ON PHOSPHATE NODULES. 113 



coast, and beating violently against the basement of tlie cliff, landslips 

 frequently occurred, thus causing a succession of little semicircular 

 " bays" in the London clay,* the fallen parts shelving from within a few- 

 feet of the beach, to as many from the summit of the cliff, some seventy 

 or more above — the width and depth of these depressions being about 

 100 feet each. The surface of this sloping portion was strewed over with 

 the debris of the red crag, including vast quantities of " nodules." It 

 was these latter that drew the Professor's attention when geologizing, 

 accompanied by the writer, then first initiated into the delights of this 

 science. Taking a few home that struck him as being peculiar in form, 

 he examined them carefully ; finding that not unfrequently some fossil 

 organic body was embedded in the nodules, he strongly suspected them 

 to be phosphoric in their nature, more especially as his first impression 

 was that the majority, if not all, were genuine coprolites. This view he 

 communicated to the Geological Society, and he also published a few 

 remarks in the 'Gardener's Chronicle' (p. 43, 1844). He, however, 

 subsequently considerably modified this idea, being by more extended 

 observation convinced that they were either nodular concretions, or 

 mere hardened masses of London clay, which had been rolled into 

 various shapes at the time the crag was deposited, and which had subse- 

 quently undergone some alteration in their mineral character, being 

 highly " charged" with phosphate of lime. Some of these nodules were 

 transmitted to Mr. W. H. Potter, Fore street, Lambeth, who proved, as 

 the Professor suspected, that they contained a large proportion of phos- 

 phate of lime (58 per cent.) He at once saw that now was the time for 

 Liebig's anticipations to be realised, and that there was a vast source of 

 profitable material opened for any enterprising agriculturist. Deeming 

 it inconsistent, as a Christian minister, to engage in any pecuniary specu- 

 lation, he did not hesitate a moment to lead others to profit by his 

 discovery. He communicated it to an eminent manufacturer, who im- 

 mediately desired a ton of nodules to be forwarded to him ; and although 

 the idea of manufacturing on any large scale could not then be enter- 

 tained, in consequence of an exaggerated notion of their value being 

 afloat, so that a higher price was often demanded for the raw material 

 than for the manufactured article, yet, as soon as a more reasonable value 

 was assigned to the nodules, they became a staple commodity of 

 trade. 



Thus was the dream of Liebig's fond imagination realised; a dream, 

 indeed, as many, including the Professor himself, considered it to be ; 

 for thus he spoke of it : " Devotedly as we may all desire suchaconsum 

 mation, let us neither too hastily adopt, nor too hastily reject, these 

 speculations of the German chemist. If he is correct in supposing that 

 the phosphate of lime contained in fossil bones and coprolites, can be 

 economically converted to the same purposes as that in recent bones, his 



* Since the year 1813, this peculiar feature has almost entirely disappeared, 

 VOL. IV. K. 



