigated by a most able and reliable authority, 

 the Danish geologist, Professor Puggaard, who has published 

 a series of detailed sections of the cliffs. 



These cliffs extend through the north-eastern coast of the 

 island, called Moens Klint,f where the chalk precipices are 

 bold and picturesque, being 300 and 400 feet high, with tall 

 beech-trees growing on their summits, and covered here and 

 there at their base with huge taluses of fallen drift, verdant 

 with wild shrubs and grass, by which the monotony of a 

 continuous range of white chalk cliffs is prevented. 



In the low part of the island, at A, fig. 47, or the southern 

 extremity of the line of section above alluded to, the drift 

 is horizontal, but when we reach B, a change, both in the 

 height of the cliffs and in the inclination of the strata, begins 

 to be perceptible, and the chalk No. 1 soon makes its appear 

 ance from beneath the overlying members of the drift 

 Nos. 2, 3, 4, and 5. 



This chalk, with its layers of flints, is so like that of 

 England as to require no description. The incumbent 



* Lyell, Geological Transactions, Bern, 1851; and Bulletin de la So- 

 2nd series, vol. ii. p. 243. ciete" Geologique de France, 1851. 



t Puggaard, Geologiedlnsel Moen, 



