It was at one time
supposed that the face of the Downs originally formed a white sea cliff
and that an arm of the sea stretched across what we know as the Weald,
but the simpler explanation is undoubtedly the correct one.
[Illustration: WANNOCK.]
The Downs themselves are composed of various qualities of chalk; some
of such a hard, smooth and workable material that, as will be seen
presently, the columns in some of the Downland churches are made from
this native "rock." While the upper strata is soft and contains great
quantities of flints, the middle layers are brittle and yield plenty of
fossils, lower still is the marl, a greyish chalk of great value in the
fertilization of the gault. This latter forms an enormous moist ditch
or gutter at the foot of the escarpment, and from the farmer's point of
view is essentially bad land, requiring many tons of marl to be mixed
with it before this most difficult of all clays becomes fertile.
Between the chalk and the gault clay is a very narrow band of upper
greensand, only occasionally noticeable in the southern range, but
strongly marked in the North Downs.
"The chalk is our landscape and our proper habitation.
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