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STUDENTS LIBRARY
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U'JIfilliliJ
THE
EAETH AND ITS INHABITANTS
EUROPE.
BY
fiLISEE RECLUS.
EDITED BY
E. G. RAYENSTEm, F.R.G.S., F.S.S., Etc
VOL. IV.
THE BRITISH ISLES.
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ILLUSTRATED BY NUMEROUS ENGRAVINGS AND MAPS.
NEW YORK:
D. APPLETON AIN^D COMPANY,
1, 3, AND 5 BOND STREET.
JUN 7 1956
CHAP.
CONTENTS.
VOL. IV.
PAGE
I. General Featurks 1
The British Seas, p. 3. Geology and Surface Features, p. 7. Rivers and Lakes, p. 15.
Climate, p. 17. Flora, p. 23. Fauna, p. 27. Inhabitants, p. 28.
II. WAi,Ti"8 AND Monmouthshire. 46
General Features, p. 46. The Welsh People, p. 55.
Topography. — Flint, p. 58. Denbigh, p. 60. Carnarvon, p. 61. Anglesey, 62. Merioneth,
p. 64. Montgomery, p. 65. Cardigan, p. 66. Pembroke, p. 67. Carmarthen, p. 69.
Glamorgan, p. 69. Monmouth, p. 72. Brecknock, p. 73. Radnor, p. 74.
III. The Cornish Pkninsula 75
General Features, p. 75.
Topograph]) — CoruM-all, p 84. Devonshire, p. 87.
IV. The Basin of the Severn and the Bristol Channel, .96
General Features, p. 96.
Topography. — Shropshire, p. 101, Worcester, p. 104. Warwick, p. 105. Gloucester, p. 111.
Hereford, p. 117. Somerset, p. 119.
V. The Channel Slope 122
General Features, p. 122.
Topography. — Dorset, p. 131. Wilts, p. 132. Hampshire, p. 136, Sussex, 141.
VI. The Basin of the Thamf.s ............. 146
General Features, p. H6.
Topography. — Oxford, p. 153. Berkshire, p. 157. Buckingham, p. 161. Hertford, p. 162.
Middlesex, p. 164. London, p. 165. Surrey, p. 199. Kent, p. 202, Essex, p. 209.
VII. East Anglta 212
General Features, p. 212.
Topography.— ^\xSQ\\i. p. 211. Norfolk, p. 216,
VIII. The Basin of the Wash 220
General Features, p. 220.
Topography. — Bedford, p. 224. Huntingdon, p. 225. Cambridge, p. 225. Northampton, p. 227.
Rutland, p. 2^8. Lincoln, p. 228.
IX, The Basin of the Hvmrer 233
General Features, p. 233,
To;jo/7r«joA«/.— Stafford, p. 238. Derby, p. 242. Leicester, p. 244. Nottingham, p. 245.
Yorkshire, p. 246.
X. The Basins of the Mersey and the Ribble 261
General Features, p. 261.
Topojraphy . — Cheshire, p. 262, Lancashire, p. 265.
j^ CONTENTS.
PAGK
'xL The North of England, the Cumbhian Mountains, the B.sins of the Eden, the Tees, ^_^
AND THE TyNE
General Features, p. 279, oon x- n v.
Topography.-We^imove\2.u^, p. 284. Cumberland, p. 286. Durham, p. 289. Northumber-
land, p. 293.
299
XII. The Isle of Man
XIII. Southern Scotland ; * „ ' t i i " "^
General Features, p. 302. Surface Features, p. 1303. Coasts, p. 306. Eivers, p. 806. Islands,
p. 307. Inhabitants, p. 309.
rojoo^;-«jo%.-Durnfries,p.313. Kirkcudbright, p. 313. Wigtown, p. 314. Ayr, p. 314. Bute,
p 315. Lanark, p. 315. Eenfrew, p. 319. Dumbarton, p. 320. Peebles, p. 322. Selkirk,
p' 322. Roxburgh, p. 322. Berwick, p. 323. Haddington, p. 325. Edinburgli, p. 325.
Linlithgow, p. 328. Stirling, p. 329. Clackmannan, p. 329. Kinross, p. 330. Fife, p. 331.
333
XIV. Northern Scotland
General Features, p. 333. Mountains, p. 335. Glaciation, p. 337. Fuths and Lochs,
p. 339. Islands, p. 343. Orkneys, p. 343. Shetland Isles, p. 345. Hebrides, p. 346.
Climate, p. 353. Flora and Fauna, p. 354. The People, p. 355.
Topography.— Vevih., p. 362. Forfar, p. 364. Kincardine, p. 366. Aberdeen, p. 367. Banff,
p. 371. Elgin, p. 371. Nairn, p. 371. Inverness, p. 371. Ross and Cromarty, p. 373.
Sutherland, p. Wo. Caithness, p. 376. Orkneys and Shetlands, p. 377. Argyll, p. 377.
XV. Ireland ^"'^
General Features, p. 378. Surface Features, p. 379. Geology, p. 380. Mountains, p. 380.
The Central Plain, p. 386. Lakes, p. 387. Bogs, p. 389. liivers, p. 390. Clim.te, p. 394.
Flora and Fauna, p. 395. The People, p. 396.
roi?o^m/)%.—LEiN8TER.— Dublin, p. 411. Louth, p. 414. Meath, p. 414. Westmeath,
p. 415. Longford, p. 415. King's County, p. 415. Queen's County, p. 415. Kildare,
p. 416. Wicklow, p. 416. Wexford, p. 417. Carlow, p. 417. Kilkenny, p. 417.
Ulster.— Down, p. 418. Antrim, p. 420. Londonderry, p. 422. Tyrone, p. 423, Armagh,
p. 423. Monaghan, p. 423. Cavan, p. 424. Fermanagh, p. 424. Donegal, p. 424.
Connaught.— Leitrim, p. 425. Roscommon, p. 425. Galway, p. 425, Mayo, p. 427.
Sligo, p. 427.
MuNSTER.— Clare, p. 427. Limerick, p. 428 Kerry, p. 429. Cork, p. 430. Waterfoid,
p. 433. Tipperary, p. 434.
XVI. Statistics of the United Kingdom 436
Population, p. 436. Agriculture, p. 443. Mining, p. 451. Manufactures, p. 456. Com-
merce, p. 460. Social Condition, p. 469.
XVII. Government and Administration 475
APPENDIX: Statistical Tables 487
I. Area and Population 487
II. Agricultural Statistics of the British Isles 494
III. Imports of Merchandise into the United Kingdom classified 496
IV. Exports of British Produce classified . . . • . . • . ,497
V. Imports and Exports according to Countries 498
VI. Trade of the Principal Ports, 1879 600
VII. Statistical View of the British Empire 502
INDEX 505
Note. — On a comparison of this volume with the corresponding French one, it will be found that not
only have ninety additional illustrations been inserted in the text, and four coloured maps added, but
that the text itself has been expanded to the extent of nearly one hundred pages. It was thought that a
work intended for English readers should furnish information on the British Isles somewhat more full than
that given for the countries of Continental Europe. The Editor, in making these additions, has taken
care to preserve the character of M. Reclus's original work. He has occasionally enlarged upon matters
only slightly touched upon by the French author, and expanded more especially the topographical
portion of the work, but he has carefully abstained from intruding his own opinions when these were not
quite in accord with the views held by the Author. — E. G. R.
LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS.
VOL. IV.
MAPS PEINTED m COLOUES.
1. British Islands; Physical , Frontispiece.
2. „ Geological
3. „ Political . . . .
4. The Overland Route to Australia
46
138
5. London and the Estuary of the Thames
6. Edinburgh and the Firth of Forth
7. Dublin Bay
8. The North Atlantic Ocean .
PAGE
165
325
411
430
PLATES.
Pass of Llanberis . . . To face page 48
Carnarvon Castle . . . . . .62
Torquay, as seen from Land's End ... 90
Rocks at Ilfracombe 95
Shrewsbury — House of the Sixteenth Century 101
Warwick Castle 106
CliflPs east of Dover 130
Isle of Wight— Lake at Bonchurch . .141
Oxford— High Street 154
"Windsor Castle 160
London— The Royal Exchange . . .175
„ The Houses of Parliament, as seen
from Lambeth . . . .185
Canterbury Cathedral 206
Ely, from the Banks of the Ouse . . . 227
Ham Rock, Dovedale . . • . .241
Ruins of Fountains Abbey . . . .253
Liverpool Docks 272
Derwentwater 288
Loch
Durham Cathedral . . . To face pagc^ 291
Loch Lomond and Men. Lomond, as seen from
Inchtavannah
The Port of Glasgow
Edinburgh, from Calton Hill
Holyrood Palace and Arthur's
The Caledonian Canal
Eilan Donan Castle— Loch
Duich . .
Isle of Skye— the Kilt Rock
Fingal's Cave, Isle of Staffa
Ruins of lona Cathedral and Oran's Chapel
Loch Katrine— Ellen's Island, as seen from the
Silver Strand 364
Pass of Glencoe 377
Typical Irish ....... 396
Vale of Glendalough 401
Limerick— Thomond's Bridge and King John's
Castle 429
306
319
326
327
333
346
347
352
357
LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS.
ILLUSTRATIONS IN TEXT.
ENGLAND AND WALES.
1 . The North Sea
2. The Strait of Dover and the EngUsh
Channel
3. The Irish Sea
4. Cotidal Lines ....
5. Section from Snowdon to the East oj
England
6. Geological Map of South-Eastern Eng
land ...•••
7. The Stack Ro.ks, South Wales
8. Plymouth Sound and the Hamoaze .
9. Comparative Size of some British and
Foreign Lakes ....
10. The River Basins of the British Isles
1 1. Isothermal Lines for July and January
12. Diagram exhibiting the Annual March of
Temperature ....
13. Rain Map of the British Isles .
U. Yuccas on Tresco (Scilly Islands)
15. An English Homestead
16. The Giant's Quoit at Lanyon, near
Penzance .....
17. Gaels and CjTnri . . . •
18. The British Colonies
19. Arundel Castle • Interior Quadkangle
20. View of Snowdon
21. Snowdon
22. The Brecknock Beacons .
23. Erosive Action on the Coast of South
Wales
24. Effects of Erosion on the Coast of
South Wales: thb Huntsman's
Leap
25. The Suspension Bridge, TMenai Strait
26. The Britannia Tuhular Bridge
27- The Bridges over Menai Strait
28. Linguistic Map of Wales
29. The Sands of the Dee, from abov
Bagilt .....
30. Remains of Vallb Crucis Abrey
3L Holyhead Harbour ....
32. Harhour of Refuge, Holyhead .
33. On the Dee, near Bala
34. The Parliament House, Dolgelly
3-5. Milford Haven ....
36. Milford Haven ....
37. The Worm's Head : PiN insula oi
Gower .....
38. Swansea ......
39. Cardiff
40. Newport .
41. Land's End and the Longshifs Light
HOUSE
42. The "Ahmed Knights," near Land'i
End
43. The Scilly Islands . . , ,
44. The Botallack Mine
PACJK
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6
0
9
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08
FIO.
45.
46.
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49.
5t).
5L
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68.
59.
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62.
63.
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65.
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67.
68.
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72.
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81.
82.
83.
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85.
86.
87.
the
89.
90.
91.
92.
93.
94.
95.
96.
Penzance . . . •
Falmouth and Truro
Plymouth . . . •
Smeaton's Eddvstone Lighthouse
Eddystone Rocks
Tor Bay
Exeter and the Estuary of the Exe
Exeter Cathedral
Promontories and Beach of Weston- super
Mare . . . ■
Bristol Channel
Railway Ferry at Portskewet .
Shrewsbury ....
Warwick and Leamington
Strat ford-on- Avon .
Shakspere's House
Birmingham ....
The Severn below Gloucester, and
Berkeley Ship Canal .
Gloucester Cathedral .
The Cloisters : Gloucester Cathedral
Cheltenham ....
Bristol and Bath
Clifton Suspension Bridge
Hereford Cathedral
Portland .....
The Isle of Wight .
Portsmouth ....
Beachy Head .
Romney Marsh
Salisbury Cathedrvl
Salisbury and Stonehenge
Stonehenge ....
Southampton Water
Portsmouth and Approaches
Brighton ....
Hastings ....
Cirencester and Thames Head .
Old London Bridge
The Entrance to the Thames
The Isle of Thanet .
Goodwin Sands
The Environs of Oxford .
Reading
Windsor .....
Annual Increase of Population in T
one Cities of Europe
The Growth of London
The London Sewers
London: Hyde Park and the Ser
hirt\
pentine
Increase of Imm'gration and Excess of
Births of the Large Cities of Europe
Railways of London
Buckingham Palace
Westminster Abbey
Westminster Abbey : Henry YII.'s
Chapel
PAOB
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143
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182
183
184
LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS.
no.
97. St. Paul's Cathedral . . . .
98. Somerset House and the Victoria
Embankment .....
99. Kew and Richmond ....
100. The Docks of London ....
101. Guildford and Godalming
102. Rochester and Chatham ....
103. Dover
104. Harwich and Ipswich and their Estuaries
105. Great Yarmouth and Lowestoft
106. Norman Tower and Akbey : Bury St.
Edmunds ......
107. Norwich Catuedkal ....
108. Norwich . . . .
109. The Wash
110. The Fens of Wisbeach and Peterborough
111. Cambridge ......
112. Lincoln Cathedral ....
113. Lincoln .......
114. 'l"he " Peak " of Derbyshire
1 15. The Mouth of the Humber and Port of
Holderness .....
116. Warped Plain of the Ouse and the Trent
117. The District of the Potteries .
118. Lichfield Cathedral ....
119. Derby .......
120. York
121. York Minster .....
122. Middlesborough and Stockton-on-Tees .
123. Scarborough
124. Towns in South- Western Yorkshire
125. Leeds .......
126. Halifax and Huddersfield
127. Sheffield
128. Chester
129. Watergate R >w, Chester .
130. Chester C\thedhal (as restori?d)
131. Towns in Lancashire and Cheshire .
132. Manchester and Environs
133. Liverpool ......
1.34. Liverpool : The Landing-stage .
135. ,, St. George's Hall .
1 <6. Liverpool Water Works .
137. Preston
138. Hypsographical Map of the Cumbrian
Mountains .....
139. Cumbrian Mountains ....
140. Hadrian's Wall
141. The Head of Windermere .
142. Screes at Wastwater, Cumberland
143. The Falls of Lodore ....
144. Hartlepool
145. The Durham Coast between Sunderland
and the Tyne .....
146. Sunderland, Newcastle, and the Mouth of
the Tyne
147. Holy Island
148. The Isle of Man
SCOTLAND.
149. Mount Merrick
150. The Wall of Antoninus ....
151. Loch Lomond ......
152. Arran Island
PAGK
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ly6
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307
308
FIG.
153.
154.
155.
156.
157.
158.
159.
160.
161.
162.
163.
164.
165.
166.
167.
168.
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171.
172.
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174.
175.
176.
177.
178.
179.
180.
181.
182.
183.
184.
185.
186.
187.
188.
189.
Firth of Clyde
The Rhinns of Galloway .
Glasgow .....
Greenock and Helensburgh
Dumbarton ....
Galashiels and Melrose .
Hawick ...
Firth of Forth
Ihe Narrows of Queensferry .
Glezimore ....
Ben Nevis ....
I'he Parallel Roads of Gleuroy
The Firths of Western Scotland
Loch Etive ....
Loch Tarbert and the Crinan Canal
Holy Loch, and the silted -up Loch of
Eachaig ....
The Orkneys . . . • .
I'he Shetland Islands
The Western Islands
Lochs of Southern Lewis
St. Kilda ....
Staffa : View taken from the t
a Cliff ....
The Exterior of Fingal's Cave
The Head of Loch Fyne .
The Standing Stones of Sten.ms
Linguistic Map of Scotland
Perth ....
The Tay Bridge and Dundee (18;
Dundee and the Mouth of the Tay
Montrose
Aberdeen
Balmoral
Peterhead and Fraserburgh
Firth of Inverness .
Kirkwall
Stornuway
Lerwick ....
8) .
IRELAND.
190. Hypsographical Map of Ireland
191. The Lakes of Killarney ....
192. The Wicklow Mountains
193. The Giants' Causeway ....
194. The Giants' Causeway and Rathlin Island
195. The Table-land of Magheraboy
196. The Underground Emissary of Lough
Mask
197. Upper Lough Erne .....
198. The Falls of Doonas, at Castleconnel
199. The Mouth of the Shannon .
200. Linguistic Map of Ireland
201. Movement of the Population in Ireland .
202. Distribution of Natives of Ireland in
Great Britain .....
203. View of Dublin fkom Ph(e.nmx Park .
20 1. Carlingford Lough
205. Strangford Lough
206. Belfast Lough
207. Lough Foyle .
208. Galway Bay .
209. Killala Bay .
PAOB
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330
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b92
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LIST OF ILLUSTEATIONS.
KIiJ.
210. Sligo Harbour . . . . .
211. Round Tower of Croom
212. Lakes of Killarney : Roan Castle
213. Cape Clear Island . . . . .
214. Cork Harbour . . . . . .
215. Increase or Decrease of the Population,
1861—1871
216. The Local Element of the Pojmlation
217. Increase and Decrease of the Natives of
each County, 1861— 1871 .
218. Total Emigration from the British Islands
2! 9. Land under Cultivation . . . .
220. I^nd under Corn Crops ....
221. Distribution of Cattle . . . .
222. Distribution of Sheep ....
223. Distribution of Coal in Great Britain
PAGE
FIG.
PAGE
428
224
Coal Basins
453
429
225
The Carboniferous Formation before
430
Denudation .....
454
431
226
Fluctuations of British Commerce .
461
432
227.
Stoknoway : Retukx of the Fishing
Fleet
463
438
228.
Wreck Chart
464
439
229.
Canals and Navigable Rivers .
465
230.
Railway ]\Iap . . ...
467
440
231.
Valentia and its Telegrap Cables .
468
442
232.
Educational Map
472
444
233.
Yorkshire and Rutlandshire contrasted .
476
44.5
234.
Diocesan Map of the British Islands
480
449
235.
Distribution of Roman Catholics
481
450
236.
Breaches in the North Downs and the
452 j
Camp of Aldershot ....
4 85
THE EARTH AND ITS INHABITANTS.
THE BRITISH ISLES.
CHAPTER I.
Genebal Features.
RE AT BRITAIN and Ireland, together witli the numerous small
contiguous islands, form but an insignificant fraction of that world
upon which they have exercised so considerable an influence. In
area they do not form the thirtieth part of Europe, or the four
hundred and thirtieth of the habitable globe, whilst their truly
fruitful portion, which has enabled England to play her great part in the world's
history, constitutes scarcely more than one-half of the United Kingdom.*
Great Britain, the larger of the two main islands of the group, is separated
from Continental Europe by the English Channel and the North Sea, and is itself
divided into several well-marked geographical regions. Ranges of hills, and even
mountains, no less than the elongated shape of the island, were favourable to the
formation of distinct communities, whose conflicting interests, as might have been
expected, were frequently decided by an appeal to arms. South-eastern England,
a country of plains and hills, is one of these natural regions, and for ages its inha-
bitants differed from their neighbours in history and manners. The peninsula of
Cornwall, between the English and Bristol Channels, which juts out into the open
Atlantic, no less than the mountain land of Wales, bounded on the south and north
Great Britain .
931 Minor contiguous Islands
Isle of Man
Ireland ....
196 Minor contiguous Islands
Total British Islands
Population
Area.
(Estimated for 1880)
84,447
28,630,000
4,614
300,000
227
56,000
32,285
5,370,000
246
5,000
121,819
34,361,000
2 THE BRITISH ISLES.
by well-defined indentations of tlie coast, are likewise countries distinguished by
special features which could not fail of exercising an influence upon their inhabit-
ants. The mountainous part of England, to the north of the Humber and Mersey,
forms a fourth natural province, differing from the remainder of England in its
geological structure no less than in the history of its inhabitants. The Cheviot
Hills, which run across the island from sea to sea to the north of the Solway
Firth, form a well-defined historical boundary, and so does the lowland plain
which stretches from the Firth of Forth to the Firth of Clyde. The sterile moun-
tains and valleys of the Scottish Highlands form a most striking contrast to the
low plains and gentle hills stretching away to the south.* At two places these
natural frontiers have been marked, as it were, by lines of fortifications, viz.
between the estuary of the Forth and that of the Clyde, and farther south, between
the mouth of the Tyne and the Solway Firth, where the Eomans constructed
ramparts and towers to put a stop to the depredations of the Highland tribes.
The contours of Great Britain are at once symmetrical and bold. In its general
structure that island strikingly resembles the peninsula of Scandinavia. Like the
latter, it stretches from north to south in the direction of the meridians, its
plateaux and mountains rise near the west coast, and its principal rivers flow to
the eastward. Ireland, though it too has fine contours, is far more massive in its
configuration than the sister island. Its mountains form the nuclei of distinct
provinces, whose inhabitants made war upon each other ; but on the whole its
features exhibit greater geographical unity than those of the larger island.
The British Islands rise upon the submarine plateau of North-western Europe.
The strait which separates England from France is narrow and of inconsiderable
depth, and from the heights above Dover the grey cliffs of Gris Nez are distinctly
visible on a clear day. Still, Albion, to the ancestors of the modern Frenchmen, was
a distant country. Squalls of wind, rapid and changing currents, sand-banks, and
steep cliffs rendered navigation perilous. In time of war communications between
the two countries ceased altogether ; whilst during peace, owing to the danger
which attended them, hardly any but sailors and merchants profited by them. The
mass of the nation was thus little affected by events which took place on the conti-
nent, and remained insular in its mode of life, customs, and ideas. The Romans,
moreover, only succeeded in subduing a portion of Great Britain, and the influence
they exercised was therefore far less powerful than in Gaul. The highlands of
Scotland and Ireland never formed part of the Roman world at all, the remote-
ness and the perils of the ocean affording them a protection against the legions
of the Ca3sars. It was only slowly and by degrees that the tribes inhabiting
those countries were affected by the civilisation which had Rome for its centre.
The British Islands thus occupied a position, relatively to the general history
of mankind, analogous to that which they hold to the fauna and flora of Conti-
nental Europe. Numerous species of French and German plants, perfectly
adapted to the climate of England, are nevertheless not found there, and Ireland is
still poorer than Great Britain in its animal and vegetable forms. The migration
* Buckle, "History of Civilization in England."
THE BRITISH SEAS. 3
of numerous species has been prevented by the obstacles presented by tbe sea, and
in tbe same way many great events in the history of Europe affected England but
slightly, and were hardly felt at all in distant Erin.
The progressive development of England was thus marked by originality and
spontaneity. The country which gave birth to this national civilisation possesses,
moreover, very considerable physical advantages. Its hills and mountains are of
moderate height, and present no serious obstacles to free communications between
the inhabitants dwelling on opposite slopes ; for the Grampians lie outside the
living portion of the country, in a region of sea-born winds and mists, and
are, besides, very thinly inhabited. The lowlands, privileged in every respect,
occupy the other extremity of the island, and face Continental Europe. Washed
and defended by the sea on the east and the south, this portion of England
hospitably opened its ports to colonists and merchants. It was there, in the vicinity
of France and the Netherlands, that civilisation made most rapid progress, and
the capital of the entire country was established.
The British Sf-as.
To the seas which surround them the British Islands are indebted for the mild-
ness of their climate, their security from foreign invasion, their commerce, and
the wealth yielded by productive fisheries. These seas are shallow. If the
waters were to subside to the extent of 300 feet, the whole of the British Islands,
including Ireland, would once more be united to Continental Europe. A
subsidence of little more than 100 feet would result in the formation of an
isthmus connecting Lincolnshire with Holland. A line drawn on a map to mark
a depth of 600 feet passes about 60 miles to the west of Ireland, the Outer
Hebrides, and Shetland. All within that line is less considerable in depth,
excepting only a few " pits " — depressions in the bed of the sea — which lie off the
west coast of Scotland and in the North Channel.
The North Sea, or German Ocean, to the south of the parallel of Aberdeen,
hardly anywhere exceeds a depth of 800 feet, and it grows shallower towards the
south. It is exceedingly rich in fish, and Mobius* very justly remarks that its bed
is far more profitable to man than are the sterile heaths which border its shores.
Its fisheries give employment to about 900 fishing-smacks, of which 650 sail under
the English flag, and the harvest of fish annually drawn from its depths has been
estimated at 75,000 tons. One of its most productive fishing grounds is the
Dogger Bank, which occupies its centre, and supplies London and other large
towns with immense quantities of cod. The North Sea is indebted for its wealth
in fish to its shallowness and freedom from rocks. Oyster beds are the only
obstacles which the dredge of the fisherman occasionally encounters. These
oysters of the high sea, however, are but little esteemed. The best oysters are
found in the shallow, brackish waters along the English coast, and it is these which
are deposited in the oyster parks of Ostend to be fattened.
* " Das Thierleben am Boden der Ost- und Nordaee."
4 THE BRITISH ISLES.
In its general features the bed of the North Sea resembles the mud-flats or
«.aMe«, of its eastern shore. Oceanic currents have scooped out channels m the
mud and sand, but the original relief of the sea-bed has been obliterated. A
submarine plain like this can be the product only of causes acting uniformly
Fig. 1. — The North Sea.
Scale 1 : 7,400,000.
]0«pf* InFtthomM |
27toS4 S4tonO
100 Miles.
over a wide area ; and for sucli a cause the majority of geologists go back to the
glacial epoch, when glaciers, laden with the waste of the land, drifted into this
ancient gulf of the Atlantic, and there deposited their loads.* Even at the present
day there are agencies at work which tend to fill up the basin of the North Sea.
• Ramsay, "Physical Geology and Geography of Great Britain."
THE BRITISH SEAS. 5
Glaciers are no longer stranded on its shores, but rivers deposit in it the sediment
with which they are charged, whilst the arctic current, which makes itself feebly
felt in this vast gulf, conveys into it the pumice-stone ejected from the volcanoes
of Iceland and Jan Mayen.* Deposition is consequently still going on, though at
a much slower rate than formerly. But how are we to explain the gradual fillino-
up of the North Sea, whilst the abj'ssal channel which separates it from j^orway
Fig. 2.— The Strait of Dover and the English Channel.
Prom an Admiralty Chart. Scale 1 : 795,000.
retains its depth of hundreds of fathoms ? Is it not that its very depth saved
it from becoming the depository of glacial drift ? The glaciers carried south-
ward by currents and northerly winds may be supposed to have stranded only
after they had reached the shallower waters of the North Sea, when, melting
under the influence of the sun, they deposited upon its bottom the debris they
carried.
The Strait of Dover, which joins the North Sea to the English Channel, has a
width of only 20 miles, and in depth nowhere exceeds 180 feet. The navigation is
* " Annales Hydrographiques," 4e trimestre, 1873.
THE BPJTISH ISLES.
not without danger, owing to conflicting currents and the sand-banks which cumber
the approaches. The most famous of these banks are the Goodwins, off the coast
of Kent, within which lies the roadstead called the Downs, a great resort of vessels
waiting for favourable winds and tides. The English Channel gradually increases
Fig. 3.— The Ikish Sea.
From an Admiralty Chart. Scale 1 : 795,000.
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in-depth as we proceed to the westward, until, off Land's End, it exceeds 300
The Irish Sea is far more considerable in depth than the German Ocean, and
Ireland was an island lying off the coast of Western Europe long before Great
GEOLOGY AND SURFACE FEATURES. 7
Britain had been severed from the neighbouring continent. Yet, compared with
the open Atlantic, or even with inland seas in volcanic regions, its depth is incon-
siderable. Only detached portions of its bed sink below 300 feet, and the
maximum depth does not exceed 500 feet. In the North Channel, however,
the depth is greater, being nowhere less than 300 feet, and attaining 664 feet
in one of the "pits" lying midway between Galloway and the Lough of
Belfast.
The tidal undulation reaches the British Islands from the south-west, and,
travelling along the west coast of Ireland and Scotland, wheels completely
round the north of the islands, so that the old tide coming from the northward,
down the German Ocean, meets the Atlantic tide of twelve hours later date
opposite to the mouth of the Thames. Similarly, opposite tidal currents pene-
trate into the Irish Sea from the north and the south, meeting about the
parallel of the Isle of Man. The rise of the tide is generally greater on the
exposed west coast than on either the south or east coast, but varies exceedingly
according to local circumstances. Where tidal waves meet, a higher rise is the
result, but where the time at which a high tide wave reaches a particular coast
coincides with the moment of ebb of a tidal wave coming from another direction,
the two undulations neutralise each other. Thus, on the south-east coast of
Ireland, and at the Portland Bill, in the English Channel, the two undulations
almost balance each other, and the tide is consequently hardly perceptible. On
the contrary, when the tidal wave enters a narrowing arm of the sea or an
estuary, it advances with increasing impetuosity, and attains a considerable
height. The most conspicuous instance of this is presented by the Bristol
Channel, which becomes shallower as it narrows, and where the spring tides con-
sequently attain a height of 60 feet. The general rise of the tides, however, is
far less.
Geology akd Surface Featu4ies.
England is distinguished among all the countries of Europe for its great variety
of geological formations. It is the very paradise of geologists, for it may be
said to be in itself an epitome of the geology of almost the whole of Europe, and
of much of Asia and America. There are few formations which are not repre-
sented at least by a few patches, and so regular is their succession that the geology
of England, in its general features no less than in its details, became sooner known
to us than that of any other country in Europe. The geological map which
William Smith published in 1815, after twenty-five years of unwearied work, in
the course of which he traversed England on foot in all directions, is a remark-
able work, and surprises by the relative perfection with which it brings to our
knowledge the extent of the various geological formations.* Since his time a
♦ Table of British Formations, according to Professor A. C. Eamsay : —
Recent Alluvia, Peat, and estuarine beds now forming, &c.
Post Tertiary River and estuarine alluvia ; glacier moraines and boulder
clays ; forest bed of Norfolk, [Tertiary
8 THE BRITISH ISLES.
more minute survey has been carried on, revealing not only the surface geology
in all its details, but throwing additional light upon the great mineral and
metallic wealth hidden in the bowels of the earth. Even in fabulous times,
long before history mentioned the names of the tribes who inhabited the British
Isknds, the mineral wealth of the Cassiterides, or Cornwall, attracted merchants
from the Mediterranean ; and to the present day, whatever may be the mineral
riches of America or Australia, the British Islands remain the most productive
mining country in the world. They owe their pre-eminence, however, not to tin,
but to coal and iron.
The geological structure of Great Britain is prominently exhibited in its
surface features. The older palaoozoic rocks, which compose the most rugged
and elevated mountain regions, lie to the west and north-west, whilst rocks of more
recent age are spread over the hilly districts and lowlands.
In the rugged Highlands, which to the north of a line drawn from the Firth of
Clyde to Stonehaven, on the German Ocean, fill up nearly the whole of Northern
Scotland, are found gneiss and mica schist of the Silurian age, with numerous bosses
of granite and syenite rising above the general level, and forming some of the
most prominent peaks. Along part of the west coast these Silurian rocks overlie
gneiss and sandstone of Cambrian and Laurentian age, closely resembling similar
formations found in Canada. A deep fissure, occupied by a chain of lakes, and
bounded by steep hills, stretches for a hundred miles from Loch Eil to the
Moray Firth. This is the Glenmore, or '* large valley." It separates the
northern Highlands from the Grampians, in which rises Ben JN'evis, the culmi-
nating point of the British Isles. The whole of this tract is sterile and deso-
late in aspect, consisting largely of peaty moorlands and brown heaths, and
intersected by narrow glens and valleys, which afford pasturage to black cattle
and sheep.
A wide plain separates this inhospitable region from the hilly district of
Southern Scotland. This plain, stretching from the Clyde to the Forth, and
/ Pliocene Norwich Crag, Red Crag Coralline Crag.
Tektiahy 1 Miocene Bovey Tracey and Mull beds, with igneous rocks.
OR Cainozoic ] Eocene Hempstead, Bembridge, Osborne, and Headon beds ;
Bracklesham and Bagshot beds ; London Clay.
f Cretaceous Chalk, Greensand, Gait, Atherfield Clay.
j Wealden Series .... Weald Clay, Hastings Sands, Purbeck beds.
Secondary ' ^*^^*^^ Series Portland Oolite and Kimmeridge Clay ; Coral Rag and
OR Mtsozoic 1 Oxford Clay ; Cornbrash, Forest Marble, Bath Oolite ;
I Stonesfield Slate and inferior Oolite.
I Lias Clay, Marlstone, Rha^tic beds.
LXriassic New Red Marl (Keuper), New Red Sandstone (Bunter).
j' Permian Magnesian Limestone.
Carboniferous Coal Measures and Millstone Grit ; Carboniferous Lime-
stone and Shales.
Old Red Sandstone and
Devonian Sandstones, Slate, Limestones, Shales, INIarls, and Con-
glomerate.
Silurian Arenig Slates, Bala or Caradoc beds, Ludlow Rocks.
Cambrian Grits and Slates of Lonymynd and Wales, Tremadoc Slates.
Laurentian Gneisa.
Pri.maky
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GEOLOGY AND SURFACE FEATURES.
extending northward to Montrose, is occupied by old red sandstone and marl,
and by the shales, sandstones, and limestones of the carboniferous series. Masses
of igneous rocks rise above its surface and diversify its scenery. By its fertility
this plain contrasts most strikingly with the Grampians, which, like a wall, bound
Fig. 4. — Ootid AL Lines.
According to Scott Russell. Scale 1 : 10,626,000.
OVofG.
Over 109 Fathoms
it on the north. It is rich, moreover, in coal and iron, and has become a great
centre of population.
The hills of Southern Scotland, sometimes called the Cheviot Region, after the
range of hills which almost severs Scotland from England, resemble the Grampians
in geological formation, consisting, like them, of Silurian rocks ; but being less
rugged in their character, and penetrated by broader valleys of considerable
fertility, they are far more hospitable. Extensive tracts are covered with grass,
98— E
10 THE BRITISH ISLES.
affording excellent pasture to sheep, and agriculture is successfully carried on
in the Tweeddale and other valleys.
A gap, through which passes the railway from Newcastle to Carlisle, and
which lies at an elevation of only 446 feet above the level of the sea, separates the
Cheviot Hills from a broad range of carboniferous rocks which forms the back-
bone of Northern England, and stretches from Northumberland to Derbyshire.
This is the Pennine chain, a region of moors, heaths, and grassy uplands, inter-
sected by verdant valleys abounding in picturesque scenery. In the west this
chain presents a steep slope towards the Irish Sea, whilst to the east it dips down
gently, and finally disappears beneath a band of magnesian limestone, which
separates the carboniferous rocks from the more recent formations occupying the
plain of York. The wealth of the Pennine chain in coal and iron has attracted
to it a dense population, and flourishing manufacturing towns have arisen upon
what were once desolate moorlands.
A transverse ridge, crossed by the pass of Shap Fell, which joins the narrow
glen of the Lune to the broad and fertile plain of the Eden, and through which
runs one of the two main roads connecting England and Scotland, joins the
Pennine range to the mountain group of Cumbria. Consisting largely of Silurian
Fig. 5. — Section fkom Snowdon to the East of England.
According to Professor Ramsay.
Pennine Ra. Lincoln
Cheshire Plain. ..,K...f s „„„v. W''^fl''™«l ^...^lit* Wolds.
Carbonif? Rocks
New Red Sandstone.
York Plain. .
Lias ! i Chalk
slates, this mountain group is famous for its pastoral scenery, its lakes and wooded
valleys.
The broad plain of Chester sepa,rates the Pennine chain from the Cambrian
or Welsh mountains, composed of highly disturbed and distorted strata of Silurian
and Cambrian slates, intermingled with igneous rocks, and interbedded with lavas
and beds of volcanic ashes. In the south-east these ancient rocks are overlaid
successively by old red sandstone and carboniferous limestone, and there the
country, though hilly and even mountainous, is naturally fertile. In the remainder
of Wales, however, although there are not wanting broad alluvial valleys
bounded by wooded hills, vast tracts are covered with heath, and are only fit for
pasture.
When we cross the Bristol Channel we enter the last mountainous region of
England— that which comprehends the counties of Devon and Cornwall, and
attains its highest elevation in the granitic moorlands of Dartmoor. Geolo-
gically this region differs totally from Wales, Silurian rocks being altogether
absent, and Devonian' strata the oldest formation met with. This south-western
peninsula of England is, in fact, closely allied to the peninsula of Brittany in
France, from which it is severed now by the Channel, but whence it derived its
population, and also, in part at least, its flora. Its mountain ranges and hiUs are
GEOLOGY AND SUEFACE FEATURES. 11
bleak and treeless, as are ttose in the north, but they yield copper, tin, and lead,
and between them lie broad pasture-lands and fruitful valleys.*
A broad expanse of comparatively level land separates the barren paloeozoic
mountain ranges of England and Wales from the uplands and plains which occupy
the entire eastern part of the country. Spreading over the whole of Central
England, this level tract extends along the eastern foot of the Pennine range to
the coast of Yorkshire, merges on the west into the wide plain of Cheshire and
Lancashire, and can be traced southwards into the valley of the Severn, and beyond,
through the vale of Taunton and other low-lying districts, to the south coast of
Devonshire. Nearly the whole of this extensive region is occupied by the sand-
stones, limestones, clays, and marls of the triassic and liassic formations, the
harder of these rocks often rising into minor escarpments facing westwards, and
overlooking rich undulating meadow lands and cultivated fields.
On the east these plains and undulating grounds are bounded by an oolitic
limestone range, which traverses England from the coast of Dorsetshire to the
estuary of the Tees, presenting a bold escarpment towards the west, on ascending
which we find ourselves upon an undulating table-land, mostly occupied by sheep
pastures. The Cotswold Hills, which bound the vale of Gloucester, and the
moorlands of Yorkshire, far away in the north, both belong to this formation.
Around the Wash it disappears beneath the alluvial flats of the Bedford level, but
everywhere else it dips below the chalk, which forms so prominent a feature' in
the physical geography of South-eastern England.
The chalk, like the oolitic limestone, generally presents a bold escarpment
towards the west. It is most extensively developed on the plain of Salisbury.
From this, as a centre, the ranges of chalk diverge in different directions. The
South Downs stretch along the coast of the Channel as far as Beachy
Head. The North Downs bound the valley of the Thames on the south, and
terminate in the cliffs of Dover. A third range extends to the north-eastward,
forming the Marlborough Downs, the Chiltern Hills, and the East Anglian
Heights, which terminate with Hunstanton Clifi^, at the mouth of the Wash, but
once again rise to the north of that shallow bay in the wolds of Lincoln and
York.
Clays, sands, limestones, and crag of the tertiary age overlie the chalk in the so-
called basins of London and Hampshire ; but between the North and South Downs
the chalk has been removed by denudation, and the subjacent strata which occupy
the district known as the Weald have been laid bare. Bounded by escarpments of
* Culminating summits of mountain groups of Great Britaia : —
Northern Highlands, Ben Wyvis 3,422 feet.
Grampians, Ben Nevis 4,406 „
„ Ben Muich (Mac) Dhui 4,296 „
Hills of South Scotland, Merrick 2,764 „
Cheviot 2,669 „
Pennine Chain, Cross FeU 2,928 „
Cambrian mountains, Sea Fell 3,230 „
Welsh mountains, Snowdon 3,590 „
Mountains of Devonshire and Cornwall, Yes Tor (Dartmoor) . . . 2,077 „
12 THE BEITISH ISLES.
chalk, this area of denudation opens out like an ancient bay upon the English
Channel. Its level parts consist of clav, above which rises a central ridge composed
of Hastings sands.*
Quite as striking as the contrast between the rugged mountain regions which
occupy North Britain and the west of England is the difference of aspect presented
by the opposite coasts of the island. The east coast is of uniform contour, and
Fig. 6.— Geological Map of South-Eastern England.
According to Best. Scale 1 : 3,350.000.
^a
2. Upper Tertiary. 3. London Clay, &c.
4. Chalk. 5 & 6. Greensand and Gait.
■
12. Permian.
13. Carboniferous.
9. Lias.
14. Devonian.
lO&ll. Triassic.
15. Silurian.
50 Miles.
almost devoid of natural harbours, but their absence is somewhat compensated for
by the existence of estuaries ; the approaches to these, however, are often rendered
♦ Culminating points of the uplands of Eastern England : —
Oolitic Limestone Ranges
Cretaceou.s Ranges .
Cotswold Hills, Cleeve Hill . . . .
1,134 feet
York Moors, Botton Head ....
1,498 „
South Downs, Butser Hill ....
883 „
North Downs, Inkpen Beacon . .
973 „
LeithHill ....
967 „
Chiltern Hills, Wendover Hill . .
905 „
I
GEOLOaY AND SURFACE FEATURES.
13
dangerous by shoals and sand-banks. Marshes and shelving beaches are frequent
along it, and the cliffs being for the most part composed of chalk, clay, or sand,
and unable to resist the assaults of the ocean, crumble away. In many places the
sea gains upon the land rapidly.
Very different are the features of the western coast. Its contour exhibits far
greater variety. In Scotland more especially it is indented by numerous sea
lochs, bounded by bold mountains, reminding us of the fiords of Norway. "Whilst
along the whole of the eastern coast there is but one island of any note, the western
coast of Scotland is skirted by the double chain of the Hebrides, the Isle of Man
occupies the centre of the Irish Sea, and Anglesey lies off the coast of Wales.
There are not wanting low sandy shores and tracts of marshy land, but bold cliffs
Fig. 7. — The Stack Rocks, South Wales.
form its characteristic feature. Being composed of solid rocks, these headlands are
better able to resist the wasting action of the sea than are the soft cliffs along the
east coast. Yet that waste, however slow, is going on here also is proved by
the detached masses of rock known as " Needles " or " Stacks," which stand apart
from the cliffs from which tbey have been severed by the erosive action of the
tides and waves.
The south-east coast of England resembles the east, but the western rises into
bold cliffs of old red sandstone and granite. It is deficient in natural harbours,
and cliffs of chalk alternate with stretches of marsh and flat tracts of clay ; but
immediately to the west of Selsey Bill the safe roadstead of Spithead opens out
between the mainland and the Isle of Wight, communicating with the spacious
harbour of Portsmouth and the well- sheltered estuary leading up to Southampton.
THE BEITISH ISLES.
Chatham and Portsmouth as a great naval station.
If we now turn to a consideration of the principal features of Ireland, we
JlZ thai they differ essentially from those presented by the more favoured
Itter Island. Less 'varied in its contour, it exhibits likewise greater simplicity in
Fig. 8.— Plymouth Sound and the Hamoaze.
From an Admiralty Chart. Scale 1 : 150.000.
//
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28
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2 Miles.
its geological structure. Broadly speaking, it may be described as consisting of a
great central plain of carboniferous limestone, stretching across from sea to sea,
and bounded in nearly all directions by mountain masses composed of tbe most ancient
geological formations.* The highlands of the north-east, north-west, and west
consist of the same crystalline and Silurian rocks which are so extensively developed
in Scotland. The south-eastern highlands likewise consist of Silurian strata pene-
trated by granite, and overlying Cambrian rocks, thus repeating the features which
* E. Hull, "The Physical Geology and Geography of Ireland."
EIVERS AND LAKES.
15
distinguish North-western Wales, on the other side of St. George's Channel. But
whilst in Wales the old red sandstone occupies the region to the east of the more
ancient rocks, it extends in Ireland to the south-west, rising into a succession of
ranges, amongst which lies the culminating point of the entire island.*
The geological formations which in Great Britain intervene between the old
red sandstone and the upper tertiary beds are in Ireland either wanting alto-
gether, or occur only sparingly, being confined to the north-east of the island, where
they crop out beneath the vast sheet of basalt which forms the striking scenery
along the coast of Antrim.
In its coast-line Ireland presents features analogous to those of Great Britain.
The eastern coast is mostly flat, and obstructed by sunken rocks and sand-banks,
Fig. 9. — Comparative Size of some British and Foreign Lakes.
IH-ELAND. SCOTLAND. C0MBRIA14 WALES.
Lo5;uiV. Lower' L.^Ree ^-^^^^asU ^ W'.s.
L . Lomond
whilst the western coast, facing the open Atlantic, abounds in deep inlets, or
fiords, separated by rocky peninsulas terminating in bold headlands. There are
many excellent harbours, but, owing to their remoteness from seats of industry,
they are little frequented.
Rivers and Lakes.
Compared with the rivers of Continental Europe, those of Great Britain are inferior
in length of course, volume, and the extent of the basins they drain ; but when we
consider the facilities they ofi'er for navigation, those of England, at all events,
* Culminating summits in Ireland : —
North-eastern highlands, Slieve Donard (Mourne) 2,796 feet.
North-western highlands, Errigal (Donegal) 2,466 „
Western highlands, Muilrea (Mayo) 2,688 „
South-eastern highlands, Lugnaquilla (Wicklow) 3,039 „
South-western highlands, Carrantuohill (Kerry) 3,414 „
jg THE BRITISH ISLES.
are to be preferred. Rising in hills and uplands of moderate elevation, they
are less exposed to changes of level and floods than continental rivers whose sources
lie in rocky mountains, covered during part of the year with masses of snow.
Wales and Scotland are less favourably situated in this respect. Their rivers,
unlike those of England, rise amongst elevated hills, and traverse narrow
Fiff 10 —The River Basins of the British Isles.
valleys, their rapid course being often impeded by ledges of rocks. The rain runs
quickly off the impervious rocks which occupy the greater part of their drainage
basins, and hence they are liable to sudden overflowings. All this renders them
unfit for navigation. The rivers of Ireland resemble those of England, in as far
as they generally flow through a flat country, are rarely rapid, and seldom inter-
rupted by cataracts ; but they difler from them in frequently traversing lakes.
CLIMATE.
17
The largest of these is Lough Neagh, which covers an area of 156 square miles,
whilst Loch Lomond, the most extensive Highland lake, only spreads over 45.
But size is not beauty, and few of the lakes of Ireland can compare with
those of the Highlands and the Cumbrian hills in their picturesque surroundings.
Yet even the largest of the Irish lakes is insignificant if we contrast it with the
vast sheets of fresh water met with in other countries, more especially in North
America.
A line drawn through Great Britain to mark the water-parting between the rivers
which empty into the German Ocean and those flowing towards the west will be
found to divide the island into two unequal portions, the larger of which lies to the
east. Nearly all the great rivers flow in that direction, the Severn forming
the only notable exception. In Ireland, on the other hand, the drainage is prin-
cipally to the westward and southward, the Boyne being the only river of any
importance which flows into the Irish Sea.*
Climate.
Great are the advantages which the British Isles derive from the mildness and
equability of their climate. Washed by the tepid waters which move slowly from
the tropical seas towards the Arctic Ocean, they form part of the domain of the
Atlantic, whose humid atmosphere envelops them. Nowhere else in the world,
except in the Faroe Isles and on the western coast of Norway, does the actual
temperature differ to the same extent from the temperature which might be looked
for from the geographical position of the country with reference to the equator.
In no other instance do the isothermal lines sweep so far to the northward. The
mean annual temperature of Ireland, under lat. 52° N., is the same as that of the
eastern coast of America, 980 miles farther south, under lat. 38°, and the winters
in the extreme north of Scotland are as mild as in the New World, 20° of latitude
nearer to the equator.
* The principal river basins of the British Islands, including all those having an area of over 1,000
square miles :-
Area in Length
Sq. Miles, in Miles.
Great Britain : Western Watershed.
Severn 8,119 186
Severn proper 4,350
Avon of Bristol .... 891
Wye 1,609
Area in Length
Sq. Miles, in Miles.
Eastern Watershed.
1,190
765
2,250
645
1,870
1,083
GrREAT Britain
Spey
Dee of Aberdeen .
Tay
Forth ....
Tweed ....
Tyne
Humber 9,293
Trent 4,052
Ouse 4,207
Witham 1,050
Nen 1,055
Great Ouse . 2,766
Yare and Waveney 1,210
Thames and Medway .... 5,935
96
87
107
60
96
73
204
167
vn
89
99
156
81
215
Great Britain : Southern Watershed.
Avon of Salisburv 1.132 67
Usk
Mersey .
Eden . .
Clyde .
158
62
135
65
85
540
1,722
995 69
1,580 98
Ireland.
Boyne 1,040 70
Earrow, Suir, and Nore . . . 3,555 119
Blackwater 1,284 104
Shannon. 6,060 225
Corrib 1,212 64
Erne 1,689 64
Foyle 1,129 73
Bann 2,242 85
18
THE BEITISH ISLES.
In summer, when the temperature of the air is higher than that of the ocean,
the latter exercises a moderating influence upon the degree of heat, more especially
in the west. Only in the inland counties and on part of the east coast do we meet
with features reminding us of a continental climate. The temperature during
that season decreases with a considerable degree of uniformity from 63° Fahr., in
the Thames valley, to 54° in the Orkneys, and the isothermals run across the
country from east to west.
Very different are the climatic conditions of winter, for it is then that the tepid
waters of the Atlantic, by considerably raising the temperature of the air, exercise
Fig. 11.— Isothermal Lines for July and January.
According to Alexander Buchan.
'SoyVoPGir
Temperature of July.
Temperature of January.
more powerfully their beneficent influence. The isothermal lines, instead of turn-
ing east and west, then almost follow the direction of the meridians, and the mean
temperature of the Orkney Islands is hardly inferior to that of London, situated
over 500 miles to the south. In the eastern part of Great Britain, and more
especially in that portion of it which lies between the Naze and the Firth of Forth,
the winter is coldest, owing to the greater exposure to easterly winds blowing from
the ice-clad plains of the continent, as well as to the lower temperature of the
German Ocean,* whilst the warm westerly winds are shut out by meridional
• Temperature of the Atlantic in January, on the north-west coast of Scotland, U° Fahr or 5°
warmer than the air. Temperature of the northern part of the German Ocean, 41°, or 2° warmer than
the air.
CLIMATE. 19
mountain ranges. January is a far colder month on the banks of the Thames than
in the Hebrides, and plants which the frosts of Middlesex would kill flourish
in these islands in the open air, even in midwinter.* Yet it happens but
rarely that the larger rivers become ice-bound, and a sight such as the Thames
presented in February, 1814, when it was frozen over above London Bridge, and
placards announced that there was a ''safe pathway over the river to Bankside,"i8
not likely to be seen again, since it was due in some measure to old London Bridge,
with its narrow arches, which now no longer obstructs the free passage of the river.
The winter temperature is mildest on the southern coasts of Devonshire and Corn-
wall, and there the myrtle and other sub-tropical plants flourish in the open air all
the year round.
Snow and ice are known, of course, and the quantity of the former which
occasionally falls in Northern England and in the Scotch Highlands is great.
It is rare, however, for the thermometer to fall below 18° Fahr., and rarer still
for such a degree of cold to continue for any length of time. The difference
between the mean temperature of the coldest and warmest months hardly ever
exceeds 25° Fahr., and in South-western England it does not amount to 19° Fahr.
This is very little when compared with places on the continent, for at Paris
and Rome it amounts to 30° Fahr., at Berlin to 36° Fahr., and at Vienna to
40° Fahr. The daily range of the summer temperature in Shetland, the Orkneys,
and the Hebrides, which enjoy perhaps the most insular climate in Europe, is only
about 10° Fahr. On the west shore of Great Britain it rises to 12° and 14° Fahr.,
in the central districts to 15° Fahr., and in the south to 20° Fahr. At Paris and
other places on the continent it is much higher, f
The direction of the winds naturally exercises an important influence upon
temperature, no less than upon the distribution and amount of rain. The westerly
winds, which preponderate throughout the year, and more especially in summer
and autumn, carry with them the warmth and moisture of the Atlantic. Easterly
* Ramsay, " Physical Geography and Geology of the British Isles."
t Mean TEMPERATtrRE in Degrees Fahrenheit.
Latitude.
Sandwich (Orkneys) . . 59°5'
Aherdeen 57°9'
Glasgow 55°oV
Edinburgh 55°27'
Carlisle 5i°5i'
York 63°51'
Manchester 53°29'
Liverpool 5 3° 25'
Dublin 53°21'
Birmingham . . . . 52°o5'
Limerick 52''39'
Oxford 5r46'
Swansea SFSS'
London ol°SO'
Gosport 60°47'
Plymouth 50°22'
Penzance 50° 7'
Winter.
39-1°
Sprin|.
43-9°
Summer.
54-3°
Autumn.
47-5°
Year.
46-2°
Difference be-
tween coldest
and warmest
Month.
17-2°
38-9
48-2
57-3
49-9
48-6
22-6
39-7
46-5
60-1
44-4
47-7
23-0
38-4
450
57-1
47-8
47-1
21-3
37-2
454
57-4
47-8
47-0
22-3
36-3
49-4
62-4
48-6
49-2
24-8
38-3
47-4
59-8
49-7
48-8
24-1
41-3
49-3
61-1
51-5
60-8
21-7
40-6
48-5
61-0
500
50-0
17-7
38-8
49-0
61-5
50-4
50-0
25-2
41-6
48-5
58-6
49 2
49-5
18-7
37-0
47-2
60-4
50-0
48-6
24-2
4o-5
49-7
63-7
56-0
53-7
24-4
39-5
49-1
62-9
51-8
50-8
26-7
40-0
50-1
62-7
53-4
51-8
25-0
44-9
49-7
60-9
52-9
521
17-4
44-2
49-3
60-9
52-7
51-8
19-5
20
THE BRITISH ISLES.
winds are most frequent between January and May. They are dry and cold,
checking the vegetation in spring, and are frequently productive of those dense
fogs which have given the British climate so unenviable a reputation.
To the annual amount of rain, and its distribution over the year, the British
Isles are largely indebted for their fertility, and under this beneficent influence
even naturally sterile tracts, which in many other countries would present an
aspect of desolation, become covered with a carpet of verdure, and afi'ord at least
succulent pasturage to sheep. Even in the eastern counties, which are less
exposed to the westerly moisture-laden winds, the rainfall is ample, and numerous
rivers and rivulets irrigate the soil. On an average far more rain falls than in
France,* and though, owing to the greater humidity of the atmosphere, the
amount of evaporation is less, the area occupied by marshes is of small extent
In England this circumstance is due to the undulations of the soil, which
Fig. 12.-
Diagram exhibiting
THE Annual March
OF Temperat
UBE.
'de^g.
jan.
Febr.
March.
April.
May.
June.
July.
Aug.
Sept.
Oct.
Nov.
Dec.
^ .
^
oA
'V^-S
^^« ^^
;/^-
^-iJ
>s
-dU—
.)
T-" r.j
j^\ u fc
-^..
.0°/-
■ >
,r>/o
-^^^
\,
A^'
^-■---.
\"'
J
/''' /
'^^^' .
■3^
\--
' \ ■*-
Kl\°
//
/.-
' yk>-
\^y
\
^\\ "
"^••s
/
//- .
'^<^^'
^'\
,c»
^' y.
-4v-°
\
\. " .
•-?«-.,
aea....
-.•-r.*-'.":
::-.^
r-g<0-v
^5
k\.
y .
y\
^*^^
^^
yy
^
^^-*.
s:~->^
/"^^..^
^
82°
facilitate the drainage of the land ; whilst in Ireland the surplus waters collect
in lakes, occupying rocky cavities, or are sucked up by peat bogs, without filling
the air with, pestiferous miasmata.
The rainfall is most considerable in the west, because the mountain ranges
extending north and south intercept the westerly winds which travel across the wide
expanse of the Atlantic, and compel them to part with most of the moisture they
carry. In Ireland the quantity of rain increases gradually as we proceed from the
west to the east coast, and the same phenomenon, on a larger scale, may be observed
in Great Britain. Nowhere else is the influence which mountain ranges exercise
upon the distribution of rain more strikingly exhibited, its amount being in every
case most considerable along the western slope. At Whitehaven, which lies at
the western foot of the Cumbrian hUls, the annual fall of rain is 47 inches, whilst
* Average rainfall in France (Delesse)
M M Oreat Britain
„ „ Ireland
30 inches.
33 „
36 „
CLIMATE.
21
at York, beyond the Pennine range, it is only 29 inches. Still more considerable
are the differences between the lowlands and the mountainous districts. In the
west of Great Britain and in Ireland, in the immediate neighbourhood of high
hills, the average rainfall is from 80 to 150 inches, and in certain localities it is
higher. Thus at the Stye, in Cumberland, 950 feet above the level of the sea,
224 inches of rain fell in 1866, a quantity immensely in excess of what has been
recorded in any other part of the temperate zone, and exceeded only by the
downpour at certain localities lying within the topics.*
It was Mr. Dalton who first observed that the rainfall in the British Isles is
most considerable in autumn, and not in summer, as in Central Europe. There
are, however, a few stations where, owing to local causes, the maximum occurs in
winter or in summer.
The variability and uncertainty of the climate of Great Britain are frequently
dwelt upon as a great disadvantage, but a dispassionate inquiry, and, above all, a
comparison with other lands, popularly supposed to be more favourably circum-
stanced, must convince us that there are equal countervailing advantages. Sudden
changes of temperature and moisture may prove hurtful in the case of certain
diseases, but the climate upon the whole is favourable to the development of the
physical powers, and hence of the moral and intellectual endowments of man.
King Charles II. was not far wrong when, in answer to some disparaging remarks
of his courtiers, who extolled the climates of Italy, Spain, and France, at the
expense of that of England, he said he thought "that was the best climate
where he could be abroad in the air with pleasure, or at least without trouble and
inconvenience, the most days of the year and the most hours of the day ; and this
he thought he could be in England more than in any other country in Europe." t
.* Average Eainfall in Inches.
Winter. Spring. Summer. Autumn. Year.
Eastern slope of Great Britain : —
EdinlDurgh 5-8 5-3 6-7 T'i 25
York 5-1 5-1 7-1 11-4 28
Oxford 4-8 4-5 7*1 7-3 23
London 4-0 3-8 5-6 5-8 19
HuU 3-2 2-1 7-0 5-8 18
South Coast : —
Gosport 8-2 6-9 7'1 10-1 32
Penzance 14-1 9*4 8-4 14-0 45
Western slope of Great Britain : —
Liverpool 7*3 6*2 9-8 10-8 34
Manchester 8*1 6-9 9-9 10-6 35
Lancaster 11-2 6-4 112 11*7 40
Kendal 16-1 9-6 12-7 15-3 53
Seathwaite (Borrowdale) . . 43-0 22-8 33*2 43-2 142
Whitehaven 12-7 7-1 13-7 13-8 47
Glasgow 5-3 3-7 6-4 5*8 21
Ireland : —
West Port 12-3 117 11-7 10-1 45
Limerick 7*7 7-1 9-3 lO'l 34
Armagh 9-6 6-8 8-9 9-4 34
Duhlin 6-8 5-9 8-1 8-5 29
t Sir W. Temple, Works, iii. p. 220.
22 THE BRITISH ISLES.
The influence of this cUmate upon the animal creation, and even upon the
vegetable kingdom, is as favourable as upon the human constitution. The
warmth of summer is never so great, nor is its accession so sudden, as to occasion
a too rapid development or too high excitement of organized bodies; nor the cold
of winter so extreme as to depress their vitality to an injurious degree. The
natural formation, soil, and cultivation, with few exceptions, prevent the generation
of marsh effluvia, whilst the fresh and strong westerly winds which prevaol,
Fig. 13.— Eain Map of the British Isles.
According to Symons. Scale 1 : 10,600,000.
ENGLISH
W.oF Or
fTTTTm UTTMim ■■
Under 25 in. 26 to 30 in. 80 to 40 in 40 to 45 in. 45 to 75 in. Over 75 in.
100 Miles.
owiDg to the position of the country, cause a continued renewal of the atmosphere,
even in the closest and most crowded streets of the manufacturing towns.*
These climatic conditions have, moreover, vastly contributed to make the
British Isles a geographical whole, and in amalgamating the various races by
whom they are inhabited. In most other countries migration is attended with
considerable risk, and a period of acclimatization has usually to be passed through.
In Great Britain the natives of either England or Scotland may exchange homes
* MacCulloch, " Statistical Account of the British Empire," i.
FLORA. 28
without being inconvenienced to the same extent as would Bretons or Proven9al8
under similar circumstances. On the other hand, foreigners born under brighter
skies generally complain about the paleness of the sun, and of the fogs, which in
some of the towns, where they are impregnated with the smoke rising from thou-
sands of chimneys, are very dense, and hinder the free circulation of the air.
Flora. /
In its main features the British flora resembles that of Continental Europe, with
a strong intermingling of American species, increasing in number as we travel
towards the west. There are only a few plants not indigenous to Continental
Europe, of which the most remarkable is the jointed pipe wort, or Eriocaulon
septangular Cy a native of tropical America, found in the Isle of Skye and in the
west of Ireland, whither the gulf- stream has carried it.
The researches of botanists have clearly established the fact that the existing
flora is the outcome of successive floral invasions which transpired during the
tertiary age, whilst the British Islands still formed a part of the neighbouring
continent. The first of these invasions of surviving species took place probably in
the eocene age, and is confined to the hilly parts of South-western Ireland. It is
an alpine flora, quite distinct from the flora of the Scotch and "Welsh mountains,
and has been traced to the Western Pyrenees. A second botanical province
embraces Devonshire and Cornwall, South Wales, and a considerable portion of
Southern Ireland. When this flora first obtained, a footing upon the British Isles a
barrier must have stretched across what is now the English Channel to Brittany and
Normandy. Some of its most characteristic species are the beautiful ciliated heath,
the purple spurge, and the graceful Sibthorpia. A third invasion took place when
England was joined to the north of France. This flora is more especially deve-
loped in the chalk districts of South-eastern England. To this succeeded, during
the glacial period, an invasion of alpine plants, principally from Norway, which
survive on the hills of Wales, Northern England, and Scotland. When the
glaciers finally melted away, and the land emerged anew, there occurred the
fifth invasion, the last in order of time, but the most important in its influence on
the character of British vegetation. This invasion emanated from Germany, at
that period joined to the British Isles by a wide plain stretching across the southern
portion of the North Sea. This hardy flora rapidly spread over the country,
where it found a congenial soil ; it invaded Scotland and Ireland, mingled with
the floras of more ancient date, and pushed them back to the west and south-west.
Though Europe has played the principal part in giving to the British Isles
their vegetable clothing, America, too, has contributed a share ; but whilst the
European species migrated by land, those of American origin were carried to these
shores, as to the coast of Norway, through the agency of the gulf-stream, and
hence they are most numerous on the Hebrides, the Orkneys, and the Shetland
Islands, where they outnumber European species.
Climate has exercised a paramount influence upon the distribution of British
24
THE BEITISH ISLES.
plants. The cool summer prevents the ripening of many fruits which flourish in
countries having a far lower mean annual temperature, whilst the mildness of winter
has rendered it possible to naturalise many plants of southern climes, which the cold
winter of the north of Continental Europe would kill. Apricots, peaches, and grapes
only ripen, with rare exceptions, when afforded the shelter of a wall ; yet myrtles
and other evergreens flourish in the open air, and the strawberry-tree {Arbutus
unedo), with its rich foliage and red berries, forms a charming feature in the
woods of Killarney. Many exotics, including even natives of the tropics, have
been successfully introduced, and add to the beauty of pleasure grounds and
Fig. 14.-— Yuccas on Tkesco (Scillt Islands^.
parks. Cacti grow in the rocks near Torquay ; the American aloe flourishes in
Salcombe Bay ; magnolias from South America, proteas from the Cape, and
camellias from Japan, are successfully cultivated ; and on Tresco, one of the Scilly
Islands, we meet with a fine avenue of yuccas. But ornamental plants are not
the only exotics, for most of the bread corns, including wheat, barley, and rye ;
the potato ; much of the produce of the kitchen gardens ; and many other plants
now widely cultivated, have been derived from other and warmer climates.
In Roman and Saxon times a considerable part of the country was covered
with forests, formed, as now, of oaks and beeches, birches and Scotch firs,
FLOEA.
25
almost to the exclusion of other trees. Most of these forests have either wholly-
disappeared, or have been considerably reduced in size. Extensive woods survive,
however, in portions of Scotland and England, the most famous being the New
Forest in Hampshire, Dean Forest in Gloucestershire, and Sherwood Forest in
Nottinghamshire. There the lover of nature may still ramble beneath woodland
Fig. 16.— An English Homestead.
trees, whilst elsewhere, though the name of " forest " is retained, the trees have
disappeared to make room for fields and pastures ; and though Great Britain
does not equal certain continental countries in the extent of its forests, it is
still appropriately described as a " woody region." From the southern shore of
England to the foot of the Grampians, beyond the Clyde and the Tay, and
for several hundred feet up the slopes of the mountains, this woody region
26
THE BKITISH ISLES.
stretches. It is eloquently described by Mr. Watson* as - an undulating plain of
meadows, pastures, and cultivated fields, separated from each other by hawthorn
hedges or stone walls, and thickly interspersed with parks, woods, gardens, towns,
and high-roads, altogether betokening a climate where man may attain a high state
of civilisation, and live for ease and pleasure, as well as for laborious occupations.
It is the region where the trees flourish, and the flowers, rendered classic by our poets,
bloom, and is not less loved by many of us, because their very commonness has
made them familiar by vernacular names, without the aid of botanical systems or
a dead language. It is, jt)«r excellence, the land of the daisy and cowslip, the oak
and hawthorn, the hazel copse and the woodbine bower : the region of fruits and
flowers, where the trees of the forest unite a graceful beauty with strength and
majesty, and where the fresh greensward of the pasture, commingling with the
yellow waves of the corn-field, tells to us that here at least
' The cheek of Spring
Smiles in the kiss of Autumn.'
" Black swampy moors, such as deface so large a portion of the next, or barren,
region, are in this of comparatively rare occurrence and small extent. The downs
and chases in early spring are covered with the countless blossoms of the golden
gorse, or the more gaudy broom, and empurpled with the different kinds of heath
during summer and autumn. Little, indeed, as we may regard these shrubs, in
Sweden and North Russia the gorse is prized as we prize the myrtles of the
south ; and our common heaths are unknown over a wide extent of Europe. The
oak, ash, yew, hornbeam, alders, elms, poplars, and willows are the principal native
trees of this region ; the first four gradually yielding to the pine, white birch, and
mouiitain ash as we approach the higher portion, forming the upland zone. The
beech, sycamore, and Spanish chestnut have been introduced, and the first two now
spring up self-sown and readily. A climate in which the heat of summer is rarely
excessive, and where rain and clouds are so frequent, is unadapted to the spon-
taneous growth of fruits, and we accordingly find our native productions poor in
the extreme. The wild cherry, crab, bullace, and native pear are the arborescent
fruit trees. The raspberry, strawberry, blackberry, sloe, hazel nut, hip and haw,
form a very indifferent catalogue for our shrubby and herbaceous fruit plants. The
cranberry, bilberry, and crowberry, with the fruit of the mountain ash and juniper,
common to this and the barren region, are greatly surpassed by one fruit, almost
peculiar to the latter, viz. the cloudberry. Lastly, the different kinds of goose-
berries and currants cultivated in our gardens are probably derived from species
indigenous to Britain, and are very apt to spring up in our woods and hedges from
translated seeds."
When we leave these smiling lowlands, so characteristic of England, we pass
through an upland affording excellent pasturage for sheep and cattle, and finally
enter the barren tracts of moorlands and peat bogs, which cover a wide area in the
Highlands of Scotland, no less than in the mountain regions of England and Wales.
* " Distribution of British Plants."
FAUNA. 27
Fauna.
The British fauna has undergone many vicissitudes in the course of ages. Not
only have large mammals, which we know to have been the contemporaries of pre-
historic man, perished, but even during historical times, as civilisation progressed,
and land was more and more brought under cultivation, several wild animals
have been exterminated. Of the existence of such southern types as the cave lion,
the hippopotamus, the mammoth, and hyena, or of the northern reindeer and the
great Irish deer, we only possess records furnished by deposits in caverns and river
gravels. The wild ox, a fierce and powerful animal of white colour, which
abounded in the time of the Romans, still browses in Hamilton Forest, near
Cadzow Castle, in Lanarkshire, and in a few other parks, but it is virtually extinct
as a wild animal. British bears, which excited much admiration at Rome, were
last heard of in the eleventh century, when a Gordon, as a reward for his valour in
killing one, was granted three bears' heads as a coat of arms. The wolf, during
Anglo-Saxon times, was a most destructive animal, and, to encourage its exter-
mination, wolves' tongues were accepted in expiation of certain crimes, and in
payment of the tribute exacted from the Welsh. But it survived, for all that, for
many centuries afterwards, and the last was killed in Scotland in 1680, and in
Ireland only in the beginning of the eighteenth century. The wild boar was
extirpated at the time of the Civil War, having been preserved up till then as a
favourite animal of chase. The beaver, even at the time when Giraldus Cambrensis
travelled in Wales, in 1188, had become scarce, and was confined to a few rivers
of that principality ; and birds, though far better able than land animals to elude
their pursuers, have become extinct almost within the memory of man. The original
capercailzie, or great cock of the wood, still frequent in Europe, and formerly in
the fir woods of Scotland and Ireland, has not been seen since 1760, whilst the great
bustard {Otis tarda) has disappeared more recently. The latter had its last home
on the downs of Wiltshire.
The only wild carnivorous quadrupeds still forming part of the British fauna
are the fox, the badger, the otter, the weasel, the polecat, the stoat, the marten,
and the wild cat. All of these have become scarce, and the fox, at all events,
would have been exterminated long ago, if it were not for the protection extended
to it by the lovers of field sports.
The ruminating animals are represented by the stag, or red deer, the roebuck,
and the fallow deer, the latter now extending to Ireland. The stag is confined
to the Highlands of Scotland, Exmoor Forest, and the woods of Killarney, but
formerly its range was far more extensive. Amongst gnawing animals are the
hare, rabbit, squirrel, and dormouse, together with a large variety of rats and
mice, whilst the insect eaters include the hedgehog and the mole, which are general
in fields and heaths throughout England.
Very considerable is the number of birds, not in species only, but also in
individuals, and since legislation has spread its sheltering mantle over most of
them, the day when British woods and fields will be without their feathered
28 THE BRITISH ISLES.
songsters is probably a very remote one. Many of these birds are stationary ;
others only visit the British Isles during part of the year. Amongst stationary
birds are many sweet songsters — including, thrushes, finches, linnets, blackbirds,
and skylarks — robins and sparrows, rooks, crows, and starlings, the latter
devouring prodigious quantities of slugs, worms, &c., so noxious to the farmer,
whilst others render themselves equally useful by keeping within bounds the
myriads of insects. In this task they are aided by numerous songsters and
other birds which arrive as the heralds of spring, and return to more congenial
climates in the fall of the year. Amongst these birds of passage are the swallow,
the cuckoo, the martin, the quail, the stork (a very rare visitor), and the nightin-
gale, which occasionally extends its wanderings as far as Yorkshire, but never
crosses over to Ireland. Other birds, whose breeding-places are in the arctic
regions, visit the British Islands in winter. Most prominent among these are
fieldfares, woodcocks, snipes, swans, ducks, geese, and a variety of aquatic birds.
Amongst game birds the partridge, the black grouse or heath-fowl, and the red
grouse or moorfowl are the most common, the first named increasing with extend-
ing cultivation, whilst the latter two are confined to the wild moorlands of
Northern England, Scotland, and Ireland. The ptarmigan, which had a wide
range formerly, occurs now only in the wildest parts of Scotland and in the
Hebrides. The pheasant, like most of the domesticated birds, is of foreign origin.
Birds of prey become scarcer every day, but the golden eagle still frequents
the high mountain regions, whilst the sea eagle is common along the western
shore, from the Shetland Islands as far as South Wales.
Frogs and toads abound in certain localities, but reptiles proper are very scarce,
being confined to lizards, efts, harmless snakes, and the common viper, or adder,
the latter alone being venomous. In Ireland there are no snakes.
The seas and rivers, as far as they are not polluted by the refuse of factories
and towns, abound in fish, Crustacea, and molluscs. Amongst sea fish the most
highly valued are the cod, turbot, mackerel, herring, pilchard, sole, and haddock,
whilst the rivers and lakes, more especially in Scotland and Ireland, yield salmon,
trout, char, and other fish. English oysters were so greatly esteemed in antiquity
that they were sent to Rome, and ''natives" have lost none of their reputation at
the present day.
Inhabitants.
Of the earliest history of man as an inhabitant of the British Isles there exist
only geological records, and these tend to prove that his first advent dates back to
a time antecedent to the great glacial epoch,* but that he returned to more
congenial lands as the gluciation proceeded. By degrees he adapted himself to
the severity of the climate, and, like the Greenlander of our own time, lived in
comparative comfort on the edges of glaciers and snow-fields. That he was a
contemporary of the mammoth and other mammals now extinct is sufficiently
proved by the discovery of his rude implements associated with the bones of these
* Ramsay, " Physical Geology and Geography of Great Britain."
INHABITANTS. 29
animals. The famous Wookey Hole, near Wells, yielded the bones of various
carnivorous animals, including the hyena, the wolf, and the bear, as well as
those of the mammoth, rhinoceros, reindeer, Bos primigenius, gigantic Irish deer,
and horse, together with rudely shaped implements made of flint and burnt bones.
Similar remains have been unearthed in other caves and in older valley gravels,
the implements in these instances being of rude workmanship, such as are
usually assigned to the palaeolithic or old stone age. Far more frequent, how-
ever, has been the discovery of polished celts and other articles indicating a
higher stage of civilisation. These relics of the neolithic age occur everywhere
throughout the British Isles, from Caithness to Cornwall, and from the east
coast of England to the west coast of Ireland. Even in the bleak Orkney and
Shetland Islands, and all over the Inner and Outer Hebrides, they have been
met with.* Neolithic man was associated with a mammalian fauna very difi'erent
from that of the palaeolithic age, its most characteristic members being dogs, horses,
pigs, several breeds of oxen, the bison, the red deer, and the great Irish deer.
Still further and fuller evidence of the presence of prehistoric man is furnished
by sepulchral barrows, cairns, and cromlechs, and by the remains of human
habitations. The most interesting amongst these latter are the crannoges, so
abundant in Ireland and Scotland. The first of these lake dwellings was dis-
covered in 1839, in the small Lake of Lagore, near Dunshaughlin, in the county
of Meath. Besides the bones of domestic animals, it yielded weapons and other
articles made of stone, bone, wood, bronze, iron, and silver, thus proving that it must
have been inhabited from the most remote to a comparatively recent period ; and
in reality some of these Irish lake dwellings served as places of refuge down
to the middle of the seventeenth century. Those crannoges are not constructed
on piles over the water, like the lake dwellings of Switzerland, but are placed
upon islands, in many instances artificial, and enclosed by a stockade of timber.
A narrow causeway generally connected them with the land, and boats cut out
of a single piece of oak have been found near them. The harrows, or artificial
mounds of earth erected for sepulchral purposes, as well as the cairm, or heaps
of stone piled up with the same objects, or as memorials, have furnished even
more interesting information on the ancient inhabitants of the country. Many
of them date back to prehistoric times, but others have been constructed since
the occupation of the country by Romans and Saxons. The oldest barrows are
of a longish shape ; the skulls found in them are, with scarcely an exception,
dolichocephalic ; and most of the implements are of polished stone, or neolithic.
Neither bronze nor iron weapons have been discovered in them. According to
Huxley, people by whom these barrows, as well as most of the chambered gallery
graves, were erected, were kinsmen of the Iberians and Aquitani.f They were
a dark people, and the Silures, who inhabited South-western England and the Cas-
siterides, or Tin Islands, belonged to them. They are described by Greek writers
as having curly hair and dark complexions, and as comparatively civilised in their
* James Geikie, "The Great Ice Age."
t " Critiques and Addresses," 1873.
^„ THE BRITISH ISLES.
habits Of this dark race no trace exists at the present day, except perhaps in
'^^:^'^r^:Z:^^^^ -possessed these .r..r
.hlrts 0. the .ost fertile --ts .^ -.ej^^^^^^^^ .^ra^ tl
n =ed l: Sir = :Z:t:^ .- o^er- -. 0.
Sand and Scotland'as far as the Tay, and P^^^^P^ ;-^^?y?"5 J^^/^J
driving the Gaels into the more sterile mountainous parts and mto Ireland In
Western Wales the Gaels, or "Gwyddel," maintained the.r ground up to the
iTh century, when the last remnants sought a refuge amongst thexr kxnsmen n.
Fig. 16.-THE -GIA^•T•8 Quoit" at Lanyon. near Penzance.
Ireland; but long before that time the great TeutoDic immigration, which
thoroughly changed the character of the population of England, had commenced.
When Julius CaDsar landed in England, fifty-five years before the Christian
era, he found the coast in the occupation of blue- eyed, fair-haired Belgse, who
tilled the land, kept cattle, and made use of copper and iron rings for money.
The inland part, however, was inhabited by " those who, according to existing
tradition, were the aborigines of the island." These " inland people," Julius
CaDsar says in his " Commentaries," " for the most part do not sow corn, but
live on milk and flesh, and are clothed in skins. They all stain themselves with
woad, which makes them of a blue tinge, and gives them a fearful appearance in
INHABITANTS. 81
battle ; they also wear their hair long, and shave every part of the body except
the head and the upper lip. Every ten or twelve of them have their wives in
common, especially brothers with brothers, and parents with children ; but
if any children are born they are accounted the children of those by whom
each maiden was first espoused." Druidism flourished among these Britons as
vigorously as with their kinsmen in Gaul. Amongst these British tribes were
Morinii, Ehemi, and Atrebatii, as in Northern France. The Atrebatii were more
civilised than the others, and had grown wealthy through their agriculture and
industry.
The Roman occupation, however great its influence upon the progress of
civilisation, afiected but little the ethnical composition of the population. When
the great empire fell to pieces, and Britain became a prey to anarchy, the Teutonic
tribes of Northern Europe, who had long harassed its coasts, obtained a permanent
footing in it, exterminating or reducing to a state of servitude the inhabitants
whom they found dwelling there, or driving them to the sterile hilly districts.
Warlike Jutes established themselves on the Isle of Thanet, in Kent, on the Isle
of Wight, and on the coast of Hampshire ; Saxons, with kindred tribes from Lower
Germany, amongst whom the Friesians were the most prominent, occupied the
basin of the Thames as well as the coasts of Essex and Sussex, still named after
them ; Angles, from the southern part of the Cimbrian peninsula, drove the
Britons out of Central and Northern England. Later still an invasion of Danes
and Northmen took place, and last of all William the Conqueror, with his
fifty thousand French-speaking Normans, landed. No warlike invasion has taken
place since then, but the population of the British Islands, already of such
diverse origin, has repeatedly received fresh accessions of kindred or alien immi-
grants, and is receiving them annually, down to the present day. Religious
persecution drove thousands of Flemings and Frenchmen to the shores of England,
where they founded new industries, and in course of time amalgamated with
the people. Palatines settled in the country when driven from their homes
by the ruthless hosts of Louis XIY., and political refugees of all nations have
at all times found a secure asylum on British soil. The stock of the actual
population of the British Isles consists of northern types, viz. Celtic Britons
and Teutonic Saxons, Northmen, and kindred tribes. It is not in accordance
with facts to comprehend so mixed a people under the general term of Anglo-
Saxons, as if it had had no other ancestors than the Germanic invaders who came
from the banks of the Elbe and the Cimbrian peninsula. The name of Anglo-
Celts, suggested by Huxley and other anthropologists, is the only one by which
the people of England, no less than of the British Isles collectively, can be
appropriately designated. In ordinary conA^ersation, however, names are indif-
ferently made use of which, far from being synonyms, convey contradictory
notions as to the origin of the population. We speak of " Great Britain " as
distinguished from "Little Britain," or Bretagne, as if that island were still
in the sole occupation of Celtic Britons. On the other hand, the name of
"England," or "Land of the Angles," is geographically applied to the whole
32 THE BRITISH ISLES.
southern portion of Great Britain, and frequently used in a still more compre-
hensive sense.
But although the Anglo-Celtic population of the British Islands is upon the
whole a mixed one, it is not difficult to point out certain districts where one or
other of its constituent elements preponderates. In Western Ireland, in the
Highlands of Scotland, in the Cumbrian mountains, in Wales, and in Cornwall the
old Celtic type still maintains its ground ; Angles, Saxons, Friesians, and Jutes are
most numerous along the east coast, upon which their ancestors first efiected a
landing, and in the adjoining districts. The Danish element is strongly repre-
sented in the whole of the region, embracing fifteen counties, from Hertford to
Durham, which was formerly known as the district of the *' Danelagh," or Danish
Law. The Northmen preponderate in the northern parts of Great Britain.
Firmly established on the Orkneys, they founded colonies on the coasts of
Scotland, Cumberland, and Northumberland. As to the ancient masters and
settlers of the country, their memory survives in the names of rivers and moun-
tains, towns and villages.* Nearly all the river names are Celtic, being derived
from four words {afon, don, uisge, and dwr), aU meaning "river" or '* water."
The British Celts occupy the most remote districts of the British Isles,! whilst
the immigrants of Teutonic race have established themselves nearest to the con-
tinent. This geographical distribution of the two races has exercised a most potent
influence upon the history of Europe. Great Britain has been likened by Michelet +
to a huge ship which turns her prow towards France ; and this prow is occupied
by men of Teutonic origin, whilst the Celts are kept in the background, in remote
peninsulas and in Ireland. The contrast between the two nations dwelling on
either side of the Channel is abrupt, and without ethnical transition. France
formerly stood face to face with her enemy, whilst her natural allies of kindred
race were far away, and often beyond reach, and never were wars waged with
greater fury than those between the Saxon islander and the continental Gaul.
But, fortunately for mankind, this ancient hatred has died out, and a feeling of
mutual respect and friendship now animates the two neighbouring nations.
Happily for England, her intercourse with the remainder of the world has
not always been of a warlike nature. The British Isles are rich in deep and
spacious harbours — far more so than France ; and in comparing the coasts of the
two countries we may even say that "Father Ocean has a bias for England."
England, besides, enjoys the advantage of higher tides, which enable vessels of
* Kemble, " The Saxons in England; " Wright, " The Celt, the Roman, and the Saxon; " Skene,
« Celtic Scotland."
t Number of Celtic-speaking persons throughout the British Isles:—
Irish Gaels 867,600
Manxinen 12 500
Scotch Gaels 309,300
Cymri (Welsh) 996,500
Total . . . 2,185,900
Of the above about 457,000 cannot speak EngUsh. (E. G. Ravenstein, Journal of the Statistical Societv,
1879.) .
X " Histoire de France," ii.
INHABITANTS.
83
considerable burden to penetrate the estuaries of her rivers, almost to the heart of
the country. As long as the British Isles were thinly peopled, and produced
sufficient to supply the wants of the inhabitants, foreign commerce, as might have
been expected, did not attain considerable proportions. Yet London, even before
the arrival of the Eomans, engaged in maritime commerce, and during the Middle
Ages, whenever its citizens had a respite from civil commotions and foreign wars,
they resumed their commercial activity. The ancestors of many of the inhabitants
of the coast were hardy Northmen, and from them they inherited a love of maritime
adventure, and an eager longing to struggle with waves and tempests. Yet it
was not they who took the lead in those memorable discoveries which brought the
Fig. 17.— Gaeis and Cymri.
Di'striciff iny which/I 0 per ctmt>
oftka InhaiuanXje ■ipexLhCeUxjCA
n ^i
Mer cF Greenw
countries of the world nearer to each other, and converted a space without limits
into a simple globe, easily encompassed by man. The glory of having discovered
the ocean routes to the Indies and the Pacific was fated to be won by the
mariners of the more civilised nations of Southern Europe. But the seamen of
England quickly learnt to find out new ocean routes for themselves, and soon their
audacity and endurance placed them at the head of all their rivals. The expeditions
which they sent forth to the arctic regions to discover a north-west passage to
China, and which they still continue to equip, no longer for the sake of commerce,
but out of a pure love for science, are amongst the most heroic enterprises recorded
by history. But where one English vessel ventured into unknown seas, hundreds
84 THE BRITISH ISLES.
followed the routes already discovered, establishing commercial relations with
distant countries, destroying the factories of rival traders, and landing troops and
colonists. By degrees the admirable geographical position of England with
reference to Europe, America, and the whole of the habitable world revealed itself.
Its situation at the western extremity of the European continent marked it out as
the natural intermediary of the commerce carried on between the Baltic, Germany,
Netherlands, and France on the one hand, and America on the other ; and whilst
the trade winds and the equatorial current sped the progress of vessels sailing to
the West Indies, the gulf-stream facilitated their return to the shores of Europe.
London, as was first pointed out by Sir John Herschel, occupies very nearly the
geometrical centre of that hemisphere which embraces the greater part of the land,
and consequently no city is more favourably situated for attracting the world's
maritime commerce* This magnificent geographical position in a large measure
accounts for the commercial preponderance of England. English commerce grew
apace, but the English colonists established in distant countries never relaxed in
their efforts to extend it still farther. No colonising nation, the Dutch alone
excepted, has brought greater zeal and more sustained effort to bear upon the
work it had taken in hand ; and thus a small European people, numbering hardly
5,000,000 souls at the time it entered upon its career of conquest, has gradually
extended its dominions, until they embrace the sixth part of the habitable
globe, and close upon 300,000,000 human beings. In addition to this there are
wide territories in India, in . Arabia, in Africa, and elsewhere, which do not
officially form part of the British Empire, but where English influence is never-
theless paramount, and the request of an English consul is tantamount to a
command. Travellers who explore distant countries contribute in no small
degree to the extension of British influence, for whether they wish it or not, they
are looked upon as the representatives of British power, and the precursors of
conquering armies. There is not a country in the world where these British
travellers and explorers are not to be met with, either simply in search of
adventure, or anxious to do honour to the country of their birth by their dis-
coveries. Whilst artisans and labourers expatriate themselves, because in another
hemisphere they hope to acquire the comforts and independence they lack at
home, there are also thousands of the younger sons of the aristocracy whom no
responsibilities tie to the land of their birth, and who are at all, times ready to
exchange their place of abode. Deprived of a share in the paternal acres, they,
like modern Mamertines, take the whole earth for their domain, and turn their
backs upon the land which dispenses with their services.
And whilst mariners, colonists, and explorers discover and occupy new lands
beyond the ocean, the miners who remain at home explore the riches of an under-
ground world. British ships bring cotton, rice, and spices ; the miners raise coal
from the bowels of the earth, and it would be difficult to tell whose share of work
is most contributive towards an increase of British power. Huge industrial towns
* the hemisphere having London for its centre embraces 16-1 7ths of the land, that of which New
Zealand is the centre only l-17th.
INHABITANTS.
35
have arisen where formerly there stood only agricultural villages and walled
burghs : a manufacturing district of wide extent in the north serves as a counter-
poise to the agricultural region of Southern England. Birmingham, Sheffield,
Manchester, Leeds, and all the rising towns around them, are of spontaneous
growth, and not the creations of an all-directing capital. They lead their own life,
and each of them has become a centre of thought, independent of London. The
great industrial movement of our age has originated in these towns, and spread
thence over Europe and the whole world. We owe to them the application of new
processes of manufacture and the improvements of machinery, for the factories of
Lancashire and Yorkshire have served as patterns to similar establishments in other
parts of the world. English hydraulic engineers, who were content formerly to
follow in the wake of their Dutch colleagues, have struck out paths of their own,
Fig. 18. — The Bbitish Colonies.
rib. Guiana
iHtctn dtCuHhm
Cape Coiy
and we have seen that even in the Netherlands there exist now large works of
canalisation which they have carried out.
In the manufacturing districts of Great Britain smoke mingles so largely with
the atmosphere as to have wholly changed the aspect of nature. There are
towns where the heavens are permanently obscured by smoke, where the houses,
including even public buildings, most sumptuously furnished in the interior, are
covered with soot, and a shower of ''blacks" is for ever descending upon the
trees and lawns. The factories have thus, as it were, changed the climate ; but their
influence upon the social condition of the people has been even greater. They
have, more than any other agency of contemporaneous civilisation, influenced the
mode of life of the people, and laid the seeds of a great revolution. England, before
all other nations, found itself face to face with the formidable problem presented
by the modern proletariate. It is there that* the great masses are involved in the
36 THE BRITISH ISLES.
fluctuations of commerce; there that disputes between masters and workmen
have assumed the largest proportions, and the workmen's trades unions dispose
of the most considerable forces. Not an event takes place in Europe but its
effects are felt in the workshops of England. Not a change can be made in the
wages of the English factory hands without the labour markets of the whole world
immediately feeling the effect.
In addition to the direct influence which England brings so powerfully to
bear upon the destinies of other nations, it exerts, through its distant colonies,
an indirect influence of the utmost importance. Unhappily English colonisa-
tion has not always proved a benefit to the aboriginal populations whose countries
have been occupied. Where the English colonist sets his foot, the days of nomadic
tribes of fishermen and hunters are numbered, and even agricultural tribes do
not always survive contact with the civilisation forced upon them. True there
still exist nations beyond the pale of Europe at once too numerous and too far
advanced in civilisation to make us fear their extermination ; but the white man
has nevertheless violently intervened in their history, and none more decisively
than the Englishman and his American kinsman. It was they who forced the
people of Japan to take part in the movement of Western civilisation, and broke
down the barriers behind which China had entrenched herself. The vast multi-
tude inhabiting the peninsula of India obey the orders of the Empress-Queen seated
upon the banks of the Thames. A deep gulf still separates the haughty Englishman
from the timorous Hindu, and the time when the two will be able fully to enter
into each other's thoughts is probably very remote. Yet the presence of the
European conqueror has wrought greater changes in the material and social con-
ditions of the population of India than the twenty centuries which preceded his
reign. Railways, schools, and printing-presses have totally overthrown this
ancient world, and a new life is penetrating a society formerly strictly regulated
by caste and tradition. If ever the peoples of that beautiful peninsula should
learn to govern themselves, and to live side by side in peace and the enjoyment of
liberty, the first impulses will have come from England.
The increasing extension of the English language in civilised and barbarous
nations cannot fail to spread English ideas amongst men of various races.
M. Alphonse de CandoUe, in a well-known book,* develops an idea already
expressed before him by various authors, and insists upon the importance which
English must, in course of time, acquire as a universal language. It is spoken
not merely in the British Isles, but also in America, in Australia, in every centre of
commerce, and even in the most remote islands of the Pacific. In reality it
is the mother tongue of some 77,000,000 of human beings ; f but if we include
♦ '* Histoire des Sciences et des Savants depuis deux sifecles."
t Distribution of persons whose mother tongue is English : —
In Europe 34,000,000
In the Lmted States . 35,000,000
In British North America 3 300 OOO
In Australasia [ [ 2',75o',000
In South Africa 300,000
In other liiughsh Colonies 1 620 000
76;970,000"
INHABITANTS. 87
men of various races, Europeans and Americans, Africans, Chinese, Hindus, and
Malays, who understand English, and make more or less use of it, it will be found
that it has already become a vehicle for thought to at least 100,000,000 indi-
viduals. If, too, we bear in mind the rapid extension of the English-speaking
nations, and the ever-increasing importance of commercial interests, we may well
foresee a time when double this number will transact their business in the language
now spoken in the ports of Liverpool, New York, Sydney, and Calcutta. English
is far more highly favoured in this expansion than either the French, Russian, or
even the Spanish language, for there exist three great centres whence it spreads over
the entire world. The United States and Canada contribute as powerfully to its
extension as the mother country ; from Australia it gradually spreads over the
islands of the Pacific ; whilst in South Africa it gains ground amongst boers, Kaffirs,
and other natives of that continent. England and the English may almost be said
to lay siege to the habitable world. The Spanish language has only two centres of
dispersion, the Iberian peninsula and South America, and up till now, owing to
the commercial inferiority of the nations by whom it is spoken, it has exhibited but
little power of expansion As to French, though highly appreciated by all nations
of culture as a common means of communication in matters of science and art,
and in social and national intercourse, it has but one centre whence it can spread,
viz. France and Algeria, for French Canada and the Antilles are too unimportant
to make their influence felt afar.
English is thus without a rival in the rapidity with which it extends its domain.
It possesses, moreover, the advantage of belonging at one and the same time to
two distinct groups of languages. Germanic in its origin, spirit, and construction,
it also belongs to the Latin group, from which it has borrowed numerous words
relating to art, science, politics, and the ordinary affairs of life. It is possible to
meet with papers of a technical nature in which only the auxiliary verbs, prepo-
sitions, and conjunctions are of the old Anglo-Saxon stock. But good writers,
according to the subject they deal with, understand how to blend these words of
diverse origin, as the weaver knows how to arrange his threads when reproducing
a coloured pattern. Whilst French is easily acquired only by the Latin nations of
Southern Europe, English, owing to its double origin, presents no greater difficulties
to the Portuguese than to the Swede, to the Romanian than the German. It is
absolutely foreign only to the Slavs, who, in their intercourse with the inhabitants
of Western Europe, mostly make use of German or French ; but they, too, have
recently paid more attention to English, which the facility with which they acquire
foreign languages enables them to master quickly.
Besides the advantages derived from the ubiquity of the English-speaking
peoples, and the large number of synonyms — many words of Anglo-Saxon origin
having been supplemented by words from the Latin conveying a similar idea —
English possesses precious qualities as a universal language. It is distinguished,
above all, by the simplicity of its grammar and its expressive conciseness.
No other language has been mutilated to the same extent ; but has not this
phonetic change emancipated thought and favoured the solution of abstract ques-
38 THE BRITISH ISLES.
tions ?* English writers consequently congratulate themselves upon having delivered
their language from a " superannuated system of flexions." They are by no means
.sorry that in some respects it should resemble the monosyllabic, and in others the
agglutinate languages.! The want of conciseness is felt so much that in ordinary
conversation a long word is sometimes reduced to a single syllable, and initial
letters are substituted for proper names and titles. " What other language is there
so expressive and concise," says Ampere, " as that in which dog means ' to follow
some one's track like a dog in pursuit of its prey,' or where, in familiar language,
cut conveys the meaning of * appearing not to know some one in order to break off
an undesirable acquaintanceship ? ' " Poetical language is hardly ever capable
of being translated, and this applies more especially to English. The language
of Shakspere, Tennyson, and Byron is rich, powerful, vigorously precise, and
picturesque to such a degree that the task of adequately conveying its meaning in
other tongues is almost a hopeless one. All its vigour Vanishes in the process
of translation, and there remains but a body without a framework.
The ordinary speech of an Englishman, however, strikes a foreigner as being
anything but agreeable. He misses the distinct pronunciation of vowels, and finds
it monotonous, abounding in sibilants and even " explosives." There is none of the
sonorousness of the Southern languages, or of the clearness and pure pronunciation
of the French. 'No other language presents similar anomalies in its orthography,
which etymology and a respect for tradition have caused to be adhered to, although
in many instances it no longer corresponds with the language as it is spoken. Will
the excess of the evil bring about its cure, as several men of thought and intelli-
gence expect ? + At all events a reform of English spelling would facilitate the
acquisition of the language by foreigners, and improve its chances of becoming one
day the language of the entire world. There are bilingual countries even now
where the children at school are taught both languages, in order that they may
converse with all their fellow-countrymen. Would it be impossible to introduce
this system into every country of the world, and to teach an international language,
such as English, in addition to the mother tongue, embodying the national genius
and its aspirations ?
In the meantime civilisation in an English guise is rapidly gaining ground in
every part of the world, and mainly through the agency of its language. What
then, we may ask, is the ideal type of the powerful nation whose sons, scattered
broadcast over the face of the earth, essay to remodel mankind on the pattern of
Old England ? What moral influence has it already exercised upon other men,
and what good or evil fruit is it likely to bear in the future ?
The Englishman combines in a vigorous individuality the characteristics of the
Celt, the German, and the Dane. He is, above all others, distinguished for strength
of will, energy, and tenacity. He has something of the nature of the mastiff; which
would rather be cut to pieces than let go his hold. Military history abounds in
* Michel Breal, « Melanges de Mj-thologie et de Linguistique."
! SlfMmtT-TT?!-^'''^^^^ ElieReclus, " Ethnography ".('' Encyclopedia Britannica ").
+ Max Muller, On fepellmg {Fortnightly Review, vol. xix. New Series).
INHABITANTS. 89
examples of the steadiness exhibited by English soldiers in the field, their firmness
in battle, and unshaken fortitude under defeat. Even the coarse boxing-matches
now prohibited by law, but until recently admired by the multitude, bear witness
to the possession of an exuberancy of spirit. But though the Englishman loves
fighting for fighting's sake, he loves it still more because of the advantages that
may be derived from it. A barren victory, in mere satisfaction of his vanity, does
not content him, for he always aims at conquest. It has long been matter of
observation that he thinks more of the tangible advahtages resulting from a success
than his old rival on the other side of the Channel.* As depicted by himself, the
typical Englishman appears under the guise of "John Bull,'' a plain, irascible, but
good-natured old fellow, without taste,t but abounding in strong common sense, and
fond of his purse and stomach. " Jacques Bonhomme," by a remarkable contrast,
is represented as being lean, poor, and sad, whilst " John Bull " is fat, rich, and
jovial.
