SECT. II.'
Natural.
SECT. III.
Faffitioius
(and.
every fide, and the fends generally different from one another : but
before we come to examine the lands- in Cornwall,'-their varieties,
and the ufes they are put to there, fome particulars relating to land
in general, it’s origin, fhape, and »places where we find it, will
deferve our enquiry.
By fend we mean a loofe incoherent congeries o f pebbles,. of
no certain uniform fize or figure; traniparent more or iels, o f various
colours, ufually turning red in common .fire, andrinr ftrong
fire reducible into glafe,
I fhall confider lands either as natural or factitious. By natural
lands I mean thole, which have been in the lame, or nearly the
fame ftate from the creation, diffufed through all parts of the earth.
Sand viewed in a microlcope is no more than a parcel of little Honest
doubtlels therefore they muff have begun, to.exift, and been formed
by the lame laws that Hones were formed by; now Hones .were
formed at firft into hard lolid mafles, in proportion to the quantity
of fimilar materials and proper cement, and ,as. they wete*divi-
ded more or lels by diflimilar adjacent bodies; where there was a
great quantity of lapideous particles and few heterogeneous • mixtures,
there ftrata, rocks, and large Hones were formed; but where; the
lapideous particles were more fcattered and difunited by the intervention
of other bodies, there fmall rubble, Hones,- gravel, . gritts, and
the fmalleH and moH numerous of all fhanesj fandy did'-« coalelce
into thofe minute glebes which we at prelent find them in. - This
probably was the procels in every part of the earth ;• fofhat fand is
one o f the primaeval bodies, concreted at-the lame .time,-with "Hones
upon the higheft mountains, as well as in the valleys-, cand at the
bottom o f the lea, as well as upon dry land. Without queflion,
thefe minute portions o f Hone, which we- call fand-, • were at firft of
as different textures, hardnefe and loftnels,. as therefbof Hones,- and
from the lame caule; but thole of a loft and tender fubftance, became,
in procefe of time, relblved into their earths, Whilft thofe
of a firmer Hnfehire, fuch as fpar, flint, and cryfial, fubfift to this
very day, and are the prefent lands and gritts.
Befides this natural fend, there is allb a factitious one, which owes
its origin to the fretting of river or fea-water; for water, always in
motion, preys upon the Hones, and grinds them by degrees into
that flony powder which we call fend: hence it is that the fand of
a particular Ihore, cove, or bay, has generally the feme colour, and
in a microfcope the feme HruChire as the rocks and Hones o f the adjacent
cliffs, and the ffrata under the fea, upon which the waves are
perpetually working, and driving in to the Ihore what they dalh off
from
from: thofe ftrata. Hence the fends at Ch’andour creek, near Penzance,
and thence to Marazion, are of a pale-blue colour, like the
rocks at Ch’andour, and the Ihingle on the ftrand; and on the
«Hands o f Scilly, it is a bright-coloured fhining fend, made for the
moft part of the.talc and cryftals of that granite, commonly called
Moorftone,.>which edges all thefe illands; and the feme may be feid
of moft . other parts, of Cornwall, where. We. have fends, reddilh,
yellow, bright and blue, according as Hones of each particular hue
prevail' in'the lands adjoining. TÜièfaftitious fend is fo like the natural,
that, itdsyextremely difficult,töidiftinguifh them one from another;
and-friswery likely, than they may have been fo mixed at
the. time of the Deluge, than thé factitious is often taken for the
natural at land, and the natural as*erroneoufly reckoned among the -
factitious on the? banks of» rivers, and on the ihores of the fea. .
In «fends ther^is no, uniformity, of fhape every fort confifts o f sect.iv.
particular fands of various ffiapes; .feme round) feme angular, Sbaf^-
nodulous; nay, what is more extraordinary, the fea-fend,
which may ife faid to. be in perpetual motion, has, notwithftanding
this, innumerable, little angular points, a s , i f it had never been
in f he fea at. all; and-the fends about London, and in.Northampton-
lhire, Oxfordfhire, and the midland counties, have abundance o f
almoft globular, which would make one believe, that they
fiad fuffered the agitation of the fea.. Having compared a fmall kind
of moorftone fend,, found among the white :clay of Amalebreh -,
three ,miles ! from any fea, with the fea-fend o f Scilly, ,1 rather
thought the land-fand more angular than that o f the fea, and it
felt ropgher ;* but the difference in the microftope was ineonfidera-
hfey . fo that the difference in ffiape, betwixt fends of the feme fize,
is not decifive or charaCteriftic : the truth is, the finaller the fend,
thfe niore it efcapes the trituration of the waters, and the purer and
harder the cryftal is of which the parts are compofed, the lefs is the
.attrition, and vice verfd. \|Upon viewing -the laiger fort o f Amale-
hreh fends, I find them full of little angular pröceffes forming gritts,
yvhich, do not appear to have undergone any diminution ; but upon
viewing the larger fea-fends, their extremities are all obtufe, plainly
manifefting, that they Ifeve been; rounded by the force o f waters.
As to the oval and globular fends, found at land, whatever caufe it
was that formed flints and pebbles into a round or nodulous figure
(which, in the chapter of the formation of Hones, we fhall more
properly enquire into) formed^ alfo the feme figure of thofe fends
which we find at a great diftance from the fea and rivers.
* Mentioned before, page 63. u But