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"Come along," repeated Jack Vance, and the next moment he and his two companions were clambering as fast as they could up the steep side of the embankment, clutching at bushes and tufts of grass, and causing miniature landslips of sand and gravel with every step they took.
The fragments of rock precipitated are sometimes of enormous size, but being a soft mica-schist, are soon removed by weathering. It is in the rainy season that landslips are most frequent, and shortly after rain they are pretty sure to be heard far or near.
These were months of torrential and persistent rain. The country became a quagmire. Landslips along the permanent way, and the washing away of culverts, became of such frequent occurrence, that it was decided to abandon this portion of this line altogether.
It is the Mole-cricket who, seeking for a root to suit her, has excavated the winding tunnel, with investigation-galleries grafted to either side of the main road. The passage is free therefore, or at most blocked by a few landslips, of which the Tachytes will easily dispose. This explains her rapid journey underground. But what does she do there?
At the top of the steps a gate opens upon a narrow stony footpath between two terraces, for here the soil is banked up, and walls are built to prevent landslips. These earthworks, as it were, are crowned with trellises and espaliers, so that the steep path that lies at the foot of the upper wall is almost hidden by the trees that grow on the top of the lower, upon which it lies.
Many parts of the river-bed were silted up by the action of wind and water on to the great overhanging sandstone mountain, enormous landslips in some places blocking up the river and changing its course. We thus saw how the sand is carried down to the mouths of the rivers into the sea, and how the great sand-banks are formed, such as those on which Venice is built.
The crater of Copernicus has a diameter of at least 50 miles. Within it, the travellers could easily discover by their glasses an immense number of terraced ridges, probably landslips, alternating with stratifications resulting from successive eruptions.
The path led over this deposit for a good many miles, and varied exceedingly in height, in some places being evidently increased by landslips, and at others apparently by moraines.
It has long been observed that avalanches and landslips occur most frequently about midnight, and especially on moonless midnights, when the sun and moon are in conjunction at the nadir.
A very great landslip of this kind happened in the memory of living people, at Lyme Regis, in Dorsetshire, in the year 1839. You will easily see how in forming earth-pillars and causing landslips rain changes the face of the country, but these are only rare effects of water. It is when the rain collects in brooks and forms rivers that it is most busy in sculpturing the land.
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