280 PK0CEEDING8 OF THE GEOLOGICAL SOCIETY. [Feb. 26, 



verse section of the coast immediately to the east of Watchet har- 

 bour (looking east) ; AB the supposed surface-contour when the 

 forest-area was first submerged; c, the possible level of the sea 

 during the Scrobicularia-mud period (which must have been lela- 

 tively higher than at present) ; d, the present high-tide level ; E, 

 Infraliassic (?) strata. The sea would begin by making a line of 

 cliifs at F, which it would wear backwards and downwards as the 

 land gradually rose to its present altitude. In this way, I think, 

 there can be little doubt the great mass of strata AEBFA has been 

 denuded ; so that the sea has not here overflowed a subsided area, 

 but really encroached on the land. 



3. Extent of Strata removed. — The average height of the cliff E B 

 is at least 50 feet. The bare rocky bottom of the sea, I have been 

 assured, extends nearly a mile from the cliff in the direction of A ; 

 and there the first traces of the submarine forest, consisting of up- 

 right stumps of trees, &c., have been found. As in scientific 

 inquiries it is better to underrate than the contrary, if we suppose 

 only half a mile to intervene between the stumps A and the cliff E 

 (and I have met with no one who would not regard this as an under- 

 estimate), it will be obvious that the sea has recently had no small 

 share in the denudation of the Bristol Channel, whatever may have 

 been the cause of the original excavation. A continuance of the 

 present mode and direction of encroachment would entirely remove 

 the high ground between Watchet and Williton, and wear back the 

 slopes of the Brendon hills into towering cliffs. Taking other parts 

 of the coast, where similar encroachments are in progress, into con- 

 sideration, it may safely be inferred that a sufficiently prolonged 

 occupation of the Bristol Channel by the sea would enlarge it to a 

 very great extent. It is likewise obvious that many wide- spreading 

 plains with steep escarpments at intervals, now far inland, may 

 have been formed out of river-valleys by the sea wearing back its 

 cliffs, and that this may even have taken place in situations compa- 

 ratively sheltered, as is the case with the Bristol Channel at the 

 present day. 



4. Recent rate of Encroachment. — I learned from a very old fisher- 

 man at Watchet, whose veracity no one seemed to doubt, and whose 

 statements concerning the encroachments of the sea were directly or 

 indirectly corroborated by others*, that not more than 150 years 

 ago a brewery, belonging to a Mr. Davies, stood at a distance of at 

 least 200 yards from the present cliff east of Watchet harbour, and 

 that rocks under its site are still recognized. There was likewise a 

 village (hamlet ?) called Easenton, to which the fisherman's great- 

 grandfather was in the habit of going for a mug of beer, the site of 

 the furthest east part of which is now about a quarter of a mile 

 from the coast. To the west of Watchet, the sea is encroaching on 

 a high ridge and undermining large blocks of sandstone interwoven 

 with alabaster, which it carries entirely away, or scatters and piles 



-* I found the following record among the documents of a solicitor of Willi- 

 ^11 : — jSforth of Raclose [a part of Watchet] in 1662, a barn and other buildings, 

 with orchard and garden beyond. In 1751, all gone to sea. 



