68 FALL OF A CLIFF. 



Chronicle of walking hills and travelling moun- 

 tains. John Philips, in his Cyder, alludes to the 

 credit that was given to such stories with a deli- 

 cate but quaint vein of humour peculiar to the 

 author of the Splendid Shilling. 



" I nor advise, nor reprehend, the choice 

 Of Marclay Hill ; the apple no where finds 

 A kinder mould : yet 'tis unsafe to trust 

 Deceitful ground : who knows but that, once more, 

 This mount may journey, and, his present site 

 Forsaking, to thy neighbour's bounds transfer 

 Thy goodly plants, affording matter strange 

 For law debates !" 



But, when I came to consider hetter, I began 

 to suspect that though our hills may never have 

 journeyed far, yet that the ends of many of them 

 have slipped and fallen away at distant periods, 

 leaving the cliffs bare and abrupt. This seems 

 to have been the case with Nore and Whetham 

 Hills, and especially with the ridge between 

 Harteley Park and Ward-le-ham, where the ground 

 has slid into vast swellings and furrows, and lies 

 still in such romantic confusion as cannot be ac- 

 counted for from any other cause. A strange 

 event, that happened not long since, justifies our 

 suspicions ; which, though it befell not within the 

 limits of this parish, yet as it was within the hun- 

 dred of Selborne, and as the circumstances were 

 singular, may fairly claim a place in a work of 

 this nature. 



The months of January and February, in the 

 year 1774, were remarkable for great melting 

 snows and vast gluts of rain, so that by the end 

 of the latter month the land- springs, or levants, 

 began to prevail, and to be near as high as in the 

 memorable winter of 1764. The beginning of 

 March also went on in the same tenor, when, in 