British energy, when exhibited for the personal advantage of individuals
struggling for existence, is often apt to degenerate into ferocity. An Englishman
desirous of making his way through a crowd pushes aside without ceremony those
who obstruct his progress. The independence of which he is so proud is often
nothing but an absolute want of sympathy for other8.+ If he yields to his natural
inclinations, he becomes hard, cold, and egotistic. Even in the presence of
strangers he frequently takes up the attitude of an enemy. His early national
history tells us of frightful cruelties committed in cold blood, and not, as in other
countries, in the exaltation of fanaticism or revenge. Abroad, whether he make
his appearance as an exacting and distant master, as a merchant eager to transact
business, or merely as a curious traveller enveloped in an atmosphere of frigidity,
he inspires no feelings of love. He is respected, and sometimes even admired, but
occasionally it happens that he is hated. He knows it, and it does not trouble
him. The islander is an island unto himself § He never changes, and his impas-
sive face does not reflect his inner life. It is not that he is without feelings of
afiection : quite the contrary. If he says little, and only after due reflection, it is
because to him every word is the forerunner of an action. !l He loves devotedly,
and forms fast friendships, but represses his passions, and by doing so renders them
all the more potent.
There is not, perhaps, a people in existence amongst whom the changes
resulting from social development have been more considerable than in the
English. No difference could be greater than that between the ferocious Saxon
and Dane and the modern English gentleman, who is discreet, reserved in his
speech, kindly in his manners, obliging, aff'able, and generous. Yet this great
change has taken place almost imperceptibly, and by slow degrees. The same
man, now so remarkable in many respects as a product of civilisation, was a
* Alph. Esquiros, " L'Angleterre et la vie anglaise."
t Washington Irving, "An American in London."
} Bulwer, "England Hnd the English."
§ Emerson, "English Traits."
Il Auguste Laugel, "De 1' aristocratic anglaise" [Revue des Beux-Mondes, 1872).
4Q THE BRITISH ISLES.
thousand years ago a brutish churl, whose deeds of violence have been placed on
record in ancient chronicles. The wonderful transformation is the result of the
patient and unremitting labour of years. No great political revolution has occurred
in the country since the seventeenth century, and it is by a process of slow evolu-
tion that the English have thus modified their character. None of the vestiges of
the past have whoUv disappeared. In no other country can the progress of
architecture since the davs of Saxons and Normans be studied with greater advan-
tage Cromwell, the great leveller, razed many castles and burnt numerous
abbeys; but from Arundel to Carnavon, from Salisbury to York, hundreds of
these medieval structures, both feudal and monastic, survive to the present day,
and all the world is engaged in their restoration. Ancient customs, meaningless
Fig. 19.— Akundel Castle: Interior Quadrangle.
to the general public, are still religiously observed. Terms in Norman French,
no longer intelligible on the other side of the Channel, are still employed in
legal documents and on certain occasions of state. Mediaeval costumes are worn
by the custodians of certain royal buildings, and the children in some of the
foundation schools are still dressed in the style in vogue at the time of the
original founders. Leases are granted for ninety-nine and even for nine hundred
and ninety-nine years, as if the lessor could insure the existence of his family for
all time to come. Testamentary dispositions made in the Middle Ages remain in
force to the present day. Even in London there are streets which are occasionally
closed on one day in the year, by having barriers placed across them, in order to
show that the owner of the land, although he allows the public to use them, does
not relinquish his claim to property in the soil. "Beating the bounds*' is
INHABITANTS. 41
a procedure still observed in certain parts of England on Holy Thursday, or
Ascension Day, and consists in perambulating the parish boundaries, the boys of
the parish school striking the boundary marks with peeled willow wands. The
singular expedient of whipping the boys themselves on the spot, in order to more
firmly fix the lay of the boundaries in their memories, appears, however, to have
been relinquished. " Merry Christmas " plays an important part in the life of
Englishmen, and for that festive occasion every good housewife attends to the pre-
paration of the traditional fare. On that happy day all Englishmen, from one end
of the world to the other, from London to the antipodes, and from the icy North to
the burning deserts of Africa, feel in communion with each other. The explorer,
if obliged, from the want of porters, to part with some of his most precious
stores, nevertheless holds fast to his plum pudding, and, when eating it, exchanges
good wishes with his friends at home.*
In no other country of the world are juridical precedents looked up to with
greater respect than in England, and the antiquated legal procedure, that "monster
plague of the country," to use an expression of Lord Brougham, is only too often
in conflict with our ideas of justice. The judges and barristers still wear wigs, and
enjoy an amount of consideration which is not extended to their colleagues on the
continent. The judges attending the assizes are looked upon as the direct repre-
sentatives of the sovereign, and take precedence before all other Englishmen,
including even princes of the blood royal. f
The Englishman, patient and strong, never in a hurry, but at all times ready
to act, is not ordinarily possessed of those high ambitions which sway his neigh-
bour on the other side of the Channel. His horizon is more limited, and he
conceives no vast general plans, being content with efiecting changes by degrees
and in detail. He only attends to one thing at a time, but does it thoroughly.
His eye is deep-set, and he looks straight before him. He is even said to wear
"blinkers," in order that objects lying outside his path may not distract his atten-
tion. + Those vast synthetic views and generalisations, which elsewhere divide
nations into parties strongly opposed to each other, can hardly be said to exist
amongst Englishmen, taking them as a whole. They concern themselves, above all
things, with facts, and successively analyze every question as it turns up. The
principle of a division of labour is strictly carried out, and those who study have
not so much in view the advancement of learning as the practical requirements
of their future avocation. This want of a wide comprehension often renders
Englishmen intolerant, for they cannot understand how other people can think
differently from themselves. It is only rarely that parliamentary speakers
enunciate a principle ; they are content to discuss in commonplace language the
advantages and disadvantages of the thing proposed, adducing facts in support of
their views. They leave " ideas " to others, and prefer large battalions and strong
redoubts to the most ingenious plans of battle or the inspiration of the moment. §
* Cameron, " Across Africa."
t N. Hawthorne, " English Note-Books."
J Emerson, " English Traits."
§ Henri Heine, " De I'Angleterre." Emerson, " English Traits."
100— E
^2 . THE BKITISH ISLES.
^if in 'msociate themselves with those of
- -- i~r rir:ra:t n. ana .e n.... ». .c..
their countrymen who hold v.ew. s.muar » — ;""' " ^^ p^^„„^ ^^,^,
estahHshed for every conceivable ob^cj ^-^^jj^^^^^^ ^^.^ ,„
tions of this kind are less "^7 ^J/^^^^Jl^^^^^ .. unions," and other
vast and indefinite projects, whilst the ""™J^J;; / ^.^^ p^^tieal parties
societies of England have always some definite object in view f
rr i^^^^^^ b'odies do not forxn distinct and hostile camps as on the contm^^^^^^^
The tran^tions between one pole of society and the other are ^^^-f ^^f;^^^^^^^
hundreds of associations, whatever their object, recruit the. members from the
whole nation, wherever a sympathetic voice responds to them. It thus happens
that an Englishman may find himself associated, for a particular object, w.^ men
belonging to the most diverse political parties. No one thxnks of blammg h.m, or
expects him to sacrifice his independent opmions. , wt, •
It is now four centuries since Froissart said that Enghshmen took their
pleasures sadly, although, at the time this author wrote, " Merry "was the epithet
which the natives of the country prefixed to the name of England. The crowds
which throng the streets of the towns of Great Britain in our own days certainly
are anything but gay. On the contrary, these preoccupied, silent men, clad in
sombre garments, are almost lugubrious in appearance. The climate, with its fogs,
its rains, and its leaden skies, may account, to some extent, for the gloomy faces we
meet with ; but there are other causes at work calculated to stamp a character of
melancholy upon the countenances of vast numbers. In none of the Latin countries
of Europe is social inequality so great as in England. It has created a gulf
separating the rich from the poor, the landed proprietor from the tillers of the soil,
the master from the servant— nay, even, until recently, the undergraduate of noble
birth from his fellow-commoner. Veneration of the aristocracy has passed into the
blood of the people, and in some provincial towns crowds immediately collect
whenever a nobleman's carriage stops in the streets.* The moral malady, which
Bulwer designates as " aristocratic contagion," has corrupted the whole nation,
from the court to the village. Every one aspires to become " respectable ; " that
is, to appear wealthier than he is. Society is thus divided into innumerable classes,
all busily employed removing the barriers which separate them from their superiors,
but equally intent upon maintaining those which shut out the class next beneath
it. Not a provincial town but the haberdasher's wife declines, to associate with
the wife of the grocer, as being beneath her.f Nor has the Puritanical reaction
ceased yet, which consisted, not in a maceration of the body, but in stifling free
inquiry, and curtailing the delight yielded by a cultivation of art. The actual
inferiority of the British stage may probably be due to this Puritanical influence,
for power of observation or fancy is not lacking for comedy, whilst the drama
boasts of the models furnished by Shakspere and his successors. But perhaps
we ought also to take into account that England has enjoyed internal peace for
more than two centuries ; it lives no longer, like France, in the midst of a great
* N. Hawthorne, " English Note- Books."
t Edward Lytton Bulwer, " England and the English."
INHABITANTS. 43
drama, the scenes of which succeed each other from generation to generation*
In painting, more especially, England, until recently, was inferior to her neigh-
bours. At the time of the revolution in the seventeenth century Parliament
ordered the destruction or sale of the most precious Italian masterpieces, and even
now it will not allow the paintings belonging to the nation to be looked at on
Sunday. Sunday is, indeed, a great institution of the country, more especially in
Scotland, where all animation then appears to be suspended. In 1844, when the
King of Saxony desired to embark on a Sunday, after he had been feted for a
whole week, he was obliged to proceed very cautiously, in order not to expose
himself to the insults of an Edinburgh mob,t and quite recently the Queen
herself was taken to task for venturing to cross a ferry on the Sabbath-day.
By a curious contrast, which may also be observed in Holland, the Anglo-
Saxon, whenever the moment has come for putting aside, like a borrowed garment,
the seriousness of every-day life, suddenly passes from a state of apathy, or even
apparent despondency, into one of boisterous hilarity. The enthusiasm exhibited
at horse and boat races, and on other occasions, is quite unintelligible to a French-
man or Italian, who looks upon it as akin to folly. On holidays everybody spends
money without counting the cost, and often it is the wife who is most lavish, and
least thoughtful of the future.
A love of nature somewhat counteracts the influences of the monotonous life
passed in counting-houses and factories. Though no adepts in the arrangement
of lines or blending of colours. Englishmen love open fields, fine trees, and woods ;
they are fond, too, of the sea, and enjoy being in the midst of the agitated waves.
This love of nature in its grand and unadulterated aspects is reflected throughout
the country in the appearance of the land, which, though carefully cultivated,
has not been disfigured by the process. :{: Quickset hedges separate meadows and
fields, while masses of trees afford shade near the dwelling-houses, whose red bricks
are often half hidden by climbing vines or ivy. Humble cottages on the roadside
charm by their air of peaceful beauty. The mansions of the wealthy stand
in the midst of wide parks, where oaks, beeches, and ash-trees mingle with the
conifers of Europe, the Himalayas, and Oregon ; and these mansions, moreover,
are often replete with treasures of art, unfortunately open only to the inspection
of privileged visitors. Even under the smoke-laden atmosphere of the manu-
facturing districts the country in many places retains its verdure; its copses of
wood, its peaceful and smiling aspect, for the manufacturers, as a rule, take much
delight in agriculture and gardening. The foliage of their copses hides the
chimney of the neighbouring factory, and the rivulet, which only a short distance
lower down turns the wheel of a mill, winds peaceably between grass-clad slopes.
But a turn of the road, and the scene changes abruptly ; we find ourselves
suddenly transported into a region of clatter and activity.
The love of nature, joined to that of danger, has rendered Englishmen
* Alfred Dumesnil, " Notes Manuscrites."
t Carus, " England und Schottland im Jahre 1844."
X N. Hawthorne, " English Note-Books."
44 THE BRITISH ISLES.
famous as climbers and explorers of mountains. Nearly a century and a half
has passed by since Mont Blanc was "discovered," as it were, by Pococke and
Windham. Englishmen were not the first to climb this giant amongst European
mountains, but next to Saussure they have most frequently scaled the summits
of the peaks of Savoy and Switzerland, far surpassing in intrepidity the natives of
these countries. It is they who have most assiduously studied the phenomena of
the Mer de Glace, and of its surrounding snow-fields, and who were the first to
unravel the topography of the little-known mountain groups of the Pelvoux.
Grand Paradis, and Viso. It was they, too, who first founded an Alpine Club,
which has become the parent of similar societies in other parts of Europe, and
even of India, at the foot of the Himalayas.
A loving intimacy with nature has undoubtedly helped Englishmen in
appreciating and breeding to perfection the various kinds of domestic animals.
They do not confine themselves merely to improve the breeds, in order that they
may yield more meat or better wool, and thus enhance the pecuniary profits to
be derived from them, for they seek also to satisfy their aesthetic feelings by
rendering them more shapely. Passionately fond of horses and dogs, they have
succeeded, by judicious crossings, unflagging attention, and a course of training
persevered in for generations, in producing new varieties, and transmitting the
qualities in which they excel. An English breeder has almost the power of
endowing the animal he breeds with strength, agility, or beauty. Even before
it is born he ventures to predict its shape, its gait, the form of its head, and the
colour of its skin. English horticulturists, too, have created thousands of new
varieties of plants, and they reproduce in their hothouses the climate best suited
to each species.
But if England- is the country where the breeding of our various domestic
animals is carried on with the greatest success, it is no less the country where
the physical education of youth is conducted most intelligently, and with the
greatest respect for the nature of the child, so that it may gain in strength
and beauty. There are few English babies not charming to look upon. Poverty
unfortunately disfigures the features of many early in life, but amongst those
privileged by fortune how many are there not who amply fulfil the promises
they held out in early childhood ! Observations made at Harrow and Eton, as
well as at the'Universities of Oxford and Cambridge, during a period of fifty years,
prove conclusively that the young men of modern England are superior to their
forefathers in strength and agility. Thanks to a greater attention to the laws of ^
hygiene, the growing generation is physically superior to the generations which jl
preceded it. A cricket match is at all times a pleasant sight. These tail, lithe ^M
youths, with muscular arms, dressed in light attire, and surrounded by thousands
of spectators keenly interested in their eftbrts ,do they not remind us of the heroes
of the Olympian games? Difierent surroundings, and perhaps a little more
personal grace, alone are wanting to weave around them a charm of poetry such
as enveloped the athletes of ancient Hellas. But where is the azure sky, where are
the marble halls and divinely shaped statues which surrounded the ancient
INHABITANTS. 45
arenas, not to speak of the prestige conferred by a past of two thousand years ?
Still these young athletes of England do not yield to those of ancient Greece in
the courage, endurance, and earnestness with which they engage in their sports.
Their education, which unfortunately does not always tend to a proper balance
between mental and physical culture, undoubtedly braces the muscles, renders the
glance more calm, and develops energy. Thanks to this course of discipline, men
thus trained learn to depend upon themselves on^ every occasion. They brave
disease, fatigue, and danger ; dread neither high winds, cold, nor heat ; and though
left alone on the ocean or in the desert, are inflexible in the attainment of their
purpose, regretting neither parents, friends, nor the easy life of large towns, as
long as their work is unaccomplished. Conscious of their strength, they despise
cunning, that resource of the feeble ; they boldly speak the truth, even to their
own detriment.
England, of all civilised countries, is the one where the number of truly
conscientious men, who guide their conduct by rules which they consider to be
j ust and honourable, is the largest. But in a country where personal dignity and
a love of truth are held in such high respect, it is only natural that hypocrites
should be numerous. The number of those who assume a virtue, though they
have it not, is undoubtedly large, but by this very act they do homage to the self-
respect which is the true characteristic of an Englishman, and this self-respect has
been more conducive to the upbuilding of British power than all the advantages
derived from a flourishing industry and extensive commerce.
CHAPTER IT.
WALES AND MONMOUTHSHIRE.
General Features.
ALES, with the county of Monmouthshire, forms a well-marked
geographical division of Great Britain, distinguished at once by its
mountainous character, its ancient rocks, and the origin of a vast
majority of its inhabitants. Its shores are washed on the north
by the Irish Sea as far as the mouth of the Dee, on the west by
St. George's Channel, and on the south by the Bristol Channel, whilst on the east
the country slopes down to the vale of the Severn, the hills lying to the west of
that river approximately forming its boundary on that side. Wales, compared
with the remainder of Great Britain, is but of small extent,* for it merely consists
of a two-horned peninsula jutting out westward ; but within its borders rise the
loftiest mountains met with to the south of the Scotch Grampians. This mountain
land, distinguished rather for its varied aspects, its wild yet picturesque valleys,
its rich verdure, its lakes and sparkling rivulets, than for the boldness of its
summits, is the most ancient soil of Southern Britain. Long before England had
emerged above the sea, the Laurentian, Silurian, and Cambrian rocks of "Wales
rose as islands in the midst of the ocean. They are the vestiges of a Britain more
ancient than that now known to us as England and Scotland. And those who
people this ancient soil are distinguished from the other inhabitants by the
antiquity of their origin; for they are the descendants of the . aborigines of the
country, and can look upon Saxons, Jutes, Danes, and Normans as comparatively
recent intruders.
The mountains of Wales do not form a continuous range, or a regular succes-
sion of ranges, but rather rise in distinct groups, separated by low passes, and
spreading out sometimes into elevated table-lands intersected by deep and fertile
valleys. The principal amongst these groups is that which occupies the whole
of Carnarvon, and within which rises the monarch of the Welsh mountains,
Snowdon,t thus named on account of the snow which remains on its summit foi
* Area, 7,957 square miles ; population (1861) 1,286,413— (1871) 1,412,583.
t By the Welsh it is called Eryri, which some translate " Eagle's Rock," others " Snowy Mountain."
WALES.
47
five or six months of the year. Though only 3,590 feet in height, this mountuiu
impresses the beholder by the boldness with which it rises above all surrounding
heights, revealing the whole of its slopes, from their base to the peaked summit
called Y W^'ddfa, or the ** Place of Presence." The prospect to be enjoyed from
this mass of slate pierced by porphyritic rocks, rising close to the sea, is most
magnificent, and extends over a vast horizon of lower hills, valleys, lakes, promon-
tories, and inlets of the sea. On a clear day the eye commands not only a vast
Pig. 20. — ViBW OF Snowbon.
portion of Wales, but may range eastward to the distant plains of England,
and westward across St. George's Channel to the blue hills of Ireland. In the
north the Isle of Man and Scotland are also visible. Snowdon, during the
glacial epoch, was a centre from which six glaciers descended the divergent
valleys extending at its foot. The greatest of these occupied the valley of
Llanberis, covering it to a depth of 1,200 feet. At that time the llym, or lakes of
green-hued water, which occupy the hollows of this mountain group, were filled
^g THE BEITISH ISLES.
with ice, and the frozen rivers probably extended to the sea, conveying into it
the blocks of rock and detritus resulting from the waste of the mountams The
bards look upon Snowdon as a kind of Parnassus. It is their " Mount of Awen,
or, of the Muses, and the falling in of its summit is to herald the day of judg-
ment. . • ^^.
Other summits rise to the north-east of the Pass of Llanberis, almost rivallmg
Snowdon in height. Amongst them are Glyder Fawr (3,227 feet), Carnedd
Dafydd (3,430 feet), Carnedd Llewellyn (3,482 feet), and Y Foel Fras (3,091
feet). In no other part of Wales are mountains met with equalling these in
Fig. 21.— Snowuon.
Scale 1 : 425,000.
Depth under 5 Fathoms
5 to 10 Fathoms
Over 10 Fathoms.
10 Miles.
elevation, and as many of them rise close by the sea, the aspect they present
is bold in the extreme, and they remind us, if not of the Alps, at all
events of their lower spurs. Cader Idris (2,958 feet), the "Seat of Idris," a
fabulous warrior and astronomer, is a mountain of volcanic origin, hardly inferior
to Snowdon in the grandeur of the prospect which it affords those who climb
its craggy summits to look down , upon the chaotic masses of rock which extend
thence to Cardigan Bay. In a deep hollow on its flank lies Llyn Y Can, one
of the finest tarns in the principality. A branch stretches north-eastward to
the Aran Mowddwy (2,970 feet) and Berwyn range (2,716 feet) : from the latter
may be seen the valley of the Dee, and Lake Bala, in which that river rises.
WALES.
49
Plynlimmon* (2,481 feet), a rather tame mountain range of Silurian slate
containing rich veins of lead ore, forms the connecting link between the
mountains of North and South Wales. It occupies the very centre of the princi-
pality, and the Severn and the Wye have their origin in its valleys. The range
which stretches thence south-westward as far as St. David's Head nowhere exceeds
a height of 1,800 feet. Another range extends along the right bank of the Severn,
terminating in Long Mountain (1,696 feet), on the border of Shropshire. The
valley of the Wye is bounded on one side by Radnor Forest, and on the other
by the Epynt Hills : both are desolate mountain tracts, covered with mosses and
peat or thin herbage. The valley of the Usk separates the Epynt Hills from the
Black Mountains, or Forest Fawr, the highest range of Southern Wales, within
which the Brecknock Beacons attain a height of 2,163 feet. These mountains
are covered with herbage, and they derive their epithet '* black " from the dark
Fig. 22. — The Brecknock Beacons.
Scale 1 : 600,000.
10 Miles.
appearance of the heath when out of blossom, and their generally desolate
character. These hills of South Wales cannot compare in picturesqueness with
those of the north, and the view afforded from many of their summits often
includes nothing but bogs or monotonous grassy hills. Less disturbed in their
geological structure, they are, on the other hand, richer in mineral wealth.
North Wales, besides yielding slate, lead, and a little copper, embraces a coal
basin of small extent, which is, however, likely to become exhausted before the close
of the century; but the carboniferous region which covers so vast an area in the
south is one of the most productive mineral districts of Great Britain. It was
first described by Owen towards the close of the sixteenth century. In area it
exceeds any one of the coal basins of England, and it reaches a depth of no less than
10,000 feet.f Of its hundred seams, sixty-six, of a total average thickness of
* Or rather, Pum Lumen, or " Peak of Five Points."
t Edward Hull, " The Coalfields of Great Britain."
THE BEITISH ISLES.
50
80 feet are being worked, and the quantity of coal which it is posBible to extract
ou leei, are oemg ^ a ..tV. than 4 000 feet is estimated by Vivian
without descending to a greater depth than 4,UUU lee :
and Clark at more than 36.000,000,000 tons. In the west the seams jield
anthra ite but in proportion as we proceed eastward the coal becomes more and
:t it u'lous. the gases enclosed in it often giving rise ^ " ^Pf ^i
the frequent recurrence of which is a calamity which -S^* g-^'^Jy be obvi-
ated by judicious cautionary measures. So fiery is some of this Welsh coal, that
after having been placed on shipboard it will ignite spontaneously.
The resLches of men of science have conclusively proved that Wales within
recent geological time, has undergone variations of level. Marine shells of living
species were discovered as long ago as 1831 near the summit of Moel Tryfaen,
Fig. 23.— Erosive Action on the Coast of South Wales.
Scale 1 : 100.000.
Granite or Volcanic
Syenite. Rocks.
Lower
Silurian.
Upper
Hiluiian.
Devonian
Sandstone.
Millstone Carboniferous Coal
Grit. Limestone. Measures.
10 Miles.
to the south of the Menai Strait, at an elevation of 1,400 feet above the
level of the sea. This discovery has been confirmed and followed tip by other
geologists, including Edward Forbes, Prestwich, Ramsay, Darwin, and Lyell.
Mr. Darbishire has found fifty-seven marine molluscs in the upheaved strata
which during the post-pliocene epoch formed the beach, and all these shells belong
to species which still live in the neighbouring sea or in the Arctic Ocean. The
general character of this ancient fauna points to a climate as rigorous as that of
Iceland or Spitzbergen. The British seas were colder at that time than now,
and when the land once more emerged from the sea these shell banks became
covered with the detritus brought down by glaciers.*
* Lyell. " Elements of Geology.'*
WALES.
51
These variations of level are perhaps still going on. They must have singu-
larly increased the effects of erosion, as exercised upon the rocks and coasts of Wales.
The carboniferous formation of South Wales originally occupied an oval-shaped
basin of pretty regular contour, surrounded concentrically by beds of more ancient
age, but it has been visibly encroached upon by the floods of the Atlantic. The
peninsula of Gower, to the west of Swansea, is nothing but the remains of an
ancient promontory, formed of carboniferous and Devonian rocks. St. Bride's
Fig. 24. — Epfects of Erosion on the Coast of South Wales : the Huntsman's Leap.
Bay, at the south-western angle of Wales, is the result of the continued erosive
action of the sea. The two promontories which bound it on the north and south
are composed in a large measure of hard rock, capable of resisting the onslaught of
the sea, but the softer intervening rocks of the carboniferous formation have been
washed away, and their place is occupied now by a bay of strikingly regular con-
tours.* The erosive action of rain and running water has completely changed the
The Physical Geology and Geography of Great Britain."
6S
THE BRITISH ISLES.
surface features of the interior of the principality. A large portion of South Wales,
anciently covered hv the sea. has. sinee its emorgonco, been sculptured by the sur-
face watVr into the 'succession of ravines, glens, and valleys which now intersect
the basins of the Usk. Wye, and other rivers, for the most part designated by
the same nun,., slightly m.«liHed. as Taf, Tawey, Towey, Taivi, or Dafty. The
hill-tops and isolated tublo-lands of Cardiganshire rise to an ideal line which
.vscends tronllv as we proceed to the eastward, and it is thus clear that the inequdi-
JfHg. 'io.-- The SuwiiXiiiuN Biuuok, Mknai Stuait.
ties of the surface must be of coraparatively recent oricrin, whilsjk the hills are the
remains of an ancient plateau which had a gentle slope to the westward
A few rooky islands have been severed by the waves of the ocean from the coast
of South Wales, but Anglesey is the only large island of the principality. It
formed originally a portion of North Wales. Of its ancient connection with the
neighbouring mainland there can be no doubt, for the geological formations on
both sides of the Menai Strait correspond. The dividing strait passes through
carboniferous rocks, bedded between Silurian strata and rocks of porphyry. Pro-
fessor Ramsjiy is of opinion that the valley now occupied by the strait is of
glacial origin, and was scooped out. not by the glaciers of Snowdon, which never
reached so far, but by those of Cumberland.* If it is true that horsemen were
formerly, able to cross the strait at low water, great changes must have taken
• Qttmi^jf Jotrrmil of tAt G€oloiric«f Sociriy, May, 1866.
«Bd tl»^ tumtnX
^-T:%auit IWUaor Br
uptm it;. TV« Wd^ Ws ^.
^(■wk, Wtil loA
ii^iiollASM^ "ittad States, V
Hwe tiie moist r; tkft I>:
looiHtr;» sufWHMifML tm all sides W «
54
THE BRITISH ISLES.
over the inhabitants of Britain which is born of mystery. Some historians are
even of opinion that Anglesey was visited by the priests of Gaul, in order to be
initiated into the secret rites of Druidism. Ancient ruins, known as Terr Drew
and Terr Beirdd— that is, Druids' or Bards* dwellings— still exist ;* but in fact the
whole of Wales is one huge temple, if not of Druid worship, at all events of the
religion that preceded it ; and everywhere we meet with caerns, springs, and ruins,
which commemorate some miracle or the mythical feats of the Cymric ancestors of
the modern Welsh. In these records of ancient Wales Christian legends are
mingled with heathen fables, which latter survive to this day, outwardly adapted
to the changing spirit of the times. Cromlechs are as numerous as in Brittany,
and equally respected, for in their presence the Welshman feels himself the
Fig. 27.— The Bridges over Menai Strait.
Scale 1 : 25,000.
i
Foreshore.
Depth under 15 feet. Depth over 35 feet,
_i^^^ Half a Mile.
descendant of an ancient race. The name of some ancient hero is attached to
nearly every one of these stones. The large cromlech in the peninsula of Gower,
to the west of Swansea, is thus dedicated to King Arthur, the legendary
King of Old Wales. An oval pit, Caerleon, near Newport, which excavations
have clearly shown to be the site of a Roman amphitheatre, is popularly identified
with Arthur's Round Table, at which the King sat with his knights when they
came back from their chivalrous expeditions. Near Carmarthen, long the capital
of the Welsh, a grotto is pointed out, in which the fay Vivian kept Merlin the
magician a prisoner. In another part of Wales, at the base of Plynlimmon, near
the village of Tre Taliesin, tradiiion points out the burial-place of Taliesin, the
* Alph. Esquiros, " L'Angleterre et la vie anglaise."
WALES. 55
famous bard — a circular mound, ancieutly surrounded by two circles of stones.
If any one sleep upon tbis grave be will arise eitber a poet or a madman. It was
to tbis mound tbat tbe bards wended tbeir steps in searcb of inspiration wben
desirous of composing tribannau, or "triads." Owing to tbeir symbolism, tbe
meaning of tbese triads often escaped tbe profane, but some of tbem deserve to be
remembered for all time. " Tbree tbings tbere are," one of tbem tells us, " wbich
were contemporaneous from tbe beginning — Man, Liberty, Ligbt."*
Tbe Welsb, notwitb standing tbe extension of Voads and railways, of manufac-
turing industry and commerce, bave kept alive tbeir national traditions and tbeir
language. Tbe principality of Wales bas ceased to exist as an independent countrv
since tbe middle of tbe tbirteentb century ; nevertbeless tbe Welsb, wbo call
tbemselves **Cymry" — tbat is, "tbey tbat bave a common fatberland"t — look
upon tbemselves as a separate people, and bave often attempted to tbrow off tbe
yoke of tbe Englisb kings. Like tbe Bretons of France, tbeir kinsmen by race and
language, tbey seized tbe opportunities afforded by tbe civil wars in wbicb tbe
nation, to wbicb tbey bad been attacbed by force, found itself involved. Tbus
in tbe seventeentb century tbey were ardent Royalists, boping tbereby to establish
indirectly tbeir claim to national independence. During tbe seven years tbe war
lasted tbe Welsb remained faitbful to King Cbarles, wbose cause tbey bad
embraced as if it were tbeir own, and Cromwell found bimself obliged to storm
several of tbeir strongbolds. But tbis was tbe last struggle, and tbe public peace
bas not since been disturbed, unless, perbaps, during tbe so-called Rebecca riots
in 1843, wben bodies of men, disguised as women ("Rebecca and ber Daughters "),
overran tbe country, and made war upon turnpike toll collectors. Since 1746
tbe "principality" of Wales bas formed politically a portion of England. In
matters of religion, bowever, tbere exist certain contrasts between tbe Welsb and
English ; but these are the very reverse of what may be observed in France, where
the Bretons are far more zealous adherents of the old faith than the French. The
Welsh, being addicted to mysticism, as enthusiastic as they are choleric, passionately
fond of controversy, and impatient of rules laid down by strangers, naturally rejected
the episcopal rites adhered to by a majority in England. Most of them are
Dissenters ; Calvinistic Methodists, Baptists, and Congregationalists being most
numerously represented. + About the middle of the eighteenth century, when
Whitefield, the famous preacher, passed through the valleys of Wales, religious
fervour revived throughout the principality, and in the smallest hamlet might be
heard hymns, prayers, and vehement religious discourses. The Welsh Dissent-
ing bodies have even anticipated their English brethren in several religious
movements. It was they who established the oldest Bible Society and the
first Sunday schools. Tbey maintain a mission in Brittany for the purpose of
converting their kinsmen separated from them by the ocean. Still, in spite of
all this religious zeal, the Welsh are inferior to the English' as regards general
* Pictet, '* Mystferes des Bardes, Cj^rinach Beirdd Ynys Prydain."
t H. Gaidoz, Revue des Leux-Mondes, May 1st, 1876.
X There are in the principality 1,145 churches of the Establishment, and about 3,000 chapels o£
Dissenters, and in the vast majority of these latter the services are conducted in Welsh.
56
THE BRITISH ISLES.
education. Their principality, together with the neighbouring county of
Lancashire, exhibits the blackest tint on a map showing the state of illiteracy.*
Welsh, though a guttural language, is nevertheless full of harmony. Its chief
feature consists in the mutation of certain consonants at the beginning of words,
and it bears a greater resemblance to the Breton of Armorica and ancient Cornish
than to the Gaelic spoken in Scotland and Ireland.f The language is in a better
state of preservation than Breton, and boasts of a literature incomparably richer.
Theological works occupy a prominent place, and it is probably owing to the zeal
of preachers bent upon the saving of souls that Welsh has not fallen into
disuse.:}: The first Welsh book was printed in 1546. This was merely an
almanac, but it was succeeded, in the following year, by the first English- Welsh
dictionary. During the present century Welsh literature has been enriched with
periodical publications, journals, and reviews, besides numerous popular songs and
tales discovered in the libraries of the country. But many other precious documents,
still hidden away in libraries, ought to be published, for it was from Wales that
mediaeval Europe received the traditions and poems of Arthur's Eound Table.
The study of ancient Welsh is now pursued by many savants, and not only brings
to light literary fragments of high value, but also exercises an important influence
upon the study of other Celtic languages, including even those which survive
only in the names of places. As to the Welsh themselves, they have an abiding
love for their ancient language, and cling to it with great tenacity. The
eisteddfodau, or musical and literary meetings, which have taken the place of
the ancient gorsedd, or court of justice, held by the Druids, are highly popular.
Tradition names King Arthur — magician, priest, and king — as having instituted
these meetings, and awarded prizes to the best players on the teii/n, or Welsh
harp. Even now the victorious bards, musicians, and singers are frequently
crowned in his name, and the president, standing upon a cromlech, still opens
the proceedings by pronouncing the time-honoured and noble formula of " The
Truth against the World." § So great is the love which the Welshman bears his
mother tongue, that these eisteddfodau are held not in Wales only, where the
language is spoken by over 900,000 persons, II but also at Birkenhead, in the
* Lord Aberdare, at the Eisteddfod of Birkenhead, in 1878.
t Latham, "Ethnology of the British Islands."
i H. Gaidoz, Jievue des I)eux-Mondes, May 1st, 1876.
§ Alfred Emy et Henri Martin, " Tour du monde," t. xv. 1867.
II Geographical Distribution of the Welsh-speaking Population of Wales.
Districts in which Welsh is spoken by
a majority .....
Districts in which it is spoken by 25
to 50 per cent
Districts in which it is spoken by less
than 25 per cent, of the in-
habitants . .
Total
Area.
Sq.M.
Populatioii.
Persons speaking
No. Per Cent.
Persons
speaking
Enplish, OT
Welsh and
English.
Per Cent.
6,050
1,025,573
887,870
86-5
81-7
357
113,030
38,046
33-7
96-8
1,501
174,080
1,312,583
8,614
4-9
71-2
1000
7,908
934,530
85-5
(E. G. Ravenstein, Journal Statistical Society, 1879.)
WALES.
57
New World, and even in Australia. "Wherever Welsli emigrants settle down in
numbers, the Cymraeg is spoken side by side with Sassenach, or Saxon. At
Liverpool there are some twenty chapels in which the services are conducted in
Welsh, and a journal is published in Cymraeg.* The Welsh in the United States
cocasionally meet in order to sing and declaim in the language of the ancient
Fig. 28.— Linguistic Map of Wales.
By E. G. Ravenstein.
Proportion of Celtic-speaking Inhabitants,
25 to 50 p.c.
50 to 90 p.c.
Over 90 p.c.
bards ; and the indomitable colonists who, notwithstanding the difficulties they
encountered, founded a 'New Wales in Patagonia, retain the use of their
mother tongue, and the Rio Chuput, on the banks of which they established their
settlement, has been renamed by them Afon Llwyd, or " Grey River.'* Through-
out the world Welsh is spoken by far above 1,000,000 human beings.
Nevertheless the Celtic spoken by the Cymry of Wales would appear to be doomed
* Throughout England there are about 110 chapels in which the services are conducted in Welsh.
101— E
58 ' THE BRITISH ISLES.
to extinction, and a time must come when it will survive only among philologists.
Many use it from patriotic motives, others employ it to gratify their craving after
literarv honours. All men of education learn to think in English, and even at
the eisteddfodau the language of the conquering Saxon struggles for pre-eminence
with that of the vanquished Celt. It even happens occasionally that the president
of these meetings is ignorant of the language in which most of the poetry is being
recited. Although Welsh is still general throughout the greater portion of Wales,
even in the towns, and in the western part of Monmouthshire, English nevertheless
is rapidly gaining ground. It is virtually the language of civilisation, and the
only means of communicating with the outside world. Its use is general in all the
schools — the Sunday schools attached to chapels excepted — and it is rare nowa-
days to meet with young people unable to converse in English. A knowledge of the
old mother tongue is thus daily becoming of less service, and, together with the
old-fashioned heavy cloaks and the men's hats worn by women, is being put aside.
The number of persons of Welsh origin scattered throughout the world, who have
completely forgotten the language of their ancestors, is probably greater than that
of the Welsh who remain at home, and still speak it. At all events we might
conclude that such is the case from the large number of Welsh family names met
with in all English-speaking countries, nearly all of them being modifications of
Christian names, such as Jones — the most frequent of all — Roberts, Edwards,
Humphreys, and P'ugh, P'owel, P'robert, Ap'jones (son of Ugh, Owel, Robert, or
Jones). In the United States alone there are supposed to reside 3,000,000
persons of Welsh descent, of whom hardly a third have remained faithful to the
language of their ancestors.* Most of these Welsh have become as good Americans
as the pilgrim fathers of New Plyraquth, and the Welshmen of Great Britain can
hardly be serious when they claim Thomas Jefferson as one of their compatriots.
But the native genius of the race survives in a thousand new forms, and in this
sense the Cymry can still repeat their ancient motto, " Tra mor, tra Briton."
Topography.
The ancient feudal cities of Wales present a striking contrast to the modern
towns which have sprung into existence at the call of industry. The former, irregular
and picturesque, with the ruins of one of the twenty-six strongholds of the country
perched on a commanding rock, are possessed of individual features, and have long
ere this been wedded as it were to the charming country which surrounds them.
The latter, on the other hand, are generally mere agglomerations of buildings
prematurely blackened. Their only monuments are factory chimneys, and they
encroach on the surrounding fields, without that softening of their lines which
would bring them into harmony with surrounding nature.
Flintshitie (Ffi.int), the north-easternmost county of Wales, stretches inland
from the estuary of the river Dee. Its surface along that river, and more especially
in the tract known as Sealand, is level, but the interior is beautifully diversified
* Thomas, "Hanes Cymry America."
FLINTSHIRE.
59
by hills, which in the Moel Fammau (" Mother of Hills ") attain an elevation of 1,823
feet. Coal and lead abound, and there are also iron works, but the manufacturing
industry is of little importance.
Haimrden, near which there . are some potteries, overlooks the alluvial plain
at the mouth of the Dee. Mold lies some 4 miles inland, on the Alyn, a
tributary of the Dee: the hills enclosing it are rich in coal and oil shale, whilst
the river turns the wheels 'of several paper-mills.
Flint, the county town, with large chemical works and collieries, lead mines and
paper-mills, in its neighbourhood, was formerly accessible to large vessels, but its
silted-up port now admits only small coasting vessels. Four miles to the west of it
Fig. 29. — The Sands of the Dee, from above Bagilt.
lies the ancient town of Holywell (Trefynnon), 1 mile from the estuary of the Dee.
It has lead mines, lime-kilns, and Roman cement works, and supplies the potteries
of Staffordshire with chert, but is celebrated more especially for its copious and
miraculous well, dedicated to St. Winifrid, and formerly a noted place of pilgrim-
age and source of wealth to the adjoining Abbey of Basingwerk. A few miles
inland lies Caerivys, the ''Fortress of Assize," which up to 1672 was the county
town, and famous for its eisteddfods, but is now of little note. Mostyn, a small
port below Holywell, exports coal from the collieries in its neighbourhood,
whilst Rhyl, near the mouth of the Elwy, has become a favourite seaside resort.
Proceeding up the Elwy, past Rhuddlan and its marshes, where Offa, King of
QQ THE BRITISH ISLES.
Mercia, in 795, annihilated the Welsh, fighting under the leadership of Caradoc,
the lofty spires of the cathedral of St. Asaph indicate our approach to the charming
Yale of Clwyd, the greater part of which lies in the neighbouring county of
Denbighshire. i t:. t -.
A detached portion of Flintshire lies to the south-east, between the English
counties of Cheshire and Shropshire. This is known as the Maelor Saesneg, or
'' Saxon Land," and Welsh has not been heard there since the days of Henry VIII.
This smaU tract of country abounds in curious old villages, the most remarkable
amongst themheing Bangor Isi/coed (-Under the Wood"), or Monachor urn, famous
for its monastery, supposed to have been founded about the year 180 by the first
Christian King of Britain ; but of this not a vestige remains at the present day.
Fii2-. 30.~ Rkmains of Vallb Orucis Akbey.
Denbighshire (Dinbych) is a somewhat straggling county, extending from
the broad Vale of the Dee to the Irish Sea, between the rivers Elwy and Conway.
The greater portion of its surface is hilly, and fit only for pasture, but it is inter-
sected bv several fruitful valleys, the most extensive being that of the Clwyd.
Wrexham and Ruabon, the two most populous towns of the county, lie in the east,
close to Watt's Dyke, which separates the Vale of the Dee from the hilly part of
the county, and which was thrown up by the Saxons as a defence against the Welsh.
Both these towns depend upon coal and iron for their livelihood, and the former
likewise produces some flannel. The dyke referred to, as well as that of Offa, to
the south of the Dee, approximately marks the linguistic boundary ; and whilst
Wrexham, to the east of it, is virtually an English town, Ruabon, on its farther
side, is almost wholly Welsh, and is becoming more so every day, owing to the
DENBIGHSHIEE— CAENAEVONSHIRE. 61
immigration of Welsh labourers. Above Euabon the Dee flows through the
romantic Vale of Llangollen, where limestone quarrying and burning, slate quarry-
ing, and the weaving of flannel are carried on extensively. Near the small
town of Llangollen stand the remains of Valle Cruets Abbey, the most picturesque
ruin of the kind in North Wales.
The Vale of Ckvyd, which opens out upon the Irish Sea between Ehyl and
Abergele, is inferior to that of Llangollen in picturesque features, but far surpasses
it in fruitfulness. Denbigh, the capital of the county, rises in its midst on a steep
limestone hill crowned b}^ a ruined castle. It was formerly noted for its glovers,
tanners, and shoemakers, but not lying on a natural high-road of commerce, it has
not become very populous, though of some importance as the centre of a fine
agricultural district. It is nevertheless one of the most pleasant towns to visit.
The prospect from its castle over the wide valley is magnificent, and the town
abounds in quaint timbered buildings, with overhanging stories and gabled roofs.
Higher up the valley stands Ruthin, a picturesque town, known for its artificial
mineral waters.
Llanrivst is the only place of note on the river Conway, which forms the
western boundary of Denbighshire, and is navigable to within a short distance of
the village. Gwydyr Castle and the chalybeate springs of Trefrew lie within
Carnarvonshire.
CarnarvoivSHIre (Arfon) is one of the most mountainous counties of Wales,
for within its borders rise the ranges of Snowdon, the fastnesses of which afforded
a last refuge to the Welsh when struggling for their independence. The south-
western portion of the county, terminating in the bold promontory of Braich-y-
PwU, off" which lies Bardsey Island (Ynys Enlli), is less elevated. Sheep-farming
and slate quarrying constitute the principal occupations of the inhabitants.
The district of Creuddyn, with the bold promontory of Orme's Head, though
lying to the east of the Conway, forms a part of Carnarvonshire, Llandudno,
one of the most attractive seaside resorts in Great Britain, is situate within that
detacned portion of the county. The copper mines of Great Orme's Head have
been worked from time immemorial, and were formerly exceedingly productive.
Conway, an ancient city enclosed within a lofty wall, formerly defended the
difficult road along the coast, and the estuary of the river upon the left bank of
which it has been built. The construction of the railway embankments and of
the bridges over the river proved very costly. The tubular railway bridge is built
in the massive architectural style of the castle which commands it. Bangor,
at the northern entrance of Menai Strait, is for the most part of modern
origin. Near it the railway bifurcates, one branch conducting the traveller
across the strait to Holyhead, and the other carrying him to Carnarvon. Bangor
is a favourite resort of tourists, affording unusual facilities for exploring
delightful valleys, climbing lofty mountains, and visiting interesting castles
perched upon capes or the spurs of the hills. The town is largely indebted to
the neighbouring slate quarries for its prosperity. Port Ptnrhyn, whence the
slate of the famous Penrhyn quarries is exported, lies close to it. Proceeding up
(52 THE BEITISH ISLES.
the beautiful valley of Nant Francon, and passing through Bethesda, a town of
quarrymen, we reach the Penrhyn quarries after a five-mile walk. They form
one of the busiest hives of human industry. Tier rises above tier around a huge
amphitheatre ; locomotives, dragging long trains of trucks laden with slate, pass
incessantly ; and at short intervals flashes of light and puff's of smoke, followed by
loud reports, announce the firing of blasting charges. About 3,000 workmen
are permanently employed in these quarries, and if we would obtain an idea of
the quantity of slate already removed, we need merely glance at the rugged
pyramids which rise like lowers in the centre of the amphitheatre. The slate from
these quarries finds its way to all parts of the world. Several towns in Norway
have their houses covered with it,* and it is also exported to America. The annual
produce of the quarries is estimated at 70,000 tons, worth £160,000«
Carmrvon (Caer-yn-ar-fon), capital of the county, and formerly of the whole of
North Wales, retains the lofty walls of its feudal castle, and near it may be seen
the ruins of the Roman station of Seguntium. Like Bangor, it depends upon fishing,
quarrying, and its coasting trade for its prosperity, and is also a great favourite
with tourists, who crowd its streets and environs during the summer Near it are
the slate quarries of Binorwic, and others on the slopes of the Pass of Llanberis, to
the north of Snowdon. These quarries are hardly inferior to those of Penrhyn.
Their debris is unfortunately gradually filling up Llyn Peris, and disfiguring one of
the most charming prospects in the country. Other quarries lie in the south, near
Kantk.
Nevin, Pwllheli, and Criccieth are old towns with small ports in the south-
western part of the county, but they are exceeded in importance by Tremadoc and
Portmadoc, both founded in the beginning of the century, partly upon soil won
from the estuary of Glas Llyn. Portmadoc is the shipping port of Ffestiniog, in
Merionethshire, with which a miniature railway connects it.
Anglesey (Mona), owing to its position in advance of the mainland and
opposite to the Bay of Dublin, has at all times been a place of traffic, contrasting
in this respect with the mountainous parts of Wales, whose inhabitants lived in
seclusion, and came but little into contact with strangers. Gently undulating,
fertile throughout, and possessed of productive veins of copper, Anglesey held out
inducements to colonists. The Druids, whom Tiberius caused to be expelled from
Gaul, sought a refuge here. The old bards speak of Anglesey as the "shady
island ; " but the forests which justified this epithet have long disappeared, and the
surface of the country is now almost treeless. The gardens of Anglesey are noted
on account of the variety of their produce. The climate is mild and equable, and even
bamboos grow in the open air. Anglesey, owing to its great fertility, was known
in former times as " Mona, mam Cymri ; " that is, " The Mother of Cambria.''
Beaumaris, the capital, at the northern entrance of the Menai Strait, boasts of
an old castle, is a favourite seaside resort, and carries on a considerable trade with
England, several thousand coasting vessels annually frequenting its port. Amlwch,
on the north coast, derives its importance from the copper mines in Parys
* Carl Vogt, " Nordfahrt."
iH!iiiiii!r.iiiiiiriiiiiiii!i!ii!iiii:i'ii;iiiiiiii;n:nii:iiii.i,hii!iiiiiiii;i'iiF!!iiiiiii; :;'!!' "'TT'^
liiiii
fmmi
I
ANGLESEY.
63
Mountain, a couple of miles to the south of the town. They were discovered in
1768. Holyhead (Caer Gybi), on a smaller island lying ofE the west coast of
Anglesey, to which it is joined by a railway embankment and an old bridge, has
attained considerable importance as the nearest port to Ireland. Holyhead may
almost be called an outport of London, and engineering works on a large scale
have been completed to adapt it to the requirements of the increasing trade
between England and Ireland, and as a harbour of refuge for vessels trading to
Liverpool. Two breakwaters, with a total length of 9,860 feet, planned by
J. M. Rendel, and completed by Sir J. Hawksley in 1873, protect a harbour with
an area of 267 acres. They are built upon rubble mounds, 250 feet wide at the
Fig. 31. — HoL-YHEAD Uarbouk.
Scale 1 : 50,000.
W.ofGr. 4*40'
4'36'
Depth under 5 Fathoms.
5 to 10 Fathoms.
___ Haifa MUe.
Over 10 i athoms.
surface of the water, and their solid walls, rising to a height of 38 feet, form a
noble promenade. The stones for these works were furnished by the neighbouring
hills. Mariners may well have bestowed the epithet of " Holy " upon so con-
spicuous a promontory, even though a monastery had not been established at its
foot until the seventh century after Christ. A fine lighthouse rises at the head (jf
the breakwater, which, with the light on the Skerries, 6 miles to the north of it,
points out the road to Liverpool.
Llangefni and Llanerchymedd are the principal towns in the interior of the
island, the former having collieries, whilst the latter is famous for its cattle fairs
and snuff. A remarkable cromlech, known as " Arthur's Quoit," stands near it.
64
THE BRITISH ISLES.
Meeionethshire (Metetonydd) is perhaps the most mountainous county of
all Wales, although Cader Idris and its other summits are inferior in height to
Snowdon. The north-eastern portion of the county is drained by the river Dee,
which flows through Bala Lake. The western portion slopes down towards
Cardigan Bay, and the rivers traversing it form broad and shallow estuaries
before they ^nter the sea.
Bala, at the foot of Bala Lake, or Llyn Tegid, is much resorted to for fishing
and shooting. It is the seat of colleges of the Calvinistic Methodists and
Independents. Bala Lake has been selected by the Liverpool Corporation to
furnish it with a supply of wholesome drinking water. Concen, a quiet market
town, is the only other place of any importance in the beautiful valley of the Dee.
Festiniog, on the Upper Dwyryd, is a large parish, containing meadows,
woods, and fine mountains, these latter yielding copper as well as slate. The
Fig. 32.~Harbotik of Refuge, Holyhead
quarries employ about 3,500 men, and their produce is exported through Port-
madoc. Harlech, some distance to the south of the Dwyryd, was anciently the
capital of the county, but is now an unimportant place, and only shows some
anmiatiou in summer, when it is visited by tourists and sea-bathers.
Barmouth, or Ahermaw, at the mouth of the Mawddach, has a small harbour.
Proceedmg up the estuary of the Mawddach, and then following the valley of the
Wnion, we reach Dolgelly, the present capital of the county, situated in a lovely
mountam district commanded by the crags of Cader Idris. Here flannel weaving
IS carried on, and gold and copper mines are worked at Clogan and St. David's, to
the north of it. An old cottage is pointed out as the house in which Owen Glyndwir
assembled his parliament in 1404.
To,oyn, within half a mile of the coast, has a mineral spring, and is acquiring
Bome importance as a sea-bathing town. Aberdovey, or Afon Dyfi, at the mouth
MONTGOMERYSHIRE.
65
of the Dovey, has a small harbour, from which slate is shipped. Higher up on
the same river, in the midst of the mountains, stands Dinas Mawddwy^ a poor
village, surrounded by exquisite scenery.
Montgomeryshire (Maldw yn) is for the greater part drained by the Severn
and its tributaries, only a small portion of it lying within the basin of the
Dovey, towards the west. Barren mountains occupy nearly the whole of its
area, but the valleys open out towards the English border, and afford space for
the pursuit of agriculture. The manufacture of flannel is carried on extensively,
and there are lead mines and quarries.
Montgomeryshire is one of those counties in which Welsh is visibly losing
groimd. In the valley of the Severn, up to within a mile or two of Newtown,
Fig. 33. — On tke Dee, near Bala.
Welsh is heard only in the mouths of immigrants and of a few very old people. At
Montgomery and Welshpool Welsh has been extinct among the natives for at least
fifty years. It is only on the Upper Severn, beyond Llanidloes, on the Upper
Vyrnwy, and in the western part of the county, that Welsh remains the language
of the majority.*
Montgomery, the county town, is a quiet place, with the scanty ruins of a
castle, but prettily situated. WeMpool, at the head of the navigation of the
Severn, is a busy market town. Its chief attraction is the magnificent park
surrounding Powis Castle, the ancestral seat of the noble family of Herbert.
♦ About 44 per cent, of the population speak Welsh, but hardly 10 per cent, are unable to converse
in English
gg THE BEITISH ISLES.
Ne,dou,n, higher up on the Severn, is a modern manufacturing town, the prin-
cipal seat of the Welsh flannel trade. LlanWoe,, on the same river, is a pros-
perous town, the inhabitants of which are occupied in the manufacture of
flannel and in the neighbouring lead mines. Lhn.fymn, on the Cam, a tributary
of the Severn, ie famous for its ale, and a proverb says that "Old ale fills
Llanfyllin with young widows." Llan/air Caer Einion is built on the borders of
the Vyrnwy. The castle from which this Llanfair, or St. Mary's Church, derived
its name, exists no longer.
Machynlleth, the only town in the western part of the county, known as
Cyffeiliog, is a cheerful place in the midst of charming scenery. It is supposed
Fig. 34.— Thb Pakliamint Hovse, Dolgklly.
J^m,^
WWy^:
■^v
to occupy the site of the Roman Maglona. The inhabitants manufacture coarse
cloth (" web"), and work in the neighbouring slate quarries and lead mines.
Cardiganshire stretches from the Dovey to the Teifi, presenting a bold face
towards the sea, and rising inland to mountains, which culminate in Plynlimmon.
Agriculture, sheep farming, and lead mining are the principal pursuits.
Aherystwith^ at the mouth of the Rheidol and near that of the Ystwith, has
grown into a sort of Welsh Brighton, with large hotels and a fine beach
remarkable for the quantity of pebbles found on it. The buildings of the
University College of Wales adjoin the ruins of a castle founded by Gilbert de
Strongbow. Lead smelting is carried on in the neighbourhood. Farther south,
on the coast, are Aberaeron, a favourite watering-place; Neiv Quay, with a small
harbour and quarries ; and Aherporth, a primitive fishing and bathing place.
Cardigan, near the mouth of the Teifi, whence it exports the produce of its
PEMBROKESHIRE.
67
fisheries, has but a small harbour, which larger vessels can enter only with the
tide. Travelling up the lovely valley of the Teifi, we reach Lamjyettr, a bright
market town in a fine situation, and the seat of a college of the Church of
England. North of it lies Tregaron, to the north-west of which are the ruins of
Strata Florida, an abbey founded in 1184.
Pembrokeshire is called in Welsh Penfro — that is, ** Head of the Peninsula '*
— a very appropriate name for a county forming the south-western extremity of
Wales. The surface of Pembrokeshire is for the most part undulating, and rises
in the Mynydd Preseley to a height of 1,758 feet. The coast is generally bold,
Fig. 35. — MiLFORD Haven.
Scale 1 : 330,000.
=—6.4
rfjHaverfopdwest
m^-' ■-.■^«
5i
40
^
mmm
51-
40-
==^~^^^^^^^^^^^^?^
iS^^^\IS!ujia
==£^^^^!^*9^p^^
^S
^l^^^^^g^iit :^^^ys^^
i
^" ^Hi.'^^<'^:::2^^wmmwm
^^^m
^"^^^'"^^
^B
5 20-
5" W.oFGr
Depth under 10 I'athoms. 10 to 20 Fathoms
20 to 33 Fathoms.
5 Miles.
Over 33 Fathoms.
and Milford Haven, a veritable fiord with many ramifications, penetrates far
inland. It is easily accessible, and capable of afibrding shelter to the combined
merchant fleet of England, but owing to its remote situation no great mercantile
harbour has arisen on its shores.
Pembrokeshire is Welsh in its northern, English in its southern half, and the
line separating the two races is well marked, extending from the northern part of
St. Bride's Bay to Narberth, which lies to the east of it. When Arnulf de
Montgomery conquered the country, in the reign of Henry I., he no doubt brought
English settlers with him. These were on two subsequent occasions reinforced by
68 THE BRITISH ISLES.
Flemings, who established themselves in Roose, with Haverfordwest for their capital,
and in the peninsula of Castle Martin, to the west of Tenby. In these early days
Southern Pembrokeshire was known as - Little England," and although the King's
writ did not then run in Wales, it was duly acknowledged in this - Anglia-trans-
Wallnia." The present English inhabitants may no doubt claim descent from
these early settlers, but they have perpetually been receiving reinforcements, and
the dialect they now speak is said to resemble that of Somersetshire.
Haverfordwest is picturesquely seated on the slope of a hill overlooking the
Cleddau, which flows into Milford Haven, and is navigable for vessels of a burden of
100 tons. It is the capital of the county. The keep of its old castle has been con-
verted into a prison. Pembroke, on the south side of Milford Haven, is interesting
chiefly on account of its Norman castle, the birthplace of Henry YII. (1456), now
in ruins. Pembroke Dockyard, a Government ship-building vard, defended by for-
Fig. 36. — MiLFOiin Haven
midable military works, lies 2 miles north-west of the old town. A steam ferry
connects it with New Milford, where docks have been excavated in the vain hope
of this place, so favourably situated, becoming a rival of Liverpool in the trade
with America. At present only steamers plying to Cork and Waterford avail
themselves of the facilities thus provided. The town of Milford lies 5 miles below
these docks.
St. Davids, the ancient Menapia, in the north-west corner of St. Bride's Bay,
is merely a village, but boasts of a grand old cathedral, built in 1176. Fishguard
and Newport are small towns on the north coast, whence slates are shipped.
Tenby, at the other extremity of the county, is a delightful watering-place, its
neighbourhood abounding in charming walks and drives. The ruins of a
Norman castle crown the summit of a promontory. Saundersfoot, a couple of
miles to the north, has collieries and iron works.
CARMARTHENSHIRE— GLAMORGANSHIEE. 69
Carmarthen (Caerfyrddin) is for the most part drained by the Towey and
Taf, and that portion of the county which lies to the north, along the left bank
of the Teifi, is of small extent. The coast is low, and in places marshy, whilst the
interior is hilly, or even mountainous, the hills being intersected by productive
valleys and wooded glens. Carmarthen Van (2,596 feet), a summit of the Black
Mountains, is the highest point in the county. Coal and iron are found, and
there are iron works, iron-mills, copper-mills, tin works, and other manufacturing
establishments. '
Laugharne (pronounced Lame), on the west bank of the Taf, is a decayed town,
with a small port and some trade in butter and corn. St. Clears, higher up on
the same river, has partly usurped its trade.
Carmarthen, the county town and reputed birthplace of Merlin, the Welsh
Fig. 37 — The Worm's Head : Peninsula ok Gower.
magician, is seated upon the Lower Towey, 9 miles above its mouth in Carmar-
then Bay. It is a picturesque town, with irregular and steep streets. Sir Richard
Steele, the essayist, lies buried in its ancient parish church. Tin and iron works
are near it. Ahergwilli, with the palace of the Bishop of St. David's and Merlin's
Hill, is in its neighbourhood. Higher up on the Towey are Llandilofaicr, a market
town, with collieries and marble quarries, and Llandovery.
Llanelly, on Burry Inlet, is the principal seaport of the county. It depends in
a large measure upon the Cambrian Copper "Works, its tin works, and some
collieries. Pemhrey, at the mouth of Burry Inlet, has copper smelting works and
a small harbour. Kidwelly, to the north of it, lies on a silted -up harbour, and is
mainly dependent upon its tin-plate works.
Glamorganshire (Morganwg) is the most southerly county in Wales. Its
northern part is hilly, but none of its hills attain a height of 2,000 feet, whilst the
70
THE BRITISH ISLES.
south, known as the Yale of Glamorgan, is generally level. It is the most
fertile portion of Wales, and heavy crops of wheat are raised on a reddish clay
soil. The coast is most irregular towards the west, where the peninsula of Gower,
between Swansea Bay and Burry Inlet, juts out into the Bristol Channel. Off its
south-western point lies a small island, terminating in the forbidding promontory
known as the Worm's Head. The chief rivers are the Llwchwr (Loughor), sepa-
rating the county from Carmarthenshire, the Tawe, the Neath, the Taf, and the
Rumney, the last forming the eastern boundary. The great wealth of the county
in coal and iron, combined with its running streams and excellent harbours, has
Fig. 38.— Swansea.
Scale 1 : 200,000.
WoP Gr
foreshore.
iJepth under 5 Fathoms.
5 to 10 Fathoms.
2 Miles.
Over 10 Fathoms.
caused its manufacturing industry and commerce to flourish, and its population is
more dense than that of any other county in Wales.
English is almost universally understood, although Welsh continues to be the
language of the majority. There is only one tract of any extent within which
English is spoken to the entire exclusion of Welsh. This is the peninsula of
Gower, in which Flemish colonists established themselves in 1103. It is famous for
its cromlechs. Physically the inhabitants of this peninsula are said to differ from
their neighbours, and a few words of Flemish survive amongst them, although they
have discontinued the use of their mother tongue since the fifteenth century.*
Swansea^ at the mouth of the Tawe, is an unattractive town, which owes its
* Varenbergh, " Patria Belgica," iii.
GLAMOEGANSHIEE.
71
'prosperity to the smelting and refining of copper. As early as the twelfth
century, we are told by Borrow, Swansea was known for its castings, but it is only
since the beginning of this century that it has grown into an important seat of
industry. The miners of Cornwall were the first to send their ores to Swansea to
be smelted, and so great are the advantages conferred upon the town by its wealth
Fig. 39.— Cardiff.
Scale 1 : 52.500.
3-12-
W. oF G r
iMUe.
in coal, that copper ores from all parts of the world now find their way to its
smelting furnaces. The smoke ascending from the numerous chimneys of the
town poisons the atmosphere and kills the vegetation on the surrounding hills.
Swansea has excellent docks, and its foreign trade, more especially with France, is
of great importance. The museum belonging to the Royal Institution of South
72 THE BEITISii ISLES.
Wales contains a valuable natural-history collection. Landore, a suburb of Swan-
sea, is well known for its steel works.
Oystermoiith, on the western side of Swansea Bay, bas grown into a favourite
watering-place. The Neath enters Swansea Bay to the east of Swansea. Briton
Ferry, at its mouth, has iron and tin-plate works, but is surpassed m importance
by Neath, a few miles up the river, where copper smelting is carried on, and
whence coal is exported in considerable quantities. Aherafon, at the mouth of the
A.von, has copper works, and carries on a large trade. The small port of Porth-
cawl depends for its prosperity upon the coal mines of Civmdu, in the interior of the
county. Still proceeding up the Bristol Channel to its narrowest part, where the
estuary of the Severn may be said to begin, we find ourselves opposite the port of
Cardiff, one of the most important in Europe. Though commanded by an old
castle, in which Robert, the eldest son of the Conqueror, lingered a captive for
thirty years, and which has been restored as a residence of the Marquis of Bute,
Cardiff is essentially a modern town, with broad, clean streets. The exports of
coal and iron from the Taff valley are the great source of its prosperity, and since
the opening of the famous Bute Docks its growth has been rapid. Roath, Canton,
and Penarth are suburbs of Cardiff, and Llandqf, the seat of a bishopric founded in
the fifth century, lies 2 miles to the north-west of it. Its cathedral has recently
been restored. Cowhridge and Bridgend are the principal towns in the Yale of
Glamorgan, which extends from Llandaff to Swansea Bay.
The towns in the basin of the Taff depend upon their collieries and iron works
for their prosperity, and like Cardiff, their principal shipping port, they suffered
much during the depression of trade. Merthyr Tydvil, high up in this
valley, and close to the borders of Brecknockshire, is the chief amongst them,
though it consists of an agglomeration of factories and dwelling-houses rather
than of a compactly built town. Its mines yield coal and excellent iron ore,
and as lime, which plays so important a part in the manufacture of iron, is found
close to the coal, the conditions are as favourable as possible for the development
of the iron and steel industry. The whole of this district is dotted over with iron
and steel works, railways intersect each other in all directions, and the lurid glare
of smoking heaps of slag lights up the night. The iron works of Doiclais, a suburb
of Merthyr Tydvil, give occasionally employment to 20,000 men, and rank with the
largest works of the kind in existence. Cyfarthfa, another of these workmen's cities,
formerly enjoyed the monopoly of casting all the guns required by the British
Government. It was here that Trevethick constructed his first traction engine.
Aherdare and Mountain Ash, on the Cynon, a tributary of the Taff ; Neicbridge
(Pontypridd), at the mouth of the Rhondda valley ; and other towns along the canal
which connects Merthyr Tydvil with Cardiff, are dependent upon their collieries
and iron works for existence. They possess hardly a feature to mitigate their
rough and grimy aspect, and it is a relief to turn from them to the fine ruins
of the feudal stronghold of Caerphilly, 8 miles to the north of Cardiff, in the
valley of the Rumney.
Monmouthshire extends from the Rumney to the Lower Wye, its central
MONMOUTHSHIEE-BRECKNOCKSHIRE.
73
Fig. 40. — Newport.
portion being drained by the Usk. Along the coast there are extensive " levels "
protected by embankments against the high tides of the Severn ; but the greater
portion of the county is hilly. The Sugar-loaf Hill (Pen-y-val), to the north of
Abergavenny, rises to a height of 1,954 feet.
The geographical nomenclature is for the most part Welsh, but English is now the
predominant tongue, Welsh being spoken only in the coal and iron regions to the
west of the Usk, where its use is perpetuated by immigrants from adjoining counties.
The towns to the west of the Usk, in the valleys of the Sirhowy, Ebwy, and
Llwyd, engage in coal mining and the manufacture of iron and steel, the chief
amongst them being Tredegar, Abersychan,
Blaenavon, and Pontypool. Newport, at the
mouth of the Usk, is their great shipping
port. It has grown from a small village
into a populous town, with iron works, nail
factories, wire, and nut and bolt works. Its
docks give access to the largest vessels, and
Caerleon, the Isca Silurum of the Romans,
and residence of King Arthur, which lies
3 miles above, on the right bank of the
Usk, probably at no time equalled it in im-
portance. Higher up on the Usk are
Raglan, with the ruins of a famous strong-
hold, and Abergavenny, a manufacturing
town, producing principally boots and shoes.
Monmouth (Mynwy), the capital of the
county, is seated at the confluence of the
Monnow with the Wye, in the midst of
wooded hills. Its associations are altogether
English. In its castle, now a ruin, was
born Henry Y., the victor of Agincourt.
Geoffrey of Monmouth, whose Latin Chro-
nicles Shakspere made use of, was a native
of the town. The Wye, between Monmouth
and Chepstow, is renowned for its scenery,
presenting an alternation of meadow lands,
steep cliffs, and woods descending to the water's edge. The ruins of Tintern Abbey
lie about half-way between the two. Chepstow (Aberwye), near the mouth of the
river, is a port of some importance. Its castle, on a formidable cliff overhanging
the river, was captured by Cromwell, and is now a picturesque ruin.
Brecknockshire (Brycheiniog) is an inland county, comprising the upper
basin of the Usk as well as the western slope of the Upper Wye. The Black
Mountains, which in the Brecknock Beacons attain a height of 2,910 feet, rise
boldly to the south of the Usk, whilst the north is filled with the wooded range
of the Mynydd Epynt and other lofty hiUs, The arable land is of limited
102— E
Scale 1 : 143,000.
1 Mile.
74 THE BEITISH ISLES.
extent, but sheep farming and the rearing of cattle are of importance. Coal and
iron abound in the south. Welsh is still the language of the majority, but is
losing its hold upon the inhabitants.
Brecknock^ or Brecon^ on the Usk, centrally situated, is the county town. In
the neighbourhood of Llanelly, near the Usk, not far from the boundary of
Monmouthshire, are the Clydach iron works. Bryntnawr, another town noted for
its iron works and collieries, lies to the south-west, on the Upper Ebwy, whilst
Ynyscedwin and Ystalyfera are situate in the extreme south-west, on the Upper
Tawe, and virtually belong to the vast manufacturing district depending upon
Swansea.
Hay and Biiilth, the latter a curious old place, with narrow, tortuous streets,
are the only remarkable towns on the Wye.
Radnorshire (Maesyfed) is an inland county, covered almost wholly with
desolate moorlands, and very sparsely peopled. The Wye, which washes the
county on the west and south, is the outflow for its watershed, whilst the Lugg
and x\rrow, rising in Radnor Forest (2,166 feet), flow to the eastward into Here-
fordshire. The geographical nomenclature is Welsh, but Welsh is now only
understood by a few old people at Rhayader and some other remote localities on
the Upper Wye.
Presteigne, the county town, is situate in the fertile valley of the Lugg ; Netv
Radnor lies at the foot of Radnor Forest ; and Knighton occupies the heights over-
looking the river Teme. Offa's Dyke passes through it. Llandrindod, in the
valley of the Wye, near Builth, enjoys some reputation as a watering-place.
CHAPTER TIL
THE COJRNISH PENINSULA.
(Cornwall and Devonshire.)
HE peninsula formed almost wholly of the counties of Cornwall and
Devonshire constitutes a distinct geographical province, which
resembles "Wales rather than any other part of England. It is a
country of rocks, hills, promontories, and heath-covered ridges.
Like the Cambrian mountain region, its rocks belong to the most
ancient formations, and a well-marked depression, extending southward from
the valley of the Severn, separates it from the rest of England. Cornwall and
Wales also resemble each other as respects the origin of their inhabitants, and
a like geographical position has resulted in a certain analogy in the historical
development of the two peoples. When we speak of the Welsh, our thoughts
almost involuntarily turn to the neighbouring people of Cornwall.
Cornwall, by its geological structure, is a sister-land of French Brittany, from
which it is separated by the wide mouth of the English Channel. The land
on both sides of that arm of the sea is composed of granite, schists, and palaeozoic
rocks ; the shores are indented by deep gulfs and bays, affording facilities for the
establishment of great naval stations ; and both peninsulas terminate in promon-
tories known as Land's End, or Finistere. Climate, rivers, soil, and inhabitants all
resemble each other on these two shores. Cornwall, however, enjoys the advantage
of being far richer in mineral wealth than the French peninsula. There is no coal,
as in Wales, but rich lodes of copper, zinc, and lead have attracted navigators
from the most ancient times, and have proved the principal source of prosperity of
the county.*
A range of hills of Devonian formation rises to the south of the Bristol Channel,
and constitutes, as it were, the root of the peninsula. These hiUs are separated by
valleys, giving birth to the head-stream of the Exe, and terminate in the west, in
the table-land of Exmoor, some of the summits of which exceed a height of 1,500
feet. On the north this table-land is intersected by picturesque valleys, and termi-
nates in bold cliffs. From its summits we may witness the continuous onslaught
* Dufr^noy et Elie de Beaumont, " Voyage metallurgique en Angleterre."
76
THE BRITISH ISLES.
of the sea upon the rocks of Ilfracombe, whilst in the south the land gradually slopes
down towards the wide semicircular bay bounded by Start Point and the Bill of
Portland. Human habitations are few and far between on this plateau, being
confined to hamlets and lonely farms hidden away in the hollows. The slopes
of the hills are covered with heather or short herbage, whilst their summits
are occupied by sepulchral mounds or ancient entrenchments. The Quantock
Hills, to the east of Exmoor, are the only part of England where the stag still
lives in a wild state.
A second mountain mass, the Dartmoor, rises to the west of the river Exe into
the region of pasture, culminating in the Yeo Tor (2,077 feet), and High Wilhays
Pig. 41.— Land's End and the Longships Lighthovse.
(2,040 feet). The nucleus of this mountain group consists of granite, and the
rivers which rise in it diverge in all directions, feeding the Teign and Exe in
the east ; the Taw and Torridge in the north ; the Tamar, or Tamer, in the west ;
the Tavy, Avon, and Dart in the south. The coast-line projects far to the south,
where the spurs of Dartmoor approach it, as if the floods of the ocean had been
powerless in their attacks upon the rocks which envelop this nucleus of granite.
Start Point, the extreme promontory, is thus named because vessels take their
departure from it when about to venture upon the open ocean. Two estuaries
bound the uplands which culminate in Dartmoor, viz. that of the Ex in the east,
and that of the Tamar, which debouches upon many-armed Plymouth Sound, in
THE CORNISH PENINSULA. 77
the west. Dartmoor, within its proper limits, covers an area of 200 square
miles, and its population is as sparse as that of Exmoor. Many of its valleys,
where villages would be sheltered from the cold winds which sweep the heights,
are filled with peat and quaking " stables." Piles of stone and the sepulchral
mounds of the ancient inhabitants of the country crown the summits of some of the
tors, those enormous masses of granite which form the most striking feature of the
scenery. In former times most of the slopes were covered with trees, but they
have long ago disappeared, and the ancient Dartmoor Forest has become the home
of partridges and heath-cocks. Hidden away in one of its wildest recesses lies the
small village of Prince Town (thus named in honour of the Prince of Wales, who
owns most of the surrounding land), and near it is one of the largest convict
prisons in England.
The uplands of Cornwall are far inferior to Exmoor and Dartmoor in elevation.
They, too, are dreary treeless wastes, intersected by boggy valleys, and are
composed of a great variety of rocks, including limestones and schists, granite and
porphyry. From Hartland Point, which bounds Barnstaple Bay in the west, a
range of hills and small plateaux stretches south and south-westward to the
extremity of the peninsula, its spurs terminating in cliffs or chaotic masses of rock
along the sea-coast. The Cornish heights culminate in Brown Willy, 1,864 feet.
They are bounded in the east by the valley of the Tamar, and deeply penetrated by
the winding estuary of the Fal, which almost severs the bold cliffs forming their
western extremity from the body of the peninsula. Lizard Point (224 feet), a
bold mass of variegated rock, surmounted by two lighthouses lit by electricity,
is the southernmost point of England. Its latitude (49° 57') is nearly the same
as that of Dieppe, Amiens, and Mayence. A small group of hills to the west
of the St. Ives and Mount's Bays terminates in the headlands of Cornwall
and Land's End. The Scilly Islands, which lie off these, are now the only
vestiges of an extensive tract of land. Tradition tells us that anciently the districts
of the Lionesse and Lelothsow, with forty villages, extended from Cori^vall to
these islands. An old family bears on its coat of arms a horse escaping from the
sea, in memory of an ancestor whom the fleetness of his charger saved from a
premature death when these districts were swallowed up by the sea.*
The aspect of the headlands varies with the nature of the rocks composing
them, and the strength of the winds and waves to which they are exposed.
Lizard Point, a mass of compact serpentine, is being gnawed by the waves, which,
however, are unable to break it up. Land's End is a mass of tabular granite
weathered iilto huge blocks, piled one upon the other like cyclopean walls.
Cape Cornwall, composed of slate, is being split up into laminae. The moist
and saliferous air proves exceedingly destructive, and on many hills the rocks
have been broken into quadrangular masses, hardly to be distinguished from
the artificial structures raised by the ancient inhabitants of the country. The
waves, however, are the principal agents of destruction along the coast. Yast
caverns, locally known as "Hugos," have been scooped out at the foot of
* Carew, " Survey of Cornwall."
78
THE BEITISH ISLES.
the cliffs, and into these the waves rush with great noise. Isolated pinnacles,
washed by the ocean's foam, rise beyond the line of cliffs, whilst sunken rocks, the
remains of ancient promontories, still break the force of the waves, above which
they formerly rose. Old chronicles tell us of hills and tracts of coast which have
been swaUowed up by the sea. Mount St. Michael, in Mount's Bay, rose formerly,
like its namesake off the coast of Normandy, in the midst of a wooded plain, which
rig. 42.— The "Akmed Knights," near Land's End, Coknwall.
has disappeared beneath the waves. The church which crowns its summit is
referred to in ancient documents as *' Hoar Kirk in the Wood," but the famous
Mount is now alternately a peninsula and an island, according to the state of the
tide. The wind, more especially along the north coast, has likewise aided in
changing the form of the littoral region, for it has piled up dunes, or " towans,"
which travel towards the interior of the country until " fixed " by plantations, or
consolidated into sandstone through the agency of the oxide of iron which the
THE CORNISH PENINSULA. 79
sand contains.* Oscillations of the land appear likewise to have had a large share
in the changes witnessed along the coasts of Cornwall and Devonshire. On the
beach which the retiring tide uncovers at the foot of the Exmoor cliffs, along
the Bristol Channel, may be seen the remains of ancient forests which can have
grown only on dry land. The submarine forest of Babbacombe, on the southern
coast of Devonshire, between Teignmouth and Torquay, indicates a subsidence of the
land to the extent of at least 20 feet. This subsidence, however, was evidently
preceded by an upheaval, for ancient beaches have been discovered far inland on
the hillsides. One of the caverns of this upheaved coast yielded flint implements,
which proves that man was an inhabitant of the country at a remote epoch. t
Prehistoric monuments are as numerous in Cornwall as in the Celtic countries of
Wales and Brittany. Neither cromlechs, ** logans,*' nor rocking-stones, sepulchral
mounds, nor rings of unhewn stones are wanting to give completeness to this open-
air archaeological museum of Cornwall.
Lundy Island (466 feet), a mass of granite 920 acres in extent, off Barnstaple
Bay, marks the former limit of the coast in that direction, whilst the low
archipelago of the Scilly Islands may be looked upon as an outlier of the Cornish
peninsula. Only five out of the twenty-four islands of this archipelago exceed
250 acres in area, and they alone are inhabited. + Samson, which had a few
inhabitants in 1851, has since been abandoned, not because its inhabitants wished
it, but by order of the despotic proprietor of these islands. The inhabitants of
Samson, as well as the poor residing on the other islands, were transferred by him
to the mainland, and his tenants were ordered to keep only one son with them, to
be supported by the land. Those amongst them who had numerous families
were obliged to send their sons to sea or to the ship-yards.§ The population
decreases from decade to decade, but the inhabitants have grown considerabl)^ in
wealth. The people of Scilly, though very small as far as numbers go, are never-
theless an interesting subject for study, for amongst them the much- vaunted theory
of an *' intelligent despotism " has been carried out with method and to perfection
for nearly half a century. ||
The Scilly Islands can boast of some of the finest market gardens in England,
and they are largely indebted to steam navigation for their prosperity, for by its
means they are able to supply the London markets with early vegetables. The
warm and moisture-laden atmosphere secures the gardeners of the Scilly Islands,
and of the neighbouring coast of the Cornish peninsula, against winter frosts.
But though the climate is highly favourable to the growth of foliage, it does not
suit fruit. Even plums and apricots ripen only in exceptionally dry seasons. On
an average there are only six days of real calm in the year. The wind blows
almost without interruption from one point of the compass or the other, bringing
* Alph. Esquiros, " L'Angleterre et la vie Anglaise."
t Pengelly, Reader, Nov. 19, 1864.
Area.
X St. Mary's, Tresco, St. Martin's, St. Agnes, Boyer .... 2,330 acres.
Nineteen uninhabited islands - • 289 ,,
§ Population (1851), 2,627, (1861) 2,431, (1871) 2,075.
II Froude, " Uses of a Landed Gentry " (Paper read at the Edinburgh Philosophical Institute).
80
THE BRITISH ISLES.
with it fogs, drizzling rain, or heavy showers. Storms are of frequent occurrence,
and the number of shipwrecks is nowhere larger. The currents which meet at
the SciUy Islands often carry vessels out of their true course, and during fogs
cause them to run upon sunken rocks. It was here that, in 1707, the most disastrous
shipwreck of modern times occurred. An entire fleet, commanded by Sir Cloudesley
Shovel, was thrown upon the rocks, and two thousand human souls passed together
Fig. 43.— The Scilly Islands.
Scale 1 : 170,000.
'DO'
W.oPGt
6'25
6° 15
ESS
Foresliore.
Depth under 26 Fathoms
to 54 Fathoms.
. 2MUes.
Over 54 Fathoms.
into eternity. An old saying will have it that out of every ten natives of the
Scilly Islands nine perish in the sea ; but thanks to lighthouses, lightships, fog
signals, life-boats, and a change in the mode of life of the inhabitants, this,
happily, is no longer true.
The Cornish peninsula is quite as much a land of mist and rain as are the
Scilly Islands. The annual rainfall is nowhere less than 30 inches ; in most
localities it exceeds 3 feet, and on the western slopes of Dartmoor it rises to
THE CORNISH PENINSULA. 81
80 inclies. At Tavistock it rains almost incessantly, showers accompanyino- the
wind from whatever quarter it blows.
Many geographers have identified the Scilly Islands with the Cassiterides of
the ancients, simply because of their vicinity to the Cornish mines. But these
granitic islands in reality contain only feeble traces of metal, while the rocks of
the neighbouring mainland abound in underground treasures, which have certainly
been explored from a period anterior to Caesar's expedition. Old mines dating
back to that time can still be traced, and the detached, almost insular, rock masses
of Cornwall are undoubtedly the CEstrymnides or Cassiterides visited by the
traders of Phoenicia and Carthage. During the Roman epoch the tin of Cornwall
was sent across Gaul to Marseilles.
The lodes of Cornwall are principally of copper and tin, sometimes sepa-
rately, sometimes in combination. The richest lodes of tin have been discovered
in the environs of Penzance, near the extretnity of the peninsula, whilst the most
productive copper mines are some distance inland, more especially around Redruth.
There are a few mines which, after having ceased to yield one metal, are
worked for the sake of the other. In some instances the ores are exceedingly rich,
and near the coast may be seen rocks dyed green by an efflorescence of copper ; *
but as a rule the Cornish ores are very poor, containing scarcely 2 per cent, of
tin, or from 3 to 4 per cent, of copper. Their value depended altogether upon
the scarcity of the metal they yielded, and since the discovery of rich ores in
the United States, Bolivia, Australia, and the Sunda Islands, it has decreased
very much. In their search after the precious ores the valiant miners of Corn-
wall have sunk pits and excavated galleries which rank amongst the curiosities
of England. Powerful pumping-engines have been brought into requisition to
empty the mines of the water which invades them through fissures in the rocks.
But in the case of mines many hundred fathoms in depth artificial means for
raising the water do not suffice, and an adit conveys it directly to the sea.
The underground workings in the mining districts of Gwennap and Redruth
reach to a depth of 1,750 feet below the surface, the galleries extend 60
miles, the adit is 7 miles long, and sixty pumping-engines daily remove 100,000
tons of water, being at the rate of more than a ton every second. The timber
buried in the mines of Cornwall is supposed to be equivalent to a pine forest a
hundred years old, and covering 140 square miles.
Botallack promontory, near Cape Cornwall, one of the most picturesque rocks
on the coast, is more especially curious on account of the copper mine which is
hidden in its bowels. Almost severed from the mainland by a wide fissure, that
enormous block of rock, 200 feet in height, is reached by narrow bridges
constructed at a giddy height. Spiral railways wind round its flanks, and its
pinnacles terminate in smoking chimneys. The workings are continued for 1,200
feet under the bed of the Atlantic, and the miners can feebly hear the noise made
by the pebbles rolling up and down the beach. In the neighbouring mine of
Wheal Cock the lode has been followed to the very bed of the sea, and the hole
* Carus, " England and Scotland in 1844."
82
THE BRITISH ISLES.
plugged up, to prevent its irruption. The noise of rolling pebbles and of the surf
becomes terrific when we penetrate this mine, and on a tempestuous day the uproar
is sufficient to cause even the hardiest miner to shudder. Elsewhere the old
miners had the imprudence to follow a lode within so short a distance of the bed
of the sea, that the latter broke through the roof of the mine and flooded a portion
of its galleries. The hole, however, was fortunately stopped up by means of a
plank platform covered with turf and weighted with stones. Another copper mme
to the south of Penzance is often cited as an instance of the enterprise of the
Cornish miners. It was commenced towards the close of the last century by a work-
■pig. 44.— The Botallack Mine.
ing miner, on a part of the beach which was covered twice daily by the advancing
tide. Under these circumstances it was only possible to work for a few hours of the
day. But when the mine had been enclosed by a wooden fence and joined to the
land by a plank bridge, it became possible to work it continuously, and for a
number of years the ** Wherry " yielded considerable quantities of copper. One
day, however, during a storm, a vessel anchored in the neighbourhood, dragged her
anchor, and was helplessly driven upon the wooden enclosure. The sea then once
more invaded the mine, which has not since been worked.*
* Dufrenoy et Elie de Beaumont, " Voyage metallurgique en Angleterre."
THE CORNISH PENINSULA. S8
But though the miners of Cornwall be ever so persevering, and take advan-
tage of every improvement in machinery, the cost of coal and timber will not
enable them to compete with other mining countries whose ores are richer. The
Stannary Parliament, which used to discuss the business connected with the mines,
meets no longer. Its last meetings took place in Devonshire in 1749, in Cornwall
in 1752. Many of the miners have sought new homes beyond the Atlantic,
and in proportion as the wealth of the mines diminishes, the country popula-
tion decreases in numbers, and the towns grow larger. Quarries and china-clay
diggings, though of importance, are not sufficiently so to compensate for the mines
that had to be abandoned.* There remain, however, many sources of wealth,
including pilchard and mackerel fisheries ; market gardens, from which London
draws a large supply of early vegetables ; and productive fields, fertilised by the
calcareous sand which is spread over them. The rocks of Cornwall are poor in
carbonate of lime, resembling in this respect the rocks of Brittany, but there is an
abundance of marine organisms, by which the lime contained in the water of the
ocean is secreted, and the sand along the shore converted into a valuable fertiliser.
For centuries this sand has been utilised to increase the productiveness of the soil.
It is more especially made use of in the vicinity of the little bay of Padstow,
where about 100,000 tons of it are annually spread over the fields, this being about
one-fifth of the total quantity applied in this manner throughout Cornwall and
Devonshire.!
The inhabitants of the Cornish peninsula offered a long-continued resistance to
the Saxon invaders, and in many localities they still present peculiar features.
Black hair, sallow complexions, short and broad skulls, are met with more
frequently than in other parts of England. Many of the women on the south
coast, between Falmouth and Lizard Point, are of a southern type, which it has
been sought to trace to an immigration from Spain, and indeed Tacitus writes of
Iberians who settled in the country. A few vestiges of a division into hostile clans
survive to the present day. The old language, however, a sister tongue of that
of Wales, lives now only in the geographical nomenclature. For two centuries it
had ceased to be commonly spoken, and the last woman able to express herself in
the original language of the country died in 1778 at Mousehole, near Penzance.
Enthusiastic philologists have raised a stone to her memory. A few words
of Cornish have been preserved in the l^cal dialect. Cornish literature, which has
been especially studied by Mr. Whitley Stokes, is, he says, limited to a glossary of
the twelfth century, and a number of ** mysteries " of later date, for the most part
adapted or translated from the contemporaneous literature current during the
Middle Ages. A society has been formed in Cornwall for the purpose of publish-
ing the ancient manuscripts. The numerous popular legends, which still form
the stock of many a simple story-teller in the remote villages of Cornwall, have
been collected and published in various English works.
* In 1844 the mines yielded 152,970 tons of copper ore; at present they yield scarcely 50,000 tons.
Of china clay, or kaolin, about 150,000 tons are annually exported,
f Delesse, "Lithologie du fond des mers."
84
THE BRITISH ISLES.
Topography.
Cornwall, tlie extreme south-western county of England, terminates in the
rocky promontories of Land's End and Lizard Point. The greater portion of its
area is occupied by wild and barren moorlands, surmounted by bosses of granite
Fig. 45. — Penzance.
Scale 1 : 505,000.
Foreshore. Depth under 5 Fathoms 5 to 10 Fathoms. 10 to 20 Fathoms. Over 20 Fathoms.
1 Mile.
and intersected by valleys with boggy bottoms. Mining, quarrying, fishing, and
the cultivation of early vegetables constitute the principal sources of wealth.
Penzance is admirably seated upon the shore of a fine semicircular bay, bounded
on the east by the bold serpentine rocks of Lizard Point, and on the west by the
heights which extend thence to the Land's End. It is the south- westernmost town
CORNWALL. 3g
in England, and is much frequented by visitors, who delight in its equable climate
and luxuriant vegetation, and to whom bold cliffs of granite or serpentine,
quarries and mines, and magnificent cromlechs, stone circles, logans, &c. (see
page 30), present objects of attraction. Penzance is the centre of an important
mining, fishing, and agricultural district. Within a radius of 7 or 8 miles of
it are situated some of the most celebrated " setts " in the county of Cornwall
including Botallack and its neighbour Wheal Owles, which hardly yields to it in
reputation. The harbour is formed by a breakwater, and defended by batteries.
The town has smelting-houses, and works where serpentine is fashioned into cups
and vases. It exports early vegetables and fish. Penzance was the birthplace of
Sir Humphry Davy, to whom a monument has been erected, and is justly proud
of the scientific collections accumulated by its geological, natural history, and
antiquarian societies. Porthcurno, near Penzance, and other creeks in its vicinity,
are the points of departure of three submarine cables, which connect England with
the Spanish ports of Santander and Vigo, and the Portuguese village of Carcavellos,
near Lisbon, whence the cable is carried on to Gibraltar and the Mediterranean.
In addition to these a submarine cable connects Penzance with a lightship 50 miles
to the south-west, which hails all passing ships and places them in communica-
tion with their owners in London. Madron and Ludgvan are ancient market
towns, within a couple of miles of Penzance, but are exceeded in interest by the
pretty village of Marazion, opposite the pyramidal St. Michael's Mount, with which
it is connected by an ancient causeway, flooded eight hours out of every twelve.
The Mount rises to a height of 95 feet, and is crowned by an ancient castle, partly
in ruins, commanding a magnificent prospect.
Helston, on the Looe, which enters the sea 9 miles to the north-east of Lizard
Point, depends upon mines and agriculture for such prosperity as it enjoys.
E/Ounding the promontory just named, and its quarries of serpentine, we reach the
estuary of the Fal, and with it the important town of Falmouth, beautifully seated
on the shore of a magnificent harbour, bounded in the south by the conical
promontory surmounted by Pendennis Castle, and protected by a breakwater.
The harbour of Falmouth is one of the finest in England, capable of sheltering an
entire fleet. The town itself is mean, but its environs abound in picturesque
scenery. Penryn, on an inlet of Falmouth Harbour, is known for its granite
quarries. St. Mawes, opposite Falmouth, boasts an ancient castle erected in the
time of Henry VIII. Proceeding up the beautiful haven at the entrance of which
lie Falmouth and St. Mawes, and which is known as Carrick Eoads, we reach
Truro, the finest town in Cornwall, and recently created an episcopal see. Truro
has smelting-houses and paper-mills, and exports the ores obtained from the
neighbouring mines. Like Penzance, it can boast of its museum and scientific
institutions. It was the birthplace of Richard and John Lander, the African
travellers. A cathedral of noble proportions is being raised.
Rounding Dodman Head, we reach Mevagisseij, one of the principal seats of the
pilchard fishery, and farther north the small town of Charlestown, which is the port
of St. Austell, known for its china-clay diggings and potteries. Par, on the
86
THE BRITISH ISLES.
northern side of St. Austell Bay, has a small harbour defended by a breakwater,
and exports china clay and iron ore from the neighbouring mines of St. Blazey.
Foweyy at the mouth of the estuary of the same name, has an excellent harbour,
defended by forts and batteries, and much frequented. Three hundred years ago
Fowey was the most important maritime city in the south-west of England. The
site of Falmouth was at that time occupied by a solitary house, whilst Fowey
Fig. 46. — Falmouth and Tkuro.
Scale 1 : 176,000.
Depth under 10 Fathoms
Depth over 10 Fathoms.
2 Miles.
furnished Edward III. with forty-seven vessels for the siege of Calais. It was a
noted place for pirates, and its mariners occasionally even fought vessels from other
English ports, including those of Rye and Winchelsea. The town was burnt by
the French in 1457. Lostwithiel is higher up on the Fowey, which yields excellent
trout and smelts.
East and West Looe are two old-fashioned fishing villages at the mouth of the
DEVONSHIRE.
87
river Looe, which affords access to the old mining town of Liskeard. Granite
and ores are the principal articles of export.
The north-western coast of Cornwall is far poorer in good harbours than the
south-east coast. The most important is St. Ives, the principal seat of the
pilchard fishery. It is a quaint old town at the entrance to a fine bay, on which is
also situated the small port of Hayle. Both export the produce of the neighbour-
ing mining district, the centres of which are Redruth, Camborne, and Phillack.
Neiv Quay, farther north, exports a little iron ore. Padstow, at the mouth of
the estuary of the Camel, has an indifferent harbour, but is of some importance on
account of its fisheries and coasting trade. It is a very ancient, but by no means
an attractive place. Following the Camel upwards, we reach Bodmin, the county
town, but not otherwise remarkable, and Camelford, near the head of that river.
In its neighbourhood are the slate quarries of Delahole. Once more resuming our
voyage along the cliff-bound coast, we pass the castle of Tintagel on its lofty rock,
and reach Bude Haven, at the mouth of a canal, by which tons of sand containing
carbonate of lime are transported inland.
The only place of importance in the interior of the county not yet noticed is
Launceston, with a fine Gothic church and a ruined castle, on the Attery, a
tributary of the Tamar, which separates Cornwall from Devonshire.
Devonshire is noted throughout England for its picturesque scenery, its rich
pasture-lands, orchards, and copper mines. The north of the county is occupied by
the treeless moorlands of Exmoor, the centre by the equally sterile Dartmoor
Forest ; in the east the Black Downs extend into the county from Dorsetshire ; but
the south is rich in orchards, and hence is known as the " Garden of Devonshire.' '
Plymouth, with its sister towns of Devonport and Stonehouse, has grown into the
greatest centre of population on the south-west coast of England. No other town has
been so frequently mentioned in connection with expeditions of war and discovery.
It was from Plymouth that Sir Francis Drake started in 1577, and Cook in 1772.
Although a town of war, girdled by fortifications, with crenellated walls occupying
every point of vantage, Plymouth is nevertheless a beautiful town. From the
surrounding heights and from the walks which line the quays we look in all
directions upon bays and inlets of the sea studded with vessels. Here steamers
glide STNdftly from shore to shore ; there sailing vessels are anchored in the
roadstead ; farther away we look upon men-of-war and huge hulks towering
above the water; whilst on the open sea, which glistens beyond the break-
water, may be seen passing vessels with swollen sails. Kight opposite to the town
rise the heights of Mount Edgcumbe, clad with fine trees, divided by broad
avenues into picturesque masses. When the sun lights up the landscape we
might almost fancy ourselves transported to some Italian city on the Mediter-
ranean seaboard, the delusion being heightened by the clustering pines. The
magnificent roadstead of Plymouth, known as the "Sound," covers 1,800 acres,
and receives the tribute of the rivers Plym and Tamar, the estuary of the
first forming the harbour of Catwater on the east, and that of the latter the
Hamoaze on the west. The harbour was long exposed to the heavy sea which
Qg THE BRITISH ISLES.
rolled into the Sound with the southerly gales, often causing great damage. To
remedy this defect a breakwater, 5,100 feet in length, has been constructed
across its middle. This stupendous work was commenced in 1812 by Rennie,
and completed in 1846 at a cost of nearly £2,000,000 sterling. About two
million and a half tons of blocks of coarse marble have been employed m its
construction. It is continually requiring repairs, for during severe gales the
Fig. 47.— Plymouth.
Scale 1 : 268,000,
Depth under W to 20
10 Fathoms. Fathoms.
20 to;
Fathoms.
Miles.
blocks composing it, notwithstanding their weighing between 60 and 80 tons, are
often forced from their positions, whilst the destructive work of the pholades, or
pittocks, is going on at all times, converting the solid rock into pumice-like masses.
More than once this barrier has been broken through by the sea, and it is on record
that a helpless vessel was washed over the breakwater by the infuriated waves, and
landed in the inner Sound.* Experts assert that the height of the breakwater
* Carus, " England and Scotland in 1844."
DEVONSHIRE. 89
above the level of the sea is insufficient, in consequence of which the waves
wash over it during gales, transmitting their undulatory movement as far as the
inner harbour.*
Plymouth, in addition to its breakwater, can boast of other remarkable
engineering works, testifying to the spirit of enterprise possessed by Englishmen.
The Royal William victualling-yards in the modern town of Stonehouse cover an
area of 14 acres at the extremity of the peninsula which separates the Sound from
the harbour of Hamoaze, Devonport, which is still confined within a bastioned
wall, possesses one of the great dockyards of the kingdom, whilst far out at sea the
proximity of Plymouth is revealed by a lofty lighthouse, boldly raised upon a rock
in mid-channel. Shipwrecks were formerly frequent on the group of the Eddy-
stone rocks, one of which is occupied by the lighthouse. The first structure
was erected in 1696. It was of wood, and a storm in 1703 completely washed it
and its architect away. Another lighthouse was built, 1706 — 1709, also of wood,
but was burned in 1755. The third structure was constructed by Smeaton, 1757 — 59.
It is noted for its strength and the engineering skill it displays, and rises to a
height of 85 feet, its light being visible at a distance of 13 miles. This structure
still stands, but it, also, is doomed to disappear, for the rock it occupies is slowly,
but surely, being undermined by the waves. The new lighthouse, now in course of
construction, will rise to the stupendous height of 130 feet, and its light will thus be
placed beyond the reach of the waves.
Plymouth, with its sister cities, depends for its prosperity in a large measure upon
the Government establishment of which it is the seat. Its coasting trade is exten-
sive, but not so its commerce with foreign countries. Ship-building and the refining
of sugar are the principal industries. Amongst the public buildings the most
remarkable are the new Guildhall, the Athenaeum, with a valuable museum, and
the public library. Flympton, a small market town to the east of Plymouth, was
the birthplace of Sir Joshua Reynolds.
