114 



THE GEOLOGIST, 



but these are very scarce. The following minerals have been found in this 

 district by a local geologist. Sulphate of iron, mundic, specular iron-ore, 

 sulphuret' and the black and green carbonates of copper, carbonate of iron, 

 iron-ore, brown and pearl spar, sulphuret of lead, carbonate of lead, sulphuret 

 of manganese, epidote, schorlite, actinolite, prehonite, steatite, asbestus, 

 talc, and pot -stone. 



On the western side of the island there is a bay where an extensive peat-bed 

 was discovered not many years since. It happened thus : after a heavy gale, 

 masses of wood and peat were seen floating about, and several pieces were 

 stranded by the force of the waves on the shore ; the sand and shingle which 

 form the sea-bottom having been removed by the fury of the storm, these beds 

 of peat, which lie exactly below them, were thus exposed and portions uplifted, 

 which to the astonishment of the islanders were strewed over their shores. 

 "Trunks of full-sized trees, accompanied by the wreck of humbler plants, which 

 once carpetted the meadows where they grew, roots and rushes, surrounded by 

 moss, gave evidence of the rank luxuriance of the locality. The compression of 

 the trunks and boughs exhibit the first indication of that flattened form which 

 all fossil plants undergo, by the superincumbent pressure during the slow 

 decomposition of the vegetable fibre, without the complete destruction of the 

 texture of the wood. The trees were overspread with coralines, fuci, and 

 sertularise; and riddled with the numerous perforations of three species of 

 Pholas, P. dadylus, P. candidcL, and P. parva, the dead shells of which were 

 found in their holes. Pieces of pottery, stone-implements, teeth of horses and 

 hogs, have likewise been discovered in the peat."* This peat is used for fuel, 

 and is called by the natives "gorban" (eorban, i. e., a gift). 



Prom the position and appearance of this peat, we may conclude that an 

 extensive forest once extended along a great part of the western shores of 

 Guernsey, and that the sea has gradually encroached on the land at this side of 

 the island ; and it is well known that part of Guernsey, called the " Braye du 

 Val," was only prevented from being swallowed up by the sea by means of an 

 embankment made near the Val church in the year 1808 ; for the encroach- 

 ments of the sea over this tract of land became yearly more and more apparent. 

 The shores of this part of the island are low and sandy, everywhere dotted with 

 little hillocks of drifted sand. Druidical cromlechs are here very abundant, in 

 which many curious relics of antiquity have been discovered. The largest 

 cromlech is composed of five cumbent stones of immense weight, covering an 

 area of twenty-nine feet long and twelve wide ; in this were found many human 

 teeth and bones, and some entire earthern vessels. There are several other 

 " druidical temples" in the vicinity of l'Ancresse. On the south-western side 

 of Guernsey there is a rocky islet called Lihon, which is accessible to the 

 edestrian at low water ; but at high tide must be reached by means of a 

 oat. On account of the beds of gravel, which here repose on the granite, as 

 also from marks of a supposed ancient sea-margin on the rocks, some have 

 imagined that the present elevation of the district is much higher than formerly ; 

 these layers of gravel have been accounted for, however, as having been washed 

 l)y rivulets and rain from the high southern lands of Guernsey down to this 

 lower part of the island ; but there still remains the marks on the rocks at 

 Lihon to be accounted for. There is a similar appearance of a raised sea-beach 

 on the north-western coast, near a place called " Paradis." 



The islet of Lihon consists chiefly of gneissic rocks, traversed in some places 

 by veins of felspar. There arc the remains of an ancient priory ; and in the 

 rocks on the shore of this island are to be seen two curious natural basins — 

 scooped out of the rock by the violence of the sea — which tradition asserts 



s Bxi tact from a letter of Mr. Jukes to the " Guernsey Star." 



