Some distance beyond the first opening is a group of three caverns, connected by a low, natural arch, and having in the foreground a remarkable group of detached rocks, pinnacles, and large boulders. A cascade-the water falling exactly over the entry of one of the caves, which is situated between two others, all visible from the same point, produces a variety of rock scenery only to be met with in the Channel Islands in this remarkable bay. In front of the caverns, and on the rocks immediately adjacent, is a wide expanse of perfectly smooth and unbroken sand, over which the water ripples gently with the advancing or receding tide. An engraving, from a sketch taken outside the principal cavern, will be found in the last page.

Past this singular group the opening to another fine cavern is seen, but the cavern itself is not very easily entered, owing to the intervention of large and rather deep pools of salt water. Near this the telegraph cable from Guernsey is conducted over a small deep inlet, and once more there is a gloomy archway, from the extremity of which one may see exactly across the bay to the inlet and cavern first described. Other broken rocks and partial caverns are observable beyond, but they cannot be reached.

It

From a path on the cliffs, at some height above the sea, the hardy pedestrian may still pursue his investigations, and he will discover many other fiords that occur with singular regularity and parallelism, between this point and Cape Grosnez. would be quite impossible to communicate an idea of the wild grandeur of this scenery, for it must be very nearly approached to be at all understood, and is not an excursion fitted for those who are timid or delicate. The inlets are all narrow; but in some a rocky islet breaks the water into foam, and increases the savage character of the view. Most of them are floored with vast masses of granite; some angular, some rounded; and they all enter at right angles to the coast, with a degree of formal squareness, very singular, and only to be understood when we consider their origin, and the peculiarly systematic

THE PINNACLE ROCK.

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character of the veins of soft rock that once penetrated the granite, and whose former existence they now mark. The headland called Grosnez, is marked by a picturesque ruined arch,* and the views from it are extremely striking. It is the north-westerly point of Jersey.

From Cape Grosnez, round to the south-west, the cliffs continue almost vertical, and are extremely broken; but not in the same manner, or with the same regularity, as on the other side. The inlets are more rugged and wider, but hardly more easily reached; and a horizontal vein of basalt is the cause of a steplike appearance at the point called Rouge Nez, which is very striking. A little further we reach one of the most singular isolated rocks in the island. It is called La Pule, or the Pinnacle rock, and is almost detached, although a grassy slope still remains connecting it with the cliff behind. This grand pinnacle rises almost vertically out of the sea, and cannot be less than 150 to 180 feet in height. It is entirely granite, but presents a singular appearance of parallel layers of rock, inclining inland. A sketch of it will be found in the chapter on modern geology, taken from a picturesque headland a little to the north.

The land in this part of Jersey is high, and nearly level, but not cultivable near the sea. It is called Les Landes, and is covered with tufts of heather, with a small growth of furze; but there is no great thickness of soil, and occasionally some tracts of marsh intervene. The cliffs are at first precipitous, and continue so for nearly two miles beyond Cape Grosnez, when they fall back a little, and a transverse valley opens, through which a good road runs into the interior. At this angle of the cliff is the remarkable and prominent rock called l’Etac.† Few single rocks on the coast of Jersey are more picturesque

* See the vignette, referred to in the index of illustrations.

+ L'Etac-le Tas, the heap, as in Sark, where the same word is changed to Etat. The shape of l'Etac is pyramidal, and seen at a distance it has the form of a pile of stones.

than this detached pyramid. It is not very lofty, but in formin the associated cubical and broken blocks of granite behindthe martello tower below-the roads winding and twisting to the bottom, and the houses of the little village clustered by the road side-the floor of rocks, black with sea-weed, spreading out far into the sea-and the mixture of a certain amount of vegetation with all these sources of the picturesque :-in all these points the picture is one not easily forgotten.