Proceeding up the Tamar, we pass beneath the wonderful Albert Suspension
Bridge, which spans the river at a height of 260 feet, and has a length of 2,240
feet. It connects the Devonshire side of the river with Saltash, a small town in
Cornwall, noted for its acres of vineries, in which tons of grapes are grown
every year. Higher up on the Tamar we reach Morwelham Quay, the port of the
mining town of Tavistock, with which it is connected by a canal, running for a
considerable distance through a tunnel. Tavistock, on the Tavy, and at the
western foot of Dartmoor, has copper and lead mines. About 7 miles to the east
of it lies the village of Prince Toicn, with a convict establishment.
Salcombe River, the sinuous estuary of the Avon, penetrates far into the
southernmost portion of Devonshire. Salcombe Regis occupies a magnificent
position near its mouth. Its equable temperature has earned for it the epithet of
the " English Montpelier." Here oranges and lemons ripen in the open air.
Rounding Start Point, we reach the estuary of the river Dart, the entrance to
which is commanded by the ancient town of Dartmouth. Its houses rise tier
* Cialdi, "On Wave Action." Revue maritime et coloniale, January, 1876.
103— E
90
THE BEITISH ISLES.
above tier on the hillsides. Dartmouth has a convenient harbour. It was the
birthplace of Newcomen, the improver of the steam-engine. Higher up on the
Dart rises Totnes, with the ruins of an ancient castle, and still farther inland is
Ashhurton, a mining town, almost in the centre of the cider district of South
Hams.
Several towns of note are seated upon the shore of Tor Bay. Brixham, on its
south side, is the principal fishing town of Devonshire, about two hundred trawlers
Fig. 48.— Smeaton's Eddystone Lighthouse.
belonging to its port. Its harbour is protected by a breakwater. It was here
that William of Orange landed in 1688. Paignton, in the centre of the bay, has
a small harbour. Torquay, on the northern side of the bay, rises in terraces
above the magnificent quay, whilst the surrounding heights are studded with
villas. It is the most important seaside resort on the south coast of England
to the west of Brighton, its equable climate and the shelter afforded by the
surrounding heights also attracting a large number of persons suffering from
consumption. The influx of bathers and invalids has caused the population of
DEVONSHIRE.
91
the town to increase rapidly, and has given rise to a considerable local trade, its
small port now being frequently crowded with shipping. Kent's Hole, near
Torquay, and a similar cavern near Brixham, are remarkable on account of the
stone implements, human remains, and bones of animals which have been found in
them. The fossil fauna of these underground galleries embraces forty-six or forty-
seven species of animals, including the bear, otter, fox, wolf, hyena, panther, stag,
ox, pig, rhinoceros, and elephant, and, amongst the smaller animals, the mouse.*
Flint implements, which first attracted the notice of men of science, were discovered
between 1825 and 1841. Kent's Hole has been known for centuries, and, accord-
Fig. 49. — Eddystone Rocks.
From an Admiralty Chart.
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ing to local tradition, it owes its name to a falcon which flew into it and reappeared
in the county of Kent.
8t. Mary Church, a couple of miles to the north of Torquay, has marble and
terra-cotta works. Teignmoiith has marble works, and exports potter's clay and
cider, besides granite from the Heytor quarries. Neicton Abbot and Woolborough
lie 5 miles inland, whilst Boveij Tracey, known to geologists for its lignite coal
beds and diggings of potter's clay, occupies the centre of a valley which joins that
of the Teiffn on the east. Dawlish, a short distance to the north of Teignmouth,
* MacEnery ; Pengelly, " Kent's Hole;" Boyd Dawkins {Journal of the Geological Society, vol. xxv.
1869).
92
THE BRITISH ISLES.
at the foot of steep cliffs, has grown from a small fishing village into a fashion-
able watering-place.
Exmoiith commands the entrance to the estuary of the river Exe. It is charm-
ingly situated, and is much resorted to by sea-bathers. Ascending the Exe, we
reach Toj}shmn, which has ship yards and rope-walks, and is connected by a ship
canal, 15 feet deep, with the city of Exeter. The Exe is said to have been formerly
navigable for sea- going vessels as far as the quays of Exeter, but the municipality
Fig. 50.— Tor Bay.
Scale 1 : 120,000.
Under 5 Fathoms.
Over 5 Fathoms.
1 Mile.
having offended the neighbouring nobility by forbidding inhabitants of the town
to appear in the livery of a lord without previously obtaining the license of the
mayor and his council, an Earl of Devon had the water dammed above Topsham,
and thus caused the river to silt up rapidly. The village of Topsham, which
was his property, then became the port of the whole district. It is, however, far
more reasonable to suppose that the Exe became silted up through the slow opera-
tion of natural agencies.
DEVONSHIEE.
93
Exeter is proudly seated upon a steep hill on the left bank of the Exe. This
ancient capital of the West Saxons, whose resistance to the Normans was broken
by the massacre ordered by William the Conqueror in 1085, still possesses several
remarkable mediaeval buildings, including the remains of the Norman castle of
Fig. 51. — EXETEII AND THE ESTUARY OF THE ExE.
Scale 1 : 250.000.
5- 30'
3°25'
W.oF Gr
Depth under 5 Fathoms.
5 to 10 Fathoms. Over 10 Fathoms.
__^_^— .^^ 2 Miles.
Rougemont, portions of the old city walls, a Guildhall of the sixteenth century,
and, above all, its cathedral. This edifice was erected between 1107 and 1206 ; it
boasts of fine stained-glass windows, curious paintings on stone, and beautiful wood
carvings, and is the only church in England which has transeptal towers. Amongst
94
THE BEITISH ISLES.
modern buildings the most striking is the Albert Museum. In tbe beginning of
the sixteenth century Exeter was the centre of the English woollen industry, since
transferred to Yorkshire. Crediton, 7 miles to the north-west, on the river Greedy,
a tributary of the Exe, lies in the centre of a prosperous agricultural district. The
parish of Sandford, near it, is said to be the most fertile in all Devonshire.
Tiverton, a place of some importance on the Upper Exe, engages in the lace trade
and net-making.
Sidmouth and Axmouth are favourite watering-places to the east of the Exe.
Sidmouth, in a narrow glen formed by the river Sid, occupies a site of striking
beauty, red cliffs of Devonian sandstone presenting a charming contrast to the
white sand of the beach and the greenish floods of the English Channel. Axmouth, on
the other hand, has become famous through a landslip which occurred in December,
1839, and has formed the subject of careful observation on the. part of Sir Charles
Fig. 52.— Exeter Cathedral.
Lyell and other geologists. A mass of chalk and sandstone, resting upon a bed of
sand, had become thoroughly saturated with water. The sand being unable any
longer to support the superincumbent mass, the whole of it slid down upon the
beach, producing a rent 4,000 feet long, 250 feet wide, and 100 to 150 feet deep.
Honiton and Ottenj St. Manj, both on the river Otter, and Colyton, on the
river Axe, are the principal seats for the manufacture of pillow lace. Honiton is
noted for its cleanliness, Ottery St. Mary for its church, which is an imitation of
Exeter Cathedral on a reduced scale, and Colyton for its flint-built, slate-covered
houses. Axminster, on a hill overlooking the Axe, has a famous old church, and
was formerly noted for its carpets, but their manufacture has been discontinued
since 1835.
Barnstaple is the principal town in North Devonshire. It lies in a verdant
valley at the head of the estuary of the Taw, has ship-yards, potteries, and a few
DEVONSHIEE. 95
other manufectures, and a port accessible to coasting vessels. It is mucli frequented
bv tourists on their way to the delightful watering-places of Ilfracombe and Lyn-
moufh, at the foot of the cliffs and escarpments in which Exmoor Forest terminates
towards the Bristol ChanneL South Molton, in the interior of the county, to the
south-east of Barnstaple, has iron mines. Bide/ord, on the estuary of the Torrid ge,
which is tributary to that of the Taw, possesses greater facilities for navigation,
its quays being accessible to vessels of 500 tons burden. Xoriham lies to the
north of it, on the estuary. We^firard Ho ' on the open ocean, to the west of
it, is rising into favour as a watering-place. TorrimgUm, where leather gloves are
made, is the only town of any importance on the Torridge above BidefonL
CHAPTER IV.
THE BASIN OF THE SEVERN AND THE BRISTOL CHANNEL.
(Shropshire, Worcestershire, Warwickshire, HE^EFORDSHiaE, Gloucestershire, Somersetshire.)
General Features.
HE upper watershed of the Severn lies within Wales, but no sooner
has that river become navigable than it crosses the boundary into
England, and, sweeping round to the south and south-west, it irri-
gates the gently inclined plains bounded by the distant escarpments
of table-lands. The six shires whose boundaries approximately
coincide with those of the basin of the Severn, including therein the Avon
and other rivers tributary to the Bristol Channel, are distinguished, upon the
whole, for gentle undulations, fertility of soil, beauty and variety of scenery,
and facility of communication, and they have consequently attracted a large
population.
Still, along the Welsh boundary there rise a few hills which are almost
entitled to be called mountains. A range of heights, rising to an altitude of 1,250
feet, occupies nearly the centre of the wide curve formed by the Severn. This is
the Long Mynd, which is of very humble aspect, if compared with the Snowdon
and other mountain giants of Wales, but famous in the geology of England as
being the "foundation-stone,'* as it were, of the whole country, for it was
around this small nucleus of Cambrian rocks that the more recent sedimentary
strata were deposited.* The Long Mynd and other ranges in that part of
Shropshire are joined on the one side to the hills of Wales, whilst in the
north-east they extend to the Severn, and may be traced even beyond that river,
where the Wrekin (1,320 feet) rises almost in the centre of the county. The view
from its summit is superb, extending from Derbyshire to Snowdon. The range
of the Clee Hills (1,788 feet), somewhat more elevated than the Long Mynd,
stretches to the southward, and bounds the valley of the Severn in the west. It
is continued in the Malvern Hills (1,396 feet), famous for the diversity of their
scenery, the purity and salubrity of their air, their variety of vegetation, and the
* Murchison, " Siluria : The Historv of the Oldest Rocks."
THE BASIN OF THE SEVERN AND THE BRISTOL CHANNEL.
97
virtue of their medicinal springs. Whilst the Malvern Hills are covered with
villas and hotels, the Forest of Dean, to the south of them, has become a great
centre of industry, abounding in coal and iron. Dean Forest, notwithstanding its
coal-pits and blast furnaces, is a picturesque district, comprising some 26,000 acres
of wild woodland, producing some of the finest timber in the country.
Of the ranges which bound the vale of the Severn on the east, the Cotswold
Hills, rising in Cleeve Hill to a height of 1,134 feet, are the most important.
These hills are named after their "cots," or shepherds' huts, and have in turn
given their name to one of the most highly prized breeds of sheep, whose excellence
is due to the short and savoury grass which grows upon the oolitic rocks. This
Fig. 53. — Promontories and Beach of "Weston-supek-Make.
Scale 1 : 195,000.
WoF Or
Foreshore.
Depth under
2i Fathoms.
Depth 2i to 5
Fathoms.
3 Miles.
Depth over 5
Fathoms.
range terminates in the hills which form so fine an amphitheatre around Bath, on
the Avon, and may be traced even beyond that river, where there are a few
heights belonging to the same geological formations. The environs of Bath
are well known for their fossil wealth. Here cuttle-fish of gigantic size have
been found, which still retained pigment fit for use, notwithstanding the count-
less ages that must have elapsed from the time of its secretion by the living
organism.
Towards its mouth the valley of the Severn is almost shut in by spurs thrown
ofi" from the mountains of Wales and the range of the Cotswolds. To the north of
this ancient barrier the vale of Gloucester widens, its shape being that of a
triangle whose apex lies in the south. The rocks spread over the valley of
98 THE BEITISH ISLES.
the Severn and that of its affluent, the Avon, are triassic, but there was a
time when ranges of carboniferous limestone extended right across the Bristol
Channel, connecting the hills of Somerset with those of Wales. The Mendip
Hills (1,067 feet) are a remnant of this formation, and so are the three parallel
ridges near Weston-super-Mare, which jut out into the Bristol Channel. The
cape facing them in Wales belongs to the same formation, as do also the forti-
fied islands of Steepholm (240 feet) and Flatholm, which connect the fragments
of the ancient limestone range, which has disappeared through long-continued
erosive action. These islands, together with the sand-banks in their neighbour-
hood, form the natural boundary between the estuary of the Severn and the Bristol
Channel.
The Severn, in comparison with the great rivers of continental Europe, is
only a feeble stream. About 30 inches of rain fall within its basin, and this
amount would be sufficient to sustain a river discharging 11,000 cubic feet of
water per second throughout the year, if large quantities were not absorbed by the
vegetation, sucked up by the soil, or evaporated into the air. It is only by the
construction of locks that the Severn, up to Worcester, has been converted into
a navigable river, having an average depth of nearly 8 feet. The Wye, Usk,
Lower Avon, and other rivers, which discharge themselves into the estuary of the
Severn, are usually looked upon as its affluents, though in reality they are
independent rivers, having their proper regime, and forming minor estuaries of
their own. Including these, the Severn drains an area of 8,119 square miles; it
discharges on an average 5,300 cubic feet of water per second, a quantity raised to
12,000 cubic feet when it is in flood.*
In no other part of Europe does the tide rise to the same height as in the
Bristol Channel and the estuary of the Severn. In reality we have to do here
with three tidal waves, which enter the channel simultaneously, and increase in
height and vehemence in proportion to the resistance they meet with on their
progress up the funnel-shaped estuary. One of these tidal waves originates in the
open Atlantic, and travels along the coast from the Land's End ; the second is
thrown back by the coast of Ireland, and enters through the centre of the channel ;
a third arrives from the northern part of the Irish Sea, coalesces with the former off
St. David's Head, and thus doubles its height. This enormous mass of water,
discoloured by the waste of the land resulting from its erosive action, rushes up
the channel with considerable velocity, producing a rise at ordinary tides of 40 to
43 feet. At spring tides the rise at Chepstow, at the mouth of the Wye, is 60
* Kivers which discharge themselves into the estuary of the Severn :—
Drainage Basin. Length. Average.
Sq. Miles. Miles. Cubic Feet.
Severn . . . 4,350 158 5,300 per sec.
Avon of Bristol . 891 62 1,100
Wye . . . 1,609 135 2,100
Usk- ... 540 65 880
Smaller rivers . . 729 186 1,000
Total 8,119 606 10,380
THE BASIN OF THE SEVERN AND THE BRISTOL CHANNEL.
99
feet. The Severn estuary presents the aspect of a river only at low water,
when in some places it is no more than from 700 to 900 feet wide. Sand-
hanks and ledges of rock then make their appearance above the water, and
vessels which fail to take advantage of the rising tide to reach their port of desti-
nation are obliged to cast anchor in some favourable spot, until the next tide
enables them to proceed on their voyage. At low water the Lower Severn is
scarcely navigable, and even the mouths of the Wye and Avon are sometimes
inaccessible. As to the fishing- smacks, they allow the retiring tide to leave them
Fig. 54.— Bristol Channel.
From an Admiralty Chart.
Mtan
H
S'lrry TV.
'""Mr^^ ~' f ?aJ^rvH . V.
^^ yy BoJiislaple lind^jf TI
high and dry upon a sand-bank. From afar the fishermen see the shining crest of
the approaching tidal wave ; soon the river is arrested in its flow and turned back
upon itself ; the sand-bank grows less and less ; the waves approach the sides of
the vessel ; they burrow in the sand in which its keel is embedded, and gradually
uplift it. The steersman once more grasps the helm, and he finds himself afloat,
where but a few minutes before there extended a mere waste of sand. In the upper
and narrower part of the estuary, where the interval between low and high water
is very short, the advancing tide- wave rushes suddenly up, and forms a dangerous
bore. At spring tides this bore is felt as high up as Gloucester, and owing to its
100
THE BRITISH ISLES.
suddenness is dangerous to small craft. Shouts of " Flood O ! flood O ! " herald
its approach, and warn boatmen to prepare to meet its shock. The tide-waves,
especially when a high wind blows up channel, frequently endanger the safety
of the coast lands, and miles of sea-wall have been constructed for their protec-
tion.
Some of the sand-banks in the channel of the Severn are of considerable extent,
that known as the Welsh Grounds, for instance, covering an area of 10 square
miles. They have been utilised, in a few cases, for the construction of piers,
Fig. 55.— Railway Fekry at Portskewet.
Scale 1 : 75,000.
im^^wm^m
Q-39' W.ofGj-.
Foreshore.
1 Mile.
as at Portskewet, where a railway ferry-boat crosses the river at regular intervals.
Until quite recently the first bridge met with on ascending the Severn was that of
Gloucester, but since 1879 a railway bridge has spanned the river at the Sharpness
Docks, above the entrance to the Gloucester and Berkeley Ship Canal. Including
a masonry approach, this bridge has a total length of 4,162 feet. It is composed
of bowstring girders, carried on cast-iron cylinders filled with concrete. Two of its
spans have a width of 327 feet each, with a headway of 70 feet above the
high- water level of ordinary spring tides.
The basin of the Severn is designed by nature as a region of great commercial
SHREWSBURY-HOUSE OF THE SIXTEENTH CENTURY.
SHROPSHIRE. 101
activity, for whilst, on the one hand, it impinges upon the coal-fields of Wales, it
approaches on the other the metalliferous formations of Cornwall, and its eastern
affluents mingle their waters, in the very centre of England, with those of the
Trent and Thames, which flow to the German Ocean. But this region is peculiarly
favoured by the vast estuary of the Severn in its commercial intercourse with
trans- Atlantic countries. This estuary is a counterpart of that of the Thames,
and lies under the same latitude. Jointly they almost sever Southern England
from the northern part of the island, and merely looking to geographical features,
we might conclude that the two leading commercial towns of the country would
have sprung up on these great natural outlets. But whilst London actually holds
that position with reference to the neighbouring countries of continental Europe,
Bristol has not been able to maintain its superiority in the face of the competition
of Liverpool. Its geographical position is no doubt more favourable than that
of the great seaport of Lancashire, and during a considerable period it main-
tained its rank as the foremost commercial town of Western England. Geographi-
cal disadvantages, however, are more than counterbalanced, in the case of Liverpool,
by its vicinity to productive coal, iron, and salt mines, and populous manufacturing
towns.
Topography.
Shropshire, or Salop, is divided by the Severn into two almost equal portions,
that to the north and east of the river being for the most part flat or undulating,
whilst hills of moderate elevation occupy the tract beyond the Severn. The
so-called plain of Shrewsbury, which extends into the county from the borders of
Cheshire and stretches beyond the Severn as far as Church Stretton, forms a cha-
racteristic feature, and is known for its fertility. On the east it is overlooked
by the isolated summit of the Wrekin, the famous landmark of the entire
county. From Clun Forest, in the west, several ranges of hills radiate like the
spokes of a wheel, extending as far as the Severn, and in some instances even
beyond it. The principal of these ranges are the Stiper Stones, Long Mynd,
Caradoc Hills, and Wenlock Edge. Farther east, and nearer to the Severn, rise
the Clee Hills, and before leaving the county that river washes the foot of the
heights of the Forest of Wyre. Tillage and husbandry prevail in the north,
cattle and sheep breeding in the hilly parts of the county. Much cheese is made,
and a breed of horned sheep is peculiar to the county. Shropshire, however, is
not wholly dependent upon agriculture, for it possesses productive coal and iron
mines. Lead is also raised, but the copper mines appear to have become
exhausted. The manufactures are comparatively unimportant.
Shrewsbury, the capital of the county, is the first town washed by the Severn
after that river has left Wales. In former times it was a place of great
military importance, and the lofty peninsula, almost encircled by the Severn, upon
which it is seated, was strongly fortified by walls and a Norman castle, of which
there still exist considerable remains. Perhaps no other town in England is equally
rich in fine mediseval buildings. The market-house dates from the sixteenth
102
THE BRITISH ISLES.
century; the Council House is an old mansion, where the court of the Welsh
Marches was held. St. Mary's Church has an octagonal spire and a profusion of
stained glass. ''Butchers' Row" is interesting on account of its quaint shops.
Monuments have been raised in honour of Lord Hill and Lord Clive. Shrewsbury
Pig. 56.— Shrewsbury.
From the Ordnance Survey Map. Scale 1 : 63,1
pr^fTfi*^
\ ^". "^^'Ac-^-fe^.
iMile.
carries on the manufacture of flannel, agricultural machmery, and linen- weaving,
but is essentially an agricultural town. It is famous for its brawn and
cakes.
Descending the Severn, we soon reach Wroxeter, a village with a Norman
church, and the ruins of the Roman city of Uriconium, at the foot of the Wrekin.
SHKOPSHIRE. 108
Host of the antiquities discovered on this spot have been deposited in the museum
of Shrewsbury, but the visitor may still trace part of the old wall, the foundations
of a basilica, and the remains of baths. The Roman city was probably destroyed
by the Saxons, in the sixth century, when its defenders were Eomanised Britons.
Below Wroxeter the Severn enters a narrow gorge, and passes through the coal
and iron district of the county. Leaving the ruins of Buildtcas Ahhey on our left,
we soon reach the iron bridge which joins the town of Ironhridge to that of
Broseky, and is the oldest bridge of the kind in the world, having been erected in
1779 by Abraham Darby, of Coalbrookdale. Broseley is noted for its tiles and
tobacco-pipes, whilst the cluster of towns on the opposite bank of the river,
including Ironhridge, Coalbrookdale, Daicley Magna, and Madeley, is the seat of a
flourishing iron industry, which spreads northward through the beautiful dale of
Coalbrook as far as Wellington, and in the north-east to Shifnal. Coalport, a few
miles below the bridge, has potteries and china works. The iron industry of this
district was established in 1709, and the works have retained their reputation for
fine castings. It is probable, however, that these populous towns will at no very
remote time sink as rapidly into insignificance as they have risen into importance.
The whole of the western portion of this Shropshire coal basin has become
exhausted, and large tracts exhibit only abandoned works and heaps of rubbish,
which are gradually becoming clothed with soil. Sooner or later grass and
herbage will spring up upon them, and it will then be impossible to distinguish
them from natural hillocks. Two-thirds of the coal originally stored in this basin
have already been raised to the surface, and before many years the iron-masters and
coal miners will migrate to the east, in order to tap the coal beds which there
underlie the Permian and new red sandstone formations.*
To the south of this industrial district the Severn passes between " low *'
and "high" Bridgenorth, the latter perched on a picturesque cliflf of sandstone,
150 feet high. Besides the remains of its Norman castle, Bridgenorth may boast
of several half-timbered houses, including that in which Bishop Percy, the collector
of the " Eeliques," was born.
The few towns in the northern portion of the county are quiet centres of
agricultural districts. They include Osicestry, in the north-west, amidst prettily
wooded hills, between Offa's and Watt's Dykes, the ancient frontier of Wales ;
FAlesmere and Whitchurch in the north ; Market Drayton, on the Upper Tern and
the Birmingham and Liverpool Canal ; and Newport.
In the hilly region, bounded on the north and east by the valley of the Severn,
and in the south by that of its tributary the Teme, there are only small market
towns and villages. The principal of these are Much Wenlock, the centre of an
extensive borough, including a considerable portion of the county ; Cleohury-
Mortimer, in the Clee Hills ; Church Stretton, in a fertile pastoral district, between
the Caradoc Hills and Long Mynd ; and Bishop's Castle, on the Welsh border. The
river Teme runs along the southern border of the county. On it stands Ludlow, a
famous old border-town, with curious timber houses and an extensive Norman
* Edward Hull, " The Coal-fields of Great Britain."
104 THE BRITISH ISLES.
castle, where Milton wrote the masque of Comus, and Samuel Butler his
"Hudibras." The town boasts a museum, rich in Silurian fossils found in the
castle rock, and whilst these attract geologists, the picturesque environs are the
delight of all lovers of nature. Higher up on the Teme is Clun, a quiet place
with a ruined castle. In its neighbourhood small freehold properties, tilled by
the proprietors and their families, are numerous.
Worcestershire occupies the central portion of the fertile valley of the Severn,
here about 15 miles in width, and shut in on the west by the Abberley and
Malvern Hills (1,396 feet), and on the east by the Clent and Lickey (Hagley)
Hills. The Teme, which comes down from the Welsh hills, flows through a narrow
valley, whilst the Avon irrigates the fertile vale of Evesham. The north-eastern
portion of the county, beyond the Lickey Hills, is only in part drained by the
Severn. Its soil, in many places, is poor and arid, but this is compensated for by
the existence of rich beds of coal and ironstone. Worcestershire, besides cattle
and dairy produce, yields fine wool, hops, apples, and excellent cider. There are
coal, iron, and salt mines, and the manufactures are of considerable importance.
If we follow the Severnas it crosses from Shropshire into Worcestershire, the
first town we meet with is Bewdley, a quaint old place with many timbered houses,
close to the fine scenery of the Forest of Wyre. Lower down is Stourport, at the
mouth of the Stour, which exports the produce of Kidderminster and Stourbridge,
higher up on that tributary of the Severn. Kidderminster, a dingy town, is
famous for its carpet- weaving, whilst Stourbridge has glass manufactories, brick
works, collieries, and tin-plate works. The making of glass was here first intro-
duced in 1555. Resuming our journey down the Severn, we reach the mouth of
the Salwarpe, in the narrow valley of which is situate the old town of Droittvich,
known for its brine spring. Still lower on the same river, at Stoke Prior, there
are mines of rock-salt, and a couple of miles beyond we reach JBromsgrove, a more
important town than either of those named, and remarkable for its curious houses
with ornamental gables. Nail-making and the manufacture of needles, fish-hooks,
buttons, and coarse linens are here carried on.
Worcester, although the capital of the county, yields to Dudley in population,
but is infinitely superior to it in other respects. It is a place of the highest
antiquity, and when the Romans established one of their stations there it had
already attained some importance. Earthenware and other relics of the Roman
dominion have been placed in a museum built within the walls of the ancient
castle. In the Middle Ages Worcester played a leading part ; and during the
Revolution, Cromwell, in 1651, inflicted a decisive defeat upon the Royalists in its
neighbourhood. The cathedral, standing on rising ground, is the most conspicuous
building in the city. It presents specimens of all styles of architecture, from the
earliest Norman to the latest perpendicular. Its central tower, completed in
1374, rises to a height of 192 feet. The town has lost its manufacture of carpets
and woollen stuffs, now carried on at Kidderminster, but is famous for its
leather gloves, its china, and potted lampreys. The Royal China Manufactory
was opened in 1755. Recently erected engine works add to the prosperity of the
WOECESTERSHIRE— WARWICKSHIRE. 105
town, whicli also carries on a considerable commerce in agricultural produce. But
in addition to being a town of business, Worcester enjoys a high reputation for its
social amenities, and families in search of a pleasant retreat are attracted to it
from all parts of England.
Upton-on- Severn, below Worcester, owes its importance to its shipping, for the
river is navigable to this place for vessels of 110 tons burden.
To the west of it rise the Malvern Hills, famous fo^ their scenery, no less than
for the salubrious spas known as Great Malvern, West Malvern, and Malvern
Link, which have been established on their slopes. The springs to which
Malvern owes its reputation are slightly sulphureous, and in no other part of
England is hydrotherapic treatment carried on with the same success. Tenhury,
a more retiring spa, lies in the valley of the Teme. Its water is supposed to
be most effective in the cure of cutaneous diseases.
Evesham is the principal town of Worcestershire within the fertile valley of
the Avon. It boasts a famous old abbey with a fine bell tower, and, though now a
quiet country place, has been the scene of some stirring events. On Greenhill, to
the north of the town, was fought the battle (1265) in which Simon de Montfort,
the champion of the barons and of constitutional government, ''fought stoutly
for the liberties of England," but fell, overwhelmed by numbers. A miracu-
lous well, still known as '* Battle Well," burst forth from the ground on the
spot where Simon de Montfort expired, and for ages attracted pilgrims in
search of relief from their ailments. On Vineyard Hill, on the other side of the
Avon, the vine was cultivated from the time of the Conquest to the dissolution of
the neighbouring abbey. Pershore, lower down on the Avon, has a famous old
church with a handsome lantern tower of the fourteenth century, held to be not
inferior to that of Lincoln Cathedral.
In the north the " Black Country " of Staffordshire overlaps the borders of
the county, and has given birth to several populous towns, the seats of coal mining
and iron works. Foremost amongst these is Dudley, within a detached portion of
the county. The castle, now in ruins, dates back to a time when Dudley was yet
a quiet country town. The hill which it crowns has yielded large quantities of
fossils, which have been deposited in the local museum. The Wenlock Canal
is carried through it by means of a tunnel. Oldhury and Hales Oicen, one to
the east and the other to the south of Dudley, are engaged in the same industries,
nail-making playing a leading part. Hugh Miller is our authority for stating
that the severe work in the iron-mines has in no respect been detrimental to the
physical beauty of the inhabitants, which is most striking amongst the women,
whilst the natives of the Malvern Hills, notwithstanding the salubrious aii
they breathe, are homely in appearance, not to say ugly.* As to Balsall, it is in
reality a part of Birmingham. The only other town to be noticed is Redditch,
close to the eastern borders, where the manufacture of needles and fish-hooks
is carried on.
Warwickshire, one of the midland counties, lies almost wholly within the
* Hugh Miller, " First Impressions of England and its People."
104— K
106 THE BRITISH ISLES.
basin of the Avon, only a small section of its extreme northern part being drained
by the Tame and other small rivers flowing northward to the Trent. The surface
is varied only by gentle undulations. Formerly nearly the whole of the county
was an extensive forest, and it still retains somewhat of this ancient character, small
patches of woodland and heath being by no means infrequent. The Avon is the
only navigable river, but canals and railways afford ready means of intercommuni-
cation. Coal is found in the north, and as a manufacturing county Warwickshire
takes a high rank, for within its borders lies Birmingham, the centre of a huge
industrial district.
The Avon, the principal eastern affluent of the Severn, rises nearer to the
German Ocean than to the Bristol Channel. Its springs lie in Northamptonshire,
near Naseby Hill, rendered famous by the defeat of the Royalists in 1645. The
first town in Warwickshire which is reflected in its waters is Rughy, celebrated
for its grammar school, founded in 1567. The original endowment of this public
school consisted of 8 acres of land, near the city of London, yielding an annual
income of £8. In course of time these have become covered with houses, and
produce now an annual revenue exceeding £6,000. The school occupies a fine
Gothic building, and is attended by five hundred pupils.
Warwick, the capital of the county, occupies a central position. It has
played a great part in the history of the English people. Its castle, on a hill
washed by the waters of the Avon, and seated in the midst of a fine park, was one
of the most magnificent and extensive castles of the Middle Ages, and much of its
pristine beauty still survives. In 1871 a fire threatened destruction to this seat of
Warwick the King-maker, but the damage sustained has been repaired, and the
costly paintings and other treasures of art were fortunately saved. Foremost
amongst these is the celebrated Warwick Vase, recovered from the ruins of
the Emperor Adrian's villa at Tivoli. " Caesar's Tower " is probably as old
as the Conquest, but from Guy's Tower may be obtained a more magnificent view.
Looking northward, we catch a glimpse of another castle, almost equally famous,
namely, Kenilworth, where Dudley, Earl of Leicester, entertained Queen Elizabeth
for seventeen days (1575). Cromwell caused this stronghold to be dismantled,
and its extensive and picturesque ruins now form one of the great attractions
of the visitors to the neighbouring spa of Leamington. In 1811 this favourite
resort of invalids and pleasure- seekers was a humble and obscure village of five
hundred inhabitants. Since then the fame of its sulphureous, saline, and chalybeate
springs has gone on increasing, and with it the number of residents and visitors, and
now this new town far exceeds in population its venerable neighbour Warwick,
from which it is still separated by the Avon, here joined by the Leam, but which
its new streets are rapidly approaching.
Only a few miles below Warwick we reach another town rich in historical
associations. This is Stratford- on- Avon, the birthplace of Shakspere, The
house in which the poet lived, and was probably born, still exists, and there are
few monuments held in higher veneration than this humble dwelling, now
converted into a museum. The last descendant of the family, having become
WAEWICKSHIRE.
107
impoverislied, was compelled to leave it about the commencement of this century.
The great dramatist lies buried in the parish church, and a monument was raised
in his honour by Grarrick, the actor. A small theatre has been recently erected in
celebration of the third centenary of his birth, and contains a Shakspere library,
together with works of art relating to the poet. The environs of the town abound
in sites and villages referred to in Shakspere's plays and ballads, and there even
Fig. 57. — Wakwick and Leamington.
1-35
Wof G
r30-
2 Miles.
survive a few patches of the extensive forests in which he used to poach when a
youth.
The Arrow joins the Avon shortly before the river crosses the border of
Worcestershire. In its valley lie Alcester, the Roman Alauna, with many quaint
old houses, and Studley, with the ruins of an abbey. Needles and fish-hooks are
manufactured in both these towns. Henley-in-Arden, a small market town,
occupies almost the centre of the ancient Forest of Arden, between Studley and
Warwick.
108
THE BRITISH ISLES.
Coventry, on the Sherbourne, a small tributary of the Avon, is far more
populous than either of the towns mentioned. Its name recalls the ancient
convent around which the first houses were built. Originally Coventry was a
place of processions and pilgrimages, and legends and popular sayings testify to
the reputation which it enjoyed during the Middle Ages. Best known amongst
these legends is that of Lady Godiva, the wife of Leofric, and -Peeping Tom."
St. Michael's Church, with a steeple 303 feet in height, is one of the finest Gothic
edifices in the country. Formerly Coventry was noted for its cloth, but for its
Fig. 58.— Stratfohd-on-Avon.
Scale 1 : 88,400.
2 Miles.
present prosperity it is mainly dependent upon the manufacture of ribbons,
which was introduced by French refugees who settled there after the revocar
tion of the Edict of Nantes. Foleshill and Bedivorth, higher up on the Sher-
bourne, carry on the same branches of industry, besides which the latter has
some collieries. Nuneaton, in the valley of the Anker, on the northern slope of
the county, engages largely in cotton-spinning, whilst its neighbour Atherstone,
in the same valley, in addition to collieries, carries on the manufacture of hats
and caps.
WARWICKSHIRE.
109
Birmingham^ the largest town of Warwickshire, does not lie within the basin
pf the Severn, for it is built upon the undulating ground extending on both sides
of the river Rea, a tributary of the Tame, which discharges its waters through
the Humber into the German Ocean. In Doomsday Book the city is called
Bermingeham. This afterwards became corrupted into Bromwycham, or Brum-
magem, meaning the "town of brooms," but popularly associated with pinch-
beck and base metals fraudulently used to make articles glitter like gold.
Birmingham is an ancient seat of the iron industry, and in 1643, having
taken the side of the Parliament, it supplied swords and other weapons which
did good service against the lancers of Prince Rupert. The commercial importance
Fis- o9. — Shakspere's House.
of the town dates, however, only from the restoration of Charles II., who brought
metal ornaments into fashion, and these Birmingham supplied with unexampled
vigour. From being the " toy-shop of Europe " of Burke's time, it has grown into
a town pre-eminent for every description of metal-ware, from steam-engines to steel
pens and jewellery. Its industry is not exclusively carried on in huge factories,
but employs a multitude of artisans working at home, or in small shops, and
they have thus retained a spirit of initiation and independence not usually
found to exist in manufacturing towns. The leading articles made at Bir-
mingham are hardware, unequalled for variety and value ; tools, small arms,
nails, pins, steel pens, buttons, jewellery, electro-plated ware, glass, bronzes,
110
THE BEITISH ISLES.
papier-mache goods, and carriages. Near Bandsworth, a little to the west of
Birminghain,within the Staffordshire border, are the famous Soho and Smethwick
works, founded by Watt and Boulton, where steam-engines were first made. The
manufacture of "toys" is still vigorously carried on, the most curious of this
class of goods being Chinese idols and African fetishes.
The lower part of Birmingham is crowded with workshops, and grimy, but
the upper has regular streets, and the suburbs, including Edgbaston and Aston
Manor, abound in elegant villas and stately residences. Birmingham boasts now
Fig. 60. — Birmingham.
Scale 1 : 200.000,
2 Miles.
of being the most " radical " town of the kingdom, and of having the largest
number of public institutions supported by voluntary contributions ; yet it was
here that the mob denounced the distinguished Dr. Priestley as an atheist and
Jacobin (1791), and destroyed his house, library, and apparatus. Amends for
this outrage have been made by the erection of a statue of the great chemist and
discoverer of oxygen, which occupies a site in front of the municipal buildings.
Most prominent amongst the public edifices of the town is its Town-hall, in which
the celebrated triennial musical festivals are held, and which contains a fine
marble bust of Mendelssohn, who produced here, in 1847, his oratorio Elijah
GLOUCESTERSHIEE.
Ill
Its shape is that of a Grecian temple, and it was built 1832 — 35. The Birmingham
and Midland Institute adjoins it, and accommodates a school of science and art,
a museum, and a free library. King Edward's Grammar School, founded in 1533,
occupies a Gothic building of modern date. Other educational institutions
are Queen's College, founded in 1843, in connection with London University,
and the Science College, endowed by Joshua Mason in 1872. St. Martin's Church,
in the Bull Ring, contains a few ancient monuments, and portions of it date back
to the thirteenth century. All other churches are modern. Bingley Hall, a
Fig. 61. — The Severn below Gloucester, and the Berkeley Ship Canal.
Scale 1 : 200,000.
2*20
W.oP&r
2 Miles.
vast structure with no claims to architectural beauty, is used for cattle and poultry
shows, and as a drill-place for the volunteers. Aston Hall, an edifice in the
Elizabethan style, where Charles I. was entertained before the battle of Edge
Hill, is now a museum, and the surrounding park has been thrown open to the
public. Still farther north, about 4 miles from the town, is the fine park of
Sutton Coldfield.
Gloucestershire lies for the greater part within the basin of the Severn, and
extends on both sides of the estuary of that river, in the west as far as the "Wye,
112
THE BRITISH ISLES.
in the east to the mouth of the Bristol Avon. Physically the county includes
three well-marked regions, the principal being the fertile lowland intersected by
the Severn, and known as the Yale of Gloucester and Berkeley. In it is gathered
the bulk of the population of the county, and tillage and dairy-farming are practised
with great success. The most valuable meadow lands extend along the banks
of the Severn below Gloucester, and are defended from inundation by sea-walls.
The environs of Berkeley are more especially famous for their cheese. The vale
is remarkable for the mildness of its climate, and William of Malmesbury tells us
that in the twelfth century it produced wine but little inferior to that of France.
The forest district lies to the west of the Severn, its great feature being the
Royal Forest of Dean, now much reduced by the progress of cultivation, but still
of great extent. It is rich in coal and iron, and famous for its cider, or " styre."
Fig. 62.— Gloucester Cathkukal.
The third region is that of the Cotswolds, to the east of the Severn, where
the air is keen and sharp, the soil thin, and the population sparse, but which
nevertheless abounds in good pasturage for sheep.
Gloucestershire carries on numerous industries, the manufacture of superior
cloth being the chief amongst them.
Immediately after we cross the borders of Shropshire we find ourselves within
sight of the old town of Teivkesbury, with its quaint houses and extensive abbey
church, recently renovated. About half a mile to the south of the town lies the
" Bloody Meadow," upon which was fought, in 1471, the last battle in the War of
the Roses.
Gloucester, the capital of the county, the Glevum of the Romans, is an ancient
city. The tower of its superb cathedral rises to a height of 223 feet, and there
are other buildings interesting to the antiquary, the most remarkable being the
GLOUCESTERSHIRE.
118
New Inn, an old house for poor pilgrims, built of chestnut-wood. The town
carries on a considerable trade in agricultural produce, for it lies in the centre of
one of the most productive districts of England. By means of the Berkeley
Ship Canal, which enters the estuary of the Severn 16 miles below it at Sharp-
ness, vessels of 400 tons burden can reach its docks. The manufacture of
agricultural machinery is extensively carried on. Gloucester has a mineral spring
in its spa grounds, now converted into a public park, but is completely
Fig. 63. -The Cloisters, Gloccester Cathedral.
overshadowed as a watering-place by its more attractive neighbour Cheltenham
This favourite place of retreat of Anglo-Indians lies at the foot of the Cotswold
Hills, and on the margin of the vale of Gloucester. It is renowned for its mild
and salubrious air, its delightful environs, and its chalybeate springs, reputed
as an effective remedy in a variety of diseases. Fine promenades, assembly-
rooms, and a pump-room add to the amenities of a place which boasts of having
a lower death rate than any other town in England. But, besides being a
fashionable watering-place, Cheltenham has become an educational centre, whose
114
THE BEITISH ISLES.
proprietary colleges, both for boys and girls, take a high rank, and are supplemented
by numerous private schools.
Stroud, to the south of Gloucester, in a valley of the Cotswolds, is one of the
principal seats of the clothing trade of the county, an industry which employs
likewise many of the inhabitants of the small towns of Bisley and Minchin-
hampton, the one to the east, the other to the south-east of it. At Lypiatt Park,
an old monastic establishment, half-way on the road to Bisley, the Gunpowder
Plot is said to have been concocted.
Berkeley, in the centre of a fertile grazing country, exports real Gloucester
cheese. Its castle, with a keep erected in 1093, is still inhabited, and the dungeon
Fig. 64. — Cheltenham.
Scale 1 : 175,000.
2 Miles.
over the gatehouse, in which King Edward II. was murdered in 1327, is
pointed out to curious visitors. Dursley and JFotton-under-Udge, both prettily
situated towns on the slope of the Cotswolds, to the south-east of Berkeley, are
engaged in the clothing trade. Near Dursley there are valuable quarries of Bath
stone, which hardens on exposure to the air, but is not very durable. Tetbury,
still farther to the east, on an eminence overlooking the source of the Avon, is
famous for its corn market. Of the many towns in the valley of the Avon, Malmes-
bury, Chippenham, Melksham, and Bradford belong to the county of Wiltshire,
and Bath lies within Somersetshire; but Bristol, the most important of all, only
7 miles above the mouth of the river, is situated almost wholly within the borders
of Gloucestershire.
GLOUCESTERSHIRE. 115
Bristol is one of the busiest cities of the United Kingdom. In the fourteenth
century it hardly yielded in importance to the capital, for when Edward III.
appealed to the maritime towns of his kingdom to furnish vessels for the invest-
ment of Calais, Bristol was called upon to fit out twenty-four, or only one less than
London. In the age of great discoveries it was from the Avon that most vessels
sailed in search of new countries and a north-west passage. It was Bristol which
sent forth the Mathias in 1497, under the command of John Cabot, a citizen
of Venice, but a Genoese by birth ; * and Bristol may thus claim the honour of
having sent out an explorer of a portion of North America, probably Labrador,
fourteen months before Columbus himself had touched the New World. f In
our own century it was again Bristol which was first amongst the maritime towns
of Europe to send a steamer across the Atlantic to America, for in 1838 the Great
Western, commanded by Captain Hosken, started from the Avon, and reached New
York without an accident. Yet it is not Bristol which has reaped the advantages
which accrued from the spirit of enterprise animating its shipowners, for
Liverpool has become the great port of departure for trans- Atlantic steamers. The
relative decay of Bristol, however, had commenced more than a century before
that time, and if Liverpool rapidly overtook her rival, this was not done without
the citizens themselves being largely to blame. In the enjoyment of almost
unlimited privileges, they prevented strangers from settling in the town unless
they submitted to numerous disabilities which deprived them of every initiative.
It was thus that the advantages which Bristol enjoyed in consequence of its
geographical position and the relations established with foreign countries were
gradually lost to it.+
Bristol nevertheless continues to this day one of the busiest seaports of
England. The Avon, a narrow tidal river bounded by steep cliffs, enables the
largest vessels to reach the docks of the town, whose locks are closed as soon as
the tide begins to retire. These docks were excavated in the beginning of the
present century, and occupy the ancient bed of the Avon, as well as the lower part
of the Frome, which joins that river close by the cathedral. Although some
3 miles in length, this '' harbour " hardly suffices for the accommodation of the
vessels which crowd it, and sea-docks have consequently been constructed at the
mouth of the river, at Avonmouth, and opened in 1876. The trade of the place
has always been connected with the West Indies and the North American colonies.
Whilst the West Indies were cultivated by slaves, and Virginia partly by trans-
ported criminals, the wealth generated in Bristol by intercourse between them
produced, on the one hand, an upper class peculiarly haughty and unsympathetic, and
on the other a mob exceptionally rough and violent. In the seventeenth century,
Mr. Bancroft tells us, the Bristol authorities used to make large profits by selling
criminals as slaves to Virginia, inducing them to consent by threatening them
with death. In our own days, the "Reform riots" of 1831, which laid much of the
* D'Avezac, Bulletiti de la Societe de Geographie.
t Peschel, "Zeitalter der Entdeckungen."
X Halley, "Atlas Maritimus et Commercifilis."
116
THE BRITISH ISLES.
city in ashes, bear witness to the roughness of the Bristol mob.* The imports
include tobacco and raw sugar from the West and East Indies and America,
timber from Norway and Canada, corn from Russia, spirits, and wine. The exports
consist principally of the manufactures of the town, such as refined sugar, tobacco
and cigars, metal- ware, soap, oil-cloth, machinery, and glass ; for though Bristol
does not hold the first place in any single branch of manufacturing industry, it is
at all events distinguished for the variety of its productions. The coal seams
which underlie the basin of the Avon are not very thick, but they supply the manu-
factories of the town with excellent fuel. The manufacture of cloth, introduced by
Flemish weavers in the reign of Edward III., is no longer carried on by Bristol,
but has been transferred to the Gloucestershire towns to the north-east of it.
Fig. 65. — Bristol and Bath.
Scale 1 : 230,000.
W c&r 2*20
,2 Miles.
Bristol proper rises on hilly ground to the north of the Avon, and, like Rome,
is supposed to have been built upon seven hills. The suburbs, however, spread far
beyond the ancient limits of the city. Bedminster, to the south, in the county of
Somerset, now forms part of it ; villas are scattered over the heights which separate
it from E^orbury and Wesfbury-on-Trpm, in the north; whilst in the west it has
coalesced with Clifton, which in the last century was a pretty village where the
merchants of Bristol sought repose from their labours. The airy heights which
were at that time dotted over with a few detached villas are now covered with orna-
mental buildings and rows of terraces, stretching round Durdham Downs, and
crowning the bold cliffs which here bound the narrow gorge of the Avon. Since
1864 this gorge has been spanned by a suspension bridge, at a height of 287 feet
* Moberley, " Geography of Northern Europe."
GLOUCESTERSHIRE— HEREFOEDSHIEE.
117
Fig. 66. — Clifton Suspension Bkidgb.
from low water. This bridge, the numerous villas of Clifton, and their shrubberies,
together with the venerable cathedral, the chaste Gothic church of St. Mary
Kedcliffe, and the lofty square tower of St. Stephen's, built in 1472, constitute the
principal attractions of the town. The Bristol Museum and several country seats
in the vicinity, including Leigh Court and Blaise Castle, are rich in works of art.
Amongst the famous men born in Bristol are William Penn, South ey the poet,
Thomas Lawrence the painter, and Chatterton. Bristol also disputes with Venice
the honour of being the birthplace of Sebastian Cabot.
There are no towns of importance in the hill district of Gloucestershire, to the
west of the Severn. Newent^ a market town 9 miles north-west of Gloucester,
has collieries, and a church with a lofty spire. TFestburp-on-Severn is interest-
, ing to geologists on account of the fish and bone beds of its garden clifi*.
Newnham, on a hill below Westbury, exports the coal raised in its vicinity
and at 3Iitcheldean, in the interior. Half-way between these two places we pass the
ruins of the ancient abbey of Flaxley, whose foundation dates back to the twelfth
century. Lydneyy lower down on the
Severn, has iron and tin-plate works, and
is a coal shipping port. We are now within
the manufacturing and mining districts
of the ancient Forest of Dean, nearly all
the towns and villages of which lie nearer
to the bank of the picturesque Wye, which
bounds the county on the west, than to
that of the Severn. 8t. Briavels, the
ancient capital of the forest, has a castle
of the thirteenth century, in which the
Lord Warden of the forest used to reside.
Newland and Co/eford are the principal
mining towns of the forest. The Buck-
stone, a famous rocking-stone on a hill'-slope overlooking the valley of the Wye,
stands near the former of these towns.
Cirencester is the principal town in that part of the county which is drained
into the Thames. It is a place of great antiquity, the Corinium of the Romans,
and its museum contains numerous Roman antiquities found in the neighbourhood.
Cirencester carries on a large trade in wool and corn. Near it stands the Royal
Agricultural College. Lechlade, near the confluence of the Colne and Lech with
the Thames, and at the eastern termination of the Thames and Severn Canal, is a
place of some traffic, but the other market towns in the north-eastern portion of the
county enjoy only local importance. The chief amongst them are Northleach^
Winchcombe, Chipping Campdcn, and Stoiv-on-the-Wold.
Herefordshire, an inland county, has a surface beautifully diversified by
hills, and set off" to the greatest advantage by luxuriant woods. The Wye inter-
sects it from the north-west to the south-east, and is joined about the centre of the
county by the Lugg, draining its northern half. Agriculture and cattle-breeding
118
THE BEITISH ISLES.
are almost the sole occupations, and the county is noted for its wool, its cider, and
its hops.
Eereford, the county town, occupies a central position on the river Wye, and
is one of the ancient " gateways " of Wales, formerly strongly fortified. Five
railways converge upon it, and its trade in corn, timber, and hops is very con-
siderable. The cathedral, founded in the eleventh century, and restored by Sir
G-. Scott, is one of the most interesting buildings of that kind in England,
exhibiting various styles of architecture, from Norman to decorated work. To
geographers more especially it is interesting, for in its chapter library is preserved
one of the most valuable maps of the world which have come to us from the
Middle Ages. M. d'Avezac, who has carefully studied this curious document,
which transports monkeys to Norway, scorpions to the banks of the Rhine, and
aurochs to Provence, believes that it originated in 1314, or at all events between
Fig. 67. — Hereford Cathedral.
1313 and 1320. Hereford has not only played a part in the history of science,
but it was likewise the birthplace of Garrick, and there Mrs. Siddons and Kemble
commenced their dramatic career.
Lugwardine, a village to the east of Hereford, near the mouth of the Lugg,
has a pottery and tile works. Ascending the Lugg, we reach Leominster, a
town very important during the Heptarchy, with a fine old church, the remains
of a priory, and several timbered houses. Leather gloves and coarse woollen stuff's
are made here. Kington is a market town on the Arrow, which joins the Lugg
from the west, whilst Bromyard is the principal town in the valley of the Frome,
the eastern tributary of the Lugg.
Ross, on the Wye below Hereford, is a picturesque town much frequented by
tourists, and well known as the birthplace of John Kyrle, Pope's "Man of Ross,"
who was buried in the parish church in 1724.
SOMERSETSHIRE. 119
A small portion of the east of the county is drained by the Leddon, which
flows into the Severn at Gloucester. Ledbury is the chief town on its banks,
and Eastnor Castle, near it, contains a valuable collection of paintings.
Somersetshire is a maritime county, bounded on the north and north-west
by the Bristol Channel, and drained by the Avon (which divides it from
Gloucestershire), the Axe, Brue, and Parret. An oolitic upland of irregular
configuration separates the county from Dorset and Wiltshire, and coalesces near
Bath with the Cotswold Hills. Two spurs jut dut from this elevated tract
towards the Bristol Channel, forming the Mendip and Polden Hills. The former
are composed of mountain limestone and Devonian sandstone, have steep sides
and flat tops, and contain veins of lead and copper, now nearly exhausted.
They separate the valley of the Avon, a portion of which is occupied by the
Bristol coal bed, from the low marshes intersected by the river Brue. This
" Brue Level " contains peat, but parts of it are of exceeding fertility, and dairy-
farming is successfully carried on in it. The Polden Hills separate this lowland
from the more diversified valley of the Parret, which is rich in pasture-grounds,
and yields an abundance of butter and cheese.
The western portion of the county is covered for the most part with wild and
barren hills, abounding in bogs and moorland ; but these are intersected by the
rich and picturesque valley of Taunton Deane, one of the most fruitful districts of
England. On the norfh this " vale " is sheltered by the Quantock Hills (1,270 feet
high), the Brendon Hills, and Exmoor (Dunkerry Beacon, 1,706 feet), which
separate it from the Bristol Channel ; on the south the Blackdown Hills, crowned
by a monument erected in honour of the Duke of Wellington, divide it from
Devonshire.
Somersetshire has woollen, silk, and other factories : coal and a little iron ore
are raised, but the wealth of the county is principally produced by agriculture,
dairy-farming, and the rearing of cattle and sheep. Cheddar cheese is one of the
most highly appreciated of its productions.
Bath, the largest town of Somersetshire, but not its county town, is situated in the
beautiful valley of the Avon, and on the hills surrounding it, only a short distance
below the gorge which the river runs through on its course to the plain. The fine
abbey church, the pump-rooms, the baths, and the business part of the city occupy
the valley, whilst on the hill-slopes terraces and crescents of handsome houses rise
tier above tier. We perceive at once that we have entered one of those watering-
places where the number of pleasure- seekers is greater than that of the invalids.
As early as the time of the Romans these Aquce Sulis were much frequented, and
carved stones, showing Minerva in association with the British divinity Sulis, have
been discovered. But Bath is no longer the " Queen of all the Spas in the World,"
to which position the genius of two men. Wood, the architect, and " Beau " Nash, the
master of ceremonies, had raised it in the eighteenth century. The monumental
buildings of that age have a forsaken look, and fashionable crowds no longer file
through their colonnades and the grounds which surround them. Cheltenham,
Malvern, and the seaside towns exercise a stronger attraction upon wealthy
120 THE BRITISH ISLES.
bathers, and now Bath has become a place of residence for retired men of
business in the enjoyment of a moderate competency. The cloth trade, for-
merly of very considerable importance, exists no longer, and though " Bath "
paper still enjoys a high reputation, most of that consumed even in the town of
its reputed manufacture is forwarded from London. Parry, the arctic navigator,
is the most famous amongst the children of Bath, and down to the present day
his achievements can hardly be said to have been eclipsed. Herschel, the famous
astronomer, resided for a considerable time at Bath, earning his living as a
musician, and it was there he began his career as a man of science.
Tiverton, near Bath, carries on cloth and carpet weaving, whilst Keynsham, lower
down on the Avon, has brass works and lias clay diggings. The principal coal mines
of the county are near Radstock and Midsomer Norton, to the south of Bath, and
Long Ashton and Nailsea, to the south-west of Bristol. Nailsea, in addition,
carries on the manufacture of glass, and Ashton that of iron. But the principal
manufacturing town of the northern part of Somersetshire is Frome, on a tributary
of the Avon, and not far from the Wiltshire border. Its neighbourhood abounds
in cloth-mills, and there are also a card factory and several breweries. Portishead,
Clevedon, and Weston-super-Mare are watering-places, and the latter, since the
beginning of the century, has grown from a small fishing village into a town of
considerable importance. Seated upon a capacious bay, with an outlook upon the
fortified islands at the mouth of the estuary of the SevS^n, facing the coast of
Wales, sheltered by the wooded scarps of Worle Hill (540 feet), and backed by a
fruitful country abounding in picturesque scenery, it enjoys peculiar advantages.
The sprat fishery is still carried on here from October to Christmas, as in days
of yore.
Several interesting old towns are seated at the southern foot of the Mendip
Hills. Axhridge is a very ancient little borough, with the population of a village.
Cheddar is no less famous for its cheeses than for its cliffs and stalactite caverns.
A lead mine is near it. Wells is a town almost purely ecclesiastical, its principal
edifices being the cathedral, the bishop's palace, and dependent buildings. Brush
and paper making are carried on. Near it, close to the. source of the Axe, which
bursts forth here a considerable stream, is a famous cavern, the legendary haunt of
the " Witch of Wookey." Shepton-Mallet carries on trade with timber, and brews
an excellent ale.
Glastonbury, the principal town on the river Brue, which enters the Bristol
Channel below the small port of Highbridge, is best known for the ruins of its old
abbey, the most remarkable portion of which is the " Abbot's Kitchen," a building
reproduced at Oxford and in other towns.
Bridgn-ater is the principal town on the Parret. It is situated 12 miles above
the mouth of that river, on the borders of a marshy plain, carries on a brisk coast-
ing trade, and is the only place in the world where the clay and sand deposited at
some localities on the river-side are made into " Bath bricks." The most highly
prized Art treasure of this town appears to be a painting of the '* Descent from the
Cross," found on board a French privateer, and now suspended over the altar of
SOMEESETSHIRE. 121
the church of St. Mary Magdalen. Sedgemoor, where Monmouth was defeated
in 1685, lies to the east of the town. Ascending the Parret, we reach Langporf,
just below its confluence with the Isle and Yeo, or Ivel. The latter runs through
a fertile valley, the chief towns of which are Ilchester, the Ischalis of the Romans,
and the birthplace of Roger Bacon, and Yeovil, a picturesque old place, with a
noble church, where gloves are largely made. The towns on the Upper Parret are
South Petherton, near which are the famous Hamden or Hamhill quarries, and
Crewherne^ with a handsome church and grammar school. Ilminster and Chard,
both on the Isle, engage in lace-making. The latter is a handsome town, at the
foot of the Blackdowns.
Taunton, the county town, on the Tone, is a place of considerable antiquity,
with one of the finest perpendicular churches in the country, and a grammar
school, founded in 1522 by Bishop Fox. There are two silk factories, the manu-
facture of silk having superseded that of wool since 1778, and a glove factory.
The castle forms an object of considerable interest. Its hall, where Judge Jeffreys
held his *' Bloody Assize," now affords accommodation to the museum of the
Somersetshire Archaeological and Natural History Society. Wellington, on the
Upper Tone, and at the northern foot of the Blackdowns, still engages in the
woollen trade. It has given a title to the Great Duke, in whose honour a stone
obelisk has been raised on a neighbouring height.
There remain to be noticed a few small towns on the coast of the Bristol
Channel and to the west of the Parret. They are small in population, but
interesting on account of their antiquity. Watchet exports the iron ore raised in
the Brendon Hills. Near it are the ruins of Cleeve Abbey, founded in 1188 for
Cistercian monks. Dunster has a famous old castle ; Minehead is a quiet watering-
place ; and Porlock is a picturesque village at the foot of Dunkerry Beacon.
105-
CHAPTER V.
1
^^$
THE CHANNEL SLOPE.
Dorsetshire, Wiltshire, Hampshire, and Sussex.
General Features.
HE region which, to the east of the Cornish peninsula, slopes down
to the Channel, is of considerable width only in its western portion,
where the Avon of Salisbury rises on the chalk downs of Wilt-
shire. Here its width is no less than 50 miles, but it narrows
as we proceed eastwards. The rivers become rivulets, and, on
reaching the neighbourhood of the Straits of Dover, there are merely combs down
which the water runs on the surface only after heavy rains. This region, never-
theless, is characterized by special features, due to its southern aspect, its deficiency
in navigable rivers, and its geological formation. In the latter respect some
portions of it bear a greater resemblance to France, from which it is now
separated by the sea, than to the remainder of England, of which it actually
forms part. The English Weald and the French Boulonnais, or country around
Boulogne, are thus clearly the fragments of what was anciently a continuous tract
of land, whose severance has been effected by the erosive action of the sea.
The calcareous uplands which to the east of Devonshire form the watershed
between the Bristol and English Channels are generally known as the Dorset
Heights. They are of moderate elevation, none of the summits attaining a height
of 1,000 feet, but form bold cliffs along the coast. To geologists they have proved
a fertile field of exploration, for they exhibit very clearly the superposition of
various strata. The quarries of Lyme Regis have more especially acquired
celebrity on account of the ichthyosaurians and other gigantic reptiles of liassic
age which they have yielded. They are well known likewise to agriculturists,
for the coprolite, or fossilised guano, in which they abound contains a large
quantity of phosphoric acid, and furnishes a most powerful fertiliser.
The liassic rocks of Lyme Regis are succeeded in the east by oolite cliffs, which
terminate in the Bill of Portland, right out in the open sea. The so-called Isle
of Portland is in reality a peninsula rising superbly above a submarine plateau,
THE CHANNEL SLOPE.
123
where conflicting tides render navigation dangerous, and attached to the main-
land by a narrow strip of beach. Eooted to the base of the clifi" crowned by
Burton Castle, this beach extends along the coast, growing wider by degrees as
we follow it to the south-eastward, and forming a gentle curve, the con-
cave side of which is turned towards the sea. It is known as Chesil or
Fig. 68.— Portland.
Scale 1 : 225,000.
2°30-
2-20'
W.oFGr.
Foresiiore.
Miles.
"Pebble" Bank, and hides all the irregularities of the inner coast-line. The
old inlets and creeks in its rear have gradually been converted into swamps, or
silted up by the alluvium washed into them by the rivers, and only for a distance
of 8 miles along the coast of Dorsetshire is it separated from the mainland by
a narrow channel which debouches into Portland Roads, and is known as the
Fleet. But it is not only this striking regularity of contour which distin-
124 THE BRITISH ISLES.
guishes this beach ; it is equally regular with respect to the arrangement of the
materials of which it is composed. Its pebbles increase in size as we proceed
from west to east. The sand in the west almost imperceptibly passes over into
pebbles, and in the vicinity of the Isle of Portland these latter give place to
shingle. The fishermen along the coast will inform you that when they land on a
dark night on any part of the beach they can tell, from the size of the pebbles, at
what spot they find themselves. The true explanation of the phenomenon is
this : the tidal current runs strongest from west to east, and its power is greater in
the more open channel, or farthest from the land, while the size of the fragments
which are carried to the east and thrown ashore is largest where the motion of
the water is most violent.*
To geologists the Isle of Portland offers a peculiarly interesting field of
research, for it is rich in dirt beds containing organic relics of marine origin,
and still exhibits the fossilised remains of a forest which flourished on the
emerged oolite rocks. It is probable that not a single one of these fossils will
escape the notice of man, for few rocks are being more extensively utilised.
The upper layers are being carried away to be converted into lime, whilst the
lower beds supply a highly valued building stone, which has been largely used
for some of the monumental edifices of London. In recent times most of the stone
quarried on the ''island" has been employed in the construction of a breakwater
planned towards the close of the last century, but only commenced in 1847, mainly
with the view of opposing to the French Cherbourg an English Cherbourg of even
greater strength. This prodigious breakwater is the largest work of the kind ever
undertaken, for nearly 6,000,000 tons of stone have been sunk in the sea to protect
against winds and waves an artificial harbour having an area of 2,107 acres, where
the largest men-of-war find secure riding- ground. The first portion of the break-
water runs from the shore due east for about 1,800 feet, and serves the inha-
bitants of the island as a promenade. Then comes an opening of 400 feet, beyond
which the main section stretches 6,000 feet in length, terminating in an ironclad
fort armed with the heaviest guns. The summit of Yerne Hill (495 feet) is crowned
by impregnable fortifications, armed with one hundred and fifty cannon, and this
citadel, supported by numerous batteries, by a fort on Nothe Hill, near Weymouth,
and by two ironclad forts on the breakwater itself, amply provides for the security
of the harbour. Breakwaters and forts alike have been constructed by convicts, and
this colossal work of modern England, like similar undertakings of ancient Egypt
and Rome, has thus been accomplished by the hands of slaves. f
But though man may modify the aspects of nature by converting an open
bay into a secure harbour, what are his feeble efforts of a day in comparison with
the slow, but incessant erosive action of a single geological period ? Beyond the
island of Portland and the oolitic rocks of the littoral region, the cretaceous
formation extends uninterruptedly as far as Salisbury Plain. That ''plain"
♦ Lyell, " Principles of Geology." Prestwich, at the Institution of Civil Engineers, February 2nd,
1875. Kinahan, Quarterly Journal of the Geological Society, February 1st, 1877.
t The work occupied about a thousand convicts between 1847 and 1872, and cost £1,043,000.
THE CHANNEL SLOPE. 125
is in reality a chalky table-land, rising now and then into gently swelling
hills, and intersected by narrow and picturesque valleys. In its general features
this tract of country presents an appearance of uniformity and repose, and
we might almost fancy that for ages it had undergone no change. But
geologists have here discovered the remnants of enormous strata, which have
been gradually dissolved by water, and transported seaward. Extensive tracts
of chalk are covered with a layer of pebbles more than a yard in depth, and these
pebbles are all that remains of tbick strata ofcalcarebus rocks, the soluble portions
of which have been washed away.* Elsewhere the ground is covered with
scattered rocks, fragments of eocene hills destroyed through long-continued erosive
action. These rocks, on account of their colour and appearance when seen from
afar, are usually known as " grey wethers," but sometimes they are improperly
described as "Druids' stones," because they furnished the material employed
in the construction of Stonehenge. Towards the middle of the century these
scattered rocks and the monuments raised by the aboriginal inhabitants were the
only objects which, away from the towns and villages, contrasted with the uniform
verdure of the pastures. Recently, however, this ''plain," which was formerly
roamed over only by sheep, has been invaded on all sides by the plough, and a
considerable portion of it is now under tillage.
The zone of cretaceous rocks, of which the plain of Salisbury forms a part,
bounds in the north a basin occupied by eocene formations, which stretches for 60
miles along the English Channel. Anciently this basin extended far beyond the
actual line of coast. The whole of the northern portion of the Isle of Wight was
included in it. The Celtic name of that island, Giiith, is supposed to mean
" severed," and an examination of its coast-line shows very clearly that it originally
formed part of the mainland. The coasts of the island run nearly parallel to
those of the mainland from which it has been cut off. The strait of the Solent
on the west, and that of Spithead on the east, are bounded by coasts having
the same inflections, and the Isle of Wight almost looks as if it were a fragment
detacbed from England, and bodily shifted to the south. But though the eocene
rocks to the north of the island have disappeared, and their place has been
invaded by the sea, the cretaceous rocks which form its spine, and anciently
extended to the cliffs of Purbeck, have offered a stouter resistance to erosive
action. In the interior of the island they have been dissolved in many places
by running water, and wide gaps resembling breaches in a rampart open between
the hills, but the extremities of the rhomboid terminate abruptly in cliffs.
The western promontory rises almost vertically to a height of 450 feet, and off
it there stand above the glaucous waters of the sea, not unlike a flotilla of
vessels under sail, a few masses of detached chalk, known as the *' Needles."
These rocks are exposed to the full fury of the gales, and from time to time they
yield to the pressure and are broken into fragments. A remarkable case of this
kind occurred during a violent storm in 1764, when a rock known as " Lot's
Wife" disappeared beneath the foaming waves. In geological structure these
* Eamsay, "Physical Geology and Geography of Great Britain."
126
THE BRITISH ISLES.
superb rocks resemble the cliffs of Purbeck, about 15 miles due west of tbem.
Their image impresses itself firmly on the minds of many emigrants, and thousands
amongst them, when these objects vanish from their sight, have looked upon Europe
for the last time in their lives. The southern portion of the Isle of Wight is one
of the most picturesque districts in England. St. Catherine's Down, the most
elevated summit of the island, rises near its southern angle to a height of 830
feet, and commands an immense horizon, extending from Portland Bill to Beachy
Head, and sometimes even beyond the Channel with its numerous ships, to the
Fig. 69.— The Isle op Wight.
Scale 1 : 420,000.
Depth under 5 Fathoms. 5 to 10 Fathoms.
10 to 20 Fathoms.
Over 20 Fathoms.
5 Miles.
hazy promontories of Cotentin, in France. To the east of this angular landmark
the coast sinks abruptly, but along its foot there extends a singular strip, or
terrace, of considerable width, which has fallen down from the upper part of the
cliff, and is hence known as the TJndercliff. This tract is perfectly sheltered from
northerly winds ; myrtles, geraniums, and other delicate plants flourish there
throughout the winter ; and Yentnor and other places of less note afford accom-
modation to invalids whose state of health requires a milder climate than is to be
found in other parts of England.* The nature of the soil sufficiently accounts
for the existence of this TJndercliff. The subjacent beds, consisting of sand
* James Thome, " The Land we Live in."
THE CHANNEL SLOPE. 127
and clay, were undermined by tlie action of the rain, and the superincumbent
masses of rock were precipitated upon the beach below, where they now act as a
kind of embankment protecting the remaining cliff from the attacks of the sea.
Some of these landslips occurred almost in our own time. In 1799 a farm, with
about 100 acres of the surrounding land, slid down upon the beach, and more
recently still, in 1810 and 1818, other cliffs broke away in a similar manner. The
narrow ravines worn into the rocks by running water are locally known as *' chines."
Formerly they could only be explored with great diffichlty, but steps and easy paths
have been made to facilitate the progress of visitors in search of fine scenery.
The Isle of Wight, though scarcely more than half the size of Anglesey,* has
played a more considerable part in the modern history of England. Unlike the
Welsh island, it is not joined by bridges to the mainland, the dividing channel
being too wide and too deep.f A tunnel, about 4 miles in length, has, however,
been projected, and some preliminary surveys, with a view to its construction,
have actually been made. But though the channel which separates the island from
the mainland cannot yet be crossed dry shod, like Menai Strait, there are few locali-
ties more crowded with shipping. It forms a vast roadstead, fairly sheltered from
most winds, and ramifies northward into the interior of Hampshire. This northern
extension of the road of Spithead is known as Southampton Water, from the
great outport of London which rises near its extremity, and which is exceptionally
favoured by the tide ; for whilst one tidal wave penetrates it through the
Solent, another arrives soon after through the channel of Spithead, sustaining the
first, and extending the time of high water. But the commercial town of South-
ampton is not the only place that has profited by the excellent shelter afforded by
the Isle of Wight; the advantages of the position are also shared by the naval
station of Portsmouth. This great stronghold has been constructed on the flat
island of Portsea, at the entrance to the waters of Spithead.
The road of Spithead, Southampton Water, and the towns which have arisen
upon them, render this portion of the English sea-coast of considerable importance,
and jointly with the beauty of the scenery and the mild climate, they have
attracted to it a large business or pleasure- seeking population. Nevertheless, a
wide tract of country, stretching from Southampton Water westward to the Avon
of Salisbury, is still occupied by a deer forest, and very sparsely peopled. This
"New Forest" covers an area of 60,000 acres, and if ancient chronicles can be
believed, it was planted by William the Conqueror, as a wild-boar and deer
preserve and hunting ground. He is stated to have destroyed twenty villages,
turning out the inhabitants and laying waste their fields. But owing to the
poor nature of the gravel and sand of this tract, it is not likely that it was ever
worth tilling. Eight hundred years ago there may have been more clearings
and groups of houses, but we may well doubt whether so ungrateful a soil can
ever have been extensively cultivated. +
* Anglesey, 302 square miles ; Isle of Wight, 155 square miles.
t Least width, 9,200 feet; depth at the mouth of the Solent, 72 feet.
X Eamsay, " Physical Geology and Geography of Great Britain."
128
THE BEITISH ISLES.
To the east of the flat islands of Portsea and Hayling, and of the low peninsula
terminating in Selsey Bill, the coast gradually approaches the range of cretaceous
hills known as the South Downs. Beyond Brighton clifis once more bound the
encroaching sea, until the downs terminate abruptly in the bold promontory of
Beachy Head. The short and savory herbage of the South Downs feeds a race of
Fig. 70. — Portsmouth.
From an Admiralty Chart.
5^
$tmi'k$«a' £ait^
sheep highly appreciated for their mutton. Now these downs only present' us with
scenes of rural peace, but, to judge from the fortifications which crown nearly every
point of vantage, there must have been a time when the country was the scene of
almost incessant wars. The most famous of these entrenchments is the Poor Man's
Dyke, on a commanding height to the north of Brighton, which in a more super-
stitious age was looked upon as a work of the devil.
The South and North Downs enclose between them the triangular Weald valley,
THE CHANNEL SLOPE.
129
upon whose denuded surface are exposed rocks of mere ancient date than the chalk
of the surrounding downs. When the Normans invaded England, the Forest, or
"Weald," of Andred, or Andredes, still covered the whole of this region, but the trees
have been cut down and converted into charcoal, and consumed in the smelting fur-
naces erected near iron pits which have long since been abandoned as unprofitable.
The clays, sands, and limestones of this district were in all probability deposited in
the delta of some river equal in volume to the Ganges or Mississippi. Its hardened
alluvium contains in prodigious quantities the debris of terrestrial plants, marsupials,
terrestrial reptiles and amphibiae, mixed with the remains of fishes, turtles, and fresh-
water shells. It was to the south of this ancient delta, in Tilgate Forest, near
Fig. 71.— Beach Y Head.
From an Admiralty Chart.
'3 13 ^ 13
Lewes, that Dr. Mantell discovered the first skeleton of the gigantic Iguanodon, an
herbivorous land reptile.
The range of the Northern Downs which separates the Weald from the valley
of the Thames terminates in the east with the cliffs of Folkestone and Dover, but is
continued on the other side of the strait in the hills to the east of Calais. All
that part of England is being encroached upon by the sea, which is constantly
undermining the cliffs. In many parts the footpath which conducts along their
summit terminates abruptly in front of a newly formed precipice, and the traveller
desirous of passing beyond is compelled to strike out for himself a new path
through the herbage, farther away from its edge. It is more especially the cliffs
130
THE BRITISH ISLES.
on the Straits of Dover whicli are exposed to this waste, and Shakspere's Cliff, since
the day Julius Ceesar set his foot upon the shore of England, is supposed to have
receded no less than a mile and a half.* Old chronicles tell us of fearful landslips,
which shook the town of Dover, and caused the country for miles around it to
vibrate. A railway tunnel passes through one of these cliffs, and it was found
advisable to secure the cliff' from further encroachments by precipitating its summit
into the sea, so as to form a kind of breakwater. By the blasting operations carried
on with this view, a huge mass of rock, of a presumed weight of a million tons, was
Fig. 72.— RoMNEY Marsh.
Scale 1 : 350,500.
Depth over
5 Fathoms*
5 Miles.
detached, and, falling into the sea, formed a bank with an area of about 20 acres,
upon which the waves now spend their force.
But whilst the sea is busily demolishing the cliffs of Dover and Hastings, it
has gradually silted up the intervening level tract. The triangular plain thus
formed juts out beyond the general line of the coast, and terminates in Dungeness.
Nowhere else is it possible to meet with a more striking illustration of the influence
which the strength and direction of the tides exercise upon the formation of a
coast-line. This Romney level, named after a town in its centre, would never
have been formed if the English Channel and the North Sea were not placed in
* Beete Jukes, ** School Manual of Geology."
DOESETSHIRE. 131
communication by the Straits of Dover. It owes its existence to the fact that at
this spot the tidal wave proceeding from the Atlantic is met and stopped by
another tidal wave, propagated from the North Sea. The waste of the cliffs of
Hastings, held in suspension by the water, cannot, consequently, pass beyond this
point, where opposite tides neutralise each other, and it is therefore deposited
along the coast of the Eomney Marsh, which is thus continually increasing in
extent. Dungeness, its extreme point, is supposed to advance annually about
5 feet into the sea.
Agriculture and sheep farming are the principal occupations in that part of
England which extends from Cornwall to the Straits of Dover. There are no really
large towns besides Southampton, Portsmouth, and Brighton, and these only flourish
because in one way or other they are dependencies and outposts of London.
Reduced to their own resources, they would soon sink to a secondary rank.
Topography.
Dorsetshire is a maritime county, pleasantly diversified, and in the enjoyment
of a dry and salubrious climate. A considerable portion of its area is occupied by
chalky downs, which extend from the coast at Lyme Regis to Cranborne Chase, a
wooded tract on the border of Wiltshire, and attain their greatest height (910 feet)
in Pillesdon Pen, to the west of Beaminster. Lesser ranges extend along the
sea- coast, and end in the isles, or rather peninsulas, of Portland and Purbeck.
The chief rivers are the Frome and the Stour. The former enters Poole Harbour ;
the latter traverses the fruitful vale of Blackmore, and finally passes into
Hampshire, where it joins the Avon. The so-called Trough of Poole is a low-lying
district around Poole Harbour, abounding in peaty mosses. Agriculture and dairy-
farming are the principal industries.
Lyme Regis, close to the Devonshire border, romantically seated in a deep
comb opening out upon the sea between cliffs of forbidding aspect, is a favourite
watering-place. The neighbouring village of Charmouth has its Undercliff, like
Yentnor, in the Isle of Wight, and there are other landslips in its neighbourhood.
Bridporty 2 miles above the small harbour formed by the river Brit, is
an ancient but somewhat decayed town, where flax-spinning and ship-building
are carried on. Higher up the beautiful and fertile valley of the Brit, in the
midst of the hills, there stands the small market town of Beaminster.
Chesil Bank, which connects the mainland with the Isle of Portland, commences
at the mouth of the Brit. Portland, with its fortifications, its convict prison,
quarries, and magnificent breakwater, has already been referred to (see p. 122).
On the western side of the capacious bay, now protected by this great work of
engineering skill, Weymouth is seated, with its aristocratic suburb of Me Icombe Regis.
Like Bridport, it has had its period of decay, but its beach, so well adapted for
sea-bathing, the beauty of the surrounding country, and the advantages conferred
upon it by its well-sheltered harbour could hardly fail of once more restoring it to
prosperity.
132 THE BRITISH ISLES.
Dorchester, the county town, on the Frome, was anciently known by the Celtic
name of Durnovaria, and after the invasion of the Romans it was fortified by them.
It is a quiet, prosperous place, its most remarkable building being the pinnacled
tower of the church at the point of intersection of its four streets. In its
neighbourhood there exists the most perfect Roman amphitheatre in England.
It is known as Mambury, and is in so fair a state of preservation for open-air
performances that a witch was burnt in its centre as recently as 1705, when a
large crowd attended the spectacle. Flowing past the ancient town otWareham,
and its magnificent earthworks, which have resisted the onset of many a Danish
attack, the Frome enters the shallow harbour of Poole, which is the principal
seaport of the county, foremost amongst its exports being potter's clay, from the
neighbouring isle of Purbeck, and pitwood. Ship-building is carried on, oysters
are bred, and there are a few potteries in the neighbourhood. The Isle of Purbeck,
on the southern side of Poole Harbour, must ever form a focus of attraction to
geologists, who will find in the museum of the small but ancient village of Corfe
Castle a collection of the most interesting fossils yielded by the district. Kim-
meridge is a village well known to geologists on account of its clay, but the chief
place of the isle is Swanage, a favourite watering-place in summer, because it is
exposed to the cooling breeze from the north-east.
The Stour, in its course through the county, runs past Blandford Forum and
Wimhorne, the latter famous for its minster, a building of singular beauty. At
Kingston Lacy, 2 miles to the north-west of the town, there stands an obelisk
brought thither from the island of Philae. Shaftesbury, traditionally one of the
oldest towns in the kingdom, where King Alfred founded a nunnery in 880
for one of his daughters, stands on the margin of the fruitful vale of Blackmore.
Sherborne is the only town of the county which lies beyond the Channel basin.
It is seated on the river Yeo, which finds its way into the Bristol Channel. It was
a bishopric until 1058, and still boasts a fine cathedral to remind it of its days
of grandeur, a famous grammar school, and several curious old dwelling-houses.
Glove-making is carried on both here and in the neighbouring town of Yeovil, in
Somersetshire.
Wiltshire is an inland county, which lies only partly within the basin of the
English Channel. Its southern and more extensive portion forms the so-called plain
of Salisbury, an undulating chalky table-land, drained by the river Avon and its
tributaries, and lying at an elevation of about 500 feet above the level of the sea.
The northern escarpment of this table-land looks down upon the vale of Pewsey,
the most fertile tract of the county, on greensand, and bounded on the north
by the Marlborough Downs, a treeless tract of chalk hills, presenting features
similar to those of Salisbury Plain. The north-western part lies within the basin
of the Severn, and is drained by the Bristol Avon ; the north-eastern part belongs
to the basin of the Thames. Foremost amongst the productions of Wiltshire are
cheese, bacon, and mutton, and the manufacture of cloth is extensively carried on in
the valley of the Bristol Avon. Some iron ore is raised in the neighbourhood of
Westbury and Melksham.
WILTSHIRE.
133
Salishury, the county town, is favourably situated at the confluence of three
streams — the Upper Avon, Bourn, and Wiley. Its foundation only dates back
to the thirteenth century. Old Sarimi, which down to the reign of Henry III.
was one of the most important towns of the kingdom, exists no longer ; but
for more than five hundred years after it had ceased to be inhabited it retained
the privilege of returning two members to Parliament, who were virtually
the nominees of the lord of the manor. Its site is marked by a conical
knoll, about 2 miles to the north of the moderh town. Salisbury is now
one of the cleanest towns in the kingdom, but as recently as 1840 it was a
Fig. 73. —Salisbury Cathedeat..
poor place, with numerous unsightly brick houses covered with thatched roofs.
It has grown more sightly since, but all its modern buildings are thrown into the
shade by its famous cathedral, the finest Gothic church in England, and the only
cathedral in the country of which the nave was erected in the course of a single
generation. It was finished in 1258, in the purest pointed style, then only
recently introduced, and in accordance with the original conceptions of its
architect. Its spire, the loftiest in England, rising 400 feet above the pavement,
although not built for a century after the nave had been completed, so far from
disfiguring it, is one of the most imposing objects of which Gothic architecture
can boast. The nave and north porch have recently been restored to the condition
134
THE BRITISH ISLES.
in which they were before the Puritans robbed them of their numerous ornaments.
The cloisters and adjoining chapter-house, octagonal in form, and with a vaulted
roof supported by a central pillar, need not fear comparison with similar structures
in other parts of the world.* The Salisbury Museum contains Dr. Blackmore's
collection of prehistoric remains, the valuable American collections of Squiers
and Davis, and numerous other objects of interest. Amongst its remains of
Fig. 74.— Salisbury and Stonehenge.
Scale 1 : 168,000.
Ancients^- T^SmW^
#-'/'/.:':7^ Ancient Earthworks
V/W/.V:
}IM'm\<^''-
1*50
1-40 W,ofG.
«T Tumulus
2 Miles.
mediaeval architecture, the finest example is a banqueting hall, built about 1470
by John Hall, a wool-stapler, and now used as a china store. Salisbury carries on
a large trade in wool, and manufactures a little cutlery. Important sheep fairs
are held at the village of Britford, a couple of miles to the south of it. Wilton, to
the westward, at the confluence of the Wiley and Nadder, has a carpet factory, and
* Atii6dee Pichot, " L'Irlande et le pays de Galles."
WILTSHIRE. 135
a seat of the Earl of Pembroke, famed for its marbles and Vandycks. Wardour
Castle, a venerable pile in a finely wooded park, rises on the Upper Nadder, and is
rich in art treasures.
Warminster is the most important town in the valley of the Wiley, and its
neighbourhood abounds in entrenchments attributed to the ancient Britons. But
far more interesting than either of the places named are the circles of stones to the
west of the ancient town of Amesbury, on the Upper Avon, and in the very centre
of the plain of Salisbury. These "hanging stones," formerly known also under
the name of " dancing giants,"* were originally arranged in two circles and two
ellipses, having an altar for their common centre, but now present the appearance
of a confused pile of enormous rocks. Most of these stones are such as occur on
the plain, but some of the smaller ones appear to be erratic boulders, probably
conveyed hither from Devonshire. Roman and British pottery have been found in
the neighbourhood, which abounds in barrows, or sepulchral tumuli, but these
remains have not hitherto shed any light upon the origin of Stonehenge.f
Northern Wiltshire lies within the basins of the Bristol Avon and Thames.
Devizes is the principal town of the fertile
vale of Pewsey, which extends between ^'^' '^^■~^^^^^^'
the downs of South and North Wiltshire, - ^^^^=^^3- ^:^^^_
and is traversed by a canal connecting the '^^^--^=^ '^^^. ^'
Thames (Kennet) with the Bristol Avon. ^^^^=^ ^^^-
Devizes carries on a considerable trade ^^^^-^^^^S^^s^^UtjSf^ i^ltt
in corn and cloth. Its museum, the pro- ^flj ■^V^nf^^^HH^^fllV
perty of the Wiltshire Archaeological and ^^^^^HHHH^^HJHJ^^I^kK
Natural History Society, is more especially — ^^^^^^^^^^BH[^^HH^^fc
rich in fossils. Seend, a villao^e to the ~^^^^^^^^^^5^^^^^^^^^
west of Devizes, has iron foundries.
The Bristol Avon traverses the manufacturing district of the county, which
shares in the clothing industry of Western England, the principal seats of which
are gathered round the Cotswold Hills. Malmeshury, a decayed town on the
Upper Avon, with a fine abbey church, does not participate in the prosperity of
the towns on the lower course of the river. Chippenham, in some respects the
most important amongst these latter, is celebrated for its cheese and corn markets,
and successfully carries on the manufacture of cloth, agricultural machinery,
and condensed milk. The bridge which here spans the Avon is a venerable
structure, built probably in the latter part of the twelfth century, Calne, a
town famous for its bacon, lies to the east. The Lansdowne column crowns a lofty
promontory of chalk in its neighbourhood. It stands within the area of Oldbury
Castle, an entrenchment to which the Danes are supposed to have retired after their
defeat by Alfred in the battle of Ethandune. A huge White Horse, 157 feet in
length, and visible at a distance of 30 miles, was cut into the chalky ground, in
1780, by an enthusiastic physician of Calne, to commemorate this victory. Laycock
* Thomas Wright, " The Celt, the Roman, and the Saxon."
t Rich. Colt Hoare, " History of Wiltshire."
136 THE BRITISH ISLES.
Abbey, to the soufh of Chippenham, was the property of W. H. Fox Talbot, the
well-known inventor of Talbotype. Corsham, an old residence of the Saxon
kings, lies to the east, and carries on an extensive trade in oolitic freestone, procured
from quarries in its neighbourhood. MeJksham, on the Avon, has a thriving cloth
industry, but yields in importance to its neighbour Bradford-on-Avon, prettily
situated on the slopes of the hill, and rich in quaint gable-fronted houses. Its
most interesting building is the Saxon church of St. Lawrence, the only perfect
Saxon church remaining in England. Bradford has been noted for many cen-
turies for its fine broadcloth, and kerseymeres were first made here, but the cloth
industry is no\N' carried on more extensively in the neighbouring town of Trow-
bridge, which crowns the summit of a lofty rock on the banks of the Bliss, a
southern feeder of the Avon. Higher up on that river are the iron mines and
furnaces of Westbury.
The Thames, or rather Tsis, traverses the northern extremity of the county,
running past the ancient town of Cricklade, the centre of an extensive parlia-
mentary borough. Old Swindon, in a pleasantly diversified grazing country to
the south, is a pretty market town, which has risen into importance since the
construction, by the Great Western Railway Company, of extensive workshops
and stores. Most of the men employed by the company live in New Swindon,
about a mile to the north of the old market town.
The river Kennet rises on the Marlborough Downs, which are not less rich in
prehistoric remains than Salisbury Plain, and joins the Thames at Reading. Marl-
borough, the principal Wiltshire town in its valley, is a quaint old-fashioned place,
with a famous college occupying the site of the Norman castle, and in close prox-
imity to Savernake Forest, the domain of the Marquis of Aylesbury. Ascending
the Kennet for about 5 miles, we reach Silbury Hill, a gigantic artificial mound
rising to a height of 125 feet, and surrounded by a circle of sarsen stones. Tradition
is silent as to the events which this structure is intended to commemorate. Close
to it rises Avebury, girt by an earthen mound 170 feet in height, and an inner
ditch. The area thus enclosed was originally occupied by stone circles, similar
to those of Stonehenge, and perhaps of even greater antiquity, but as many of
the stones have been removed, it is difficult now to trace the original arrange-
ments.*
Hampshire, South amptonshire, or Hants, one of the most agreeable counties
of England, has a varied surface and a mild and genial climate. A considerable
portion of it is occupied by chalky downs, whose northern escarpments f look down
upon the valley of the Kennet, whilst to the southward they slope towards the
level tracts which border the English Channel. The valleys which intersect these
downs contain much good land, and some of the finest water-meadows in England.
The south-western portion of the county is almost wholly occupied by the sparsely
peopled district known as the New Forest, where oak and beech trees abound, but
which also includes large stretches of heath. The most populous towns have arisen
* Forbes Leslie, " Early Races of Scotland."
t Inkpen here attnins a height of 970 feet.
HAMPSHIRE.
137
on tlie capacious bays which indent the coast. Agriculture and sheep farming
are the principal occupations, the manufactures being altogether unimportant.
The Salisbury Avon traverses the western extremity of the county. Flowino-
past the ancient towns of Fordingbridge and Bingwood, it enters the English
Channel below Christchurch, a small seaport, the only attraction of which consists
of a fine priory church. Bournemouth is an aspiring watering-place to the west of
the Avon, much resorted to on account of its dry climate, but not so favoured as
many other watering-places as regards picturesque scenery.
Lyndhurst, the capital of the New Forest, is a smalltown much frequented during
the summer, because the neighbourhood is full of interest to the botanist and entomo-
logist. On the skirts of the forest is Lymington, an outport of Southampton, with
an inconsiderable coasting trade. Bay-salt is manufactured in its neighbourhood.
The peninsula at the head of Southampton Water, formed by the confluence
of the Test and Itchin, is occupied by the town of Southampton. The Roman
town of Ciausentum lay to the east of the Itchin, its site being occupied now by the
village of Bittern. The Test, or Anton, is a good trout stream. It rises above the
old town of Andover, to the west of which lies the village of Weyhill, famous for
its sheep and hop fairs, and runs past the towns of Stockhridge and Romsey. The
latter boasts a noble abbey church. Adjoining it is Broadlands, the residence of
the late Lord Palmerston, to whom a monument has been erected in the town.
The Itchin washes the foot of a plateau upon which rises the ancient and illustrious
city of Winchester, known as Caer Gwent, or *' White Town," in the time of the
Britons, perhaps in token of its pre-eminence. During the century which preceded
the invasion of the Homans immigrant Belgae settled at Winchester, whence its
Latin name of Veuta Belgarum. The Saxons made it the capital of Wessex, and
subsequently of the whole of England, and notwithstanding sieges and ravages, it
retained its title until the twelfth century. For a long time afterwards it was
looked upon as a kind of holy city, and Parliaments met there, and kings were
crowned in its cathedral. The latter is its chief edifice, and recalls the time of its
ancient supremacy. It has been built and transformed in various ages, and includes
examples of all the styles of architecture — from the rude Norman to the most
highly ornate decorated. The great western window occupies more than two-
thirds of the height of this superb structure, and the light which penetrates through
its stained glass falls upon mortuary chests, supposed to contain the bones of early
Saxon kings. Winchester College, founded by William of Wykeham in 1387, is
another remarkable monument of the Middle Ages, not so much on account
of its architecture as of an adherence to ancient traditions in the system of
education carried on within its walls. Of the old royal castle, originally built by
William the Conqueror, only the wall and a subterranean passage remain. The
palace which Charles II. erected is now occupied as a barrack. The Hospital of
St. Cross, founded in 1136, lies about a mile to the south of Winchester, and the
** wayfarer's dole," consisting of a horn of beer and a piece of bread, is still given
to all who apply for it at the porter's lodge. Higher up on the Itchin is the
market town of Alresford.
106-E
188
THE BRITISH ISLES.
Southampton occupies so favourable a position between the estuaries of tbe Test
and Itchin, and at tbe bead of its long bay, tbat we need not wonder at the
importance into which it has grown since England has permanently entered into
intimate relations with the continent. Flemish refugees, driven by religious
intolerance from their homes in the sixteenth century, introduced several branches
of manufacture, including more especially that of cloth- weaving, but these indus-
tries deserted the town in the course of last century. The event which made South-
Fig. 76.— Southampton Water.
Scale 1 : 160,000.
WoPCr
Depth under
5 Fathoms.
Depth over
5 Fathoms.
2 Miles.
ampton what it is was the opening of the South-Western Railway. Placed thereby
within a two-hours' ride of the metropolis, Southampton was enabled to make the
most of the advantages which it oflfered to persons desirous of proceeding from
London to foreign parts. By embarking at Southampton these travellers avoided
the delay incidental to a passage through the Straits of Dover. That town
became, in fact, the starting-point of the Indian and other mail-packets, and the
docks excavated for their accommodation at the head of the peninsula, as well as
HAMPSHIRE. 139
the roadstead, are at all times crowded with steamers. The stream of travellers
which uninterruptedly passes through the town, the transhipment of merchan-
dise, and the repair, outfit, and construction of ships have given an impetus to
the industry of the place, which is causing it steadily to expand in the direction of
Shirley and other neighbouring villages. *' Bargate," which separates the lower
from the upper town, is the most interesting relic of old Southampton. The
Hartley Institution contains a museum, a library, and a School of Art, but
geographers are more likely to feel interested in the Ordnance Survey Office, which
is intrusted with the publication of the maps of the United Kingdom. Several
thousand sheets, varying in scale from 6 feet to 1 inch to a mile, have already been
published, but many years must elapse before this gigantic work can be completed,
only to be begun de novo, for the surface of the country is perpetually changing,
from natural causes no less than through the agency of man.
The eastern bank of Southampton Water is one of the loveliest and most
salubrious districts in England, and no better site could have been selected for the
great Naval and Military Hospital of the country, founded immediately after the
termination of the Crimean war. Though christened in honour of Queen
Victoria, this hospital is popularly named after the ruins of Netley Abbey, which
are in its vicinity. It forms an outlying dependency of Portsmouth, which defends
the mouth of the Portus Magnns of the Romans, opposite to the Isle of Wight.
This great place ot war, whose population fluctuates with the requirements of the
naval authorities, consists in reality of three distinct towns, viz. Portsmouth,
Portsea, and Gosport, the two former on Portsea Island, on the eastern side of the
harbour, the latter opposite. The lines of fortification, however, include several
suburbs and even outlying towns. Southsea, to the south of Portsmouth, facing
the road of Spithead, is a new watering-place, with an aquarium and a fine
esplanade. Landport, the northern suburb, leads to the Lines of Hilsea, which
defend Portsea Island. Stokes Bay, with the watering-place of Anglesey, lies
between the walls of Gosport and the detached forts. In it is the *' measured
mile " for testing the speed of Government vessels. Even Porchester, the ancient
Roman station on the northern side of the bay, where there are the remains of a
Norman castle, and the small port of Fareham, in its north-western corner, have been
drawn within the new lines of defence. Portsmouth is now virtually one of the
strongest fortresses in the world. The entrance to the harbour is defended by
Southsea Castle and Fort Monckton, and by a number of ironclad forts raised
upon artificial islands in Spithead Road, and armed with guns of the heaviest
calibre. Two lines of detached forts defend the approaches to Gosport, and a chain
of most powerful works crowns the heights of Portsdown, to the north of the
harbour. These various works of defence are armed with 1,120 guns, and a
garrison of 20,000 men is required to man them. They are well calculated to
secure the safety of the docks and arsenals, which give shelter to England's most
powerful men-of-war and a vast accumulation of naval and military stores.
Portsmouth proper possesses but little to interest the visitor, except, perhaps, its
garrison chapel, which formed part of the Hospital of St. Nicholas, founded in the
140
THE BRITISH ISLES.
time of Henry III. ; but Portsea, with its floating basins, covers an area of 290
acres, and its arsenal, armory, and ship-yards abound in objects calculated to
rivet the attention. Here may be seen the most perfect and ingenious machinery
for making blocks, rivets, and bolts, and the amplest arrangements for the construc-
tion and repair of wooden and iron ships. Off the dockyard lies Nelson's celebrated
flagship, the Victory, and looking northward, we discern, clearly standing out against
the sky, an obelisk which has been erected in his memory. Gosport, besides large
barracks, contains the Royal Clarence Victualling Yard, a huge establishment.
Haslar Hospital, for sailors and soldiers, lies about a mile beyond the town. Life
in Portsmouth may be said to be concentrated in the dockyard, to which the town
Fig. 77. — FoKisMouTH and Approaches.
Scale 1 : 185.000.
Foreshore.
Depth under
2^ Fathoms.
is indebted for its prosperity ; but there remains a small surplus of energy for
carrying on a not inconsiderable coasting trade. Charles Dickens is the most
illustrious amongst the men born here.
Havant, at the head of Langston Harbour, to the east of Portsmouth, is a
small market town ; whilst Hayling, on the flat island of the same name,
aspires to the honour of being a watering-place, and engages in oyster-breeding.
Petersfield, an old parliamentary borough, close to the Sussex border, is a pretty
market town at the northern foot of the South Downs.
The north-eastern point of Hampshire lies within the basin of the Thames.
Here are Basingstoke, Alton, and Alder shot. The first is the centre of one of
SUSSEX. 24 J
the finest wheat and bean growing districts in England, which extends northward to
Silchester, a village on the boundary of Berkshire. Silchester is interesting on
account of the remains of a Roman amphitheatre. Alton, on the Upper Wey is
famous for its hops. Aldershot, since the establishment of a permanent military
camp on the downs in its neighbourhood in 1854, has grown from an inconsider-
able village into a populous town. The two military colleges of Sandhurst lie to
the north of the camp, within the county of Berkshire.
Rude, opposite Portsmouth Harbour, is the largest town of the Isle of Wight.
It is altogether a town of pleasure, surrounded by gardens and villa residences,
and the chief landing-place of the crowds of visitors annually attracted by the beau-
tiful scenery of the island. Newport, the chief town, almost in the centre of the
island, at the head of the estuary of the Medina, possesses few features of interest ;
but it adjoins the pretty village of Carisbrooke, commanded by a picturesque Korman
castle, in which Charles I. was confined a prisoner, and his daughter Elizabeth
died in 1650. The port of the Medina is at Cowes. If Portsmouth is the great
resort of men-of-war, and Southampton a principal station for mail-steamers, West
Cowes may feel some pride in being the head-quarters of the royal yacht squadron.
