CHAP. XVII. IN THE ISLAND OF MOEN. 343 



of the Isle of Wight in Hampshire, or of Purbeek in Dorset- 

 shire. Tlie whole displacement of the chalk is evidently pos- 

 terior 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. Forchham- 

 mer 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 tho- 

 roughly investigated by a most able and reliable authority, 

 the Danish geologist, Professor Puggaard, who has published 

 a sei'ies of detailed sections of the cliffs. 



These cliffs extend through the northeastern coast of the 

 island, called IMoens Klint,"}" 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 con- 

 tinuous range of Avhite 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 sti'ata, begins to be 

 perceptible, and the chalk No. 1 soon makes its appearance 

 from beneath the overlying members of the drift Nos. 2, 3, 

 4, and 5. 



This chalk, with its laj^ers of flints, is so like that of 

 England as to require no description. The incumbent 



* Lyell, Geological Transactions, 2d Bern, 1851; and Bulletin de la Societe 

 series, vol. ii. p. 243. Geologique de France, 1851. 



f Puggaard, Geologie d. Insel Moen, 



23 



