1 14 Sewell: Coast Erosion at Whitby. 
extended a further 500 feet, and built on the edge of a line of 
shale which runs north for nearly half a mile. These three 
points of rock regulate in great measure the denudation of 
the cliffs and the shore of the bay, for the rising tide is diverted 
by them and made to flow in a westerly direction, and with 
the help of certain winds, not infrequently removed the sand 
from the more easterly end of the bay. However since the 
extension of the piers the curve of the current has been removed 
further seaward, and the sand is now deposited in much 
greater quantities at the foot of the cliff. 
I recently saw an old painting, dated 1796, showing under- 
cliff immediately west of the present coastguard station, near 
the pier. This undercliff had, in earlier times, been a place 
for fairs, etc. It had apparently disappeared in 1840, as 
at that date the cliffs are spoken of as rising perpendicularly 
from the sand, as they do to-day. The painting also shows 
a path* leading to the top of the east cliff, and on the sea 
edge. This has since gone. I am permitted to reproduce a 
photograph of this painting (Plate IX.). Since 1840 large 
quantities of clay that were thrown over the cliff face when the 
West Cliff estate was first built upon have been washed away. 
At the Sandsend part of the bay, the shore at Sandsend 
Xess has been lowered from ten to seventeen feet as a result of 
the blasting away of the jet-rock which formed its surface. 
This took place between i860 and 1868, and continued perhaps 
a little later. I remember the beach at Sandsend being at 
times level with the present sea-front — pigsties and sheds 
existed on the sand near East Row stream — a pathway, in 
part bordered by shrubs, was at the cliff foot for part of the 
way between Upgang and Raithwaite ; and an inn, with two 
lime-kilns to the seaward of it, at Upgang. All these have 
disappeared, I believe as the result of the lowering of the shore 
at Sandsend point, thus allowing the rising tide to flow over 
the rock into the bay from the west many hours earlier. 
Previously, the rising tide flowing against the Upgang rock 
had turned westward for a longer time, and deposited sand 
in the angle of the bay, from which it would not easily be re- 
moved except by the strong north-east storms which occasion- 
ally visit the coast. This is perhaps best explained by the 
sketch given on the previous page. 
: o : 
We learn from a Hull paper that ‘ Some surprise has been expressed 
that a bigger attempt was not made to capture the seal which was seen 
in the Humber recently. It is probable that the men at St. Andrew’s 
Dock remember realising only 4s. 6d. for a “ Porpus ” seal they once 
caught.’ We had not heard of this new form of seal or would certainly 
have bid 5s. for it! 
* Made by a member of the Cholmley family. 
Naturalisti 