Its regattas are the most famous in the world, and on these occasions the most
expert seamanship may be witnessed, for the members of the Royal Yacht Club
have in their service 1,500 of the best sailors England is able to furnish. Slat-
woods, a villa near Cowes, was the birthplace of Dr. Arnold, of Rugby, and Osborne
House is the marine residence of her Majesty Queen Victoria.
Sandoicn is a favourite resort on the south-east coast of the Isle of Wight. The
road leads thence through the lovely village of Bonchureh to Vent nor, the chief
place on the Undercliff. Bonchureh, in the opinion of Dr. Arnold, is " the most
beautiful thing on the sea-coast this side of Genoa."
Freshwater Gate, Alum Bay (where sand is dug for the glass trade), and
Yarmouth are favourite tourist haunts in the extreme west of the island, close
to the famous " Needles."
Sussex, which* preserves the name of a Saxon kingdom, is a maritime county
belonging to two well-marked geological districts, viz. those of the Chalk and the
Wealden. The chalky range of the South Downs extends through the southern
portion of the county, from the borders of Hampshire to Beachy Head. It slopes
down gently towards the sea, but presents a bold escarpment where it joins the
Weald. To this latter the remainder of the county belongs, and it abounds in
wild woodland scenery, unsurpassed in any other part of England. Most of the
rivers which rise on the southern slope of th.e Forest Ridge, the backbone of the
Wealden district, find their way to the sea through the downs by oourses which
they have hollowed for themselves. The soil of the Weald is for the most part a
stiff" tenacious clay, but along the sea-coast, in Pevensey Level and around
Winchelsea, there occur extensive tracts of fine marsh land. Hops are raised in
large quantities, and the county is justly celebrated for its fine breeds of sheep and
cattle, and the excellence and abundance of its timber, oak being more prevalent
in the Weald, and beech in the other parts. Ironstone exists, but it has not been
142 THE BRITISH ISLES.
raised since the use of charcoal has been superseded by that of pit coal in the
smelting and refining of iron. All the large towns are near the coast, and the
central part very thinly peopled ; but with the exception of Hastings there is not
one which can boast of fine scenery, and most of them are commercially unim-
portant, owing to the coast being singularly deficient in good harbours. Even
Chichester, the Roman station in the country of the Regni, and subsequently
the capital of the Southern Saxons, retains its importance chiefly on account
of its fine cathedral, the only one in England which has a nave with four aisles.
Goodwood Park and its famous racecourse are in the neighbourhood.
Bognor was founded in 1786 by a London hatter, as a rival of Bath. Little-
ham2)ton, at the mouth of the Arun, and Worthing, are small watering-places,
frequented chiefly on account of the mildness of their climate, the facility of access
from London, and the advantages which they afEord for sea-bathing. The town
of Arundel is situated 4 miles up the river Arun. Its magnificent castle is the
baronial residence of the Duke of Norfolk, who has built a Roman Catholic Church,
at the enormous cost of £100,000, which far surpasses in size and splendour the
old parish church. Cisbury Hill, crowned by a British camp, lies to the north
of Worthing, and within an easy walking distance is the village of Tarring,
famous for its fig gardens, said to have been planted in 1145, and producing
about 2,500 figs annually. JHew Shoreham, at the mouth of the Adur, which has
opened itself a passage through the downs a few miles to the north at Steyning
and Bramher, possesses a small tidal harbour, and carries on some coasting trade.
Brighton, whose houses and terraces extend for 4 miles along the coast, from
Hove to Kemp Town, can neither boast of a beach presenting unusual facilities
to bathers, nor is its climate very mild, nor the scenery of the surrounding country
very attractive. It is indebted for its good fortune to the circumstance of
having been built under the same meridian as London, and on a part of the
south coast most readily accessible by rail. Brighton is, in fact, a mere suburb
of London. It has grown into a populous town through the favour extended to
it by the Londoners, and though having no other industries than its fisheries
and the entertainment of visitors, it numbers 100,000 inhabitants, or 150,000
during the season, being in this respect the equal of many important manu-
facturing or commercial towns. Hundreds of merchants whose places of business
are in London have chosen Brighton for their residence, and almost every morning
they travel up to their offices, and return thither in the afternoon. By degrees
Brighton has come to be looked upon as the queen of watering-places on the
south coast of England, and its fine museum, in the curious Pavilion which
George lY. .erected as a marine residence, its unrivalled Aquarium, opened in
1872, schools, and other public institutions entitle it to rank amongst the foremost
towns of England. Brighton has two piers, which jut out into the sea for a
considerable distance. The town is supplied with excellent drinking water from
the chalk hills which bound it on the north.
The old carriage road from London to Brighton runs through Lewes, an
interesting town, at a gap in the South Downs, through which the Ouse finds its
SUSSEX.
143
way to the sea. A portion of the castle contains the museum of the Sussex
Archaeological Society. Mount Harry, the site of the defeat of Henry III. by
Earl Simon de Montfort in 1264, lies 3 miles to the east of it. Newhaven, at
the mouth of the Ouse, is merely an outport of London, whence there is regular
communication with Dieppe. Close to the railway station may be seen a mill, the
motive power of which is supplied by the tide. Formerly the Ouse entered the
sea at Seafordy a quiet watering-place about 2 miles farther east.
Eastbourne, on the eastern side of Beachy Head, consists of an old village at
Fig. 78. — Brighton.
Scale 1 : 120,000.
W.of G.
Foreshore
2 Miles.
some distance from the sea, and a modern watering-place, far more quiet in
appearance than are its rivals, Brighton and Hastings. But whilst the old village
of Eastbourne has grown into a populous town, its neighbour Pevensey, on the site
of the Roman Portus Anderida, and affiliated to Hastings as one of the Cinque
Ports, has been deserted by the sea, and has dwindled into a poor village, whose
houses nestle at the base of a Norman castle reared upon Roman foundations. As
one of the Cinque Ports, Pevensey was exempted from customs dues, and enjoyed
special fishery rights, on condition of its providing a certain number of men-of-war
144
THE BRITISH ISLES.
for the King's service. We may fairly doubt whether Julius Caesar landed in Peven-
sey Bay, but there can be no question of its having sheltered, in 1066, the nine
hundred vessels which brought William the Conqueror's host to England. It was
from here he marched upon the village of Epiton, now known as Battle, where he
overthrew the Saxons under King Harold. On the spot where the Saxon standard
Fig. 79. — Hastings.
From an Admiralty Chai-t.
'"4 "
4i ..-si
«* Si
6 fit
4*^ ,'■ ^^'
6 -••■ 4 *• Jm^ « e
e ? , 7 7 5 ^ « V.'' '
*««7 7 /<■ 5777
6 S x'ZJ O
/'
i
! 13 It
! MUes.
was captured and King Harold fell, the victorious Norman caused an abbey to be
erected, which he endowed with the prettily wooded land for a league around, and
with numerous manors in other parts of the kingdom. At the village of Brightling,
near here, a great boring for coal took place in 1876 ; the bore extended to a depth
of 2,000 feet without reaching coal, but it passed through a bed of gypsum which
is now being worked.
SUSSEX. 146
' Hastings, whose Scandinavian name suflBciently indicates its origin, is, next to
Brighton, the principal watering-place on the south coast of England, and far
surpasses it in the picturesqueness of its surroundings. The old town is built at'
the mouth of a valley shut in between cliffs, one of which (the west) is surmounted
by the remains of a castle. The modem watering-place coalesces with the western
suburb of St. Leonards ; but clusters of buildings have also sprung up on the
surrounding hills, and these enjoy a climate radically distinct from that which
prevails along the coast. Though formerly the most jiowerful of the Cinque Ports,
furnishing no less than twenty- one vessels towards the fleet out of a total of fifty-
seven, Hastings is now unimportant as a place of maritime commerce ; but it still
carries on its fisheries. Wirichelsea and Rye, which from the time of King John
enjoyed the same privileges as the Cinque Ports, are two interesting little towns in
the marsh lands which stretch from Eastern Sussex into Kent. The former of these
places lies 3 miles to the north-west of the ancient site of the town, which was
submerged in 1287. Rye, like Winchelsea, has since been deserted by the sea, but
still carries on some coasting trade through its outlying harbour, about a mile and
a half to the east of the town. During the Middle Ages this town was much
frequented, and on the revocation of the Edict of Nantes numerous Huguenots
settled in it, and many of their descendants still live there. A huge church, an old
tower, and a gate are the principal buildings likely to interest the antiquary.
Horsham, on the Upper Arun and to the west of St. Leonards Forest, the chief
town in the Weald of Sussex, is remarkable on account of its wide streets planted
with shady trees. All other towns in this district are of local importance only.
Midhurst, on the Eastern Rother, is a dull market town ; Petworth, to the east of
it, attracts visitors on account of the art treasures stored in a neighbouring mansion
called Petworth House ; Cuckfield was of some importance as a stage on the high-road
which connects London with Brighton ; whilst JJckfield is deserving of notice for
the charming woodlands which surround it.
A small portion of the county, to the north of the Forest Hills, lies within the
basin of the Thames. Here East Grinstead is the most important town. It is a
rising place, near the head of the Medway, in the midst of charming scenery, and
is rapidly becoming a suburban residence of City merchants.
Dover and Folkestone both lie on the Channel slope, but will be described in
connection with the county of Kent.
CHAPTER VI.
THE BASIN OF THE THAMES.
(Oxfordshire, Berkshire, Bugkinghamshihe, Hertfordshire, Middlesex, Surrey, Kent, Essex.)
tIE Thames is not the largest river of the British Islands, but in
historical importance it has few rivals. The largest river of our
globe, tbe Amazon, drains an area of 2,300,000 square miles, but
within its basin there dwells not one titbe of the population which
crowds the great city of the Thames valley. True the city we
refer to is Liondon, probably the greatest agglomeration of human beings which
the world ever saw.
The river which flows past London rises within a short distance of the Bristol
Channel, on an oolitic upland of the Cotswold Hills, which looks down upon the
broad plain of Stroud, Gloucester, and Cheltenham on the west. Some of its springs
rise close to the edge of the escarpment which faces the valley of the Severn, 900
feet below them. Formerly the whole of this upland region belonged to the basin
of the Severn, but continued erosive action has encroached upon the eastern slope of
the plateau, and for ages the water-parting has been travelling westward, the basin
of the Thames gaining in extent at the expense of that of the Severn,* An
examination of a geological map of England shows at a glance how extensively the
liassic strata in the region which gives rise to the head- waters of the Thames have
been reduced by denudation.
The principal source of the river, known as Thames Head, rises at an elevation
of 376 feet above the sea, a little to the south-west of Cirencester. It gives birth
to the Isis, which, having been augmented by the Churn, the Colne, and other
streams, becomes navigable for barges at Lechlade, on the borders of Gloucester-
shire and Berkshire. Only after its junction with the Thame, in Oxfordshire, does
the combined river obtain its proper name of Thames, which it retains till it joins
the German Ocean. In its course it traverses various geological formations,
which succeed each other with singular regularity. From the oolitic uplands near
its head it passes through a region of chalk, succeeded by tertiary rocks and the
alluvial deposits which surround its estuary. Speaking generally, the basin of the
* Ramsay, " Physical Geology and Geography of Great Britaia."
THE BASIN OF THE THAMES.
147
Thames may be said to be made up of parallel strips varying in width, but all
striking from the south-west to the north-east. A broad band of cretaceous rocks
extends, however, to the south, having its root in the " plain " of Salisbury, and
forming the range of the ^N'orth Downs, which separates the tracts of the Weald
from the valley of the" Thames. The eastern extremity of the county of Kent,
which may be likened to the prow of England, forms part of this extended band
of chalk. These North Downs, together with the culminating points rising upon
the uplands from which they extend eastward, forni the highest elevations within
the basin of the Thames, Their height, however, in no instance exceeds
1,000 feet.* The chalky uplands to the north of the river are even less elevated,
and only the Chiltern Hills, which stretch north-eastward from the Thames, above
Reading, can compare with them, their culminating point, Wendover Hill, attain-
Fig. 80. — CiRENGESTER AND ThAMES HeAD.
Scale 1 : 175,u00.
bfetade
W.of G
r 5.0
2 Miles.
ing a height of 905 feet. Formerly these hills abounded in timber, especially
beech, and afforded shelter to numerous highwaymen. To put the latter down, and
to protect the inhabitants of the neighbouring parts from their depredations, a
" steward " was appointed under the Crown. For several generations past the
duties of this officer have ceased, but his office remains, in order that it may be
conferred on any member of Parliament, not otherwise disqualified, who is desirous
of resigning his seat. The applicant, by accepting office under the Crown,
renders his seat in Parliament vacant, and a writ for a new election is ordered.
The basin of the VThames has singularly varied in extent in the course of
geological ages, in accordance with the oscillations of the land and the displace-
ments of the sea. Whilst England still constituted a portion of the neighbouring
* Milk Hill, 967 feet; Inkpen, 973 feet ; Leith Hill, 967 feet.
148 THE BRITISH ISLES.
continent, the Thames flowed eastward and formed part of the basin of the Rhine.
At that time it was merely a tributary river, but its volume was nevertheless far
more considerable than during a subsequent stage, when it flowed into a huge bay
of the sea, which reached up to London, and when the site of the great city was
occupied by an oyster bed.* At that period vast swamps extended to the eastward,
almost shut off from the sea by a half- submerged littoral ridge, upon which, even
during post-tertiary ages, the bodies of huge animals floated down by the river
were stranded. The quantity of bones of rhinoceroses, mammoths, elephants, stags,
bisons, and other animals, which geologists have discovered in the marshes of
Ilford and elsewhere, is truly astonishing. At the present time the land once
more gains upon the sea, but this is due, in a large measure, to the work of man.
The sea-walls, perhaps commenced by the Romans, enclose an area of 33 square
miles, depressed between 3 and 7 feet below the level of high water.f
At Teddington Lock, at an elevation of 21 feet above the level of the sea, the
Thames ceases to be an independent river. The tide flows up to that village, and
hence, perhaps, its name (Tide-end- ton :J:), but the river does not present the aspect
of an estuary until within a short distance of London, where muddy banks,
alternately covered and uncovered by the tide, are first met with. Even within
the limits of the metropolis the river frequently overflows its banks, and the
low-lying quarters to the south of it have more than once been invaded by its
floods. Yet in the basin of the Thames floods ought to be amongst the most
exceptional occurrences. § The rainfall is pretty regularly distributed through-
out the year ; there are no high mountain ranges bounding the basin ; the hills
within it are for the most part of gentle contours ; and the rain runs down slowly
from them into the river channels. As already remarked, the principal source,
near Cirencester, rises at an elevation of only 376 feet, but virtually its surface is
about 30 feet lower, owing to its water being pumped into the summit " pound "
of the Thames and Severn Canal. But, besides this, more than one-half of the
basin of the Thames is composed of permeable rocks, which allow the water to
percolate into the bowels of the earth, instead of rapidly flowing down the hill-
slopes. The contrast between permeable and impermeable rocks strikes even the
superficial observer, permeable soil being planted with corn, whilst that which
retains the water is laid out in meadows. In the permeable district between
Nuneham and Maidenhead no tributary of any size enters the main river, and yet
it grows almost visibly with every one of its bends, owing to the numerous
perennial springs which rise on its banks. A regime such as this acts as a natural
♦ Hugh Miller, " Summer Rjimble among the Hebrides."
t Redman, Institution of Civil Engineers, 1877.
X Huxley, "Physiography."
§ Volume of ihe Tiiames at Teddington Lock : —
A verage discharge, per second 1,300 cubic feet.
Maximum ,. ,, ..... 1,770 „
Minimum ,, ,, 700 ,,
Area of the basin above Teddington Lock , . . 4,590 square miles.
Rainfall within the basin . 26 inches.
Surface drainage ........ 4
THE BASIN OF THE THAMES.
149
regulator upon the volume of the river, for whilst the rain which falls upon
impermeable rocks is quickly carried off, that which percolates through permeable
soil is stored up for months before it finds its way into the river. Curiously enough,
the labour of man has been expended to interfere with the natural discharge of the
river, and the Thames, which is by nature most inoffensive, has become a source
of danger and annoyance to the people who dwell along its banks. The locks,
which to the number of thirty-three, interfere with the natural discharge of the
river between Oxford and Teddington, are for the most part under the control of
millers, whose interests run counter to those of navigation and of the inhabitants
generally. They have reduced as far as possible the number of locks required for
raising the barges from one level to the other, and they take care to maintain the
level of the river at its highest, so as to secure ample motive power, quite regard-
less of the fact that by doing so they expose the riverine regions to disastrou.s
Fig. 81. — Old London Bridgk.
inundations. The channel of the river being thus for the most part bank-full, is
incapable of receiving the surplus water resulting from exceptional rains, and floods
are the natural consequence. But what matters this to the millers, who appear to
be guided by the axiom that " one man's loss is another man's gain ?"
But whilst the normal regime of the Upper Thames is being interfered with by
locks, the channel exposed to the action of the tide was, until recently, quite as
much encumbered by old-fashioned bridges. Old London Bridge, owing to its
contracted arches, proved a formidable impediment to the free passage of the tide. At
low water, on account of the obstacle it presented to the returning tide, there was a
fall here of about 5 feet. Since the reconstruction of this bridge a greatly increased
body of tidal water flows up and down the river, and as it meets with no obstruc-
tion, it flows with a decidedly greater velocity. The eflect of this is to scour and
deepen the channel ; shores formerly foul and muddy have become clean shingle
and gravel ; the time of high water is an hour in advance of what it was at
15Q • THE BRITISH ISLES.
the close of the fourteenth century ; and the tide rises a foot higher than it did
formerly.*
Of the tributaries of the Thames, the Thame, Kennet, Wey, Lea, Rodmg, and
Darent alone are navigable, for the Medway, which falls into its estuary, is, pro-
Yig, 82. — The Entrance to the Thames.
From an Admiralty Chart. Scale 1 : 384,000.
K i: S '!
iic'i/ne^' 1'., . / <" 2 r
^
5 Miles.
perly speaking, an independent river ; and the same remark applies to the Chelmer,
Colne, and Stour, which fall into the mouth of the Thames, using that term in
its most extended sense, at various points on the Sussex coast. The Nore light-
ship, which lies off Sheerness, where the river is 6 miles wide, marks the
commonly reputed mouth of the Thames, but legally the Port of London is
* Redman, Institution of Civil Engineers.
THE BASIN OF THE THAMES.
151
bounded by a line drawn from the North Foreland through the Gunfleet beacon
to Harwich Naze.
The littoral region which bounds the estuary of the Thames to the north and
south has undergone frequent changes during the historical epoch. The sea
gains almost incessantly upon the coasts of Suffolk and Norfolk, advancing at a
speed of 6 to 15 feet annually. Towns have been compelled to retreat inland,
and the old church of Eccles-by-the-Sea is now buried beneath sand piled up
by the waves.* Elsewhere changes of an opposite kind have taken place.
Estuaries have become silted up, and ancient seaport towns reduced into agri-
cultural villages. Beccles, which had a much -frequented port in the fourteenth
century, now lies 8 miles inland, and the trade which formerly was its own is
Fig. 83.- The Isle of Thanet.
Scale 1 : 206.000.
Dep^^h beyond
6Pa ■
'athoras.
1 Mile.
carried on now by the modern town of Lowestoft. f Changes of even greater impor-
tance have taken place along the coast of Kent, where the geographical features of
the country have undergone radical alterations since the time of the Romans. The
ancient church of the Reculvers, which may be seen on a low cliff to the west
of Margate, bears witness to the erosive action prejdng upon the coast, for the
Roman city of Regulbm, which subsequently became the capital of a Saxon
kingdom, stood at a considerable distance from the sea. The waves have gnawed
the coast, the Roman wall which surrounded the city has for the most part been
destroyed, and in order to protect the church, which serves as a landmark to
mariners, from a similar fate, the Admiralty has been obliged to construct a sea-
* A. Ramsay, " Physical Geology and Geography of Great Britain."
t Rogers ; 0. Peschel, '* Neue Probleme der vergleichenden Erdkunde."
152
THE BEITISH ISLES.
wall. But whilst tlie sea encroached at that spot upon the coast, the land else-
where has gained in extent. The strait which anciently separated the Isle of
Thanet from the mainland of Kent has been silted up, the old island converted
into a peninsula, and the river Stour now traverses the site of the old Wantsome,
or sea-passage, through which foreign ships sometimes passed on their way to
London. This gain at the north-eastern corner of the county of Kent, however,
is but small if compared with the loss sustained along the east shore towards the
Fig. 84. — Goodwin Sands.
Scale 1 : 175,000.
E.of G.
5 to 13
Fathoms.
Over 13
Fathoms.
close of the eleventh century, in consequence of a terrible hurricane, which also
ravaged the coasts of Flanders and Holland, That storm, we are told, caused
the vast estates of Earl Godwin to be swallowed up by the sea, their site
being marked now by a crescent-shaped bank of sand, which lies about 5 miles
off Deal, and turns its convex side towards the open sea. Mariners dread these
sands, for shipwrecks are frequent. The " great storm " of 1703, when four
men-of-war, with 1,190 souls on board, were lost in a single night, and the
OXFORDSHIRE. I53
neighbouring coast was covered with the wreckage of merchantmen, will long
live in the memory of British sailors. Two attempts have been made to build
a lighthouse upon this dreaded bank, but the work of man was incapable of
resisting the power of the waves, and mariners must rest content with light-
ships and buoys, which mark its contour. The roadstead between the Goodwin
Sands and Deal is known as the Downs. It affords shelter to vessels during
storms, and as many as five hundred have been waiting here for favourable weather
to continue their voyage down Channel or to the north.
The ten counties lying wholly or for the greater part in the basin of the
Thames are almost exclusively agricultural. Neither coal nor iron, which might
have given rise to a manufacturing industry similar to that of the north, is
found. Yet London, which has gathered within its boundaries more than half
the population of the whole basin, and a few other towns of less note, are indis-
putably seats of industry ; and the metropolis, thanks to its noble river,
its densely packed population, and its command of capital, will always be able
to maintain its pre-eminence as " universi orbis terrarum emporium." Fishing
adds to the resources of the counties bordering upon the German Ocean.
Topography.
Eastern Gloucestershire and North-eastern Wiltshire are within the basin of
the Thames, but their principal towns having already been described (see pp. 1 1 7,
136), we at once pass to a consideration of Oxfordshire.
Oxfordshire lies to the north of the Thames, between Gloucestershire and
Buckinghamshire, and consists of level or slightly undulating land, for the most
part under tillage. The northern portion of the county is occupied by the Edge
Hills, a continuation of the oolitic Cotswolds, presenting a bold escarpment
towards the vale of the Avon. These uplands give rise to the Windrush,
Evenlode, and Cherwell, which flow to the Thames. At Oxford the latter river
abruptly turns to the south, and passes through a gap at the foot of the Chiltern
Hills, which occupy the south-eastern corner of the county. Agriculture and
dairy husbandry are the principal sources of wealth, barley for malting and butter
being amongst the most important products. The manufactures are unimportant ;
but if the coal underlying the oolite, and reached by a boring made at Burford,
should one day be worked, Oxfordshire may be transformed from a purely agri-
cultural region into a land of manufactures.
Oxford, in many of its buildings, still presents the features of a mediaBval city.
It almost looks as if Time had not touched it for four or five centuries. Its monuments
of the past, however, have not become ruins, for they are maintained with religious
care, and present the appearance of only having recently left the hands of the
architect. Still the limestone of which most of them have been constructed
shows marks of decay, and many a column originally decorated with elaborate
carvings has become an unshapely mass of stone. This decay, however, has nowhere
degenerated into ruin, and numerous finely carved facades, with ivy clinging to their
lor— E
154 THE BRITISH ISLES.
projections, may still be seen. Broad lawns surround the old towers and gabled
buildings with pointed windows, fountains send forth jets of sparkling water
in the centre of the courts, statues decorate the streets and open places. The city-
walls, dating back to the eleventh century, can still be traced through almost the
whole of their course ; but the remains of the castle are reduced to a solitary
tower, the Norman buildings which occupy its site being of modern date. From
the banks of the Cherwell or Thames, where the rowing clubs engage in their
trials of strength, the domes, spires, and stately towers of colleges and churches,
rising behind masses of dense foliage, form a picture of incomparable beauty.
The panorama to be enjoyed from the roof of Eadcliffe Library is unique of its
kind, for we look down upon what appear to be the palaces, monasteries, and
churches of a mediaeval city. Each of the twenty-five colleges and halls which
cluster in this seat of learning leads a life of its own, whether it be University
College, whose foundation dates back to 1264, or Keble College, only opened in
1870. Each has its special history, and boasts of the possession of ancient charters,
precious works of art, valued libraries, or other treasures. The buildings occupied
by several of the colleges are remarkable as works of architecture, foremost in this
respect being Christ Church, which boasts the noblest hall, and has attached to it
the cathedral church of Oxford. Each college glories in the men of mark whose
names appear upon its roll of members. Oxford, more than any other town of
equal size, has shaped the common destinies of the nation, and many men, illus-
trious as statesmen or in the history of art and science, have been trained there.
Yet the power of the ancient university has in most instances been exercised in
resisting the march of progress. Not a stone can fall at Oxford but is religiously
replaced by another of exactly the same shape. Similarly there exists not an
ancient idea or a custom of the olden time which the learned dons, in the retire-
ment of their time-blackened colleges, do not seek to perpetuate through their
influence and erudition. Although Wickliffe was one of the professors at Oxford,
the university offered a most powerful resistance to the spread of Protestantism in
England, and the learned Cranmer, Ridley, and Latimer were burnt to death in
front of one of the colleges, that of Balliol, in the reign of Queen Mary. At the
time of the Revolution Oxford took the side of the Royalists, and it was within its
walls that Charles I. established his head-quarters during the war. Since that time
Oxford has taken a pride in being looked upon as the stronghold of Conservatism.
Of late, however, its traditions have received a rude shock. Some of its professors
and students are being carried along by a current of new ideas, and Oxford may
now be said to send forth champions who ably represent the most extreme views
of either side. Nor is there another town where, thanks to the labours of the
past, arguments in favour of the most opposite views can so readily be commanded ;
for nowhere else, not even in London, are similar facilities for study concentrated
within so small an area. Laboratories, libraries, and scientific collfections are
attached to every college, and, in addition to these, there are the ever-increasing
collections of the university. The new Natural-History Museum— it was only
built 1855-60 — is rapidly growing into importance. The ''Taylor Buildings''
OXFORDSHIRE.
155
contain the university library, whilst the adjoining " Galleries " afford accommo-
dation to the famous Pomfret marbles and a collection of paintings and drawings,
most precious amongst which are 162 original designs by Raphael and 79 by
Michael Angelo. Radcliffe Library, named after its founder, the physician of
"William III., to whom the university is likewise indebted for its observatory,
occupies a handsome rotunda, surmounted by a dome rising from an octagonal base.
Fig. 85. — The Environs of Oxi*^ord.
Scale 1 : 250.000
3 Miles.
The buildings known as the "Schools," which were once used for lectures, in
which a suite of rooms is set apart for public examinations, are now mainly occu-
pied by the famous Bodleian Library, thus named after its founder, Dr. Bodley,
who died in 1612. This collection, one of the largest in the world, for it contains
400,000 printed volumes and 25,000 MSS., is more especially rich in oriental
literature, and possesses the MSS, collected by Dr. Clarke on Mount Athos. It is
entitled to a copy of every work printed in England ; but, like other collections in
156 THE BEITISH ISLES.
Oxford, it profits by the donations which accrue to it through wealthy graduates,
who keep their alma mater in fond remembrance. Jointly the various libraries of
Oxford contain more than a million volumes, or nearly as many as the British
Museum ; but it is matter for regret that these treasures should be available only
to members of the university and foreigners whose studies compel them to do
homage in this sanctuary of science. During vacations the libraries are almost
completely deserted. It is at such a time that the fact of Oxford's native insignifi-
cance is most strikingly brought home to us. Without its two thousand under-
graduates and the herd of hangers-on who minister to their wants, the town would
resemble a desert, and grass would grow in its streets.
The environs of Oxford abound in pretty villages and interesting localities.
At Cuddesdon, 5 miles to the south-east, are the Bishop's Palace and an ecclesias-
tical Training College. Nuneham Courtney, the seat of the Harcourts, occupies a
wooded height overlooking the river 5 miles to the south of Oxford, its park of
1,200 acres abounding in fine trees. Woodstock, 8 miles to the north-north-west,
is an early residence of the Kings of England, where Henry II. made the bower
for his fair Hosamond. Not a trace remains of the old palace. Blenheim Park,
which was presented to the Duke of Marlborough in recognition of his famous
victory of 1704, adjoins the town. Its mansion contains a valuable collection of
paintings, whilst the beautifully diversified park abounds in old oaks and cedars,
and is stocked with deer and kangaroos. Woodstock is known for its gloves ;
whilst Witney, an ancient town 6 miles to the south-west of it, on the Windrush,
enjoys some reputation for its blankets. Burford, higher up on the Windrush,
is an old market town, with an interesting church ; whilst Bampton-in-the-Bush, in
the south-west, has the remains of a castle. Spelshury, on the Upper Evenlode,
was the birthplace of Sir John Franklin, the arctic navigator, in whose honour
a monument has been placed in front of the town-hall. Chipping Norton is
a quiet market town, near the western border of the county. The neighbour-
ing village of Churchill was the birthplace of William Smith, the father of modern
geology, who thus passed his childhood at the foot of those oolitic hills which are
so rich in the fossils which subsequently he studied to such great advantage.
Ascending the Cherwell for 25 miles above Oxford, we reach Banbury, a clean
old town, with quaint houses and the remains of a Roman amphitheatre
known as the " Bear Hing." Banbury is famed in the w^orld of gastronomy for its
cakes, cream cheese, and ale. The battle of Edgehill, in which Charles I. was
defeated by the Parliamentary forces under the Earl of Essex, was fought 7 miles
to the north of it. Bicester and Thame, both towards the Bucks frontier — the
one to the east of the Cherwell, the other on the navigable Thame — are prosperous
market towns. Bicester, moreover, is noted for its ale. Near it, on Akeman
Street, are the ruins of the Roman city of ^lia Castra, or Alcester.
Descending the river below Oxford, we reach Dorchester, at the mouth of the
* There are 53 University professors and teachers, 385 Fellows of Colleges, and nearly 2,000 under-
graduates. The University has an income from external sources of £15,000. the Colleges and Halls of
£307,000. The 439 benefices in the gift of the latter have an annual value of £187.660. Out of this
income £132,000 is paid to heads and fellows of colleges, £26,000 to scholars and exhibitioners.
BERKSHIRE. I57
Thame, which was the seat of a bishopric from the seventh to the eleventh
century, but is now a place of no importance. Keeping the Chiltern Hills on our
left, we pass from the upper into the lower basin of the Thames, and reach Henley,
delightfully situated on a gentle declivity, amid hills covered with beech woods.
A handsome stone bridge here spans the river. Henley is the head-quarters of
aquatic sports on the Upper Thames.
Berkshire lies to the south of the Thames, which separates it from Oxfordshire
and Buckinghamshire. Its surface is beautifully diversified. The rivers Ock and
Kennet intersect the county from west to east. The vale of the Ock, known also
as that of the White Horse, from a gigantic figure of a horse rudely carved on an
overhanging escarpment of chalk, is the most fruitful district of the county. A
range of chalk downs separates this valley from that of the " Kennet swift, for
silver eels renowned." Here the soil is less productive, being for the most part
gravelly, and a good deal of peat is found. The eastern part of the county,
beyond the river Loddon, contains Windsor Forest and Bagshot Heath, and is
characterized by its woods and forests. Berks enjoys a considerable reputation as
a dairying and grazing county, the former being most successfully practised in the
western part of the vale of the White Horse. Most of the cheese made is of the
description called double Gloucester.
Faringdon, an old residence of the Saxon kings, occupies a sheltered position near
the head of the river Ock, the hill above it commanding a fine view of the valley
of the Thames and of the Berkshire Downs, White Horse Hill, with its gigantic
steed, forming a conspicuous object. Wantage, on a branch of the Ock, and at the
foot of the downs, is celebrated as the birthplace of Alfred the Great. AshdoM^n,
to the south, where the Saxon king defeated the Danes, is covered with numerous
earthworks. Though situated within a purely agricultural district, Wantage
enjoys some reputation on account of its grammar school. It also boasts a fine
church of the fourteenth century, and feels some pride, too, in having given birth
to Bishop Butler, the author of the '' Analogy." Abingdon, at the union of
the Ock with the Thames, here joined by the Berks and Wilts Canal, which
brings the town into communication with Bath and Bristol, carries on a brisk
trade in corn and malt. Of the old abbey, founded m the seventh century, there
now exist only insignificant remains. The churches and public buildings are
deserving of attention. The pretty village of Sunningivell lies within a couple
of miles of the town. From the tower of its old church Eoger Bacon is said
to have made his astronomical observations. Culham College, for the training of
schoolmasters, lies on the other side of the Thames, in Oxfordshire.
Lamhourn and Ikley are the principal market-towns in the Berkshire Downs,
which at the ancient municipal borough of Wallingford approach close to the
Thames.
The Kennet, on first entering the county from Wiltshire, waters the old town
of Hungerford, a favourite resort of the angler, the river being famous for its
trout, and the fisheries yielding a handsome revenue to the corporation. The
Kennet and Avon Canal passes the town. It affords the most direct line of
J5Q THE BEITISH ISLES.
communication by water between London and Bristol, and many of the bulky
articles of commerce pass along it. Newhury, lower down the Kennet, is built on
a peat bed. Battles took place near it, in 1643 and 1644, during the Cml War.
In the neighbourhood are Donnington Castle and Shaw House— the latter, not-
withstanding the injury it suffered during the war, the most stately Elizabethan
mansion in the county.
Reading, a flourishing commercial town, stands on the river Kennet, 1 mile
Fig. 86.— Reading.
From the Ordnance Survey. Scale 1 : 6.S,366.
above its junction with the Thames It is a place of considerable historical fame,
battles having been fought in its neighbourhood, and Parliaments held within its
walls. But the only object likely to interest the antiquary is the remains of a
Benedictine abbey founded in 1121, and converted by Henry VIII. into a royal
palace. At the present day Reading is known chiefly on account of its biscuit
factory, which dispatches train-loads of them daily to every quarter of the
globe. There does not probably exist an article of food more widely dispersed
BEEKSHIEE.
159
than Reading biscuits, for they are eaten everywhere, from Alaska to New
Zealand, and from Greenland to the Cape of Good Hope. Reading also exports
seeds for flowers, and has an iron foundry.
Below the " Town of Biscuits " the Loddon, born in the North Downs, not
far from Basingstoke, mingles its water with that of the Thames. The country
Fig. 87. — Windsor.
Scale 1 : 55,000.
0'34'
1 Mile.
beyond that river is to a great extent covered with woods. Wokingham, formerly
known as Oakingham, lies on the verge of the ancient royal forest, and up to
1821 was noted for bull-baiting. Near it are Wellington College, for the educa-
tion of officers' sons, and the Royal Military College of Sandhurst, both on the
road to the camp of Aldershot (see p. 141).
IgO THE BRITISH ISLES.
The Thames, between Reading and Windsor, passes through some of the most
lovely scenery to be met with in England. Princely mansions are numerous in
this favoured region, most prominent amongst them being Cliefden, the seat of
the Duke of Westminster, opposite the charming village of Cookham, on the
Buckinghamshire bank of the river. Maidenhead, the centre of this attractive
district, is more especially noted for the beauty of the surrounding scenery. Near
it stands the church of Brayy known through its versatile vicar, who, true to his
principle, '' to live and die the Vicar of Bray," never hesitated to change his
religion.
After winding through the verdant plain below Maidenhead, the Thames
strikes the foot of a scarped hill crowned by Windsor Castle, the only sumptuous
palace of the sovereign of England, and one of the most extensive and picturesque
piles of buildings in the world. The all- surmounting Round Tower, or Keep ; the
pinnacles of the beautiful St. George's Chapel showing above the walls ; the crenel-
lated towers of unequal height, which break the monotony of the enceinte ; luxuriant
trees hiding the foot of the walls and clothing the slopes of the hill down to the
banks of the river ; and last, not least, the town nestling beneath the innumerable
gables and towers of the castle — all these make up a most charming picture. This
is indeed the residence, not of one sovereign, but of a whole line of kings, who
from century to century employed their wealth in the embellishment of the home
of their ancestors. William the Conqueror was the first to raise a fortress on this
spot. Edward III., who here founded the Order of the Garter in 1349, almost
entirely reconstructed it, and since his time nearly every sovereign has added to
this pile of buildings. The castle consists of two great divisions, the Lower
and the Upper Ward, separated by the Round Tower, formerly a place of
confinement for prisoners of state. Several portions of the palace are exquisite
specimens of architecture, St. George's Chapel being most notable in this respect.
It is one of the finest existing examples of the perpendicular style, most richly
decorated, and not unworthy of being the burial-place of seven Kings of England.
The entire castle forms a vast museum, abounding in pictures, statues, tapestry,
and works of art of every kind, presented to or purchased by its royal occupants.
In the state apartments we find ourselves surrounded by precious works of art,
tastefully displayed to the best advantage. One room contains an unrivalled
collection of twenty-two portraits by Vandyck ; another is devoted to works by
Rubens. The Waterloo Chamber is decorated with portraits, mostly painted by
Sir Thomas Lawrence, of the chief persons who bore a prominent part in the
Congress of Vienna. The collection of drawings by ancient masters is perhaps the
richest in the world, and the library contains many works of inestimable value.
It would be difficult to discover a more cheerful place for study, for the wide bow
windows, suspended as it were above the terrace walks, look out upon one of the
most charming landscapes of England, with the Thames pursuing its devious course
through verdant meadows.
Looking across the river, we perceive the clock tower, chapel, and other
buildings of Eton College. The village of Eton is in Buckinghamshire, joined to
BUCKINGHAMSHIRE. 161
Windsor by an iron bridge, and virtually a suburb of it. At this school the
flower of the English nobility and gentry are educated, and its muster-roll of
eminent scholars is worthy of the position it has attained. The college was
founded in 1440 by Henry YI. for the support of twenty-five poor grammar
scholars, and the like number of poor men, who were to pray for the King. In
the course of time, however, it has grown into the most aristocratic school of
England.*
The delights of the environs of Windsor have inspired the muse of England's
poets since the days of Shakspere. Historical associations abound. It was not
far from Windsor, at Eunnymead, that King John was forced, in 1215, to sign the
Charter, which for ever limited the royal prerogatives. The large park which
adjoins the castle abounds in delightful walks and drives through forest scenery,
and is stocked with herds of deer. The " Long Walk," an avenue of noble elms,
3 miles in length, traverses it, and terminates on Snow Hill, which is sur-
mounted by Westmacott's equestrian statue of George III. Three miles farther
is a much-admired artificial lake, known as Virginia Water. The famous race-
course of Ascot adjoins this park on the south. Frogmore House and the
magnificently decorated mausoleum of the Prince Consort are in the Home Park,
to the east of the castle. Manor Lodge, in the Great Park, has recently been
converted into a manufactory of tapestry, directed by French workmen.
Buckinghamshire, which derives its name from the beeches abounding in its
woods, forms a narrow slip of land, extending from the Thames northward into
the basin of the Ouse. The chalky downs of the Chiltern range cross the southern
part of the county, and separate the beautifully diversified tract of country
bordering upon the Thames from the fruitful vale of Aylesbury. This vale, noted
for its dairy farms, is drained by the river Thame, and bounded on the north by a
range of sandy hills, beyond which lies that part of the county which is drained by
the Ouse and its tributaries. Agriculture, dairy-farming, and the raising of
poultry are the principal -occupations of the people, in addition to which the manu-
facture of pillow lace, paper, straw plait, boots, and wooden chairs is carried on.
Great Marlow, the principal town on the Thames, is here spanned by a suspen-
sion bridge. A few miles to the north of it, in a delightful valley of the Chiltern
Hills, surrounded by villas and shrubberies, lies High or Chipping Wycombe,
one of the leading manufacturing towns of the county, producing paper, wooden
(Windsor) chairs, pillow lace, parchment, and plaited straw. It has the finest and
largest church in Buckinghamshire. Two miles to the north of it is Hughenden,
the residence of the Earl of Beaconsfield, whose title is derived from the neighbour-
ing market town of Beaconsfield, a place of some trade : Burke and Waller the
poet are buried there.
The Thames between Great Marlow and Windsor is studded Mdth villas and
mansions, most prominent amongst them being princely Cliefden, already men-
tioned, and Dropmore, whose delightful grounds abound in exotic pine-trees,
* At present there are 70 foundation or King's Scholars (Collegers) admitted after a competitive
examination, who are lodged and boarded in the college, and 880 " Oppidans."
162 THE BRITISH ISLES.
unequalled in size. Slough, a growing town close to Eton, has brick-yards and
nursery grounds, but is more widely known as tbe place where Sir William
Herschel resided for forty years. Here he constructed his forty-foot telescope,
and here he died in 1822. Stoke Poges, a pretty village, is close by. It is the
burial-place of Gray, the poet, and the scene of his " Elegy." In a neighbouring
park a colossal monument has been raised to Sir Edwin Coke, Lord Chief Justice
of England. Amersham, a small municipal borough in the valley of the Misbourne,
amidst wooded hills, manufactures wooden chairs and straw plait. Near it are
Chesham, in the fertile valley of the Chess, a famous trout stream, with its paper-
mills, and the village of Chalfont St. Giles, where stands the house in which
Milton wrote " Paradise Regained."
Crossing the Chiltern Hills, we reach Aylesbury, on an eminence looking down
upon its fertile vale, the county town, where the assizes and quarter sessions are
held. It carries on a large business in preserved milk, butter, and straw plait,
and sends ducklings and turkeys to London in enormous numbers. Wendover
and Prince's Rishorough lie at the northern foot of the Chiltern Hills. The first
named manufactures pillow lace, straw plait, and coaches ; the latter is a flourish-
ing market town. Hampden House, the home of John Hampden the patriot, Hes
near it. Brill, on the border of Oxfordshire, had formerly a royal palace, and
King Henry II. and Henry III. kept their courts there. A mineral spring rises
near it.
The northern portion of the county is traversed by the Ouse, and nearly all
its towns are seated upon that river. Chief amongst these is Buckingham, the
former county town. It is an old place, but with few remains of antiquity,
having suffered greatly from a fire in 1724. In its neighbourhood is Stowe, the
princely seat of the Duke of Buckingham. The Ouse, in its onward course, flows
past Stony- Stratford, Wolverton, Newport Pagnel, and Olney. Pillow lace is made
in all these places. At Wolverton there are extensive railway-engine shops;
Newport Pagnel has breweries and paper-mills ; and at Olney the poet Cowper
spent most of his days. Fenny -Stratford is the principal place in the valley of the
Ousel, which joins the Ouse at Newport Pagnel. It occupies the site of Magio-
vinium, and is traversed by Watling Street. Winslow is the principal town on the
road from Buckingham to Aylesbury.
Hertfordshire lies almost wholly within the area occupied by the chalky
upland extending eastward from the Chiltern Hills. In the north-west this
range forms a steep escarpment towards the plain of Bedford, whilst in the
opposite direction it slopes gently down to the low counties of Middlesex and Essex.
The principal rivers are the Colne and the Lea, both flowing into the Thames. A
small portion of the county, along its north-western border, is drained by the Ivel,
which is tributary to the Ouse. Agriculture is the leading occupation.
St. Albans, the principal town in the basin of the Colne, stands on rising
ground on the left bank of the Yer, or Mure, which is the main upper branch of
that river. For its historical associations it is the most interesting town in the
vicinity of London. Of the Roman town of Verulamium, or Verulam, from which
HERTFOEDSHIEE.
163
Lord Bacon derived his title, there remain now only insignificant vestiges, though
at one time it was the most populous Roman town in the south of England. Its
chief interest now centres in the church of an abbey founded in 793 by Offa, King
of the Mercians, in expiation of the share he took in the murder of Ethelbert. The
abbey was dedicated to St. Alban, the protomartyr of England, who was executed
here in 303 for having sheltered a Christian priest. The abbey church, recently
restored, is the largest and one of the grandest edifices of the kind in England, and
its oldest portions date back to the eleventh century. ' In 1875 St. Albans became
the seat of a bishopric. Gorhamhury, the seat of the Earl of Yerulam, which
was purchased in 1550 by the father of the great Chancellor, stands near the town,
in the midst of a fine park.
Watford, on the Colne, consists of a long street, and carries on the manufacture
of paper. Near it is Cassiohury, the seat of the Earl of Essex, with a valuable
library, an interesting collection of portraits, and one of the finest parks in
England. Ascending the valley of the Gade, along which the Grand Junction
Canal takes its course, we reach the market towns of Hemel-Hempstead, Berkham-
sted, and Tring, the latter at an elevation of 420 feet above the level of the sea.
Malting and the manufacture of straw plait and of chairs are carried on at these
places. Berkhamsted was the birthplace of Cowper, the poet. Bickmansworth,
near the junction of the Chess with the Colne, has important paper-mills. Straw-
plaiting and horsehair weaving are among the domestic occupations, and water-
cress is largely grown for the London market.
Hatfield is the first town washed by the river Lea in its course through the
county. It is a quiet, old-fashioned place, with a church of Norman foundation,
overshadowed by the magnificent Jacobean mansion of the Marquis of Salisbury.
The surrounding park abounds in noble trees, and a carefully kept vineyard is
amongst its curiosities. Hertford, the county town, on the Lea, carries on a
brisk trade in corn and malt. It has the remains of an old castle and a branch
school of Christ's Hospital. Near it is Panshanger, the seat of Earl Cowper,
with a valuable collection of paintings, more especially rich in examples of the
Florentine school. Ware, also on the Lea, is the largest malting town in England,
and malt-houses form its most conspicuous feature. In its southward course the
Lea flows past Hoddesdon, Broxbourne, Cheshunt, and Waltham Cross, beyond
which latter it enters the county of Middlesex. Broxbourne and Rye House, near
Hoddesdon, are the best fishing stations on the river. Rye House is a favourite
goal of London excursionists. It was the scene of the plot of 1683 for setting
aside the succession of the Duke of York. Cheshunt is a straggling village, with
extensive nurseries, and here the New River Company has a reservoir which stores
75,000,000 gallons of water.
Bishop Stortford, on the Stort, an affluent of the Lea, and close to the eastern
border of the county, has malting-houses, breweries, and tan-yards. Chipping or
High Barnet, in a commanding position to the west of the Lea, is noteworthy on
account of a battle fought there in 1471, which cost Warwick the King-maker his
life. An obelisk marks the site of this memorable event.
164 THE BRITISH ISLES.
Hitchin and Baldock are the only towns in that part of the county which slopes
down to the Ouse. The former is important as a corn market, and engages in the
manufacture of straw plait ; the latter boasts a church founded by the Templars in
the thirteenth century.
Middlesex takes its name from those Saxons who settled in this " middle '*
district. Though one of the smallest counties in England, it exceeds in population
all others, for within its limits lies the chief part of the metropolis. By the side
of London all other towns of the county dwindle into insignificance, nine-tenths of
its population being embraced within the limits of the metropolis. The Thames
divides Middlesex from Surrey, the Colne separates it from Buckinghamshire, the
Lea forms its eastern boundary towards Essex, whilst the Brent intersects its centre.
A range of chalk downs runs along the northern border, but the greater part of
the surface consists of gravel, loam, or clay, and is diversified by hills and gentle
undulations, which form a screen to the north of London, attaining its greatest
elevation (440 feet) in Hampstead Heath. By far the largest portion of the
county is in grass, the meadows along the Lea being particularly rich. Along the
Thames much land is occupied by market gardens and nurseries.
Staines, on the left bank of the Thames, at its confluence with the Colne, marks
the extreme extent of the jurisdiction of the conservators of the Thames, the
boundary-stone bearing the date of 1280. This stone stands 36| miles above London
Bridge. Descending past the villages of Laleham, Ohertsey, Shepperton, Walton,
and Sunbury, we enter a portion of its valley famed for its sylvan scenery. Below
the village oi Hampton, where Garrick had his country seat till his death in 1779, and
which is the head-quarters of the Thames Angling Preservation Society, the gardens
of Hampton Court extend close to the river bank. This palace, built by Cardinal
Wolsey, who was compelled to surrender it to his master, Henry YIII., is at
present appropriated as a place of residence for court pensioners. A considerable
portion of the palace is, however, set apart as a picture gallery and museum.
Besides a good many paintings of inferior value, there are displayed here some
undoubted masterpieces. Most prominent amongst these are the portraits by
Velasquez, Holbein, Titian, Yandyck, Gainsborough, aiid Lawrence. The fine
gardens are laid out in the manner of those of Versailles, but cannot compare with
them in the magnificence of their perspectives. Bushey Park, with its unrivalled
triple avenue of limes and horse-chestnuts, over a mile long, lies to the north of
Hampton Court. Passing through this park, we arrive at Teddington, at the head
of the tide, and virtually one of the suburbs of the great city, though not embraced
within its boundaries. Thence onward country seats, in the midst of grounds
famous for the beauty of their trees, become numerous. Twickenham, opposite Eel
Pie Island, a famous resort of Thames anglers and picnic parties, is especially
favoured in this respect. Strawberry Hill, the castellated mansion built by
Horace Walpole in 1747, lies above this delightful village ; Orleans House, from
1852 — 71 the residence of the Due d'Aumale, but at present the home of an aristo-
cratic club, below it. Near the latter stood Pope's famous villa. Passing Isle-
worthy near which stands Sion House, the residence of the Duke of Northumber-
Scale, 1:370,000
LONDON ANDTHE
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LONDON. 165
land, on the site of an ancient monastery, we reacli Brentford^ at the mouth of the
Brent, an important river port, with saw-mills, malt-houses, breweries, chemical
works, and soap factories. Kew, with its famous botanical gardens, lies on the
Surrey side of the river. Chistvick is noted for the nursery gardens of the Royal
Horticultural Society, the palladian villa of the Duke of Devonshire, in which
Charles James Fox died in 1806, and George Canning in 1827, and the tomb of
William Hogarth, in the parish church. The house in which Hogarth spent
his summers for many years is now let in tenements. Fulham, with its ancient
church and an episcopal palace, the summer residence of the Bishop of London,
lies within the precincts of the metropolis.
A chaplet of ever- increasing suburbs, extending from the Thames to the Lea,
encircles London towards the west and north. They include Ealing; Acton; Hamp-
stead, with its breezy heath ; Ilighgate, affording the best view of the metropolis ;
Hornsey, which still retains some of its primitive features, and near which, on
Muswell Hill, has been raised the gigantic structure of the Alexandra Palace ;
Tottenham ; and Edmonton, the latter in the flat and clayey country bordering upon
the Lea. At Colney Hatch, to the north of Hornsey, is one of the lunatic asylums
of the county of Middlesex, and still farther north, on the banks of the New
Eiver, formed by Sir Hugh Myddelton to supply London with water, and fed by
springs and chalk wells, there rises the straggling town of Enfield, interesting on
account of its Royal Small Arms Factory.
There still remain to be mentioned a few towns in the western portion of the
county. Of these Harrow-on-the-Hill is the most noteworthy. It is famous for
its church, rising on the summit of an isolated hill, commanding a most extensive
prospect, and its school, founded in 1571. At Hounslow, in the neighbourhood of
Brentford and the Thames, there are cavalry barracks and powder-mills. The
adjoining heath was formerly a favourite resort of highwaymen. Hamvell, on the
Brent, is known for its county lunatic asylum, which affords accommodation to
1,750 patients.
Uxhridge, an ancient borough, on the Colne, has important cattle fairs. In
1645 the commissioners of Charles I. and the Parliament met there to negotiate
a treaty for peace.
LONDON, the capital of England and metropolis of the British Empire, is the
most populous city in the world. It is probable that no other city ever existed
which could compare with it in the number of inhabitants. Neither Babylon nor
Memphis, nor any of the great cities of China, ever contained an equal number
within their walls ; and if Rome and Byzantium, the two metropolitan cities of
the ancient world, could have been united into one when they were at the height of
their prosperity, their population would nevertheless have been but small, compared
with the multitudes who have established themselves in the capital of England.*
♦ The most populous cities of the world, next to London, are— New York, with Brooklyn, &c.,
1,980,000 inhabitants; Paris, 1,8-51,792 inhabitants; Berlin, 1,085,000 inhabitants; Vienna, 1,001,999
inhabitants; Canton, Siang-tau, Singanfu, and Chang-chau-fu in China, with 1,000,000 inhabitants
each; Tientsin. 930,000 inhabitants; Calcutta (with Howrah), 992,000 inhabitants; and Philadelphia,
850,000 inhabitants.
166
THE BEITISH ISLES.
London has often been likened to a province covered with houses. If we hut
enter this labyrinth of streets, we feel as if steam-power alone were able to extri-
cate us. Even the hardiest pedestrian yields to fatigue when traversing this
interminable city. Street follows street, and the chance of obtaining a glimpse
of the horizon appears to be a remote one. Houses without end, factories, railway
stations, villas, gardens, and blind brick walls succeed each other in this huge hive
of humanity. Even in the midst of the fields or in the outlying parks we
feel that London still surrounds us, for on all sides the houses line the great
Fig. 88. — Annual Increase of Population in Thirty-one Cities op Europe.
According to Dunant.
highways which join the metropolis to its more remote suburbs. Starting
from the western extremity of the metropolis, we can walk successively through
Hammersmith, Chiswick, Brentford, Isleworth, and Twickenham without ever
leaving the houses behind us. A road, parallel to the former, connects Shepherd's
Bush with Acton and Ealing. The northern suburbs, Hampstead, Highgate,
Hornsey, Tottenham, and Edmonton, advance far into the open country like the
arms of a gigantic polype. Similarly, when travelling south or south-westward,
we reach Dulwich after we have passed through Brixton; then follow Sydenham,
Norwood, and Croydon, and though we extend our walk for a distance of 12 miles,
LONDON. 167
as far as Epsom, one group of houses succeeds the other, and only at intervals do
we catch a glimpse of what can truly be described as " country." Thousands are
born in London, live and die there, whose horizon has ever been bounded by bricks
and mortar. The only forests they have seen are the plantations in the public
squares, and the sky above them has ever been tarnished by the smoke ascending
from innumerable chimneys.
It is by no means easy to ascertain the real extent of London, and to settle
upon a boundary which may fairly claim to embrace the whole of it. Officially
there are no less than seventeen distinct Londons, each differing from the other in
area and delimitation. Every public department has traced boundaries and
subdivided the area included within them to suit its own convenience, and the
population of the metropolis differs to the extent of several hundred thousand
souls, according to whether we accept one or the other of these divisions, the most
extensive of all being the London of the Police authorities, which includes all
Middlesex, together with Kent and Surrey, within a circuit of 12 miles.*
The concentration of so great a multitude of human beings is explained by the
evident advantages of London's geographical position. The site which it occupies
has made it a great agricultural market, a place of transit for passengers and
merchandise, a fluvial and maritime port, and a city of commerce centrally situated
with reference to all parts of the world. It enjoys every possible advantage except
that of a serene sky.
London is, above all, the natural outlet of the rich valley of the Thames, the
most fertile of England, and that which is most accessible throughout the year.
The deep yet gentle river which drains that basin has from time immemorial
carried on its back the produce intended for the maritine emporium established
at the head of its estuary. No other town along the river could have taken
the place of London in this respect. Near it the last hills die away on either
side, and communication between the two banks is still easy. Lower down the
Thames winds between marshy banks, frequently flooded, and finally expands into
a wide gulf. Crossing the latter was sometimes attended with danger, and
frequently the dwellers on the Ijower Thames, desirous of crossing from shore to
shore, preferred to journey up to London in order that they might effect their
purpose with ease and safety. Its site presented peculiar facilities for the
establishment of ferries and the construction of bridges, in addition to which it
afforded considerable security against foreign aggression. Like Paris, it is pro-
tected by the winding reaches of its river, and this is a capital advantage in the
* Area and population of London within the under-mentioned limits : —
Parliamentary boroughs
Registrar-General's District .
District of the Illetropolitan Board of Work-
Postal Districts
School Board District ....
Metropolitan and City Police Districts .
In 1880 London within the Registrar- General's limits had a population of 3,680,000 souls.
Area.
Inhabitants.
Sq. Miles.
1861.
1871.
60
2,640,253
3,024,066
118
2,803,989
3,254,'260
122
2,808,862
3,266.987
452
2,967,956
3,536,129
—
—
3,265,005
687
3,222,720
3,883,092
168 THE BRITISH ISLES.
case of a town standing at the head of a wide estuary, open to the fleets of an
enemy. It proved to be so, at all events, when the Dutch under De Ruyter
were forced to retire baffled, after having produced a great panic, but done little
harm.
Even looked at merely with reference to the other parts of the island, London
enjoys a natural pre-eminence, which has become more conspicuous from century to
century in proportion as the means of inland communication have expanded. The
position of London relatively to the sea-coast and the continent of Europe
substantially enhances the sources of its prosperity. The configuration of the
estuary of the Thames is most happily adapted to the purposes of commerce.
Wider than the estuary of the Humber ; deeper, more secure, and less encumbered
with sand-banks than the bay of the Wash, the huge cavity filled by the mari- ,
time Thames is admirably fitted as a harbour of refuge for the vessels which
crowd the neighbouring seas. Moreover, this outer roadstead of London lies
near the south-eastern corner of England — that is to say, close to the strait which
joins the North Sea to the English Channel — and London in consequence has
become the great mart of the two opposing streams of commerce which pass
through this strait. Just as the two tidal currents, the one coming straight from the
Atlantic, the other wheeling round the northern extremity of the British Islands,
meet in this locality and produce a tide of double the ordinary height, so does the
maritime traffic of the Channel mingle with that of Northern Europe in the
port of London. Without this common centre of exchange neither would have
attained its present importance.
The position of London is equally favourable in relation to the more remote
parts of Europe and the other continents. As long as England was only feebly
peopled by four or five million inhabitants, whose energies were almost perpetually
being wasted in civil wars, London was unable to profit from the advantages
which it possessed as an international emporium. But no sooner had England made
up her mind to share in the wealth resulting from maritime enterprise than the
geographical superiority of the Thames as a port at once revealed itself. London
lies very nearly in the centre of the maritime regions of Europe, half-way between
the Strait of Gibraltar and the North Cape of Scandinavia, whilst at the same
time it occupies the centre of gravity of the great continental land masses. It is
the natural point of departure for vessels trading either with the two Americas or
the extreme East and the world of the Pacific. The great lines of navigation
converge upon it from every quarter of the globe. The Mayor of London who
ironically asked the King, who had threatened to remove the seat of his government,
whether the citizens would be permitted to keep the Thames, had an inkling of
the advantages London possessed as an international port long before they had
fully revealed themselves.
London was already a town of some importance during the dominion of the
Romans, for Tacitus refers to it as being famous for its commerce and the resort of
numerous strangers. During the Middle Ages London grew but slowly, and
its progress was repeatedly arrested by wars, commercial crises, and epidemics. Up
LONDON.
169
to'the beginning of the eighteenth century Paris equalled it in population, and had
no doubt surpassed it at various preceding epochs. But no sooner had England
gained a footing in India, which gave London a fresh source of wealth through its
commerce with the East, than the city on the Thames rapidly and definitely
passed ahead of its rival on the Seine. Its population of scarcely over half
a million souls in the beginning of the eighteenth century rose to nearly a million
in the course of the succeeding hundred years, and has quadrupled since. The
average normal increase, which during the preceding decade annually amounted
to 45,000 souls, exceeds at present 60,000. This increase is the same as if a village
of 170 inhabitants sprang daily from the ground, to be added to the existing
Fig. 89. — The Growth of London.
Scale 1 : 178,500.
2 MUes.
agglomeration of buildings and human beings. On an average a new house is
built every hour of the day or night, and added to the 500,000 existing houses
of the metropolis.* The absorption of the country by the great city proceeds with
the inexorability of a natural phenomenon. The ''ocean of bricks and mortar"
expands without cessation, like the surface of a lake which has broken its embank-
ments. And whilst London increases in extent, sending forth shoots in all
directions like certain trees, the villages around it gradually grow into towns, until
they are swallowed up by the overflowing metropolis. Three hundred years ago
* In 1878 17,127 new houses were built within the district of the Metropolitan Police, and 352
streets, with a total length of 55 miles, were opened to the public.
108— E
170 THE BRITISH ISLES.
the City and Westminster became one ; Greenwich and Woolwich are attached to
their powerful neighbour by bands of houses ; and Croydon, Wimbledon, Putney,
Kichmond, Kingston, Brentford, and other more remote towns and villages are on
the point of losing their individual character and becoming suburbs of the all-
devouring city. We smile now when told of the severe edict published
by Queen Elizabeth which forbade the erection of any building whatsoever within
3 miles of London and Westminster, and required the demolition of all sheds
constructed within the previous seven years, and of all buildings not then completed.
And yet in 1602, when the Queen, dreading the mischief likely to arise from a
further increase of the metropolis, sought to stop it for ever after by her edict,
London had not the fifteenth part of its present population. Actually the 25,000
streets of London, if placed end to end, would stretch across Europe and Asia as
far as the southern extremity of British India.
In the course of its expansion, at the expense of fields, meadows, and woods,
London, like Paris, has converted its streams and rivulets into covered sewers.
The Fleet has disappeared altogether, but its ancient course can still be traced by
following the low-lying streets in the western part of the City. The Old Bourne,
now corrupted into Holborn, was one of its feeders, and by its mouth the
Thames formed a small harbour. The winding rivulet, on the banks of which
stood Tyburn Tree, so often referred to in the history of England, has likewise
disappeared for the greater part of its course, but it continues to feed a pretty
sheet of water in Hyde Park. In the heart of London we only meet with a few
trees to remind us of external nature, but the names of streets and districts, such
as Hatton Garden, Spitalfields, and others, recall a time when there existed
gardens famous for their roses and strawberries, and preserves in which the Lord
Mayor and the Aldermen hunted the stag.* Most of the modern quarters of the
town are laid out in such a manner as to enclose here and there a bit of veritable
country, with clumps of trees, shrubberies, carefully kept lawns, and herds of
browsing sheep. To these parks f and squares, and to the thousands of gardens
attached to private houses, the town is indebted for much pure air and light. The
removal of the primitive fortifications which formerly engirdled the City has
allowed London to expand freely in all directions. Instead of raising tenement
upon tenement, as in Paris, houses of moderate size have been reared side by side,
and only in the business quarters has space been utilised to the full extent of its
capacity. Thus, though the population of London is only double that of Paris,
the area it covers is at least five times as great, and its inhabitants obtain a larger
supply of respirable air. On an average every house in London is inhabited by
seven or eight persons. J
* Thornbury and Walford, " Old and New London."
t The thirteen parks of London cover an area of 2,223 acres— the West-end parks, from Whitehall
to Kensington, embracing 788 acres.
X Average number of persons to each inhabited house in the metropolitan counties : —
Middlesex .
Surrey-
Kent .
England and Wales
1851.
1861.
1871.
7-9
7-9
7-9
6-3
6-4
6-6
6-7
5-8
5-6
55
5-4
6-3
LONDON. 171
Unfortunately the metropolis of England has not at its command a sufficient
supply of pure drinking water. The liquid supplied to some of the quarters of the
town abounds in organic matter in a state of decomposition ; and the death rate
rises there to double and even triple the height of what it is in more favoured
localities, where the water supply is more satisfactory.* The Thames still supplies
London with most of the water required for domestic purposes, and in the
neighbourhood of London that river is not by any means a limpid stream. Its
improvement has nevertheless been great since the middle of the century, when
the whole of the London sewage found its way into it. At that time the water of
the Thames was much polluted. The tide floated this matter up and .down the
river ; the passing vessels stirred it to the surface ; and it was not without some
risk to health that passengers embarked in them. Even now the water of the
Thames, polluted by the waste washed into it from the river banks, or thrown out
by the crews of the vessels, is far from pure. A deposit; of mud is left by it upon
the flats and steps of the landing-places when it retires with the ebb tide. The
Thames has been much " purified," as far as it flows through London proper ; but
this cannot be said of its lower course.
The main drainage of London was carried out between 1859 and 1875 under
the supervision of the Metropolitan Board of Works. The sewage is carried to a
considerable distance below London, and pumped into the Thames by powerful
steam-engines erected at the Abbey Mills, near Barking Creek, and at Crossness
Point, on the opposite bank of the river.t These works cost no less than
£4,500,000, but they have by no means answered expectations. The metropolis
has been purified, no doubt, but the towns near the outfall sewers complain of
being poisoned, and the silt in the river increases from year to year. It was hoped
more especially that the sewage discharged into the river would be carried away
to the sea. Unfortunately a considerable portion of this sewage, after having been
carried down stream by the ebb, returns with the flowing tide, and banks formed
of sewage approach nearer and nearer to the towns in the neighbourhood of its
outfalls. The Metropolitan Board of Works is responsible for this contamina-
tion. Several kinds of fish which formerly ascended the Thames have been
driven away by these impurities. Whitebait, so highly esteemed by gastro-
nomists,+ and which were formerly caught as high up as Greenwich, are seen there
no longer. The Dutch fishermen, who enter the Thames in their pursuit, restrict
their incursions from year to year. In 1852 they came up to Erith ; in 1859 they
stopped short of Greenhithe ; in 1862 they were driven from Gravesend ; and at
present they hardly pass beyond the Nore.§ And yet this sewage matter, which
poisons the river and pollutes the air of the towns, might be usefully employed
* In 1877 the London water supply was classified as follows : —
Unexception ably pure 7,000,000 gallons.
Sometimes pure . 63,000,000 „
Polluted with sewage 61,000,000
t Total length of main sewers 254 miles, and of local sewers 776 miles. Daily discharge of sewage
about 500,000 tons.
X According to Van Beneden (" Patria Belgica," i. p. 326) the whitebait is a young herring, but
other authorities maintain that it is a distinct species.
§ Calvert, Official Report, 1877.
172
THE BEITISH ISLES.
in fertilising tlie lowlands along both banks of the Thames, and in converting
unproductive mud-flats into rich pasture- grounds. Experiments made on various
occasions have demonstrated that London gets rid at a considerable expense, and
throws into the sea, an element of agricultural wealth equal in value to the annual
produce of 7,660,000 acres.* Surely the example set by Paris, Danzig, Edinburgh,
Coventry, and many other towns ought not to have been lost upon London ; but
no plan for utilising its sewage has hitherto been carried out effectually.
In the distribution of pure water the authorities of London have been no more
successful than in the removal of the sewage, and in both respects they might
Fig. 90.— The London Sewers.
Scale 1 : 250,000.
2 Miles.
have advantageously followed the example of Paris. An enormous capital has
been expended in the construction of aqueducts, reservoirs, filtering beds, and other
appliances. The water companies, who draw most of their supplies from the
Thames, have grown rich and powerful, and they have hitherto successfully resisted
the introduction of every improvement. t The first water supply of London, on a
large scale was devised, by Peter Morrys, a German, who put up a water-wheel
under one of the arches of London Bridge. This wheel was set in motion by the
* J. J. Mechi, Times, September 27tli, 1878.
t Their capital amounts to Jl2,000,000 ; their annual expenditure to £520,000; their income to
;B1,327,300. They supply 121,000,000 gallons daily, being at the rate of 28 gallons per head of the
population.
LONDON.
173
tidal current, and worked a pump which forced the water through pipes into the
streets and houses. These water works turned out a great success, and they
disappeared only with old London Bridge in 1831. In 1606 the City obtained
an Act of Parliament for bringing a stream of pure water from Hertfordshire
into London, but, frightened at the magnitude of the task which they had under-
taken, they were only too happy when Hugh Myddelton undertook to carry out
Fig. 91. — LoxDON : Hyde Park and the' Serpentine.
the scheme at his own risk. This was the origin of the 'New River Company,
one of the most successful undertakings in the world. The cost of this enterprise
only amounted to £17,000 ;* but a few years ago a single share of the company was
sold for £50,000. At the present time the London water supply forms the
subject of serious discussion, and various schemes have been brought forward for
rendering the metropolis independent of a river which receives the sewage of
a million inhabitants. It has been proposed to collect the rain-water which
* See Timbs's " Curiosities of London."
174 THE BRITISH ISLES.
falls on Bagshot Heath, to the south-west of London ; or to draw a supply of
100,000,000 gallons daily from the head-streams of the Severn, 180 miles
distant; nay, even to construct an aqueduct, some 250 miles in length, for
conveying to London the limpid water of the lakes of Cumberland. There can
hardly arise a question of cost in the case of the wealthiest city of the world,
which a supply of pure water would at the same time convert into the most
salubrious.
Gas was first introduced into the London streets in 1807, when Winzor, a
native of Znaim, in Moravia, experimentally lit up one side of Pall Mall. He
and his supporters were incorporated, in 1812, as the Chartered Gas Company.
At the present time there are six gas companies, who consume an immense
quantity of coal, and effectively light up London during the night.* The electric
light, however, is invading the monopoly hitherto enjoyed by the companies, and
its use in streets, warehouses, and public buildings is becoming almost daily more
general.
Superficial observers frequently talk of the uncertainty of life in London, whilst
that city, notwithstanding the bad quality of some of the water supplied to it, is
in reality one of the most healthy in Europe, and certainly that one among the
great capitals in which the number of births is most in excess of the number of
deaths. t Four-fifths of the annual increase of the population of London are due
to this excess, the remainder resulting from immigration. It is more especially
the natives of the surrounding counties who are attracted to London, and the gaps
left by these migrations are filled up by an inflow from the more remote districts. +
Many of the female servants of London are included amongst these immigrants.
There are 1,137 females to every 1,000 males. It is said sometimes that there
* The six companies have a capital of £12,682,000; they annually consume 1,560,000 tons of coal,
and produce daily about 42,000,000 cubic feet of gas of an illuminating power of twelve candles, for which
they charge 3s. 9d. per 1 ,000 cubic feet.
t Birth rate and death rate in a few large towns (1878) : —
Biiths to 1,000 Deaths to 1,000
living. , living.
London 36-2 23-5
Paris _ 24-6
Berlin 41-8 29-9
Vienna 38-0 29-6
Rome 27-2 296
X The population of London according to birthplaces (1871) :—
XT >+•, * T 1 Number. Per Cent.
Natives of London 2,055,576 63-2
„ Middlesex, Surrey, Kent, Essex, Bucks,
and Herts 317,202 98
Other parts of England .... 634,620 19-5
„ Monmouth and Wales .... 22,262 0*7
^^'^tl'^^'l • • 41,'o29 1-3
I^flf'id 91J71 2-8
„ British Colonies 25 494 0-8
„ Foreign countries 66,101 2-0
Bom at sea j 205
Aniongst the foreigners there were (exclusive of naturalised British subjects) 19,773 Germans, 10,719
Frenchmen, 4,825 Dutchmen, 4,229 Poles, 2,287 Scandinavians, &c.
LONDON.
175
are more Scotchmen in London than in Edinburgh, and more Irishmen than in
Dublin. This is a mistake, though the Scotch and Irish who have settled in
London, together with their descendants, are sufficiently numerous to form two
very respectable towns. The number of Jews is more considerable than in any
other town of England. Gipsies have permanently established themselves in the
neighbourhood of Dulwich ; whilst in the east, near the Docks, we meet with
representatives of nearly every nationality on the face of the globe, including
Hindus, Malays, Chinese, and Polynesians. Nowhere else in Europe are we pre-
sented with equal facilities for ethnological study. The foreign European popu-
lation of London is proportionately not as numerous now as it was in the sixteenth
century.* Most of these foreigners come to London in search of business; and
Fig. 92 —Increase by Immigkation, axd Excess of Births of the Large Cities of Europe.
According to Dunant.
Inci-ease due to Immigration
I I Increase due to an excess of births.
whilst the English residents at Paris have gone there to spend, the Frenchmen
whom we meet in London are intent upon making money. Hence the striking
contrasts between the two colonies, which are not those of race only.
In order to gain some idea of the immense multitudes of London it is by no
means necessary that we should be present on one of those occasions when a public
procession through the streets attracts its multitudes, or take part in the festivities
inseparably connected with public holidays. It is quite sufficient to visit some of
the leading thoroughfares of the City, such as Cheapside, Ludgate Hill, Cannon
Street, or Lombard Street, during business hours. Carriages, omnibuses, and
vehicles of every description appear at first sight to be mixed up in inextricable
* In 1580 there were 6,502 foreigners amongst a total population of at most 150,000 souls, or 4*3
per cent. ; in 1871 there were 66,101 foreigners, equal to IZ'O per cent, of the total population.
176 THE BRITISH ISLES.
confusion ; but after awhile we perceive that in this moving chaos there are two
well-marked currents, fed by the numerous side-streets as by so many affluents,
and that these currents, though flowing in opposite directions, carefully avoid
each other. Beneath the crowd passing along on the tops of omnibuses and in
carriages there moves another crowd, which glides between the wheels, dives
beneath the horses' heads, and flows in contrary streams along the pathways. Now
and then may be heard the dull rumble which announces the arrival of a train ;
the railway station sends forth its crowd of passengers, and these are quickly lost
amongst the greater crowd pouring through the streets. London Bridge, the
principal means of communication between the City and Southwark, is daily
crossed by at least 300,000 persons, and from year to year the trafiic which flows
across it increases in bulk.* Reconstructed in 1825, to accommodate the grow-
ing traffic, it has become necessary since to widen it once more, in order that it
may afford a channel broad enough for the " river of men which flows across the
unconscious river beneath." f Standing upon this bridge and looking seawards, we
see both banks fringed with a forest of masts, the intervening space being hardly
wide enough for the manoeuvring vessels, carried along by the current or
struggling against the tide. Above bridge numerous small steamers, crowded
from stem to stern with passengers, appear and disappear under the arches of a
railway bridge quivering almost incessantly beneath passing trains. These minia-
ture steamers, which stop every instant at some pier, and start as soon as they have
discharged or replenished their human cargoes, may be likened to moving quays
travelling from one end of the town to the other.
The metropolitan railways, carried along high viaducts above the houses or
running through tunnels and deep cuttings beneath them, are great passenger
high-roads, in no way inferior to the streets of the City, and far more important
than the Thames. The number of passengers who arrive daily at the railway
stations of London cannot be less than a million. In the more frequented under-
ground stations, the din and rumble of carriages are incessant, and hardly has a
train departed before another makes its appearance. Between Brentford and
Greenwich, Sydenham and Highgate, there are no lesS than 150 stations, great
and small, and all the quarters of the town have been placed in communication
with each other and with the great trunk" lines which connect London with the
provinces. All but the local traffic is carried on by steam. On the approaching
completion of the Inner Circle, it is proposed to attach the trains to cables set in
motion by stationary engines, and they will then roll along without intermission like
planets in their orbit. It is mainly owing to these facilities for rapid locomotion
that London has been able to spread- itself over the surrounding country, much to
the advantage of public health. If the aid of steam had not been invoked,
London, like Paris and most other continental towns, would have been compelled
to grow in height by placing story upon story. Nevertheless, even London can
show a few of those huge edifices in which thousands of human beings live, floor
!'S^ 1875 London Bridge was crossed daily by 20,000 vehicles, and by 170,000 persons on foot,
t Charles Dickens.
LONDON.
177
above floor, within a narrow area. Sucli is the gigantic Midland Hotel at the
St. Pancras station, a huge mass of brick and iron, with towers, pavilions, and
triumphal gateways ; such also are the other hotels constructed for the convenience
of travellers contiguous to the great railway termini. These palaces tower high
above the surrounding houses, but they are scarcely sufficiently capacious to
accommodate the crowds that flock to them.
So prodigious is the extent of London that there exists no point of vantage
where the whole of it can be seen spread out beneath us, even though the
prospect be not obscured by fog or smoke. From the top of the Monument
Fig. 93, — Railways of London.
Scale 1 : 350,000.
raised in the centre of the City we merely see the roofs of numberless houses, the
steeples of hundreds of churches, and a crescent- shaped reach of the river, with its
bridges, steamers, and forests of masts, lost on the horizon. From Primrose Hill or
the heights of Hampstead or Highgate, on the north of London, we look down upon
the parks, gardens, and villas, beyond which extends the ocean of houses
surmounted by the cupola of St. Paul's ; but the Thames and its port are beyond
the reach of vision. From Greenwich, or from the tall tower of the Crystal
Palace, other portions of the metropolis can be seen or divined, but the greater part
of London is always excluded from the immense panorama. In order to obtain a
true idea of the prodigious size of the City we must necessarily explore its various
178 THE BRITISH ISLES.
quarters, all difFering in aspect and population. London, unlike Paris in this
respect, has no collective personality. It is not, strictly speaking, a town at all,
possessed of a well-defined individuality, and differing in any marked way from
the towns in any other parts of Grreat Britain. Its growth has heen too rapid to
enable it to develop a well defined character of its own. Like a plant whose sap
rises too quickly, it has not displayed the firmness of contour and special phy-
siognomy which are the characteristics of organisms of slower growth. London,
very unlike Paris and most of the great cities of the continent, has not grown
around a kernel, but is an agglomeration of distinct towns, amongst which the
City of London, Westminster, and Greenwich were the most considerable. The
vast metropolis is the outcome of a combination of numerous towns and villages
placed in contiguity to each other. This mode of growth prevented London from
acquiring a distinct personality. It is, above all, an assemblage of distinct worlds
— worlds of warehouses, banks, factories, princely residences and villas — each world
having its proper physiognomy and history. It is an organism with several centres of
life, such as are typified by the Houses of Parliament, Charing Cross, the Bank
of England, and the Docks. But nevertheless nearly all its quarters agree in this —
that their houses are constructed of the same material and covered with the same
layer of grime resulting from the smoke-laden fogs. Though London occupies
a geological basin similar to that of Paris, it does not enjoy the advantage of
having quarries of limestone and gypsum in its neighbourhood. Hence most of
its houses are built of brick, and the stone for the more monumental buildings
has to be brought from quarries situated at an immense distance. The rocks of
Yorkshire furnished the limestone required for the construction of the Houses
of Parliament; Portland supplied the materials for St. Paul's and many other
buildings. The Tower of London is built of Caen stone, for it was in their duchy
of Normandy that the early Kings of England sought the materials required for
raising their palaces and fortresses. Even now a considerable number of vessels
annually leave the basin of the Orne laden with stone for London builders. But
the granite and limestone of the monumental buildings are covered with the same
coating of grime which disfigures the meaner houses. The showers of soot
discolour even the leaves of trees, the lawns and garden flowers, and a few years
sufiice to blacken the walls of buildings. It is matter for surprise that rich
Englishmen, so scrupulously careful of the cleanliness of their persons and homes,
should not have adopted more extensively the Portuguese and Brazilian fashion of
covering their houses with glazed bricks, which can be washed. In the finer
quarters of the West-end, however, such bricks are gradually coming into vogue.
London, like most other European towns, expands principally towards the
west, for it is from that direction that the purifying westerly winds blow
during the greater part of the year. There are, however, other circumstances
which have caused London to grow in the direction of the setting sun. The soil
on that side is solid, whilst swampy lowlands stretch out towards the east ; the
Thames above London Bridge can be crossed more easily than below it; and houses
have been built in preference in localities where the communication between bank
LONDON. 179
and bank presents the least difficulties. It results from this that the centre of London
is continually gravitating towards the west. The Koman milestone which may still
be seen in the wall of St. Swithin's Church, opposite Cannon Street station, and which
probably marked the spot whence the roads from Londinium to the other towns of
Britain diverged, no longer occupies the centre of London, nor does the City.
As to the latter, it by no means presents that aspect of antiquity which might be
expected. London is essentially a modern town, even in those parts which
occupy the site of the Roman Londinium, six-sevenths of its area having been
devastated by the great fire of 1666, commemorated by a monumental column
near London Bridge. This fire destroyed over 13,000 houses, 85 churches, and the
Guildhall, and there now remain, independently of the Tower, only a few buildings
anterior in date to the seventeenth century. Most prominent amongst these are
St. Bartholomew's Church, portions of which belong to the time of Henry I. ; the
beautiful round church in the Temple, constructed between 1185 and 1240; and
St. John's Gate, which belonged to a hospital of the Knights of St. John. Another
old church is that of St. Saviour's, South wark, near the southern end of London
Bridge. The. old walls which formerly surrounded the City have likewise disap-
peared, the last remaining gate, that of Temple Bar, having been demolished quite
recently, on account of its impeding the traffic which flows through the Strand into
Fleet Street. It was on Temple Bar that heads of traitors were exposed to the
public gaze within the last century. The gate used to be closed whenever the
sovereign approached the City, the Lord Mayor waiting on the City side,
prepared to make over to him his sword of office, which he was expected
graciously to return.
The City, like the central quarter of Paris, contains a considerable number of
public buildings, but its most striking edifices are banks, warehouses, and offices.
These palatial structures of granite, marble, or brick, five or six stories in height,
are situated, for the most part, in narrow and winding streets and alleys.
During the night many of them are left in the care of housekeepers or of
the police. Early in the morning thousands of men take the road towards
the City from all the suburbs of London, from the towns in its neighbourhood,
and even from Brigjiton, The trains deposit their freights in the stations
near the Bank, omnibuses contribute their due contingent of passengers, and
the streets swarm with life. More than a million of human beings then crowd
this hive of industry. As the evening approaches the tide begins to retire.
Trains, omnibuses, and steamers fill once more, but this time they carry their
passengers away from the City. There remain then hardly over 70,000
residents, where only a few hours before commercial afiairs of interest to the
entire world had been dealt with. More than 2,000 houses stand almost
empty. The number of residents decreases with every decade, and the City is
more and more becoming exclusively a place of business.* But it is not merely
* Population and inhabited houses of the City : —
1801 . . ' . . 16,508 houses, 128,833 inhabitants.
1861 . . . . 13,298 „ 112,063 „
1871 .... 5,309 „ 74,732 „
180 THE BEITISH ISLES.
a desire of concentrating the transactions of commerce in this quarter that
causes the resident population to diminish, for thB City authorities, by opening
wide thoroughfares through the districts inhabited by the poor, work towards the
same end. When Farringdon Street was extended through the old valley of the
Fleet, nearly 8,000 workmen's families found themselves homeless at a single
blow, and their humble dwellings made room for public buildings, railways, and
piles of offices. In the course of the last forty years at least 50,000 work-
men have in this manner been driven out of the City, and compelled to herd
together in the adjoining districts. The number of paupers has grown small
in the City, but it has increased all the more rapidly in the neighbouring
parishes.
The very poorest quarters of London have immediate contact with that wealthy
City, which not many years hence will count only employes and housekeepers
amongst its resident population. The labyrinth of streets around the Tower and the
Docks is dreaded by the stranger, and not often entered by the Londoner residing
in more favoured districts. The mud is carried from the streets into the passages
of the houses ; the walls are bespattered with filth ; tatters hang in the windows ;
a fetid or rancid odour fills the atmosphere ; while most of the men and women you
meet in the streets have sunken eyes and emaciated limbs. The soiled garments
which they wear have originally belonged to the fine ladies and gentlemen of the
West -end ; they have changed hands ten times since their original owners parted
with them, and finish as rags upon the bodies of the inhabitants of Shadwell and
Wapping. Certain narrow streets in Eotherhithe, Bermondsey, and Lambeth, to
the south of the Thames, are likewise the seats of misery, and it is with a feeling
of relief we emerge from them, and obtain a sight of the Thames, of some wide
thoroughfare, or of a public park. How vast is the contrast between these wretched
quarters and the sumptuous suburbs ; how great the difference in the modes of life
of the inhabitants and the burdens they are called upon to carry ! The annual
death rate varies between 14 and 60 to every 1,000 persons living, according to
the streets, and death gathers its harvest most' rapidly where want of work, of
bread, and of other necessaries facilitates its task. The misery London hides is
indescribable.
The districts which bound the City to the north and east, such as Spital-
fields, Bethnal Green, and Clerkenwell, are principally inhabited by artisans, and
separate the poorest quarters of London from those mainly occupied by the lower
middle classes. The houses there are for the most part of the common English
type. An area, 6 to 10 feet deep, and bounded by railings, separates the
street from the house. A flagstone or " steps," thrown across this " ditch " like a
drawbridge over the moat of a fortress, lead to the entrance of what has very
appropriately been described as the Englishman's " castle." Separate steps
usually lead down into the area and to the kitchen and coal cellar. There are no
" spy-glasses," such as may frequently be seen in the Low Countries, and the sash-
windows towards the street remain obstinately closed. Flowers usually ornament
the rooms, but cannot be seen from the street, for they are there for the gratifica-
LONDON. IQj
tion of the owner, and not for that of casual passers-by.* The house, nevertheless
is a hospitable one. If its outer walls are blackened with soot, the steps leading
up to the door are irreproachably clean, and it is the pride and ambition of London
housewives to keep them so.
Farther west, in the district of Marylebone, the houses are higher, the areas
wider and deeper, and open squares planted with trees more numerous, for we
there already find ourselves in a quarter largely inhabited by the wealthier middle
class. During last century Marylebone was the aristocratic quarter, which has
now moved westward, to the neighbourhood of Hyde Park and Kensington
Gardens, Belgravia being looked upon as its centre. In this part of the town
every square or street presents itself architectually as a whole. There are streets
lined uninterruptedly for half a mile and more with porticoed houses, all apparently
forming part of one huge building. Elsewhere the residences are detached, but
they still resemble each other in size and architectural accessories, such as balconies
and conservatories. The genius of the architects is only occasionally allowed to
reveal itself in &ome separate building. Acres, nay, square miles, are covered with
houses designed on the same pattern, as if they had come out of the hands of the
same artisan, like the chalets in a Swiss toy-box. Their stairs and fireplaces
occupy similar positions ; their mouldings and decorations have been supplied in
thousands by the same manufacturer. On entering such -a house, there is no need
for a searching examination ; its internal arrangements are rigidly determined in
advance, and their regularity is greater than that of the cells in a beehive. Such is
the inevitable result of the employment of large capital in the simultaneous
construction of hundreds of houses. An exploration of the new quarters, which
cover so considerable a portion of the county of Middlesex to the west of older
London, makes us marvel at the large number of men rich enough to live in such
luxurious dwellings. Broad flights of steps, carefully kept front gardens, rare
flowers, marble terraces, and plate- glass windows enable us to judge of the wealth
of the interiors ; and certes, if we enter one of these houses, we find that carpets,
curtains, and every article of furniture is of the most substantial quality.
Several of the palatial residences in the older parts of the town were left
behind when the aristocracy effected their exodus to the westward, and they now
rise like islands in the midst of the quarters invaded by commercial London.
Even Buckingham Palace and the royal palace of St. James lie to the eastward
of Belgravia, but the latter of these is merely used on rare occasions of state,
whilst Buckingham Palace is perfectly isolated, being surrounded by parks and
royal private gardens. As to the club-houses, which on account of their noble
proportions and architectural merits are undoubtedly amongst the great ornaments
of London, they have naturally been built in that part of the town where parlia-
mentary, aristocratic, and commercial London approach nearest to each other.
St. James's Park bounds this " London of the Clubs " in the south. Regent Street
in the east, and Piccadilly, one of the great seats of the retail trade, in the north.
* We fancy windows in London are kept closed to prevent the entrance of dust, and prized flowers are
not exposed on the window-sill because the London atmosphere does not usually agree with them. — Ed.
182
THE BRITISH ISLES.
Of all the old buildings of London the Tower is the most venerable. It was
erected by William the Conqueror, to the east of the City and on the banks of the
Thames, on a site perhaps previously occupied by a Roman castle, for coins of the
Empire and the foundations of walls, believed to be very ancient, have been discovered
there. Looking across the wide moat of the fortress, now laid out as a garden and
drill-ground, there rises boldly and commandingly the glorious old pile known as
the " White Tower." This keep of the ancient fortress, in its simple grandeur,
contrasts most advantageously with the pretentious buildings of more modern date
which surround it. Its walls, so old chronicles tell us, were " cemented with the
blood of animals," and in its neighbourhood the blood of human beings has been
shed most freely. Leaving out of account those who fell on both sides during
revolutions and civil wars in the defence or attack of the fortress, as also the
obscure prisoners who were murdered within its precincts, we can count
Fig. 94.— Buckingham Palace.
many personages known to history whose heads fell on Tower Green, close
to the unpretending church of St. Peter ad Vincula, or on Tower Hill, outside
the entrance gate. It was here that the sovereigns of England caused to be
beheaded rivals to kingly power, courtiers of whom they had grown tired, wives
whom they repudiated. Here, too, perished some of those men whose names are
justly venerated in England, and amongst them Algernon Sidney, whom
Charles II. caused to be executed in 1685. The " Bloody Tower *' was the scene
of the murder of the children of Edward IV. The history of the Tower is that of
royal crimes. " Upon its blackened walls are painted, in lines of blood, the ambition
of Edward L, the luxuriousness of Henry YIIL, the fanaticism of Mary, the cruel
vanity of Elizabeth." Long before the destruction of the French Bastille, the
Tower of London had twice fallen into the hands of a revolted people ; but neither
Wat Tyler nor Jack Cade thought of demolishing the fortress, which up to 1820
served as a state prison. The Tower is now used as an arsenal and armoury,
LONDON. 183
and the royal jewels are kept there. The lions of the Tower, upon whose life,
following an old legend, depended that of the sovereign, were transferred in 1834
to the Zoological Gardens.*
Westminster Abbey, around which was built the city of the same name, an old
rival of that of London, is less ancient than the Tower. It only dates back to the
thirteenth century, but it rises on the site of older churches, the first amongst
which was encircled by an arm of the Thames, long since dried up. "Westminster
Abbey, notwithstanding modern additions and restorations, *is one of the most
perfect Gothic churches of England, one of those whose aspect is most harmonious.
The interior, though too much cumbered with mortuary monuments, is more
especially remarkable for its boldness and airiness. The apsidal chapel of
Henry YII., in which the Knights of the Most Noble Order of the Bath used to
meet, is ablaze with light and decorations. Arches of fairy -like grace support the
Fig. 95. — Westminster Abbey.
fretted vault, " pendent by subtle magic," a marvel of constructive skill. West-
minster Abbey is the St. Denis and Pantheon of England thrown into one. In it
most of those men whose memory is venerated by the nation have found a last rest-
ing-place, or at least a monument has been erected to their memory. But besides
men of distinction, how many are there not who have found a place in this edifice
who were great only in birth, wealth, or in their own conceit ; and in addition
to works of the sculptor's art, great in design and sober in taste, how frequently
are we not offended by ridiculous allegories and boastful inscriptions ! Amongst
the most remarkable monuments are the sarcophagus of Henry VII. and his wife,
and the seated statue of Lord Mansfield ; but who could pass without notice the
monuments or tombstones of Edward the Confessor, Edward III., Jane Seymour,
Mary Stuart, or Queen Elizabeth, or those of statesmen such as Monk, Canning,
* Hepworth Dixon, "The Tower of London.''
184 THE BRITISH ISLES.
Chatham, Pitt, Fox, Warren Hastings, and Robert Peel, whose influences upon the
destinies of the nation have been so pronounced? Newton, Herschel, Watt,
Humphry Davy, Telford, and Young are buried at Westminster. Here, too, are
interred, or commemorated by monuments, mostly in the "Poets' Corner," Chaucer,
Ben Jonson, Camden, Milton, Butler, Gray, Spenser, Addison, Dryden, Congreve,
Westminster Abbey: Henry VII. 's Chapel.
Thomson, Casaubon, Goldsmith, Southey, Macaulay, Dickens, Thackeray, PaoH,
Wilberforce, Handel, Kemble, Mrs. Siddons, and Garrick. Lastly, amongst those
who have made the earth their study, are Stamford Raffles, Rennel, Chardin,
Lyell, and Livingstone.
Westminster Abbey has survived, notwithstanding the Reformation. It still is
LONDON. 185
'in possession of its church, chapter-house, and cloister, has retained its ancient
institutions, and grown in wealth. Its Dean is a prince of the Church, who lives in
a Gothic mansion adjoining the Abbey, and enjoys an annual stipend of £2,000.
The Chapter has a revenue of £60,000, out of which 1,000 guineas are annually
expended upon the public school dependent upon it. In many respects this West-
minster School resembles a grammar school of the sixteenth century rather than a
modern place of instruction.* It was near it, in the old Almonry of Westminster,
that William Caxton, before the year 1477, set 'up the first printing-press in
England.
Close to the ancient abbey, on the banks of the Thames, rises Westminster
Palace, reconstructed since the fire of 1834, to serve as a seat for the two Houses
of Parliament. This Gothic edifice is one of the vastest in the world, for it covers
8 acres, and contains more than a thousand rooms of all sizes, a chapel, and 2
miles of corridors. But, for all this, the building has not realised the expectations
of those who caused it to be constructed. If worthy of England by the wealth of
its decorations and its size, it is hardly so as regards its beauty, and still less so
with respect to its internal arrangements. Famous Westminster Hall, a remnant
of the old palace, has been embodied in the modern structure. It is a superb room,
250 feet in length and 68 in width, spanned by a remarkable roof supported on
sculptured rafters of chestnut-wood. The parliamentary commission charged
with the selection of a plan is said to have vitiated the original design of
the architect. Sir Charles Barry. It certainly failed in selecting a stone capable
of resisting the deleterious efiects of the London climate. The magnesian lime-
stone from Anston, in Yorkshire, is rapidly crumbling to pieces, and had to be
covered with silicates to stay its decay. But whatever art critics may say, there
are parts of the building deserving of our admiration, nor can we contemplate
without delight the long facade reflected in the Thames, the slender clock tower
with its gilded roof, or the more compactly built Victoria Tower, rising to a height
of 336 feet, and commanding all surrounding buildings.
The dome of St. Paul's Cathedral rises even higher than the towers of West-
minster, and stands out nobly above the houses of the City. Of all the monumental
buildings of London this one is the most superb of aspect, that which is visible
from the greatest distance, and which, owing to its commanding position, is best
entitled to be looked upon as the veritable centre of the metropolis. This edifice
is the masterpiece of Christopher Wren, who built many other churches, all in
different styles, as if it had been his aim to grapple with and solve all the problems
which present themselves to the architect. The edifice was raised between 1675 and
1710, on the site of a cathedral swept away by the great fire of 1666. Its principal
features are a double portico of coupled columns, forming the west front, and a
gigantic dome of most noble proportions, rising to a height of 360 feet, including
its lantern. Seen from the Thames, the grandeur of this dome, hung in a bluish
haze, is best brought home to us. But the interior of the building hardly corre-
sponds with the magnificence of its external features. The bare walls are of repellent
* Demogeot et Montucci, " De I'Enseignement secondaire en Angleterre et en Ecosse."
109— E
186
THE BRITISH ISLES.
coldness, while many of the monuments placed in the nave and the aisles are bad in
taste, and altogether out of keeping with the character of the building. Plans for
decorating the interior, said to be in accordance with the original conceptions of the
architect, are, however, being carried out. Military and naval heroes are most
prominent amongst those to whom the honour of interment in St. Paul's has been
accorded, the foremost places being occupied by ]N'elson and Wellington. By their
side, room has been found for a large band of scholars and artists, including
William Jones, Joshua Reynolds, Thomas Lawrence, Rennie, and last, not least.
Sir Christopher Wren, its architect.
There are in London about 1,200 churches, chapels, and synagogues, and
Fig. 97. — St. Paul's Cathedral.
many of these buildings are remarkable for their purity of style, which the
modern English architect knows how to imitate with great aptitude, or for
the wealth of their internal decoration. Amongst the multitude of its other
buildings, including palaces, Government offices, theatres, clubs, hospitals, and
schools, London may boast of several distinguished for the beauty of their archi-
tecture. Prominent amongst these are the new Courts of Justice, close to
the site of old Temple Bar ; St. Thomas's Hospital, opposite the Houses of
Parliament ; Albert Hall, a building of magnificent proportions, facing the gilt
statue of the Prince Consort on the southern side of Kensington Gardens;
and Somerset House, between the Strand and the Victoria Embankment. But
LONDON.
187
of all the many buildings of London there are none capable of conveying
a higher notion of its might than the seventeen bridges which span the Thames
between Hammersmith and the Tower. Some of these are built of granite,
others of iron ; they all vary in aspect, and are sometimes of superb propor-
tions. Eight of them are met with between Westminster Palace and the
Pool, or Port of London, a distance of less than 2 miles by the river, and
three of these vibrate almost incessantly beneath the weight of passing railway
trains. Until quite recently it was impossible to admire these bridges without
embarking in a steamer ; but the Thames has now been " regulated " for a con-
siderable portion of its course, and superb quays have taken the place of fetid
banks of mud, left dry by each receding tide. The Victoria Embankment now
stretches for 6,640 feet from Westminster to Blackfriars Bridge. Its river wall,
of solid granite, rises 40 feet above low water, and rests upon a foundation
Fig. 98. — Somerset House Axr> the Victoria Emrankment.
descending to a depth of from 16 to 40 feet. Public gardens and rows of trees
occupy a considerable part of it, and gladden the eyes which formerly turned away
with disgust from wretched hovels and narrow alleys, washed by the turgid
waters of the Thames. Upon this embankment stands " Cleopatra's Needle,"
one of the forty-two obelisks known to exist in the world. It was brought
thither from Alexandria. Thanks to the use of hydraulic rams, twenty-four
men were enabled to raise this monument ; whilst Lebas, in 1836, employed 480
persons in the erection of the Obelisk of Luxor ; and Fontana, in 1586, required
the services of 960 men and 75 horses to poise the Needle on the Piazza di San
Pietro ,at Rome.
