south, the highest and wildest part being known by the name of Exmoor Forest. In appearance and structure it is very analogous to a great part of Devonshire and Cornwall, and may be considered as the termination of those schistose rocks which prevail so much in these counties. It is divided into several ranges of hills, distinguished by particular names, the most conspicuous of which are Dunkery beacon, Brendon hill, Croydon hill, Grabbist hill, North hill, and the Quantock hills. The longitudinal direction of these is, with the exception of the Quantock hills, nearly east and west; there are numerous lateral branches from each central ridge, forming small steep vallies, or gullies, which terminate in the great vallies that divide, and are parallel to the principal ranges. These gullies, called Combes in the country, when richly wooded, form some of the most striking features of the beautiful scenery for which this coast is so celebrated. The Quantock hills, although cut of from the main body of this mountainous tract by a wide cultivated valley, may, in a geological point of view, be considered as strictly belonging to it, for the range itself and the intervening valley are formed of the same rocks as the country to the westward. This apparent insulation, and the peculiar beauty of the range, mark themes a prominent feature in the country; they are no less remarkable from the varied scenery they afford, and the magnificent prospect that is seen from their summit. The name is generally applied in the country, as it is in the Ordnance map, to a range of about eight miles in extent from north-west to south-east, and which is in fact the highest and most conspicuous part. From the south eastern extremity, the mass is divided into several distinct ridges, all composed of the same materials as the Quantock hills strictly so called, and which spread out in the form of a fan, having one extremity at North Petherton, and the other at West Monckton,
Page:Transactions of the Geological Society, 1st series, vol. 3.djvu/347
