There are parts of our island where, even within historic times, the coast-line has been greatly changed by the encroachment of the sea, usually through the wearing away of the cliffs along the shore. This is especially the case on the eastern coast of England, where, in the lapse of ages, villages, towns, and whole manors have been completely swept away. The old town of Ravenspur, for example, a place that in its time rivalled Hull as a sea-port, is to-day a mere sandbank far out from shore; and the sea runs twenty feet deep over the once great shipping town of Dunwich, whose site is now two miles from the land. On the other hand, there are places where the reverse has happened; where the shore has gained upon the sea. The town of Yarmouth, for instance, stands on ground that first became firm enough to build upon nine hundred years ago. A large tract of land on the coast of Carnarvonshire has, in times much more recent, been Similar changes—changes resulting both from gain and loss—have happened and are still happening in Devonshire. Braunton Great Field, a rich tract of land some 300 acres in extent, cut up into hundreds of small freeholds, was, it is believed, reclaimed from the estuary of the Taw. On the other hand, the Pebble Ridge on the shore of Barnstaple Bay has been slowly driven inland by the force of the sea, and is said to have advanced 200 yards in the last fifty years, thus covering a long stretch of pasture-land under heaps of stones. Attempts have been lately made, by means of piles and groynes of timber, to stop its further movement. Much more remarkable, however, and much more widely distributed, are the alterations that have taken place on the south coast of Devonshire, owing mainly to erosion of the cliffs and consequent landslips, and to the washing up, by strong currents, of vast quantities of sand and shingle. From the Dorset border westwards, especially between Pinhay Bay and Culverhole Point, in the White Cliff near Seaton, and at Beer Head, long stretches of cliff, undermined probably by streams and heavy rains, have fallen, sometimes in masses half a mile long. The old town of Sidmouth is now buried under the shingle, the cliffs that protected the harbour having been entirely washed away. At Dawlish, again, rather more than fifty years since, a mass estimated at 4000 tons fell bodily into the sea. Nor is the erosion the Most of the south coast estuaries, as has already been pointed out, have been more or less blocked up by banks of sand or shingle, some of which are still undergoing change. The Warren, for example, the great bar at the mouth of the Exe, now connected with the western shore, was in the seventeenth century joined to the Great as has been the loss of land on the south coast, there have been some gains. More than 170 acres of land, for instance, have been reclaimed from the Laira near Plymouth; and the village of Penny-come-quick, lower down, whose anglicised Celtic name means "the house at the head of the creek," is no longer at the water's edge. In 1805 some thirty acres were recovered from the Charleston marshes, on the Salcombe estuary. The Bristol Channel is one of the most stormy and dangerous parts of the British seas, and is the scene of about one-tenth of all the shipping disasters that happen on our coasts every year. In its upper reaches navigation is made difficult by banks of mud and sand which are continually altering in shape and position. On the north coast of Devonshire, however, there are no outlying sandbanks. There is a small patch of sand off Lynmouth, 1 ½ miles N.N.W. of Countisbury Foreland, and the estuary of the Taw and Torridge is obstructed by a dangerous and shifting sandbank known as Barnstaple Bar, upon which ("the harbour bar" of Kingsley's song), many vessels have been wrecked. But the dangers of this stormy shore lie mainly in the iron-bound coast itself, and in the rocks that stretch seaward from the bases of the cliffs. From Bull Point to Baggy Point, especially off Morte Point, and again from Clovelly to Lundy, again, is a constant source of danger to sailors; partly because of the many rocks that stretch out from it, especially the Hen and Chickens at the north end and the Lee Rocks at the south; partly because of the strong currents that, off the south point of the island, run five knots an hour; and partly because of the fogs that so frequently envelope it. It was all three clauses combined that, in 1906, occasioned the loss of the first-class battleship Montagu, which, carried out of her course by the current, and deceived by the fog, became a total wreck on the Shutter Rock, the southern extremity of the island. Off Lundy, too, are the only banks of importance. Over the Stanley Bank, which lies to the north-east, where the depth at one point is only four and a half fathoms, there run, in heavy weather, the dangerous "tide-rips" known as the White Horses. The navigation of the south shore of Devonshire is much more important than that of the north; partly because of the number of ports in the county itself, and partly because the English Channel is a much more crowded waterway. The principal danger to navigation on the south coast is the group of reefs called the Eddystone Rocks, fourteen miles south-south-west of the entrance of Plymouth Sound. They are all covered at high tide, but the top of one of them is nineteen feet above low-water mark. In Plymouth Sound itself, especially near the eastern shore, there are many rocks and shallow From the mouth of the Dart to Hope's Nose there are many outlying rocks; but from that headland to the Dorsetshire border the coast is comparatively "clean," that is to say, free from obstructions. All the rivers east of Plymouth Sound are more or less blocked by bars, with the exception of the Dart, whose entrance, however, is strewn with rocks. To warn the sailor against these and other dangers, buoys, bells, beacons, fog-horns or sirens, guns or explosive signals, and lighthouses have been provided at many points along the Devonshire coasts. There are also numerous storm-signalling stations, and there are no fewer than thirteen lifeboats, of which eight are on the south coast. The men of the thirty-three Devonshire Coastguard stations have been the means of saving many lives. On the two coasts, including Lundy, there are in all fifty-one lights of various sorts and sizes, from the eight first-class lighthouses with massive stone towers, of which the most famous although not the most powerful is the Eddystone, down to the small but useful lights of a hundred candle-power or less, most of which are connected with quays and harbours; while others, like that at Clovelly, lighted only in the fishing-season, are temporary, a number of The first Eddystone lighthouse, a fantastic structure of wood, with six stages, begun in 1690 by Winstanley—who, while engaged in building it, was carried off by a French privateer, but promptly released by command of Louis XIV—was swept away, with its builder and three other men, in the historic storm of 1703. The second lighthouse, also of wood, built by Rudyerd in 1706, was destroyed by fire in 1755. The third, which was the first real lighthouse ever erected, was constructed by Smeaton of stones dovetailed together, with a shaft eighty-seven feet high, shaped like the trunk of an oak-tree for the sake of strength, and with the idea that it would offer greater resistance to the waves. It was finished in 1759, but its woodwork having been burnt in 1770 was then replaced by stone. The foundations of this tower having been undermined by the sea, a fourth lighthouse, whose top is 133 feet above high-water mark, was built by Douglas, between 1878 and 1882, on a rock forty yards south-south-east of the original site, which is nine miles and a quarter from the nearest land. Part of the old tower was taken down, and re-erected on Plymouth Hoe, in memory of Smeaton. Like most of the Devonshire lights the Eddystone lantern is of the group-flashing order, giving a light equal to that of nearly 300,000 candles, with two quick flashes every half-minute, and visible in clear weather for seventeen Other very powerful lights, visible for from seventeen to twenty-one miles, are—giving them in ascending order—those at Hartland, Bull Point, Countisbury Foreland, North Lundy, the Start, and South Lundy, the last named being the most brilliant of all, of 374,225 candle-power. All these lighthouses have fog-sirens or explosive fog-signals. Most of the English lighthouses are under the charge of the Trinity House, a corporation founded in 1512, and now having a yearly revenue of £300,000, derived |