Above London Bridge numerous bridges facilitate the intercourse between the
two banks of the river, but lower down the Port begins, with its warehouses, jetties,
landing-stages, and cranes. It has not hitherto been found feasible to throw a
188 THE BRITISH ISLES.
bridge across the river below London Bridge without unduly interfering with the
traffic, and recourse has been had to tunnels. One of these underground passages,
through which a railway now runs, has become famous on account of the difficulties
which Brunei, its engineer, was compelled to surmount in the course of its
construction. In 1825, when he began his work, his undertaking was looked upon
as one of the most audacious effiarts of human genius ; for experience in the
construction of tunnels had not then been won on a large scale, and nearly every
mechanical appliance had to be invented. Quite recently a second tunnel has
been constructed beneath the bed of the Thames, close to the Tower. Instead of
its requiring fifteen years for its completion, as did the first, it was finished in
hardly more than a year ; its cost was trifling, and not a human life was lost
during the progress of the work.* At the present time a third tunnel is projected
for the Lower Thames, and the construction of a huge bridge near the Tower is
under discussion. In order that this bridge may not interfere with the river
traffic, and yet permit a stream of carriages to flow uninterruptedly across it, it is
proposed to place two swing-bridges in its centre, which would successively be
opened in order to permit large vessels to pass through.
Amongst the public buildings of London there are many which are not visited
because of their size or architecture, but for the sake of the treasures which they
shelter. Foremost of these is the British Museum — a vast edifice of noble pro-
portions, with a lofty portico. But no sooner have we penetrated the entrance
hall than we forget the building, and have eyes only for the treasures of nature
and art which fill its vast rooms. Its sculpture galleries contain the most admired
and most curious monuments of Assyria, Egypt, Armenia, Asia Minor, Greece, and
Etruria. It is there the lover of high art may contemplate with feelings akin to
religion the tombs of Lycia, the fragments of the Mausoleum, the columns from
the Temple of Diana of Ephesus, the Phygalian marbles, and the sculptures of the
Parthenon. Since Lord Elgin in 1816 brought these precious marbles from
Athens to the banks of the Thames, it is to London we must wend our way, and
not to Hellas, if we would study the genius of Greece. Here, too, we find the
famous " Rosetta stone " which Young sought to decipher, and which furnished
Champollion with a key for readitig the hieroglyphics of Egypt. Papyri of three
and four and perhaps even five thousand years of age, and the brick tablets which
formed the library in the palace of Nineveh, are likewise preserved in the British
Museum. In the course of its hundred and twenty-seven years of existence between
1753 and 1880 the British nation has expended upon this Museum the respectable sum
of £5,600,000. The library attached to the Museum, notwithstanding its 1,500,000
volumes, is as yet less rich than the Bibliotheque Rationale of Paris, but, being
liberally supported, it increases rapidly, whilst its admirable arrangements
attract to it scholars from every part of the world. The reading-room itself, a
vast circular apartment covered by a dome 140 feet in diameter and 106 feet in
height, and lit up during' the evening by electric lights, is deserving our admira-
* Brunei's tunnel cost £464.715, the " subway " near the Tower only £16,000. The former consists,
however, of two arched passages 1,200 feet long, 14 feet wide, and 16^ feet in height ; whUst the latter,
though 1,330 feet in length, is merely an iron tube of 8 feet in diameter.
LONDON. 189
tion. In it are arranged a classified catalogue in a thousand volumes, and 20,000
works of reference, freely at the disposal of the readers. Unfortunately the
Museum authorities are much hampered for want of accommodation. Some of the
most precious sculptures have had to be relegated to sheds or vaults, and many
offers of donations have been declined owing to want of space.*
The National Gallery occupies a magnificent site in Trafalgar Square, in
which artesian wells send forth fountains of water. There does not, how-
ever, exist another building in London which stands so much in need of an
apology. True it is stated to be merely a temporary home for the great
National Gallery, but the paintings have nevertheless been kept there for
over half a century. The National Gallery started with a small collection of
forty paintings, but purchases and donations have caused it to grow rapidly. In
a single year (1872) seventy-seven paintings, of the value of £76,000, were added
to it, and it includes now more than a thousand paintings, together with several
works of the sculptor's chisel. The large funds at its disposal have enabled
its trustees to secure many of the most highly prized treasures of European
collections. The old Italian schools are well represented in this gallery, and
paintings of the older masters are numerous, including the " Raising of Lazarus,"
the joint production of Sebastiano del Piombo and Michael Angelo, Correggio's
'* Mercury and Venus" and " Ecce Homo," and various paintings by Raffael and
other Italian masters. We meet, likewise, with the masterly productions of
Velasquez, Murillo, Rembrandt, Rubens, and Vandyck, and with landscapes by
Ruysdael and Hobbema. Two paintings by Turner have, by express desire of
the artist, been placed side by side with two similar works by Claude Lorraine.
Dulwich Gallery, near the Crystal Palace, contains valuable paintings by
Murillo, Velasquez, and the Dutch masters. Very considerable, too, are the
private collections in London, including those in Bridgewater House, in
Devonshire House, Grosvenor House, and other princely mansions of the
aristocracy.
South Kensington Museum possesses, next to the British Museum, the largest
number of priceless art treasures. It was founded in 1851 as an aid towards the
development of art industries, in which the English were confessedly behind some
of their neighbours, as was clearly demonstrated by the Exhibition held in the year
named. The museum includes quite an agglomeration of buildings, some of them
of a provisional character ; but a permanent edifice, in the purest style of Italian
Renaissance, is rapidly approaching completion, and promises to become one of the
great ornaments of London. The collections exhibited at South Kensington include
an immense variety of objects, but owing to the provisional nature of a portion
of the buildings, it has not yet been found possible to classify and arrange them in
a thoroughly satisfactory manner. Nevertheless progress is being made, and now
and then the eye alights upon a masterpiece which commands admiration, quite
* The expenditure of the Museum amounts to £110,000 per annum. It is visited annually by about
650,000 persons, of whom 115,000 make use of the reading-room for purposes of research, each reader, on
an average, consulting 12 volumes daily. The library increases at the rate of 35,000 volumes a year.
190 THE BRITISH ISLES.
irrespective of the locality assigned to it. Even Florence might envy South
Kensino-ton the possession of some of the best examples of Italian Renaissance,*
most prominent amongst which are seven admirable cartoons by Raffael, which
produce almost the effect of fresco paintings. In addition to the articles which are
the property of the museum, there is exhibited at South Kensington a most
valuable '' loan collection/' intrusted to the authorities by wealthy amateurs, in
order that artists and the public may study its contents. Quite recently the
museum has been enriched by the acquisition of the larger portion of the contents
of the old India Museum. These are exhibited in a series of rooms overlooking
the gardens of the Horticultural Society, and nowhere else in Europe is it possible
to meet with a larger collection of objects illustrating the history and private life
of the inhabitants of the Ganges peninsula. South Kensington is, indeed, becoming
a '* town of museums." The straggling galleries which surround the gardens of
the society just named are filled with all kinds of objects, including huge cannons,
ships' models, educational apparatus, portraits of eminent Englishmen, an anthro-
pological collection, and maps. The new Natural History Museum occupies an
adjoining site. It has recently received the precious miner alogical, geological,
botanical, zoological, and* anthropological collections of the British Museum,
which are the delight of the student, and some of the objects in which — as, for
instance, the fossilised Caraib found on Guadaloupe — are of priceless value. The
Patent Office Museum adjoins the museum of South Kensington, and contains, in
addition to numerous models, several objects, such as the earliest machines and
engines constructed by Arkwright, Watt, and Stephenson, which no mechanician
can behold without a feeling of veneration. Parliament has at all times shown
favour to the museum in South Kensington, by willingly granting the large sums
demanded on its behalf by Government. During the first years of its existence
the Department of Science and Art was enabled to spend annually between
£160,000 and £200,000 in enlarging its collections.! It is nevertheless to
be regretted that a museum like this, which is at the same time a school of
art and science, should have been located in one of the aristocratic suburbs
of London, far from the centre of the town and the homes of the artisans
who were primarily intended to profit by its establishment. In order to obviate
this disadvantage, a branch museum has been opened in the industrial suburb of
Bethnal Green, and, besides this, the art schools throughout the country are
supplied with loan collections.
London is particularly rich in special museums, some of which have already
been referred to. Amongst others which contribute most largely to the progress
of science we may mention the Geological Museum in Jermyn Street, founded by
De la Beche, and John Hunter's Anatomical Museum in the College of Surgeons,
* Perrot, Revue dea Beux-Mondes, Mai 1, 1878.
t The Science and Art Department of South Kensington expends annually about £330,000, \n
addition to wRioh £40,000 are voted for the maintenance of the museum, and a considerable sum (in 1879
£8,000) for buildings in course of construction. The expenses of the National Portrait Gallery and
Patent Museum, though popularly supposed to form part of the South Kensington Museum, are defrayed
from other sources.
LONDON.
191
Lincoln's Inn Fields. Several of the learned societies boast tlie possession of
libraries and valuable scientific collections. The Royal Society, the Geological
Society (the first of the kind founded), the Anthropological Institute, the Linnean
Society, and more especially the Royal Geographical, which has taken the initiative
in so many voyages of exploration— all these societies prosper, and have the
command of revenues which enable them to increase their collections to the profit
Fig. 99.— Kew and Richmond.
Scale 1 : 65,000.
20'
W.of G.
15'
iMile.
of science.* The Zoological Society, installed in a portion of Regent's Park, owns
the finest collection of living animals in the world, and attracts annually close
upon a million visitors. There are Horticultural and Botanical Societies, both in
the enjoyment of fine gardens, but they are far inferior to the Botanical Gardens
at Kew, which are the richest of their kind in the world, and are maintained
* The Eoyal Geographical Society has nearly 4,000 members, and enjoys an annual income of
£12,000.
192 THE BEITISH ISLES.
with the greatest liberality. On Sunday afternoons the extensive pleasure grounds
attached to them are crowded with visitors, happy to escape the ennui of the
town. Three museums and numerous conservatories are scattered within its
precincts. A winter garden, covering an area of an acre and a half, is
intended to afford shelter to plants of the temperate regions. The palm stove
rises to a height of QQ feet, and walking amongst the tropical plants which it con-
tains, we might fancy ourselves transported into a virgin forest of the New World,
if it were not for the roof of glass visible through the fan-shaped foliage above our
heads. There are many private gardens in the vicinity of London, and more
especially near Chiswick, which almost rival Kew in the extent of their conserva-
tories and the luxuriance of their vegetation.
As to the Crystal Palace, which occupies an eminence to the south of London,
in the midst of a vast garden 200 acres in extent, it is essentially a place of
recreation. The building contains, no doubt, many beautiful imitations of works
of architecture and art, but the character of the entertainments offered to the
public shows only too plainly that amusement is the principal object aimed at.
The same may be said of the Alexandra Palace, commanding a magnificent prospect
of woods and meadows from its vantage-ground on Muswell Hill. Quite recently,
after twenty- five years of litigation, the City of London has obtained possession
of Epping Forest, an extensive tract of woodland to the north-east, which forms
a most welcome addition to the public parks of the metropolis.
London, though it contains one- eighth of the total population of the British
Isles, is not the seat of a university, like Oxford or Cambridge, or even Durham
or St. Andrews. True, Sir Thomas Gresham, a wealthy London merchant, devised
extensive estates, about the middle of the sixteenth century, for the purpose of
endowing a school of learning ; but this legacy, stated to be actually worth
£3,000,000,* was wasted by its guardians, and supports now merely a Col-
lege where lectures are occasionally delivered to miscellaneous audiences.
The University of London is not a teaching corporation, but an examining
body, which dispenses its degrees to any candidate who may present himself,
without exacting any other conditions than his competency. But though the
superior schools of London may not officially occupy the same rank as the colleges
of Oxford and Cambridge, they nevertheless turn out excellent scholars, and
devote more especially attention to experimental science and the exigencies of
modern society. Medicine, almost completely neglected in the old universities, is
one of those sciences which may most successfully be studied in London, where
there are eleven medical schools connected with the public hospitals, in addition
to University College and King's College. University College e:^cludes religious
instruction altogether, and Hindus, Parsees, and Jews sit side by side with their
Christian fellow-students ; whilst King's College bases its course of instruction
upon the principles of the Church of England, interpreted in a spirit of liberality.
Women have enjoyed the right of taking part in the course of education of
University College since 1869, and may present themselves for examination
* Times, October 2nd, 1878.
LONDON. 193
before the authorities of the London University. Besides this, there are three
colleges specially established for the higher education of women.
There are four great public schools for boys — Westminster, St. Paul's, Merchant
Taylors', and Christ's Hospital ; numerous middle- class schools, supported by
corporations, societies, or endowments ; and a multitude of elementary schools.
These latter are in a great measure under the administration of a School Board
elected by the ratepayers, and it will convey some notion of their importance if
we state that they are attended by close upon half a million of pupils.*
If London, notwithstanding its many great schools, is not the university centre
of England, and is bound to recognise the prerogatives of Oxford and Cambridge,
it may at all events claim to be the scientific, literary, and art centre of all the
countries where English is the common tongue. It publishes more books than any
other town, is the seat of the most flourishing scientific societies, possesses the most
valuable art collections and the most famous exhibition galleries, and its boards
confer distinction upon the actors who appear upon them. The most valued
reviews and journals, which may not only claim to be the " fourth estate " of the
realm, but also sway public opinion throughout the world, are published in London.
The newspaper printing-offices are amongst the most wonderful industrial establish-
ments of the metropolis.
London does not hold the first place amongst the industrial centres of the
British Isles. It is not the equal of Manchester, Birmingham, Sheffield, Leeds,
or Glasgow in any special branch of manufacture. Yet, if the workshops and
factories scattered through the various quarters of London could be combined
to form a town by themselves, it would very soon become clear that in the totality
of its manufactures the metropolis is still the first town of England, and
that the name of Cockneys, contemptuously applied to all who live within
the sound of Bow bells, has not been earned through a life of idleness. The
majority of the factories lie within a huge semicircle, which bounds the City
towards the east and south, and extends from Clerkenwell, through Spitalfields,
Bethnal Green, Mile End, Eotherhithe, and Southwark, to Lambeth ; but there is
not a quarter of the town where workmen engaged in some useful occupation are
not to be met with.t London is more especially noted for its pottery, cutlery,
* Population of school age, Christmas, 1878 729,710
Children in primary schools 444,322
Average daily attendance 350,507
Total expenditure of School Board, 1879 £470,543
t Occupations of the inhabitants of London (1871) : —
Males and Females
Females. only.
General and Local Government ..... 31.952 1,591
Army and Navy 18,464 —
Learned Professions (Literature, Art, and Science) . 96,096 37,781
Persons engaged in entertaining and performing
personal oflfices for man 314,7il 262,100
Persons who buy and sell, keep or lend money, houses,
or goods. 86,957 8,757
Conveyance of men, animals, goods, or messages . 134,014 1,096
Agriculture . 15,790 1,739
Persons engaged about animals ..... 12,907 124
Industrial classes 725,695 220,923
Labourers, &c 112,162 13,782
194 THE BEITISH ISLES.
fire-arms, machinery of every description, watches, jewellery, and furniture. It
builds and fits out vessels, though on a much-reduced scale since the introduction
of iron steamers, which can be more economically produced in the northern ports.
The silk industry, first introduced by French Huguenots towards the close of the
seventeenth century, still keeps its ground. Tan-yards, sugar refineries, and dis-
tilleries are of great importance. The breweries are vast establishments, and the
excise dues exacted from them considerably swell the receipts of the treasury.
Nearly all of them have secured a supply of pure water by boring artesian wells,
one of which descends a depth of 1,020 feet, to the beds of the lower greensand.
A large proportion of the market gardens of all England lie in the vicinity of
London, but they cannot compare with those to be seen around Paris.
As a money market London is without a rival in the world. Even France can-
not dispose of savings equal to those which annually accumulate in England, which
latter enjoys, in addition, the advantages accruing from the universal practice of
' banking. The City of London probably has at its immediate command a capital
equal in amount to what could be furnished jointly by all the other money markets
of the world, and this circumstance enables her, to the detriment of other countries,
to take advantage of every opportunity for realising a profit that may present itself
in any quarter of the globe * The great bankers in Lombard Street, the worthy
successors of those Lombards and Florentines who first initiated Englishmen into
the mysteries of banking, are applied to by every Government in distress, by mining
and railway companies, by inventors desirous of converting their ideas into ringing
coin, by speculators of every description. There are but few Grovernments which,
in addition to an official envoy accredited to the court of St. James, do not maintain
a representative attached to the money-lenders in Lombard Street. Thanks to
the information which flows into London as the centre of the world, the City
capitalists are the first to learn where judicious investments can be made. Nearly
every colonial enterprise is "financed" by London; the mines of South America
are being worked indirectly on behalf of the bankers of the City, who have also
constructed, the railways and harbours of Brazil, the Argentine Confederation, and
Chili ; and it is the city which nearly all the submarine telegraph companies of the
world have chosen as their head- quarters.
The first town of the world as a money market, London ranks foremost, too, as
a place of commerce and a shipping port. It is the greatest mart in the universe for
tea, Coffee, and most kinds of colonial produce. The wool of Australia and Africa
finds its way into its warehouses, and foreign purchasers are compelled to replenish
their supplies there. A large quantity of merchandise only reaches continental
Europe through the port of the Thames as an intermediary.!
* W. Bagehot, " Lombard Street."
t Foreign trade of London (Exports and Imports) :—
l''^35 . . . £333,160 1873 . . . £184,759,500
1~<^0 . . . £10,000,000 1876 . . . £186,700,000
^791 • • • £31,000,000 1879 . . . £146,741,000
1825 . . . £42,803,145
For further details on the Trade and Shipping of London we refer the reader to the Appendix.
LONDON. 195
The commerce whicli London carries on with foreign countries has increased
twenty-fold since the beginning of the eighteenth century, and continues to increase
with every decade. The Port of London is a world of which we can form no
notion unless we enter it. In fact, legally no less than virtually, the whole
estuary of the Thames belongs to it.* It is bounded on the east by an ideal line
drawn from the North Foreland, near Margate, through the Gunfleet lightship to
Harwich Naze. A few of the small ports embraced within these limits enjoy some
local importance, but are nevertheless mere enclaves of the great port of London.
They are outports established for the convenience of fishermen and traders, and
may fairly be described as maritime suburbs of London. As we leave the Nore
Light behind us and journey up to London, the number of vessels increases rapidly.
Not a group of houses on the bank but a cluster of vessels may be seen at anchor
in front of it, nor a jetty but its head is surrounded by shipping engaged in dis-
charging or receiving cargo. Above Sheerness the banks approach each other, and
higher up we find ourselves upon a river lined for miles by quays, where cranes are
steadily at work hoisting grain from the holds of ships into granaries. At times
we are hardly able to distinguish the houses along the banks, so closely packed is
the shipping, and at frequent intervals long rows of masts may be seen stretch-
ing away inland until lost to sight in the distance. These rows mark the sites of
docks.
Towards the close of last century the quay at which it was legally permitted
to discharge certain kinds of merchandise only extended from the Tower to
Billingsgate, a distance of 1,450 feet. There were "tolerated" quays beyond
these narrow limits ; but the conveniences for landing merchandise were of so
insufficient a nature as to constantly interfere with the conduct of commerce.
It was difficult, moreover, to bring order into piles of merchandise deposited upon
the quay, and the losses sustained by pillage were estimated to amount annually
to nearly half a million sterling. Most of the vessels were detained in the port
for weeks and months, and were able only to discharge cargo by means of lighters
communicating with the shore.
Such a state of affairs could be permitted to exist no longer, more especially since
the wars of the French Revolution and the Empire had enabled London to become
the intermediary of nearly all the trade which was carried on between continental
Europe and the New World. The merchants of London resolved upon following
the example set by Liverpool, which already had docks surrounded by ware-
houses, and able to accommodate not only ships, but also their cargoes. After
a tedious discussion in Parliament, a Joint-Stock Company was founded for the
purpose of providing London with its first docks The site selected lay at the
neck of the peninsula known as the Isle of Dogs, half-way between London
and Blackwall. Pitt, in 1800, laid the foundation stone. The site was well
chosen, for vessels drawing 24 feet of water were able to enter the new docks,
without first being obliged to make the circuit of the peninsula. The great
success of these docks demonstrated the necessity of constructing others. These
* *'De jure maritimo et navali," 1677.
196
THE BRITISH ISLES.
West India Docks had no sooner been completed than the East India Docks,
originally reserved to Indiaraen, but now open to all vessels, were taken in
hand. Next followed the London Docks, still more important on account
of their proximity to the City and the vastness of their warehouses, more
especially designed for the storage of rice, tobacco, wine, and spirits. After
these were constructed the St Katherine Docks, on the same bank of the
river, and even nearer to the City than the preceding. In proportion to their
size they are the busiest docks of London. In order to obtain the site they
cover it was necessary to pull down 1,250 houses, inhabited by nearly 12,000
persons.
Since then works more considerable still have been carried out. The
Victoria Docks, below the river Lea, only recently completed, cover an area
Fig. 100. — The Docks of London.
Scale 1 : 65.500.
0 I of Gr.
Mile.
of no less than 180 acres, and there is reason to believe that they will be able,
for some time to come, to meet the growing requirements of commerce. All the
docks hitherto mentioned are on the left bank of the river, but though the right
bank near London is of inferior importance, owing to its remoteness from the
City, it, too, has been furnished with docks for the storage of timber and corn.
Lower down, the right bank enjoys a commercial preponderance, for on it rise
Deptford, with its huge foreign cattle market, Greenwich, Woolwich, Gravesend,
Sheerness, and other towns.
The Docks of London do not at first sight strike the beholder as much as
would be expected, for they are scattered throughout the meanest quarters of the
town, and dwarfed by the tall warehouses which surround them. If we would gain
a true idea of the prodigious commerce carried on within them, we must be prepared
to spend days, nay, weeks, within their limits, travelling from warehouse to ware-
LONDON. 197
house, from basin to basin, inspecting interminable rows of vessels of every size
and description, examining the piles of merchandise imported from every quarter
of the globe, and watching the loading and unloading of vessels, Liverpool
surpasses the capital in the value of its foreign exports, but lags far behind it as a
port for the importation of wine, sugar, and colonial goods of every description.
Altogether London is still the superior of Liverpool, even though the shipping
belonging to its port be of somewhat inferior tonnage
London, outside the City, is not in the enjoyment of municipal institutions,
no doubt because Parliament dreads creating a rival which might overshadow it.
Commercial and financial interests have their natural centres there, but not political
ones. For purposes of local government London is divided into a multitude of dis-
tricts, which in many instances overlap each other. So great are the confusion and
intricacy of these administrative jurisdictions that but few Londoners take the
trouble to penetrate their mystery, and are content to pay the rates and taxes
on condition of being troubled no further. The legislature has handed London
over to the tender mercies of powerful gas, water, and railway companies, and
given life to not a single local representative body strong and powerful enough
to assert the claims of the ratepayers. As recently as 1855 London was governed
by 300 distinct local bodies, counting 10,448 members, and exercising their
authority by virtue of 250 Acts of Parliament.* The City, which alone enjoys
municipal institutions, forms virtually a town within the town, whilst the
remainder of the metropolis is governed by 38 Local Boards or Vestries, 30
Boards of Guardians for the administration of the Poor Laws, a Metro-
politan Board of Works, a School Board, and several other bodies, wholly or in
part elected by the ratepayers. Even the Dean and Chapter of Westminster still
exercise a few remnants of their old municipal functions. These various bodies
count no less than 8,073 members, supported by an army of local officials. But
notwithstanding this strange complication of the official " machinery, and the
financial confusion necessarily resulting from it, London spends less money than
Paris, and is burdened with a smaller debt, which is partly accounted for by
the fact that most of the great public works have been carried out by private
companies, and not by the town.t The Metropolitan Police force + is under the
orders of the Home Secretary, but the City authorities maintain a police of
their own.§
The Metropolitan Board of Works, whose 44 members are elected by the
Corporation of the City of London, and by 38 parishes or local districts, is
the most important of these local governing bodies. It has charge of the main
* Firth, "Municipal London;" Dexter, "The Government of London ; " Raveusiein, "London."
t In 1875 the local authorities of the metropolis, including the City, expended £9,071,000, or
£2 158. 9d, per head of the population. Of this sum municipal and sanitary objects absorbed £6,397,000,
the maintenance of the poor £1,723,000, and public education £895,000. The total debt amounted to
£22,688,000 (Captain Craigie, Journal of the Statistical Society, 1877). In 1878 the Metropolitan Board alone
spent £3,680,000, and had a debt of £10,310.000, whilst the School Board spent £1,189,713.
X 10,900 officers and men. In 1879 83,914 persons were arrested, of whom 33,892 were drunk or
disorderly; 14,562 were charged with burglary, robbery, &c. ; and 10,866 with assaults.
§ 825 officers and men.
198 THE BEITISH ISLES.
drainage, the formation of new streets, the supervision of the gas and water
supply, the fire brigade,* and the public parks and gardens. But, however
great its influence, it is overshadowed by the powerful corporation which has its
seat in the City. In 1835, when the municipalities of the kingdom were reformed,
the City of London was the only place of importance exempted from the opera-
tion of that Act, and it continues to enjoy, up to the present day, its ancient
privileges and immunities. Old English customs are preserved there to an
extent not known elsewhere, except, perhaps, in the decayed municipal boroughs
whose maladministration has only recently been exposed in Parliament. The
City is divided into 26 wards, and these into 207 precincts, the latter consist-
ing sometimes of a single street. The inhabitants of each precinct, whether
citizens or not, meet annually a few days before St. Thomas's Day, when the
afi'airs of the precinct are discussed, and the roll of candidates for election as
common councilmen and inquestmen is made up. The *' Wardmote " meets on
St. Thomas's Day for the election of a common councilman, and of other officials,
including the inquestmen charged with the inspection of weights and measures
and the removal of nuisances. At this meeting only freemen of the City, who
are also on the parliamentary voters' list, have a right to vote. On the Monday
after Twelfth Day the inquestmen of the wards attend before the Court of
Aldermen sitting at the Guildhall, when the common councilmen chosen are
presented. The wardmote likewise elects the aldermen, but for life, and these,
jointly with the common councilmen, form the Court of Common Council, which
thus consists of 233 members, 26 of whom are aldermen. The Lord Mayor,
whose election takes place annually on the 29th of September, presides over the
Courts of Aldermen and of Common Council, as well as over the *' Common Hall "
of the Livery. As a rule the senior alderman who has not served the office is
chosen Lord Mayor, the privilege of nomination being vested in the Common Hall,
that of election in the Court of Aldermen, and the same person generally holds the
office only once for one year. The election is formally approved by the Lord
Chancellor on behalf of the Crown. On the 8th of November the Lord Mayor
elect is sworn in before the Court of Aldermen, and invested with the insignia of
his office, and on the day after, " Lord Mayor's Day," he proceeds in state to the
High Court of Justice, where he takes the oath of allegiance. On his return to
the City the procession is joined by the Judges, her Majesty's Ministers, the
foreign ambassadors, and other distinguished persons, to be entertained at a
magnificent banquet at the Guildhall, the expenses of which are borne jointly by
the Lord Mayor and the two Sheriffs. The Lord Mayor holds the first place in
the City next to the sovereign ; he is, ex officio, a member of the Privy Council,
a Judge of the Central Criminal Court, a Justice of the Peace in the metropolitan
counties. Lord- Lieutenant and Admiral of the Port of London, and Conservator
of the Thames. In order to assist him in keeping up the traditional reputation
of the City for hospitality, he is allowed an annual stipend of £10,000.
* 505 men, with 4 floating fire-engines on the Thames, 32 steam-engines, 112 manual engines, and
129 fire-escapes. Between 1,600 and 1,700 fires break out annually, but of these less than 200 are
described as "serious."
SUEREY. 199
The two Sheriffs are elected by the Livery on Midsummer Day, and their
office, though one of distinction, is costly, for, like their chief, they are expected
to give annually a number of dinners. The Recorder of London is the chief City
judge and official *' orator ; " the Common Serjeant presides in the City of London
Court ; an Assistant Judge in the Lord Mayor's Court. A Chamberlain acts as
City Treasurer.
Most of the great companies date from the thirteenth or fourteenth century,
though they spring, no doubt, from the guilds of Saxon times. Originally they
were associations of persons carrying on the same trade ; but they are so no
longer, and only the Apothecaries, the Groldsmiths, the Gunmakers, and the
Stationers are still charged with the exercise of certain functions connected
with the trade they profess to represent. Out of a total of 79 companies, 73
enjoy the distinction of being " Livery Companies ; " that is, the liverymen
belonging to them are members of the Common Hall. An order of precedence
is rigidly enforced by these companies, at the head of which march the Mercers,
Grocers, Drapers, Fishmongers, Goldsmiths, Skinners, Merchant Taylors, Haber-
dashers, Salters, Ironmongers, Yintners, and Clothworkers. Much has been
fabled about the enormous income of these companies, and there can be no doubt
that they expend large sums in feasting. It must be said to their credit, at the
same time, that all of them support charitable institutions, that several amongst
them maintain excellent schools, and that if they do feast, they do so at their
own expense.
Surrey. — A large portion of this county, with three-fourths of its inhabitants, is
included in the metropolis, and nearly the whole of the remainder of its population
is more or less dependent upon London for its existence. The surface of the
county, with its alternation of hill and dale, is beautifully diversified. The chalk
range of the Downs intersects it through its entire length, forming a bold escarp-
ment towards the fertile valley of the Thames, and merging to the southward
into the Weald, not yet altogether deprived of the woods for which it was
famous in former times. The Thames bounds the county on the north, and
the tributaries which it receives within its limits, including the Wey, Mole,
and Wandle, rise to the south of the Downs, through natural gaps in which
they take their course to the northward. The views commanded from the
Downs and from the hills in the Weald are amongst the most charming in the
neighbourhood of London, that from Leith Hill extending over a wild woodland
scenery to the English Channel, whilst Box Hill,, near Dorking, possesses features
of a more cultivated cast. The Downs are. likewise of some strategical importance
with reference to the metropolis, to the south of which they form a natural
rampart. In the case of an invasion it is believed by military men that the fate
of London will depend upon the results of a battle to be fought in the neighbour-
hood of the " passes " which lead through them at Reigate and Dorking, and
propositions have been freely made to enhance their natural strength by a chain
of detached forts. Considerable portions of Surrey consist of barren heaths and
200 THE BEITISH ISLES.
moorish tracts, but the greater part of the county is devoted to agriculture and
market gardening. Hops are amongst its most appreciated productions. The
manufacturing industry, excepting within the limits of London, is but of small
importance.
The river Wey, which pays its tribute to the Thames below Weybridge,
rises in Wiltshire, and soon after it has entered Surrey flows past the ancient town
of Farnham, which boasts a stately moated castle, the residence of the Bishops of
Winchester, and carries on a brisk trade in hops and malt. The height to the
north of that town is occupied by the camp of Aldershot, whilst below it the Wey
passes Moor Park, where Dean Swift wrote his "Tale of a Tub " and made love to
Stella, Lady Giffard's waiting-maid. Here also are the beautiful ruins of Waverley
Abbey. Between Farnham and Guildford the fertile valley of the Wey is bounded
on the north by the " Hog's Back," a link of the Downs. The river first becomes
navigable at Godalming, which retains some portion of the stocking manufacture
for which it was formerly celebrated, and has recently acquired fresh importance
through the transfer to it of Charterhouse School from London. Below this town the
Wey escapes through a cleft in the Downs. This cleft is commanded by the town
of Guildford, whose antiquity is attested by a Norman castle, a grammar school
dating from the time of Henry VIIL, and an interesting old church. Guildford
has an important corn market, and possesses large breweries. In the beauty of its
environs few towns can rival it, clumps of trees, carefully kept fields, ivy-clad
walls, and shady lanes winding up the hillsides, combining to form a picture of
rural beauty and tranquillity. Only a short distance to the north of the town we
enter a heathy district in the vicinity of Woking. Before leaving this south-western
portion of the county there remains to be noticed the small town of Haslemere,
close to the Hampshire border, which manufactures walking-sticks and turnery.
Dorking, 10 miles to the east of Guildford, commands another gap in the
northern Downs, and is seated amidst much-admired scenery. Near it are Deep-
dene, the seat of Mrs. Hope, full of art treasures, and the "Rookery," where
Malthus was born in 1776. Dorking is noted for its fowls. The Mole, which flows
near the town, derives its name from a chain of •" swallows " into which it
disappears at intervals. It runs past Leafherhead and Cohham, and enters the
Thames at Molesey, opposite Hampton Court Palace.
Heigate, near a third gap in the Downs, which here bound the lovely Holms-
dale on the north, has deservedly grown into favour with London merchants as a
place of residence. Near its suburb Redhill are an Asylum for Idiots and the
Reformatory of the Philanthropic Society. Fuller's earth is dug in the neigh-
bourhood.
Epsom, in a depression on the northern slopes of the Downs, was a resort of
fashion in the seventeenth century, when its medicinal springs attracted numerous
visitors. The famous racecourse lies on the Downs to the south of the town, and
not less than 100,000 persons have assembled on it on Derby Day. Eicell, a
small village near -Epsom, has powder-mills. Near it is Nonsuch Park, with a
castellated mansion, close to the site of an ancient palace of King Henry VIII.
SUEREY.
201
' All the other towns and villages of Surrey are hardly more than suburbs of
the great metropolis. Foremost amongst them in population is Croydon, an
ancient town, with the ruins of a palace of the Archbishop of Canterbury (who
now usually resides in the neighbouring Addiugton Park), an ancient grammar
school, and an old church recently restored. The Wandle, which flows past Croydon,
Fig. 101. — Guildford and Godalmiko.
Scale X : 63,000.
Mile.
affords some good fishing, and in its lower course sets in motion the wheels of the
paper and rice mills of Wandsirorth, a south-western suburb of London. Other
suburbs are Noricood, 3Iitcham, Tooting, and Wimbledon, on the edge of an open
gorse-covered heath, upon which the National Rifle Association holds its annual
gatherings. Amongst the towns and villages seated on the banks of the Thames,
110— E
202 THE BRITISH ISLES.
those of Putney, Kew, Richmond, and Kingston (with Surbiton) are of world-wide
renown. The park near Richmond is nearly 9 miles in circumference, its sylvan
scenery is of extreme beauty, and many fine distant views are commanded from it.
Higher up on the Thames are Molesey, Walton, Weijhridge, Chertsey, and Eghmn.
Kent, a maritime county, stretching from the Lower Thames to the English
Channel, is of varied aspect, and the beauty of its scenery, joined to the variety
and nature of its productions, fairly entitles it to the epithet of "The Garden of
England," aspired to by several of the other counties. The chalky range of the
northern Downs traverses the county from the borders of Surrey to the east coast,
where it terminates in bold cliffs, perpetually undermined by the sea. These Downs
are cleft by the valleys of the rivers which flow northward to the Thames, or into
the sea, and amongst which the Darent, the Medway, and the Stour are the most
important. The country to the north of the Downs consists of gravel and sand
overlying the chalk, but Shooter's Hill (446 feet), near Woolwich, is an insulated
mass of clay. The fertile Holmsdale stretches along the interior scarpment of the
Downs, and separates them from a parallel range of chalk marl and greensand,
which marks the northern limit of the Weald, within which nearly all the rivers
of the county have their source. Extensive marshes occur along the Thames, on
the isles of Grain and Sheppey, along the estuary of the Medway, in the tract which
separates the Isle of Thanet from the bulk of the county, and on the Channel
side, where Romney Marsh, famous for its cattle and sheep, occupies a vast area.
The agricultural productions of Kent are most varied. More hops are grown
there than in any other part of England, and vast quantities of cherries, apples,
strawberries, and vegetables annually find their way to the London market.
Poultry of every sort is large and fine ; the rivers abound in fish ; while the native
oysters bred in the Swale, an arm of the sea which separates the Isle of Sheppey
from the mainland, are most highly appreciated for their delicate flavour.
Kent, owing to its proximity to the continent, was the earliest civilised
portion of England, but is now far surpassed in wealth and population by other
counties. It has nevertheless retained some of its ancient customs and privileges,
secured through the stout resistance which the yeomanry to the west of the Med-
way opposed to the victorious march of the Conqueror. Ever since that time the
inhabitants of the western part of the county have been known as '* Men of Kent,"
those of the eastern division as *' Kentish men." Most remarkable amongst these
privileges is the tenure of land known as *' gavelkind," in virtue of which an
estate descends to all the sons in equal proportions, unless there be a testamentary
disposition to the contrary.
The north- westernmost corner of Kent, including the large towns of Deptford.
Greenwich, and Woolwich, lies within the limits of the metropolis. The famous
dockyard of Deptford, whence Sir Francis Drake started upon his voyages of
adventure, was closed in 1872, and most of its buildings are utilised as cattle-
sheds, sheep-pens, and slaughter-houses, for it is here that all foreign cattle must
be landed and slaughtered, in order that infectious diseases may not gain a footing
in the country through their dispersion. The Ravensbourne, a small river which
KENT. 203
rises in Caesar's Well near Keston, flows past the old market town of Bromley y
drives the mill-wheels of Lewisham, and separates Deptford from Greenwich.
Greenwich is celebrated for its Hospital, consisting of four blocks of buildings erected
from designs by Sir Christopher Wren. The invalided sailors for whom this great
work was erected know it no longer, they being paid a pension instead of being
lodged and boarded, and their place is now occupied by the Royal Naval College
and a Naval Museum. The old refectory, or hall, a magnificent apartment of
noble proportions, is used as a gallery of pictures illustrating England's naval
glories. On a verdant hill which rises in the centre of Greenwich Park, laid
out by Le Notre, there stands an unpretending building. This is the Royal
Observatory, rendered famous by the labours of Flamsteed, Halley, Bradley, and
Maskelyne, who have found a worthy successor in the present Astronomer-Royal.
This Observatory is fitted out with the most costly instruments. The initial meridian
almost universally accepted by mariners throughout the world passes through the
equatorial cupola forming its roof Strange to relate, the exact difference in
longitude between Greenwich and Paris is not yet known. It probably amounts
to 2° 20' 15",* but authorities differ to the extent of 400 feet.
To Greenwich succeeds Woolwich, which owes its growth to its great Arsenal,
its barracks, Military Academy, and other establishments. The Arsenal covers
a very large area, and is a great repository and storehouse, no less than a manu-
factory, of guns, carriages, and warlike materials of every kind, not infrequently
employing 10,000 workpeople. The dockyard was closed in 1869, and is now used
for stores. North Woolwich is on the left bank of the river. Shooter's Hill, to
the south of Woolwich Common, is famous for its views of London and the valley of
the Thames. Charlton, Blackheath, and Lee are populous places between Woolwich
and Greenwich, with numerous villa residences. Chislehurst, a few miles to the
south, beautifully situated on a broad common surrounded by lofty trees, contains
Camden House, once the residence of the antiquary after whom it is named.
Napoleon III. retired to this house, and died there an exile.
Descending the Thames below Woolwdch, we pass village after village along the
Kentish shore, whilst the flat shore of Essex is but thinly peopled. Immediately
below Plumstead Marshes, on which some factories have been established, we
arrive at the pretty village of Erith, close to the river bank, with extensive
ballast pits and iron works in its rear. Dartford, a flourishing place, where paper-
making and the manufacture of gunpowder are extensively carried on, lies on
the river Darent, a short distance above its outfall into the Thames. Other paper-
mills are to be met with at St. Mary^s Cray, on the Cray, which joins the
Darent at Dartford. We next pass Greenhithe, near which, at the Swine's Camp,
(now Swanscombe), the men of Kent, led on by Stigand and Egheltig, offered such
stout resistance to William the Conqueror. Northjieet, with its chalk quarries,
comes next, and then we reach Gravesend, a shipping port of some importance,
situated at the foot of gentle hills. The fisheries furnish the chief employment of
the seafaring population, and most of the shrimps consumed in London are sent
* Hilgard, "United States Coast Survey, Report for 1874."
204 THE BRITISH ISLES.
up from Gravesend. Amongst the many seats in the neighbourhood of this town,
Cobham Hall, in the midst of a magnificent park almost extending to the Medway,
is the most important. The pleasure grounds of Rosherville lie at the upper end
of the town. A ferry connects Gravesend with Tilbury Fort, on the northern
bank of the river, where Queen Elizabeth in 1588 mustered the forces which were
to resist the expected invasion of the Spanish Armada. Tilbury, with other
formidable works of defence on both banks of the river, disposes of means of
destruction which would frustrate any hostile effort to reach London by way of
the Thames.
Serenoaks, in the fruitful tract known as the Holmsdale, in the western part
of the county, is famed for the beauty of its surrounding scenery. Knole, one of
the most interesting baronial mansions, adjoins the town, whilst Chevening, full of
interest on account of its historical associations, with a park extending up to the
far- seen Knockholt beeches, lies 4 miles to the north-west. Westerham, to the
west of Sevenoaks, near the source of the Darent, and Wrotham, to the north-east,
at the southern escarpment of the Downs, are both interesting old market towns.
The Medway, which flows through a region abounding in picturesque scenery,
rises close to the famous old watering-place of Tunbridge Wells, which owes more
to its bracing air than to the medicinal virtues of its hot chalybeate springs. In
the time of Charles II. the visitors to this place were lodged in small cabins
placed upon wheels, and the first church was only built in 1658. The neighbour-
hood abounds in delightful walks, and country seats are numerous. Pemhurst, a
quaint old village, rises on the Medway, 7 miles to the north-east of the Wells.
Near it is Penshurst Place, which Edward VI. bestowed upon his valiant standard-
bearer. Sir William Sidney, amongst whose descendants were Sir Philip, the author
of ''Arcadia," and Algernon Sidney, whose head fell on the block in 1683. The
Eden joins the Medway at Penshurst. A short distance above the junction stands
Hever Castle, the birthplace of the unfortunate Anne Boleyn.
Tunhridge, at the head of the navigation of the Medway, is a town of con-
siderable antiquity, with the remains of a castle (thirteenth century), a grammar
school founded in 1553, and several timbered houses. Wooden articles known as
Tunbridge-ware are made here, and hops are grown in the neighbourhood. The
centre of the Kentish hop gardens, however, is Maidstone, lower down on the
Medway, an interesting old town, with many gabled houses and other ancient
buildings. In 1567 French refugees introduced the linen industry into Maidstone,
but that town is at present noted only for its hop trade. Annually during the
"picking season" thousands of labourers from London invade it and the sur-
rounding villages.
Maidstone is the assize town of the county, but yields in population to the
triple town formed by Rochester, Strood, and Chatham., on the estuary of the
Medway. Pochester is the oldest of these three. It is the Dubris of the ancieat
Britons, the Durobrhw of the Romans, the Rqfsceaster of the Saxons. Close to
the river rises the massive keep of the Norman castle erected in the time of
William the Conqueror by Bishop Gundulph, the same who built the Tower
KENT. 205
of London, as also the cathedral of Rochester. Chatham is a naval and military-
town. Its dockyard is the largest in the kingdom, next to that of Portsmouth,
and has been constructed in a great measure by convict labour. Extensive
lines of fortifications and detached forts envelop the three towns, and no second
De Ruyter would now dare to sail up the Medway and carry off the vessels
sheltered by its fortifications.
Not the least formidable of these have been erected at the mouth of the
Medway, 10 miles below Chatham, on the isles of Grain and Sheppey. The
former is in reality only a peninsula, whilst the latter is separated from the rest
of the county by a shallow arm of the sea, known as the Swale. Sheerness
occupies the north-west point of the island, and its guns command the entrances
Fig. 102. — ROCHESTEK AND CHATHAM.
Scale 1 : 250,000.
^^w
^^^
te^^ •^#-
0-25'
0'3Q'
E.ofG.
2 Miles.
of both the Thames and the Medway. The site of the town, a quaking swamp,
which had to be solidified by piles before houses could be built upon it, is by no
means healthy by nature, but by planting pines the sanitary conditions of the
town and its neighbourhood have been much improved. Queenhorough, close to
Sheerness, has recently come into notice as the point whence a mail-steamer daily
departs for Flushing. The stream of passengers, however, flows past this ancient
town without leaving any mark upon it. At Siftingbourne the train which
conveys them to London joins the main line from Dover. Sittingbourne, and its
neighbour Milton, the latter at the head of a small creek, have paper-mills,
breweries, brick-kilns, and malting-houses. Faversham, at the head of another
creek, like that of Milton tributary to the Swale, has paper-mills, brick-kilns.
206 THE BRITISH ISLES.
gun-cotton and gunpowder works, and oyster beds. It is the shipping port of
Canterbury, and a place of considerable antiquity, with an old abbey church of
great size and beauty. Whitdable, another shipping port of Canterbury, lies
farther to the east, and is principally noticeable for its oyster beds. The owners
of the oyster fisheries here have formed a co-operative association, which divides
the produce of the fisheries amongst its members.
The northern coast of Kent, and more especially the Isle of Thanet, presenting
its bold cliffs towards the German Ocean, abounds in watering-places much
frequented by London pleasure-seekers. Heme Bay, though of recent origin, is
rapidly rising into importance. A few miles to the east of it the towers of
Eeculver Church form a prominent landmark (see p. 151). Margate, on the
northern coast of the Isle of Thanet, is one of the most popular watering-places
in the neighbourhood of London. Doubling the North Foreland, with its far-seen
lighthouse, we pass Broadstairs, a quiet place, with excellent sands for bathing,
and reach Ramsgate, a town which is almost as much frequented as Margate, and
which has an excellent harbour. Pegwell Bay, which adjoins it on the south, is
noted for its shrimps.
The river Stour is tributary at present to the bay just named, but formerly
flowed into the arm of the sea which separated the Isle of Thanet from the
mainland. Sandicich, a very interesting old town, with many curious buildings,
stands on the alluvial tract through which the Stour takes its winding course.
Formerly it was a place of very considerable importance, ranking next to Hastings
amongst the Cinque Ports, but the alluvial soil washed down by the river has
silted up the " Haven," and the sea lies now at a distance of 2 miles. A short
distance to the north of it rise the ruins of the Roman castle of Rutupice (Rich'
borough), perhaps the most striking relic of old Rome existing in Britain. Near
its head the Stour flows past Ashford, where there are the extensive railway works
of the South-Eastern Company; but the largest town within its basin, and historically
the most interesting of all Kent, is Canterbury^ the Durovernum of the Romans.
Canterbury is perhaps the oldest seat of Christianity in England, and the venerable
church of St. Martin's, with its ivy-clad tower, partly constructed of Roman
bricks, has been styled the " mother church of England," and dates back to pre-
Saxon times. Since the days of St. Augustine, Canterbury has been the seat of
the Primate of all England, though at present the Archbishop's principal residence
is Lambeth Palace in London. Churches and ecclesiastical buildings of every kind
abound in Canterbury, and constitute its individuality. The bold mass of the
cathedral towers above all. Founded in 1070, but destroyed by fire in 1174, the
vast edifice has been almost completely rebuilt since the latter year. The
church, as it were " a cathedral within a cathedral," is the work of William of
Sens (1174—1182), and the oldest example of the pointed style in England. The
choir is rich in precious monuments, including that of Edward the Black Prince.
The shrine of Thomas a Becket, who was slain at the foot of the altar by order of
Henry II. for braving the royal authority (1170), was a goal which attracted
pilgrims from all parts of the world, and Canterbury grew rich on the ofl'erings of
KENT. 207
all Christendom. Canterbury no longer holds its ancient rank as a place of
commerce and industry, notwithstanding the navigable river upon which it stands
and the five railways which converge upon it. As a wool and hop market it is
still of some importance, but the industries introduced by French or Flemish
refugees in the sixteenth century have ceased to be carried on, and the population
diminishes. But notwithstanding this, Canterbury, with its many churches and
ancient walls, now converted into public walks, remains one of the most interesting
and picturesque towns of England.
The smiling town of Deal rises on the east coast of Kent, opposite the dreaded
Goodwin Sands, and is separated from them by the roadstead of the Downs. The
boatmen of Deal are renowned for their daring, and only too frequently are their
services called into requisition by vessels in distress. Of the three castles which
Henry YIII. built for the defence of the town, that of Sandown was pulled down
in 1862, owing to the inroads made by the sea, that of Deal is now in private
occupation, whilst Walmer Castle continues the official residence of the Lord
Warden of the Cinque Ports — an honorary office, held in succession by some of
the most distinguished men of the kingdom. The great Duke of Wellington died
in this castle in 1852.
Dover, which retains in French its ancient Celtic appellation of Douvres,
occupies a commanding position directly opposite to the cliffs rising along the coast
of France. It is one of those towns which, notwithstanding historical vicissitudes,
the shifting of sandbanks, and the changes of currents, are able to maintain their
rank as places of commerce. Its port, at the mouth of the Dour, which enters
the sea betw^een steep cliffs, offers the greatest facilities to vessels crossing the
strait. Dover is the only one of the Cinque Ports which has not merely retained its
traffic, but increased it, and this is exclusively due to the mail-steamers which
several times daily place it in communication with Calais and Ostend.* Dover
Harbour scarcely suffices for the many vessels which fly to it during stress of
weather, and proposals for its enlargement are under discussion. The Admiralty
Pier is a noble work, extending 700 feet into the sea. It is composed of
enormous rectangular blocks, formed into a wall rising perpendicularly from the
sea. A vertical pier like this is exposed to all the fury of the waves lashed by a
storm, but the recoiling waves enable vessels to keep at a safe distance. A
powerful fort has been erected at the termination of the pier ; for Dover is a
fortress, no less than a place of trade. A picturesque castle occupies a command-
ing site to the north. It consists of structures of many different ages, including
even a Roman pharos, or watch-tower. Other heights, crowned with batteries and
forts, command the castle. Only a short distance to the north of Dover, near
St. Margaret's Bay and the South Foreland, preliminary works, with a view to the
construction of a railway tunnel between France and England, have been carried
out. It can no longer be doubted that this great work is capable of realisation.
The rocks through which the tunnel is to pass are regularly bedded., and without
* Over 180,000 passengers annually cross from Dover to Calais, as compared with 135,000 who go
from Folkestone to Boulogne.
208
THE BRITISH ISLES.
"faults.'' Will our generation, fully occupied in wars and armaments, leave the
honour of once more joining England to the continent to the twentieth century ?
Folkestone, under the shelter of a chalky range known as the " backbone " of
Kent, possesses advantages superior to those of Dover as n, watering-place, but ranks
far behind it as a place of commerce. Its trade with Boulogne is, nevertheless,
of considerable importance, and its fine harbour affords excellent accommodation
to mail-steamers and smaller craft. Folkestone was the birthplace of Harvey, the
discoverer of the circulation of the blood, whose memory has been honoured by the
foundation of a scientific institution. Walking along the top of the cliffs which
extend to the west of Folkestone, we pass the pretty village of Sandgate and
Fig. 103.— Dover.
Scale 1 : 110,000.
Depth under 5 JTathoms,
5 to 1 1 Fathoms.
11 to 16 Fathoms.
^— ^ 2 Miles.
Over 16 Fathoms.
ShorncUffe camp, and reach Hythe, one of the Cinque Ports. Hythe signifies
" port," but the old town is now separated by a waste of shingles from the sea, and
its commerce has passed over to its neighbour, Folkestone. Hythe is the seat of
a School of Musketry, and the low coast westward is thickly studded with rifle-
butts. The "Royal Military Canal extends from Hythe to Eye, in Sussex, and
bounds the Eomney Marsh, famous for its sheep, on the landward side. The
principal town in this tract of rich meadow land is New Romney, one of the Cinque
Ports, though now at a distance of more than a mile from the sea. Ujdd and
Dymchurch are mere villages, interesting on account of their antiquity. There
now only remains to be mentioned the ancient municipal borough of Tenterden, in
a fertile district on a tributary of the Rother.
ESSEX. 209
Essex is a maritime county, separated from Kent by the Thames and its
estuary, from Middlesex and Hertfordshire by the rivers Lea and Stort, and from
Suffolk by the Stour. Of the rivers which drain the interior of the county,
the Roding flows into the Thames, whilst the Crouch, Blackwater, and Colne
are directly tributary to the German Ocean. These latter expand into wide
estuaries, forming convenient harbours, and are famous for the breeding of
oysters. The surface of the country is for the most part undulating. A small
tract of chalk occurs in the north-west, but loam and clay predominate, and
form gentle slopes. The coast is much indented and broken up into flat
islands. It is fringed by marshes protected by sea-walls and drainage works.
Most of the ancient forests have been extirpated, and it is only quite recently
that the most picturesque amongst them, that of Epping, narrowly escaped
destruction through the public-spirited action of the Corporation of London.
Agriculture constitutes the chief occupation, the requirements of the metro-
politan markets largely influencing its character. Manufactures, particularly
of baize, were formerly carried on upon a large scale, but are now of small
importance. The flsheries, however, together with the breeding and feeding of
oysters, constitute one of the sources of wealth.
West Ham, which includes Stratford and other places near the river Lea, in
the south-western corner of the county, is, properly speaking, an eastern suburb
of the metropolis, where numerous industries, some of them not of the most
savoury nature, are carried on. The Royal Victoria and Albert Docks here
extend for nearly 3 miles along the northern bank of the Thames, between the
Lea and North Woolwich, and near them are iron works, ship- yards, and chemical
works. Stratford has extensive railway works, oil and grease works, gutta percha
factories, and distilleries. Plaistow is noted for its market gardens. Walthamstow,
a short distance to the north, and on the western edge of Epping Forest, early
became a favourite residence with opulent citizens, and has still many quaint old-
fashioned mansions embowered in trees. Waltham, on the Lea, is famed for the
remains of its ancient abbey. An old bridge connects that part of the parish
which lies in Essex with Waltham Cross, in Hertfordshire, named from one of the
crosses erected to mark the resting-places of Queen Eleanor's body. The Govern-
ment gunpowder-mills are built above Waltham Abbey, on a branch of the Lea.
They cover an area of 160 acres, and the various buildings are separated by
meadows and woods, as a safeguard against accidents. Harlow, now a quiet market
town on the Stort, a tributary of the Lea, formerly carried on the manufacture of silk.
Epping Forest, which lies between the Lea and the Upper Roding, is named
after a pleasant market town, the vicinity of which is famed for its dairy farms.
Descending the Roding, we pass Chipping Ongar, Wanstead, Ilford, and Barking,
where are the remains of a Cistercian abbey, not far above the mouth of the
river. Romford, on the Rom, which enters the Thames lower down, is well known
for its brewery. The ancient town of Brentwood lies to the east of it, in the
midst of fine scenery. Its old Elizabethan assize-house is at present in the
occupation of a butcher. There is a grammar school, founded in 1557.
210 THE BRITISH ISLES.
There are no towns of note along the Essex bank of the Thames. Hainham,
on the river Ingrebourne, about a mile from it, is the heart of a fertile market-
gardening district. It has an early Norman church. Purfleet is merely a small
village, with lime and chalk quarries, and a Government powder magazine.
Tilbury, opposite Gravesend, with its old fort, has already been referred to. Thames
Raven, joined to London by a railway, has not acquired the hoped-for importance,
since foreign cattle are now obliged to be landed at Deptford ; and only Southend,
near the mouth of the Thames, has made any progress as a watering-place. At
Shoehiiryness, 3 miles to the east of it, a Royal School of Gunnery for artillery
practice has been established.
The only towns on the Crouch are Billericay, a pretty market town, and
Burnham, which engages in fishing and oyster-breeding, on the estuary of the
river.
The Blackwater rises in the north-western part of the county, and flows
past Braintree, Coggeshall, Kelvedon, and Witham to Maldon, where it is joined
by the Chelmer. Braintree is an old town, with narrow streets and many timbered
houses. The manufacture of crape and silk is still extensively carried on there,
and in the adjoining village of Booking. Coggeshall has manufactories of silk,
plush, and velvets. The remains of the Cistercian abbey founded here by King
Stephen in 1142 are scanty. Near Kelvedon is Tiptree Hall, Mr. Mechi's
experimental farm, which attracts strangers from every part of the world. Maldon
occupies a steep eminence by the river Chelmer. Its port is accessible to vessels of
200 tons burden, and a brisk coasting trade is carried on through it. Maldon is a
very ancient town, and amongst its buildings are a church of the thirteenth
century with a triangular tower, and a town-hall of the reign of Henry VII.
Malting, brewing, and salt-making are carried on. Near the town are the remains
of Billeigh Abbey, and below it, at the mouth of the Blackwater, is the village of
Bradtvell, the site of the Roman Othona.
Chelmsford, the county town, stands at the junction of the navigable Chelmer
with the Cann. St. Mary's Church, partly dating back to the fifteenth century,
the free school endowed by Edward YI., the museum and shire-hall, are the
most interesting buildings. Chief Justice Tindal, whose statue stands in front
of the shire-hall, was a native of Chelmsford. Agricultural machinery is made,
and the trade in corn is of importance. Great Bunmow and Thaxted are market
towns on the Upper Chelmer, and both have interesting old churches.
Colchester, on the Colne, 8 miles above its mouth at Brightlingsea, is
the largest town in Essex, and occupies the site of Colonia Camelodumm, the
first Roman colony in Great Britain. Ample remains of Roman times still
exist in the town wall ; whilst the keep of the old Norman castle, double
the size of the White Tower of London, the ruins of St. Botolph's Priory
Church, and St. John's Abbey Gate, the last relic of a Benedictine monastery
founded in 1096, adequately represent, the Middle Ages. The museum in the
chapel of the castle is rich in Roman and other antiquities. The Port or
'* Hythe " of Colchester is too shallow to admit the huge vessels in which most
ESSEX.
211
of the world's commerce is carried on now, and the maritime trade is consequently
not of very great importance ; nor is the silk industry in a flourishing condition.
The celebrated Colchester oysters are taken in the Colne, and fattened on
" layings'' at Wivenhoe and Brightlingsea, or carried to the oyster parks of
Ostend. Halstead, on the Upper Colne, has silk and crape mills.
Sailing along the coast, we pass Clacton and Walton-on- the- Naze , two small
watering-places, and reach the ancient seaport and bprough of Harwich, built in a
Fig. 104.— Harwich and Ipswich and their Estuaries.
Scale 1 : 325,000.
,a| 80
an E.ofG.
mwm
Foreshore.
Depth under 2^
Fathoms.
2\ to 5 Fathoms
Over 5 Fathoms.
4 MUes.
commanding position at the confluence of the Stour and the Orwell. The harbour of
Harwich is the best on the east coast of England, and during the wars with the
Dutch it played a prominent part. Through the establishment of a regular line
of steamers, which connect it with Antwerp and Rotterdam, it has recently
acquired importance as a place of commerce. Landguard Fort and several
batteries defend its approaches. Dovercourt is a pleasant watering-place a short
distance above Harwich. Marwingtree, at the head of the estuary of the Stour,
carries on some trade in malt.
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CHAPTER YII.
EAST ANGLIA.
(Suffolk and Norfolk.)
General Features.
HE two counties of Norfolk and Suffolk form a distinct geographical
region, extending along the shore of the German Ocean, from the
shallow bay known as the Wash as far as the estuary of the
Stour. Originally these counties were conquered and settled by
the Angles, and, together with Cambridgeshire, they formed the
kingdom of East Anglia, which submitted in 823 to the sovereignty of the King
of Wessex, but was for a considerable time afterwards governed by its own kings
or ealdormen. Subsequently many Danes settled in the country, which was
included in the " Danelagh."
In East Anglia we meet with no elevations deserving even the name of hills.
The bulk of the country is occupied by chalky downs, known as the East Anglian
Heights, and forming the north-eastern extremity of the range of chalk which
traverses the whole of England from Dorsetshire to the Hunstanton cliffs, on the
Wash. Towards the west these heights form an escarpment of some boldness, but
in the east they subside gradually, and on approaching the coast sink under
tertiary beds of London clay and crag.
The principal rivers are the Orwell, the Deben, the Aide, the Yare, and the
Waveney. The two latter flow into Breydon Water, a shallow lake 4 miles in
length, from which the united stream is discharged into the North Sea at Great
Yarmouth. Formerly the Waveney had a natural outfall farther south, through
Lake Lothing, near Lowestoft ; but a bar of shingle and sand having formed at its
mouth, it became necessary to construct a canal in order to afford vessels direct
access to the upper part of the river. The western portion of the country is
drained by the Ouse and its tributaries.
In no other part of England do we meet with so many marks of geological
agencies as in East Anglia. At one period the Yare and Waveney expanded iDto
a wide arm of the sea, whilst now they traverse broad plains abounding in marshy
EAST ANGLIA.
213
flats, locally known as ''broads" or *' meres." This gain upon the sea appears,
however, to have been more than counterbalanced by losses suflPered along parts of
the coast where the sea, for centuries past, has been encroaching upon the land.
The climate of East Anglia is colder, and the rainfall less than in the remainder
Fig. 105. — Gkeat Yaiimouth and Lowestoft.
From an Admiralty Chart.
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of England ; but the soil is nevertheless productive, and agriculture is carried on
with remarkable success, 80 per cent, of the total area being under cultivation.
Wheat and barley are the principal crops grown. The manufactures established by
Flemish and Huguenot refugees were of considerable importance formerly, but they
214^ THE BRITISH ISLES.
have now declined. The fisheries, however, still yield a considerable revenue,
notwithstanding that Yarmouth is no longer the centre of the herring trade,
having in a large measure been supplanted by Peterhead and other Scotch towns.
Topography.
Suffolk, the country of the "South Folk," is bounded on the south by the
Stour, which separates it from Essex, and on the north by the Waveney, which
divides it from Norfolk, and extends from the German Ocean in the east to the
lowlands of Cambridgeshire in the west. Its principal rivers flow to the German
Ocean, but the western portion of the county is drained by the Lark, which is
tributary to the Ouse.
Haverhill and Clare are small market towns in the upper valley of the
Stour. Both engage in silk and coir weaving, and Clare possesses, moreover, the
ruins of an ancient Norman stronghold, aiid of a priory of Augustine friars founded
in 1248 by one of the Earls of Clare. At Sudbury the Stour becomes navigable
for barges. This town was one of the first in which Flemish weavers established
themselves, and the manufacture of silk and crape still gives employment to many
of its inhabitants. Thomas Gainsborough, the artist, was born here, Hadleigh, on
the Brett, an affluent of the Stour, was one of the ancient centres of the woollen
trade, and the neighbouring villages of Kersey and Lindsey are supposed to have
given their names to certain well-known fabrics.
Ipswich, the capital town of the county, stands at the head of the estuary of
the Orwell, and its docks are accessible to vessels drawing 15 feet of water. It
is a picturesque place, with fourteen churches and several interesting old buildings.
It was distinguished at one time for its linen trade, and is still a busy place,
with famous works for the manufacture of agricultural implements and other
industrial establishments. Its coasting trade is very considerable. Stowmarket
is a thriving town near the head of the Gipping, which enters the estuary of the
Orwell. It has a gun-cotton factory.
Woodbridge, at the head of the estuary of the Deben^ occupies a position analogous
to that of Ipswich, but is a place of very inferior importance, though enjoying
a great reputation amongst horse-breeders. Travelling northward along the coast,
we pass Orford, with the remains of a fanious old castle, on the estuary of the Aide,
at the back of Orford Ness ; Aldeburgh, or Aldborough, a small seaport and fishing
station, the birthplace of Crabbe, the poet ; Dunwich, a place of importance
formerly, but now merely a small watering-place ; and Southwoldf noted for its
mild climate. In Southwold or Sole Bay w^as fought in 1672 a great naval battle
between the allied English and French fleets and the Dutch.
Lowestoft is picturesquely seated upon an eminence to the north of the canal
which joins Lake Lothing and the Waveney to the sea. It is a curious old place,
with narrow streets, or '-scores," and gardens sloping down to the "Denes," a
deserted tract of shingle intervening between the cliff's and the sea. New
Lowestoft, one of the most cheerful watering-places of England, lies to the south
SUFFOLK.
215
of 'the harbour. For its prosperity Lowestoft is almost exclusively dependent
upon seaside visitors and its herring fishery, which employs 350 boats. Its
harbour is formed by two vast piers, and a canal connects it with Lake Lothing,
which thus constitutes an inner harbour. Beccks and Bungay are towns pleasantly
seated upon the navigable Waveney. They both carry on a brisk trade in corn,
and Bungay engages, moreover, in the silk trade and in book-printing.
Bury St. Edimmds, the capital of Western Suffolk, occupies a pleasant position
near the head of the river Lark, and is famed for its Salubrity. It acquired fame
and wealth as the resting-place of St. Edmund, King of East Anglia, who was slain
by the Danes about the year 870. Its abbey became one of the wealthiest and
most powerful in England, and its remains, including a great Norman tower built in
1090, are even now of great interest. But though Bury has ceased to be the great
religious centre of Eastern England, and wealth is no longer poured in its lap by
Fitr. 106.— NouMAN TowEH AND Ahbey : BuuY St. Edmunds.
crowds of pilgrims, it is still a prosperous place, carrying on a large trade in corn,
brewing an excellent ale, and manufacturing agricultural machinery. Ichvorth,
in its neighbourhood, is a residence of the Marquis of Bristol, and, standing on high
ground, it forms a conspicuous landmark.
Thetford, on the Little Ouse, to the north of Bury, is one of the most ancient
settlements in the eastern counties, and was a chief residence of the East- Anglian
kings. In the reign of Edward III. it is said to have contained twenty churches
and eight monasteries, and the colossal earthworks which cover the " Mount,'' or
''Castle Hill," bear witness to its former importance. It has settled down now
into a quiet market-place, depending upon the neighbouring farmers for its existence.
Newmarket, on the western border of the county, and partly in Cambridgeshire,
is famous as the " metropolis of the turf," and the virtual head-quarters of the
Jockey Club. Newmarket Heath, the site of the racecourse, lies to the west of
216
THE BRITISH ISLES.
the town. Seven meetings take place annually — the Craven, on Easter Monday,
and the Houghton on the 3rd of October, being the most famous. There are
numerous stables belonging to trainers in the outskirts of the town, and about 400
horses are kept in them during the greater part of the year.
Norfolk, the country of the " j^orth Folk," is occupied for the greater part by
the East Anglian heights, and most of its rivers wend their way eastward to the
Ware, and, having been gathered in Breydon Water, are discharged into the
German Ocean at Great Yarmouth. The western portion of the county, however,
forms part of the district of the Fens, and is drained by the sluggish Ouse.
Norwich, the capital, is seated on the river Wensum, the chief feeder of the
Yare, and is one of the most interesting cities of England. The Norman keep of
Fig. 107.— NoKwicH Cathedral.
the castle, towering over a lofty mound, forms the most conspicuous feature of the
town. It is used now as a gaol. Near it stands the modern shire-hall, and at
its foot an extensive cattle market. The cathedral, in the main a Norman edifice,
the first stone of which was laid in 1096, stands on the low ground near the river,
which is here spanned by a venerable bridge constructed in 1395. In addition,
there are numerous churches dating back to the fourteenth century, and to a
stranger not deterred by the intricacy of its streets, Norwich presents many
other buildings full of interest. Foremost amongst these are the Guildhall in the
market-place, St. Andrew's Hall in an old monastery, the Bishop's palace within
NORFOLK.
217
the cathedral precincts, and a grammar school lodged in an ancient charnel-house.
There are also fragments of the old walls and gates. The town possesses a public
library of 40,000 volumes, a museum, and a Literary Institution. Placed in the
centre of a fruitful agricultural district, famous for its cattle and the beauty of its
horses, it is only natural that Norwich should have become a great mart of
agricultural produce ; but it is at the same time a manufacturing town of no
mean importance, although in this respect it is now merely the shadow of its
Fig. 108.— Norwich.
Prom the Ordnance Map. Scale 1 : 30,663.
1 Mile.
former self. In the sixteenth century about four thousand Flemings, driven from
their homes by the Spanish Inquisition, settled in Norwich and introduced the
woollen trade. These were subsequently joined by French Huguenots skilled in
making brocades and velvets as well as clocks and watches. In Defoe's time the
city and its neighbourhood employed 120,000 workmen in its woollen and silk
manufactures. In the present day the staple trade of Norwich is boot and shoe-
making. Besides this the manufacture of bombasins, crapes, camlets, and other
fabrics of worsted, mohair, and silk, is carried on, and there are oil-cake factories
111— E
218 THE BRITISH ISLES.
and mustard works. The river below the town has been made navigable for
vessels drawing 10 feet of water, but Great Yarmouth is virtually its seaport.
One of the decayed seats of the linen and woollen industry is Af/kham, 10
miles to the north of Norwich, at the head of the navigation of the Bure, a cheerful
town in a well- wooded country, known as the " Garden of Norfolk." Near it
are the villages of North Walsham and Worstead, the latter notable as the place
where Flemings first manufactured tbe fabric known as worsted. East Dereham
and Wi/mondham are towns to tbe west of Norwich, the former a flourish-
ing place surrounded by market gardens and orchards, tbe latter of no note
since the dissolution of the Benedictine priory around which it grew up. The
poet Cowper lies buried in the fine old parish chlirch of East Dereham. i>m, on
the Waveney, is a quaint old market town with a remarkable church.
We have stated above that the great rivers of Norfolk converge upon Brey-
don Water, and thus Great Yarinouth, which occupies a flat tongue of land at the
mouth of the Yare, possesses considerable advantages for carrying on an extensive
commerce. The town consists of two portions — the old town, which faces the
Yare, and the modern town, opening on the Marine Parade. A quay, planted
with lime-trees and lined with curious old houses, extends for nearly a mile along
the river, and terminates in the south with the Nelson Column, a Doric pillar 144
feet in height, and surmounted by a statue of Britannia. This is the busy part of
the town, whilst the Parade, with its two piers, is the chief place of resort for the
numerous excursionists who visit the town during the summer months. But it
is neither as a watering-place nor as a commercial port that Yarmouth prospers
most, for its wealth depends upon its herring and mackerel fisheries, which employ
a large part of the population. As early as the thirteenth century, and long before
Beukelszoon's alleged invention, the fishermen of Yarmouth knew how to cure the
herrings they caught. The inhabitants of the town claim to be descended from a
Danish colony which established itself on this coast soon after the Saxon
conquest. Many words of Scandinavian origin are preserved in the local dialect.
Thus the navigable channels between the banks which skirt the coast are known
as " Gats," as on the coast of Denmark. Yarmouth .Roads, which are protected by
these sand-banks from the fury of the North Sea, present the only secure anchorage
between the Humber and the Thames, and whole fleets of colliers and coasting
vessels may sometimes be seen riding there.
Cromer is a pretty fishing and watering place on the north coast of Norfolk,
which here forms cliffs nearly 200 feet in height. Its vicinity furnishes ample
proof of the rapidity with which the cliffs are being undermined by the sea, for
landslips meet the eye in every direction. Clet/, or Clej/ton-next-the-Sea, to the
west of Cromer, is a small seaport in an uninteresting flat country. Wells-next-
the-Sea, on a small creek which forms an indifferent harbour, carries on some
trade in corn, coals, timber, and salt. Near it is Holkham Hall, the magnificent
seat of the Earl of Leicester. It has a memorial column erected to Mr. Coke,
who was deservedly honoured for the agricultural improvements he introduced,
and was created Earl of Leicester in 1837.
NORFOLK. 219
King's Lynn is the principal town in that part of the county which is drained by
the river Ouse. In former times it was a place of considerable importance, and
carried on a great trade with Flanders, the Hanse Towns, and the Baltic ports ;
but its commerce fled when its harbour became silted up. Kecently, however,
a navigable channel has been constructed through the mud and sand-banks
which intervene between the town and the "deeps" of the Wash, and vessels
of 300 tons can now enter the Alexandra Docks with every high tide. Flax-
dressing and machine-making are carried on in the town, and sand, used in the
manufacture of glass, is enumerated amongst the articles of export. There are
several quaint old buildings, including a Guildhall, and a custom-house "that might
have been bodily imported from Flanders ; " and one of the ancient town gates
still remains. Sandringham, a country seat of the Prince of Wales, lies about 8
miles to the north of Lynn. Downham Market, on the Ouse above Lynn, carries
on a brisk trade in butter. Swajfham, in the upland to the east of the Ouse, is a
well-built market town. Castle Acre, with the picturesque remains of a priory,
lies about 4 miles to the north of it.
CHAPTER VIII.
THE BASIN OF THE WASH.
(Bedfordshire, Cambridgeshire, Huntingdonshire, Northamptonshire, Rutland, Lincolnshire.)
General Features.
HESE are the Englisli Netherlands, and one of the districts even
bears the name of Holland — and that with perfect justice. The
aspect of the two countries is precisely the same. As in Holland,
so in the district of the Fens, the country forms a perfect level,
and a traveller sees trees, houses, windmills, and other elevated
objects rise gradually above the horizon, like ships on the ocean. The country of
the Fens occupies an area of nearly 1,200 square miles, and it is intersected by
innumerable artificial water channels — some of them broad like rivers, and capable
of bearing large vessels, others mere drains, whose direction is indicated from afar
by a fringe of reeds. The waters would flood nearly the whole of this region if
artificial means were not employed to get rid of the excess. The coast, the rivers,
and the canals are lined by embankments, which prevent the water from invading
the adjoining fields and meadows. Trees are scarce ; only willows are reflected in
the sluggish waters, and here and there clumps of verdure surround the isolated
homesteads. The soil of English Holland is also the same as that of the Nether-
lands. In a few localities clayey soil of exceeding fertility slightly rises above
the surrounding plain, and here the most ancient villages of the country are
found. As a rule, the soil consists of peat, which has gradually been trans-
formed by cultivation. The district of the Fens lies, moreover, at a higher
level than the greater part of veritable Holland. It has been raised by warp-
ing, and as there are no " polders " whose level is inferior to that of the sea,
the danger from inundation is very much less. In 1613, however, several villages
were overwhelmed by a flood, and an extensive tract of productive land converted
temporarily into a marsh, but since that time the sea has not again broken through
the embankments which form its bounds. The rainfall is less considerable than in
the Netherlands,* and the floods of the small rivers which intersect the lowlands
* Average rainfall in the basin of the Wash .... 22 inches.
»» ,. Holland 27 „
THE BASIN OF THE WASH.
221
borderiug upon the Wash are consequently not at all comparable to those of the
Meuse or Rhine. Hence the inhabitants of the country of the Fens have not
recently been called upon to contest with the elements the possession of the soil
which bears their habitations.
The geological history of the two countries is the same, for the sea has struggled
for the possession of both. Near Peterborough, at a distance of 25 miles from
the actual coast, oysters and molluscs have been found in large quantities, mingled
with fresh-water shells. In Whittlesea Mere, now drained, the bones of seals
have been discovered by the side of those of other animals, and at Waterbeach,
Fig. 109.— The Wash.
Scale 1 : 240.000.
Fcoreshore.
Depth over 10
Fathoms.
5 Miles.
within 10 miles of Cambridge, the remains of a whale have been unearthed.
There can be no doubt that the whole of this district of the Fens was formerly
covered by the sea, and formed a huge marine estuary.* But at the glacial epoch
the country had already emerged, for everywhere beneath the recent alluvial deposits
we meet with gravels and boulder clay, and at that time a broad plain probably
united England to the continent, f Even after the glacial epoch, when oscillation
of the soil and erosive action of the sea had completely changed the face of the
country, the district of the Fens yet retained a sufficient elevation to become the
♦ Evans, " Ancient Stone Implements of Great Britain."
t Ramsay, "Physical Geology and Geography of Great Britain."
222 THE BRITISH ISLES.
residence of human beings. This is proved by the flint weapons and implements
which, together with fresh-water shells and the bones of oxen and mammoths, have
been discovered on the river terraces along the Ouse.
The peat of the Fens in several places attains a thickness of lO feet. As in
the peat of the Netherlands, there are embedded in it the remains of ancient
forests, the bones of wild boars, stags, and beavers, and more rarely weapons
and boats which belonged perhaps to the ancient Britons. It has been noticed that
the most elevated peat yields oak, whilst that nearer the sea conceals only ancient
forests of fir.* In proportion as the soil subsides these buried trunks of trees
come to be nearer the surface, just as in Holland, and very frequently the plough-
share strikes against them. There are localities where the wood recovered from
the peat sufiices for the construction of fences'.
The embankment and reclamation of these lowlands were begun more than
eighteen hundred years ago. An old embankment, traces of which are still visible
a few miles from the actual coast-line, connects all those towns which are known
to have been Roman stations. The Normans raised powerful dykes along the
river Welland for the protection of the adjoining flats, but the drainage works on a
really large scale date back no further than the seventeenth century, and were
carried out by a company formed by the Earl of Bedford. It is from this circum-
stance that a large portion of the Fen country is known as the Bedford Level. Later
on Dutchmen, taken prisoners in a naval battle fought in 1652, were employed in
the construction of canals and dykes, and the lessons then conveyed proved very
profitable. Not a decade has passed since without the extent of cultivable land
having been increased at the expense of the sea. A line drawn through the ancient
towns of Wainfleet, Boston, Spalding, Wisbeach, and King's Lynn approximately
marks the direction of the coast in the Middle Ages. The towns named have
travelled inland, as it were, ever since, and new dykes and embankments are for
ever encroaching upon the bay of the Wash. Propositions have even been made
for blotting out that indenture of the sea altogether. Natural obstacles would not
prevent such a work from being carried to a happy conclusion, for the Wash is
encumbered with banks of sand and mud, which would assist such an embank-
ment. Many of the towns, villages, and homesteads whose names terminate
in " beach," " sea," " mere," or " ey," proving that formerly they were close to the
sea, and even on islands in the midst of it, now lie 5, 10, or even 30 miles
inland, and a few shallow meres are all that remain of an estuary which at
one time extended inland as far as the Cam, Huntingdon, Peterborough, and
Lincoln.
The islands which rose in the midst of this estuary were formerly of great
historical importance, for they proved an asylum to the persecuted of every race.
Quaking bogs and marshes enabled Ditmarschers, Frieslanders, and Batavians to
maintain their independence for a considerable time ; and similarly the inhabitants
of the Fen country, too, repeatedly endeavoured to throw off" the yoke of their
♦ John Algernon Clarke, " On the Great Level of the Fens " {Journal of the Agricultural Society of
England, vol. viii.).
THE BASIN OF THE WASH. 228
masters. They might have finally succeeded in this had their half-drowned
lands been more extensive, and the facilities for communicating with the continent
greater. When the Saxons invaded England the people of the Fens fled to the
islands of Ely, Rams-ey, Thorn-ey, and others, and for a considerable time they
resisted successfully. At a later date the Saxons and Angles established their
" Camp of Refuge " in the Isle of Ely, and under the leadership of Hereward they
repeatedly routed their Norman oppressors, until the treachery of the ecclesiastics
of Ely put an end to their resistance.* But the spirit of independence in the
Fig, 110. — The Fens of Wisbeach and Peterborough.
Scale 1 : 182,000.
3 Miles
people was not wholly crushed ; it rallied many of them to Cromwell's standard
in 1645, and survives to the present day.
The Ouse, Nen, Welland, and Witham, which traverse this lowland region,
have frequently changed their channels even within historical times. They can
hardly be said to take their course through valleys, but rather spread themselves
over wide flats, and before they had been confined within artificial banks they
stagnated into vast marshes. The actual channels of these rivers are altogether the
work of human industry. Numerous " leams," or '* eaus," a French term evidently
introduced by the Normans,! discharge themselves direct into the sea, but their
mouths are closed by sluices, and these are kept shut as long as the tide rises.
Thanks to the innumerable drains now intersecting the plain in all directions,
* Augustin Thierrj^ *' Histoire de la conquete de I'Angleterre par les Normandes."
t Elstobb, " Historical Account of the Great Level of the Fens. '
224 THE BRITISH ISLES.
most of the windmills which were formerly employed, after the practice common
in Holland, to raise the water into artificial channels, can now be dispensed with,
and even steam-engines need not be kept at work to the same extent as formerly.
It happens unfortunately that the interests of navigation and agriculture are
irreconcilable; for whilst mariners demand that the water be retained in the
channels by means of locks, so as to render them navigable, the agricul-
turists desire to see the water carried off to the sea as rapidly as possible. They
point to the lock which obstructs the discharge of the Witham as to the principal
cause of the dampness of the soil around Boston. The removal of this lock, they
say, would enable them to dispense with fifty steam-engines and two hundred and
fifty windmills which are now incessantly engaged in the drainage of the Fens
near that town. The river Witham is subject to a " bore " of considerable force,
though less powerful than that of the Severn. On the eastern coast of England
this phenomenon is known as " eagre."
A range of heights of inconsiderable elevation separates the basin of the Wash
from that of the Humber, and presents a precipitous front towards the plain of
Central England. It is composed of liassic and oolitic rocks, which sink down on
the east between the tertiary clays and alluvial formations which occupy the greater
extent of the region now under consideration. In the south and west the cretaceous
downs, known as the East Anglian Heights, form a steep escarpment of slight
elevation. They dip beneath the Wash, and reappear to the north in the Lincoln
Wolds.
Of all rivers which wend their sluggish course towards the Wash, the Ouse is
by far the most considerable, and when that bay of the sea shall have been
converted into dry land, the Witham, Welland, and Nen will become its tributaries.
The Ouse rises near the southern border of JS^orthamptonshire, traverses in its
upper course the county of Buckinghamshire (see p. 162), crosses Bedfordshire and
Cambridgeshire, and finally the western part of Norfolk, on its way to the Wash^
which it enters below King's Lynn.
The six counties which lie wholly or for the most part within the basin of the
Wash depend almost solely upon agriculture. Their* soil is of exceeding fertility,
and scarcely anywhere else in England do crops equally heavy reward the labours
of the husbandman.
Topography.
Bedfordshire consists in the main of a fertile clayey plain, traversed by the
Ouse, and bounded on the south by the steep escarpment of the Chiltern Hills, here
known as Dunstable and Luton Downs, and on the north by an oolitic upland,
which separates it from Northamptonshire. Agriculture and market gardening
are the principal occupations. Pillow lace is manufactured, though to a smaller
extent than formerly, and straw plait for hats is made.
Bedford., the capital of the county, is pleasantly situated on the navigable Ouse.
It is noted for its grammar school and charitable institutions. Agricultural
HUNTINGDONSHIEE— CAMBRIDGESHIRE. 226
implements, lace, and straw plait are manufactured. There are a public library, a
literary institution, and an archaeological museum. John Bunyan was born in
the neighbouring village of Elstoiv, and the town and its vicinity abound in
objects connected with him.
Wohurn is a quiet market town near the western border of the county, famous
on account of the magnificent mansion of the Duke of Bedford (Woburn Abbey),
which stands in the centre of a park 3,500 acres in extent. Fuller's earth is
procured in the neighbourhood.
Leighton Buzzard, an old country town, is giving signs of renewed life since it
has become a principal station on the London and North- Western Railway.
Biggleswade, on the Ivel, a navigable tributary of the Ouse, has been almost
wholly reconstructed since 1785, in which year a conflagration laid it waste. Dun-
stable, at the northern foot of the Chiltern Hills, has interesting remains of a priory
church founded by Henry I. The quarries in the Downs present many features
of interest to the geologist. Some of the neighbouring heights are crowned with
British earthworks. Luton, a straggling place with a remarkable Gothic church, lies
beyond the Chiltern Hills, in the valley of the Thames. It is the centre of the trade
in straw hats and bonnets, the plait for which is made in the neighbouring villages.
Huntingdonshire stretches from the Nen in the north to beyond the Ouse in
the south. Its surface is gently undulating in the west, but the north-eastern
portion is for the most part embraced within the district of the Fens.
Huntingdon, the county town, is pleasantly seated upon the Ouse. An ancient
stone bridge, erected before 1259, connects it with its suburb of Godmanchester,
the site of the Roman station of DuroUpons. The trade in wool and corn is
considerable, and patent bricks are made. OHver Cromwell was born in the town,
baptized in its ancient church, recently restored, and educated in its grammar
school. 8t. Ices and St. Neofs are interesting market towns on the Ouse, the one
below, the other above Huntingdon. Kimholton, with a castle belonging to the Duke
of Manchester, lies to the west. Ramsey is the principal town in the district of the
Fens. Stilton is a village in the same part of the county. It is usually stated
that "Stilton cheese " was first made here ; but in point of fact it was originally
produced in Leicestershire, and derives its name from having been first brought
into notice at an inn of this village, which lies on the great northern road.
Cambridgeshire lies almost wholly within the great level of the Fens, but the
southern portion of the county has a finely diversified surface, and the chalk
downs rise here to a height of between 300 to 500 feet. Butter and cream cheese
are amongst the most highly appreciated productions, and the breeding of pigeons
is carried on more extensively than in any other part of England, the produce of
a single "pigeonry " frequently exceeding 100,000 dozens a year. The manufac-
tures are unimportant.
Cambridge, the county town, is seated on the river Cam, which flows north-
ward into the Ouse. Its university is a worthy rival of that at Oxford.
Its situation in a wide plain is not so favourable or so picturesque as that of
Oxford; but the green meadows surrounded by trees, which run along the
226
THE BRITISH ISLES.
backs of the colleges, form a beautiful leafy screen bordering upon a river alive
with gaily decorated rowing-boats. The public buildings of Cambridge are
upon the whole inferior to those of Oxford, although there are amongst them
Fig. 111. — Cambridge.
From the Ordnance Map. Scale 1 : 63,36fi.
, 1 Mile.
several which for size, stateliness, and beauty of architecture need not fear com-
parison. They are constructed of more durable stone, and the delicate tracery
wrought by the sculptor's chisel survives in its pristine beauty.* King's College
• Demogeot et Montucci, " De TEnseignemeiit superieur en Angleterre et en Ecosse."
NORTHAMPTONSHIRE. 227
Chapel, with its lofty roof and sumptuous yet chaste interior, overshadows all
other buildings, and is indubitably one of the finest Gothic monuments of the fifteenth
century. Trinity College, with its four courts, occupies a considerable area, and
attracts more students than any similar institution in the country. Though
not rejoicing in the possession of a library at all comparable with the Bodleian at
Oxford, the University Library, with its 220,000 volumes and 3,000 manuscripts,
and the libraries of the various colleges, nevertheless make a goodly show. The
Woodwardian Geological Museum has grown, under t^e able direction of the illus-
trious Professor Sedgwick, into one of the most remarkable collections in Europe ;
the Observatory has also acquired fame through the discoveries of Mr. Adams ;
and the Fitzwilliam Museum, a fine classical building, is rich in works of art,
including paintings by Titian, Paul Veronese, and other masters of the Italian school.
The foundation of the university dates back to the early Middle Ages, and St. Peter's
College is known to have been founded in 1257, and is consequently more ancient
than any college of Oxford. There are seventeen colleges and two institutions
Girton College and Newnham Hall have recently been founded for the education
of ladies. Cambridge even more than Oxford depends for its prosperity upon
its 2,500 professors, fellows, and under-graduates. When these retire during
the vacations, dulness reigns in the streets, and Cambridge resembles a city of
the dead. Paiker's Piece, at other times the scene of cricket matches and athletic
sports, lies deserted, and the boats on the Cam are hidden away in their boat-
houses. Newmarket, so famous for its races, lies 11 miles to the west of Cam-
bridge, in a detached portion of Suffolk (see p. 215).
Following the Cam on its way to the Ouse, we reach Waterbeach, where
coprolites are dug and ground, and immediately afterwards we enter the district
of the Fens. In front of us rises the isolated hillock, surmounted by the magnifi-
cent cathedral of Uli/. This city is the capital of the district known as the Isle of
Ely, and an ancient stronghold. The cathedral displays a mixture of many
styles, and has been carefully restored. Its great western tower rises to a height
of 270 feet, and the centre octagon, at the intersection of the nave and the
transepts, is justly admired for its slender shafts and ribbed vaulting of wood.
March and Whittlesea occupy eminences in the midst of the Fens, and both boast
interesting old churches forming conspicuous landmarks. Wisheach, on the
navigable Nen, is the chief town in the northern part of the county. Vessels of
500 tons can enter the harbour of the town at high water. Wheat is the principal
article of export. WaUoken, a village within the borders of Norfolk, is now
virtually a suburb of Wisbeach. Its Norman church is one of the most beautiful
in the east of England.
Northamptonshire has for the most part a beautifully varied surface. The
breezy uplands in its south-western portion give birth to the Nen and the Ouse,
which flow to the Wash; and to the Avon, which takes its course to the
Severn. The Nen is the principal river of the county, whilst the Welland bounds
it for a considerable distance in the north. Along both these is some fine
meadow land, whilst the north-east corner of the county is occupied by rich
228 THE BEITISH ISLES.
fen land. The woodlands, consisting principally of the remains of ancient forests,
are still very extensive ; but the adjoining inhabitants have the right to cut the
underwood and to depasture them, and they do not consequently yield as much
timber as they would under better management. The manufacture of boots and
shoes is extensively carried on, but other branches of industry languish, owing to
the want of cheap coal.
Brackley and Towcester are ancient market towns in the extreme south of the
county. Daventry occupies an eminence near the source of the river Nen. Not
far from it are the remains of an ancient encampment.
Northampton, the most populous town in the basin of the Wash, stretches
along a ridge of high ground on the left bank of the Nen, which here becomes
navigable. Several Parliaments met in this venerable town, and the number of
mediaeval churches and other buildings is very considerable, but at the present
day Northampton is known principally for its boots and shoes and its horse fairs.
The environs are delightful, and gentlemen's seats abound. Althorp Park, the
seat of Earl Spencer, with a library of 50,000 volumes, lies to the north-west.
Descending the Nen, we pass Castle Ashby and the adjoining Yardley Chase, an
extensive tract of woodland. On the other bank of the river rises the tower of
the Saxon church of Castle Barton. Lower down the Nen flows past the old
market town of Wellingborough, and is joined by the river Ise, which passes Ketter-
ing in its course. Both these towns are places of considerable importance, with
iron mines in their neighbourhood and iron works. Higham Ferrers, on a lofty
cliff looking down upon the Nen, was the birthplace of Archbishop Chichele, and
the church, college, cross, school, and bedehouse raised and endowed by him form
the most conspicuous features of the town. Continuing our journey past the
pleasant town of Oundle, where the Nen is spanned by a bridge, we reach Petor-
horough, which has grown up around a Benedictine abbey founded on the borders of
the Fen country in 655. The cathedral, with its magnificent western front
completed about the middle of the thirteenth century, is the most remarkable
building of the city. There are extensive railway works, and the manufacture of
agricultural machinery is carried on. Castor, a village about 4 miles to the
west of Peterborough, occupies the site of the Eoman station of Durohrivce, and
much pottery and many coins have been discovered there. Still farther west are
the remains of Fotheringay Castle, where Mary Queen of Scots was beheaded in
1587.
There are no towns on the Northamptonshire bank of the Welland, the only
remarkable object being Rockingham Castle, founded by William the Conqueror.
Rutlandshire, the smallest county of England, lies to the north of the river
Welland, above the Fen country, and has a beautifully varied surface. Oakham,
the county town, stands in the fertile vale of Catmose. The assizes are held in
the hall of its ancient castle, and there is a richly endowed grammar school.
Uppingham, the second town of the county, has likewise a grammar school of
considerable reputation.
Lincolnshire lies only partly within the basin of the Wash, for the Trent and
LINCOLNSHIRE. 229
other rivers drain its northern portion into the Humber. Its surface is greatly-
diversified, a range of oolitic uplands stretches through the western portion of the
county as far as the Humber, and through a gap in them the river Withani finds
its way into the Wash. The chalk downs known as " lincoln Wolds " occupy
the eastern maritime portion of the county between the Humber and the Wash.
These two ranges of upland are separated by a level tract of great fertility, which
is drained by the Ancholme and the Witham, the former flowing northward into
the Humber, the other taking its course towards the Wash. The coast is low and
marshy, and around the Wash the marshes extend far inland and merge into the
chief level of the Fens, the greater part of which is known as Holland. A similar
district of fens and marshes lies beyond the river Trent, at the head of the Humber.
This is the island of Axeholme, or Axel. Up to about 1626 this district was
covered with marshes, its sparse inhabitants being confined to a few knolls rising
above them. In that year a Dutchman, Vermuyden, undertook to drain the
country, on condition of receiving one-third of the land recovered in free and
common socage. Yermuyden performed his share of the contract in the course
of five years, and about two hundred families, Dutch and French Protestants,
settled in the district. But disputes between the original inhabitants of the
country and these foreign settlers led to a protracted course of litigation, which
continued till 1719, and ended in the Dutchmen being worsted.
In Lincolnshire all kinds of grain are produced in the greatest abundance,
and the county has long been celebrated for its breed of horses, cattle, and sheep.
Some of the finest dray horses seen in London are bred in the Fens. The industry
of the shire is not, however, wholly agricultural ; for the manufacture of agricul-
tural implements is carried on with great success, and even a little iron is mined
near Frodingham, a village close to the eastern bank of the Trent.
The county is divided into three ''parts," viz. Lindsey in the north, Kesteven
in the south-west, and Holland in the south.
The Welland is the principal river of Holland. It rises in Northamptonshire,
separates that county from Leicestershire and Rutland, and first touches the
borders of Lincolnshire a little above Stamford, an ancient borough which carries
on a considerable trade in agricultural produce, and is one of the five "burghs "
of the Danes. The other towns on the Welland are Market Deeping, Crowland (with
an abbey), and Spalding. The latter is the capital of Holland, and has much trade
in wool. Holheach and Long Sutton are to the east of it, in the centre of the Fens.
Boston, an ancient seaport, lies 14 miles above the mouth of the river Witham,
and is accessible at spring tides for vessels of 400 tons burden. The lofty tower
of the church of St. Botolph serves as a landmark to mariners. Many of its
boats are engaged in the fishing, and the commerce with Holland and the north
of England is of some importance. There was a time when it was second only to
London, when the Hanseatic merchants had a factory here, and its annual fairs
attracted crowds of purchasers. Tattershall, with the remains of the castle of the
Lord Treasurer Cromwell, lies a few miles above Boston. .Horncastle, on the Bain,
a navigable tributary of the Witham, and at the west foot of the Wolds, carries on
230
THE BRITISH ISLES.
much trade in corn, wool, and horses. Sleaford and Boiirne are market towns of
local importance, on or near the western border of the Fen country.
They both lie within the "part" of Kesteven whose principal river is the
Witham, which rises in Eutlandshire, and flows northward past the ancient borough
Fig. 112. — Lincoln Cathedral.
of Grantham. It was at the grammar school of Grantham that Sir Isaac Newton,
a native of the neighbouring village of Woolsthorpe, received his early education.
The borough boasts a fine parish church, has works for the manufacture of agricul-
tural machinery, and carries on a profitable trade in corn, malt, and coal, its
neighbourhood is much frequented by fox-hunters.
LINCOLNSHIEE.
281
In its onward course the Witham washes the city of Lincoln, superbly seated
on a lofty ridge and the slopes of a hill which commands a view of the Fens. It
is the Lindiim of the Romans, by whom the *' foss-dyke," which joins its crowded
Fig. 113.- Lincoln.
From the Ordnance Map. Scale 1 : 0.3.300.
Mile.
harbour to the Trent, was dug out, and Ermine Street, which traverses the city
from north to south, constructed. A gateway and portions of the Roman wall
survive, and there is a castle built by William the Conqueror, and now used as a
gaol and assize hall, but all other buildings are overshadowed by the superb cathe-
232 THE BRITISH ISLES.
dral, whicli rises proudly upon the summit of the hill. In the early Middle Ages
Lincoln was a place relatively of greater importance than it is now, and the only
towns mentioned in the Domesday Book as having been superior to it were
London and York ; and although in course of time it became a city of monks,
with fifty-two churches in the reign of Edward VL, it only maiDtained its eminent
position until the discovery of coal and iron in Western England had deranged the
natural balance of population; but even now it carries on a very considerable
commerce, and employs several thousand workmen in making agricultural
machinery.
That portion of Lincolnshire which has not yet been considered belongs to the
basin of the Humber, or is drained directly into the German Ocean. Gainsborough
is the principal town on the river Trent, which forms part of the western boundary
of the county, and up which an " eagre,'' or bore, rushes with some impetuosity. Its
harbour is accessible to vessels of from 150 to 200 tons burden, and the town has
recently acquired some importance through the manufacture of agricultural
machinery. Epivorth, the principal market town of the district of Axeholme, was
the birthplace of John Wesley, whose father was rector of the parish. Descend-
ing the Humber, we reach the mouth of the Ancholme, on whose upper course
is situated the important market town of Brigg, or Glamford Brigg, easily acces-
sible by means of a navigation canal. Then follow Barton-upon-Humber, an
ancient town, formerly strongly fortified ; Netc Holland, opposite to Hull, with
which it is connected by a steam ferry ; and Great Grimsby, at the mouth of the
Humber. The latter has grown into a place of very considerable importance
since 1849, in which year the clearance of the choked-up harbour began. Space
was thus gained for the construction of the present docks and piers, and the town
now possesses all the requisites of a modern maritime port. Lines of steamers
connect it with several continental markets, and trade has increased wonderfully.
Cleethorpe, its neighbour, has grown into favour as a watering-place, but Saltfleet
and other fishing villages farther south are little frequented, because the marshy
coast is uninviting.
Louth is the most flourishing town at the eastern foot of the Wolds. Alford,
with its " holy well," said to be efficacious in scorbutic complaints, lies to the
south-east of it.
CHAPTER IX.
THE BASIN OF THE HUMBER.
(Leicestershire, Staffordshire, Derbyshire, Nottinghamshire, Yorkshire.)
General Features.
