564 Reviews — Shore Processes and Shoreline Development. 



In the section on terminology the author tries to avoid, as far as he 

 can, the introduction of new terms ; and by restricting the significance 

 of common English words he hopes to make them serve his purpose. 

 For him the "coast" is the sea-cliff and a zone of indeterminate 

 width on its landward side; the "shore" is the belt hetween low- 

 water mark and the cliff; "beach" is the actual material which 

 moves along the shore, or on and off the shore. In his choice of 

 words the author endeavours to do as little violence to the language 

 as possible; but artificially to restrict the meaning of such widely 

 used expressions may easily lead to misunderstanding. Indeed, because 

 no vaguely limited term is left, the author himself is sometimes 

 compelled to use one or other of these words in a wider sense than 

 is contemplated by his own definition. The chapter on the develop- 

 ment of the shore profile, for example, deals not only with the shore 

 but with the whole width from the cliff to the edge of the continental 

 shelf. 



The classification of shores that the author follows is the simple 

 and natural one into (1) shorelines of submergence, (2) shorelines of 

 emergence, (3) neutral shorelines, which do not owe their characteristic 

 features either to submergence or emergence, (4) compound shorelines, 

 the essential features of which combine elements of at least two of the 

 foregoing classes. 



The account of the development of the shore profile suffers from the 

 defect that it is almost exclusively deductive, and illustrative examples 

 are too few. From a consideration of the agencies concerned in its 

 production the author deduces the forms that the ideal profile should 

 pass through ; but whether real profiles assume these forms lie makes 

 little attempt to prove. The truth is that accurate profiles are not 

 readily obtained. Even the large-scale maps of a Government Survey 

 are not sufficiently minute with regard to altitudes on the land or 

 depths in the sea, and in most cases a special survey would be 

 needed. In consequence of this our knowledge of real profiles is far 

 less complete than our knowledge of real shorelines. 



It is no doubt for this reason that the chapters on the development 

 of the shoreline are not open to the same criticism. Deduction is 

 employed as freely, but there are frequent comparisons with actual 

 examples. Probably this is the section of the book that will be 

 found most generally attractive. 



It would take too much space to follow the author further. The 

 English geologist will be interested in the account of Dungeness; 

 perhaps he may not be sorry to find that Chesil Bank is only 

 incidentally referred to. The "fulls" of Orford Ness deserve more 

 attention than they have received, either in this book or elsewhere. 



An important general conclusion arrived at by the author is that 

 marine denudation is more effective, compared with fluvial denudation, 

 than the older school of geologists have usually been disposed to 

 allow. 



Illustrations, both in the text and in the form of plates, are 

 numerous and, for the most part, good ; but, except in a few instances, 

 the maps are without a scale. This is the most serious of the 

 omissions that call for the indulgence which the author claims. 



