RAISED BEACHES AND THEIR ORIGIN. 
173 
sometimes lined with, shingle containing shells of species living 
at the present day in the neighbouring seas, together with 
bones of animals which inhabited the country either at 
the time the cave was in course of formation, or subse- 
quently. The shores of the Mediterranean sea afford many 
illustrations of these and other kinds of raised beaches. In 
the island of Sicily there are caves of this kind so recently 
elevated that serpulce are still found clinging to their walls. 
Of these, the cave of San Ciro, near Palermo, is a good 
example. It is about twenty feet high, ten wide, and 180 
above the sea. Within it is found an ancient beach of pebbles 
of various rocks, many of which must have come from places 
far remote. Broken pieces of coral and shell, especially of 
oysters and pectens, are intermingled with the pebbles ; and 
immediately above the level of this beach, serpulce are still 
found adhering to the rock, while the walls of the cave are 
perforated by lithodomi. The number of species of shells in 
this beach examined by Dr. Phillipi was about forty-five, all 
of which, with two or three exceptions, now inhabit the 
adjoining sea ; while overlying this shell-gravel is a deposit 
of bone-breccia, containing the remains of the mammoth, 
hippopotamus, and several species of deer. 
The eastern shores of the same island present many striking 
instances of inland cliffs, and sea-beaches, sometimes carved 
in solid white limestone. Amongst the most interesting are 
those of the Gozzo degli Martiri. Here the terraces rise above 
one another in a succession of semi-circular steps resembling 
a Roman amphitheatre. Another ancient sea-wall of noble 
proportions runs along the coast both north and south of the 
town of Syracuse, varying in height from 500 to 700 feet, and 
between its base and the sea is an inferior platform, the whole 
composed of solid limestone rock. Similar cliffs, with terraces 
at their base containing marine shells, are to be observed in 
the Morea, rising one above the other from the shores to 
elevations occasionally exceeding 1,000 feet. These cliffs are 
sometimes penetrated by caves, the floors of which are paved 
with a breccia (or angular gravel) cemented into a solid stratum, 
and containing fragments of shells of species now living in the 
adjoining seas, such as Strombus and Spondylus. Caves and 
beaches, precisely similar, are now forming along the present 
shores, and if the coast were now to be still further elevated, 
another raised beach, in all respects similar to those described, 
would be the result. The evidence of the shells found in these 
beaches goes to prove that, geologically speaking, this age is 
but as yesterday, yet it is doubtful whether the youngest of 
them had not been lifted beyond the reach of the waves when 
Agamemnon and his host sailed forth for the shores of Troy. 