HE basin whose outlet is through the estuary of the Humber is
the most extensive of the British Isles, for it exceeds in area the
basins of the Thames and the Severn.* Yet England, to the
north of the bay of the Wash and the estuary of the Mersey, is of
small width, and the distance from the central water-parting to
either sea is inconsiderable. But though the basin of the Humber is thus hemmed
in between the " backbone " of England and the coast ranges, it stretches far to
the north and south. Two rivers, the Trent, rising in the moorlands of Stafford-
shire, and the Yorkshire Ouse — the one coming from the south, the other from the
north — combine as they fall into the winding estuary of the Humber, and discharge
themselves into the North Sea.
In the south the basin of the Trent penetrates like a wedge towards the valley
of the Severn, from which it is separated only by gentle undulations of the
ground. In the north, however, the ground grows in elevation, at first forming
heath-covered ridges rising above cultivated fields, and finally developing into
the broad upland of the Pennine chain, which stretches far away to the borders
of Scotland. The " Peak of Derbyshire " forms one of the vertebrae of this " back-
bone" of England. It is by no means a peak, as its name would imply, but
a table-land bounded by steep scarps, remarkable for its caverns and subterranean
passages, and rich in cromlechs. The Peak attains a height of 1,981 feet.
Farther north the moorlands broaden out, but the depressions which separate
the rounded masses of upland facilitate intercommunication between the two
slopes of the chain. t The summits increase in elevation as we travel to the
* Area of the basin of the Humber (including Trent and Ouse), 9,550 square miles ; basin of the
Thames, 6,160 square miles ; basin of the Severn, 4,350 square miles.
t The "passes " over the Pennine range vary in height between 450 and 660 feet, the latter being
that of the pass through which runs the turnpike road from Huddersfield, to the north of the Holme Moss.
112— E
234
THE BRITISH ISLES.
north, and culminate in the Whernside (2,414 feet), in Yorkshire, and Cross Fell
(2,892 feet), on the borders of Durham. A transverse range connects the Pennine
chain with the Cumbrian Mountains, which are higher still.
The scenery of the Pennine range is by no means inferior to that of the
Malvern Hills. The higher summits, it is true, are covered with heather or peat,
but their slopes are wooded or clad with succulent grasses. The finest oaks of all
England shade the southern slopes of the hills of Derbyshire and Nottingham-
shire. Delightful valleys penetrate the chain wherever we look, and the naked-
ness of the rocks enhances the beauty of the smiling landscapes which lie at their
base. Derbyshire and the valley of the Yorkshire Ouse may fairly dispute with
the Weald of Kent and the vale of Severn the claim of being considered the finest
parts of England. Running water abounds in these hills, for the rains are
abundant. Through every valley a winding rivulet, sparkling amidst the verdure,
hastens along to pay its tribute to the " tranquil Ure, the flying Wharfe, or the
Fig. 114. — The "Peak" of Dehbyshire.
Scale 1 : 110,000.
IMae.
superb Ouse." * Caverns, some of them in the possession of miners in search of
argentiferous lead, abound in this limestone region, and the water, charged with
carbonate of lime, which trickles from their roofs, has formed innumerable stalac-
tites, whose beauty delights the visitor. Some of these caverns have been explored
by men of science, and the objects discovered in them have enriched the museums
of the country. An old mine yielded the remains of a human being and of 3,750
animals, belonging to five difierent species, and amongst articles of human work-
manship there was a precious design of a horse's head graven upon the bone of an
animal, t
The uplands, which separate the basins of the Trent and Ouse from the North
Sea, are pretty regular in their direction. The whole of this littoral region is
formed of oolitic and cretaceous rocks, which strike north and south in narrow
bands. Separated by the great fissure through which the Ouse and Trent find
* Spenser, «• Faerie Queen."
t W. Boyd Dawkins, Journal of the Geological Society, Feb., 1877.
THE BASIN OF THE HUMBER.
235
their way into the sea, the hills rise once more to the north of the estuary of the
Humber, and, trending round to the eastward, terminate in the bold promontory
of Flamborough Head. To the north lie the wild and barren York Wolds,
whose northern face is known as the Cleveland Hills, They are composed of
liassic strata capped by oolitic rocks, and abound in picturesque scenery, and from
their culminating summits afford at once a view of the distant vale of the Tees and
of the sea studded with vessels. Here and there the more prominent heights are
crowned with funereal mounds, locally known as hones* and every position of
strategical importance is defended by vast entrenchments. These entrenchments
Fig. 115. — The Mouth of the Humber and Part of Holderness.
Scale 1 : 450,000.
^^^KS^mMiid
20' N ofGr
0 Gr.
5 Miles.
can still be traced for miles, and they converted the valley of the Derwent, at the
back of Scarborough, as well as the whole of the peninsula which is bounded by
the Humber in the south, into vast camps. The entrenchment near Scarborough
is still known as the Dane^s Dyke. Some of the barrows, or hones, on the Cleveland
Hills are as much as 200 feet in length, of quadrangular shape, and placed due east
and west. Skulls and flint and bronze implements have been found in them,
and prove that they do not all belong to the same epoch. Rolleston, the
archseologist, is of opinion that some of the skulls resemble those of the Yeddahs
of Ceylon.
* Hog, in Old Swedish or Jutic ; hoi in Danish.
236
THE BRITISH ISLES.
The coast district, whicli juts out like an eagle's beak between Flamborough
Head and the estuary of the Humber, and terminates in Spurn Head, is known as
Holderness. The whole of this country is of recent formation, and differs alto-
gether from the rocky hills away in the interior. To geologists it is classic ground,
owing to the grand scale on which it illustrates erosive phenomena. The boulder
clay and alluvial till form a sea-cliff, here rising to a height of some 60 feet,
and extending more than 80 miles along the coast. Landslips and "shoots" of
detached masses of rocks are frequent along this coast ; the waves undermine the
foot of the cliffs, and spread their triturated waste over the beach. Not a storm,
not an exceptionally high tide, but the coast is worn away, and houses, villages,
and even towns disappear. Ravenspur, at one time a rival to Hull, and a
port so considerable in 1332 that Edward Baliol and the confederated English
barons sailed from it with a great fleet to invade Scotland, has long since been
devoured by the merciless ocean. The villages of Hyde, Auburn, Kilnsea, Upsal,
and many others have shared the same fate ; and with them have disappeared
the lakes which formerly studded the plateau, and one of which, Sandley Mere,
filled a cavity in the alluvial soil abounding in the tusks of elephants. Extensive
sands, dry at low water, occupy the places of these towns, but a fine rock, known
as the Matron, still marks the site where the cliffs rose within historic times.*
A phenomenon of an inverse nature may be observed along the banks of the
Humber, where the waste of the cliffs of Holderness and the alluvial soil brought
down by the rivers cause the land and the banks in the estuary to grow. Sunk
Island, which about the middle of the seventeenth century had an area of only
10 acres, and was separated by a navigable channel, 1,600 yards wide, from the
shore, is now firmly attached to the mainland. It forms the apex of a peninsula,
12 square miles in extent, jutting out opposite Great Grimsby, and its rich
meadows are protected by dykes against the encroachments of the sea. Similarly
wide tracts formerly covered by the sea have become dry land along both banks of
the river above Hull, but there nature has been guided in her work by the genius
of man. The plain in which the Ouse and Trent mingle their waters was formerly
a lake, which extended in rear of the littoral ranges until it was drained by the
rivers named finding an outlet into the Humber. Above the swamps which then
took the place of the lake there rose the isles of Axholme, Wroot, Crowle, and
others, and most of the inhabitants of the country established themselves upon
these more solid spots to escape the pestilential vapours rising from a half-drowned
country. Since the Middle Ages these swamps have been drained, and here, as in
the fenny land around the Wash, it was the Dutch who initiated the inhabitants
into the art of the hydraulic engineer. One of the principal drains is still known
as "Dutch River," and recalls the services rendered by these foreigners. The
whole of the country is intersected now by canals and drains, and it is difficult to trace
the old channels of the Don and Idle, which formerly flowed slowly through a
plain having no regular slope. One of the first objects of the engineers was to provide
a natural outfall for the rivers, and the alluvial soil brought down in large quan-
* Philipps, " Rivers, Mountains, and Sea-coast of Yorkshire ; " Pennant, "Arctic Zoology."
THE BASIN OF THE HUMBEE.
287
titles by the Trent enabled them to attain this object, by spreading the soil over
the more inland parts of the plain, whilst deepening the drains which intersect the
Fig. 116, — Warped Plain of the Ouse and the Trent.
Scale 1 '. .%0,000
40' W.of G.
5 Miles.
seaward regions. This system of " warping " proved as successful here as it had
done in Italy. The lowlands along the coast are still known as " marshes," but
their soil is as firm as that of the neighbouring inland districts. Pure water was
238 THE BEITISH ISLES.
the only thing needed to render this region a fit place of residence for human
beings, and that need has been abundantly supplied by artesian wells. A layer
of clay about 25 feet in thickness underlies the surface soil for 50 miles along
the coast and 10 miles inland, so that all that is requisite to be done in order to
obtain pure water is to bore through this clay, when a fountain will burst forth,
sometimes rising to a height of 10 feet.
The physiognomy of the towns and villages of a considerable portion of the
basin of the Huraber has undergone a singular change in the course of the nine-
teenth century, and perhaps nowhere is this change more striking than in Western
Yorkshire. Quiet villages, unfettered rivulets, are found no longer. The valleys
are filled with noisy factories ; every stream of water is confined within bounds to
set in motion wheels and turbines ; the roads are black ; and even the atmosphere is
filled with particles of soot. The number of inhabitants is tenfold — nay, hundred-
fold in certain districts — what it used to be. Manufacturing towns have sprung
from the soil where at the beginning of the century the eye beheld only open
moors or forests. These changes are due to the same causes which have brought
about similar results in other parts of England. The counties at the foot of the
Pennine chain have learnt to appreciate the wealth which they possess in their
rocks — coal, iron, lime, and building stone — and the inhabitants of Yorkshire, at all
events, have set themselves to utilise these treasures with an eagerness far surpassing
that of other Englishmen. The people of Yorkshire are, indeed, noted for their
industry, activity, and business intelligence, and few are their equals in the art of
making money. Conservative though they be — as is proved by an adherence to
their ancient dialect — they have nevertheless, in the course of becoming a manu-
facturing people, greatly changed their time-honoured customs. And this perilous
social evolution, whilst it enriched thousands, has condemned hundreds of thousands
to the precarious existence of proletarians. How great the contrast between the
factory hands of the West Riding and their ancestors, whose hero was merry
Robin Hood !
Topography.
Staffordshire lies wholly within the great central plain of England, and its
surface, except in the north, where it is broken by barren hills, including the Axe
Edge Hill (1,810 feet), Mow Copt (1,101 feet). Weaver Hill (1,154 feet), and other
outliers of the Pennine chain, is slightly undulating, and upon the whole fertile.
The river Trent rises near the northern boundary of the county, and passes through
its centre, receiving on its way several tributaries, the principal of which are the
Dove, which forms the eastern boundary of the county, and the Tame, which drains
the south.
The valley of the Trent is noted for its fertility, but Staff'ordshire is essentially
a manufacturing and mining county. The distribution of the bulk of its popula-
tion has been determined by the existence of coal and iron, and there are conse-
STAFFORDSHIRE.
239
quently two great centres of industry — the one in the north, in the coal basin of
North Staffordshire, the other in the south, around Dudley and Wolverhampton.
The former of these districts is drained by the nascent Trent, and is known as
that of the Potteries, for the manufacture of earthenware has been carried on there
from immemorial times, and it furnishes most of the china which England exports
to foreign countries, much to the increase of its national wealth. Stoke- upon- Trent ^
Fig. 117. — The District of the Potteries.
Scale 1 : 80,000.
iMile.
the metropolis of this district, a dingy and straggling town, has raised monuments
to Wedgwood and Minton, the two men who by their genius have most contributed
towards its prosperity. It was at Etruria, a couple of miles to the north of Stoke, that
Josiah Wedgwood established his factory in 1771, in the hope of being able to equal
one day the productions of the master potters of Tuscany. It was he who taught
England the art of producing a beautiful cream-coloured porcelain, such as had
been manufactured for a short time in the sixteenth century at the French village
240 THE BRITISH ISLES.
of Oiron, but the- secret of which had been lost. Wedgwood and Minton bestowed
equal attention upon form and decoration, and the ware produced by them, with
the aid of artists of high repute, far surpasses in taste the articles ordinarily
made by English manufacturers. We almost marvel that these smoky towns
should have turned out such beautiful majolicas, and porcelain so tastefully
decorated. Recently a school of art adapted to ceramic manufacture, and known as
the Wedgwood Institute, has been opened at Burslem, the birthplace of Wedgwood.
This building is decorated with terra-cotta, which bears witness to the high state of
perfection attained by the local manufacture. The population concentrated around
Stoke-upon-Trent already approaches 300,000 souls, and it increases rapidly, for
the coal basin of North Staffordshire, despite its small extent, possesses inestimable
advantages in its alternation of coal seams and beds of iron ore. The remaining
towns of the Pottery District are Hanky, half-way between Stoke and Burslem,
which is as much dependent upon iron, works as upon potteries ; Tunstall, Small-
thorne, and Kidsgrove, the latter a mining town, close to the northern boundary of
the county. Fentonaiid Longton (with Dresden), which have potteries and earthen
wofks, lie to the south-east, whilst Newcastle-under-Lyme, which carries on a great
trade in hats and "shoes, and near which are the Silverdale Iron Works, lies to the
west.
Leaving the district of the Potteries behind us, we enter the agricultural
portion of the county, and soon find ourselves in the midst of fields and woods,
and able to breathe a pure atmosphere. The towns are few and far between.
Stoke, on the banks of the Trent, is dependent upon its breweries and the manu-
facture of boots and shoes. Staffor'd, the county town, on the Sow, a tributary of
the Trent, has several ancient timbered houses, two interesting churches, and a shire-
hall. The castle, on a hill, commands a view of the Welsh hills. Izaak Walton,
the celebrated English angler, was born here. Rugeley, on the Trent, is noted for
its horse fairs. It adjoins Cannock Chase, an upland tract, in which a little coal,
remarkably fine in quality, is found. Lichfield lies away from the river on a
navigable canal. Tamworth, on the Tame, which flows past Birmingham and pays
tribute to the Trent, is the centre of a rich grazing district. Several of the towns
named are seats of industry, but in their general aspects and mediaeval buildings they
contrast strikingly with the great manufacturing district which lies farther west.
Lichfield, an episcopal see, boasts a cathedral which, though small, is exquisitely
beautiful. It was built 1128 — 53. St. John's Hospital is a curious specimen of
the domestic architecture of the fifteenth century, whilst the grammar school has
acquired fame through Addison, Garrick, Bishop Newton, Dr. Johnson, and other
celebrated pupils who attended it. Dr. Johnson was born at Lichfield, and a
statue has been raised in his memory.
Below the confluence of the Trent and Tame there rises the important town of
Burton-upon-Trenty famous throughout the world for its bitter ale, said to owe its
peculiar qualities to the carbonate of lime contained in the water used by its
brewers. There are six large and about twenty-four small firms at Burton,
annually producing between them about a million and a half barrels of beer.
STAFFORDSHIRE. 241
The Dove joins the Trent a few miles below Burton. In its upper course it
flows through a narrow dale, where umbrageous woods, naked rocks, caverns,
and a sparkling rivulet combine to form some of the most picturesque scenery in
England. The Churnet is tributary to the Dove, and hardly yields to it in
romantic beauty. On its banks rises Alton Towers, the princely mansion of the
Earl of Shrewsbury and Talbot. Higher up in the valley limestone is quarried
and iron ore won. Leek is a considerable town near ^he source of the Churnet,
where silk-thread spinning is extensively carried on. Cheadle, in the moorlands
to the west of the Churnet, is a small market town. Uttoxeter is the principal
town on the Lower Dove. The inhabitants engage in the manufacture of clock
cases and agricultural machinery, and in cork-cutting.
There now remains to be noticed the great manufacturing and mining district
in South Staffordshire known as the ''Black Country." Though hardly 150
Fig. 118.— JjicHFiELn Cathedral.
square miles in extent, this district (including the adjoining town of Birmingham,
which is virtually its capital) supports more than a million inhabitants. It owes
its prosperity to its mineral treasures. Coal, iron, the limestone required for fusing
it, and even the clay from which the bricks for lining the furnaces are made, are
found here in juxtaposition. Many discoveries of great importance have been
made in the manufactories of this district, and especially in the Soho Works, near
West Bromwich. The coal found here is admirably adapted for the manufacture
of tar and aniline, and is largely used for these purposes. The principal coal seam
of the basin has a thickness of 10 yards, and has proved a source of great wealth.
Unfortunately it is nearly exhausted. There remain now only 100,000,000
tons of coal, which at the present rate of consumption will hardly suffice for
another century, at the close of which the manufacturers will have to migrate to a
more favoured locality.
242 THE BRITISH ISLES.
The best view of the Black Country is from Dudley Castle, which occupies
an eminence in its centre. Dudley, however, lies within a detached portion of
Worcestershire (see p. 105), and the most important Staffordshire town in the
district under notice is Wolverharnj^ton, an old town in a commanding position,
the centre of the lock trade, and producing also all kinds of hardware, and
japanned and papier-mache articles. The town is known also in the annals of
aeronautics and meteorology, for it was here that Glaisher and Coxwell made their
experimental trip into the air, which took them to a height of probably 36,000
feet — an altitude never yet exceeded. Walsall is distinguished for its saddlery.
West Bromwich, which is nearer to Birmingham, manufactures hardware of every
description, besides glass and gas. These are the principal towns of the district.
Their satellites engage in the same industries, all alike depending upon the coal
and iron mines which are being worked in their vicinity. Heathtotvn, Wednes-
iieldy Sedgley, and Tq)ton lie in the west, around Wolverhampton and towards
Dudley ; WUlenhall, Darlaston, Bilsfon, and Wednesbury — the latter a place of great
antiquity — occupy, with Walsall, the centre of the district ; Brierley Hill, Rowley
Regis, and Quarry Bank are near the Worcestershire border ; whilst Smethwick and
Harhorne may almost be designated suburbs of Birmingham (see Fig. 60).
Derbyshire is one of the most beautiful counties of England. Its northern
part, culminating in the Peak, is full of moors and mountains, intersected by
narrow valleys, and dells bounded by fantastic cliffs. Towards the south the hills
decrease in height, until they sink into the wide and fertile vale of the Trent,
which crosses the southern portion of the county. The great river of Derbyshire,
however, is the Derwent {Der Gwent, i.e. Beautiful River), which rises in the
Peak, and, flowing through the centre of the county, separates the coal and iron
district to its east from the more purely agricultural district to its west. In
addition to coal and iron, Derbyshire yields lead, and is famous for its spar, and its
quarries of marble, gypsum, &c. The manufactures are varied and of considerable
importance.
Derby, the ancient county town, has attained considerable importance as a seat
of industry. It was here J. Lombe established the" first silk-mill in England, in
1717 ; but if contemporary evidence can be accepted, the Englishman who learnt
the secret of the manufacture in Italy died of poison administered by his Italian
instructors.* This old factory still exists, and many others have been added since.
In addition to hosiery, Derby, and its suburb of Litchiirch, engage in the manu-
facture of porcelain and of spar ornaments. It is here the Midland Railway Com-
pany has established its head- quarters, its workshops occupying a considerable area.
A monument has been erected to H. Cavendish, the discoverer of the chemical
constituents of air, in the church of All Saints. Flamsteed, the astronomer, was
born in the neighbouring village of Denby.
Ascending the Derwent, we reach Belper, whose inhabitants find employment
in cotton and hosiery mills and in nail-making. Still proceeding on our journey
up a valley which increases in beauty with every step we take, we reach Matlock
* Ch. Dupin, " Force commerciale de la Grande Bretagne."
DERBYSHIRE.
243
and its baths, the centre of the most romantic limestone district in which the
Derwent clears its way through a succession of grand defiles, one of which is com-
manded by the superb High Tor, rising to a height of 396 feet. The mineral
Fig. 119.— Dbrby.
Prom the Ordnance Survey. Scale 1
IMile.
waters of Matlock are largely charged with carbonate of lime, and they quickly
petrify any object placed in them.
A few miles above Matlock we reach the confluence of the "Wye and the Derwent.
On the former, beautifully seated upon a wooded slope, rises the ancient town of
Bakeimll, near which is Haddon Hall, perhaps the finest specimen of a baronial
dwelling of the fifteenth century to be met with in England. At the head of the
244 THE BEITISH ISLES.
Wye, in a bleak but bealtby situation 1,100 feet above the level of tlie sea, stands
Buxton, which has been a place of resort for three hundred years on account of the
virtues of its mineral waters, but owes something, too, to the vicinity of the great
city of Manchester Meadows, parks, and avenues of trees environ the sumptuous
dwellings set apart for invalids, whilst, far below, the . Wye courses through a
savage defile, the entrance to which is guarded by the Chee Tor, a noble rock 300
feet in height.
Returning to the Derwent, we soon reach Chatsworth, the noble seat of the
Duke of Devonshire, in the midst of a park 11 miles in circuit. The house con-
tains a precious collection of paintings, statues by Thorwaldsen, Canova, Schadow,
and Gibson, and a valuable library. The great conservatory in the gardens
was built by Sir Joseph Paxton, the designer of the Crystal Palace, and one of the
fountains plays to a height of 267 feet. Higher up on the Derwent, in a charming
situation, stands Hathersage, where needles and fishing-tackle are made, and
beyond we reach Castleton, in the very heart of the Peak. Its neighbourhood
abounds in caverns, that of the Peak being traversed by an underground river.
A little lead is won in the vicinity.
That portion of Derbyshire which lies beyond the Peak, towards the north-
west, is drained into the Mersey. Glossop, Hayfield, and other places in this
neighbourhood carry on cotton-spinning, and depend naturally upon Manchester.
There are but few towns in Western Derbyshire. Wirksworth and Winster are
the principal places of a lead-mining district of small importance, to the west of
Matlock. Ashbourne, in the fertile valley of the Dove, and the centre of a grazing
district, carries on an important trade in cheese, wool, and corn.
Far more populous is the great industrial and mining district of Eastern Derby-
shire, between the Derwent and the Erwash, the northern portion of which is
tributary to the river Don. Chesterfield, a busj^ town remarkable for its "crooked"
or leaning spire, has coal mines and iron works, and manufactures lace, hosiery,
and woollen stuffs. George Stephenson, the engineer, died here in 1848, and Hes
buried in Trinity Church. Farther south are the towns of Claycross, Alfreton,
Ripley, Heanor, and Ilkeston, all of them with coal? mines, most of them with iron
works, and some of them with hosiery- mills. Ilkeston rejoices, in addition, in the
possession of mineral springs.
Leicestershire is almost wholly comprised within the basin of the Soar, which
flows northward through its centre, and joins the Trent on the northern border of
the shire. Its surface is for the most part undulating, and Bardon Hill, in Charn-
wood Forest, to the west of the Soar, although the culminating summit of the
county, does not exceed a height of 853 feet. To the east of the Soar the country
rises gently towards the oolitic uplands of Rutland and N'orthamptonshire, whilst
in the south-west the plain of Leicester extends across the borders of the county
into Warwickshire. A small coal basin lies towards the north-west. Leicestershire
is famous for its horses, cattle, and sheep, and is the great centre of the hosiery
manufacture.
Leicester, the county town, occupies the site of the Roman city of Ratae, and
NOTTINGHAMSHIRE. 245
here still exist portions of Roman walls and other ancient remains, carefully pre-
served in the local museum. The central position of the town on the navigable
Soar has enabled it to play an important part in the history of England. It was
here that Richard III. and Cardinal Wolsey died. But it is more especially from
the beginning of this century that Leicester has grown into a large town, its
population since 1850 having more than doubled. This increase is due almost
solely to the development of the hosiery trade, of which Leicester is the head-
quarters, and which employs many thousand hands throughout the county. The
famous Leicester sheep, which produce long combing wool, pasture in the valley
of the Upper Soar, towards the old towns of Hinckley and Market Bosworth, near
which the Earl of Richmond defeated Richard III. (1485), and on the downs
stretching along the southern confines of the shire. The only places in this remote
part of the county are Lutterworth, on a feeder of the Avon, of which John Wick-
liffe was rector (1375 — 84), and Market Harhorough, on the Welland, a favourite
resort of hunting-men during the winter. Indeed, the openness of a great part of
the county is favourable to sportsmen, and Melton Mowbray, on the Wreke,
which joins the Soar from the east, is the great head-quarters of fox-hunting, and
its stables afford accommodation to five or six hundred horses. The town, more-
over, is noted for its pork pies, and exports the famous Stilton cheese made in
its environs. Quorndon, on the Soar, within a short distance of the granite quarries
of Mount Sorrel and the lime-kilns of Barrow, is the head-quarters of the Quorn
Hunt. Loughborough, on the Lower Soar, and the much smaller town of Castle-
Donington, farther north, engage in the manufacture of woollen hosiery, and the
former has in addition a bell foundry and locomotive factory.
Ashby -de-la- Zouch retains its ancient name, half Danish, half Norman. It is
the centre of a coal basin. Whitwick, to the east of it, on the fringe of Charn-
wood Chase, is remarkable for the modern Roman Catholic abbey of Mount
St. Bernard, the first establishment of the kind completed in England since the
Reformation.
Nottinghamshire in the main consists of the broad and fertile plain of the
Trent, which opens out upon the alluvial lowland at the head of the Humber, and
of a broken hill country which occupies the western portion of the shire. The soil
in the latter is sandy and gravelly, and the whole region from the Trent to "Work-
sop, in the basin of its tributary the Idle, was formerly comprehended within
Sherwood Forest, the principal scene of the adventures of Robin Hood and his
companions. Coal occurs along the western boundary, and the manufacture of
bobbinet, or lace, and of hosiery, employs thousands of hands.
Nottingham occupies a steep declivity overlooking the Trent. It is a place of
great antiquity, with a castle built by William the Conqueror, now converted into
an art museum. The Standard Hill, upon which Charles I. unfurled the royal
standard in 1642, adjoins this ancient stronghold. Like Leicester, the county
town of Nottinghamshire has grown into a great seat of industry, famous for its
hosiery, bobbinet, and machinery. The same branches of industry are carried on at
the neighbouring towns of Sneinton, Lenton, Basford, Hucknal Torkard, and Arnold.
246 THE BRITISH ISLES.
Newark'Upon- Trent is a town of breweries, like Burton, and the capital of the
agricultural portion of the county, where great corn and cattle markets are held.
King John died within the castle whose ruins crown a neighbouring hill. Bing-
ham is a market town in the fruitful vale of Bel voir, which stretches across the
southern boundary of the county into Leicestershire, and is named after Belvoir
Castle, the stately residence of the Duke of Rutland.
Mansfield and Sutton-in-Ashfield are the principal towns in Sherwood Forest.
Collieries and quarries are near them, and hosiery is manufactured. Newstead
Abbey, farther south, in the midst of the " Forest," is doubly interesting on account
of its ivy-clad facade of the twelfth century, and its association with Lord Byron.
Worksop, in the basin of the Idle, is a quiet country place, doing a large trade in
malt. Near it are a colliery and several noble parks. Retford, the centre of a
rural parliamentary borough on the Idle, carries on a considerable trade in corn
and malt.
Yorkshire is by far the largest and most important county of England. It
extends along the Grerman Ocean from the bay of the Tees to the mouth of the
Humber, and stretches inland to the summit of the Pennine chain and beyond.
Politically the county is divided into the city of York and its Ainsty, and the
three districts called the North, West, and East Ridings. Geographically, how-
ever, it consists of several well-defined regions, and of these the fruitful vale of
York is by far the most extensive and important. This vale, or plain, extends from
the southern confines of the county, beyond the river Tees, into Durham. It is
drained by the river Ouse and its tributaries. On the east the fertile vale of
Pickering opens out into it like a huge bay, extending to the sea near Scarborough,
and separating the wild oolitic moors of North Yorkshire from the chalky wolds of
the East Riding. These latter form a screen around the fertile alluvial tract of
Holderness, at the mouth of the Humber.
Western Yorkshire consists of wild moorlands, which attain their highest eleva-
tion in the Craven district in the north, and are intersected by valleys renowned
for their picturesque scenery. As we proceed south the hills decline in height, and
gradually merge into monotonous moorlands. But \yhat South-western Yorkshire
lacks in scenery is amply compensated for by the mineral treasures, coal and iron,
which are hidden in its soil, and which have given birth to one of the busiest manufac-
turing districts of the world. Yorkshire holds the first place for its woollens, but the
manufacture of iron and of every description of ironware also furnishes occupation
to thousands, and some of the cotton-mills rival those of Lancashire in their huge
proportions. The county holds, moreover, a prominent position for its agriculture.
Its horses, cattle, and sheep are in high estimation, and the hams of Yorkshire are
famous throughout England.
Right in the centre of the great fertile plain which forms so striking a physical
feature of the county, admirably situated as a place of commerce on the great
natural high-road which connects England with Scotland, and on the navigable
Ouse, rises the ancient city of York. As long as the subterranean treasures
YORKSHIRE.
247
in the western moorlands remained untouched, York was able to maintain its
commercial supremacy. It is only natural that the great north road, instead
of following the sinuosities of the coast-line, should take a more direct course at
some distance inland. Leaving the Fens around the Wash to the east, the road
descends the valley of the Trent, and then skirts the marshes, in the midst of which
the water of the Trent mingles with that of the Ouse. Having followed the latter
as far as the point where it turns abruptly to the south, it becomes necessary to
cross to the other bank, in order to avoid a long det6ur to the west. It was at
this natural crossing-place that the Brigantes had founded their capital of EburaCy
or Ehorac, which subsequently expanded into Eboracum, the most important
Fig 120.- York.
Scale 1 : 286,000.
*w;?;3
W.ofG 1*5
45'
Roman colony in Britain. It was here Septimius Severus died in 211. The
political authorities of the Empire were in course of time superseded by the powers
of the Church. Early in the seventh century York became the seat of a bishop,
and subsequently of an archbishop, who disputed with his rival of Canterbury the
primacy of all England. York and London are the only cities in England whose
chief magistrate bears the title of Lord Mayor.
A few Roman foundations may still be traced at York, but all Roman buildings
have disappeared, and the many curious edifices of the city belong to the Middle
Ages. A tower, built by William the Conqueror upon Roman foundations, rises
within the castle precincts, by the side of the modern County Court and gaol.
Ancient walls, nearly 3 miles in circuit, still surround the city, and afford
248
THE BRITISH ISLES.
pleasant walks. The minster, which rises on the highest ground within them, is
not the structure of a single age, but nevertheless exhibits a remarkable unity of
design; Its west front fully deserves its reputation, but the two towers which
Fig. 121.— York Minster.
flank it, as is the case with most of the old English cathedrals, are not sufficiently
lofty in proportion to the size of the nave. York, as compared with the more
modern towns in the manufacturing district, rejoices in the possession of greater
wealth bequeathed by the past. Its museums are more interesting, its scientific
YOEKSHIEE. 249
and literary life more active, and its individual character more strongly marked.
York, indeed, by its general physiognomy, is the most English town of all England.
Flaxman, the sculptor, was born here. The battle of Stamford Bridge (1066),
between Harold of England and Harald Hardrada of Norway, was fought to the
east of York, on the Derwent; that of Marston Moor (1644) about 7 miles to the
west.
Tadcaster, the Roman Calcaria, lies 8 miles to the south-west of York, and near
it is the field of the battle of Towton, fought in 1461 between King Edward, of
York, and the Lancastrians, in which the latter were defeated, with a loss of 40,000
men. The fight was thickest in the field still called the *' Bloody Meadow." In a
sweet-brier hedge by its side the white rose now mingles with the red rose, and
after having hurried thousands into a bloody death, these flowers have become
symbols of peace.
Vessels of more than 100 tons burden ascend the Ouse as far as York. Those
of greater size only proceed to Selbij, a place of commerce, with a magnificent
abbey church, or to Goole, the great rival of Kingston-upon-HuU. Goole, close to
the confluence of the *' Dutch River" with the Ouse, is a shipping port of con-
siderable importance. It imports fruit and vegetables from Belgium and the
Netherlands, and exports iron, cloth, and building stones.
Ascending the river Don, which traverses the southern portion of the plain of
York, we pass Thome, a market town of the Isle of Axholme, and reach Boncaster,
the Daniim of the Romans, and anciently the capital of the county. It is a quiet
town, contrasting with the busy hives of industry to the west of it. Only once in the
year, during the race week in September, is it stirred into life, but it then attracts
pleasure-seekers and sporting-men from the whole of England. The modern Gothic
church of Doncaster is one of the finest works of Sir Gilbert Scott. The Great
Northern Railway works, for the manufacture of carriages and locomotives, are
close to the town.
Pickering lies in the centre of the vale named after it, which is drained
by the Upper Derwent. Malton, lower down on that river, is a place of some
importance. Near it, on a height overlooking the river, rises Castle Howard,
the magnificent seat of the Earl of Carlisle, containing a noble collection of
works of art.
The York Moors occupy the north-western portion of the county, rising boldly
above the vales of York and Cleveland, and presenting picturesque clifis towards
the German Ocean. The greater part of this wild country is given up to sheep
grazing, and the narrow valleys which intersect it are but sparsely peopled.
Within the last fifty years, however, the discovery of ironstone has attracted a
large mining population.
Midclleshorough, the largest town in the district, at the mouth of the Tees, owes
its rapid growth, if not its existence, to the discovery of this iron. In 1829
there stood but a solitary house upon the site of Middlesborough, whilst now
the atmosphere is blackened with the smoke ascending from blast furnaces and
iron works, and there is hardly to be seen a blade of grass or a tree to relieve the
113— E
260
THE BRITISH ISLES.
dreariness. The great iron works of this prosperous town were originally con-
structed for the treatment of Spanish and Algerian ores, but they now draw most
of their supplies from the Cleveland Hills, which form the northern escarpment
of the Moors, and yield nearly one-third of all the iron ore found in Great
Britain. In addition to iron and steel, Middlesborough manufactures machinery
and earthenware, and carries on a most extensive commerce. Its growth has,
indeed, been unparalleled in Europe, and only Barrow-in-Furness can compare
with it.
Guisborough, the centre of the mining district, is a town of great age, with
the ruins of an Augustinian priory. Other places in the vicinity are Skelton-in-
Cleveland, Orrheshy, and Novmanhy.
Northallerton and Thirsk are quiet agricultural towns at the foot of the
Fig. 122. — MiDDLESBORO.UGH AND StOCKTON-ON-TeES.
1 : 97,600.
Mile.
Hambleton Hills, which form the western escarpment of the Moors, and on the
margin of the vale of York. Near Northallerton was fought the Battle of the
Standard (1138). Helmsley lies at the southern foot of the Moors, on the fringe of
the vale of Pickering. The ruins of Rivaulx Abbey, the first Cistercian house
established in Yorkshire (1132), are near it.
Far more widely known than either of these agricultural towns of Yorkshire
are the watering-places which dot the coast from the mouth of the Tees to Flam;
borough Head. The most renowned amongst them are Whitby and Scarborough.
Whitby, at the mouth of the river Esk, which rises in the Cleveland Hills, is at the
same time a shipping port and a watering-place, and occupies a most picturesque
YORKSHIRE.
251
site. There are alum works in the vicinity, and the herring fishery gives employ-
ment to many of the inhabitants, but the town is more widely known for its jet
ornaments. This industry has been carried on here from immemorial times, as
is proved by the discoveries made in the hones which crown the neighbouring
hills, and the pilgrims who during the Middle Ages paid their devotions in the
abbey of Whitby never failed to carry away with them a cross or a rosary made
of jet.
Scarborough, the " Queec of the northern watering-places," possesses resources
and amusements far exceeding those of its neighbour Whitby. It is built
at the foot and on the top of two cliffs, separated by a chasm spanned by a
lofty bridge, which joins the old town to the Spa, Museum, and other buildings
Fig. 123. — Scarborough.
Scale 1 : 310,000.
ec w.ofG.
Ancient Entrenchments.
Tumuli.
5 Miles.
specially constructed for the accommodation of the 20,000 visitors who annually
flock to it. The Marine Aquarium is larger than that of Brighton. From the
keep of the Norman castle which commands the old town we look down with
admiration upon the sands which stretch along the foot of the limestone cliffs.
Scarborough has been a place of commerce for centuries, and its port, protected by
two piers, affords shelter to the largest vessels. The coasting trade carried on is
considerable, and the herring fishery is a source of profit. Still the importance
of the town is derived almost exclusively from the crowds of visitors annually
attracted by its picturesque scenery, bracing air, smooth sands, chalybeate springs,
and varied resources for amusement.
Filey, to the south-east of Scarborough, on the spacious bay to which it gives
252 THE BRITISH ISLES.
name, is protected by a spit of sand, and offers great advantages as a naval station.
Amongst other watering-places along this coast Redmr and Saltburn-bt/-the-Spa
deserve to be mentioned.
The crescent- shaped range of the cretaceous York Wolds extends from the
Humber above Hull to Flamborough Head, and presents a bold escarpment
towards the vales of York and Pickering, at the foot of which lie the market
towns of Market Weighton and Pocklington. The towns along the inner rim,
which merges in the lowlands of Holderness, are far more important. Foremost
amongst them is Kingston-upon-HuU, usually known as Hull, from the small
tributary of the Humber at the mouth of which it has been built. Hull is the
great port of the whole region, and on the east coast of England it holds a place
analogous to that of Liverpool on the west coast. The great port of tlie Mersey
is fed by the manufacturing district of Lancashire ; that of the Humber is
the emporium of Yorkshire : the former trades in cotton and cottons, the latter
in wool and woollens. Hull, in certain respects, enjoys advantages superior
even to those of Liverpool, for the Humber and its many navigable tributaries
place it in facile communication with a considerable portion of Central England.
But though possessing the advantage as regards the river and coasting trades, it
is less favoured with respect to the world at large. Hull can look only to
Germany, Scandinavia, and the Baltic to feed its commerce, whilst Liverpool faces
not only Ireland, but also the New World, and trades largely with Africa.
This advantage of Liverpool, however, only revealed itself after America
had been discovered and distinct colonies established, and for a considerable
period Hull was her superior. In the fourteenth century it was the third port
of England, ranking next to London and Bristol. It furnished Edward III.
with sixteen vessels, manned by 500 sailors, to be employed against France.
As long as England was a grain-exporting country — that is, until about 1770—
large flotillas of barges laden with corn descended all the rivers which discharge
themselves into the Humber, and Hull was the natural emporium through which
the corn trade with Holland was carried on.* A^ the present time Hull ranks
fifth, and it imports corn, flour, and other agricultural produce, as well as cattle,
from Germany, Denmark, and the Baltic. Wool and tobacco likewise figure
largely amongst the imports, in return for which Hull exports the produce of
the numerous industrial inland towns as well as of its own machine shops,
chemical works, oil-crushing mills, and other factories. Lines of steamers place
Hull in regular communication with all the ports of the east coast of Great
Britain and of Northern Europe. Hull was one of the first towns to take advan-
tage of the maritime route to Siberia opened up by the persistent labours of
Nordenskjold. In 1877 a Hull steamer laden with coal and petroleum reached
Tobolsk. The docks, constructed since 1778, and the crescent-shaped roadstead
of the river, here 2 miles in width, are at all times crowded with shipping of
every description. There are ship.building yards, principally for the construc-
* Halley, "Atlas Maritimus et Commercial is," 1728.
YOEKSHIRE. 253
tion of iron vessels. Hull has a fine park, a museum, and several learned societies.
Wilberforce was born here, and a monument has been raised in his honour.
Cottingham, a suburban village of Hull, with many market gardens, lies on
the road to Beverleij, a very ancient city, at one time of greater importance than
its neighbour Hull, and still the capital of the East Riding. Beverley boasts a
remarkably fine minster. There are chemical and agricultural machinery works,
and a great trade in corn and provisions is carried on. Passing through Great
Driffield, we reach Bridlington, with its fine priory dhurch, and Bridlington Quay,
its port, on the great bay, protected in the north by Flamborough Head. A
chalybeate spring and several intermittent springs, known as the " Gipsies,"
are near the town. Geologists will be interested in the caverns and fossils of
the chalk cliffs, as well as in the ancient bushes covered with shells, which Gwyn
Jeffreys refers to the glacial epoch.
There are no towns of importance in the fertile district of Holderness. The
only places worth notice are Patrington, with a church described as " one of the
glories of England," Withernsea, and Hornsea, the two latter quiet seaside places,
as is implied by their names.
We now turn to the desolate moors and romantic valleys of North-western
Yorkshire, where the mountains are steepest and the population least dense.
This district, known for its greater part as Craven, is intersected by the upper
valleys of the rivers Swale, Ure, Nidd, Wharfe, and Aire. It yields a little lead,
but no coal : hence the striking contrast it presents to the great hive of industry
which adjoins it on the south.
The Swale, in its upper course, flows past the small mining villages of Keld
and E-eeth, and below the ancient parliamentary borough of Richmond it emerges
upon the broad plain of York. The Norman castle which overshadows this
picturesque town is now used as a militia store. Near this stagnant town is the
village of Hipswell, the reputed birthplace of Wickliffe, the reformer.
The Ure, or Yore, traverses the Wensley Dale, where woollen knitting and
carpet-making occupy some of the inhabitants of the small towns of Haives and
Askrigg. Ley bourne, at the mouth of the dale, has a lead mine ; and at Middleham,
near it, are the ruins of one of the castles held by Warwick the King-maker.
Bipon is the principal town on the Ure, and one of the oldest. Near it a
funereal mound is pointed out, which tradition asserts to contain the bones of
Saxons and Danes who fell on a neighbouring battle-field. There are a small
cathedral raised above a Saxon crypt and several ancient hospitals. Studley
Royal, the princely seat of the Marquis of Ripon, lies to the west of Ripon, and
near it are the picturesque ruins of Fountains Abbey, at one time one of the most
powerful houses of the Cistercians, who held all the land from the banks of the
Ure as far as the hills of Cumberland. Boroughbridge and Aldboroug]i, the Roman
Isurium, are small towns below Ripon, in whose vicinity many antiquities have been
discovered. Most curious amongst these relics of the past are three obelisk-like
masses of ragstone, which have long puzzled the brains of antiquaries.
254
THE BRITISH ISLES.
The Mdd, in its upper course, flows through the beautiful Nidderdale, the
principal town in which is Pateley Bridge, where there is a lead mine. Ripley has
Fig. 124. — Towns in South-Western Yorkshire.
Scale 1 : 506,000.
5 Miles.
an old castle and an ambitious new town-hall. At Knareshorough the river flows
between steep cliff's, wooded at their foot. Here, too, there is a castle, and, besides
this, a "dropping well," by the side of which "Mother Shipton,'' the famous
YOEKSHIRE. 255
prophetess of the sixteenth century, was born, and extensive limestone quarries.
Ribston is a small village below Knaresborough, where Ribston pippins were
first grown. Harrogate, the famous watering-place, occupies a lofty position above
the Ure. The first spring was discovered in 1596, and there are now known about
twenty-five, both sulphureous and chalybeate.
The Wharfe rises in Langshothdale, and takes its winding course through a
dale renowned for its scenic charms. It flows past the ruins of Bolton Abbey and
the huge hydropathic establishments which have m^de Ilkley a second Malvern,
until it reaches Otley, a small manufacturing town, which is the capital of Wharfe-
dale. At Wetherbij the Wharfe emerges upon the plain of York, and flowing past
Tadeaster, it joins the Ouse a short distance above Cawood.
The Aire takes its rise at the foot of the scars of Gordale and in the pretty
Malham Tarn (1,246 feet above the sea). It flows near Skipton, the capital of the
Craven district, close by which is the castle of the Cliffords. Cotton-spinning and
quarrying occupy many of the inhabitants. At Skipton the Aire leaves behind it
the rugged limestone region, and enters upon more monotonous moorlands, the
towns amongst which will be described further on.
A portion of Yorkshire lies beyond the Pennine chain, and is drained by the
river Eibble and by the Rawthey, a tributary of the Lune. Sedbergh, the principal
town on the latter, is a secluded place in the midst of steep fells. Its grammar
school, however, enjoys some reputation, and amongst its scholars was Sedgwick,
the geologist, a native of the village of Dent, a few miles to the south-east, famous
for its black marble.
The Ribble rises in the fells to the north of the Ingleborough, and flows
through a charming countrj^ past the small town of Settle, dependent upon agri-
culture and cotton-spinning, into Lancashire.
We now enter the south-western moorlands, so abundantly supplied with coal
and iron, and traversed in all directions by running streams, which furnish the
motive power needed by its innumerable factories. The towns are crowded together
in this region, and in some localities have almost blotted out green fields. The oppo-
site diagram will enable us to obtain some notion of their distribution. Broadly
speaking, the valleys of the Aire and Calder are the seats of the woollen and
worsted trades, wnth a great deal of cotton-spinning towards the west ; the Upper
Don is the centre of the iron industry, and its tributary Dearne that of the linen
trade.
The Aire and Calder, which traverse the northern portion of this industrial
region, have vastly changed their character since the Middle Ages. Their water was
famous then for its crystalline purity, and a Yorkshire poet cried out, " Why should
not the maidens of Castleford be beautiful ? do they not lave themselves in the
mingled waters of the Aire and Calder ? " These rivers, in our own day, are hardly
better than open sewers, for they receive the refuse of innumerable factories.
The Calder, when it first enters this district, flows past the town oi Keighley,
engaged in the manufacture of worsted and in cotton- spinning, and known for its
256
THE BEITISH ISLES.
ingenious washing macliines. In the valley of the Worth, which joins the Aire at
Keighley, is Haworth, the home of the Brontes. Bingley is engaged in the worsted
and woollen trades. Saltaire, below it, is a model town, and was founded in 1853
by the late Sir Titus Salt, who first introduced the manufacture of alpaca into
England. Passing Shipley, which carries on the same industries as Bingley, we
reach Leeds, the commercial and industrial metropolis of -the whole district, by
right of its population the fifth town of England, but the first in the world for its
clothing trade. This branch of industry has been carried on here from very
remote times, and as early as the beginning of the sixteenth century the cloth-
makers of Leeds, instructed in their craft by Flemish workmen, sent their ware«
Fig. 125. — Leeds.
Scale 1 : 192,000.
•I Miles.
into every part of England. Halifax at that time was the most important manu-
facturing town of the county, and its burgesses enjoyed the privilege of beheading
every malefactor who stole any cloth from off the " tenters," a privilege of which
they freely availed themselves until its abrogation in 1650. By the end of the
seventeenth century Leeds had distanced all its Yorkshire rivals in the clothing
trade, and about the same period, in consequence of the introduction of coal into
its factories, it enriched itself still further by adding fresh branches of industry to
that which had first established its reputation. At the present day almost every
description of cloth is made at Leeds, but, besides this, there are huge flax-mills,
iron-mills, locomotive works, dye and bleaching works, felt factories, brass foundries,
YORKSHIRE. 257
glass houses, chemical works, leather works, and many others. The lower part of
the town, with its numerous factories lit up on a winter night, is a sight never to
be forgotten. The principal edifices of Leeds are naturally connected with its
leading industries ; but, proud of its wealth, the metropolis of the clothing trade
has built itself a magnificent town-hall, created public libraries and museums,
erected statues to its great men, and provided, in Woodhouse Moor and Roundhay,
ample breathing grounds for its population. A grammar school, founded in 1552,
a medical school, and a Wesleyan college are the foremost educational establish-
ments of the town. The merchants of Leeds own neat villas on the surrounding
heights, and more especially near Chapel Allerton. The ruins of Kirkstall Abbey
lie a short distance above the town, near the Aire. Priestley, the illustrious
physicist, was born near Leeds.
Castleford, just below the junction of the Aire with the Calder, is the modern
representative of the Roman station of Lcgeolium. Its glass houses supply
millions of bottles every year. Knotting ley, on the margin of the plain of York,
has a magnificent abbey church, and depends upon glass works and limestone
quarries. On the height of land to the south of Castleford lies the cheerful old
town of Pontefrad, i.e. " Broken Bridge," often called Porafret. Its chief
curiosities are the ruins of the Norman castle in which Richard II. was starved to
death (1400). The town is famous for its liquorice.
Bradford, in a narrow valley which trends northward towards the Aire, and
to the west of Leeds, has made wonderful progress in wealth and population since
the beginning of this century. In 1801 the town only numbered 13,000
inhabitants ; in 1822 the first steam-engine was set up ; but at present Bradford
stands foremost for its woollen stufis and worsted yarns, and has close upon
200,000 inhabitants. No other town in Yorkshire surpasses it in public spirit.
The town-hall, with its carillon chimes, is one of the finest buildings in Yorkshire ;
there are three parks ; and statues have been raised in honour of several bene-
factors of the town. Bierley, almost a suburb of Bradford, is dependent upon the
Bowling and Lowmoor iron works, the latter the oldest and most important in
Yorkshire.
The river Calder rises in the moors around Todmorden, a brisk manufacturing
town, with numerous cotton-mills, on the boundary of Lancashire. This upper
valley of the Calder is very pretty, and would present scenes of rural peace and
beauty if it were not for the numerous factories which have invaded it. Soioerby,
EUand, and Brighouse, quiet villages in former times, have grown into little
manufacturing towns, principally engaged in the production of textiles. Far
more ancient than either of these, and, in fact, the most venerable manufacturing
town of Yorkshire, is Halifax, which rises on the slopes of the picturesque hills
overlooking the Hebble, a tributary of the Calder. Though outstripped in impor-
tance by Leeds and Bradford, Halifax nevertheless remains one of the most interest-
ing and picturesque towns of Yorkshire. It is one of the chief seats of the worsted
and carpet trades.. Huddersfield is a well-built town on the Colne, which joins the
Calder from the south. It carries on the manufacture of woollens, cottons, and
258
THE BRITISH ISLES.
machinery. In its neighbourhood are foundries, quarries, and coal mines. The
smaller towns dependent upon it— such as Golcar, Linthivaite, Melt/iam, and Wooldale
— engage in the same industries.
Once more returning to the Calder, we reach Dewshury, an ancient town,
where Paulinus first preached Christianity to the heathen. Together with the neigh-
bouring town of Batley, it forms a parliamentary borough. Batley and Dewsbury
are the head-quarters of the shoddy trade, whose profitable task it is to convert
old clothes into new cloth. The same industry engages Morley, Birstall, Cleck-
Fig. 126.— Halifax and Hubdersfield.
Scale 1 : 160,000.
1 Mile.
heaton, and other towns in the vicinity ; whilst Heckmondwike, to the east, produces
carpets, blankets, and " flushings." Thornhill, to the south of Dewsbury, boasts a
fine decorated church and an Elizabethan mansion.
Wakefield, formerly one of the busiest manufacturing towns of Yorkshire, has
still some woollen- mills, worsted-mills, and iron works, but flourishes principally
as the great corn market of the county. The feudal enactment which compelled
the inhabitants to have their corn ground in certain mills was in force as recently
as 1853. Amongst the scholars who attended the grammar school of the town
were Dr. Radcliffe, the founder of the Radclifie Library, and Dr. Bentley, the
YORKSHIRE. 259
critic. The battle of Wakefield, in which the Duke of York was defeated and
slain by the forces of Queen Margaret, was fought around Sandal Castle, to the
south of the town (1460).
"Bleak" Bamsley, an interesting town on the river Dearne, is the centre of
the linen manufacture of Yorkshire. Its neighbourhood abounds in collieries and
iron works. One of the former has been sunk to a depth of 1,885 feet, and yields
daily a thousand tons of coal. Worshorough and Nether Hoijland, to the south of
Barnsley, have important iron works, whilst Silkstone, to the west, is best known
for its coal. It was also the birthplace of Bramah, the locksmith.
The river Don rises not far from Woodhead Tunnel, through which runs the
Fig. 127. — Sheffield.
Scale 1 : 113,000.
2 Miles.
railway connecting South-western Yorkshire with Manchester. Thurlstone,
Penistone, and Wortley are small towns on the Upper Don, which in its onward
course traverses the famous manufacturing town of Sheffield. It is admirably
seated in the midst of a fine amphitheatre of hills, at the point of junction of
five rivers, and above the stores of coal which furnish its numerous factories
with the fuel indispensable to them. Sheffield, originally a small feudal village,
has been for centuries a place of iron-workers, and Chaucer mentions the
"thwytels" which were made there. Soon after the Reformation skilled
Flemish metal-workers settled in the town, and greatly contributed towards
260 THE BRITISH ISLES.
its prosperity. But it is only since the beginning of the present century that
this Yorkshire town has won the first place in the world for its cutlery and
steel. Its population is seven times greater now than what it was in 1801,
and continues to increase at the same rate. Like London, Manchester, and
Birmingham, it swallows up the villages in its neighbourhood, and already its
houses cover an area of 8 square miles. The iron won in this district, which
is known as Hallamshire, no longer suffices for the wants of the factories, and addi-
tional supplies have to be procured from abroad. Most of the famous iron of
Sweden is bought up on account of Sheffield houses. ~ More ivory is used in
Sheffield than in any other part of the world. It has been computed that the
ivory handles of the knives annually manufactured at Sheffield have a weight
of 200 tons, which would represent the spoils of at least 15,000 elephants.
Cutlery, files, saws, and tools of every description, Britannia and electro-plated
ware, are the staple manufactures of Sheffield ; and there are also important iron
and steel works. The water supply of the town is obtained from reservoirs
formed in the valleys to the west. In 1864 one of these dams burst its
embankment, causing a great flood, in which 250 persons were drowned and
much property destroyed. Chantrey, the sculptor, was born at Norton, a village
near Sheffield.
The towns and villages around Sheffield participate in its industry. RotJier-
ham, the most important amongst them, has iron and steel works as well as
collieries. Mexhoroiigh, near the mouth of the Dearne, in addition to iron works,
has important glass houses. Soon after passing this town the Don emerges from
the dreary moorlands, blackened by the smoke of factories, and enters upon the
smiling plain of York.*
* For smaller towns and villages not mentioned above refer to the Statistical Appendix.
CHAPTER X.
THE BASINS OF THE MERSEY AND THE RIBBLE.
(Cheshire and Lancashire.)
General Features.
HOUGH small in extent, the district which we are about to describe
is one of the most densely peopled in the worid, and green fields
appear almost obliterated by the masses of brick houses raised by
human hands. Lancashire has more inhabitants within its limits
than any other county of England, not even excepting Yorkshire
or Middlesex — the one more than thrice its size, the other occupied by the greater
part of the metropolis. If the whole world were as densely peopled as Lancashire,
it would hold 76,000,000,000 of human beings.
At first view this county does not appear to possess exceptional advantages.
The soil is only of middling fertility, and vast tracts on the western slope of the
Pennine chain are not even cultivated. The climate is moist, and the prevailing
winds carry the sea-fogs inland, where they are precipitated as rain. The coast, it
is true, is indented by several estuaries, in which the tide rises to a considerable
height ; but this is an advantage enjoyed by many other parts of England. What
has proved the great source of wealth of Lancashire is its coal measures, and as
the coal is found in close proximity to an excellent harbour, it became at once
available as a means of establishing commercial relations with foreign countries.
The raw materials could thus be conveyed within a short distance of the locality in
which they were to be converted into manufactures, and it was possible to
concentrate here commercial emporiums, factories, and mines. The enterprise and
energy of the inhabitants have done the rest. The people of Lancashire are in no
respect inferior in skill to their neighbours of Yorkshire. They have turned to
profit all the resources which their county ofiers, and derive benefit even from
advantages which elsewhere are allowed to lie sterile. The local dialects are as
tenaciously preserved as amongst the dwellers on the other side of the Pennine
chain. It has been observed that the large rivers and estuaries form the boundaries
between a variety of local dialects. Where the rivers can be forded, or are spanned
262
THE BEITISH ISLES.
by a bridge, the same dialect is heard on both banks ; but where they constitute a
serious obstacle to free intercourse the dialects differ.*
Cheshire consists in the main of a broad plain, which extends from the river
Dee to the Mersey, and is intersected by the Weaver and its tributaries. The soil
of this plain is for the most part loam ; it is of exceeding fertility, and it is
impossible to imagine a finer grazing district. The grass retains its verdure
throughout the year, and the dairy husbandry is consequently attended to with
great success. A broken ridge of hills divides this plain into a western and an eastern
portion. It passes into the county from the south, and extends northward as far
as the Lower Mersey. Its most remarkable feature is the insulated rock of Beeston,
crowned with the ruins of a castle. In the east the plain is bounded by a range of
uplands, known as Congleton Edge and Macclesfield Forest. These uplands are
a southern extension of the Pennine chain ; they separate Cheshire from Stafford-
Fig. 128.— Chester.
Scale 1 : 500,000.
3' 90 W.of G.
2°40'
5 Miles.
shire and Derbyshire, and contain coal, iron, and lead. Far more important than
either of these are, however, the salt mines and brine springs in the valley of the
"Weaver. In the north-west the plain of Cheshire runs into the peninsula of
Wirral, which juts out to the Irish Sea between the estuaries of the Dee and
Mersey. Cotton and silk spinning and weaving are the principal branches of
manufacture carried on.
Chester, the ancient capital of the county, is seated upon the river Dee, which a
few miles below the city broadens out into a wide and shallow estuary close to the
Welsh frontier. It is of great antiquity, as is proved by its very name, a corrup-
tion of the Eoman eastnmi, and a great Roman highway, now known as Watling
Street, connected it with London and Dover. The foundations of Roman buildings
-and antiquities of every description have been discovered. The Romans called
* James Pearson ; Nodal and Milner, " Glossary of the Lancashire Dialect."
CHESHIRE. 263
their city Devay after the river Dee. They certainly worked lead mines in its
vicinity, for two *' pigs " of that metal have been found, one of which has impressed
upon it the name of Vespasian. That which distinguishes Chester more especially
from all other towns of modern England is its streets carved out of the rock, and
the covered arcades, or " rows," in front of the first-floor rooms of the houses
which line them. The old Roman ramparts have been transformed into walls,
which are wide enough to allow of three men walking abreast. Perambulating
them, we obtain curious glimpses of the city : we look down upon the famous
♦• Roodee," the Chester racecourse, backed by the Clwydian hills. The circuit of
the walls is interrupted by several towers, and from one of these Charles I. is said
to have witnessed the defeat of his army on Rowton Heath in 1645.
Most prominent amongst the buildings of the town is the venerable cathedral,
reopened, after having been carefully restored, in 1876. Its foundations date back
to the twelfth century ; but the existing building, which is chiefly in the perpen-
dicular style, is of more recent date. Far more venerable than the cathedral is the
church of St. John, outside the city walls, with its detached belfry, one of the most
splendid examples of early Norman archi-
tecture ^^' ^^^' — Watergate Row, Chest
Chester is still a seaport ; but neither
its canalised river, nor the cantil which
connects the city with the Mersey at
Ellesmere Port, is navigable by any but
the smallest coasting craft. Hence the
maritime commerce of Chester is no longer
what it used to be. Ship-building and
lead smelting are carried on to a small
extent ; but it is more especially through
its trade in cheese that Chester has become
known throughout the commercial world. Many strangers have settled in the city,
attracted by its pure air and cheap living. Within a few miles of it is Eaton Hall,
the magnificent seat of the Duke of Westminster. Tarporley, a quaint old market
town, where hosiery and leather breeches are manufactured, lies about 10 miles to
the E.S.E. of Chester.
Birkenhead, the principal town on the peninsula of Wirral, is a mere depend-
ency of Liverpool, which lies within sight of it, on the opposite bank of the
Mersey, and with which a tunnel will soon connect it. Its vast docks have been
constructed since 1847, principally through the exertions of Mr. Laird. They
cover an area of 165 acres, have quays 10 miles in length, and 235 acres of
warehouses. One of these artificial basins is the largest into which the waters of
the Mersey are admitted. Ship-building and machinery are the principal industries
carried on here. Tranmere and Wallasey are populous suburbs of Birkenhead,
and from the latter a row of pretty villas extends to the delightful watering-place
of New Brighton, at the mouth of the Mersey, where a charming view of the
Welsh hills presents itself, and the crowds of shipping entering and leaving the
264
THE BRITISH ISLES.
port may be watched. The two Bebinytons are pleasant villages to the south-east of
Birkenhead ; whilst Bilston, with the Liverpool Observatory, lies to the west.
Parkgate is a small watering-place on the estuary of the Dee.
Ascending the Mersey above Liverpool and Birkenhead, we reach Runcorn, in
the vicinity of the mouth of the Weaver — the busy shipping port of the Stafford-
shire Potteries, and of the salt mines in the basin of the Weaver. That river is
fed by numerous streams which rise in the saliferous triassic formation. The
names of several towns in its neighbourhood terminate in the Celtic wich,
or rather wyche, which signifies " salt work," and must not be confounded
with the Danish wicl', the meaning of which is "bay." Of these salt
Fig. 130.— Chester Cathedral (as restored).
mines and brine springs those at Northwich are by far the most productive.
The saliferous strata have a total thickness of about 100 feet, and extend
for a considerable distance beneath the soil. They are honeycombed by the
galleries excavated by the miners, and although these are supported by a
multitude of pillars, the ground has given way in many places, and a portion of
the town had to be deserted by its inhabitants, who have built themselves fresh
dwellings at Witton and other villages in the neighbourhood. Middlewich, on the
Dane, a tributary of the Weaver, and NanUdch, a quaint old town, on the Weaver
itself, are the principal amongst the other salt towns of Cheshire. In favourable
years the mines and springs of the Weaver basin yield over 1,000,000 tons of salt,
LANCASHIRE. 265
whicli supplies a profitable cargo to outward-bound merchantmen, and in this
manner the miners of Cheshire contribute largely to the prosperity of the great
port of the Mersey. Most of this salt, which is cut into huge quadrangular blocks,
is sent to India, E-ussia, and the United States. The salt mines of Cheshire may
be less famous than those of Wieliczka in Galicia, or of Hallein and Hallstatt in
Austria, but commercially they are certainly of far greater importance.
Crewe, to the east of Nantwich, has grown from an agricultural village into a
populous hive of industry since the establishment of the locomotive factories of
the London and North- Western Railway Company. There are, besides these, iron
and Bessemer steel works.
Sandhach, Congleton, Macclesfield, and Bollington, to the north-east of Crewe,
and at the foot of the picturesque range of heights which stretches along the
eastern border of the county, are the centres of a manufacturing district, in which
silk spinning and weaving are the principal branches of industry carried on.
Macclesfield, the most important of these towns, engages also in the velvet and
cotton trade, and near it are coal mines and quarries.
A second manufacturing district of even greater importance occupies the north-
eastern portion of the county, extending down the picturesque valley of the
Mersey, almost from its origin in the moorlands of Yorkshire to wdthin a few
miles of its junction with the Irwell. Cotton is king in this district, the natural
head- quarters of which are at Manchester. Stockport is the great cotton town of
Cheshire. It occupies a beautiful site on both banks of the Mersey, here spanned
by a fine viaduct, and, in addition to cotton stufis, produces felt hats. Higher up
on the Mersey are Hyde, one of the most prosperous of these cotton towns,
Dukinfield, and Stalyhridge, which, in addition to cotton-mills, have important
machine works, and manufacture nails and rivets. Bredbury and Mottram are the
principal towns in the Longdondale, which joins the Mersey above Stockport.
The hills along its sides yield coal and iron.
Descending the Mersey, we pass Sale, a small manufacturing town, and,
turning away from the river, reach Altringham, or Altrincham, a clean and cheerful
town, with a few flax-mills, close to Bowden Downs and the beautiful park of
Dunham Massey.
Lymm, near the confluence of the Bollin with the Mersey, and Knutsford, half-
way between the Bollin and the Weaver, are prosperous market towns.
Lancashire naturally falls into three parts, of which the first lies between the
Mersey and the Ribble, and is the great seat of the cotton industry of the British
Islands ; the second stretches to the north of the Ribble, and is mainly agricultural ;.
whilst the third includes the hundred of Furness, a detached part of the county
lying beyond Morecambe Bay, which has recently attained considerable importance
on account of its iron mines and furnaces. The central and eastern portions of
Southern Lancashire are occupied by hilly moorlands,* which throw off" a branch
in the direction of Liverpool, and thus separate the plain of the Mersey, with its
mosses, from the western maritime plain, which near the coast merges into
* Pendle Hill, their culminating point, attains a height of 1,816 feet.
114— E
266
THE BRITISH ISLES.
forbidding niarslies. These moorlands are not by any means fertile, and before
tbe coal mines which lie amongst them were opened to become a source of wealth
to the county, they supported only a small population. Since then hamlets have
grown into towns, towns into provinces of houses, and there is not a district of
similar extent in England which supports so large a number of inhabitants.
Northern Lancashire includes a similar tract of moorland in the west, which rises
Fig. 131. — Towns in Lancashire and Cheshibe.
Scale 1 : 792,000.
W of Gi
10 MUes.
to a height of 1,709 feet in the Bleasdale Moors ; but for the most part it consists
of a broad plain, the maritime portion of which, between the Ribble and Lancaster
Bay, is known as the Fylde. The hundred of Furness forms part of the Cumbrian
region, and within it lie a portion of the Windermere and Coniston Water, from
the banks of which Coniston Old Man rises to a height of 2,655 feet.
LANCASHIRE.
267
The coast of Lancashire, though much indented by arms of the sea, is
singularly deficient in good harbours, and even the approaches to the Mersey are
much obstructed by sand-banks. Morecambe Bay, which forms so inviting
a feature on a map, is also choked with sand-banks, and when the tide is out it is
possible to cross almost dry shod.
Lancashire is most essentially a manufacturing and mining county, its agri-
culture being quite of secondary importance. An extensive system of canals
places its principal centres of population in communication with each other,
and railways intersect it in every direction.
There is not, probably, a river in the world which sets in motion the wheels
of so many mills, and carries on its back so many vessels, as does the Mersey ;
and yet this river drains only a small basin, and its volume does not exceed
1,400 cubic feet a second. But within this basin lies Manchester, the great seat of
Fig. 132. — Manchester and Environs.
Scale 1 : 375,000.
W.of G. e-30
5 Miles.
the cotton trade, and its mouth is guarded by Liverpool, the commercial port of the
most important manufacturing region in the world.
Manchester and Salford are built upon the black and dye-stained waters of the
Irwell, Irk, and Medlock, into which numerous factories discharge their refuse,
but which the corporations of these two towns have at last determined to cleanse
and convert into limpid streams. The volume of water brought down from the
moorlands by these rivulets is not very great, but it suffices to fill a dock crowded
with barges. It has been proposed by engineers to make Manchester a maritime
port by converting the Mersey and its tributary Irwell into a ship canal, up
which the tide would ascend as far as the present dock. The construction of
such a canal, which would have a length of 33 miles, a width of 220 and a depth
of 20 feet, it is assumed, would require an expenditure of close upon four millions.
If this scheme should ever be realised, Manchester will have no longercause to
envy Glasgow, its Scotch rival. For the present the metropolis of the cotton
268 THE BEITISH ISLES.
trade is almost entirely dependent upon the railway which connects it with
Liverpool. This is one of the oldest lines in existence, and its opening in 1830
marked the starting-point of a new industrial and commercial era, which has
influenced the whole world. Near its centre this railway crosses the quaking
Chat Moss, which even engineers of our own days would look upon as a formidable
obstacle.
The city of Manchester is not, like Bradford, Middlesborough, and other vast
manufacturing centres of England, of yesterday's growth. It is the modern repre-
sentative of the Roman Mancunmm, and as early as the fourteenth century it had
become known for its manufacture of cloth, introduced by Flemish workmen. At
a subsequent period other branches of industry were established by Protestant
refugees, whom religious wars had driven from the continent, and about the begin-
ning of the eighteenth century cotton was first largely manufactured, in addition
to wool. In our own days Manchester is .known throughout the world as the
metropolis of the cotton trade, and its great merchants have become "cotton
lords." Cotton factories, however, are not so much to be found in Manchester
itself — which is rather the market and business centre of the trade — as in its
suburbs, and in the numerous towns which stud the country between Preston and
Clitheroe in the north, and Stockton in the south. There are towns in this district
which, relatively to their size, employ more hands in their cotton-mills than
Manchester ; but that city, if we include Salford and the more remote suburbs,
nevertheless ranks first amongst all as a manufacturing centre no less than as
a place of business. Thousands of workmen find employment in its cotton-mills,
calendering and finishing works, bleaching, dyeing, and print works. There
are, besides, worsted, flax, and silk mills, though these are very subordinate to
the leading industry. Far more important are the machine shops, which supply
most of the cotton-mills with machinery. Of importance, likewise, are the manu-
facture of miscellaneous metal articles, glass-making, coach-building, and brass
finishing. Millions of pounds of capital have been invested in these various
branches of manufacture, and we need not, therefore, wonder if zealous advocates
of a policy which considers above all things financial and industrial interests should
have come forward at Manchester. It was in the old Free-Trade Hall, now
replaced by a building of ampler dimensions, that free trade was hatched under
the auspices of the Anti- Corn-Law League. Politicians of the so-called Man-
chester school, a very influential party in England, are generally credited with a
desire of remaining neutral under any circumstances, and desiring peace at any
price, as long as the markets of the world are not closed against Lancashire
produce. Of recent years, however, the factory owners of Lancashire have not
lain upon a bed of roses. The United States have shut out their goods by high
protective duties, and India has established cotton-mills of her own to supply the
wants of her population. Manchester, consequently, has not recently grown quite
so fast as several other towns.
Sumptuous public edifices bear witness to the wealth of the great Lancashire
city. The new Town Hall is one of the most magnificent buildings of the class
LANCASHIRE. 269
in England ; the Exchange is a vast and splendid pile, in the classic style ; the
Assize Courts is a beautiful Gothic pile, by Waterhouse-— the same architect to
whom we are indebted for the Town Hall. The cathedral, or «* old church," is
venerable for its age, but not remarkable for size. Amongst charitable institutions
the most important is the Infirmary, in front of which have been placed statues
of Wellington, Watt, Dalton (the discoverer of the atomic theory), and Sir Robert
Peel. Public parks and gardens supply the citizens with a fair amount of fresh air.
Besides three parks, one of them having a museum in its centre, there are the
Zoological Gardens at Bellevue, the Botanic Gardens at Trafford, the Alexandra
Park, with an Aquarium, and the Pomona Gardens, the two latter favourite places
of resort.
In addition to pure air, Manchester is anxious to secure an ample supply of
pure water. The present supply amounts to 240,000,000 gallons daily, being at
the rate of 30 gallons per head of the population ; but as a considerable propor-
tion of this quantity is absorbed by the factories, the remainder does not ade-
quately meet the requirements of the inhabitants. The corporation has conse-
quently purchased a charming lake in Cumberland, the Thirlemere, with a view
of raising its level 50 feet by means of a dam, and carrying its limpid contents
along an aqueduct 90 miles in length, as far as Manchester. No doubt the
corporation might have obtained all the water they require had they converted
the neighbouring heaths into a huge basin for catching the rain, and constructed
gigantic reservoirs ; but these heaths are already dotted over with houses and
factories, and all the wealth of Manchester would hardly suffice to purchase them.
Manchester is not merely a place of business and industry, for it can boast
its libraries, learned societies, and educational institutions. Cheetham Library,
founded in 1457, is the oldest amongst the former, but the modern Free Library
is far richer, if wealth can be counted by the number of volumes. Foremost
amongst educational institutions is the famous college founded by John Owen
in 1846. It has recently received a long-coveted charter, which confers upon it
the privileges of a university, named in honour of the Queen.
The towns and villages around Manchester are all of them more or less
dependent upon that city, and carry on the same industries. Swinton, Pendlebury,
and Presticich are towns on both banks of the Irwell above Manchester. Below
that city the river named flows past Trafford Park and the suburbs of Eccles and
Barton, the one famous for its wakes and cakes, the other noteworthy for the
aqueduct which carries the Bridge water Canal across the Irwell. Close by, at
Worsley, is a seat of the Earl of Ellesmere. Strefford and Bidahury are the prin-
cipal places on the Mersey to the south of Manchester. Stretford has large
slaughter-houses for pigs, whilst Didsbury is the seat of a Wesleyan Methodist
College. The eastern and south-eastern suburbs of Manchester include Gorton,
with chemical works, in addition to the all-pervading cotton-mills, Neivton Heath,
Bradford, OpeAishaw, Rusholme, and LevcuHholme.
Farther away in the same direction, we reach a constellation of manu-
facturing towns, the principal amongst which is Ashton-iinder-Lyme, and which
270 THE BRITISH ISLES.
includes amongst its members the Cheshire towns of Stalybridge, Dukinfield, and
Hyde (see p. 265). In the whole of this district cotton-spinning is the leading
industry, but a good deal of machinery is also made. Mossley, Hurst, Droylsden,
and Denton are the principal villages dependent upon Ashton.
Oldham, to the north-east of Manchester, is almost wholly devoted to cotton
spinning and weaving, and machine-making. The machine works of Messrs.
Piatt are the largest in the United Kingdom. Middleton, on the Irk, to the
north of Manchester, manufactures tapes and small wares, in addition to brocaded
silks, which are frequently sold as the produce of the looms of Bethnal Green.
Bolton-h-Moors is another centre of a congeries of factory towns, and
scarcely yields to Oldham in population. It is a busy hive of industry, which
has grown up in the midst of sterile moors near the river Roach, and owes much
of its prosperity to Flemish, Palatine, and Huguenot emigrants. During the
Civil War it was besieged by the Earl of Derby. The town is famous for its fine
yarns, shirtings, and cambrics, and also turns out engines, machinery, patent
safes and locks, and other minor articles. Amongst its buildings are a town-hall,
a large market hall, and a free library with museum. A monument has been
erected to Crompton, the inventor of the mule. Collieries are worked in the
neighbourhood. Farnivorth, Kearsleij, and HalUwell are minor manafacturing
places near Bolton. Farther away towards the south-west are the cotton towns
of Leigh — where also silk is woven on hand-looms — Atherton, Tyldesley, Astley, and
Bedford. The country around these towns is rich in coal and building stone, and
the dairies supply excellent cheese.
Burp, on a hill overlooking the Irwell, is another centre of the cotton trade,
besides which the paper for the Times newspaper is made here. Sir Robert Peel was
a native of the town, and a monument has been erected in his memory. Siimmerseat
is higher up on the river, with the factory of Messrs. Grant, who were the original
Brothers Cheery ble in "Nicholas Nickleby." Radclife and Whitefield are in the
same neighbourhood. Ascending the Irwell, we pass Ramshottom and HasUngden,
and reach Bacup, known for its co-operative cotton factories, in the heart of the
Rossendale Forest, and near the head of the Irwell.
Rochdale, on the Roch, an affluent of the Irwell, is chiefly occupied in the woollen,
and more especially the flannel trade. It was here that twenty-eight " Equitable
Pioneers " founded in 1842 a co-operative society which has served as a model to
similar associations throughout the world. Hey wood, lower down on the Roch, is
engaged in cotton-spinning ; whilst Littleborough, near the head of the river, and
at the foot of Blackstone Edge, is noted for its pretty scenery.
Having now dealt with the Lancashire towns which occupy the upper basin of
the Mersey, we return to the south, in order to descend that river as far as
Liverpool. On our way we pass the important manufacturing tovm of Warrington,
where the Mersey is spanned by a bridge built in the time of Henry YIL From
this bridge the river is navigable for vessels of 150 tons burden. Warrington
has iron and steel works, engineering factories, glass houses, and wire works.
Pins are enumerated amongst the articles made here. A few miles lower
LANCASHIRE.
271
down, between Runcorn, on the Cheshire side, and Widnes, the estuary of the
Mersey has a width of 7,500 feet, but is nevertheless crossed by a magni-
ficent railway viaduct. Widnes is a town of evil odour, with chemical works,
soap factories, bone-manure works, and copper- smelting houses. Continuino- our
journey, we soon obtain a sight of the small town of Garston, after which house
succeeds house in a continuous city, which is half hidden by the rigging of the
innumerable ships and steamers lying at anchor in the roadstead or crowding the
docks. This is Liverpool.
This powerful city has only risen into importance in recent times. It is not
even mentioned in the list of towns and villages in the Domesday Book.
Fig. 133.— Liverpool. ,
Scale 1 : 800.000.
6 Miles.
The first reference to it occurs in the year 1172, when Henry II. was preparing
to invade Ireland, and embarked his troops in the estuary of the Mersey. In 1338,
when Edward III. made a general levy upon the vessels and sailors of his
kingdom, Liverpool was as yet of such small importance that out of a total of
700 vessels and 14,141 men it was called upon to furnish a solitary barge manned
by six mariners. Even as recently as 1571 the citizens of Liverpool, when
appealing to Queen Elizabeth to reduce their taxes, referred to their town as a
"poor decayed place."* About 1700 Liverpool had hardly 5,000 inhabitants;
but the gradual silting up of the Dee, and consequent destruction of the port of
Chester, proved of advantage to Liverpool, whose merchants, about this period,
* Weale, " Public Works of England."
272
THE BEITISH ISLES.
began to grow ricli, mainly from the profits derived from the slave trade. When
Fuseli, the artist, was called upon to admire the wide streets and noble buildings
of a quarter of the town then recently constructed, he said, with reference to this
fact, that he felt as if the blood of negroes must ooze out of the stones.
Liverpool is largely indebted for its prosperity to its central position with
reference to the sister islands of Great Britain and Ireland, for upon it con-
verge all the great highways over which the home trade of the British Islands
is carried on. This central position has been equally advantageous to its
foreign trade. Though farther away than Bristol from the ocean, which is
the high-road connecting England with America, Africa, and the Indies, this
disadvantage is more than compensated for by Liverpool's proximity to the vast
coal basin which has become the great seat of English manufacturing industry.
Fig. 134. — The Landing-stage.
The docks are the great marvel of Liverpool. No other town can boast of
possessing so considerable an extent of sea- water enclosed between solid masonry
walls, and kept under control by locks. There are maritime cities with roadsteads
capable of accommodating entire fleets, but few amongst them have docks
sufficiently spacious to admit thousands of vessels at one and the same time, like
London and Liverpool. The latter is even superior in this respect to the great
commercial emporium on the Thames, and certainly preceded it in the construction
of docks. In 1709 the Corporation of Liverpool first caused a pool to be deepened
in order that it might afford shelter to vessels. This, the precursor of the existing
basins, has been filled up since, and the sumptuous revenue and customs buildings
have been raised upon its site. But for the one dock thus abolished, twenty-seven
others, far more vast and convenient, have been constructed since. These docks
LANCASHIRE.
273
extend for 5 miles along the river-side, and have an area of 1,000 acres, of which
the basins, wet and dry docks, occupy 277 acres. Vast though these docks are,
they no longer suffice for the trade of the Mersey, and others have been excavated
at Birkenhead, on the Cheshire bank of the Mersey, and at Garston, abo.ve Liverpool.
Whilst eight of these docks are thrown open to the general trade, there are others
specially dedicated to America, the East Indies, Russia, or Australia, or respectively
to the timber trade, the tobacco trade, or emigration business ; and whilst certain
quays are covered with bales of cotton, others are given up to sacks of corn, barrels
of palm oil, or ground nuts. A stranger who spends a day in these docks, and in
the warehouses which surround them, visits, in fact, a huge commercial museum,
in which various articles are represented in bulk, and not by small samples.
Liverpool cannot yet claim precedence of London as the greatest commercial
town of the world, though its export of British produce is more considerable, and its
Fior. 135. — St. George's Hall.
commercial fleet more numerous and powerful.* More than one-third of the tonnage
of the whole of the United Kingdom belongs to the port of Liverpool, whose
commercial marine is superior to that of either France or Germany. In order to
facilitate the embarkation and disembarkation of travellers, a landing-stage,
floating on pontoons, and connected with the land by six iron bridges, has been
placed in the Mersey. This remarkable structure is nearly half a mile in length,
and rises and sinks with the tide.
In 1720 scarcely one-fortieth of the foreign trade of England was carried on
through the port of Liverpool. A century later about one-sixth of this trade had
passed into the hands of the merchants established at the mouth of the Mersey, and
at present they export about one-half of all the British produce that finds its way
into foreign countries. The increase of population has kept pace with the expanding
* See Appendix.
274
THE BRITISH ISLES.
commerce of the town, and the inhabitants are at present a hundred times more
numerous than they were at the commencement of the eighteenth century.
Including its suburbs, Liverpool is the second town of the United Kingdom. It
altoo-ether monopolizes certain branches of commerce. Nearly all the cotton of
the world finds its way to Liverpool, and is thence distributed amongst the towns
of continental Europe. Most of the emigrants who leave Europe embark at
Liverpool. The principal articles of export are coal, salt, cutlery, fire-arms.
Fig. 136.— The Liverpool Water Works.
According to H. Beloe. Scale 1 : 350,000.
5 Miles.
machinery, china and earthenware, and textile fabrics of every description. The
local manufactures contribute in a certain measure in feeding this export trade.
There are iron foundries and brass works, machine shops, chemical works, breweries,
and, above all, the ship-building yards on both banks of the Mersey.
Like most other large towns, Liverpool can show a few noble edifices. It has
its public parks, a zoological and a botanical garden. Interesting, too, is one of
the cemeteries, with catacombs cut out of the rock. Most prominent amongst its
public buildings is St. George's Hall, in the style of a Greek temple. Near it
LANCASHIRE. 275
have been raised a monument to the Duke of Wellington, and statues of the
Queen and Prince Albert. The Free Library and Museum, founded by Sir
W. Brown, are in the same quarter of the town, and contain valuable collections of
books, stuffed animals, antiquities, china, and paintings. The new Exchange
Buildings are in the classic style, and surround a courtyard ornamented with a
monument to Nelson. Foremost amongst educational institutions are the College,
the Liverpool and the Royal Institutions, the latter with a gallery of paintings.
The oldest church is that of St. Nicholas, with a remarkable lantern spire.
Liverpool, unfortunately, has not yet been provided with an ample supply of
pure drinking water. The reservoirs constructed at an expenditure of nearly
two million sterling at the foot of Rivington Pike, 20 miles north from the
town, cover an area of 600 acres, and collect the drainage of 10,000 acres, but
they are not suflScient. Supplemented by several springs, they only yield 28
gallons per head daily for a population of 650,000 souls, and a considerable portion
of this is consumed by factories.* The corporation has consequently sought
for some other source of supply, and after careful consideration the upper valley
of Yyrnwy, or Yerniew, which is tributary to the Severn, has been fixed upon,
and will be converted into a huge reservoir of water for its use.
Liverpool, in addition to constructing several new docks, is at present
carrying out another great work, namely, a railway tunnel, which will pass
beneath the Mersey, and into its Cheshire suburb of Birkenhead. Much remains,
however, to be done before Liverpool can be called a healthy town. Of every
1,000 children born only 540, or hardly more than half, attain the age of five
years ; and about 20,000 of the inhabitants live in cellars. Poverty, and the
floating population of sailors of every nation, swell the criminal records. About
50,000 persons are annually taken into custody by the police, or one out of every
10 inhabitants — a proportion not met with in any other town of Europe.
Numerous smaller towns encircle Liverpool on the land side, and form its suburbs
and favourite places of residence. Amongst these suburban towns and villages
are Toocteth, Wavertree, West Derby, Walton-on'the-Hill, and Bootle-cum-Linacre.
Following the low shore in a northerly direction, we pass the cheerful seaside
villages of Seaforth, Waterloo, and Great Crosby, double Formby Head, and
reach Southport, a great favourite with the people of Lancashire, who speak of it
as of an English Montpelier. A pier stretches over a mile into the sea ; there
are a winter garden and an aquarium ; and over 700 species of native plants
grow on the sand-hills which shut in the town, which has Birkdale for its suburb.
Prescot, the birthplace of Kemble the tragedian, lies a few miles to the east
of Liverpool. Watches are made here by machinery, and there are collieries in
the neighbourhood. Knowsley, the family residence of the Earls of Derby
since 1385, lies near it. St. Helenas, to the north-east of Prescot, has plate-
glass, chemical, and copper works. Farther east still are Ashton- in- Maker field
and Newton-in-MakerJield. The former is engaged in the manufacture of locks,
the latter has cotton-mills, iron foundries, and glass houses.
* H. Beloe, *' The Liverpool Water Works.'
276 THE BRITISH ISLES.
The basin of tlie Eibble is less extensive tban that of the Mersey, but it
nevertheless contains a considerable population, and abounds in large manu-
facturing towns. Entering tbis basin from tbe soutb-west, we first reacb TFigan,
on the Douglas, the centre of the Lancashire iron and coal district, with huge
iron works, cotton-mills, and collieries. One of tbe coal-pits in tbe neighbour-
hood of this town bas tbe greatest depth of any in England, and tbe temperature
at its bottom is never less tban 93° Fahr. Ince-in-Makerfield and Hindley are
smaller towns in the neighbourhood of Wigan, which engage in the same industries.
Ormskirk, a market town of some importance, famous for its gingerbread, lies 10
miles to the west.
Blaokhurn, tbe principal town in the valley of tbe Darwen, is almost blacker
and noisier than otber towns of this region ; but at all events it enjoys with tbe
towns in its neigbbourbood the advantage of being surrounded by breezy bills.
Cotton-spinning is tbe leading industry bere as well as at Over and Lower Darwen
and at Oswaldtivistle, but a good deal of machinery is also made, and much coal
won. Heald knitting is still carried on as a bome industry. Blackburn was the
birtbplace of the first Sir Robert Peel, and of Hargreaves. tbe inventor of the
spinning- jenny. Its public buildings are on a noble scale, and contain a museum
and free library.
Accrington, tbougb a neighbour of Blackburn, lies within tbe basin of the
Calder, whicb, like tbe Darwen, pays tribute to tbe Kibble. It is a place of
modern growth, witb cotton-mills and chemical works, and has its satellites in
Church) Clayton-le-MoorS) and Oreat Harwood. Burnley, near tbe junction of the
Calder and the Burn, in a broken and picturesque district, bas a little woollen
trade in addition to tbat of cotton. Many gentlemen's seats are in its vicinity,
including tbat of tbe Towneley family, wbere casts of the Towneley marbles are
kept. Ascending the Calder, we pass througb Brierfield and Nelson, and reach the
ancient little town of Colne, tbe Roman Colunio, close to the Yorkshire boundary.
Padiham, an uninviting cotton town, is below Burnley, and is succeeded by the
pretty village of Whalley, witb the ruins of its famous abbey. The Jesuit College of
Stony hurst is in this neigbbourbood, near tbe northern bank of the Ribble.
Clitheroe, a few miles farther up the Ribble, is picturesque despite its few cotton-
mills. It lies near tbe foot of the Pendle Hill (1,816 feet), a huge mass of
carboniferous limestone, formerly supposed to be tbe resort of the Lancashire
Witches. Ruhus chamcemorus, a semi-arctic plant, grows on tbe summit.
Descending the Ribble, we pass tbe ancient village of Rihchester (it represents
the Cocium or Rigodunum of tbe Romans), and reach Preston, majestically seated
upon the steep banks of the river, and at the head of its estuary. Preston is one
of the leading manufacturing towns of Lancashire, as befits the birthplace of
R. Arkwright, and carries on a considerable trade by sea. Tbe wealth of the
town, joined to tbe beauty of its position, has won for it the epithet of " Proud."
Tbe modern town-ball is a sumptuous building. The strike whicb took place here
in 1853-54 was one of tbe most remarkable in history, for it lasted seven months.
Chorley, to the south of Preston, has cotton-mills and waggon works, and is a place
LANCASHIRE.
277
of some note, whilst Leyland, Fulwood, and Kirhham are mere villao-es with
cotton-mills. Lytham, on the northern bank of the Ribble, attracts a few visitors
as a sea-bathing place, but the favourite watering-place of Lancashire is Blackpool,
a little farther north, where the usually flat shore rises into earthy cliffs, from
whose summit may be enjoyed a view of the Irish Sea.
The road from Preston to Lancaster crosses the Wyre at Garstang, near which
is Greenhaigh Castle.
Lancaster, the political capital of Lancashire, takes its name from the river
Lune, or Lun, which washes its walls. It occupies the site of a Roman station
probably Longovicium — and is commanded by a modernised castle, whence may be
enjoyed the magnificent panorama presented by the Welsh hills, the Isle of Man,
and the Cumbrian Mountains. The town manufactures American cloth, leather, cocoa
Fig. 137.— Preston.
Scale 1 : 450,000.
Depth under 5 Fathoms
Depth over 5 I'dthoniii.
1 Mile
matting, furniture, silks, cottons, and waggons. A short railway connects Lancaster
with its outlying suburbs of Poulton-le- Sands and Morecamhe, on Morecambe Bay.
Vessels of 300 tons burden are able to ascend the Lune with the tide as far as the
quays of Lancaster, the maritime port of which is Fleetivood, a forsaken-looking
place at the mouth of the Wyre, connected by a line of steam-packets with
Belfast. Near it is the famous school installed in old Rossall House.
The detached portion of Lancashire " north of the Sands " (that is, those of
Morecambe Bay, which are exposed, and can be crossed when the sea retires
from the bay) is also known as Furness, from a famous old abbey, beautiful even
in its present state of ruin, and seated in a country more beautiful still. Ulverston
is the nominal capital of this district. A ship canal, lined by furnaces and paper-
mills, connects it with Morecambe Bay. John Barrow, the arctic explorer, was
born at Ulverston, and a monument has been raised to commemorate him. The
278 THE BRITISH ISLES.
great town of this district, however, and one of those which has grown with
astonishing rapidity, is Barroiv-in-Fumess, near the southern extremity of the
Cumbrian peninsula, and at the east of Walney Island, which acts as a break-
water to its roadstead. In 1846 Barrow was a poor fishing village, but the
discovery of pure hematite ores led to the construction of iron and steel works.
Ship-building yards followed, jute-mills were established, and the small village
rapidly grew into a prosperous town, with docks which admit the largest vessels
at any state of the tide. Dalton, a few miles to the north of Barrow, lies in the
heart of the hematite iron district. Broiighton is a quiet town at the head of the
estuary of the Duddon, famous for trout and salmon. Farther inland, in the Lake
district, are Coniston, delightfully situate at the head of Coniston Water and at the
foot of the Old Man, with copper mines and slate quarries near it, and Hawkshead,
a quaint market town at the head- of Esthwaite Water. Archbishop Sandys and
Wordsworth were educated at its grammar school.
Cartmel, in the eastern portion of Furness, has a famous priory church. Holker
HaU, a mansion of the Duke of Devonshire, lies in its neighbourhood.
CHAPTER XI.
THE NORTH OF ENGLAND, THE CUMBRIAN MOUNTAINS, THE BASINS OF THE
EDEN, THE TEES, AND THE TYNE.
(Cumberland, Westmoreland, Durham, and Northumberland.)
General Features.
HAT part of England whicli lies to the north of the estuary of the
Tees and Morecarabe Bay forms a distinct geographical region of
transition, which connects the south of the island with North
Britain. The mountainous peninsula of Cumbria is still bounded
by another gulf in the north, namely, the Solway Firth, which
penetrates into the land to within 60 miles of the German Ocean. The
tidal currents which ascend the rivers falling on the one hand into the Irish
Sea, and on the other into the German Ocean, approach within 50 miles of each
other.
The Pennine chain, which begins to the north of Derby, and bounds the
basins of the Trent and Ouse on the west, separates farther north the basin of
the Eden from that of the Tees, and finally coalesces with the Cheviot Hills
on the Scotch frontier. The highest summit of the entire chain, the Cross Fell
(2,928 feet), rises in this northern portion. But the Silurian and granitic moun-
tains, which are attached to the " backbone " of England by a transversal ridge
of moderate elevation, are more lofty still. When the weather is favourable the
traveller who climbs these, the proudest mountains of all England, sees spread
beneath him nearly the whole of the Irish Sea, together with the hills that
bound it. Whilst ascending them he successively passes through difierent
zones or climates. Starting from the smiling country, abounding in orchards,
at their foot, he traverses the pine woods which clothe their lower slopes, and
finally emerges upon the fells, which yield nought but ling and bracken. The
topmost summits are clad with verdure only during summer and autumn, for
in winter and spring they are either covered with snow, or their scant vegeta-
tion is tinged a russet brown by the frost. As they face the moisture-laden
south-westerly winds, the amount of precipitation is enormous, averaging about
80 inches a year, and even reaching 16 feet in some localities, where the clouds are
THE BEITISH ISLES.
entrapped in hollows on the mountain sides, from which they cannot escape.
Torrent rains and violent snow-storms are phenomena of ordinary occurrence,
and in the depth of winter it is often impossible to ascend the highest summits.
Fig. 138.— Hypsographical Map of thb Cumbrian Mountains.
Scale 1 : 634,000.
3° W. of Gr.
Foreshore.
Sea-level to
600 Feet.
600 to 1,200
Feet.
Over 1,200
Feet.
10 Miles.
The boldest shepherds have refused at times to climb the mountain-tops in order
to consult the rain gauges which have been placed upon them.*
* J. Fletcher Miller, Philosophical Transactions, 1851.
THE NOETH OF ENGLAND.
281
The torrents which run down the impermeable sides of these craggy moun-
tains are the feeders of lakes which occupy deep cavities, reaching in several
instances below the level of the sea. A slight subsidence of the land would
convert these lakes into lochs or firths, such as we see at the present day along
the coast of Scotland, and it is the opinion of geologists that previously to the
last upheaval of the land they actually were firths, and ramified in the same
manner as Morecambe Bay does to the present day. But it is not their geological
genesis which renders these lakes so great an attraction. They are one of the
glories of England not only because they are filled with translucent water,
reflecting the islets which stud and the crags which enclose them, and are fringed
with rich meadow lands backed by woods, but also because of their association
with the poets who have sung their beauties. The lakes of Cumberland have
Fig. 139.— The Cumbrian Mountains.
Scale 1 : 700,000.
Depth under 5 J
Fathoms.
Over 11
Fathomg.
10 Miles.
given birth to a literary *' school," that of the Lakists, which, like all schools,
includes, by the side of true poets who have given expression to that which they
felt, a crowd of tedious imitators, who merely look to the verses of their predecessors
for a revelation of nature. The names of Wordsworth, Coleridge, Southey, De
Quincey, and Martineau will for ever remain associated with Windermere,
Grasmere, Thirlemere, Derwentwater, and UUeswater. All these lakes are drained
by rivers, either into the Eden or Derwent, or direct into the sea, for precipita-
tion is far in excess of evaporation. Manufactories have not yet sprung up on
their banks and defiled their water, but the artists who have settled down
in the district, and the devout visitors who explore the scenery described in the
verses of their favourite poets, may not be able much longer to defend them
against avaricious speculators. Already factories have been established in the
115 — E
282 THE BRITISH ISLES.
towns which surround the district, and they are gradually extending into the
interior of the country.
The coal measures which extend along the coast to the south of the Solway Firth
are of considerable importance. At some former epoch the carboniferous forma-
tion covered the whole of the Pennine range, and extended from the shores of the
German Ocean to the Irish Sea ; but, owing to the displacement of strata and the
action of denudation, there are now two separate basins, viz. that of Cumberland^
and that of Durham and Northumberland. The Cumbrian coal mines are somewhat
famous on account of their submarine galleries. At Whitehaven the levels driven
by the miners extend for a distance of nearly 2 miles off the shore, and lie at a
depth of 650 feet beneath the level of the sea ; and the entire network of submarine
galleries and levels has a length of several hundred miles. The roof which
intervenes between the miners and the floor of the ocean varies in thickness
between 230 and 720 feet, and is amply sufficient to preclude every idea of
danger. Still the water of the ocean occasionally finds its way through fissures
into the mines, but in most instances the miners succeed in calking the leaky
places. The mine of Workington, however, which extended for 5,000 feet beneath
the sea, had a roof too feeble to resist the pressure of the superincumbent waters.
On the 30th of June, 1837, it suddenly gave way, the mine was inundated, and the
miners barely escaped the flood which pursued them. One of these galleries
actually extends for a distance of 9,604 feet beneath the sea. The quantity of
workable coal still contained in these submarine seams is estimated to amount to
100,000,000 tons.*
The coal-field of Durham and Northumberland, which is traversed at intervals
by parallel dykes of basalt, is more actively worked than any other in Europe
It yields double the quantity of coal produced by all France, and is the principal
source of supply for the metropolis. Four collieries in the environs of Durham
supply each 1,500,000 tons of fuel annually, and the nine principal seams now
being worked in the basins of the Tees and Tyne still contain at least eight or ten
milliards of tons of coal within easy reach — a quantity sufficient to last for
centuries at the present rate of working. The ^oal beds extend far beneath the
sea ; and statisticians, in calculating the supply of the future, have assumed that all
the coal within 4 miles of the coast can be got at.f The collieries, and in the
valley of the Tees the iron mines, have attracted a considerable population. The
towns press upon each other, the roadsteads and quays are crowded with shipping,
and even in England there are not many districts in which industry has achieved
such wonders.
Yet for many centuries this was one of the poorest and least-peopled districts
of Great Britain — a district of permanent warfare and unexpected border raids,
where even in time of peace the inhabitants were obliged to be on their guard.
The fact that the great historical highway between England and Scotland passes
along the eastern foot of the Pennine range and the Cheviot Hills sufficiently
* Smyth ; Hull, " Coal Fields of Great Britain."
t Ramsay ; Eliot ; Forster ; Hull.
THE NORTH OF ENGLAND.
283
accounts for this state of affairs. The country to the west of that great road was
too rugged and too rich in natural obstacles to be adapted to the movement of
armies. The war-path consequently lay on the eastern slope, and the region
through which it passed was frequently laid waste. Extensive tracts of territory
remained altogether unoccupied : they were " marches," similar to those which in
another part of Europe separated Avares from Germans, and Slavs from Russians.
