Chalk. 575 



shire, where it ends in the lofty sea cliffs on the 

 south side of Filey Bay, near Flamborough Head.- 

 Many quarries, often of great antiquity, have been 

 opened in the escarpments that overlook the Lower 

 Grreensand, and some of great extent, now deserted and 

 overgrown with yews and other trees, form beautiful 

 features in the landscape. The steep scarped slopes, 

 and even the inner dry valleys are likewise frequently 

 sparingly dotted with yew-trees and numerous bushes 

 of straight-growing juniper. 



West and north of the London basin the Chalk 

 generally lies in broad undulating plains, forming a 

 tableland of which Salisbury Plain may be taken 

 as a type. Within my own recollection, these plains 

 were almost entirely devoted to sheep, but they are now 

 being gradually invaded by the plough, and turned 

 into arable land. Many of the slopes of the great 

 Chalk escarpments on the North and South Downs in 

 the West of England, on the Chiltern Hills and else- 

 where, are however so steep, that the ground, covered 

 with short turf, and in places dotted with yew and 

 juniper, is likely to remain for long unscarred by the 

 ploughshare. 



In many places the surface of the Chalk, as already 

 stated, is covered by thick accumulations of flints, and 

 elsewhere over extensive areas by clay, a residue left 

 by the dissolving of the carbonate of lime of the Chalk. 

 This clay invariably forms a stiff cold soil, and is 

 plentiful on parts of the plains of Wiltshire, Berkshire, 

 and Hertfordshire, and also on the Chalk of Kent and 

 Surrey. It has often been left uncultivated, and forms 

 commons, or furze-clad and wooded patches. The loam 

 which accompanies it is occasionally used for making 

 bricks. In the east part of Hertfordshire, Essex, and 



