THE EARTH. Ill 



are composed. The coasts of Italy, for instance,* are bordered with 

 rocks of marble of different kinds, the quarries of which may easily 

 be distinguished at a distance from sea, and appear like perpendicu- 

 lar columns of the most beautiful kinds of marble, ranged along the 

 shore. In general, the coasts of France, from Brest to Bourdeaux, 

 are composed of rocks; as are also those of Spain and England, 

 which defend the land, and only are interrupted, here and there, to 

 give an egress to rivers, and to grant the conveniences of bays and 

 harbours to our shipping. It may in general be remarked, that 

 wherever the sea is most violent and furious, there the boldest shores, 

 and of the most compact materials, are found to oppose it There 

 are many shores several hundred feet perpendicular, against which 

 the sea, when swollen with tides or storms, rises and beats with in- 

 conceivable fury. In the Orkneys,! where the shores are thus form- 

 ed, it sometimes, when agitated by a storm, rises two hundred feet 

 perpendicular, and dashes up its spray, together with sand and other 

 substances that compose its bottom, upon land, like showers of rain. 



From hence, therefore, we may conceive how the violence of the 

 sea, and the boldness of the shore, may be said to have made each 

 other. Where the sea meets no obstacles, it spreads its waters with 

 a gentle intumescence, till all its power is destroyed, by wanting 

 depth to aid the motion. But when its progress is checked in the 

 midst, by the prominence of rocks, or the abrupt elevation of the 

 land, it dashes with all the force of its depth against the obstacle, and 

 forms, by its repeated violence, that abruptness of *he shore which 

 confines its impetuosity. Where the sea is extremely deep, or very 

 much vexed by tempests, it is .no small obstacle that can confine its 

 rage ; and for this reason we see the boldest shores projected against 

 the deepest waters; all less impediments having long before been sur- 

 mounted and washed away. Perhaps of all the shores in the world, 

 there is not one so high as that on the west of St. Kilda, which, upon 

 a late admeasurement,! was found to be six hundred fathoms perpen- 

 dicular above the surface of the sea. Here also, the sea is deep, tur- 

 bulent, and stormy ; so that it requires great force in the shore to 

 oppose its violence. In many parts of the world, and particularly 

 upon the coasts of the East Indies, the shores, though not hign above 

 water, are generally very deep, and consequently the waves roll 

 against the land with great weight and irregularity. The rising of 

 the waves against the shore, is called by mariners the surf of the sea ; 

 and in shipwrecks is generally fatal to such as attempt to swim on 

 shore. In this case no dexterity in the swimmer, no float he can use, 

 neither swimming-girdle nor cork-jacket will save him; the weight of 

 the superincumbent waves breaks upon him at once, and crushes him 

 with certain ruin. Some few of the natives, however, have the art 

 of swimming and of navigating their little boats near those shores 

 where a European is sure of instant destruction. 



In places where the force of the sea is less violent, or its tiles less 

 rapid, the shores are generally seen to descend with a more gradual 

 declivity. Over these, the waters of the tide steal by almost imper 



* Buffon, vol. ii. p. 199. f Ibid. vol. ii. p. 191. { Description of St. Kilda 



