CHAPTER II. 

 THE STRUCTURE OF THE ISLAND. 



THE best place to begin the study of the Geology of the Isle 

 of Wight is in Sandown Bay. North of Sandown, beyond 

 the flat of the marshes, are low cliffs of reddish clay, which 

 has slipped in places, and is much covered by grass. At 

 low tide we shall see the coloured clays on the shore, unless 

 the sand has covered them up. Variegated marls they 

 are called marl means a limy clay, loam a sandy clay ; 

 and very fine are the colours of these marls, rich reds and 

 purples and browns. Beyond the little sea wall below 

 Yaverland battery we come to a different kind of clay 

 forming the cliff. It is in thin layers. Clay in thin 

 layers like this is called shale. Some of these shales are 

 known as paper shales, for the layers are thin almost like 

 the leaves of a book. The junction of the shales with the 

 marls is quite sharp, and we see that the shales rest on the 

 coloured marls, not horizontally, but sloping down towards 

 the North. Bands of limestone and sandstone running 

 through the shales, and a hard band of brown rock which 

 runs out on the shore as a reef, slope in the same direction. 

 As we pass on by the Red Cliff to the White Cliffs we 

 notice that the strata slope more steeply the further North 

 we go. We have seen that these strata were laid down 

 layer by layer at the bottom of the sea. If we find a lot 

 of things lying one on top of another, we may generally 

 conclude that the ones at the bottom were put there first, 

 then the next, and so on to the top. And this will 

 generally be true with regard to the rocks. The lowest 

 rocks must have been laid down first, then the next, and 