Extensive heaths still recall the time when the twp kingdoms were almost
perpetually engaged in war, and the old buildings which we meet with in the
country districts are constructed so as to be able to sustain a siege. The nearer we
approach the Scotch border, the more numerous are these towers of defence. Not
only the castles of the great lords, but also the simple homesteads of the farmers,
churches, and monasteries, were fortified. Many of the castles could be entered
only by means of ladders, so great was the fear of their inhabitants of a surprise.
Buildings of this kind existed during the Middle Ages in nearly every country
frequently ravaged by war. The most southern of these towers of defence stood
Fig, 140.— Hadrian's Wall.
According to C. Rnice. Scale 1 : 900,000.
5'
Zmrna.!
^
55:
5-
W.ofG
10 Miles.
on the northern frontier of Yorkshire, on the southern bank of the Tees, and it
was only at such a distance from the Scotch border that the inhabitants felt secure
from unexpected attacks.*
The fortunes of war have caused the frontiers between the two kingdoms to
oscillate. The actual boundary has of course been drawn at the dictation of the
state which disposed of the most powerful armies. Commencing at the Solway
Firth, it climbs the crest of the Cheviot Hills, but instead of being drawn from
their eastern extremity to the nearest headland on the coast, it abruptly turns to
the north, and follows the course of the Lower Tees. The most natural boundary
is that which the Romans laid down when they constructed the wall which
extends from the Solway Firth to the mouth of the Tyne, to serve as a second
line of defence to the provinces they held. This wall, built by the Emperor
Hadrian, and accompanied throughout by a military road, was still in a fair
state of preservation towards the close of the sixteenth century, but in our own
* Yorkshire, Edinburgh Review, vol. cxxiii.
284 THE BEITISH ISLES.
days is limited to a few blocks of masonry, some of them 10 feet in height. In
its eastern portion, where the country, owing to the incessant wars of the Middle
Ages, no less than because of its natural sterility, has only recently been peopled,
the wall can still be traced ; but not so in the west, where the ploughshare has
almost obliterated it, so that it was not even easy to ascertain the sites of the
Eoman stations.* In certain localities, however, the ancient ditch, now over-
grown with grass upon which sheep browse, may still be seen. Two piers of a
bridge over the Northern Tyne are the principal ruins remaining of this ancient
work. Excavations have furnished antiquaries with medals and numerous inscrip-
tions, which have thrown much light upon the history of Great Britain whilst
under the dominion of the Romans. f Hadrian's wall was from 6 to 10 feet thick,
and averaged 18 feet in height. A ditch, 36 feet wide and over 12 feet in depth,
extended along its northern side, whilst a narrower ditch, with entrenchments,
accompanied it on the south. Fortresses, stations, and posts succeeded each other
at short intervals. The wall terminates in the east close to the town of Wallsend,
in the centre of the coal basin of the Tyne.
The inhabitants of Northumberland, whose country has so frequently been a
bone of contention between Scotch and English, resemble their northern neighbours
in customs and language, and in the people, no less than in the aspect of the
country, do we perceive the transition between south and north. In the west, on
the other hand, the contrast is very great. The Cumbrians remained independent
for a considerable period, and, sheltered by their mountains, were able to maintain
their ancient customs. Even after the Norman conquest they talked a Celtic
tongue differing but little from that of the Welsh. Some of the noble families
of the country boast of their pure Saxon descent, and look down upon the less
ancient nobility of Norman creation. Amongst the peasants there were, and are
still, a considerable number of freeholders, or " statesmen," who have cultivated
the land they hold for generations past.+ These men were distinguished, above all
others, by their noble bearing, the dignity of their language, and the proud inde-
pendence of their conduct. Their number, however, has greatly diminished, for
the large proprietors are gradually absorbing the smaller estates.
Topography.
Westmoreland, the smallest of these northern counties, is divided by the valley
of the Eden into two mountain districts, of which the eastern embraces some of
the most forbidding moors of the Pennine chain, whilst the western includes the
high peaks and deep ravines of a portion of the Cumbrian group. Within this
latter rises Helvellyn (8,118 feet), the second highest of the English mountains,
and two large lakes, the UUeswater and the Windermere, add to its attractions. A
range of lower moorlands binds together these mountain districts. To the south of
this range, which is crossed by the Pass of Shap Fell, the rivers Kent and Lune
* Thomas Wright, " The Celt, the Roman, and the Saxon."
t Collingwood Bruce, " The Roman Wall, Barrier of the Lower Isthmus."
t Wordsworth ; Emerson, " English Traits."
WESTMOEELAND.
285
drain an important district of the county into Morecambe Bay. The moist climate
is more favourable to cattle-breeding than to agriculture. The mineral products
include lead, a little copper and iron, beautiful marble, and roofing slate. The
manufactures are on a small scale.
Kendal, the only large town of the county, stands on the declivity of a hill
near the banks of the river Kent, which flows into Morecambe Bay at Milnthorpe,
the only seaport. It is a prosperous place, with various scientific institutions,
and the ruins of a castle in which Catherine Parr 'was born. The woollen
industry introduced by Flemish weavers in the fourteenth century still flourishes,
and, in addition to cloth, there are manufactures of linseys, carpets, fancy
stuffs, combs, fish-hooks, and clogs. But that which has made its reputation
is the beautiful country in which it is situate. The river Kent, after which
the town is named, rises in a small lake, the Kentmere ; but the lake in this
Fig. 141.— The Head of Windekmere.
neighbourhood most sought after is the Windermere. Buwness and Ambleside ,
on its shore, are villages of hotels, affording ample accommodation to the
crowds of tourists who visit them. Even more romantic are the environs of
Grasmere, at the head of a small lake which drains into Windermere, and in the
midst of the most impressive mountain scenery. Wordsworth lived at the
neighbouring hamlet of Rydal, and he and Coleridge are buried in the churchyard
of St. Oswald.
Kirkhy Lonsdale, in the fertile valley of the Lune, is the only other place of
note in the southern portion of the county. Carpets and blankets are manu-
factured, and marble is quarried there.
Ajyplehy, beautifully situated on the river Eden, is the principal town in the
northern part of the county, and its capital. It is very ancient, dating back to
the Eoman age, but has dwindled down into a small country town, with an old
286 THE BRITISH ISLES.
castle crowning a wooded eminence beside it. The grammar school was founded
by Queen Elizabeth. The manufacture of woollens is carried on to a limited
extent. Other towns on the Eden are Brough-under-Stainmore, an old Roman
station in Watling Street, and Kirhhy Stephen, within easy access of the moors
and hence much frequented by sporting-men. Quarries and mines are near both
these places. Shap, a straggling village almost in the centre of the county, and
at the foot of the Shap Fells, has slate and other quarries. Clifton is a village on
the northern border, near which took place the conflict of Clifton Moor in 1745.
Lowther and Brougham Castles are in its vicinity, the latter at one time one of
the most formidable of frontier fortresses.
Cumberland extends from the desolate moorlands of the Pennine chain to the
Irish Sea in the west, and includes within its borders the highest mountains of
England* and most of the English lakes. A broad and passably fertile plain,
traversed by the Lower Eden, separates the moorlands from the Cumbrian Hills,
and in this plain grew up the principal towns until the discovery of coal shifted
the centre of population to the westward. Besides coal and iron, the mines
and quarries yield lead, plumbago, silver, zinc, slate, marble, and various other
building stones. The cotton factories, iron works, foundries, and machine shops
are of considerable importance. Here, as in the neighbouring county of West-
moreland, a large portion of the land is the property of ** statesmen," or "lairds."
Carlisle, the chief town of the county, occupies a fine position on the Lower
Eden, about 8 miles above its mouth into Morecambe Bay. After having been a
Roman station — Luguvallum — Carlisle, under the name of Caer-leol, became a
Saxon city, and according to the legends it was a favourite residence of King
Arthur. During the Middle Ages, and even as recently as the eighteenth century,
when the last effort was made to restore the Stuarts, Carlisle, owing to its position
on the Scotch border and on a navigable river, was a place of very great strategical
importance. The castle occupies an eminence overlooking the river Eden, and has
been extensively altered ; but the keep, built by William Rufus, remains to the
present day. The cathedral is the most interesting building of the town, but it is
small. Carlisle manufactures cottons, ginghams, and hats ; but its biscuit bakeries,
despite their extent, are not equal in productiveness to the single manufactory at
Reading. A navigable canal and a railway join the old border fortress to Port
Carlisle, on Morecambe Bay, which is spanned here by a formidable railway
viaduct.
Penrith, in the fertile valley of the Eamont (which comes from the UUeswater,
and flows to the river Eden), and on the borders of Ingle wood Forest, has its ruined
castle, like most other towns in this border county. Brampton is an old town on
the river Irthing, which joins the Eden near Carlisle. It has cotton factories and
collieries. Near it are Naworth Castle and the ruins of Lanercost Abbey.
Higher up in the rocky valley of the Irthing, and close to the Northumberland
border, is Gilsland Spa, with its sulphuric and chalybeate springs.
We now turn westward towards the coast. Holme Cultram, at the mouth of the
♦ Sea Fell, 3,230 feet ; Helvellyn, on the Westmoreland border, 3,118 feet; Skiddaw, 3,058 feet.
CUMBERLAND.
287
Waver, is remarkable for its old abbey church. Allonby enjoys some favour as a
watering-place. Maryport is one of the coal-shipping towns of Cumberland, at the
mouth of the Eller, with a harbour enclosed between two piers. Cottons and lead
pencils are manufactured, and ships built. The coal mines, upon which the town
mainly depends for its prosperity, lie at Dearham, a couple of miles inland. Work-
ington, another coal- shipping port, is at the mouth of the Derwent. Whitehaven is
Fig. 142. - Screes at Wastwateu, Cumhehland.
more important than either of the above, and besides shipping immense quantities
of coal and iron ore, engages in the manufacture of iron, canvas, cottons, ropes,
and other articles. The coal mines extend under the sea. Much of the coal shipped
from Whitehaven is brought from the colliery town of Cleaton 3Ioor, whilst I^gre-
mont, a few miles to the south, supplies hematite iron ores. During the American
War of Independence in 1778, Paul Jones, the famous privateer, had the audacity
to land at Whitehaven, where he spiked the guns and set fire to two English ships
288
THE BRITISH ISLES.
which he found in the harbour. St. Bees, an interesting old village to the south
of Whitehaven, is widely known as the seat of a college for the training of Church
of England clergymen. Ravenglass, on a shallow bay into which the Esk and the
Irt (the latter the emissary of Wastwater) discharge themselves, engages in oyster-
fishing and the coasting trade. It is a quiet place, whilst Millom, on the estuary
of the Duddon, rings with the noise of iron and steel works.
We now enter that portion of the county which is so famed for its scenery,
and the capital of which is Kesicick. Situate in a beautiful vale under Skiddaw,
and near the foot of Der went water, one of the most charming lakes, Keswick
Fig. 143. — The Falls of Lodore.
*^^^^-^^-^^ /5^ 'Z'-*^
has naturally become the principal head-quarters for tourists. Amongst the spots
most frequently visited are the Falls of Lodore, near the head of the lake,
immortalised by Southey's well-known lines commencing —
" How does the water come down at Lodore ?"
Greta Hall, where Southey lived from 1803 till the time of his death, stands near
Keswick. The Upper Derwent, in its course to Derwentwater, flows through the
beautiful valley of Borrowdale, which formeidy, before the mines in Siberia had
been discovered, supplied the best '• wadd," or plumbago, for the manufacture
DUEHAM. 289
of lead pencils. The Bowder Stone — a huge erratic block, weighing 2,000 tons—
lies at the entrance to this valley.
The Derwent, below Keswick, flows through Bassenthwaite Water, and then
enters the manufacturing town of Cockermouth, prettily situated at its confluence
with the Cocker. There are cotton, woollen, and paper mills. The ruins of
the castle, dismantled in 1648, are very extensive. Cockermouth was the birthplace
of Wordsworth.
The only towns which remain to be noticed are Wilton, 10 miles to the south
of Carlisle, which has a Quakers' Academy, and Alston, in the extreme east of the
county, on the Southern Tyne, which belongs geographically to Northumber-
land, and is known for its lead mines, the property of Greenwich Hospital.
Durham, bounded on the south by the Tees, and on the north by the Tyne and
its tributary Derwent, is traversed in its centre by the Wear. It is occupied to
a large extent by heathy moorlands, but the valleys and the south-eastern portion
of the county are fertile. This deficiency of cultivable land is, however, amplv
compensated for by the mineral treasures buried in the soil. The western moun-
tainous part of the county is rich in lead, whilst its centre is occupied by a
broad band of coal measures extending from the Lower Tyne to the Tees. Agri-
culture is carried on with much spirit. The Teeswater variety of short-horned
cattle is one of the best in the kingdom, and the native sheep are large, and
produce fine combing fleeces. The manufactures are various, but every other
branch of industry is dwarfed by huge iron works, busy machine factories, and
noisy ship-yards for the construction of iron vessels.
The Tees rises on the eastern slope of Cross Fell, the giant of the Pennine
Mountains, and some of its upper valleys are deservedly renowned for picturesque
scenery Soon after entering Durham the river expands into a narrow lake,
bordered by sterile moorlands, and then rushes down in a series of wild cataracts,
known as the Caldron Spout. A few miles lower it forms the High Force (50 feet),
the finest waterfall in Eastern England. It passes Middleton-in-Teesdaley near
which are lead-mills, and then washes the foot of the declivity upon which stands
the ancient city of Barnard Castle. The castle, now in ruins, was built 1112-32
by Bernard Baliol, and was at one time a stronghold of considerable importance.
Close to it rise the modern museum and picture gallery, the contents of which are
for the most part the gift of the owner of the neighbouring Streatham Castle.
The town has a few manufactures, but it is only when we reach Darlington and
Stockton, on the Lower Tees, that we enter one of the great industrial districts of
Northern England. Darlington, on the Skerne, a few miles above its confluence
with the Tees, is one of the principal seats of the Quakers, whose influence there
is considerable. The town lies in a fertile country, and is one of the busiest
manufacturing centres of the north. There are factories for building locomotives,
blast furnaces, and rolling-mills — Durham supplying the coal; the Cleveland Hills,
on the Yorkshire side of the Tees, the iron and iron ore. The railroad which joins
Darlington to Stockton-on-Tees is the oldest in the world, having been opened in
1825, or four years before railway communication was established between Liverpool
290
THE BEITISH ISLES.
and Manchester. Stockton, 4 miles above the mouth of the Tees, is joined by a
bridge to South Stockton, in Yorkshire, and has iron works, ship-yards, sail-cloth
factories, and glass houses. Near Stockton are the village of BilUngham, with
an old Norman church, and Wynyard, the Grecian mansion of the Earl of
Lonsdale. Port Clarence, at the mouth of the river, has iron works, and exports
much coal. The Bay of the Tees is much cumbered with sand-banks, but its
navigation is rendered safe by lights, buoys, and embankments.
Turning north from it, we pass the pretty bathing-place of Seaton Carew, with
beautiful sands and the remains of a submerged forest, and reach Hartlepool,
proudly seated upon a bold promontory, whence we overlook a wide expanse of
the sea and wild country backed by the Yorkshire hills. An opulent city in the
Fig. 144.— Hartlepool.
Scale 1 : 85,000.
no
Depth under 5
Fathoms.
1 Mile.
time of the early Norman kings, Hartlepool in course of time fell from its high
estate, and at the beginning of the present century had hardly 1,000 inhabitants.
The leading place in the commercial movements of England, which it has taken since
1832, is wholly due to the opening of coal mines in its vicinity, and to the construc-
tion of docks, quays, and warehouses. The present town of Hartlepool is altogether a
creation of modern times. Its docks, accessible to vessels drawing 26 feet of water,
partly occupy an ancient inlet of the sea, and quite a new town, West Hartlepool,
has sprung up to the south of them. Hartlepool imports corn, flour, timber, and
live animals, and exports in return coal and the produce of its iron and engineering
works. Ship-building is actively carried on. Throston is a small town to the
westward, and almost a suburb of Hartlepool.
DURHAM. 291
The only place of note along the rather tame coast between Hartlepool and
Sunderland is Seaham, near which are important collieries.
The river Wear, with all its tributaries, lies wholly within the county of Durham.
Rising near the Kilhope Law, it first flows through the weird and picturesque
Weardale, and then, forcing itself a passage through a succession of gorges, finds
its way to the German Ocean. Castles and parks are numerous along its banks,
and alternate with collieries and iron works, but notwithstanding manufactories
and the unsightly heaps of slags, its valley still remains the Arcadia of England.
Stanhope, in the upper part of the valley, depends upon the lead mines and
quarries in its neighbourhood. On reaching Wolsingham we first enter the coal
and iron region. All around it, as well as about Toiclaw, to the north-east of it,
coal, iron, and limestone are found in abundance. Bishop Auckland, prettily
seated on a hill, has an old castle, one of the manorial residences of the ancient
Bishops of Durham, standing in the midst of an extensive park. The bridge
which spans the river at this town was built upon Roman foundations by Bishop
Skirlaw in 1388. Collieries and iron works abound in the vicinity of Auckland,
one of their principal centres being Spenny Moor, to the north-east. The Wear
here abruptly turns to the northward and penetrates a narrow gorge, formerly
defended by the Roman station of Vinovium, upon the site of which stands the
village of Binchester.
On leaving the gorge the river once more winds between gentle hills until it
approaches the bold promontory upon the summit of which rise proudly the Norman
cathedral and the keep of the castle built by William the Conqueror, and which
subsequently became the residence of the bishops. Since 1833 the castle has been
occupied by a university, which Cromwell intended to establish, and which owes its
origin to the enormous increase in the revenues of Durham Cathedral, mainly
derived from collieries. The University of Durham enjoys the same privileges as
Oxford and Cambridge. It possesses a library rich in precious manuscripts, a
museum, and an observatory, and students are able to pursue their studies at a far less
expense than either at Oxford or Cambridge. Notwithstanding this the university
is very little frequented, and this appears to be owing to the servility with
which the mechanical routine followed at the older universities has been copied.
The organization of the University of Durham is altogether under the direction
of the clergy, and the chapter of the cathedral virtually governs it.*
Durham has carpet and woollen manufactories and iron works. Collieries
are numerous in its vicinity. A few miles to the west of it stand the remains of
Neville's Cross, where the '* Battle of the Red Hills" was fought in 1346. Some
of the weapons used on that occasion are preserved at the ancient castle of the
Nevilles at Brancepeth, to the south. Ascending the valley of the Browney,
which joins the Wear above Durham, we pass TJshaw College, a Roman Catholic
seminary founded in 1808 on a bleak and barren hill, and finally reach the small
colliery town of Lancheater, near which are extensive remains of the Roman
station of Epideum.
* Demogeot et Montucci, " De rEuseignement superieur en Angleterre et en Ecosse."
292
THE BRITISH ISLES.
Chester-le- Street, on the Wear below Durham, is supposed to have been the
Condercum of the Romans. A pleasant country town formerly, it has expanded
Fig. 145. — The Durham Coast between Sunderland and the Tyne.
From an Admiralty Chart. Scale 1 : 120,000.
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Miles.
into a place of collieries and iron works like its neighbour, Jlougkton-le- Spring, to
the eastward.
NOETHUMBERLAND. 293
The mouth of the Wear is occupied on both sides by the great city of Sunder-
Id^d — which consists of Sunderland proper ; Bishop Wearmouth, on the south bank;
and Monkwearmouth and Southwick, on the north bank of the river — and is only
inferior to Newcastle as a coal-shipping port. Its vast docks and the river are
at all times crowded with vessels, and only London, Liverpool, and the Tyne
ports surpass it in the amount of their shipping. Formerly Sunderland pointed
with pride to its iron bridge, which spans the river Wear in one stupendous arch
of 237 feet, and at a height of 100 feet above the water ; but constructions of this kind
have become numerous in an age of railways. Far more singular is the lighthouse
on the southern pier, which, notwithstanding its weight of 338 tons, was moved
bodily a distance of 300 feet. Sunderland is an important manufacturing town.
The ship-yards employ several thousand workmen, and there are glass houses,
machine factories, iron-mills, and foundries.
The coast between Sunderland and the Tyne presents some striking scenery.
At Roker curious caverns abound in the limestone rock, and to the north of the
cheerful watering-place of Whitburn are the wild and striking Marsden Rocks, one
of them forming an archway beneath which boats can pass.
The valley of the Derwent, which joins the Tyne above Newcastle, is rich in
collieries and iron works. The principal towns within its basin are Consett,
Benfielddde (opposite Shotley Bridge), on the Northumberland side of the river,
and Leadgate. The Tyne bounds the county on the north ; but though it forms
a civil boundary, the towns on both banks are engaged in the same industries, and
may all of them be looked upon as dependencies of Newcastle. Passing the
colliery towns of Ryton and Blaydon, the Tyne flows between Newcastle and its
southern suburb Gateshead, with machine factories, chemical works, iron foundries,
and glass houses. Felling is passed below Gateshead, and then we reach Jarroic^
a large town with docks, ship-yards, chemical works, and paper-mills, interesting
as the scene of the labours of the Venerable Bede, who was born at the neighbouring
village of Monkton. South Shields, at the mouth of the Tees, connected by a
steam ferry with North Shields, on the opposite side of the river, has ship-yards
and other industrial establishments, and exports large quantities of coal. The
"ballast hills " near the town are interesting to botanists, for many exotic plants
grow upon them from seed carried thither in the ballast discharged from vessels
coming from foreign parts.
Northumberland, the northernmost county of England, extends along the
German Ocean from the Tyne to the Tweed. The entire western half of it is
occupied by mountain moors, producing hardly anything but heath, except in
the Cheviots, which are distinguished for their fine verdure. Agriculture is
possible only in the narrow valleys which intersect these hills. The maritime
portion of the county is more favourably circumstanced, and the soil, consisting
of strong clayey loam, is for the most part very fertile. Yet in no other part of
England have arable husbandry and stock- breeding made more progress, principally
owing to the large size of the farms and the leases which secure to the tenants the
full results of their labour. The great coal-field which extends across the Tyne to
294
THE BEITISH ISLES.
the sea-coast has materially added to the wealth of what would otherwise be a
purely agricultural county, and given rise to important industries. Of these the
construction of machinery, the building of iron ships, and the making and founding
of iron take the lead, and in comparison with them the potteries, glass houses
brass foundries, artificial manure works, and paper-mills are comparatively
unimportant.
Newcastle-on-Tyne, with its satellite towns, forms one of the greatest agglomera-
tions of houses and factories in England. The Tyne between it and the sea, 8
miles below, resembles an elongated dock rather than a river, and its quays are at
all times crowded with shipping. Towns and groups of factories succeed each
Fig. 146. — Sunderland, Newcastle, and the Mouth of the Tyne,
Scale 1 : 250,000.
5 to 11
Fathoms
11 to 22
Fathoms
Over 22
Fathoms.
2 Miles.
other in rapid succession along both banks of the river, and at night their flaring
furnaces present a scene of uncanny grandeur. Opposite Newcastle, as already
remarked, lies Gateshead; then come the houses of Felling, likewise on the
Durham bank ; whilst the opposite shore is lined by the alkali and vitriol works of
Walker. A bend in the river brings us within sight of Willmgton Quay, where
the Eoman Segedunum stood formerly, and of Walkend, at the eastern extremity
of the Roman wall. Howden Pans comes next, with ship-yards and tar and varnish
factories. Near it, at Hayhole, are the Northumberland Docks, and beyond these
we reach North Shields, a great coal-shipping port, also largely engaged in ship-
building, anchor forging, and the making of pottery. Tynemouth rises at the very
mouth of the Tyne, and though enclosed with Shields within the same municipal
NOETHUMBEELAND. 295
boundary, it is a separate town, aspiring to be called the " Brighton of the North."
The promontory upon which it rises is crowned with an old castle, now converted
into barracks, and the ruins of a priory, and affords a wide view of the sea.
Netccastle, on the northern bank of the Tyne, is supposed to be the modern
representative of the Roman Pons ^lii, and remained a military town through-
out the Middle Ages, of which fact the keep of its castle, built by Robert
Shorthose, and portions of the city walls remind us. It was frequently besieged,
and often changed hands between Scotch and English, according to the fortunes
of war. The old town, around its Nortnan keep and the venerable church of St.
Nicholas, whose spire is carried aloft by four flying buttresses, has retained
narrow winding streets, but the new town on the hills has wide streets and many
houses built of limestone or Scotch granite. At the head of its finest street rises a
column surmounted by a statue of Earl Grey. The high-level bridge, which crosses
the valley of the Tyne at a height of 110 feet, and is 1,327 feet in length, is the most
stupendous monument of Newcastle. It is one of the great works of Robert Stephen-
son, whose colossal statue stands in front of the railway station. The Wood Memorial
Hall contains the collections of the Literary and Philosophical Society and of the
Institute of Mining and Mechanical Engineers, and the " keep " has been con-
verted into a museum of Roman and British antiquities. But that which most
strikes the visitor to the metropolis of coal is its machine factories, potteries,
chemical works, and foundries, and the intense activity of its port. The Armstrong
gun foundry at Elswick occupies nearly a whole suburb to the west of the town,
and rivals in importance the great Government works at Woolwich. Though its
resources have been little called upon by the military authorities of England,
foreign Governments have freely availed themselves of them, and Elswick, between
1856 and 1876, has supplied to them over 4,000 pieces of ordnance of nearly every
pattern now in use.
The spectacle presented by the river port below Newcastle is full of animation.
On all sides we perceive long strings of vessels moored to the shore, beneath high
scaffoldings, to the very extremity of which travel the railway trucks laden with
coal, there to be tilted up, so that their contents may discharge themselves into
the hold of the vessels lying below. In the course of four hours a steamer of
1,200 tons burden has taken in its full cargo of coal. Thirty-three hours after-
wards it arrives at London, where ten hours are occupied in unloading it. Another
thirty -four hours and the steamer is back at Newcastle, ready for another cargo.
Thus in three days and six hours the whole of this commercial transaction is
completed. The application of steam to machinery, and the great improvements of
the mechanical arrangements for loading vessels which have been made since the
middle of the century, have vastly benefited the coal merchants of Newcastle. A
steamer with a crew of 21 men now carries as large a quantity of coal in the
course of a year as was formerly done by 16 sailing colliers manned by 144 men.
In good seasons the ports of the Tyne export close upon 6,000,000 tons of
coal, and their commerce, whilst much inferior to that of Liverpool or London,
surpasses that of every continental port, including even Hamburg, Antwerp, and
296 THE BEITISH ISLES.
Marseilles. Sometimes 300 colliers leave the Tyiie on tlie same tide. But in
order to develop this immense traffic, Newcastle has been compelled to expend large
sums in improvements of every description. It maintains more than 250 tugs on the
Tyne, as well as numerous pilot-boats off the mouth of the river. Formerly the
mouth of the Tyne was obstructed by a bar, and up to 1849 vessels drawing over
6 feet of water were unable to enter. But dredges were set to work, and not only
has a dept"h of 26 feet been secured at low water, but the scour of the river has
swept away many sand-banks, and the strong tidal current which now ascends
the river has revived the salmon fisheries, which the poisonous streams discharged
by numerous factories had nearly killed. The mouth of no other river, not even
excepting that of the Clyde, has been adapted with greater success to the require-
ments of navigation.
Ascending the river Tyne above Newcastle, we pass the village of Wylam, where
George Stephenson was born, and reach Hexham, a quaint old town below the con-
fluence of the South and North Tyne, with a fine old abbey church, a grammar
school, and a little industry. The South Tyne, though rich in picturesque scenery,
is poor in population. Allendale, in a side valley, has lead mines ; Haltwistle is but
a poor place ; and Alston, with its productive lead mines, though geographically
within the county, belongs politically to Cumberland (see p. 289).
Far more interesting is the small town of Bellingham, on the North Tyne.
Its environs abound in square camps, and a few miles to the north of it was fought
the battle of Otterhurn (1388), supposed to be referred to in the famous ballad of
** Chevy Chase."
Returning to Tynemouth and proceeding northward along the coast, we pass
the fishing village of Cullercoats ; Hartley, well known for its excellent coal ; and
Blyth, a watering-place no less than a coal-shipping port. Cowpen, near it, has
collieries, as have also Cramlington and Seghill, situated a few miles inland, but
Bedlington is the great mining centre of the district.
Morpeth is a quaint old town on the Wansbeck, with the remains of a castle.
A little flannel is woven, and collieries are worked in its vicinity. These are
nearly the last met with in the north of England, and the beautiful valley of the
Coquet is wholly devoted to agriculture. Rothbury, its chief market town, is
inferior in population to the busy hives in the manufacturing and mining districts,
but yields to none in the beauty of its environs. Old camps abound in its vicinity,
and about a mile to the west is a peel tower, one of many which formerly
defended the Scottish borders.* Warkuorth, a village at the mouth of the Coquet,
is remarkable for the noble ruins of one of the strongholds of the Percys.
Alnwick, on the Aln, 4 miles above its mouth at the bathing village of Aln-
mouth, is a quaint old town under the modernised castle of the Duke of Northum-
berland. This castle contains valuable paintings and collections of various kinds, and
the park which surrounds it forms one of the great attractions of the neighbourhood.
The coast of Northumberland, to the north of the Aln and as far as Budle
Bay, is bounded by limestone cliffs, and at a few places by basalt. On one such
* Peel tower, derived from pila, a stake, pillar, statue.
NORTHUMBERLAND. ' 297
mass of columnar basalt is perched the ancient castle of Dunstanborough, whose
foundation dates probably back to a period anterior to that of the Romans.
Another basaltic promontory is crowned with Bamhorough Castle, which formerly
defended a town of importance, now represented by a small fishing village. Off
this castle lie the basaltic Farn Islands, where seals are met with, and which
abound in sea-birds. The largest of these islands has an old chapel and a grave-
yard, associated with the name of St. Cuthbert ; while one of the smallest a mere
Fig. 147.— Holy Island.
Prom an Admiralty Chart. Scale 1 : 120,000.
-» a
K M
\2i 27
' ' " >- "' « '^ X ^
- ' ':•< J C o f w . c k B ay 5--^i }i€,.iJ f i2
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2 Miles.
patch of rock rising a few feet above the water, is occupied by the Longstone Rock
Lighthouse, the home of Grace Darling.
A little farther north is Holp Island, famous in ecclesiastical history on account
of its cathedral of Lindisfarne, the site of which is occupied by the ruins of a priory
church, a miniature imitation of Durham Cathedral.
The river Till skirts the southern and eastern foot of the Cheviot Hills,
and enters the Tweed about 12 miles above its mouth at Berwick-on -Tweed.
Wooler, an old market town, is the principal place in the valley of the Till.
Humbleton, or Homildon Hill, in its neighbourhood, is crowned with a circular
116— E
298 THE BRITISH ISLES.
entrenchment, and rises in the centre of the field on which Percy, Earl of North-
umberland, defeated a Scotch army in 1402. The more famous Field of Flodden
the scene of the crushing defeat and death of James IV., lies 8 miles to the north-
west, not far from the Tweed. Chillingham Castle, often referred to in connection
with its breed of wild cattle, is about 4 miles above Wooler, on the Till.
Berwick-on-Tiveed, the old border fortress, lies at the mouth of the Tweed, and
vessels of 500 tons burden can approach its quays. The old bastioned walls are
still in good condition. A bridge and a stupendous railway viaduct, 2,160 feet
in length, connect Berwick with its suburb Ttceedmouth, on the southern bank of
the river. Spittal, much frequented for its sea baths, adjoins the latter on the
east. Berwick has iron foundries and machine factories, and exports the salmon
caught in the Tweed, packed in ice. This is the northernmost town in England,
of which it has formed part only since 1482, in which year it was finally wrested
from the Scotch.
CHAPTER XII.
THE I8LE OF MAN.
HE Isle of Man lies about the centre of the Irish Sea, and within
sight of the three constituent parts of the United Kingdom. It
is a little nearer to Scotland than to England, but to judge by the
formation of the sea-bottom, it forms a natural dependency of the
county of Cumberland. The depth of the sea between Man and
the English coast averages 100 feet, whilst in the direction of the Scotch county
of Wigton it is at least 160 feet, and soundings of 420 feet are met with on
voyaging towards the Irish port of Belfast. In order to determine whether the
Isle of Man is a natural dependency of Ireland or Great Britain, Halley tells us *
serpents and toads were carried thither. They survived, and hence it was
concluded that Man is English, for these animals cannot live upon the soil of the
Emerald Isle. The remains of the so-called elk, so numerous in Ireland, were
first discovered on the Isle of Man.f
The geographical position of the island at nearly equal distances from three
potent centres of attraction has frequently enabled the inhabitants to maintain
their independence, notwithstanding that they were surrounded by enemies. On
some occasions, however, they quickly changed masters, according to the oscilla-
tions of political power amongst their neighbours. During the early Middle Ages
the inhabitants of Man were subjected to the influences of Ireland and Scotland.
Subsequently the island fell under the sway of Danish pirates, and was incorporated
into their " Kingdom of the Islands." When this kingdom was sold to the Scots
in 1264, Man passed with it into their possession ; but some time afterwards it was
wrested from the Scotch, and made a separate "kingdom," dependent upon
England. Thomas, Earl of Derby, relinquished the title of King of Man, and
took that of Lord, and since 1784 the British Government has purchased all the
sovereign rights and privileges appertaining to the island. Man, at the present
time, is a dependency of the British crown, unrepresented in the Imperial Parlia-
ment. It is, in fact, a kind of colony, governed by an independent legislature.
* "Atlas Maritimus et Commercialis," 1728.
t George Canning, " Isle of Man."
300
THE BRITISH ISLES.
called the Tynwald, and consisting of two branches — the Grovernor and Council,
and the House of Keys. The inhabitants of the island may consequently claim to
form a state within the state. They differ, moreover, from their neighbours on the
larger islands in their traditions, their double origin, and partly also in language.
Fig. 148.— The Isle of Man.
Scale 1 : 150,000,
Depth under 11 Fathoms.
11 to 22 Fathoms.
22 to 33 Fathoms.
_ 2 Miles.
Over 33 Fathoms,
Manx holds a middle place between Irish and Scotch Gaelic, but inclines con-
siderably to the latter ; but it is spoken now only in some of the more remote
districts, and altogether by hardly a fourth part of the population. All but a few
of the oldest inhabitants understand English. Manx literature, in addition to
religious books, includes a few ballads of the sixteenth century. The descent of the
THE ISLE OF MAN. 301
inhabitants is not, however, purely Celtic, for there has been a strong intermixture
of Scandinavian blood.*
A range of mountains of considerable elevation traverses the island from the
south-west to the north-east, and a depression near its centre separates this
range into two distinct masses. Standing upon the principal summit (2,004 feet),
the whole of the Irish Sea, with the mountains that bound it, lies spread beneath
us. This mountain still bears the Scandinavian name of Snae Fell, or Snow
Mountain, although snow only covers it during part of the winter. Indeed, the
climate of the Isle of Man is very temperate, though somewhat variable, and the
number of tourists attracted by its scenery is very considerable. The larger part
of the island is the property of yeomen, who cultivate their own small estates.
The mountains yield lead, copper, iron, and zinc.
Castletown, the official capital of the island, is built on a crescent-shaped bay
near its southern extremity. Peel is the principal port on the western, as
Ramsay is on the north-eastern coast, but Douglas is the only town of real
importance. It stands on a well- sheltered bay on the east coast, opposite
Liverpool, and at one extremity of the *' gap " which runs athwart the island,
the other end being occupied by Peel. Gardens, villas, and terraces covered
with flowers surround Douglas, and the roadstead is protected by a powerful
breakwater. In the churchyard of Kirk Braddan, to the north-west of it,
may still be seen a raised stone covered with dragons, carved in the twelfth
century, and bearing a mortuary inscription in Runic letters which Miinch of
Copenhagen was the first to decipher. So-called Druidical monuments of every
kind are plentiful throughout the island, but there is reason to believe that some
of them, at all events, are not older than the Middle Ages. One of the most
curious amongst them is the monument at Tynwald, at the intersection of four
roads, in the centre of the island. We do not know whether its origin is Celtic
or Scandinavian, but to the present day it is put to the use for which it appears
to have been intended, for the local laws still continue to be promulgated here
annually in the presence of the Governor, the two " Deemsters," or Judges, the
Council, and the " Keys." According to tradition a head Druid or kind of
Pope of the Celtic world, officiated in the Isle of Man before the Roman epoch,
and the faithful then flocked to it from all parts to do him homage. Man and
Anglesey had formerly the same name, and the mediaeval lords of the island used
the title of *' King of both the Monas." The authority of the Bishop of Sodor
and Man is now limited to the Isle of Man ; the Sodor — Stidr eyyars ; that
is, southern islands (when contrasted with the Orkneys) — or Hebrides, having
been separated from his bishopric.
* H. Jenner, "The Manx Language," Transactions of the Philological Society, 1875.
CHAPTER XIII.
SOUTHERN SCOTLAND.
(Wigtown, Ayr, Kirkcudbkight, Dumfries, Roxburgh, Selkirk, Berwick, Haddington, Edinburgh,
Linlithgow, Peebles, Lanark, Renfrew, Bute, Dumbarton, Clackmannan, Stirling, Kinross,
Fife.)
General Features.
lOUTHERN Scotland, by the nature of its soil no less than with
respect to its inhabitants, forms a well-marked geographical pro-
vince. The far-penetrating Solway Firth and the crest of the
Cheviot Hills very distinctly mark its southern boundary towards
England. But the line to the north of the Clyde and the Firth
of Forth, which is supposed to separate the Scottish Lowlands from the Highlands,
is altogether conventional and not so well defined. It passes through the
mountain spurs which descend towards the level country ; it separates men differing
in race, and marks a climatic boundary. Southern Scotland, such as it has
revealed itself in history, coincides pretty nearly with the tract of country enclosed
within the two old Roman walls. This tract is very much inferior to the remainder
of Scotland in area, but far surpasses it in industry and power, and contains two-
thirds of its population.
The contrasts between England and Scotland are manifested even in the
geological structure of the two countries. In Northern England the geological
formations strike north and south, and the Pennine chain runs in the same
direction ; whilst in Scotland the geological formations, far more regular in their
outlines, strike across the country from south-west to north-east, and from sea to
sea. The strike is the same in the Cheviot Hills, no less than in the Carrick
Hills, the Louther Hills, the Moorfoot and Lammermuir Hills, to the south of the
plain extending from the Forth to the Clyde, and in the Grampians and other
ranges of Northern Scotland. But though the mountain chains in the two portions
of Caledonia run in the same direction, the rocks which form them are different.
The carboniferous formation, which lies across the isthmus, contrasts with the
more ancient mountains in Northern Scotland, and through the mineral treasures
SOUTHEEN SCOTLAND. 808
which it encloses, it has exercised a powerful influence upon the peopling of
Southern Scotland,
But even long before the working of the coal mines had attracted a crowded
population to the plain of the Clyde, the Lowlands, owing to their mild climate, the
fruitfulness of their soil, and the facilities for opening up communications, had
become the seat of towns. The veritable centre of historical Scotland must be
looked for along the line which joins the banks of the Tay to those of the Forth,
and the inhabitants of the lateral valleys and of secondary river basins gravi-
tated towards the towns in this central plain. A cradle of civilisation, distinct
from those of England, sprang up of necessity in this part of Great Britain.
That island, being very elongated in proportion to its width, and moreover
inhabited by different races not then fused into a single nationality, naturally
became the seat of distinct political organizations, and political unity was
established only after prolonged struggles. The boundary between Scotland and
England changed frequently with the fortunes of war, until it was finally fixed at
the Solway Firth, the Cheviot Hills, and the Tweed, and there it remained until,
through a pacific arrangement, the two countries became one. Few wars have
been more bloody than were those waged between Scots and English, and innu-
merable have been the occasions on which the borders were crossed with hostile
intent. The Scotch Lowlanders, reinforced by Highland clans, frequently invaded
Northern England, and on one occasion, in 1403, they advanced as far as Shrews-
bury, in the valley of the Severn. The English, on their side, being more
numerous, succeeded several times in conquering Scotland, and frequently laid
waste the fertile fields of the isthmus. The natural advantages which that part of
Scotland enjoyed in time of peace, its wealth acquired by the commerce carried
on through its firths, and its fertile and well-cultivated soil naturally invited
invaders from the south.
The Cheviot Hills, which form the central portion of the Anglo-Scotch
frontier, are not very elevated; but as their summits, owing to the severe
climate, remain covered with snow for several months during the year, they
form a substantial obstacle, and communication between their two slopes is
difiicult.
The Louther Hills lie within a belt of Silurian rocks which extends obliquely
across Southern Scotland from the shores of the Irish Sea to the German Ocean.
Within this same belt, but farther towards the south-west, and in the midst of a
desolate region of crags, gullies, and lakes, rises one of the most elevated hills
of this district, the Merrick (2,764 feet). A rugged upland stretches north-
eastward from the Louther Hills, and connects them with the Moorfoot (2,136 feet)
and Lammermuir Hills (1,722 feet), the spurs of which extend to the seashore.
A second range of hills, less elevated and formed of more recent rocks, runs parallel
with the main range, and sinks down to the level country of the Clyde and Forth.
In a remote geological epoch, whilst the old red sandstone and the carboniferous
strata were being deposited in the sea which then covered Scotland, numerous
active volcanoes rose above the surface of the water. These volcanoes account for
804
THE BRITISH ISLES.
the dykes of lava and beds of scoriae whicli we now meet in the midst of
sedimentary rocks. Being better capable of resisting destructive agencies
Fig. 149. — Mount Merrick.
Scale 1 : 160,000.
4'35'
4° 25 /v.of G.
2 Miles.
than rocks of other formations, the products of this volcanic action still
rise here and there into hills and promontories, which impart a pleasing
variety to the country. The small range of the Pentland Hills (1,840 feet),
SOUTHERN SCOTLAND. 3O5
which terminates to the south of Edinburgh, is one of these groups of eruptive
rocks.
The plain of the Forth and Clyde is traversed by a canal whose summit level
lies at an elevation of only 157 feet, and at this spot the separation between the
Lowlands and the mountain region of Northern Scotland is consequently well
marked. But higher up, in Strathclyde, there exists another breach in the
mountains, for the Clyde, which now flows to the westward, formerly pursued its
course to the east, into the valley of the Tweed, and if Measures were not taken to
protect against erosion the gravel deposits of the plain of Biggar, to the south of
Lanark, the Clyde would resume its ancient course.* The water-parting between
the Clyde and the Forth was formerly less elevated, for raised beaches are met
with at many places along the estuaries of the two rivers, at an elevation of
between 20 and 40 feet above the sea-level, and they contain the shells of
animals similar to those still living in the neighbouring seas. In the vicinity
of Glasgow, where repeated opportunities for examining the soil are aflbrded
by the construction of sewers, the bones of whales, seals, and porpoises have
frequently been found at 20 or 30 feet above the actual level of the sea. At
the time these cetaceans w^ere stranded man already lived in the country, for
close to their bones boats of various descriptions have been discovered, some
of them mere dug-outs, such as are used by savages, but others skilfully con-
structed of planks, with pointed prows and square sterns. Mr. A. Geikie is of
opinion that these boats belong to the historical epoch, and that the Roman
conquerors of the country may have seen them afloat on the estuary of the
Clyde. In the bog of Blair Drummond, near the Firth of Forth, a whale was
unearthed, which had been harpooned by means of an instrument made of the
antlers of a stag.t In the neighbourhood of Falkirk, near the western extremity
of the Firth of Forth, the sea formerly extended up the river Carron, far beyond
the present head of the tide. The great Roman wall, named after Antoninus,
though begun by Agricola, extended from sea to sea, so as not to leave wide
passages at either end open to an invader. Yet no remains of this wall have
been found to the west of Dunglass, where it finishes at a height of 25 feet above
the present level of the sea. In the east it terminates on the top of a cliff", at
Carriden, near Falkirk.+ In the interior of the country the remains of this wall
may still be seen in a few places, and at the close of last century it was even
possible to distinguish ten forts and bridge-heads which defended the principal
river passages, and also portions of a ditch, 42 feet wide and 22 feet deep, which
extended along its northern face. This region, formerly of such strategical
importance, has, owing to its vicinity to two seas, its small elevation, and the
riches of its soil and subsoil, become one of the most prosperous of Great Britain,
and, indeed, of the whole world. Edinburgh and Glasgow are the two sentinels
of this Scotch isthmus. It was the action of the glaciers which destroyed the
* A. Goikie, " Scenery and Geology of Scotland."
t Ramsay, " Physical Geology and Geography of Great Britain."
X "Wilson, "Prehistoric Annals of Scotland;" Robert Chambers, " Ancient Sea Margins."
806 THE BRITISH ISLES.
more solid rocks, and spread their mingled waste over the plain, thus creating the
most fertile soil to be met with in all Britain.
Southern Scotland contrasts by its greater regularity of coast -line with the
deeply indented shores of the north. In the east only one peninsula, bounded
on the one side by the winding Firth of Forth, on the other by the Firth of
Tay, advances beyond the line of coast. In the west the broad peninsular mass
of Galloway projects towards Ireland, from which it is separated by a marine
" pit " having a depth of nearly 1,000 feet. This peninsula terminates in the
Rhinns of Galloway — anciently an island, but now joined by a low neck to the
mainland. These are the only inequalities in the contour of the coast, and the
contrast with the littoral region of the Western Highlands, where we feel almost
lost in a labyrinth of " lochs," is a very striking one. These lochs, some of
which communicate freely with the sea, whilst others are lakes drained by swift-
flowing rivers and torrents, are first met with to the north of the Clyde, along
Fig. 150. — The Wall of Antoninus.
Scale 1 : 555,000.
5 Miles.
the skirt of the Highlands. Loch Lomond is the most beautiful of all these
lakes, and that amongst them which has most frequently formed the theme
of poets. The river Leven drains it into the Clyde. A sinuous strait at its
northern end, a veritable lake, several miles in width near its centre, but becoming
shallower in proportion as it grows wider. Loch Lomond presents its admirers
with every possible contrast of scenery — gently swelling hills and rugged crags ;
scarped islands raising their grey pinnacles abruptly above the translucent water,
and groups of low islands covered with meadows and woods, and inhabited by
bounding deer. Beautiful country residences are here and there seen along the
shore, whilst near the northern extremity of the lake the long back of Ben
Lomond (3,192 feet high), often enveloped in mist, rises above cultivated fields
and forests.
The same mountain region gives birth to the river Forth, one of the prin-
cipal affluents of which has the famous Loch Katrine, sung of in Sir Walter Scott's
*' Lady of the Lake," for its upper reservoir. Loch Katrine resembles the Lake
iiiil(iiiHH£'!!i;T5r;iiiiiir;i:s;i:;«: :m
ni Uiiii'iMii
nii"iniiiiiirin,i»:mii((iiii(iiiii;!iiiFiM/i!iii!i!!iii!!!ii«P'«:' '!ii™^^^^^^
SOUTHERN SCOTLAND.
807
of Lucerne in its precipitous rocks and abrupt turnings. But the guardian spirit
of the lake has become the bondmaiden of human industry, for the city of
Glasgow has taken possession of Loch Katrine, in order that it may supply its
inhabitants and factories with pure water. An aqueduct, 44 miles in length, of
Fig. 151. — Loch Lomond.
Scale 1 : 350,000.
5 Miles.
which 12 miles are tunnelled, pours every second 380 gallons of water into the
reservoirs of the town. Manchester, in looking to one of the lakes of Cumber-
land for its supply of water, is only following the example set by this great city of
Scotland.
Almost without lochs, the Lowlands are poor, likewise, in islands, and the larger
THE BEITISH ISLES.
ones form in more than one respect a portion of tlie Highlands. The island
of Arran, between the Firth of Clyde and Kilbrannan Sound, rises into
lofty mountains in its northern part, and its most elevated peak, Gaodhbhein
(2,866 feet) — that is, the "Windy Mountain," corrupted into Goat Fell by the men
Fig. 152. — The Island of Arban.
Scale 1 : 325,000.
Depth iinder 26
26 to 55
Over 55
Fathoms.
Fathoms.
Fathoms.
- 5 Miles.
of Saxon speech — attains a greater height than any other mountain in the south
of Scotland. Arran, by its relief and wild aspect, forms part of the Highland
region, but its geological structure attaches it to the Lowlands ; for although
its northern portion is composed of metamorphosed Silurian rocks pierced by
granite, its southern and lower half resembles the neighbouring Lowlands in its
SOUTHERN SCOTLAND. 809
geological features. To this position on the borders of two geological domains
Arran is indebted for the great variety of its sedimentary and eruptive rocks, and
for a corresponding variety of scenery. Lamlash Bay, sheltered by Holy Island,
and surrounded by heights crowned with sepulchral pillars and other monuments,
affords one of the safest anchorages on the Firth of Clyde, and seventy or eighty
vessels frequently wait here for days and weeks for a favourable wind. The Isle
of Bute, which penetrates far into the district of Gowan, from which it is separated
by the Kyles of Bute, a narrow arm of the sea, is remarkable for its fine
scenery.
In addition to these two large islands and to several smaller ones which are
contiguous to them, there are several islets of volcanic origin in the neighbourhood
of the coast. One of these is Ailsa Craig (1,103 feet), a huge block of basalt,
at the mouth of the Firth of Clyde. Its rows of grey columnar basalt separated
by verdant terraces present a picture of singular beauty. The ruins of a tower
crown its summit. Another of these islets is the Bass Rock (350 feet), at the
entrance of the Firth of Forth, and about 2 miles from the shore, with a castle
on its summit, formerly used as a state prison, and accessible only by means
of ladders and ropes. This conical rock, when seen from a distance, almost
looks as if it were overspread with snow, so densely is it covered with sea- fowl
of every description. The solan goose only breeds on a few rocky islets around
the coast of Britain, and amongst these the Bass Rock is the most famous, the
scientific name of the bird — Siila Bassana — being derived from it.*
Inhabitants.
The Scottish Lowlanders are a very mixed race, and even their name is a
singular proof of it. Scotland was originally known as Hibernia, or Igbernia,
whilst the name of Scotia, from the end of the third to the beginning of the
eleventh century, was exclusively applied to modern Ireland. The two countries
have consequently exchanged names. Irish Scots, or Dalriads, having established
themselves, about the middle of the third century, in Argyllshire, their neighbours
became by degrees known under the same designation, and in course of time all
the " Caledonians " were turned into " Scots."t
It does not appear as if the aboriginal Picts or Caledonians, who lived in the
country at the time of its conquest, formed a strong element of the actual
population of the Scotch Lowlands. It is believed that their inhabitants are for
the most part of British and Anglo-Saxon race. The line which separated the
English from the Picts runs, no doubt, across the isthmus of the Clyde and Forth ;
the ancient wall of Antoninus would thus have marked an ethnological frontier no
less than a political one. But Saxons, Angles, and Britons were compelled to
share their territory with emigrants of various races, including the Scots of
Ireland, Frisians, Northmen, and Danes. At some places, and more especially
* Hugh Miller, " The Bass Rock : its Civil and Ecclesiastical History."
t Kemble, "Saxons in England;" Latham, "Ethnology of the British Islands;" Murray, in
Philologienl Society's Transactions, 1873.
310 THE BRITISH ISLES.
along the coast, people of different origin live in close contact with each other, and
yet remain separate. Their blood has not mingled ; habits, customs, and modes of
thought and action have remained distinct. Along the whole of the coast, on that
of the German Ocean no less than on that of the Irish Sea, we meet with colonies
of fishermen, some of whom claim descent from the Northmen, whilst others
look upon the Danes as their ancestors. There are even colonies which tradition
derives from Flanders. Several of the maritime villages consist of two portions,
like the towns on the coasts of Catalonia, Liguria, and Sicily, the upper part
being inhabited by Saxon artisans and agriculturists, whilst the lower part forms
the *' Marina " of Scandinavian fishermen. These various elements of the
population have, however, become fused in the greater part of the country.
Physically the Scotchman resembles the Norwegian, and this is not solely due to a
similarity of climate, but also to the numerous unions between Scandinavian
invaders and the daughters of the country. The languages of the two countries
also possess more features in common than was formerly believed. The Scotch
speak English with a peculiar accent, which at once betrays their origin. Their
intonation differs from that of the English, and they suppress certain consonants
in the middle and at the end of words. They still employ certain old English
terms, no longer made use of to the south of the Tweed, and, on the strength of
this, patriotic Scotchmen claim to speak English with greater purity than
their southern neighbours. Amongst the many words of foreign derivation in
common use, there are several French ones, not only such as were introduced by
the Normans, but also others belonging to the time when the two peoples were
faithful allies, and supplied each other with soldiers.
The Scotch Lowlander is, as a rule, of fair height, long-legged, strongly built,
and without any tendency to the obesity so common amongst his kinsmen of England.
His eye is ordinarily brighter than that of the Englishman, and his features more
regular ; but his cheeks are more prominent, and the leanness of the face helps
much to accentuate these features. Comparative inquiries instituted by Forbes prove
that physical development is somewhat slower amongst Scotchmen than amongst
Englishmen ; the former comes up to the latter in height and strength only at the
age of nineteen, but in his ripe age he surpasses him to the extent of about 5
per cent, in muscular strength.* Of all the men of Great Britain those of South-
western Scotland are distinguished for their tall stature. The men of Galloway
average 5 feet 7 inches in height, which is superior to the stature attained in any
other district of the British Islands. The Lowlander is intelligent, of remarkable
sagacity in business, and persevering when once he has determined upon accom-
plishing a task ; but his prudence degenerates into distrust, his thrift into avarice.
There is not a village without one or more banks. When abroad he seeks out
his fellow-countrymen, derives a pleasure from being useful to them, and helps
their success in life to the best of his ability.
The achievements of Scotch agriculturists, who are so little favoured by climate,
must appear marvellous to the peasants of Italy and of many parts of France.
* Forbes ; Hugh Miller, " First Impressions of England and the English."
SOUTHERN SCOTLAND. 3^^
Under the fifty-sixth degree of latitude they secure crops far more abundant than
those obtained from the fertile lands on the Mediterranean, which are 900
miles nearer to the equator. Human labour and ingenuity have succeeded in
acclimatizing plants which hardly appeared to be suited to the soil and climate of
Scotland. About the middle of the eighteenth century a patch of wheat was
pointed out near Edinburgh as a curiosity, whilst now that cereal grows in abun-
dance as far north as the Moray Firth. And yet it appears as if the climate had
become colder, for it is no longer possible to cultivate the poppy or tobacco, as was
done in the beginning of the century. Several varieties of apples, pears, and
prunes, formerly in high repute, no longer arrive at maturity, and the Horticultural
Societies have ceased offering prizes for these productions, because it is no longer
possible to grow them in the open air. The manufacturing triumphs of Scotland have
been quite equal to those achieved in agriculture, and it is on Scottish soil that
Glasgow, the foremost manufacturing town of the United Kingdom, has arisen
with a population greater than that of either Manchester, Leeds, or Birmingham.
Scotland, through her numerous emigrants who live in London and the other
great towns, has also largely contributed towards the prosperity of England.
The hawkers in the English manufacturing districts are usually known as
"Scotchmen." The Scotch colonists in New Zealand and Canada are amongst
the most active and industrious, and the young Lowlanders who go out to
India as Government officials are far more numerous in proportion than those from
England.
The love of education for its own sake, and not merely as a means to an end,
is far more widely spread in Scotland than in England. The lectures at the
universities are attended with a zeal which the students of Oxford or Cambridge
seldom exhibit. It is by no means rare to meet pupils in elementary schools
who are passionately fond of study, and the humble homes of artisans and
labourers frequently contain a select library which would do credit to a wealthy
English tradesman. At the same time there are not wanting young men who
accelerate their studies in order that they may secure the certificates which form
their passport to lucrative employment. They work hard, no doubt, but they
strive not after knowledge, but for material gain. The students of Edin-
burgh have little time to devote to those exercises of strength and skill which
are so highly cultivated at Oxford and Cambridge.* By a curious contrast, these
Scotchmen, so practical and full of common sense, have an extraordinary love for the
supernatural. They delight in stories of terror and of ghosts. Though clever
architects of their own fortunes, they are yet fatalists, and the religious sects
of which most of them are members defend with singular fervour the doctrine
of predestination. Thousands amongst the peasants, dressed in clerical black,
are veritable theologians, and know how to discuss the articles of their faith
with a great luxury of Scripture texts. As Emerson says, they allow their
dialectics to carry them to the extremes of insanity. In no other country of
the world is the Sabbath observed with such rigour as in Scotland. On that day
* Demogeot et Montucci, " De rEnseigncment superieur en Angleterre et en Ecosse."
812
THE BEITISH ISLES.
many of the trains and steamers cease running, and silence reigns throughout the
land. There are even landed proprietors who taboo their hills on that day,
Fig. 153.— The Fikth of Clyde.
From an Admiralty Chart. Scale 1 : 474,000.
5 Miles.
and if a tourist is found wandering amongst them he is treated as a reckless
violator of the proprieties.
DUMFRIES-KIRKCUDBRIGHT. 313
Topography.
Dumfries is formed of the dales of the Nith, Annan, and Esk, which fall into
the upper portion of Solway Firth, and is shut in by high naked hills on the
land side, which aiford excellent pasturage. Tracts of marshy ground occur near
the shores of the Solway Firth, including the Solway and the Locher Mosses, but
these have been drained and brought under cultivation./
The first village we arrive at, on crossing the boundary river Esk, is Gretna
Green, famed for its irregular Scotch marriages. Langholm, with a monument
to Sir John Malcolm, is th^ principal village of Eskdale. Annan, a small
seaport, lies at the mouth of charming Annandale. It carries on a modest
coasting trade and a little cotton-spinning. Ascending the dale, we pass
Lockerbie, noted for its sheep fair, and finally reach the picturesque village of
Moffat, lying at the foot of Hart Fell (2,651 feet), and no less noted for its
wild surroundings than for its sulphurous waters. Crossing from Annandale
into Nithsdale, we pass the village of Lochmaben, on the side of a small lake,
and the remains of one of the castles of Robert the Bruce — according to some, his
birthplace.
Dumfries, 8 miles above the mouth of the Nith, but accessible with the tide to
vessels of 150 tons burden, is the most important town of South-western Scotland,
and one of its most ancient ; it engages in the woollen and hosiery trades. Robert
Burns died here, and a monument has been erected over his grave in the old
churchyard of St. Michael's. Below the town are the ruins of Caerlaverock
Castle, at one time a place of great strength, and on the other side of the river, at
the foot of the Crifiel (1,867 feet), the beautiful remains of New or Sweetheart
Abbey. Nithsdale is noted for its picturesque scenery. Most striking amongst
its mansions is Drumlanrig Castle, a seat of the Duke of Buccleuch. Quite
at the head of the dale, amidst the Louther Hills, are the lead mines of
Wanlockhead.
Kirkcudbright, formed out of the eastern portion of the old district of
Galloway, lies between the rivers Nith and Cree, and is traversed in its centre by
the Dee, of which the Ken is a tributary, and by the much smaller Urr Water.
Wild moorlands occupy nearly the whole of it, and its population is incon-
siderable.
Kirkcudbright, the county town, on the estuary of the Dee, is merely a village,
with a small coasting trade. At Dundrennan Castle, 6 miles to the south-east.
Queen Mary spent the night after the fatal defeat of her troops at Langside.
Castle Douglas is a neat town in the valley of the Dee. Higher up the Dee expands
into two lakes, Lochs Dee and Ken, at the head of which is New Galloway.
Gatehouse of Fleet and Creetown, the latter with granite quarries, are small
ports on Wigtown Bay, to the west of the Dee ; whilst Dalbeattie, with its
granite quarries, and Kirkpatrick- Durham are the most notable villages on Urr
Water.
117— E
314
THE BEITISH ISLES.
Fig. 154. — The Rhinns of Galloway.
Scale 1 : 100,000.
Wigtown consists of a mainland portion, filled with moorland hills, and of the
peninsula, known as the Ehinns of Galloway, which is attached to it by a low
neck of land. The population is sparse and decreasing. Wigtown, the capital,
on Wigtown Bay, is a mere village, with a distillery and a small coasting trade.
Far more important, though by no means prosperous, is Stranraer, at the head of
Loch Ryan. On the . peninsula itself, and within 21 miles of the Irish coast, is
Port Patrick, with an extensive harbour, constructed at vast expense, but little
frequented. The only other villages
deserving mention are Glcnluce, on Luce
Bay ; Garlieston, on Wigtown Bay,
with the principal seat of the Earl of
Galloway ; and Whithorn, farther to the
south, with the ruins of a cathedral
founded by St. Mnian, the apostle of
the Picts.
Ayrshire borders upon the Firth of
Clyde, into which flow the Garnock,
Irvine, Ayr, Doon, and other rivers
rising on the enclosing hill ranges. The
county consists of three well-defined
districts. Carrick, in the south, is a wild
and desolate moorland region stretching
up to Mount Merrick (2,764 feet) ; Kyle,
in the centre, drained by Ayr Water,
lies within a productive coal basin;
and Cunningham, in the north, is a
region of hills, extending to the crest
of the upland which separates the
county from Renfrewshire. Whilst
Carrick supports but a small population,
the northern part of the county, with its
collieries and iron works, its textile
factories and engineering shops, is one
of the most densely peopled parts of
Scotland.
Girvan, on a fine bay near the mouth of Girvan Water, is the principal port
of Carrick. On the bold coast between it and the mouth of the Doon stand the
ruins of Turnberry and Dunure Castles, and the magnificent mansion of Colzean.
The Doon rises in a lake of the same name, on issuing from which it flows through
the iron and coal mining district of DalmelUngton. Mayhole, a small country
town, lies in a side valley, and the river enters the sea below the village of Kirk
AUoicay, the birthplace of Robert Burns. Ayr, the capital of the county, lies only
a few miles farther north, at the mouth of Ayr Water, whose harbour is acces-
sible to small vessels. It is a handsome town, with numerous villas, and its river
0 to 14 14 to 28 28 to 55 Over 55
"Fathoms. Fathoms. Fathoms. Fathoms.
5 Miles.
BUTE-LANARKSHIRE. 315
is spanned by " twa brigs." The whole of this region will for ever be associated
with the memory of Burns. At TarhoUon, a few miles up the Ayr, the poet
established his Bachelors' Club in 1780, and wooed his " Highland Mary," in
service as a dairymaid at a neighbouring mansion. Stiil ascending the Ayr,
we pass Catrine, a manufacturing village, and reach Mauchline and Muirkirk,
where there are collieries, iron works, and limestone quarries. Lugar and
Cumnock, both on the Lugar, a tributary of the Ayr, are engaged in the same
industries.
Troon, about half-way between Ayr and Irvine, has a well- sheltered harbour,
and is the busiest port of Ayr, shipping large quantities of coal. The river
Irvine traverses the principal manufacturing district of the county, whose natural
outlet is Irvine, near the mouth of the river. Kilmarnock, the largest town of the
county, manufactures carpets, shawls, cottons, worsted, Scotch bonnets, machinery,
and boots. The manufacturing villages of Hurlford, Galston, Newmilns, and Darvel,
on the Upper Irvine, and Stewarton, to the north, are its dependencies. Kihcinning
with Stevenston, Dairy, Kilhirnie, and Beith, in the valley of the Garnock, are towns
of collieries and iron works. Three seaside towns on the northern coast of
Ayrshire remain to be noticed. They are Saltcoats, with salt and magnesia works ;
Ardrossan, with iron works and collieries ; and Largs, much frequented as a
watering-place.
The shire of Bute includes the islands of Bute, Arran, and Great and Little
Cumbrae, in the Firth of Clyde. By geological structure these islands belong
as much to the Highlands as to the Lowlands, and nearly 40 per cent, of the
inhabitants are still able to converse in Gaelic, although hardly any are ignorant
of English. Rothesay, the county town, is in Bute, as are also the villages of
Millport and Kameshiirgh {Port Bannatyne) ; whilst Lamlash is the principal village
in Arran, with a harbour not to be surpassed on the Clyde.
Lanarkshire lies almost wholly within the basin of the Clyde, which, though
inferior to the Tay and Tweed, has gathered within the area it drains nearly a
third of the total population of Scotland. The river rises far to the south, its
head-streams being fed by the rain which descends upon Hart Fell (2,651 feet),
Queensberry Hill (2,285 feet), and the Louther Hills (2,403 feet). In its upper
course it traverses a region of sterile moorlands, within which lies Leadhills. Near
Biggar, on a stream which finds its way into the Tweed, the Clyde sweeps abruptly
round to the north-westward, and on approaching Lanark it leaps down a succession
of linns into the great agricultural and mining region of the county. The beautiful
country around Lanark is one of the most famous in the history of Scotland, for it was
here that the Scottish hero, Wallace, commenced his career. Here, too, at the
neighbouring village of Neic Lanark, was founded the cotton-mill in which
Robert Owen worked out his plans for the social regeneration of mankind.
Between Lanark and Glasgow the river traverses the principal mineral region of
Scotland. Its " black band " ironstone, containing coaly matter sufficient to
calcine the adjacent ore without any addition of artificial fuel, has been a source
of wealth to Scotch iron-masters, and enabled them to construct the sumptuous
816 THE BRITISH ISLES.
mansions dotted over the country. These products have caused the villages
of this district to expand into populous towns, but it is only fair to observe that
hardly one amongst them possesses other sources of attraction than collieries and
iron works. Foremost amongst the towns to the east of the Clyde are Carluke,
Wishaic with Cainhusnethan, Motherwell, Holytoivn, BellsJull, and Calderbank, in the
valley of the Calder ; Airdrie, Coatbridge, Gartsherrie, Rosehall, and Tollcross, in
the northern part of the county. Far more inviting than either of these is
Hamilton, at the confluence of the Avon with the Clyde, with the sumptuous
palace of its duke abounding in costly works of art, and its noble chase, in which
a remnant of the breed of Scottish wild cattle still browse. The staple trades of
Hamilton are hand-loom weaving and tambouring ; but Larkhall, Motherwell, and
other coal and iron mining villages are in its neighbourhood, and at night the
horizon is illumined with the fires of numerous smelting works. The Avon flows
past Strathavon and Stonehouse, and near it is the famous Drumclog, where the
Covenanters beat Claverhouse in 1679, only to meet a disastrous defeat soon after-
wards at Bothwell Bridge, 2 miles below Hamilton, and near the picturesque
ruins of Bothwell Castle. In its onward course the Clyde flows past the manu-
facturing villages of Camhuslang and Riitherglen, whose swelling heights are crowned
with the villas of the wealthy merchants and manufacturers of Glasgow.
This town, though more populous than any other in Scotland, and ranking
immediately after London, is not even the capital of a county. Glasgow, as
early as the fifteenth century, had 14,000 inhabitants, but its distance from
the sea and the small depth of the Clyde stunted its growth. At the time
of the union the port of the Clyde, now so prodigiously busy, had hardly any
commerce with foreign countries. Its position on the western coast precluded
it from competing with the towns of England in their trafiic with continental
Europe, and the English colonies were at that time closed against her merchants.
But no sooner had the Act of Union placed Glasgow and Greenock on the footing
of English ports than they endeavoured to secure their share in the commerce with
America. They imported more especially the tobacco of Virginia and Maryland,
and when they lost their monopoly in this branch of commerce, other industries
had been created, and Glasgow increased rapidly in population. In 1801 it had
already 80,000 inhabitants, and the increase since then has been enormous.
Unfortunately this increase is entirely due to immigration, and not to an excess
of births; for though Glasgow rejoices in the possession of magnificent parks,
its death rate exceeds that of Bombay and Calcutta. The crowds of half-famished
immigrants are so great, and the dens they inhabit are so unwholesome, that death
reaps a more abundant harvest here than in most of the other great cities of the
world. Irishmen without work, and numerous immigrants from the Highlands,
furnish fresh food to succeeding epidemics, and the narrow wynds are the
permanent abodes of consumption and fever. Yet between 1866 and 1876 more
than 31,000 persons were driven from the most crowded parts of the city in
consequence of the opening of new thoroughfares.
The 150,000 houses of the town extend along both banks of the Clyde, but
LANARKSHIRE.
317
the principal quarters and nearly all the public buildings are to the north
of the river. The cathedral, with its beautiful Gothic crypt, is, with the
exception of a church in the Orkneys, the only Catholic place of worship in
Scotland which escaped destruction at the time of the Reformation. The order
to wreck it had been given ; but the citizens, proud of their old church, resisted
the iconoclastic zeal of the Calvinistic ministers. In the necropolis at the
Fig. 155. — Glasgow.
Scale 1 : 70,000.
IMUe.
back of the cathedral has been placed a conspicuous column in memory of John
Knox. This venerable pile now stands near the eastern verge of the city, which
has not grown up around it, but spread to the westward, in the direction of
the sea.
The old university, founded in the fifteenth century, has recently been
transferred from its ancient site in the east of the city to the neighbourhood
of the West-end Park, and its showy buildings occupy a magnificent position
318 THE BEITISH ISLES.
on the top of Gilmore Hill. Amongst its many collections that bequeathed by
Dr. Hunter, the famous surgeon, is the most valuable. Hardly inferior in its
museums and chemical laboratories is the so-called Andersonian University, which
is at once a mechanics' institution and a school of science, whose evening classes
are attended by thousands of students. By a curious clause in his will, the
founder of this noble institution determined that it should be governed by nine
times nine curators, of whom nine must be Andersons. George Square, with
statues of Sir Walter Scott and other Scotch worthies, is the principal open
space of the city, whilst Argyle Street, with its eastern continuation, Trongate,
is the chief street.
Glasgow is, above all, an industrial city, and of its buildings none attain a
higher elevation than the chimneys of some of the great chemical works, which
have not their equal in the world. Its industry is remarkable for its variety. The
Scotch town spins cotton like Manchester, weaves silk like Macclesfield, makes
cloth like Leeds and Halifax, manufactures jute like Dundee, builds ships like
Middlesbrough, and has metal works, glass houses, and potteries like Birmingham,
Newcastle, and Worcester. And in all these branches of manufacture it
holds a foremost place. Far above 100,000 operatives find employment in its
three or four thousand factories.
The commerce of Glasgow is in proportion to its industry. The six lines of
railway which converge upon it place it in communication with every part of the
kingdom. As to its harbour, it includes the whole of the Lower Clyde, from the
Glasgow Bridge, above the Broomielaw, to Greenock, a distance of 20 miles.
The Clyde at Glasgow is scarcely 400 feet wide, and we marvel at the enterprise
which converted a river of such small volume into one of the great ports of the
world. Formerly, before the Clyde had been confined within embankments, it
spread with each tide over the adjoining marshes, and at low water was obstructed
by sand-banks, which rendered its navigation impossible to all but barges. At
that time oxen were driven across it from Dumbarton into Renfrewshire, and sea-
going vessels were obliged to discharge their cargoes 18 miles below Glasgow. In
1653 the merchants of Glasgow, despairing of ever being able to convert the
Clyde into a navigable river, determined to establish their port at Dumbarton ;
but the citizens of that old town declined the ofier, for fear that the bustle
of commerce and industry might interfere with their traditional customs.*
Glasgow thus seemed to be condemned to remain an inland city, but it
determined at least to have an outport of its own, and with that view, in 1662,
excavated docks, and erected the warehouses at Port Glasgow, on the southern
bank of the Clyde.
At the same time the works for deepening the Clyde were continued, and in
1718 the first vessel of 60 tons burden left Glasgow for North America. Greenock,
more favourably situated, likewise traded with America, and during the
whole of the eighteenth century it was a question which of the two towns
would prevail in the end. But owing to the labours of Smeaton, Watt, and
* Geo. Dodd, " The Land we Live In; " Ch. Dupin, " Voyage dans la Grande Bretagne."
RENFEEWSHIEE. 3^9
other engineers the city more distant from the sea gained the victory, and
became the great emporium of the Clyde. By 1875 the Lower Clyde had
been completely embanked, and its depth at low water was nowhere less than
8 feet. Since that time the persevering work of powerful dredging machines
has almost trebled the depth, and vessels of 1,000 tons can at all times lie
at the side of the quays of Broomielaw. The Clyde was the first river
regularly navigated by steam- vessels. This happened in 1812, and six years
later a line of steamers had been established between Greenock and Ireland.
At the present time Glasgow communicates with every part of the world,
and the Clyde ports only yield in activity to those of the Thames, the
Mersej^, and the Tyne. It has been noticed that gulls have become more
numerous in the valley of the Clyde since Glasgow has grown into a great
maritime port, and it is evident that these birds follow in the wake of
vessels.
Govan and Fartick, on the Clyde, below Glasgow, have ship- yards and print
works. Maryhiil, to the north-west, is a small manufacturing town.
Renfrewshire occupies the low-lying land on the southern bank of the Clyde
below Glasgow, and extends upwards from the river bank to the crest of a ridge
formed of igneous rock, which separates it from Ayrshire, and attains a height of
1,700 feet. The country possesses iron and coal, and its dense population is
engaged in building iron ships and machinery, cotton-spinning and other textile
industries, iron-founding, and sugar refining.
Renfreiv, the county town, on the Cart, not far from its mouth into the
Clyde, is now a place of little note, having been long since outstripped by its
neighbour Paisley, 2 miles above, which manufactures cotton, woollens, tartans,
thread, shawls, and machinery. Still higher up in the valley of the Cart, which
for a considerable portion of its course runs parallel with the Clyde, are the
smaller manufacturing towns of Pollockshmvs, Thornliehank, Bushy, and Eagles-
ham. Barrhead and Neilston, on Leven "Water, a tributary of the Cart, are
engaged in the cotton and linen trades. The alum works of Hurlet are near
the former, and both have collieries and iron mines. Johnstone and Kilbar-
chan, on the Black Cart, are dependencies of Paisley, with collieries in their
neighbourhood.
Port Glasgow was founded by the merchants of Glasgow, but since the
deepening of the river has much declined in importance, though still a bust-
ling port, with ship-yards and other manufactures. Greenock, its neighbour,
though only provided with a harbour in the beginning of the eighteenth
century, has become one of the great towns of Scotland, where the construc-
tion of iron steam- vessels is carried on to a great extent, besides which there
are sugar refineries, foundries, potteries, and jute and worsted factories. James
Watt, the improver of the steam-engine, was born at Greenock, and a marble
statue has been raised to his memory. Gourock, beautifully situated at the mouth
of the Clyde (which 'is defended by Fort Matilda), is much frequented as a
watering-place.
820
THE BRITISH ISLES.
Dumbartonshire includes a lowland tract along the north bank of the Clyde,
and a Highland region shut in between Loch Long and Loch Lomond, which rises
in Ben Vorlich, near the head of the lake, to a height of 3,091 feet. Descending
the Clyde below Glasgow, we pass Dunglass Point, where the Roman wall
terminated, and which is surmounted by the ruins of a castle, and an obelisk
erected in memory of Henry Bell, the introducer of steam navigation. A few
Fig. 156.— Greenock and Helensburgh.
Scale 1 : 100,000.
Fareshore. Depth 0 to 2|
Fathoms.
1 Mile.
miles below, at the mouth of the Leven, is the two-peaked basaltic rock of the
famous city of Dumbarton, the ancient capital of the kingdom of Strathclyde.
Dumbarton, owing to its commanding position, has ever played an important part
in military history. The Cumbrians called it Al-Cluyd, whilst the Scotch gave
it the name of Dun-Breton, and that name, slightly modified, it has retained to the
present day. It is the Balclutha of Ossian's poems. The castle which crowns the
DUMBARTONSHIRE.
321
Fig. 157.— Dumbarton.
Scale 1 : 25.000.
rock encloses remains of mediaBval structures, and even a few bits of Roman
masonry. In accordance with the treaty of union between England and Scotland,
this ancient residence of Robert
the Bruce, Mary Stuart,
Charles I., and Cromwell is
to be maintained for ever as a
place of defence, Dumbarton
engages extensively in the con-
struction of iron ships, besides
which it is a great resort of
tourists bent upon a visit to
the beautiful scenery of Loch
Lomond. The Leven, which
drains that lake, flows past
Balloch, Alexandria, Bonhill,
and Renton, all of which en-
gage in cotton bleaching and
dyeing, or have print works.
Luss, a village on the western
shore of Loch Lomond, has
slate quarries, and the fishing
village of Arrochnr, farther
north, marks the present
southern limit of Gaelic.
Cardross, below Dumbar-
ton, is noteworthy as the place
where Robert Bruce died.
Almost immediately after-
wards we reach Helensburgh, a
flourishing watering-place near
the mouth of Gare Loch, only
founded in 1777, opposite to
which rises the wooded emi-
nence of Roseneath, with a
mansion of the Duke of Argyll.
Kirkintilloch is the princi-
pal place in a detached portion
of the county, which adjoins
Lanarkshire in the north.
55-1 '^^mjm^^^.imm^Mrf^
W.of G.
4'-34
Collieries are in its neighbour-
hood.
Depth under
2 Fathoms
Over 2
Fathoms.
Half a Mile.
The basin of the Tweed, though far more extensive than that of the Clyde, and
not without tracts of fertile land, is nevertheless but sparsely peopled ; most of
its towns are mere villages, and only two amongst them have over 10,000 inhabitants.
822
THE BRITISH ISLES.
Peebles, which occupies the upper basin of the Tweed, its boundaries coinciding
nearly with those of the ancient district of Tweeddale, is for the most part
a wild pastoral region, sloping northward from the Hart Fell, but communi-
cating on the west, through the curious breach of Biggar, with the valley of the
Clyde. Peebles, the county town, is but a small place with some woollen trade.
Innerleithen^ a village at the confluence of Leithen Water with the Tweed, has
mineral springs.
Selkirk is traversed by the Tweed in the north, whilst the bulk of the shire
lies within Ettrickdale and Yarrowdale — the one drained by a •' water " thrown
off from Ettrick Pen (2,269 feet), the other by a stream descending from St.
Mary's Loch. Selkirk, the county town, has been famous for centuries for the
manufacture of single-soled shoes, and woollen-mills have lately been erected
Fig. 158.
-Galashiels and Melrose.
Scale 1 : 238.000.
1 Mile.
along the banks of the Ettrick. In the neighbouring dale of the Yarrow are the
ruins of " Newark's stately tower," and the farm of Foulshiels, where Mungo
Park was born.
Galashiels, near the confluence of the Gala with the Tweed, and on the borders
of Roxburghshire, is, with Hawick, the great manufacturing town of the valley of
the Tweed, and one of the principal seats of the woollen and hosiery trades, being
known more especially for its tartans and " tweeds."
Roxburgh extends southward from the Tweed to the Cheviot Hills, which
separate it from Northumberland, and reaches in the south-west beyond the
uplands connecting the Cheviots with the more central hills of the Lowlands
into the valley of the Liddel, which is tributary to the Tees, and through
it .to the Sol way Firth. The south-western part of the county forms the
district of Liddisdale, whilst the main portion, sinking down towards the Tweed,
BERWICKSHIRE.
323
is known as Teviotdale. Roxburgh, which derives its name from a royal castle
on the Lower Teviot, now in ruins, is largely engaged in the woollen and hosiery
trades. Crowds of visitors are annually attracted to it because of its association
with Sir Walter Scott, and of the numerous ruins of ecclesiastical buildings which
he has rendered famous. Abbotsford, the residence of the poet, stands on the
wooded bank of the Tweed, which there forms the western boundary of the
county. Melrose Abbey and Dryburgh Abbey, both jn ruins, are on the same
river, but lower down. Kelso, on the northern bank of the Tweed, and opposite
the mouth of the Teviot, occupies a site of singular beauty. It, too, has the
remains of a stately abbey, overtopping, even in its ruined condition, all the houses
around it.
Jedburgh, the county town, lies in the well-sheltered valley of the Jed, which
Fig. 159.— Hawigk.
Scale 1 : 90,000.
Q-50-
Q-^S'
iMUe.
is tributary to the Teviot, and whose mild climate ripens fruit which elsewhere
in Scotland does not attain to maturity. It is a place of great antiquity, but its
castle and turreted walls did not shield it from being repeatedly burnt and pillaged
by English invaders. The ruins of its abbey are imposing even in their decay.
Sir David Brewster and Mrs. Somerville were born at Jedburgh. *• Jethart
Justice " became proverbial during the border wars, when it was applied to
marauders who were hanged first and tried afterwards. Hawick is a thriving
manufacturing town on the Teviot.
Berwickshire is a maritime county to the north of the Tweed, which, in
addition to the fruitful plain of the Merse, and the valleys of the Lauder and
the Black and White Adder, includes the southern slopes of the Lammermuir
Hills and a small district along the cliff-bound coast.
324
THE BEITISH ISLES.
Berwick-on-Tweed having been severed from the county and attached to
England, there is not a single large town. At Coldstream, on the Tweed, General
Monk, in 1660, raised the regiment still called the Coldstream Guards. Earkton
and Lauder are villages in Lauderdale. Chernside, near the confluence of the
two Adders, is the birthplace of David Hume. Lunse, the largest town in the
county, though its population numbers less than 3,000 souls, is engaged in hand-
loom weaving ; whilst Greenlaw, on the Black Adder, though the county town, is
merely a small village with a fine county hall and gaol. Eyemouth, the only seaport
Fig. 160. — FiRTK OF FOKTH.
Scale 1 : 177,000.
2 Miles.
of the county, engages in the herring fishery. The coast to the north of it is
exceedingly wild. Two of its promontories are occupied by the lighthouse of
St. Abb's Head, and by Fast Castle, described as Wolfs Crag in the "Bride
of Lammermuir " The ravine of the Pease, or Peaths, descending to the coast,
is spanned by a singular bridge.
The three counties which lie along the southern coast of the Firth of Forth
have been carved out of the ancient district of Lothian, and are hence still
frequently described as East, Mid, and West Lothian.
Scale 1 : 290,000 . SovmdingS ni FaihojoiS
EDINBURGH At
HADDINGTON— EDINBURGH. 825
Haddington, or East Lothian, consists in the main of a fertile lowland, above
which rise a few detached groups of hills, and which is bounded on the south by
the Lammermuir Hills (1,732 feet). The Tyne Water crosses the lower part of
the county from west to east. The coast, with its bold cliffs interrupted by sandy
bays, is perilous. No part of Scotland surpasses this county in its agriculture.
Haddington, the county town, on the Tyne and at the foot of Gareton Hill, is one
of the principal grain markets in Scotland. Rape-seed cakes and bone manure are
manufactured. The fine old Gothic church, the ** lamp of Lothian " of other days
because of its beauty, is now in ruins. Gifford, the birthplace of John Knox, lies
to the south. Dunbar, near the mouth of the Tyne, with a harbour difficult of
access, is one of the principal seats of the herring fishery. Its dismantled castle,
on a jutting rock perpetually gnawed by the sea, is famous for its gallant defence
by "Black Agnes," the Countess of March. Two battles were fought near
Dunbar in 1296 and 1650, and in both the Scots were routed. North Berwick has
become the most fashionable watering-place on the east coast of Scotland, but
engages also in the herring fishery. Near it, on a bold clifi* half surrounded by
the sea, stands Tantallon Castle, and 2 miles from the shore rises Bass Rock,
covered with sea-fowl. In the western part of the county are Cockenzie, a fishing
village; Frestonpans, with a famous brewery, and noteworthy, moreover, on
account of the battle fought in its neighbourhood in 1745 ; and the market town
of Tranent, whose inhabitants engage in the manufacture of silk, and near which
are a few collieries.
The county of Edinburgh, or Mid-Lothian, extends southward from the
Forth on either side of the sterile Pentland Hills, which occupy its centre and
terminate only in Arthur's Seat and the Castle Hill of Edinburgh. The fertile
valley of the L^pper Esk separates the Pentland from the Moorfoot Hills, and
between these latter and the Lammermuir Hills, on the borders of Berwick, a pass
790 feet in height leads into the valley of the Gala, which is tributary to the
Tweed. The Water of Leith drains the western portion of the county, and the
river Almond forms the boundary towards East Lothian. Agriculture is carried
on with care and success, but the inhabitants possess also other resources in their
collieries, shipping trade, and various manufactures.
Edinburgh, the capital of Scotland, may certainly claim to take a place amongst
the beautiful cities of Europe. It possesses, above all, what most of the towns of
England are deficient in — originality. It is one of those rare places whose site
would become picturesque country if all the houses were to be suddenly swept
away. Edinburgh is unique in the natural beauty of its position, and the art
with which its inhabitants have availed themselves of the inequalities of the
ground in erecting their monuments and laying out their gardens. Moreover,
Hke Glasgow, it enjoys the advantage of being built of stone and marble, the
neighbouring quarries of Craigleith and Corstorphine having supplied the
material required by its builders. In poetical language Edinburgh is called
**Dunedin," while one of its vulgar epithets is "Auld Reekie.''
In the eastern part of the plain through which the Water of Leith takes its
326 THE BRITISH ISLES.
devious course there rises a rock of basalt, forming a bold scarp to the east
but sinking down gently towards the west. A picturesque castle of irregular
shape, and formed of groups of buildings erected in the course of ten centuries,
occupies the western brow of this rock, whilst at its foot rises the old palace of
Holyrood, with its crenellated towers and the ruins of its abbey. Between castle
and palace, on both slopes of the hill, the old town of Edinburgh has been built,
its houses rising, according to the nature of the ground, to a height of seven or
eight floors. This site, however, soon proved too small for the growing city,
which invaded the valley to the south of the castle, and climbed the slopes beyond.
Later still, during the second half of the eighteenth century, it overflowed the
narrow ravine to the north, and sumptuous dwellings arose upon a third hill,
which slopes gently down in the west and north in the direction of the Water of
Leith and the sea. Bridges joined the new quarters in the north and south to the
old town, whilst beautiful gardens, ornamented with statues, occupy the vacant
spaces and the ravine, formerly the abode of a pestilential swamp. Calton Hill,
already surrounded by houses, and Arthur's Seat (822 feet), both to the east, afibrd
excellent views of the city with its public buildings and gardens, of the fertile
country around it, its ports and jetties on the Firth of Forth, and of distant
mountains as far as Ben Lomond. At the present day unbroken avenues of houses
join Edinburgh to Leith, itg principal port, as well as to the minor ports of
Newhaven and Granton ; but there w^as a time when an uninhabited plain
separated it from the sea. This was a feature which it had in common with
Athens. The citizens of Edinburgh could therefore talk about their Piraeus and
Acropolis ; and indeed, looking to the many great men whom the capital of
Scotland has produced, no other town has equal claims upon the epithet of
" Athens of the North." Foremost amongst the famous children of Edinburgh
are Hume, Robertson, Dugald Stewart, Erskine, Napier (the inventor of logarithms),
Walter Scott, Brougham, Macaulay, Hugh Miller, and Nasmyth.
The ancient capital of a kingdom, Edinburgh still guards regalia in its castle,
and one of its buildings retains the name of Parliament House, although now
merely the seat of the High Courts of Judicature and the depository of the Advocates'
and Signet Libraries, supported by the advocates and writers to the Signet, but
thrown open, with commendable liberality, to the public at large. The Advocates'
Library is entitled to a copy of every book published in the United Kingdom, and
amongst other treasures bearing upon the history of Scotland, it contains the
precious collection of Gaelic manuscripts formed by the Highland Society in the
course of the inquiry instituted to determine the authenticity of Ossian's poems.
The Signet Library is rich in works relating to the history of England and
Ireland. Holyrood Palace possesses the remains of its abbatial church and a few
curious pictures, but historical associations attract the crowds who visit it more
especially to the apartments formerly occupied by Mary, Queen of Scots.
The most prominent public buildings of Edinburgh are consecrated to educa-
tion. The university, founded in 1582, is attended by 1,500 students, and
possesses a library of 160,000 volumes and valuable museums. The Museum of
EDINBURGH. 327
Science and Art, modelled upon that of South Kensington, but possessing in
addition a natural- history collection, adjoins it. The observatorj' on Calton
Hill, by the side of Nelson's unshapely monument and of an incomplete repro-
duction of the Parthenon, intended to commemorate the glories of Waterloo, is
a dependency of the university. There are a famous medical school, various
theological colleges, a veterinary college, a high school, Fettes College (richly
endowed), and many other schools in which a classical education, preparatory to
a university career, may be secured. On the " Mound," which connects the old
town with the new, rise two classical structures, namely, the Royal Institution,
with an antiquarian museum and a statue gallery, and the National Gallery of
Paintings. Statues and monuments are numerous in every part of the town^
most prominent being the Gothic canopy sheltering a seated statue of Sir Walter
Scott. Botanical and zoological gardens still further bear witness to the zeal
which animates the citizens in all that relates to education, and prove that they
are firmly resolved that their city shall deserve its epithet in the future as it
has earned it in the past. Nor is there any lack of charitable institutions.
The Royal Infirmary ; Heriot's Hospital for the Education of Fatherless Boys,
founded by James's " Jingling Geordie ; " and Donaldson's Hospital for Deaf and
Dumb are institutions of which any city might feel proud.
Edinburgh is not a manufacturing town, although in the matter of literary
publications of every kind it may fearlessly take its place by the side of London.
In no other town of Britain are the members of the liberal professions so numerous.
Unfortunately the number of proletarians is as great as in many a factory town,
and the narrow " closes " of the old town hide a population seething in vice, which
ever attends upon misery.
Leith, the maritime suburb of Edinburgh, is a seat of manufactories, where
we meet with foundries, engineering works, breweries, india-rubber and gutta-
percha works, foundries, glass houses, and rope-walks. The harbour, one of the
oldest in Scotland, is protected by two long piers, 3,530 and 3,123 feet in length,
and regular steam communication exists between it and Iceland, Denmark,
Germany, Holland, Belgium, France, and the coasts of England and Scotland.
Newhaven, a small fishing village, adjoins Leith, whilst Gr anion, though only a
mile to the west of it, is an independent port, connected by a steamboat ferry with
Burntisland, in Fife. Portohello, thus named by a sailor who had taken part in
the assault upon a town of the same name in America, has grown into favour as a
watering-place. Near it are the Joppa salt works.
Musselburgh, at the mouth of the Esk, spanned by three bridges, of which the
oldest is said to have been constructed by the Romans, who had a camp on
Inveresk Hill, has extensive links, affording the best golfing ground near Edin-
burgh. Pinkie House, an interesting mansion, near which the Earl of Hertford
defeated the Scots in 1547, and Carberry Hill, where, in 1567, Queen Mary
surrendered to her insurgent nobles, are in the neighbourhood. Dalkeith, a small
manufacturing town and busy grain market, with collieries near it, lies a few
miles up the river, at the confluence of the North and South Esk. Close to it
328 THE BRITISH ISLES.
are Dalkeith Palace, a seat of the Duke of Buccleuch, and Newbattle Abbey, the
residence of the Marquis of Lothian. Borthwick Castle, where Queen Mary
resided after her unfortunate marriage with Bothwell, lies to the south-east.
Full of interest are the banks of the North Esk, which flows along the eastern
foot of the Pentland Hills. Beyond the manufacturing village of Lassicade we pass
Ros/in, with the ruins of its beautiful Gothic chapel ; the moor on which the
Scots, led on by Corayn, scattered three English hosts '* beneath one summer
sun ; " and Hmvthornden, the seat of Drummond, the poet and friend of Shakspere
and Ben Jonson. Higher up still we pass through the romantic scenery
described in Allan Ramsay's pastoral poem, " The Gentle Shepherd," and finally
reach the small town of Pennycuick and its paper-mills.
Far less interesting is the region to the south-west of Edinburgh. The only
villages there are Mid-Calder, on Almond Water, and West Calder, still higher up
in the hills, where oil is distilled from shale.
The county of Linlithgow, or West Lothian, is a hilly tract of country, for
the most part of great fertility, and rich in iron and coal, which stretches from
the Firth of Forth into the valley of the Clyde. Linlithgow, the county town,
seated on a little /m, or lake, was anciently the Versailles of the Kings of
Scotland, and in its royal palace, burnt down in 1746, Mary Stuart was born.
Borrowstounness, or JBo'ness, to the north of Linlithgow, on the Firth of Forth, is
a shipping port and colliery town, and its galleries extend beneath the Firth
until they nearly meet those driven from the coast opposite. Towards the close
of last century the owner of these mines, the Earl of Kincardine, had a circular
quay constructed in the middle of the Firth, from which a shaft gave direct access
to the mine. This curiosity existed for many years, until an exceptionally high
tide washed over it, flooded the mine, and drowned the miners that were in it.
Up to 1775 all miners and salt-makers of Lothian were serfs, attached to the soil,
and sold with it. Their definitive liberation only took place in 1795, and there
still live old men in Scotland who were born slaves.* Travellers described these
miners as reduced by misery to the level of beasts ; but their descendants have
much improved in appearance, and no longer attract attention by their gauntness
and hollow eyes.
Queensferry, at the narrowest part of the Firth, will, in the course of a few
years, be joined to North Queensferry by one of the most stupendous suspension
bridges ever constructed. The roadway of this bridge will lie 150 feet above high
water, and its chains will be supported upon eight towers, of which those on the
island of Inchgarvie, in the middle of the Firth, will rise to the extraordinary height
of 596 feet. The spans on either side of the island will be 1,600 feet in width.
Bathgate is the principal town in the interior of the county. It has an oil-
shale distillery, and depends largely upon its trade in corn and cattle, and the
neighbouring collieries. Near it are Armadale, Crofthead, and Torphichen, the
latter with the ruins of a preceptory of the Knights of St. John.
* Hugh Miller, " Edinburgh and its Neighbourhood ; " Lord Rosebery, at the Social Science
Congress, Glasgow, 1874.
STIELINGSHIRE— CLACKMANNAN. 329
Stirlingshire lies along the south of the Forth, which is bordered from
its estuary up to Flanders Moss by a tract of alluvial land, formerly subject to be
flooded. The upper portion of the county is shut in between Loch Lomond and the
Upper Forth. It forms part of the Highlands, and rises in Ben Lomond to a
height of 3,192 feet. The centre of the Lowland portion is traversed by ridges of
igneous rock forming the Lennox Hills and Campsie Fells (1,894 feet). On the
north these hills are bounded by a strip of old red sandstone, whilst on the south
they border upon carboniferous limestone and coal measures.
Falkirk, the principal town in the eastern part of the county, lies on the
margin of the alluvial plain, not far from the Carron. It is the centre of a rich
agricultural district, with important cattle fairs, and its vicinity is lit up at night
by the fires of numerous iron works, most important amongst which are the
Carron Works, 2 miles to the north. Falkirk was formerly of great strategical
importance, for through it led the highway which armies desirous of passing
round the head of the Firth of Forth were obliged to follow. IS'umerous battles
have been fought in its vicinity. In 1258 Edward I. inflicted a defeat upon the
Scotch ; in 1746 the Pretender routed the English army. Grangemouth, at the
mouth of the Carron and of the Forth and Clyde Canal, though only founded in
1777, has become a place of considerable commerce. It is an eastern outport of
Glasgow. Higher up on the Carron are Kinnaird, the birthplace of Bruce, the
traveller, and Denny, a small manufacturing town. Crossing the water-parting, we
enter the basin of Kelvin Water, a tributary of the Clyde. Near its northern
bank, and in the vicinity of Graham's Dyke, or Antoninus's Wall, are the small
towns of Kilsyth, Lennoxtoivn, and Milngavie, which have bleaching grounds and
print works, and lie within the manufacturing district of which Glasgow is the
centre.
Stirling, the county town, occupies a site admirably adapted for the defence
of the passage of the Forth, whose valley is here confined between two steep
rocks. Stirling Castle, which still commands the town, is associated with many
events in the history of Scotland. A colossal statue of Robert the Bruce has been
raised within its precincts, whilst the rock on the opposite side of the valley is
crowned with a tower commemorating the first victory secured by Wallace in
1297. The view from the battlements of the castle is unsurpassed for beauty in
Scotland, and extends from the summits of the Grampians along the Links of the
Forth to the head of its Firth. Several of the old mansions in the town remind
us of similar buildings in Eouen, and prove the prevalence of French taste
during the sixteenth century. South of Stirling are St. Ninian's, inhabited by
nail-makers, and Bannockhurn, which manufactures tartans. It w^as near these
villages that Robert the Bruce defeated the English in 1314. Bridge of Allan,
2 miles to the north of Stirling, is much frequented for the sake of its mineral
springs and its delightful neighbourhood. Kipjjen, a village on the Forth,
11 miles above Stirling, is noted for its whiskey.
The small county of Clackmannan stretches from the Ochill Hills (Ben
Cleuch, 2,352 feet) to the alluvial plain bordering upon the Firth of Forth, and
118— E
830
THE BEITISH ISLES.
is traversed by the Northern and Southern Devon rivers. The former of these rivers,
not far from the Rumbling Bridge, forms the falls of " Caldron Linn." It is
rich in coal and iron, and its inhabitants are employed in mining, in the
manufacture of woollen stuffs, and in other branches of industry. Alloa, its
largest town, lies near the head of the Firth. Its manufactures are of importance.
They include plaids and shawls, steam-engines, ships, snuff, whiskey, and ale.
Fig. 161. — The Narrows op Queensferry.
Scale 1 : 70.000.
0to5
Fathoms
Over 28
Fathoms.
1 MUe.
Dollar, with Castle Campbell, the old stronghold of the Argylls ; Tillicoultry ; and
Alva (the latter in an outlying part of Stirlingshire), with disused silver
mines, are small manufacturing towns in the valley of the Northern Devon, and
at the foot of the Ochills. Clackmannan, the county town, is a mere village on
the Southern Devon.
Kinross is a small inland county, shut in between the Ochill Hills and the
basaltic Lomond Hills (1,713 feet), with its centre occupied by a beautiful sheet
FIFE.
