believe we might have done,
if we had stood somewhere at the bottom of this glen thousands of years
ago. We should have seen the sea in front of us; or rather, an arm of
the sea; for Finchampstead ridges opposite, instead of being covered with
farms, and woodlands, and purple heath above, would have been steep
cliffs of sand and clay, just like those you see at Bournemouth now;
and--what would have spoilt somewhat the beauty of the sight--along the
shores there would have floated, at least in winter, great blocks and
floes of ice, such as you might have seen in the tideway at King's Lynn
the winter before last, growling and crashing, grubbing and ploughing the
sand, and the gravel, and the mud, and sweeping them away into seas
towards the North, which are now all fruitful land. That may seem to you
like a dream: yet it is true; and some day, when we have another talk
with Madam How, I will show even a child like you that it was true.

But what could change a beautiful Chine like that at Bournemouth into a
wide sloping glen like this of Bracknell's Bottom, with a wood like
Coombs', many acres large, in the middle of it? Well now, think. It is
a capital plan for finding out Madam How's secrets, to see what she might
do in one place, and explain by it what she has done in another. Suppose
now, Madam How had orders to lift up the whole coast of Bournemouth only
twenty or even ten feet higher out of the sea than it is now. She could
do that easily enough, for she has been doing so on the coast of South
America for ages; she has been doing so this very summer in what hasty
people would call a hasty, and violent, and ruthless way; though I shall
not say so, for I believe that Lady Why knows best. She is doing so now
steadily on the west coast of Norway, which is rising quietly--all that
vast range of mountain wall and iron-bound cliff--at the rate of some
four feet in a hundred years, without making the least noise or
confusion, or even causing an extra ripple on the sea; so light and
gentle, when she will, can Madam How's strong finger be.

Now, if the mouth of that Chine at Bournemouth was lifted twenty feet out
of the sea, one thing would happen,--that the high tide would not come up
any longer, and wash away the cake of dirt at the entrance, as we saw it
do so often. But if the mud stopped there, the mud behind it would come
down more slowly, and lodge inside more and more, till the Chine was half
filled-up, and on