DESCRIPTION OF THE COAST. 
31 
lated in little bays and recesses ; whilst the lighter particles of clay 
are transported away to the south, making muddy water, and finally 
enter the great estuary of the Humber, and enrich the level lands 
under the denomination of warp. The sand and pebbles, which were at 
first deposited near the place where they fell, are afterwards removed 
further and further south by the tide, and the cliffs are left exposed to 
fresh destruction. Thus the whole shore is in motion, every cliff is 
hastening to its fall, the parishes are contracted, the churches washed 
away, and not unreasonable fears are entertained that at some time the 
waters of the ocean and the Humber may join, and the Spurn become an 
island. At present, however, the isthmus stands firm, and, though com- 
posed only of a heap of pebbles and sand, and exposed to two strong 
currents, may, perhaps, be little changed for ages to come. Such is the 
efficacy of long equal slopes and a pebbly sand, in repelling the rage of 
the sea. 
Among innumerable pebbles derived from the wasted cliffs of Holder - 
ness, which are here thrown up by the sea, we observe diallage rock, and 
mica slate with garnets, and a great variety of sienites, green-stones, and 
porphyries, which have been derived from Scotland, and perhaps Nor- 
way ; much granite from Shap fell, sienite from Carroclc fell, breccia from 
Kirby Stephen, and other Cumbrian rocks; limestone and sandstone from 
the western part of Yorkshire, and lias fossils from the neighbourhood of 
Whitby. 
From Spurn Point to Kilnsea, the shore is very low, and, being com- 
posed only of gravel and sand, presents little that requires remark. The 
ruins of Kilnsea church stand upon a low ruinous cliff, of very peculiar 
composition. Not a single pebble is to be seen in it, but the whole 
height is a mass of loam or warp, disposed in regular laminae, whose 
parallel surfaces are undulated like the broadest ripple-marks on a level 
sand. (A) is a sketch to shew the peculiar arrangement of these laminae, 
and it must be noticed that, in the sharper curves, the laminae are sepa- 
rated a little from each other, (a) 
