INFLUENCE OF THE SEA. 
139 
together, that a person may almost leap from one 
side to the other. The marble is of the whitest 
and most beautiful description, and, from the action 
of the water, appears as smooth as if it had been 
highly polished. On each side of the stream are 
several " pot-holes," as they are called, of several 
feet in depth, each containing one or more stones, 
the constant motion of which by the water doubt- 
less caused these phenomena. 
Influence of the sea upon the land. — If we wish to 
«ee, upon a large scale, the action of water in wear- 
ing down the surface of the earth, we have only to 
direct our attention to the influence of the sea upon 
the coasts which bound it. The immense power 
exerted by the beating waves may be estimated in 
some degree by a few facts. " The Isle of Sten- 
ness," says Dr. Hibbert, " presents a scene of 
miequalled desolation. In stormy winters, huge 
blocks of stones are overturned, or are removed 
from their native beds and hurried up a slight ac- 
clivity to a distance almost incredible. In the win- 
ter of 1802, a tabular-shaped mass, eight feet two 
inches by seven feet and five feet one inch thick, 
was dislodged from its bed and removed to a dis- 
tance of from 80 to 90 feet. I measured the recent 
bed from which a block had been carried away the 
preceding winter (1818), and found it to be 17 1-^2 
feet by seven feet, the depth two feet eight inches. 
The removed mass had been borne to a distance of 
30 feet, when it was shivered into thirteen or more 
lesser fragments, some of which were carried 120 
feet farther. A block nine feet two inches by six 
feet and a half, and four feet thick, was hurried up 
the acclivity to a distance of 150 feet." 
Mr. Lyell states, that in building the Bell Rock 
Lighthouse, off the mouth of the Tay, in Scotland, in 
1837, where the water is about 16 feet deep, six 
large blocks of granite which had been landed on 
-the reef were removed by the force of the sea, and 
