A HISTORY OF CORNWALL 



standing the lapse of over sixty years since the publication of that report, 

 during which the science of geology, then in its infancy, has advanced 

 with rapid strides, the observations and deductions recorded in its 

 pages have needed so little modification at the hands of subsequent 

 observers, equipped with more modern methods, as to afford the most 

 eloquent testimony to the accuracy of his facts and the soundness of 

 his reasoning. The bibliography of Cornish geology is so extensive that 

 it would be impossible within the compass of this treatise to do it jus- 

 tice. 1 Those indeed who are at present engaged in these investigations 

 suffer from an embarrassment of riches, so that it is no small task for 

 the geologist of to-day to ascertain the facts that have been gleaned by 

 former observers in the same field. The Geological Survey is at present 

 engaged on a more detailed examination of the county, and in the 

 official publications which will follow, the extent of their obligations to 

 the labours of others will be adequately acknowledged. 



Before dealing with the successive processes of nature's operations 

 which have evolved the present configuration of our county, it may be 

 stated at the outset that the rocks which enter into its geology be- 

 long to the earlier chapters of geological history, and form the natural 

 foundations on which the strata of central and eastern England have been 

 laid down. Moreover in the vast interval of time since their formation 

 they have suffered profound alteration, and the pages of their history are 

 not easily deciphered. Not only so, but the very changes which have 

 altered the rocks to the condition in which we see them to-day were 

 themselves brought about in a long distant geological epoch, the antiquity 

 of which exceeds that of the most lofty mountain chains of Europe. 



Before inquiring therefore into the history of those ancient periods 

 which gave rise to our rock formations, it will be convenient to take 

 note of the changes that are going on at the present day within the ken 

 of our own observation. For although the solid rocks of the county are 

 of vast antiquity, its physical features and the present relation of land 

 and sea, mark the final results of continuous agencies of change, the 

 operations of which, though apparently slow, are yet taking place before 

 our own eyes. Moreover it must not be understood that finality has 

 been attained, for the changes in the past which have evolved the scenery 

 of to-day are still going on, ever modifying to some extent the features 

 inland and along the coast. 



While the surface of the county is covered by a mantle of vege- 

 tation, save where our granite tors protrude their wild and fantastic 

 eminences, and the rocky wastes break the continuity of the fertile pastures 

 of the lower lands, the coast forms a line of cliffs steep and bare which 

 almost girds the county. This dissected line affords us a series of sections 

 of the great rocky platform which forms the mainland of Cornwall, and 

 which otherwise is so much concealed by the materials of its own decay 

 as to be largely beyond the limits of our observation. 



' For List of Works on the Geology of Cornwall to 1873, see W. Whitaker, Journ. Roy. Inst. 

 Cornwall, No. xvi. 1875. 



2 



