ABSTRACT
I live near Beachy Head in Sussex. Some times I go down the cliffs at Birling Gap just to gaze up at the towering cliff face. It rises vertically up from the flat level of the sea like a white cathedral. It is all but sublime, tipped by the distant wings of gulls at the top and washed by the breaking waves of the sea below. At times, I wonder about the material of chalk. What exactly is it made of? How was it thrown up out of the sea and in what period of geological time?
