LIAS CLIFFS. 
63 
20 Gray, micaceous, soft, argillaceous sandstone, mostly fissile, but not regularly plated 
like the alum shale, to which it gradually changes in the lower beds : divided like 
the lias by long joints, and filled with subramose masses of the same substance, 
not unlike the beds at Cloughton. These beds form the scars which stretch from 
Blue Wick a short distance southward. On their surfaces lie irony nests of ser- 
pulae, belemnites, aviculae, pinna;, &c. 
Below are the rough, sandy, upper beds of lias shale, which lower down become 
regularly fissile, and are full of ammonites, belemnites, unioniform shells, &c. 
LIAS CLIFFS. 
From Blue Wick, where it first appears, the lias formation is seen 
along the whole shore by Whitby, llunswick, Staitlies, Boulby, and 
Saltburn, and is every where washed by the sea, except in the space 
between Whitby and Sandsend where it is depressed by extensive 
dislocations. In consequence, the cliffs assume a different appearance 
from those already described, and present different phenomena. Stu- 
pendously abrupt and separated by a very narrow space ftom deep water, 
it is often hazardous, and sometimes impracticable, to examine them fiom 
beneath. They vary in altitude, according to the character of the inland 
country, and the pile of strata in the cliff. The great height of the Peak 
is owing to the truncation of the high ridge of Stow brow ; and the 
superior elevation of Boulby is accompanied by an accumulation of the 
sandstone rocks at the top. There is no example from the 1 eak to 
Saltburn, where any sandstone higher than the cap rock appears in the 
cliff. Some of these strata do, indeed, appear at a short distance inland, 
as the oolitic limestone near Hawsker bottoms, but they nevei reach 
the sea-shore ; and in our future descriptions we shall, therefoie, notice 
only the subdivisions of the lias, and the variations in its sandstone 
covering. 
Proceeding northward from Blue Wick, we find the lias rising with 
extreme regularity to some distance beyond the Peak house, where it 
