452 



THE GEOLOGIST. 



examined and rendered secure, and the boats were hauled up high and dry on 

 the quay. As the day advanced so did the storm ; early in the afternoon it 

 was blowing a heavy gale from the south ; about four o'clock it veered round 

 to the south-east — almost the only wind that can do the bay much mischief — 

 and blew a hurricane for about two hours at the critical juncture of an un- 

 usually high spring-tide high-water. The waves were awful ; everything seemed 

 to be helplessly abandoned to their fury, and savagely they used their opportunity. 



The turnpike-road between Torquay and the railway station was not oniy 

 impassable during the tempest, but all but totally destroyed. As an early 

 intimation that an unusual attack on the road was in prospect, the waves leaped 

 across it, tore up a somewhat temporary wooden toll-house, rushed with it 

 over a wall, across a field, and finally lodged it near the barn at Tor- Abbey. 

 In some places a breach was first made in the sea-wall, and huge masses of 

 limestone thus dislodged were used with terrible effect as missiles to aid in the 

 work of demolition, and were ultimately thrown, in wild confusion, on such 

 parts of the road as remained otherwise uninjured. In others portions of 

 every wave rushed through crevices between uncemented cyclopean blocks of 

 limestone forming parts of the masonry, and spouted in fearful jets up through 

 the road where a moment before it seemed firm, compact, unimpaired, and un- 

 yielding, whilst in other parts, where there were no such indications of sub- 

 terranean mischief, a heavier wave than usual would spring over the parapet, 

 violently crush what may be called the floor of the road, and reveal huge 

 cavities beneath $ the road having been undermined and literally sucked through 

 interstices in the wall built for its protection. In one place a portion of the 

 parapet nine feet long by three in breadth and depth, and, therefore, containing 

 eighty-one cubic feet, was removed en masse twenty-five feet horizontally, land- 

 ward, across the road, where it was found, after the storm in an inverted posi- 

 tion, the cement still firmly holding the parts together. Ey careful experiment 

 I found that a portion of this mass, weighing ninety-nine and a half ounces 

 avoirdupois, displaced seventy-one cubic inches of water, consequently the 

 entire block of masonry thus transported must have weighed about five and 

 a-half tons. Before its dislodgement, the base of this mass was six feet above 

 the level of high-water equinoctial spring-tides. 



At Livermead the greater part of the wall and road were completely swept 

 away, and a shingle-beach put in possession of the site. 



The whole of the damage above described is now nearly repaired, that is to 

 say, the labour of two years at a cost of five or six thousand pounds is 

 required to represent the mischief effected by the sea in two hours. 



The sea-wall has been rebuilt very much on the same plan as before. In 

 reply to a suggestion that it should be constructed on sounder principles, so as 

 to provide against a recurrence of so much damage and inconvenience, it was 

 stated that the cost would at least be double, and that, judging from the past, 

 it may be hoped that the wall put up will last twenty years, whilst at five per 

 cent, compound interest money doubles itself in fourteen years. 



The same storm so completely destroyed a sea-wall and road extending nearly 

 the whole length of Meadfoot beach, on the east of Torquay, constructed at a 

 great cost, about seven years before, that no attempt has been made to restore 

 it, but a road in lieu thereof opened in a less exposed situation. 



At the northern corner of Goodrington Sands there is a cottage standing in 

 a quadrangular garden, the eastern or seaward wall of which is twenty-five feet 

 from the house, three feet high on the inside and seven feet on the outside, so 

 that the terrace on which the cottage and garden are is about four feet above 

 the highest level of the beach. In still weather there is ample room between 

 this wall and the margin of spring-tide high-water to allow carts to pass. 

 During the storm, however, the waves bounded over the wall, ran across the 

 garden, smashed the drawing-room window, completely re-arranged the furni- 