At l'Etac the Bay of St. Ouen opens. It is without exception the grandest, the most picturesque, and the least visited of all the Jersey bays. Stretching across, in one noble sweep of more than five miles, from north to south; and receding to a range of hills forming a semi-elliptical back ground, nearly four miles in its shorter semi-diameter; this magnificent bay is almost everywhere covered with sands, half a mile wide at low water. The coast is, however, broken by several rocks, which become more and more prominent towards the south, and there terminate at the Corbiérest-a group of very grand and picturesque rocks, jutting out into the sea with extreme boldness. Of these we shall speak again presently. Beyond the sands at this, the southwestern, as well as at the south-eastern extremity of the island, is a far-spread floor of granite, out of which project many rocky pinnacles. Elsewhere in the bay, the hills rise gradually and gently, and are covered to their summit by blown sand, whose intense whiteness and brilliancy, and the total absence of any other than a thin, grassy vegetation, insufficient to hold back the sands, is one of the most marked characteristics of this

* This latter statement applies only to the stretch of the bay towards the Corbiéres. The small village of l'Etac is one of the common resorts of tourists and islanders, for summer pic-nics; but the distance from St. Helier's leaves little time to explore the coast.

Many of the common names of rocks are the same in all the islands, and for a manifest reason. The Corbiéres are haunts of the cormorant here, as in Guernsey, and the Moie, an adjacent headland, has the same reason for its name as in that island. L'Etac, also, we have already explained, is a corruption of le Tas.

singular district. It must not be supposed, however, that the sands on the hill slopes near St. Ouen's Bay, are without signs of life. At short intervals in most parts, but especially in the middle, where the granite has been replaced by a kind of rotten shale, there is evidently good soil and fair cultivation. Numerous farm houses are dotted over the wide plain, and are seen on the rising hills; and there is thus by no means the air of desolation that a sandy waste suggests. The hills that enclose the bay are, perhaps, from 100 to 150 feet in height, and they slope at first rapidly, and afterwards more gently, to a wide stretch of perfectly flat land, defended from the sea only by the ridge of sand hills near the present high water line. There is every evidence of the land having formerly extended further out to sea; and the roots of trees are occasionally drifted in, after heavy south-westerly gales. At present, the sands seem advancing into the interior, slowly but steadily, and have already overwhelmed many pieces of land, once cultivated and built upon.

Near the centre of this flat tract, is a large pond or lake of fresh water, inhabited by several kinds of fish. The fresh water enters this pond from the drainage of the surrounding country, the rain sinking into the loose sands, and oozing out again near the contact with salt water.

The southern part of St. Ouen's Bay is extremely bold.

About a mile before reaching the Corbiéres is a picturesque little castle on a rock, detached at high water, called la Rocca. Beyond this and connected with it, are ledges of granite projecting into the sea. For a long distance there are no intervals between the rocks, except a number of narrow channels intersecting them in long lines, parallel and at right angles to each other. Some of these channels are used as cart roads for the sea-weed, at extreme low water, but they soon fill with the rising tide, and then form serious obstacles; preventing any advance on foot from point to point.

As we approach the Corbiéres the scenery becomes very

striking, although the cliffs are not lofty. Looking back before reaching the rocks, across some of the deep inlets running into the land, views of the most varied and extreme beauty are obtained.

The Corbiéres rocks, represented in the above engraving, are detached at high water, but a broad causeway of boulders and jagged ends of granite connects them with Jersey during a large part of each tide. Their varied and broken outline, whether seen from the sea or the neighbouring shore, is always in the highest degree picturesque. They rise in majestic grandeur, forming a fine extremity to the island in this direction, and group well with every rocky bit of coast with which they are seen. It is not difficult or dangerous, though somewhat tedious, to reach them from the land; but as the tide rises rapidly and to a great height, it would be very unwise to remain on them long after the tide has turned. Though steep, they may be easily climbed; and there is some variety of vegetation in the crevices. A flower of the sea-thrift was plucked from them during a fierce and intensely cold east wind, on the last day of the year just past (1861), and no doubt they bear a constant succession of such plants as live and flourish in a salt atmosphere.