34 An Excursion to the Crag District. 



We started by the " Metis " steamboat from London Bridge 

 Wharf, at 10 a.m., to " Walton le Soken," alias " Walton on 

 the Naze," a quiet little out-of-the-way sea-side village in 

 Essex, at which we arrived at two o'clock p.m. 



The run by the ' ' Metis " and ' ' Father Thames " steamers 

 between London and Ipswich, passing down the Thames and 

 up the river Orwell, forms a short and most delightful sum- 

 mer's-day voyage, and those who can resist the malatlie clu 

 mer will be well repaid by the pretty rural scenery of the 

 Orwell at high tide, which on either bank is wooded, often to 

 the water's edge. The sea trip must be enjoyed for the sea 

 itself, as nothing will be visible of the land between Shoebury- 

 ness and Walton, for you will notice by the map that the low 

 flat coast of Essex retires up towards Colchester, leaving a 

 large area of shallow water outside, which the steamboats keep, 

 and the land being very low, is nearly, if not wholly out of 

 sight. 



The aspect of the Essex coast, composed of denuded 

 Secondary and Tertiary strata,* contrasts very strongly with 

 the corresponding western shore, where the oldest rocks of our 

 island make up, by their vast thickness and repeated crumplings, 

 the ancient Welsh mountains, snow-capped for more than half 

 the year. 



If unvisited by the summer steamboats, Walton would be 

 nearly as isolated from the rest of the world as the Channel 

 Islands. The "Naze," or neck of land on which the village 

 stands (see Map) has the sea on the east, north, and west, and 

 is approached from the south only by a single road. It is 

 eighteen miles from Colchester, f and although within seven 

 miles of Harwich in a direct line, it is fourteen or fifteen by 

 the nearest foot-ways round the salt marshes. 



A little to the north and south of the village the cliffs rise 

 from forty to eighty feet for a short distance, sloping down 

 inland to the salt marshes in the rear. It is that portion of 

 the cliff about a mile to the north of the village where the 

 nearest Crag " out-crop "% occurs. The spot is well marked 

 by a lofty hexagonal tower, eighty feet high (erected by the 

 Trinity House Board as a landmark and signal-tower for 

 ships). The tower itself stands in the middle of a field 

 between the road leading to Walton Hall and the cliff. Just 

 below this, in the face of the cliff, the Crag may be seen (see 

 Section). It is easily distinguished from the London clay by 



* Chalk arid London clay, with patches of Crag and Boulder-clay. 



t A branch railway is about to be opened to the little town. 



% The section given in the coloured plate is taken at this spot, and " the 

 measurements and details have been kindly furnished me by my friend, 

 Eobert Etheridge, Esq., E.E.S.E., F.G.S., etc., Paleontologist to "the Geological 

 Survey. 



