172 
THE GEOLOGIST. 
fact of there having been as yet no official survey of this island ; while 
those portions of the geological series represented in the Manx rocks 
having been typically established from other localities, it did not 
seem to present geological features sufficiently novel or peculiar to 
require any special investigation. Still, in the earlier years of the 
science, several eminent geologists did describe, with greater or less 
minuteness, some of its geological appearances : for example, Profes- 
sor E. Forbes, who wrote a short account of Manx geology for one of 
the local guide-books ; and a much more elaborate account was 
written by the Eev. J. G. Gumming, F.G.S., and published in 1848; 
but the rapid progress of the science, while it does not deprive these 
descriptions of all value, has in a great measure superseded them, 
and opened here a wide and almost untrodden field for the modern 
geologist. Having for several years resided on the island, and being 
convinced that many of the phenomena presented by the Manx rocks, 
if not altogether new to the geologist, are yet of remarkable interest, 
and capable of taking a great part in the solution of many of the 
problems which geologists are now endeavouring to solve,! have written 
the following brief account, with the view of diffusing, through the 
pages of the ' Geologist,' a more general knowledge of the geology of 
the Isle of Man, and in the hope of attracting to the subject that at- 
tention which it deserves. 
Approaching the shores of the Isle of Man from the south-east, the 
whole of the island, with the exception of a small part of the north- 
west, too low to be distinguished at this distance, lies spread out be- 
fore us ; first, like a long ridge of blue cloud resting upon the misty 
horizon, which, as the vessel brings us nearer, shapes itself into the 
mountains and valleys, the rocky coasts and the secluded bays, of 
green Mona. Eight before us opens out the beautiful bay of Dou- 
glas, hemmed in by the lofty headlands of Douglas Head and Banks's 
Howe, and relieved in the background by the highest peaks of the 
central range. Along the margin of the crescent-shaped bay, and 
capping the lofcy ancient beach to the back of it, are numerous ele- 
gant buildings, the suburbs of the town, which itself lies clustered on 
a low triangular patch of alluvial land at the south extremity of the 
bay. Far away to the south we can distinguish in the distance the 
rocky islet of the Calf, with its numerous outliers, many of them 
worn by the waves of older seas into huge arches and long winding 
caverns, through which we may occasionally, even at this long way 
off, catch a glimpse of the bright sunlight. Between us and the 
Calf stretches a long line of rocky coast, with numerous tall promon- 
tories — Spanish Head, Scarlet Head, Langness, St. Ann's Head, and 
others — rising precipitously out of the green water, whose roar, as it 
dashes against the rocky cliffs or rushes up the numerous caverns, 
falls upon our ear like the hoarse voice of old Ocean himself welcom- 
ing to the sea-girt gem before us. To the north, we look along a 
similar line of tail clifls and sheltered bays, until the view is closed 
in by the wild promontory of Maughold Head, beyond which nothing 
is seen but the heaving restless sea, dotted here and there, it may be. 
