74 



THE YOUNG NATUBALIST. 



At Pendine the sands are interrupted by a bold promontory of limestone 

 rock, and for some miles the coast continues very bold, until another broad 

 stretch of sands is reached at Amroth. The view from the hills across 

 Amroth, Tenby and to the cliffs further west is one of the finest in the 

 county. At Amroth, but only accessible at low spring tides, there are beds 

 of blue clay, containing multitudes of valves of Scrobicularia piper ata of 

 unusual size, and also beds of ancient peat, in which Pholas Candida still 

 lives in multitudes, and from which P kolas dactylus is hardly yet exterminated. 

 Higher up in rocks of shale, dead valves of this species and Pholas parva 

 may still be found in the holes in which they lived, and also from some 

 unexplained cause, all died. Beyond Amroth the cliffs are again very bold 

 and rugged, but soon become softened off into slopes, terraces and loose 

 undercliffs from the weathering away of a friable clay- slate, over-lying beds of 

 hard coal, or culm, which here reaches the sea. Here Silene maritima grows 

 in great profusion, and is attended by Bianthecia capsopkila and conspersa, 

 as well as by Gelechia leucomelanella. Solidago virgaurea is also plentiful, 

 affording sustenance to Ennychia oclomaculalis, Aciptilia osteodactyla, 

 Catoptria czmulana, and Eupcecilia curvistrigana, and possibly also to Botys 

 ierrealis, which if present is very rare. B. adnalis is present, wherever its 

 food plant, the wild madder (liubia peregrina) grows, and very rarely 

 Bryophila glandifera may be found sitting on a rock. 



Beyond is another sandy bay with the charming village of Saundersfoot, 

 a favourite resort of visitors. On some loose sands Euphorbia paralias 

 and Raphanus maritima are common, and Helix pisana is again to be found. 

 On the rocks between tide marks a curious imbricated variety of Purpura 

 lapillus is common, with various banded forms of the same shell, and after 

 favourable winds the sands are thickly strewn with Tellina tenuis, fabula 

 and solidula, Bonax anatinus, Lucinopsis undata, Mactra suhtruncata } and 

 stuliorum, with its variety. Occasionally Actceon tornatilis will also drift in 

 in plenty, with Philine aperta, and Venus gallina raises a little heap of sand 

 to make itself conspicuous. After passing Saundersfoot the cliffs become 

 broken into promontories and small bays, sometimes rocky and precipitous, 

 in one case — the Monkstone — throwing out a mass of rocks into the bay ; 

 elsewhere with steep slopes and undercliffs covered with stunted bushes or 

 crowned with woods. In this neighbourhood Polia nigrocincta has been 

 captured, as well as Triphcena subsequa, Noctua neglecta, and Agrotis 

 agathina with Aplecta herbida 3 Hadena adusta, and contigua, and other 

 species not usually associated with a wild and stormy sea coast. One of 

 the precipices in this section of the coast was the scene of a shocking tragedy 

 a year or two ago. A pair of ravens usually build here, undeterred by the 



