INTRODUCnON. 9 



accomplished. Great attention has been paid, to some districts, and 

 almost every thing of importance relating to their geological features 

 examined and made known; yet there are considerable portions of 

 country, and these not uninteresting, of which no satisfactory de- 

 scription has hitherto been published; and not a few blanks remain 

 to be filled up, before the survey of the United Kingdom can be 

 viewed as complete. 



To fill up a blank of this description, the present Work was 

 undertaken. The strata of the Yorkshire Coast, comprising the 

 Wolds, the Howardian hills, and the more elevated Eastern Moor- 

 lands and Cleveland hills, have not been described in any geological 

 work, except in very general terms; and the authors, having pre- 

 pared, for the History of Whitby and the Vicinity, a compre- 

 hensive view of the Geology of the district to wliich that work is 

 limited, were induced, in compliance with the wishes of some respect- 

 able friends, to undertake a more full and accurate survey of the 

 whole coast, from the Humber to the Tees. This survey they have 

 at length completed, with no small labour; exploring the whole line 

 of coast, and visiting every part of the interior likely to throw light 

 on the objects of their research. Scarcely a hill or a valley, a cliff 

 or a chasm, remains unexamined ; scarcely an alum-work, a coal-pit, 

 a quan-y, or any other remarkable opening in the strata, has been left 

 unvisited : so that, if the result should not cohie up to their own 

 wishes, or the expectations of their friends, they cannot well charge 

 themselves with want of diligence, patience, and perseverance. At 

 the same time, they are far from supposing, that the work is free from 

 mistakes, or that nothing more can be done for elucidating the geo- 

 logy of the district: on the contl-ary, their own experience has served 

 to convince them, that a work of this nature is susceptible of pro- 

 gressive improvement; for as, in making this extended survey, they 

 have been enabled to detect some mistakes in the sketch of the strata 



