292 ALLUVIUM. 



4. Sand and comminuted shells on the coast, &c. 

 Under this head, I shall merely notice the low bank near the entrance of 

 Shoreham harbour. It is about 20 feet high, and consists of clay and 

 marl, resting upon a bed of sand that contains the remains of shells in 

 a very fragile and mutilated state ; they appear to be of the same species 

 as those which inhabit the adjoining sea*. 



Present effects of the Ocean. 



Having examined the various accumulations of mineral substances that 

 are worthy of notice in the district comprehended in the present volume, 

 and described the numerous organic remains distributed in the respective 

 deposits, it now only remains to investigate the nature of those changes 

 which are still produced by that element, of whose powerful effects we 

 have seen such unequivocal manifestations. But the present operation of 

 the sea, seems to be whoUy incapable of producing the important changes 

 that have formerly taken place, and on the Sussex coast they are restricted 

 to a gradual, but constant destruction, of the strata which compose its 

 shores. 



The encroachments of the sea along the coast of Sussex, have con- 

 tinued incessantly, from time immemorial ; and when so considerable as to 

 have occasioned sudden inundations, or overwhelmed fertile or inhabited 

 tracts, have been noticed in our historical records. In the " Tawatio 

 Ecdesiastica Anglia et JVallia, auctoritate P. Nicholas, (A.D. 1292), and 

 Nonariim inqiiisitiones in curia scaccarii, (A.D. 1340), the following notices 

 occur, of the losses sustained by the action of the sea, between the years 

 1260 and 1340 ; a period of only eighty years -f. 



* On the authority of Thomas Smith, Esq. F. R. S. of London. 



■f I was favoured with this notice by the late Thomas WooUgar, Esq. of Lewes. 



