Explore "Cornwall" by Sabine Baring-Gould on Textopian. Read with annotations and highlights.
At a vastly remote period a valley lay between Britain and Gaul -- before ever they were Britain and Gaul -- and through this well-wooded valley flowed a river. The coast-line of Britain then lay from one to two hundred miles to the west, where is now the great drop in the ocean depths from 100 fathoms to 300 or 400. Cornwall was a Mesopotamia, a land between two almost parallel rivers, one occupying the bottom of what is now the English Channel, the other being the Severn. At that time the Bristol Channel was another great valley. From Brown Willy to the Scilly Isles ran a lofty mountain range, towering into the sky, of which the present Bodmin moors, Carn Brea, Carn Marth, Tregonning Hill, etc., are but the abraded stumps. Not only were they much higher, but their present roots stood 300 ft. higher than at present.
Then ensued a sinking of the land, and the Atlantic flowed into the valley to the south and joined the North Sea; and at the same time the Bristol Channel was formed. Thus the present coast was approximately outlined.