102 
last century the estate of Coubin, near Fores, in Scotland, worth some hundred 
pounds a year, was overwhelmed with an irruption of blown sand, and became 
valueless. This was caused by cutting down some trees, and grubbing up the 
plants locally known as the bent star, which grow on the sand hills, and thus 
letting loose the material to over-run the more fertile land. 
On a portion of the Flintshire shore, the sand-hills are covered with the plants 
that thrive in sandy deposits, and are thus kept firmly in position. 
The Dunes of Norfolk, situated along the shores of Norfolk, between Hunstan- 
ton and Weybourne, are a succession of dunes composed of wind-drifted sand, 
which is held together by the long interlacing roots of VheJAmmophila arenaria^ 
(sea reed), and other plants. These dunes protect several small harbours along 
the coast which in many parts is rapidly yielding to encroachments of the sea. 
On the same coast ancient villages have been overwhelmed with sand. It is 
stated in Mr. R. C. Taylor's Geology of Bast Norfolk, that Wimpweli, Eccles, 
and Shipden have disappeared ; that large parts of parishes have been gradually 
swallowed up. Unless recently destroyed, a monument of those inroads of sand 
marks the site where Eccles once flourished, the ruined tower of the old church 
still rears its weather-worn top above the surrounding dunes, under which lie the 
houses which were inhabited in 1605. 
South of Happisburg, and extending to Yarmouth, also occur hills of drift sand, 
which in some degree protect the fertile lands adjacent to the shore ; but as the 
sea frequently makes encroachments along the coast line and alters its contour, 
the dunes can offer but a temporary resistance to its ravages. The changes along 
the coast are truly remarkable, cliffs have been washed away, estuaries have been 
blocked up, manors and parishes which once supported a numerous population are 
now at the bottom of the German Ocean. 
If authentic records point to such changes on land, we may safely conclude 
that similar alterations are continually in progress in the sea bed. This has been 
proved by different surveys, one fact, however, I will mention. Captain Hewett, 
Fi,.N., when sounding along the east coast found a wide channel sixty-five feet 
deep, which some years previously was only four feet in depth. The shifting of 
those submerged sand banks makes navigation dangerous to mariners, as at one 
period ships may safely sail over spaces which in a few years become dangerous 
shoals. Many years since I narrowly escaped shipwreck by our ship striking on 
one of the banks situated at some distance from our eastern shore, but thanks to 
a kind providence, a stout ship, and strong wind, we, after grounding, literally 
ploughed our way over the shoal. The dunes of Norfolk, like the Towans of 
Cornwall, have an elevation of about sixty feet. 
The Sand-hills of Holland serve as barriers to protect the low grounds near the 
coast, and owe their present consistency to the long creeping tangled roots of 
plants which hold the heaps of sand together, in a similar manner to the root 
bound dunes of Norfolk. No doubt that if the vegetation which now serves 
to arrest the sand was removed, several parts of Holland would become submerged, 
as would probably be the case with the small sandy island off the coast of 
Heligoland. 
