150 NATURAL HISTORY OF SELBORNE 



pasture field, being more soft and springy, was protruded 

 forward without many fissures in the turf, which was raised 

 in long ridges resembling graves, lying at right angles to 

 the motion. At the bottom of this enclosure the soil and 

 turf rose many feet against the bodies of some oaks that 

 obstructed their farther course, and terminated this awful 

 commotion. 



The perpendicular height of the precipice in general is 

 twenty-three yards ; the length of the lapse or slip as seen 

 from the fields below, one hundred and eighty-one ; and a 

 partial fall, concealed in the coppice, extends seventy yards 

 more ; so that the total length of this fragment that fell 

 was two hundred and fifty-one yards. About fifty acres of 

 land suffered from this violent convulsion ; two houses 

 were entirely destroyed ; one end of a new barn was left in 

 ruins, the walls being cracked through the very stones that 

 composed them; a hanging coppice was changed to a 

 naked rock ; and some grass grounds and an arable field so 

 broken and rifted by the chasms as to be rendered for a 

 time neither fit for the plough or safe for pasturage, till 

 considerable labour and expense had been bestowed in 

 levelling the surface and filling in the gaping fissures. 