331
of water, Loch Leven, on one of the islands in which stands Lochleven Castle, in
which Mary Stuart was imprisoned in 1567. The lake is famous for its fish.
Kinross, the county town, stands on the margin of the lake, and has manufactures
of linen and woollen. Milnathort, a flourishing village near it, is noteworthy as
possessing the oldest public library in Scotland,
Fife consists of the peninsula which juts out towards the North Sea, between
the Firths of Tay and Forth, and terminates in Fife Ness. The northern portion
of this peninsula is traversed by an eastern continuation of the Ochill Hills, com-
posed of igneous rock. The fertile valley of the river Eden, or the Howe of Fife,
separates this part of the county from its southern and larger portion, almost
wholly covered by carboniferous rocks, capped here and there with sheets of
basalt, tuff", and volcanic agglomerate. There is much fertile land, and extensive
tracts have been planted with trees. Coal and iron mining, the manufacture of
Unen, and the fisheries are of importance.
Dunfermline, on the steep bank of the Lyn Water, has ruins of a royal palace
and of an abbey, and is the principal seat of the linen manufacture. Coal mines and
iron works (including those of Oakley) are in its neighbourhood. The whole of
the coast of the Firth of Forth is studded with fishing villages and towns.
Inrerkeithing and North Queensferry are close to the northern end of the tremendous
railway bridge now being constructed over the Forth. Lower down are Dalgetty,
with salt works and collieries; Aherdour ; Burntisland, »with. an excellent
harbour ; Kinghorn ; and Kirkcaldy, the birthplace of Adam Smith. Kirkcaldy is a
place of considerable importance, with rope-walks, flax-mills, and a good local
trade. East of it are Dysart, where coal is shipped ; Wetnys and Buckhaven, two
fishing villages ; and Leven, at the mouth of the river of the same name, which
flows down from Loch Leven. On the banks of that river are Markinch, with
collieries, flax, and cotton mills, and Leslie, with flax and bleaching works.
LochgeUy lies in a tributary valley near a small lake. Once more returning to
the coast, we pass the fishing villages of Largo, Earlsferry, Pittenweem, and Anstru-
ther, and doubling Fife Ness, find ourselves ofi" the perilous port of the famous
old city of St. Andrews, which was of great commercial activity formerly, but now
deserted for places more favourably situated. There are the ruins of a cathedral
wrecked by the Calvinists, and near it the tower of a chapel founded by St. Regulus,
as also the remains of a castle overhanging the sea. The university, founded in
1411, is the oldest in Scotland, and, with its residential colleges, is more like
Oxford and Cambridge than are the other universities of the country. Foremost
amongst the other scholastic establishments of the town is Madras College, founded
in 1833 by Dr. Andrew Bell for the purpose of practically testing the monitorial
system of education invented by him. The salubrious air, no less than the educa-
tional advantages of St. Andrews, has attracted many well-to-do residents.
The river Eden enters the sea to the north of St. Andrews, and in the centre
of its fertile valley stands Cupar, the county town, with many curious old build-
ings and various industries. Pipe-clay is found in the vicinity, and manufactured
into pipes. Higher up the Eden are the small market towns of Auchtermuchty and
332 THE BRITISH ISLES.
FaMand, with the " palace " in which the eldest son of Robert III. died of
starvation.
Ferry port-on- Craig occupies a commanding position at the mouth of the Tay,
opposite Broughty. Newport and Balmerino are villages on the Tay, between which
stood the bridge, destroyed in December, 1879. Neichurgh, higher up, on the
border of Perthshire, beautifully situated, carries on a considerable trade in corn
and coals. Near it are the ruins of the abbey of Lindores.
CHAPTER XIY.
NORTHERN SCOTLAND.
(The Counties of Perth, Forfar, Kincardine, Aberdeen, Banff, Elgin, Nairn, Inverness, Ross
AND Cromarty, Sutherland, Caithness, Orkney, Shetland, and Argyll.)
' GrENEKAL Features.
HIS is a portion of the British Islands which, compared with England
and Southern Scotland, is but thinly populated. In its great geo-
graphical features, its relief, contours, and coast-line, it resembles
Scandinavia rather than any other part of Great Britain. If
the sea once more flooded the broad plain stretching from the
Forth to the Clyde, its character of insularity would hardly become more apparent
than it is now. Upper Caledonia is, in fact, a large island, with smaller islands
for its satellites.
Far more elevated in the mean than England, nearly the whole of it is
occupied by mountains ; and these mountains form ranges, which extend almost
without an exception from the south-west to the north-east. In the south this
Highland region is bounded by the Strathmore, or " Great Yalley," through which
the plain of the Forth is extended north-eastward towards Montrose and Stone-
haven. The valleys of the Dee, Doveran, Spey, Findhorn, and Nairn run parallel
with that plain towards the German Ocean, and the remarkable fissure of
Glenmore, which connects Loch Eil with the Inverness Firth, extends in the
same direction. There are few fissures in Europe which in rigidity of contour can
compare with this ''Great Glen" of Scotland, which, 100 miles in length, joins
the Atlantic to the German Ocean. If the Dee were to rise but 100 feet, the
northern extremity of Scotland would be separated from the remainder of the
Highlands, and the chain of lakes and rivers now occupying the glen converted
into a narrow strait of the sea of uniform width. The ocean would then follow
the path apparently traced for it in the Caledonian Canal. The execution of that
work was greatly facilitated by the existence of the river Ness, which falls into
Inverness Firth, and Loch Ness, which occupies the centre of the isthmus. All the
engineers had to do was to excavate a canal 22 miles in length, and to furnish it
334
THE BEITISH ISLES.
with lochs and Neptune's ladders. Loch Ness, which occupies the centre of
Glenmore, is one of the most remarkable lakes for depth and regularity of contour •
for a length of some 20 miles it has a width of 4,600 feet ; the scarps which bound
it rise to a height of 1,300 feet ; and its depth is 790 feet. In the seas near the
neighbouring coast there are but few localities which exceed this depth.
In that part of Scotland which lies to the north of the Caledonian Canal there
exists another depression analogous to that of Glenmore, but far less regular in
Fig. 162. — Glenmore.
Scale 1 : 1,540,000.
its contour, and not yet completely scooped out towards the north-west. It is
almost wholly occupied by Loch Shin, and by the river which drains that lake
into Dornoch Firth. Its direction is almost at right angles to the mountains,
which here, as they do farther south, extend towards the north-east, with the
Orkneys and Shetland Islands lying in the prolongation of their axis. The sub-
NORTHERN SCOTLAND.
335
marine range which forms the Hebrides follows the same direction, as do also the
Lofoten, on the coast of Norway, and the plateau of Scandinavia.
As a whole the mountains of Northern Scotland are known under the designa-
tion of Grampians — thus named after a Mount Graupus, mentioned by Latin writers,
but misspelt by their copyists. These mountains consist of a large number of
groups and chains, separated by narrow glens or valleys occupied bv lakes.
Immediately to the north of the estuary of the Clyde rise the Southern Grampians,
whose summits, Ben Lomond (3,192 feet), Ben More (^'^,281 feet), and Ben Lawers
(3,984 feet), are most frequently the goal of tourists, owing to their vicinity to
large towns. Farther north rises the almost insulated mass of Ben Cruachan
Fig. 163.— Ben Nevis.
Scale 1 : 200,000
W.ofGr,
2 Miles.
(3,670 feet), by the side of Loch Awe ; and farther away still, beyond Loch Leven,
one of the ramifications of the Firth of Lorn, there looms in front of us the
highest summit of the British Isles, Ben Nevis (4,406 feet). Its aspect is all the
more imposing as its foot is washed in two lochs, and we are enabled at a glance to
embrace it in its entirety, from the sands and meadows at its foot to the snow which
generally caps its summit. Ben Nevis, the "rock which touches the heavens,"
forms the western pillar of the Grampians proper, wbich terminate to the south of
Aberdeen, after having thrown off the spur of Cairngorm towards the north-east.
At the point of separation rises Ben Muich Dhui, or Mac Dhui (4,296 feet),
the second highest mountain of Great Britain. The Grampians are the back-
336 THE BRITISH ISLES.
bone of all Scotland. Protuberances of granite rising into domes above tbe
Silurian strata abound in tbem, and extend eastward to the German Ocean, whose
waves wash the foot of the granitic promontory of Buchan Ness.
The mountains which rise beyond the deep and narrow Glenmore are known as
the Northern Highlands. Ben Attow (4,000 feet), their culminating summit, is
inferior in height to Ben Nevis, but they do not yield to the Grampians in wildness
of aspect. Even in the Alps we meet few sites so severely melancholy as are the
Highland glens of Ross and Sutherland. In the Alps we have at least the bright
verdure of the meadows, and at an inferior elevation dark pine woods ; but most of
the Scotch mountains are covered with sombre-coloured greyish heather and
peat ; black mountain streams run down the narrow glens ; and the mists, creeping
along the mountain sides, alternately hide and reveal the crests of the rocks, which,
suddenly seen through the vapour, loom forth like phantoms, only to sink back
again into nothingness. The very solitude has something formidable about it.
The earth appears to be void of life. From every summit the eye embraces sheets
of water winding between avenues of rocks, against the foot of which we can
even occasionally hear the waves beating. From some of the promontories we
look down a sheer precipice of 300 feet upon the foaming waves lashing their foot.
Cape Wrath, which forms the north-western angle of Scotland, is one of those
superb headlands invariably surrounded by the foam of the sea. Duncansby
Head, the other angle of the peninsula, is less abrupt ; but near it, in the midst of
the waves, a few isolated rocks rise like obelisks.
Leipoldt estimates the mean height of Scotland, including the Lowlands, at
1,250 feet, and probably this is not excessive, for the plains are few, and those in
the north are of small extent.* Excepting Strathmore, the north-eastern extension
of the plain of the Forth, the only level parts of Northern Scotland capable of
cultivation are to be found on both sides of Moray Firth and in the peninsula of
Caithness, to the north-east. These plains belong to a geological formation different
from that of the Grampians, for they are composed of old red sandstone. But though
cultivable plains are limited in extent, there exist vast stretches of undulating
moorland, gradually rising to heights of many hundred feet, and through which
we may wander for miles without meeting with a tree or human habitation.
Formerly nearly all the Highland valleys were covered with forests, which extended
also up the mountain sides, and several etymologists are of opinion that Caledonia
simply means "forest." Near Balmoral, in the upper valley of the Dee, the
trunks of pines have been dug up from the peat at an elevation of 2,460 feet above
the sea-level. There now survive only miserable remnants of these ancient woods,
for since the Middle Ages all the old forests have been either cut down or burnt,
on account of their harbouring wolves, boars, and outlaws. On the conclusion of
the Highland wars, as many as 24,000 woodmen were employed at a time
in destroying the forests, f Nearly all the trees now in the valleys have been
* According to a careful computation made at the Ordnance Survey Office, the mean height of Perth
and Clackmannan is 1,144 feet ; that of Banflfshire, 965 feet ; and that of Aberdeen, 875 feet.
T John Wilson; Keltie, " History of the Scottish Highlands."
NORTHERN SCOTLAND. 837
planted recently. Here and there, in the vicinity of the sumptuous mansions
of the owners of the land, the ancient forests have been partly replanted, but away
from them the eye meets nought but heather, peat, and naked rocks.
No Scottish mountain pierces the line of perennial snow ; but occasionally
in hollows which the sun's rays penetrate but for a few hours in summer, the
snow remains diiring the whole of the year. The precipitation, which exceeds
6 feet on the higher summits of the Grampians, descends in the shape of snow
during a considerable portion of the year, and the winds pile up this snow in the
valleys in masses too considerable to melt away very quickly. The superabundant
moisture, which is not carried off by torrents or ** waters " to the sea, is then sucked
up by the mosses which cover the sides of the valley, or fills the lochs which
occupy their bottom. Several of these water-laden peat mosses extend down the
opposite slopes of a plateau, and give birth to rivulets flowing in contrary direc-
tions. In countries formed of solid rocks such bifurcations are rare ; but they occur
frequently in regions like Scotland, where the rocks are covered with a thick
layer of peat saturated with water. The numerous breaches in the mountain
ranges account for this anastomosis between river basins. One of the most
remarkable of these transverse breaches is occupied by Loch Errocht, lying imme-
diately to the east of Ben Alder, a mountain over 3,000 feet in height.
We have seen that the general direction of the mountain ranges, valleys, and
rivers of Scotland is from the south-west to the north-east ; but besides this, on a
closer examination of the surface of the land, we find that the rocks are scored in
parallel lines of remarkable regularity. It almost looks as if the whole country
had been carded like the fleece of a sheep. All the hills at the foot of the High-
lands and in the Lowlands have been planed to their very summits, and to this
planing must be ascribed their rounded form and smooth contours.* What
other agency can thus have changed the appearance of the mountains, if not that of
the glaciers which formerly covered the whole of the country, and whose drift
deposits and terminal moraines may still be traced in every valley descending
from the Grampians ? During the great ice age huge rivers of ice flowed down from
the mountains of Scotland. Passing over the hills, they cut away all inequalities
of the ground,' and spread the debris over the plains : reaching the sea, they
sent adrift floating icebergs. According to whether a glacier was more or less
formidable, it deposited its terminal moraine at a more or less considerable distance
from its head, forming either banks and groups of islands in the arms of the sea,
or barriers across the valley. There is not a glen or a strath in all Scotland whose
streams were not arrested by one of these moraines, and pent up so as to form a
lake, whose level gradually rose until its waters were able to escape. These heaps
of glacial gravel, which lie across every river valley, and are sometimes concealed
beneath a bed of peat, whilst at others they form undulating hills covered with
verdure, are known as kaims. They are the eskers of Ireland, and the asar of
Sweden. The stiff clays of the glacial epoch are called ti/l in Scotland, and are
the boulder clay of English geologists.
* James Geikie, "The Great Ice A.ge."
338 THE BRITISH ISLES.
But the rocks detached by glacial action from the summits of the Grampians
were not all deposited at the foot of the glaciers. There was a time, during the
great ice age, when a large portion of Grreat Britain was submerged beneath the
waters of the Atlantic, and icebergs, cast off by the Scotch glaciers, carried rocks
and other debris to considerable distances. Only in this way can we explain the
presence of Scotch granite in the clay of "Wolverhampton and near Worcester, at
a distance of 170 and 200 miles from the mountains whence these erratic blocks
can have been derived.* The Hebrides, too, formerly much less elevated than
they now are, were planed by icebergs floating across the Minch.f But whilst
Caledonia sent its rock-laden icebergs to immense distances, it became in turn
the depository of erratic blocks detached from the mountains of Scandinavia.
In the county of Aberdeen, and in other parts of Scotland, Norwegian granite
occurs in immense quantities. At various places the glacial streams descending
from the Scotch and the Scandinavian mountains appear to have met, and
deflected each other. The glacial scorings on the rocks of Caithness, for instance, run
from the south-east to the north- west, instead of from south to north, in accordance
with the direction which the icebergs took when first they started upon their
pilgrimage. This deflection, however, is explained if we assume that they
encountered an easterly current laden with Scandinavian ice, and were consequently
drifted to the north-westward. Similar scorings, traceable to the agency of
Scandinavian ice, have been discovered on the rocks of the Orkneys, Shetland
Islands, and Faroer.+
Oscillations of the soil succeeded each other in Caledonia in the course of
geological periods. Near Grangemouth the bed of an ancient river has been
discovered at a depth of 260 feet beneath the Forth, and this proves that the
country must have subsided to that extent since this river flowed across it.§
So considerable and unequal have been the changes of level that boulders of
granite are found now at a height greater than that of the mountains from
which they were originally detached. The most recent phenomenon of this
nature is that of a gradual upheaval of the land. It is owing to this upheaval
that the share which the glaciers of Norway had in the formation of Scotland
has been revealed to us. Along all the coasts may be observed raised beaches
covered with marine shells, some as regular in their contours as if the sea had
only recently retired from them, others ravined by torrents, and here and there
covered with debris. At a height of 43 feet above the actual level of Loch
Lomond can be traced one of these ancient beaches, which must have been formed
when that loch was still an arm of the sea, and freely communicated with
the ocean. The erratic blocks stranded on the raised beaches of some parts of
the coast resemble rows of penguins perched on a projecting terrace. Along the
coasts of Aberdeen and Caithness these ancient beaches vary in height from
10 to 160 feet, and their elevation gradually diminishes as we proceed north-
* Mackintosh; Symonds, Quarterly Journal of the Geological Society, November, 1877.
t James Geikie, " History of a Boulder."
X James Croll, " Climate and Time."
§ James Geikie, " The Great Ice Age."
NORTHEEN SCOTLAND. 339
ward — a proof that the upheaval was unequal in amount, as is at present the case
in Scandinavia.* The question naturally arises, whether this evident upheaval
took place at the termination of the glacial epoch, or whether it continued during
the historical age, down, perhaps, to our own time. It is the opinion of geologists
that the principal upheaval occurred during an epoch in which the climate was
colder than it is now, for the shells discovered on the raised beaches belong in a
large measure to a more northern fauna than that of the neighbourino- seas.f
However this may be, the village of Kinlochewe, on the western slope of Ross, is
sometimes referred to in proof that the upheaval continued after man had taken
possession of the land. The Gaelic name of that village signifies "head of
Loch Ewe;" but the loch terminates 14 miles below the village, which stands
at the upper end of the land-locked Loch Maree. Hence, it is concluded, the
bottom which now separates Loch Maree from the sea, and through which runs
Fig. 164. — The Parallel Roads of Glenroy.
Scale 1 : 156,000.
2 Miles.
the emissary of the lake, can have appeared only after the village had been
founded by the Gaels. This feature accounts for the humorous saying, that the
Gaelic was spoken even before the birth of the lakes.
In the interior of Scotland there exist on the hillsides numerous lacustrine
beaches similar to those along the coast, and so wide and regular in the contour
as to be distinguishable even from a distance of several miles. The most famous
of these raised beaches are the *' parallel roads " of Glenroy. They occupy corre-
sponding elevations on both sides of a glen descending towards Glenmore. There
are three parallel and horizontal " roads " on either side, at elevations of
respectively 860, 1,070, and 1,150 feet. The natives account for the existence of
these roads by asserting that they were constructed by the kings of old. Their
* S. Laing, Nature, 1877-
t Smith, Memoirs of the Wernerian Society.
340
THE BEITISH ISLES.
Fig. 165.— The Firths of Western Scotland.
Scale 1 : 2,500,000.
origin formed a fertile source of discussion for years, when Agassiz, familiar with
the glacier phenomena of the Alps, paid a visit to Glenroy. He at once recognised
the ancient beaches of a lake of variable
height pent up by a glacier which lay
across the outlet of the valley.
The firths of AVestern Scotland, similar
in all respects to the fiords of Norway,
also remind us of the work accomplished
by glaciers. On looking at a map we
cannot help being struck by the contrasts
presented by the two coasts of Scotland.
The eastern coast is indented by a few
arms of the sea, but upon the whole it is re-
markable for the regularity of its contour.
Quite different is the western, Atlantic
coast, between Cape Wrath and the Firth
of Clyde. There the irregularities in
the contour are innumerable. Peninsulas,
curiously ramified, hang to the mainland
by narrow necks of sand. Large islands,
themselves indented and cut up into
fragments, add to the confusion ; and in
this labyrinth it is only after patient
observation that we are able to distinguish
between islands and mainland, lakes and
arms of the sea. The natives, indeed,
apply the same term indifferently to lakes
and firths, designating both as lochs,
and many a promontory is named by
them as if it were an island. Loch Etive
is one of the most remarkable of these
sheets of water, which are at the same
time arms of the sea and inland lakes. The
sea actually penetrates up that firth for a
distance of 18 miles ; but its bed consists
of two distinct basins, placed end to end,
and separated by a bar, hardly covered
with 6 feet of water. At Connel Sound,
which lies at the entrance of the lower
basin, the tides rush past with the noise
of a cataract. Loch Etive attains a depth of 445 feet, whilst the depth of the sea
outside hardly exceeds 150 feet. Loch Fleet, another of these firths, has been
converted into a fresh-water lake by means of a simple wall built across its mouth.*
* A. Geikie, "Scenery and Geology of Scotland."
W.oF G
25 Miles.
NORTHERN SCOTLAND.
341
Along many parts of the coast the water in the lochs resembles that of Loch
Stennis, in the Orkneys, which is briny at one end and fresh at the other ; and
like it they have two distinct faunas and floras.*
What, then, is the cause of the contrast between the two coasts of Scotland, a
contrast which may also be observed with regard to the Baltic and Atlantic coasts
of Scandinavia? Why have the ancient gulfs opening out upon the German
Ocean been filled up with alluvium and drift, whilst the innumerable indenta-
tions on the west have retained their primitive form^ ? It is once more the
glaciers to which this phenomenon must be attributed. In the glacial age, as in
our own days, the moisture-laden winds came from the west and south-west, and
precipitation, mostly in the form of snow, was consequently most considerable along
the western slopes. But they were not torrents which carried the waters back into
Fig. 166.— Loch Etive.
Scale 1 . 250,000.
'n. '*f ^7.~ir^<^:'y r TFX^-^?zr^s?
Wof G
5-20-
5°IC'
the sea ; they were glaciers. On the eastern slope the smaller amount of precipita-
tion only sufficed to maintain small glaciers, which never descended beneath the
upper valleys, and gave birth to rivers winding through the plain. The contrast
in the hydrographical features of the two slopes could not have been greater.
Along the eastern coast the sea threw up ridges of sand at the mouths of the gulfs,
in which the rivers deposited their alluvium, gradually filling them up, and
obliterating the original irregularities in the outline of the coast. On the west, on
the other hand, the enormous rivers of ice occupied the valleys through which
they took their course, and, instead of filling them up with alluvium, they scooped
them out still deeper. Every river of ice and every affluent which discharged
itself into it, from the right or left, thus shielded the inequalities in the ground
from obliteration ; and when the climate grew milder, and the glaciers melted
* Hugh Miller, "Footprints of the Creator."
342
THE BEITISH ISLES.
Fig. 167.
-LoGH Tarbekt and the Cuinan
Canal.
Scale 1 : 500,000.
''■}J^
away, the beds whicli they had occupied appeared as firths. The moraines, which
they had deposited beyond the old line of coast, only rendered more intricate
the labyrinth of straits. Owing to the enormous masses of ice which formerly
filled them, the depth of several of these firths is very considerable, and far in
excess of any to be met with in the North Sea, to the west of the abyssal
" deep " of the Skager Rack. Loch Broom, between the counties of Ross and
Cromarty, has a depth of 723 feet at its entrance ; Sleat Sound, between Skye and
the mainland, is 820 feet deep ; and the Sound of Mull 720 feet.
Nevertheless the agencies ceaselessly at
work must in the end succeed in filling
up even the firths of Western Scotland, as
of all temperate regions. As an instance
may be cited Holy Loch, opposite to the
mouth of the Clyde, the larger portion of
which has already been invaded by alluvium.
Elsewhere the sea lochs have been cut asun-
der through the agency of lateral torrents,
and their upper basin has gradually been
converted into a fresh-water lake, which
is slowly growing smaller. Not only are
the rivers busy in filling up these arms of
the sea, but the latter likewise throws the
waste of the land upon the shore. We find
that the depth of a loch is always greatest
on that side most exposed to violent winds,
whilst banks of sand are deposited in the
less agitated water.* These alluvial deposits,
whether of fluvial or marine origin, and
perhaps aided by a slow upheaval of the
whole land, have already converted several
islands along the coast into peninsulas. The
peninsula of Morven, for instance, on the
western side of Loch Linnhe, is, in reality,
an insular mass like its neighbour Mull. The
elongated peninsula of Kintyre, whose Gaelic name ( Cean tire) means Land's End,
or Finisterre, may also be looked upon as an island, for the neck which attaches
it to the mainland is no more than 60 feet in height. This neck of land is traversed
by the Crinan Canal, 9 miles in length, which is in reality a southern dependency
of the Caledonian Canal, and enables vessels drawing 10 feet of water to proceed
from the North Sea to the Clyde and Ireland without circumnavigating the
northern extremity of Scotland. A similar canal through Kintyre has been
projected farther south, where the two Lochs Tarbert approach within three-
quarters of a mile of each other.
* Oleghorn, " Observations on the Water of Wick," Journal of the Royal Geographical Society.
W.f G 5-
Depth 0 to 28
Pathoms.
28 to 55
Fathoms.
55 to 110
Fathoms.
- 2 Miles,
Over 110
Fathoms.
NORTHERN SCOTLAND.
843
If we include mere rocks, the islands dependent upon Scotland must be
numbered by thousands ; but official statistics only mention 788 islands of
which 186 were inhabited in 1871, or 4 less than ten years before. The
archipelago, properly to be described by such a name, which lies nearest to
the Scotch coast, is that formed by the Orkneys, or "Seal Islands," as their
Icelandic name has been rendered.* The distance between Duncansby Head
and South Eonaldsha, the southernmost of the group, hardly exceeds 6 miles.
Pentland Firth, as the separating channel is called, is dreaded for its currents
produced by conflicting tides. Off Stroma boils the whirlpool of Swelkie,
Fig. 168.— Holy Loch, and the silted-up Loch of Eachaig.
Scale 1 : 100,000.
1 MUe.
which a song of the ancient Eddas describes as a mill ever at work to grind the
salt of the ocean. During spring tides the current rushes along here with a
velocity of ten knots an hour; and in a tempest which raged in December,
1862, the waves, dashing against Stroma, threw up stones and fragments of broken
vessels to a height of 200 feet. The strait was no longer wide enough for the passage
of the Atlantic waters, and the sea advanced like a wall. Even in ordinary times the
* Richard Burton, " Ultima Thule." Others translate, " Islands of the Point " (Thomas, " North
Sea Pilot").
344
THE BEITISH ISLES.
waves are dashed over the northern cliffs of the island, and give birth to a briny-
stream flowing southwards, on the banks of which the natives have erected a
mill.*
Twenty-seven of the Orkneys are permanently inhabited, and about forty
smaller islands afibrd pasturage for sheep. In their contour these islands present
all the features of the coast of Western Scotland, and from the sea the archipelago
assumes the appearance of a single island bristling with bold headlands and
peninsulas. The islands, however, are formed of old red sandstone, and their
elevation is but trifling, Ward Hill, of Hoy, their culminating point, only
Fig. 169.— The Orkneys.
Scale 1 : 850,000.
28 to 55
Fathoms,
O per .55
Fathoms
10 MUes.
attaining a height of 1,555 feet. Close to the shore of that island rises the Old
Man of Hoy, an insulated pillar 300 feet high, with arches below. The Main-
land, or Pomona, t is far less elevated than Hoy. Most of the Orkneys are
covered by natural meadows, and the peat bogs are of small extent. One ot
the ancient Scandinavian Earls of Orkney actually received the surname of Tort
Einar, or " Turf-cutter," because he regularly visited tbe neighbouring mainland,
where he procured bis turf, or peat. The old lords of these islands likewise
* Peach ; Geikie, " Scenery and Geology of Scotland."
t A Scandinavian name, and not Latin : its meaning is unknown.
NOETHEEN SCOTLAND. 345
visited Scotland when desirous of hunting, for there only existed forests harbour-
ing wild beasts. The Orkneys are now inhabited by peaceable agriculturists and
fishermen, but during the early Middle Ages they were of great strategical
importance. They then afforded shelter to the fleets of the Norwegian vikings,
who thence threatened equally the western and eastern coasts of Great Britain.
During summer every part of the British Islands lay open to their attack, whilst
in winter they shut themselves up in their fortresses, and kept high festival with
barbaric splendour.
The Shetland Islands (Zetland or Hjaltland) lie in the same axis as the
Orkneys, from which they are separated by a channel 48 miles across. In the
centre of this strait lies Fair Island, otherwise Faroe, the '' Island of Sheep," a
scarped mass of rock rising to a height of 706 feet. Upon this desolate island
was cast, in 1588, the flag-ship of the Spanish Armada, and the natives are hence
supposed to have Castilian blood in their veins. Many amongst them, finding
their island too small for their support, have sought a new home in Canada.
There are few cliffs in the world superior in wild grandeur and steepness to
those of Northern Shetland. When circumnavigating the Mainland, cape
rises beyond cape from above the deep sea, which has worn caverns into the foot
of the cliffs. One of these caverns, or helyers, is known as the '' Orkney man's
Harbour," on account of its having once afforded shelter to an Orkney fisherman
pursued by a French privateer. Although the mean height of Shetland is greater
than that of the Orkneys, there is no summit equal to Ward Hill, of Hoy.
Roeness Hill, a granitic dome on the northern peninsula of the Mainland, only
rises 1,476 feet.
The archipelago, since 1766 the property of the Earl of Zetland, consists
of more than 100 islands, of which 34 are inhabited, the others being mere
stacks, or pillars of rock ; skerries, or foam- washed reefs ; and holms, or
small islands, affording pasturage to the spirited Shetland ponies and to dimi-
nutive cattle, lately crossed with English shorthorns.* For the most part the
soil of the islands consists of heathy wastes, and there exists only one tree, about
10 feet high, which is looked upon as a great curiosity. The remains of birch
forests have, however, been discovered in the peat bogs.
Secure harbours are numerous between these islands, and the depth of the
sea, even within a short distance of the land, generally exceeds 30 fathoms. But
this very depth often proves a source of danger to the mariner, as the islands are
frequently enveloped in dense fogs, and an appeal to the sounding-lead affords
no information as to the proximity of land. Often, too, powerful roosts, or
tidal currents, carry vessels out of their proposed course into the midst of cliffs.
Foul Island, or Foula, which lies in raid -ocean, 18 miles to the west of Mainland,
is more formidable of aspect than any other island of the Shetland group. The
small creek on its south-eastern coast is at all times dangerous of approach.
The Kaim, or culminating summit of the island, rises to a height of 1,370 feet, and
* John Wilson, " British Farming."
119— E
346
THE BEITISH ISLES.
its cliffs present sheer precipices of 1,000 feet. The bold men who visit this
rocky island in search of birds and birds' eggs cause themselves to be attached to
a rope, and lowered from the top of the cliffs.
The Shetland Islands as well as the Orkneys have frequently been identified
Fig. 170. — The Shetland Islands
Scale 1 : 401.00O.
W.of G.
Depth 0 to 55
Fathoms.
55tol10
Fathoms.
110 to 280
Fathoms.
5 MUes.
Over 280
Fathoms,
with the Ultima Thule of ancient writers, although there can be no doubt tbat the
Thule discovered by Pytheas of Marseilles, and placed by him under the Arctic
Circle, must have been Iceland. The Hebrides, which lie to the west of Scotland,
■I
lilii'
I3LE OF SKYE-THE KILT ROCK.
NORTHERN SCOTLAND.
347
were likewise looked upon, for a considerable period, as one of the most northern
countries in Europe. Yet, as we have already seen (ride p. 301), to the Scandi-
navians they were Southern Islands. The Scotch, however, know the Hebrides
as Western Islands, and two amongst them are still more emphatically known as
Uist, or "West." The ancients called these islands Rebudes, or Miide.s, wrongly
read Hebrides by a careless
copyist. Another ancient name ^^S- 171.— The Western Islands.
is that of Innis Gail; that is, scaiei : 2,225,000.
''Isles of the Gaels."
Several among these Western
Islands must be looked upon as
detached fragments of the main-
land, from which they became
separated through the formation
of a marine valley, and which
they resemble in geological struc-
ture, f It w^as thus that Skye
became an island. Its eastern
promontory projects far into
Loch Alsh, and Kyle Rhea, the
narrow strait which connects that
loch with the Sound of Sleat, is
scarcely 500 yards wide. The
mountains of Skye, rising in
Scuir-an-Gillean, one of the
Cuchullins, to a height of 3,220
feet, run in the same direction
as the mountains of Inverness.
But whilst Eastern Skye is mainly
formed of metamorphosed Silu-
rian rocks, its larger western
portion is overspread with basalt.
Skye is one of the most pic-
turesque islands of the Hebrides,
with serrated ridges, sheets of
lava, cup-shaped caldrons, silvery
cataracts and mountain lakes,
and spar caverns. One of the
most remarkable curiosities of the island is the Quiraing (1,000 feet), near its
northern cape. It consists of a turf-clad platform of basalt, standing like a table
amongst gigantic columns of rock, for the most part inaccessible.
The Western, or Outer Hebrides, are separated from the mainland and its
contiguous islands by the deep channel of the Minch, which sinks to a depth
of 150 fathoms. From their northern promontory, the Butt of Lewis, to Barra
Depth 0 to 28
Fathoms.
28 to 65
Fathoms.
55 to 110
Fathoms.
25 Miles.
Over 110
Fathoms.
348
THE BRITISH ISLES.
Head, on the small island of Bernera, the development of this chain of gneissic
islands is so regular that in the eyes of the inhabitants of Scotland there exists but
one Long Island. This island, however, is made up of hundreds of fragments —
islands, islets, rocks— most of which are inhabited, though the population is
numerous only on Lewis and Harris (which jointly form the northern and largest
island of the group), North Uist, South Uist, Benbecula, and Barra. Each of
these fragments of Long Island has its hills, its Ben More, or " Big Mountain,"
its lakes, peat bogs, lochs, and fishing ports. The traces of ancient glaciers are
Fig. 172. — Lochs of Southern Lewis.
Scale 1 : 275,000.
visible throughout, and several parts of Lewis have evidently been planed down
by them into a succession of ridges.*
Two submarine ridges lie outside the Western Hebrides, in the open Atlantic,
but they emerge only at two places, viz. in the Flannan Islands, or " Seven
Hunters," and in the miniature archipelago of Hirt, or Hirst, usually named
St. Kilda. The largest island of this group is still inhabited, notwithstanding its
remote situation, the small extent of its cultivable soil, and the difficulty of access.
This lonely island, 50 miles to the west of Lewis, is formed almost wholly of steep
* The culminating summits are— Bhein Mhor (Ben More), in Lewis Forest, 1,750 feet; Clesham,
in Harris, 2,662 feet : Ben More, of South Uist, 2,038 feet.
NORTHERN SCOTLAND.
349
cliffs, rising to a height of 1,220 feet, and access is possible only through a cleft in
the rocks.* Hirt is undoubtedly the most forsaken place in Europe, and its
inhabitants can but rarely see from their prison home the indistinct contours of
the nearest abode of man. St. Kilda, which vessels can approach only during the
three months of summer, is looked upon even by the inhabitants of the Hebrides
as an abode of misery, though, thanks to the tales of fishermen, what they state
respecting it is mixed up with much that is fabulous. ^ But the unanimous reports
of travellers, confirmed by the register of births and deaths, prove that the
nineteen families who inhabit the island are so largely influenced by the lonely life
they lead, that the arrival of a vessel with sailors and passengers suffices to
produce a general sickness, attended with cold in the head, amongst them.
Fig. 173.— St. Kilda.
Scale 1 : 750,000.
This "eight days' sickness," or "boat cough," is dangerous, more especially
in the case of the men, and when imported by a vessel coming from Harris, it
not unfrequently terminates fatally, t Similarly, on several islands of the Pacific,
a single stranger spreads around him an atmosphere of sickness. The handful
of people living on St. Kilda have to undergo a hard struggle for existence. The
children, before they can be considered safe, have to pass through a succession of fits
—caused, in the opinion of medical men, by the peculiar food administered to
them, for from the day of their birth they are made to swallow oil taken from
the stomach of a petrel mixed with port wine. Out of every nine children born,
* J. Sands, " Out of the World, or Life in St. Kilda."
f John Morgan, " Diseases of St. Kilda," British and Foreign Medical Review.
850
THE BEITISH ISLES.
five die in infancy ;* but the birth rate is unusually high, and the population has
not only not decreased since the middle of last century, but the island has even
dispatched a few emigrants to Australia. The Hebrides likewise differ from the
neighbouring mainland in their sanitary condition. It is asserted by medical
men that natives of the Hebrides are not subject to consumption unless they
quit their homes and imbibe the germs of the disease elsewhere. It is believed
Fig. 174. — Staffa: View taken fkom the top of a Cliff.
that this immunity is due to the acrid smoke of peat which they breathe in their
confined cabins.
Igneous rock occurs only at a single spot on the island of Lewis, t but is
abundant on the islands contiguous to the mainland. The finest columns of basalt
may be seen on the small Eigg Island, to the south of Rum. The " Scuir " of
Eigg (1,272 feet) presents on its sea face a row of columns 470 feet in height,
* Geo. Seton, " St. Kilda, Past and Present."
t For the geology of Scotland see Geikie's elaborate Map, published in 1876.
NORTHERN SCOTLAND.
351
and rising like a temple above a foundation of rock, in which are embedded the
petrified remains of a forest of pines. The sands at the foot of this Scuir
occasionally give forth a long-drawn musical sound when walked upon— a
phenomenon similar to what may be witnessed on some beaches of Pomerania, in
the desert of Atacama, and on the slopes of Mount Sinai.*
The large island of MulL, separated by the Sound of Mull and the Firth of
Lome from the mainland of Argyll, is almost wholly formed of volcanic rocks,
which occasionally rise in regular steps. Numerous rivulets, born in the interior
of the island, and fed by its plentiful moisture, hasten towards the sea, and form
foaming catai-acts on their onward course. Ben More (3,172 feet), the great
Fig. 175.— The ExTEraoR of Fingal's Cave.*
mountain of the island, as well as the principal summits along the Sound of
Mull, consists of trap ; but the south-western arm of the island terminates in
an enormous promontory of granite, the quarries on the face of which look like
mere scratches when seen from afar. On the western side of Mull lies the famous
island of Staffa, whose cave, discovered, as it were, by Sir Joseph Banks in 1772,
has been dedicated by the admirers of Ossian to Fingal. This cavern deservedly
ranks amongst the wonders of the world. The island rises to a height of about
150 feet. Its surface is covered with luxuriant grass, and on all sides it is
bounded by cliffs of columnar basalt. On turning round a cape we suddenly
* Hugh Miller, " Summer Rambles among the Hebrides."
352
THE BEITISH ISLES.
find ourselves in front of a " pillar'd vestibule " leading into a cavern, whose
fretted vault is supported by columns of basalt. When the sea is tranquil, the
billows, rolling over the lower pillars, urge their way up the receding sides of
this great temple. The murmuring, moaning noises produced by succeeding
suro-es in regular cadence account for the Gaelic name of the cave, which is
Llaimh Binse, or ''Cave of Music." But when the sea is lashed into fury the
gentle music becomes a terrible turmoil, and the compressed air, rushing from the
cave, produces a sound like thunder, which can be heard several miles off, on
the island of Mull.
The rocks of Dubh Artach form the south-western extremity of the archipelago,
of which Mull is the chief member. They, as well as the Skerryvore— or rather
Fig. 176. — The Head of Loch Fyne.
Scale 1 : 20.000.
Sgir More ; that is, " Great Eocks " — rising upon a submarine plateau stretching
away from the gneissic islands of Coll and Tiree, are pointed out from afar by a
lofty lighthouse. The Tower of Skerryvore is a rival to the famous lighthouses
of Eddystone and Bell Rock, and the difficulties over which its engineer, Alan
Stevenson, has triumphed were, perhaps, even greater than in the case of the
other two, as the power of the waves in these seas is sufficient to lift a block of
stone weighing 42 tons.
To the south of the Firth of Lome there extends another chain of islands,
formed, like the neighbouring coast, of Silurian rocks. This chain includes
NOETHEEN SCOTLAND. 353
Jura— or rather Diura ; that is, " Stag Island " *— and Islay, the one covered with
lofty mountains rising to a height of 2,566 feet, the other the most fertile and
best cultivated of the Hebrides, and rich in metals. The narrow " sound " which
separates these islands from the peninsula of Kintyre is navigable, but owing to
its swift tidal currents it is dangerous to small vessels. Two of these currents
meet between Jura and the small island of Scarba, producing a tide of double
height. The passage of this strait is attended with p^ril when the tide changes,
more especially if the wind blows in a direction contrary to its current and
towards the rocks. At such times no vessel would venture to approach this
fearful "race," which the Gaels very appropriately call Coirebhreacain, or
Corryvrekan ; that is, *' Caldron of the Sea." The velocity of the current is
variously estimated at 10 or 13 miles, f Of all the currents in the seas of Scotland
that of Coirebhreacain is most dreaded ; in its violence it is the equal of the more
famous maelstrom amongst the Norwegian Lofoten.
We already know something of the character of the climate of Northern
Scotland. Essentially maritime, even more so than that of Southern England,
it is also very damp and of surprising equability. The atmosphere is nearly
always saturated with moisture, at least on the western coast, where the clouds,
arrested by the high mountains, almost incessantly descend in rain or snow, the
latter, however, but rarely remaining long upon the ground. Rain falls at
all seasons of the year, destroying the rocks and swelling the mosses of the bogs.
Scotland is most emphatically a land of mists, through which the heroes of
Ossian loom like fleeting shadows. In the songs of the bards Skye is the
" Island of Clouds," Mull the " Island of Gloom," whilst the northern navigators
knew the sea around the Orkneys as the Libersee, or " Viscous Ocean." The
Gaels have five elements, for to fire, water, earth, and air they add mist.
The great contrast between the long nights of winter and the long days of
summer is compensated by its equability of temperature. Even in the Orkneys,
in the fifty-ninth degree of latitude, mariners may reckon in summer upon a
hundred successive days on which print may easily be read at midnight, whilst
in winter there occurs an equal number of very short days followed by a long
night, occasionally lit up by the aurora borealis. The winds are high, and storms
frequent ; but though the atmosphere be ever so much agitated, its temperature is
nearly always the same. The mean annual temperature in the Scotch islands
amounts to 45° Fahr., while that of winter is about 40° Fahr. The dark months
pass away without frost ; but the summers have no heat, and the year, as a whole,
is, so to speak, of a neutral complexion. + Several southern plants requiring only
moisture and mild winters flourish in Scotland, and on the margins of the lakes
of Sutherland fuchsias grow in the open air. But in the Orkneys the heat
of summer is not sufiicient for most of our vegetables; trees do not grow
spontaneously ; and even the service-tree and ash succeed only under careful shelter
of walls. But though the surface of the islands be barren and naked, the sea
* MacCulloch, " A Description of the Western Islands of Scotland."
t Athenmwn, 26th August, 1864.
X Charles Martins ; Gast. de Saporta, Revue des Deux-Mondes, July 1st, 1871.
354 THE BEITISH ISLES.
which surrounds them abounds in animal and vegetable life. The margins of
beaches and rocks are covered with fucus, harbouring a multitude of molluscs and
other animals, for the most part of a boreal type ; several kinds of seaweed, such
as Rodomenia palmata and Iridma cduHs, form part, under the name of *' dulse," of
the alimentary resources of the country. Loch Fyne, one of the ramifications of the
Firth of Clyde, is famous for its herring fisheries, whilst nearly every river yields
salmon. Several varieties of this fish are of American origin. Pearls likewise are
fished up from the Scottish rivers, and have become fashionable. Altogether the
produce of the fisheries amounts to at least £5,000,000 sterling per annum.
The marine fauna of the Shetland Islands is Norwegian rather than British.
The same fish are caught there as near the Norwegian Lofoten. When, in the
seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, Maassluis and Vlaardingen had attained the
height of their prosperity, the sounds of Shetland were annually frequented by 800,
1,000, 1,500, or even more Dutch " busses " of 80 tons each, and escorted by twenty
men-of-war. This Dutch fishing fleet met in Bressay Sound, ofi" Lerwick, which
became for the time one of the most bustling places in Europe. Swift " doggers "
carried the first herrings taken to Holland. At the present day the fisheries in
these seas are carried on almost exclusively by the British.
All the four-footed animals of England are met with in Scotland, including even
the wild cat, which, however, has become scarce in the Highlands. About the middle
of the twelfth century the land fauna of Northern Scotland possessed a feature
in common with Scandinavia, which is now wanting. At that time the reindeer
still roamed through the forests of Caithness, where reindeer moss abounds even
now, and according to the sagas the Earls of Orkney annually crossed the sea to
hunt that animal and the red deer. The great Scotch landowners still keep in
their parks wild cattle which some claim to be representatives of the aurochs, but
which zoologists declare to be merely a variety of our oxen. The stag is at present
the only large animal indigenous to the Highlands, and though Lithuanian
aurochsen, elks, American bufi'aloes, reindeer, and wapiti were introduced into the
parks, and readily adapted themselves to the climate, most of them, owing to their
viciousness, had to be killed. The capercailzie, a Swedish bird introduced in
1837, has become common on the moors. The beaver, an ancient inhabitant of the
country, has been imported into Bute, where it flourishes.
The fauna grows poorer in species with a restriction of area ; it is less varied
in Great Britain than on the continent, and suffers a further reduction in the
Orkneys and Hebrides. Many animals found on the mainland have never crossed
the sea into the neighbouring islands. Nowhere in these latter do we meet with
molehills, indicating the existence of an underground population. Rabbits are
unknown, as also were hares until recently. They have, however, become one of
the chief resources of the Orkneys, compensating in some measure for the cessation
in the export of seaweeds, which until 1832 were used in the manufacture of glass.*
The white hare has been introduced by sportsmen into Lewis, and when first seen
excited the fears of the natives, Avho took it for a phantom. St. Kilda has only
* D. Gorrie, " Summers and Winters in the Orkney?."
NOETHERN SCOTLAND. 355
one wild mammal — the mouse ; even rats have not yet appeared there.* Various
animals imported into the islands have grown smaller, owing to the influence of
their surroundings. Amongst these are the spirited and indefatigable Shetland
ponies, or shelties. Several birds, including the partridge, have, like rabbits and
foxes, stopped short at the straits which separate the Scottish main from the
Western Isles. Sea-birds, however, abound; for the rocky coasts of the Hebrides,
Orkneys, and Shetland Islands present the same advantages as breeding grounds as
do the cliffs of the mainland. In species no less than in individuals they are pro-
digiously numerous, and the solan geese which perch on the rocks of St. Kilda have
been estimated at 200,000. t Several sea-birds, including the common fulmar
{Procellaria glaciaUs), breed only on certain islands. One species of bird has
undoubtedly died out : we mean the great auk {Alca impennis) of the Orkneys, which
has not been seen since 1824. Amongst the marvels of the islands, and more
especially of the Orkneys, writers of the Middle Ages, and even zoologists of the
last century, enumerate a curious shell which grows into a tree, and bears ducks
and geese instead of fruit. This strange fable may be traced even through the
earliest volumes of the Philosophical Tranmctions, and Linnaeus himself alludes to it
when he calls a species of cirripede an anatifer, or " duck-bearer."
The People.
Who were the earliest inhabitants of the Scottish Highlands ? Of what race
were the Picts, who formerly inhabited the country, and over whom even the
Romans could not triumph ? Were they pure Celts, or had their blood already
mingled with that of Scandinavians ? It is usually believed that the Picts had
separated themselves from the other Britons at a very early age, and that their
idioms differed much more from the dialects spoken in Gaul than did Cymraig.
They originally inhabited, perhaps, the whole of Great Britain, and were pushed
to the northward by the Britons, who in turn were displaced by Romans and
Saxons.
Numerous stone monuments, known as Picts' " houses," or weems, and invariably
consisting of a chamber or centre passage surrounded by smaller apartments, are
attributed to these aborigines. The mainland, and to a great extent the islands,
abound in broughs, or borgs ; that is, towers of defence, resembling, at least
externally, the niiraghe of Sardinia. On the Shetland Islands there are seventy-
five of these towers, and in the Orkneys seventy. Petrie, who has examined
forty of them, looks upon them as fortified dwelling-houses. Their circular
walls are 12 feet and more in thickness ; their original height is not known, for
every one of them has reached us in a partial state of demolition. Pestles for
crushing corn, stone lamps, and vessels made of the bone of whales testify to the
rudimentary state of civilisation which the inhabitants had attained. The Brough
of Mousa, to the south of Lerwick, bulges out near its base, probably to prevent
* Macaulay, "A Voyage to and History of St. Kilda."
t G. Seton, "St. Kilda, Past and Present."
356
THE BRITISH ISLES.
the use of scaling-ladders, and recesses occur at regular intervals on the inside of
the wall. Cromlechs, cairns, standing stones, symbolical sculptures, circles of
stones, pile dwellings, and vitrified forts are found in several localities both on the
mainland and the islands. Primitive monuments of this "kind form one of the
most salient landscape features in the Orkneys. On Pomona there is a district of
several square miles in area which still abounds in prehistoric monuments of every
description, although many stones have been carried away by the neighbouring
farmers. In the tumulus of Meashow, opened in 1861, were discovered over
900 Runic inscriptions, and the carved images of fanciful animals. On the same
island are the standing stones of Stennis ; and on Lewis, 12 miles to the west of
Fig. 177.— The Standing Stones of Stennis.
Stornoway, the *' grey stones of Callernish." These latter, forty-eight in number,
are also known as Tuirsachan, or " Field of Mourning," and they still form a perfect
circle, partly buried in peat, which has grown to a height of from 6 to 12 feet
around them.* We know that these constructions belong to different ages, and
that now and then the stones raised by the earliest builders were added to by their
successors. Christian inscriptions in oghams and runes in characters not older,
according to Miinch, than the beginning of the twelfth century, have been
discovered on these monuments. At Newton, in Aberdeenshire, there is a stone
inscribed in curiously shaped letters, not yet deciphered.
* Wilson, "Prehistoric Annah of Scotland."
NORTHERN SCOTLAND.
357
Notwithstanding a change of religion, these sacred places of the ancient inha-
bitants still attract pilgrims. On South Uist the people until recently walked in
procession around a huge pile of rocks, turning thrice in following the apparent
path of the sun. The small island of lona, at the western extremity of Mull, is
one of those places which have been held sacred for generations. Various stone
monuments prove that this spot was held in veneration at the dawn of history,
and this probably induced the Irish apostle, St. Columba, to found here a monastery
— the " light of the western world " — which soon becam6 the most famous in Great
Britain. Hence went forth those ascetic Culdees whom the jealousy of the
clergy caused to disappear in the course of the thirteenth century.* In the ruined
ecclesiastical buildings of this islet are buried more than sixty Kings of Scotland,
Ireland, and the Hebrides, the last interred here having been Macbeth. A
prophecy says that one day the whole earth will be swallowed up by a deluge, with
the exception of lona. There was a time when this venerated island was
interdicted to women, as Mount Athos is at the present day. Not far from the
church lay the " black stones," thus called on account of the malediction attach-
ing to him who forswore himself by their side. It was here that the *' Lords
of the Isles," kneeling on the ground with their hands raised to heaven, were
bound to swear to maintain intact the rights of their vassals. f Among the heaps
of rocks piled up on the beach, it is said by monks in expiation of their trespasses,
are found fine fragments of granite, porphyry, and serpentine, which the inha-
bitants employ Scotch workmen to cut and polish, in order that they may sell them
as amulets to their visitors. Formerly these stones were looked upon throughout
the Hebrides as the most efficacious medicine against sorcery ; and when about
to be married a bridegroom, to insure happiness, placed a stone of lona upon his
bare left foot.+
The Scotch Highlanders are more or less mixed with Scandinavians, for the
Northmen, who for centuries held possession of the Orkneys, gained a footing
also upon the mainland, where they founded numerous colonies. Scandinavian
family names are frequent in the Orkneys, but the type of the inhabitants is
nevertheless Scotch. § The geographical nomenclature of the Shetland Isles is
wholly Norwegian. The names of farms terminate in seter or der^ and those of
hills in hoy or hole. In 1820 the sword dance of the ancient Norwegians might
still be witnessed on one of the islands, and according to Gifford,|| Norse was
spoken in a few families as recently as 1786. Sutherland clearly formed part of
the old domain of the Northmen. That county lies at the northern extremity of
Scotland ; but to the inhabitants of the Orkneys it was a Southern land, and the
name which they gave to it has survived to our own time.
A few Scandinavian colonies on the mainland have retained their distinct
character. As an instance we may mention the village of Ness on Lewis, the
* Jameson, " History of the Culdees.''
t Forbes Leslie, " Early Races of Scotland."
X Mercey, Revue des Deux-Mondes, September, 183B.
^ Hugh Miller, " Footprints of the Creator."
II •' Historical Description of Zetland."
358
THE BEITISH ISLES.
inhabitants of which are distinguished for their enterprise, presenting a singular
contrast to the sluggishness of their Gaelic neighbours. The descendants of
these hostile races have, like oil and water, long refused to mingle. It
would nevertheless be next to impossible to define the boundaries between the
various races throughout the country. Language certainly would prove no safe
guide, for many of the Gaels have given up their language and speak English.
Out of 3,500,000 Scotchmen only 250,000 are able to express themselves
Fig. 178. — Linguistic Map of Scotland.
According to E. G Ravenstein.
Proportion of Gaelic-speaking Inhabitants
25 to 50
per cent.
50 to JX)
per cent.
Over 90
per cent.
in Gaelic, and of these only 49,000 are ignorant of English.* As to the Scandi-
navians, not one amongst their descendants now speaks Old Norse. The greater
number of them speak English, but many, too, have adopted Gaelic. In most of the
islands the names of places are Danish, although Gaelic has for centuries been the
spoken language. Even in St. Kilda, remote as is its situation, an intermingling
of Gaels and Northmen has been recognised. f The use of Celtic was discon-
* E. G-. Ravenstein, " On the Celtic Languages in the British Isles."
t Sands, " Out of the World, or Life in St. Kilda."
NOETHERN SCOTLAND.
359
tinued at the court of Scotland about the middle of the eleventh century, and is
doomed to disappear. Far poorer in its literature and less cultivated than Welsh,
its domain diminishes with every decade, for English is now almost universally
spoken in the towns, and the Highland valleys are becoming depopulated, or
invaded by Saxon sportsmen and graziers. If Caledonia really stands for Gael-
Bun, or " Mountain of the Gael," then its limits are becoming narrower every
time the meshes of the network of railroads are drawn tighter. But though
Celtic may disappear as a spoken language, the geographical nomenclature of
Scotland will for all time bear witness to its ancient domination. Those
acquainted with Gaelic may obtain a tolerably correct notion of the relief of the
ground by merely studying the names upon a map. Names like ben, earn, carr,
carragh, cnoc, creag, cruach, dun, mam, meal, monadh, sguir, sith, sithean, stob, stuc,
tolm, torr, tullich, and sliahh will suggest to their minds variously shaped moun-
tains ; eye, i, and innis denote islands ; linne and loch represent lakes or gulfs ;
ahh, ahhuinn, uisge, esk, and biiinne stand for rivers or torrents. Tnver in the
west, and Aher in the east, indicate the mouths of rivers. The name Albainn,
Albe'inn, or Albion, by which the Gaels were formerly designated, is now applied
to all Britain. The Gaelic bards spoke of their fellow-countrymen by preference
as Albannaich, or " Mountaineers."* The Albannaich of the Grampians and the
Albanians of the Pindus are thus known by a similar name, having in all
probability the same meaning.
The translation of one of John Knox's religious works was the first book printed
in Gaelic, and thus, as in Wales, the Reformation conferred upon the language of
the people an importance which it had not possessed before. But whilst in Wales
religious zeal, through its manifestations in the pulpit and the press, has contributed
in a large measure to keep alive the native idiom, the division of the Highlanders into
Catholics and Protestants has resulted in a diminution of the collective patriotism
of the people, as it reveals itself in language. Catholics are numerous in the
county of Inverness, and it merely depended upon the chief of a clan whether
his followers remained true to the old faith or embraced the new. Canna and
Eigg are the only Hebrides the inhabitants of which remained Catholics. Those
of the larger island of Eum, it is said, hesitated what to do, when the chief of
the MacLeods, armed with a yellow cudgel, threw himself in the way of a
procession marching in the direction of the Romish church, and drove the faith-
ful to the temple which he patronised. Hence Protestantism on that island is
known to the present day as the religion of the yellow cudgel. f But notwith-
standing these changes of religion, many superstitions survive amongst the people.
In Lewis " stone " and " church " are synonymous terms, as they were in the time
when all religious ceremonies were performed around sacred megaliths. +
The fame of the Highlanders had been sung by poets and novelists, until
they came to be looked upon as typical for bravery, loyalty, and all manly virtues
* Forbes Leslie, " Early Races of Scotland."
t Dr. Johnson, " Tour in the Western Hebrides."
I Anderson Smith, " Lewisiana."
360 THE BEITISH ISLES.
The soldiers, in their strange and showy garb, have so frequently won distinc-
tion upon the field of battle that all their panegyrists said about their native
virtues was implicitly believed ; and on the faith of poets we admired their
pipers, the successors of the ancient bards, who accompanied their melancholy
chants on the harp. In reality, however, the Highlanders, until recently, were
warlike herdsmen, as the Montenegrins, Mirdits, and Albanians are even now,
always at enmity with their neighbours. It was only after forts had been built at
the mouths of the valleys, and military roads constructed through their territories,
that they were reduced to submission. The members of each family were closely
united, and, like American Eedskins, they had their war-cries, badges, and distinctly
patterned tartans. The people were thus split up into about forty clans, or,
including the Lowland families, into about one hundred, and several of these
clans consisted of more than 10,000 individuals.* The members of each clan,
though sometimes only cousins a hundred times removed, all bore the same
name, and they fought and worked together. The land was originally held in
common, being periodically divided amongst the clan. The honour of the
tribe was dear to every one of its individual members, and an injury done to
one amongst them was avenged by the entire community. When the Kings
of Scotland had to complain of a Highland chief, they attacked his clan, for they
well knew that every member of it would embrace the cause of the chief. There
existed no courts of justice in the Highlands, but blood was spilt for blood.
Various monuments recall such acts of savage vengeance, and as recently as 1812
a Highland family set up seven grinning heads as a trophy to commemorate a
sevenfold murder committed by its ancestors. A cavern on Eigg Island is
strewn with human bones, the relics of the ancient inhabitants of the island,
200 in number, who are said to have been sufibcated within the cavern by a neigh-
bouring chief, MacLeod, in retaliation for some private injury. t
As long as every member of the community possessed a share in the land
Scotland was spared the struggle between rich and poor. But by the close of
the eighteenth century the poorer members of the clan, though still claiming
cousinship with their chiefs, had lost all proprietary rights in the land, and the
lairds, when remonstrated with by the clan, responded in the words of the device
adopted by the Earls of Orkney, "Sic fuit, est, et erit ! " They were even then able
to drive away the ancient inhabitants from the plots of land they occupied, in order
that they might transform them into pasturing or shooting grounds. Several
landlords even burnt down the cabins of their poor *' cousins," thus compelling
them to leave the country. Between 1811 and 1820, 15,000 tenants were thus
chased from the estates of the Duchess of Stafford. Entire villages were given up
to the flames, and on a single night 300 houses might have been seen afire.
Nearly the whole population of four parishes was in this way driven from its
homes. Since the middle of the century about 1,000,000 acres in the Highlands
have been cleared of human beings and sheep to be converted into shooting
* Principal Highland clans in 1863 :— MacGregors, 36,000; MacKenzies, 21,000; MacLeans,
16,0.00; MacLeods, 14,000; Macintoshes, 11,000; MacDonalds, 10,000.
t Hugh Miller, " Cruise of the Betsy."
NORTHEEN SCOTLAND. 3gl
grounds.* Thus, contrary to what may be usually witnessed in civilised countries,
the Higliland valleys are returning to a state of nature, and wild beasts taking the
place of domesticated animals. The country, formerly almost bare of trees, has been
largely planted, and from Black Mount in Argyllshire to Marr Forest in Aberdeen
there now extends an almost unbroken belt of verdure. Already the shootino-
grounds cover over 2,000,000 acres, and they are continually extending. Scotland
has emphatically become a sporting country, and many ^ a large estate is managed
as a shooting ground, that proving more profitable to its proprietor than would its
cultivation. There are not wanting sportsmen willing to pay £400 for a salmon
stream, £1,000 for the right of shooting over a moor, or £4,000 for a deer park.
With these rents a salmon may cost £8, and a stag £40. f
Scotland, even more than England, is a land of wide demesnes. Twenty-one
individuals share between them the third of the kingdom, 70 the half, and 1,700
nine-tenths of it. The Duke of Sutherland alone owns about the fifteenth
part of Scotland, including nearly the whole county from which he derives his
title. Domains of such vast extent cannot be properly cultivated, and heaths and
swamps which would repay the labour bestowed upon them by peasant proprietors
are allowed by their wealthy owners to remain in a state of nature.
In the Orkneys a portion of the land is still owned by odallers, or peasant
proprietors ; but the Shetland Islands and several of the Hebrides, including Lewis,
the largest amongst them, belong to a single proprietor, who thus disposes
indirectly of the lives of the inhabitants, whom he can compel to abandon their
homes whenever it suits his interests. Several islands, such as Barra and Rum,
which formerly supported a considerable population, have in this way become
almost deserts ; and amongst the inhabitants left behind there are even now
many who live in a state of extreme poverty, who look upon carrageen, or Iceland
moss, as a luxury, and who are dependent upon seaweeds and fish for their daily
sustenance. Owing to the inferiority of the food, dyspepsia is a common complaint,
and certain physicians declare that the gift of ** second sight,'' which plays so
prominent a part in the history of the Highlanders, is traceable to a disorder of
the organs of digestion. The villages of Lewis are perhaps unique of their kind
in Europe. The inhabitants gather the stones embedded in the peaty soil to
construct rough concentric walls, filling the space between them with earth and
gravel. A scaffolding made of old oars and boughs supports a roof covered with
earth and peat, leaving a wide ledge on the top of the circular wall, upon which
vegetation soon springs up, and which becomes the favourite promenade and play-
ground of children, dogs, and sheep. A single door gives access to this unshapely
abode, within which a peat fire is kept burning throughout the year, in order that
the damp which perpetually penetrates through the wall and roof may evaporate.
Horses, cows, and sheep, all of diminutive stature, owing to their want of nourish-
ment, occupy one extremity of this den, while the fowls roost by the side of the human
inhabitants, or perch near the hole left for the escape of the smoke. To strangers
* Husrh Miller, " Sutherland as it Was and Is."
t In 1877 2,060 shooting grounds in Scotland were let for £600,000. (Official Journal, November
m.l877.) j^^_^
362
THE BRITISH ISLES.
the heat and smoke of these dwellings are intolerable, but the former is said to favour
the laying of eggs.* Such are the abodes of most of the inhabitants of Lewis !
Yet the claims to comfort have increased since the commencement of the nineteenth
century, and a porringer is no longer looked upon as a veritable curiosity.
Topography.
Perthshire is eminently a border county, for whilst the whole of its north-
western portion is occupied by spurs of the Grampians, the south-eastern and
smaller section of the county lies within the Lowlands. The line which divides
the Silurian rocks of the Highlands from the red sandstone formation, spread over
Fig. 179.— Perth.
Scale 1 : 120,000.
b."^
,
^^r:^t^, ' -^a^
ml
Vs. ^
j^^
Perthn
iV"' ' ^^'^^^. :*Ar«(^^>«^'' '
1^^^^
29~R^^P
1; '*^'^^fc/''" "'"'"'
-El-
Y%s
'^M^
Ig
I^CoS^
u^',.,/'A
*^
w^'- \ ^^**><L >^ ( c -^^^^■B
3-25 3-20' WofGi
2 Miles.
Strathmore and the hilly region intervening between that vale and the Forth, is
drawn as with a ruler. It marks at once a physical and an ethnical boundary, for
it nearly coincides with the line which separates the Gaelic-speaking Highlanders
from the men of Saxon tongue. In the south-east the Ochill and Sidlaw Hills
divide Perthshire from the maritime region, and it is through a gorge in these
ranges of igneous rock that the Tay, the principal river of the county, finds its
way into the Firth of Forth.
The Carse of Gower, a fertile alluvial tract extending along the northern shore
of the Firth of Tay, forms part of Perthshire, and within it lies the village of
Errol. Abernethy, supposed to have been the capital of a Pictish kingdom, but
* Anderson Smith, *' Lewisiana."
PERTHSHIEE. g^.^
now a small village on the road leading over the Ochills, is interesting to archaeo-
logists on account of its round tower. Crossing the Lower Earn at the villao-e of
Bridge of Earn, a rival of Bridge of Allan, we soon reach Perth, formerly a Roman
station, afterwards the capital of Scotland, and still a town of considerable note.
Seated at the head of the navigation of the Tay, and in the gorge which presented
the only easy means of communication between Fife and the fertile Strathmore
its geographical position is admirable. In our own days Perth has become a
manufacturing town, with flax-mills, bleaching and dye works, woollen factories
glass houses, and engineering shops, but the charms of its environs are as great as
ever. Scone Palace, a modern mansion in the neighbourhood, stands on the site
of a palace of the Kings of Scotland. The famous stone on which the Scotch
monarchs were crowned was kept in Scone Abbey, now in ruins, until Edward I.
transferred it to Westminster Abbey.
Glen Almond joins the Tay above Perth. Within it lie the manufacturing
village of Methren, and Trinity College for the education of clergymen of the
Episcopal Church of Scotland. Continuing up the winding Tay, we pass Stanley,
with its cotton-mill; obtain a glimpse of Dunsinane, where Macbeth (1056)
lost the battle which cost him his throne ; and reach the mouth of the Isla, which
flows through a part of Strathmore, and is fed by the Ericht and other rivers
descending from the Highlands. Blairgowrie, Cupar- Angus, and Alyth, the only
towns of this district, are engaged in the linen trade.
Bunkeld, beautifully seated on the Tay, enclosed by trees, above which
peep forth the ruins of its noble cathedral, lies on the threshold of the High-
lands, not far beyond the boundary which separates the red sandstone from
the Silurian slates. Near it are Birnam Wood and the newly planted grounds of
the Duke of Athol. Seven miles above it, at Logierait, the Tay receives the
tribute of the Tummel. The Tay rises to the south-west, at the foot of Ben
Lui (3,708 feet), and successively flows through Loch Dochart — to the south of
which Ben More (3,818 feet) raises its head — and Loch Tay, by the foot of
gloomy Ben Lawers (3,984 feet). The district drained by its upper course is
known as Breadalbane, whose lordly owner has a princely seat at Taymouth
Castle, at the foot of Loch Tay. In one of its wildest recesses are the lead mines
of Tyndrum. The Tummel, after having received the tribute of Lochs Luydan
and Errocht, flows through Glen Garroch, purifying its floods in Lochs Eannoch
and Tummel, and forms an attractive waterfall before its junction with the Garry.
This latter is the principal river of Athol. A short distance above the confluence
it forces itself a passage through the famous gorge of Killiecrankie, above which
the Highland clans, in 1689, inflicted so severe a defeat upon the royal forces.
Blair-Athol, at the junction of Glen Tilt with the Upper Glen Garry, rises in the
midst of the wildest mountain scenery. Two roads diverge from it : one leads
up gloomy Glen Tilt, and past Cairn Gower (3,671 feet) into Aberdeenshire ; the
other, accompanied by a railway, continues up Glen Garry, and crosses the Pass of
Drumouchter into Inverness- shire. In the great " forest " of Athol 130,000 acres
are set apart for grouse and deer- stalking.
864 THE BRITISH ISLES.
The river Earn rises in Loch Earn, and joins the Tay below Perth. In its
lower valley, but at some distance from the river, is Auchterarder. Higher up,
and surrounded by beautifully wooded hills, is Crieff, a small town engaged in
the cotton, linen, and woollen trades, with an obelisk in honour of Sir David
Baird. The village of Comrie, on the line of division between the old red sand-
stone and the Silurian rocks, is stated to suffer frequently from earthquakes.
The south-western portion of Perthshire is drained by the Forth and its
tributary Teith. The Forth rises at the eastern foot of Ben Lomond (3,123 feet),
and in its lower course washes the district of Menteith, with a beautiful lake
embosomed in wooded hills. At Stirling it is joined by the Allan, flowing
through a strath of the same name, in which is seated the picturesque town of
Dunblane, with the remains of a fine cathedral and mineral springs, which make
it a rival of the Stirlingshire town of Bridge of Allan, lower down on the same
river. The Teith flows past the small town of Doune, near which, at Deanston, is
a large cotton- mill. At Callender the wild gorge of the Trossachs, which leads
up to Loch Katrine, whence Glasgow draws its water, and the entrance to which
is guarded by Ben Ledi (3,009 feet), branches off" to the right, whilst Strath Ire
comes down from the northward. Following it we reach Balqtihidder, the burial-
place of Rob Roy, and the braes rendered famous by his exploits.
There still remains to be noticed a small detached portion of Perthshire on
the Firth of Forth, within which lie the small port of Kincardine and the fishing
village of C (dross, with the ruins of an abbe3\
Forfarshire, or Angus, is bounded on the north by the Binchinnin
Mountains, which are a section of the Grampians, and extend from Glas Miel
(3,502 feet) to Mount Battock (2,554 feet). The southern slope of this range,
which is furrowed by Glen Isla, Glen Esk, and Glen Mark, is known as the Braes
of Angus, and abuts upon the fertile Strathmore, which occupies the centre of the
county, and is separated from the Firth of Tay and the North Sea by the Sidlaw
Hills (1,134 feet).
Dundee extends for several miles along the northern shore of the Tay, here
nearly 2 miles in width, which did not prevent our engineers from throwing a
railway bridge across it. Unfortunately, during a severe gale in December,
1879, the structure was precipitated into the Tay, together with a railway train
hastening across it at the time. Dundee is an ancient city, which has been frequently
besieged and taken. It was the first town in Scotland to sever its connection
with Rome, and the religious ardour of its citizens converted it into a second
Geneva. It is the most populous town in Northern Scotland, and the first in the
United Kingdom for flax, jute, and hemp spinning and weaving, its factories in
these branches alone employing more than 50,000 operatives. But, in addition to
this, there are engineering works, ship-yards, and other industrial factories, and
200,000 cwts. of marmalade are made every year. For the last century the
mariners of Dundee have pursued the high-sea fisheries with varying success, but
on the whole not without profit, for at the present day they almost monopolize the
whale fisheries in Baffin's Bay and the seal fisheries in the Greenland Sea. The
wMmEmrsEW 't ' wwjwn iiiiiiiiiii
W*W..li.'i'iilil "1 a.L,S^,M^.P ^,
FORFAESHIEE.
365
commerce of Dundee is commensurate with its industry, and nearly all the
raw
materials consumed in its numerous factories are imported in Dundee bottoms.
368
THE BEITISH ISLES.
whicli traverses Formatin ; and those of the Upper Doveran, with the Bogie,
which drains Strathbogie. The north-eastern portion of the county is known
as Buchan, and supplies London with its finest beef. Granite and marble abound,
but neither coal nor metals are found, and the manufacturing industry is of little
importance.
Aberdeen occupies a geographical position at the outlet of the valleys of the
Dee and Don, along which latter leads the natural high-road to Moray Firth,
which amply accounts for its early growth into a prosperous city. Its harbour was
frequented at a time when Edinburgh and Glasgow were mere villages, and for
Fig. 183.— Aberdeen.
Scale 1 : 104.000
WofP.
,^' 30
4°Q5
W.ofGr.
Q°IO'
Q°5'
— 1 Mile.
centuries it has carried on a brisk trade with Northern Europe, the Low Countries,
and France. Old Aberdeen is a long street to the north of the commercial quarter
of the modern town, and, owing to its greater antiquity, can boast the most
interesting edifices, including the remains of a cathedral of the fourteenth century,
and the more ancient of the two colleges which jointly form the university. The
modern town is seated at the mouth of the Dee, which was formerly the only harbour
of the town, but has been supplemented by spacious docks, its entrance being at
the same time protected by piers. The export trade is partly fed by Aberdeen's
own industry, for there are flax, cotton, and woollen mills, engineering factories,
foundries, soap and chemical works, india-rubber and gutta-percha works, and
ABERDEENSHIRE.
369
important ship-yards for the construction of fast-sailing clippers and iron steamers.
Quarries are worked in the neighbourhood, and the yards in which granite and
marble are polished have not tbeir equal elsewhere in Great Britain. Among
the exports are also strawberries, vegetables, and cattle.
The upper valley of the Dee is much frequented by tourists, on account of
Fig. 184. — Balmoral.
From the Ordnance Map. Scale 1 : 63,000'!
iMUe.
its picturesque scenery, but it is a mere pastoral and sporting region without
towns. Ballater, the principal of its villages, has mineral springs ; above it is
the sumptuous royal castle of Balmoral; and still deeper amongst the hills the
370
THE BRITISH ISLES.
hamlet of Cadleton'in-Bmemar. Nor can the basin of the Don boast populous
towns. Inverurie, which a canal joins to Aberdeen, exports corn and cattle, as
does also Old Meldrum, on the heights to the east of it ; whilst Kintore, lower
down on the river, trades in limestone and granite. Newhurgh, at the mouth of
Fig. 185. — Peterhead and Fraserburgh.
Scale 1 : 200,000.
4°Q0
4° 10
WofR
WcfGr.
Depth under 13 Fathoms.
13 to 26 Fathoms
_^__ 2 MHes.
O s-ei- 26 Fathoms.
the Ythan, is hardly more than a fishing village, but lovers of the picturesque
will be delighted with a visit to Fyvie Castle, near the head of that river, one of
the most sumptuous baronial mansions in Scotland. In the valley of the Doveran,
on the western border of the county, are the small burghs of Turriff &^^ Euntly.
both with castles and in picturesque surroundings, but not otherwise remarkable.
INVERNESS. 871
Far more populous, at least as regards its seaboard, is the district of Buchan.
Here are Neiv Pitsligo and Stricken, in the interior of the county, both engaged
in the cattle trade, and the prosperous seaport towns of Peterhead and Fraser-
burgh, together with Rosehearti/ and other fishing villages. Peterhead is more
especially engaged in the whale and seal fishery, and amongst its imports figures
cryolite, obtained from the mines of Evigtok, in Greenland. Herrings are largely
exported.
Banffshire mainly consists of the western slope of the Cairngorm Mountains
and their spurs, which stretch to the north-eastward from Ben Muich Dhui, on the
borders of Aberdeen, and sink down towards Strathspey and its swift-flowing
salmon-yielding river. Only a small fringe along the coast is capable of cultiva-
tion. Here Bauf, the county town, occupies a beautiful site at the mouth of the
Doveran, and besides engaging in the fisheries and carrying on a brisk commerce,
it has flax-mills, stone-yards, manure works, engineering works, and a ship-yard.
Dufl" House, the magnificent seat of the Earl of Fife, adjoins it. Portsoy, Cullen
(with its three rocks), and Buckie are fishing villages. In the interior are Keith,
on the Isla, a tributary of the Doveran, with important horse and cattle fairs,
woollen and flax mills, and Dufftoivn, in a side valley of the Spey, with the
cathedral church of Old Machar.
Elginshire, or Moray, lies in the main between the Spey and the Findhorn,
both rapid streams abounding in salmon. A spur of the Monadhliadh Mountains,
which are formed of Silurian rock, fills up the centre of the count}^ ; but
along the coast extends a belt of old red sandstone, where the soil is fruitful.
Elgin, on the Lossie, 5 miles above Lossiemouth, has the ruins of a noble
cathedral and a geological museum. Forres, on Findhorn Loch, is a quaint old
town, with many gabled houses. Near it stands Sweno's Stone, an obelisk covered
with curious carvings, probably intended to commemorate the expulsion of the
Danes. Findhorn, Burghcad, and Garmouth are fishing villages, the latter at the
mouth of the Spey, up which are Fochabers, with Castle Gordon, and Rothes.
Nairnshire, a small county between the Findhorn (Strathdearn) and the
Nairn, resembles Elginshire in its geological structure, except that the sand-
stone nowhere reaches the coast, which is fringed with a tract of blown sand
and alluvial soil. Nairn, the county town, is much frequented for sea-bathing.
About 5 miles above it stands Cawdor Castle, a fine feudal stronghold of the
fifteenth century, built on the site of that in which Macbeth murdered
Duncan.
Inverness, the laj-gest of the Highland counties, not only includes a con-
siderable portion of the mainland, stretching from sea to sea, but also the
large island of Skye and the whole of the Outer Hebrides, with the exception
of Lewis. The great feature of the mainland is the huge cleft of Glenmore,
between Inverness and Loch Eil (see p. 333). The northern declivity of this
valley is occupied by Lochs Ness and Oich, upon which Glen Urquhart, Glen
Moriston, and Glen Garry open from the w^estw^ard. The famous Foyers Falls
are on the eastern side of Loch Ness, right opposite to the naked, hayrick-like
872
THE BRITISH ISLES.
summit of Mealfourvounie (3,060 feet). Loch Lochy, with its tributary, Loch
Arkaig, drains the southern portion of the great glen, which is joined on the east
by Glen Spean, to the north of which lies the district of Lochaber. The Pass of
Corryarrick (1,864 feet) leads from Loch Ness, across a spur of the Monadh-
liadh Mountains, into Strathspey, which forms the most marked feature of
Fig. 186.— Firth of Inverness.
From an Admiraitv Chait. Scale 1 : 150,000.
igh Water T^&r C^SI^.iS^ Sprouts riseJ2/€ct. yeapjt 9i
Eastern Inverness, and at whose head on the borders of Perth lies the moorland
district of Badenoch. Northern Inverness is drained by Strathglass, which,
fed by streams descending from Ben Attow and Mam Soul (3,861 feet), throws
itself into Beauly basin. The water-parting lies close to the western coast, and
the peninsular districts of Glenelg and Knoidart (Laorbein, 3,341 feet), Arasaig
with Loch Morar), and Moidart (bounded by Loch Shiel) are of small extent.
EOSS AND CEOMARTY. 873
Excepting Inverness, there is no town or village in the county whose population
exceeds 1,200 souls. Gaelic is still spoken by 83 per cent, of the population.
If Inverness, the " capital " of the Highlands, could he suddenly transported
6^ of latitude to the south, to a milder climate, it might become one of the great
cities of the world ; for its geographical position upon a deep firth, and at the
mouth of a cleft which crosses a whole kingdom from sea to sea, is exceptionally
favourable. But the north of Scotland is too cold and inhospitable to give
birth to a great city. Still Inverness is a town of noble appearance, and its
commerce is not inconsiderable. The site of Macbeth's ancient castle is now
occupied by a castellated court-house. Culloden Moor, upon which the fortunes of
the royal house of Stuart were for ever wrecked, stretches along the Inverness
Firth, below the town. Camjjbelltown, near the entrance to the Firth, which is
guarded by Fort George, and Beauly, at the mouth of Strathglass, are merely
villages. At Kirkhill, near the latter, is the county lunatic asylum. Fort
Augustus, at the head of Loch Ness, has recently been converted into a Jesuit
college ; whilst Fort William, at the southern terminus of the Caledonian Canal,
has grown into the second town of the county. Near it are Banavie, the ruins of
Inverlochy Castle, and a famous distillery which supplies the *' dew " off Ben Nevis,
which looks down calmly from the other side of the valley. The villages of
Kingussie and Newtonmore, in Strathspey, derive some importance from their
position on the Highland Railway which connects Inverness with the basin of the
Tay. It crosses the Pass of Drumouchter, or Dalwhinni (1,450 feet), between
Badenoch and Athol.
Portree, the capital of the Isle of Skye (see p. 347), is a small village on the
steep side of a land-locked harbour. Near it is a stalactite cavern in which Prince
Charles lay concealed for a time.
The united shires of Boss and Cromarty stretch from sea to sea. Along their
eastern seaboard lies a fertile tract of old red sandstone and alluvial soil,
forming the peninsula of Black Isle, between Inverness and Cromarty Firths, and
a second peninsula which terminates in Tarbat Ness, between the latter and
Dornoch Firth. The bulk of the country consists, however, of sterile and almost
deserted moorlands and mosses. The backbone of the Grampians runs nearer to
the western than to the eastern shore, extending from Ben Attow northward
through the Diresdh Mor, Ben Dearig (3,551 feet), and Badnagown Forest,
or Freevater, to Ben More Assynt (3,281 feet), but towards the east there
lies the bold mass of Ben Uaish, or Wyvis (3,425 feet), almost insulated. The
western coast is indented with numerous lochs, chief amongst which are Loch
Broom, to the north of the Gruinard district, on which stands the fishing village
of XJllapool ; Loch Ewe, continued by the inland Loch of Maree, at whose head the
Sleugach rises to a height of 4,000 feet ; the Gareloch ; Loch Torridon, with the
village of Shieldag, one of the most remarkable on account of its land-locked inner
basin ; Loch Carron, to the south of Applecross district, with the fishing village
of Jeantown ; and Loch Alsh. The bulk of the population is, however, gathered
along the eastern seaboard. Here, on the northern shore of Inverness Firth, are
374
THE BEITISH ISLES.
Fortrose, with the poor remains of a cathedral, and Avoch. Cromarty guards the
entrance to the firth of the same name, and has an excellent harbour. Invergordon and'
Alness are villages on the northern side of the Firth; whilst Dingwall is at its head,
and at the mouth of Strathpeffer, in the midst of wooded scenery, at the back of
which rises the towering mass of Ben Wyvis. The district of Ferrindonald, or of
Fig. 187. — Kirkwall.
From an Admiralty Chart. Scale 1 : 150,000.
Nr.j:^, 7 JO (3
Jt 14. 13
24
iS J2
,7 IS
9
J3 J.
J.?
'.^^-^ JO
jS / ^^ -W
JU D 0 ^- - ^*^
. ,„ , . . .\utro 7
4&^
r-. /
SHAPINSHA.
2 Miles.
the clan Munro, which stretches along the northern shore of the Firth, has for
centuries past produced a race distinguished for its military ardour. Tain, on the
southern shore of Dornoch Firth, is rapidly losing its trade, owing to the filling up
of its harbour with sand thrown up by the sea.
Lewis forms part of Eoss, and here is Stornoway, the great fishing port.
AEGYLLSHIRE.
875
Many lives are sacrificed in the pursuit of its great industry, one quarter of
the town being mainly inhabited by the widows of fishermen, and hence known
as Widows' Row. Swainsbost is a fishing village on the north-western coast of
Lewis.
Gaelic is still spoken throughout Ross, except in Black Isle, which was settled
in the days of James VI. by people from the south.
Sutherland is the wildest and most desolate of all the Highland counties,
its only cultivable tract forming a narrow fringe along the coast of the North
Sea. Oolitic limestones occur here, almost the only place where they are
Fig. 188.— Stornoway.
Scale 1 : 160,000.
found in Scotland. The interior of the county is furrowed by deep glens filled
with lochs, above which Ben More of Assynt, Ben Klibrech (3,160 feet), and
other mountains rear their naked heads. Chief among these glens is that within
which lies Loch Shin, and which drains eastward through the Kyles of Suther-
land into the Dornoch Firth. Bonar, at the head of that loch, and Dornoch,
the county town, are mere fishing villages. Golspie, near which rises the magni-
ficent Dunrobin Castle; Brora, where coal is won and clay manufactured into
bricks ; and Hehnsdale lie on the open North Sea. Portskerra, Tongue, Eddrachillis,
and Lochinver are small hamlets on the north and west coasts, which would escape
notice except in a country so thinly peopled.
376
THE BRITISH ISLES.
Caithness forms the north-eastern extremity of Great Britain, and near
Duncansby Head stood John o' Groat's house, often proverbially alluded to. Yery
different from the Highland counties, it is an old red sandstone country of undu-
lating surface, for the greater part capable of cultivation, though still largely
Fig. 189.— Lerwick.
From an Admiralty Chart Scale 1 : 150,000.
^ ."jrc
H
'"'J'VV.-
'•'Jfead
4
T-^ A,
S'
■Jf 3*
+
2 Miles.
covered with moors and marshes. It differs, too, in its population, Gaelic being
spoken only in the interior. Wick, on the east coast, is the principal town,
and one of the chief seats of the herring fishery, which also occupies the bulk of
the people of Thurso, on the northern shore. Both these towns possess excellent
harbours. Smaller fishing villages are Lyhster, Canisbai/ (with a castle of the
PASS OF GLENCOE.
ARGYLLSHIRE. ^jj
Earl of Caithness), and Castletown. Halkirk is the only village in the interior of
the county.
The Orkneys and Shetland Isles (see p. 346) jointly form one county, whose
chief town, Kirhcall, lies on Pomona, the " mainland " of the Orkneys. It is not
a town of great population, but in its cathedral of St. Magnus, founded in the
twelfth century, it possesses a unique specimen of Scandinavian architecture
not unlike the cathedral of Trondhjem, in Norway. Stromness, on the western
side of the Mainland, where its scenery is most beautiful, has a natural-history
museum of some importance. St. Margaret's Hope is the principal village on
South Ronaldsha.
Lerwick, the capital of the Shetland Islands, has an excellent harbour, but its
trade is less than that of Kirkwall. Amongst its exports figure articles of
hosiery and various woollen stuffs, which the women make in the long winter
nights.
Argyllshire, the most southern of the Highland counties, and the only one
which lies wholly upon the western slope of the island, consists of a number of penin-
sulas and almost insulated land masses, separated by lochs and glens. Ardnamur-
chan advances its bold basaltic foreland far into the waves of the Atlantic to the
north of Loch Sunart. Along the western side of Loch Linnhe lie Ardgower and
Morven, almost severed by the deep Glen Tarbert, and separated by a narrow arm
of the sea from the lofty island of Mull. On the eastern side lies the district of
Lome, pierced by Loch Etive, which receives the emissary of the inland Loch
Awe, escaping through a succession of gorges. Loch Levin is farther north.
Ballachulish, on its southern shore, is famed for its slate quarries ; but far more
attractive is the wild and gloomy Pass of Glencoe, which leads up from it into one
of the most savage parts of the Highlands, and rendered infamous by the treacherous
murder of the MacDonalds at the instigation of a Campbell (1692). Oban, to the
south of Loch Etive, is one of the great tourist head-quarters of Scotland. The
district of Argyll lies to the east of Loch Awe, along the western shore of Loch
Fyne, near whose head stand the village of Inverary and the Gothic mansion of the
Duke. The claw-shaped peninsula of Cowal stretches south between Lochs Fyne
and Long, and has on its eastern side, opposite to the mouth of the Clyde, the
watering-town of Dunoon.
Far away to the southward extends the narrow peninsula formed by the districts
of Knapdale and Kintyre, the neck of which is cut across by the Crinan Canal — near
whose eastern extremity are the villages of Lochgilphead and Ardrishaig — and which
is almost sundered in its centre, where the two Lochs of Tarhert approach within a
few hundred yards of each other. Near the southern extremity of this peninsula,
in a district extensively peopled by Lowland farmers, stands Campbeltown, the
largest town of the shire, famous above all other things for its whiskey.
On the islands of Argyllshire — Eum, Coll, and Tiree in the north-west ; Mull
and Colonsay in the centre ; Jura and Islay in the south-west — there is no place even
deserving the name of a village, Tobermory in Mull being merely a fishing station,
with an inn for tourists.
121— E
CHAPTER XV.
IRELAND.
General Features.
RELAND and Great Britain form together a geographical unit.
The latter, so elegant in its contours, is harmoniously balanced
by the former, whose outline resembles that of a geometrical
figure. Originally portions of the same continent, the two islands
were severed in the course of geological ages without losing their
family likeness. The geological formations exhibit the original continuity of the
land, and the arm of the sea which separates the two islands exceeds only locally
a depth of 50 fathoms.
Washed by the same sea and bathed in the same atmosphere, the destinies of
the inhabitants of the sister islands have been similar, and for centuries past they
have been under the same government. But hitherto this political union has not
brought about an intimate coalescence between the Irish and their neighbours of the
larger island. On the contrary, there exist feelings of strong hostility, fostered
by differences of religion, manners, and national traditions. The Irish look
upon themselves as a conquered race, injured in its most sacred rights and
interests, while the English, conscious of their power, have too frequently treated
substantial Irish grievances with contempt. They, too, regard the Irish as a
conquered people, not entitled to an independent government, owing to their lack
of strength to enforce it.*
Ireland has sometimes been called an English Poland, but two centuries have
elapsed since the Irish were able to place an army in the field to fight for their
alleged rights. Their divisions are too numerous to enable them to overthrow the
existing Government, and many amongst them are attached to England through
kinship, religion, and interest. Every attempt at a resurrection — even that of 1798,
when 30,000 men took the field — has been promptly suppressed. But though
England need no longer dread an open rebellion, she has nevertheless to contend
with the sullen hostility of a majority amongst the inhabitants of the sister island
* Froude, "The English in Ireland."
IRELAND.
379
More than once the foreign policy of Great Britain has been hampered through the
discontent animating Irishmen on both sides of the ocean. Nor can Englishmen
shut their eyes to the fact that the institutions forced by them upon Ireland have
yielded no favourable economical results. Within a few miles of the wealthiest
island in the world there live the most wretched human beings in Plurope. In
no other country has famine committed such ravages as on the fertile soil of
Fig. 190.— Hypsographical Map of Ireland.
Scale 1 : 4,500,000.
lEiGHT JiBO/E SE/« LEVEL
DEPTH OF SE4
Over 1,640 Feet. 1,640 to 820 Feet. Under 820 Feet. Under 820 Feet. over 820 Feet.
50 Mileb.
Ireland, and no other country has poured forth so broad a stream of emigrants.
Though nearly as densely peopled as France, Ireland is inferior in that respect to
Great Britain, and still more so in its agriculture, industry, commerce, and
material wealth.
Ireland has a mean height of 400 feet,* and its shape is that of a diamond, with
* Leipoldt, •' Ueber die mittlere Hohe Europas."
880 THE BRITISH ISLES.
its edges crumbled up. Most islands and peninsulas rise into a central point, or
are traversed by a backbone of mountains ; but not so Ireland. The whole of the
central portion of that island is occupied by a vast plain, nowhere more than 250
feet above the sea-level.* All around this depression the country rises into hills
and mountains, which form a ring-shaped rampart along the coast, through which
wide breaches at intervals give access to the sea. The plain comprises about
half the area of the island, and consists of regularly bedded carboniferous lime-
stone, whilst most of the mountains which environ it are composed of granite,
metamorphosed slates, and other ancient rocks. Geologically Ireland contrasts
in a remarkable manner with England, for whilst in the latter the various
formations succeed each other with regularity, and enable us to measure as it
were the cycle of ages since the deposition of the oldest sedimentary rock, the
western sister island presents the appearance of having been almost wholly built
up and sculptured during the epochs which preceded the carboniferous. There are
hardly any mesozoic rocks, and the more recent formations are only very sparingly
represented in the volcanic region of North-western Ireland, between Lough Neagh
and the North Channel. Ireland is geologically a much more ancient country
than England, its age being the same as that of the Scotch Highlands and of
Wales, from which it was severed by an irruption of the sea.
The distribution of the mountain groups and the configuration of the coast
explain in a measure the fate of the country. Though apparently compact in
shape, Ireland nevertheless has no geographical centre. Its vast plain, extend-
ing from the Bay of Dublin to that of Galway, and covered with bogs and a
multitude of lakes, very distinctly separates its two upland regions. The region
in the north-east, which is bounded by the Bays of Dundalk and Donegal, and
juts out like a peninsula towards Scotland, is occupied by a distinct group of
mountains, and forms the nucleus of the province of Ulster. Similarly Con-
naught, in the north-west, has its separate system of mountains and lakes.
Munster, in the south-west, and Leinster, in the south-east, are separated by
the plain of Tipperary, whilst the greater portion of the central plain formed
part of the ancient province of Meath. Each of these geographical provinces
exercised a modifying influence upon the men by whom they were inhabited.
Ulster was, above all, exposed to the incursions of the Scotch. Leinster
and Meath appeared to be intended by nature to fall an easy prey to the
English ; whilst Munster, on the open Atlantic, attracted Phoenicians, and later
on Spaniards, Algerines, and French, to its hospitable bays. Connaught, the
most remote of these provinces, afforded a last refuge to the indigenous popu-
lations flying before conquering invaders. But, besides this, every separate group
of mountains became a place of shelter to the conquered population dwelling
around. The mountains of Galtymore in the south, and those of Tyrconnell in
Donegal, have repeatedly afforded shelter to fugitives, and ancient customs long
survived in their valleys after they had died out elsewhere. f
* Edward Hull, "The Thysical Geology and Geography of Ireland."
t Sullivan, "New Ireland."
lEELAND.
381
The most elevated mountains of Ireland rise in the county of Kerry, but are
inferior in height to the giants of Scotland, and even to Snowdon of Wales.
They form parallel chains running in the same direction as the deep and
narrow bays which penetrate that part of Ireland, and consist of old red sand-
stone, whilst the valleys which open upon the sea are scooped out of the carboni-
ferous formation. It can hardly be doubted that the whole of this reo-ion,
mountains and all, was formerly occupied by the /formation which we now
Fig. 191. — The Lakes of Killakney.
Scale 1 : 130,000.
2 Miles.
see in the valleys, but through the action of ice and other causes which still
sculpture the face of the land all salient points have been planed off. Moraines
and polished rocks at the foot of the mountains bear witness to the existence of
glaciers, and the delightful Lakes of Killarney, which contribute so much towards
the beauty of the country, occupy the bed of one of these moving rivers of ice.
The beauty of these lakes and of the surrounding hills attracts crowds of tourists,
but the solitary rambler may derive greater pleasure from exploring the western
slopes of the mountains. There he looks down, on the one hand, upon pro-
882
THE BRITISH ISLES.
montories, islands, and the open Atlantic, whilst on the other the view embraces
verdant valleys, foaming torrents, and mountain- tops, streaked black with peat,
or dyed white, yellow, or green by mosses. The contrasts of light and shade
presented by the mountains enclosing Dingle Bay, Kenmare River, or Bantry
Bay are rendered all the more striking through the varied tints of the rocks.
Few landscapes in Ireland can compare with the valley of Glengariff, on the
shore of Bantry Bay, for magnificence of contours, wealth of vegetation, or the
wild grace exhibited in every feature of the ground.*
The mountains of Kerry culminate in Carrantuohill (3,414 feet), in the
Macgillicuddy Reeks. In the east they sink down into highlands, upon which
rise at intervals a few hills. The river Blackwater runs along the northern
foot of these hills until it abruptly turns to the south, and finds its way through
a breach into Youghal Harbour. The hills which rise to the north of the
Fig. 192. — Thr WicKLow Mountains.
Blackwater are of considerable elevation, and really mountainous in appearance.
They include the Knockmealdown (2,609 feet) and Comeragh Mountains (2,476
feet). Farther north, and almost insulated, rises the pyramidal mass of the Galty-
more (3,015 feet), with small black lakes almost choked with sedge in its recesses.
The various groups of hills on both banks of the Middle Shannon are likewise
ranged along axes running from west to east, and this parallelism in the arrange-
ment of the mountains of South-western Ireland must evidently be traced to a general
cause acting over a wide area. Slieve Bernagh (1,746 feet) and Slieve Aughty
rise to the west of the Shannon ; the Silvermine Mountains, culminating in Keeper
Hill (2,278 feet), Slieve Felim, and the Devil's-bit Mountain (1,586 feet) rise to the
east ; whilst Slieve Bloom (1,733 feet) occupies the most central position of the
Irish hills.
The mountains of Wicklow do not, like those of Munster, include several
distinct groups or ranges. They are of compact structure, and only on the south
* Thackeray, " Irisli Sketch-Book."
lEELAND.
883
does the valley of the Slaney separate them from a few outlying hills, including
Mount Leinster (2,610 feet) and Blackstairs Mountain (2,409 feet). The nucleus
of these mountains consists of granite, their axis of upheaval runs from south-west
to north-east, and they culminate in Lugnaquilla (3,039 feet). Metamorphosed
and other Silurian rocks conceal the base of the granite, and on the eastern slope
an eruption of volcanic rocks has taken place. The mountain region of Wicklow,
owing to the vicinity of the capital, is one of the most frequented in Ireland, as it
is certainly one of the most beautiful. Lakes, cascades, and bold promontories
overhanging the blue waters of the sea, ancient ruins and legendary lore, exercise
an irresistible power of attraction. No spot in Britain has inspired more
harmonious and sweeter verse than the " Meeting of the Waters " of the Avonmore
and Avonbeg, which form the river Avoca.
Far wilder, but no less beautiful than the Wicklow Mountains are the highlands
of Connemara, which occupy a portion of the almost insular region surrounded by
Galway Bay, the Atlantic, Clew Bay, and Loughs Mask and Corrib. These
mountains, formed of granite and metamorphosed rocks, and the rugged table-land
of Slieve Partry, or Joyce's Country, upon which their craggy summits look down,
are amongst the most ancient of all Ireland. Wandering through this desolate
region, we might almost fancy that we were living in the early days of our planet, so
primitive is the aspect of the country, with its piled-up rocks, island-studded lakes,
winding streams, and swampy bogs. These western highlands culminate in
Muilrea (2,688 feet), at the mouth of Killary Harbour. Very similar in aspect are
the mountains which fill Western Mayo to the north of Clew Bay, most conspicuous
amongst which are Mount Nephin (2,646 feet), Nephin Beg (2,065 feet), and
Croaghaun (2,192 feet), on Achill Island.
The highlands of Donegal, which occupy the north-western corner of Ireland,
are of Silurian age, and must be looked upon as a prolongation of the Highlands of
Scotland. Granite occurs plentifully within them, and Mount Errigal, close to
the shore of the Atlantic, rises to a height of 2,466 feet. Separated from Donegal
by the valley of the Foyle rises the moorland tract of Derry called Sperrin
Mountains (2,240 feet), which is geologically of the same age as the north-western
highlands.
Most recent amongst the mountains of Ireland are those of Mourne and
Carlingford, which rise on either side of Carlingford Lough. Slieve Donard, a
dome-shaped mass of granite rising from the margin of the sea to an elevation of
2,796 feet, is an imposing object, but there is every reason to believe that formerly
these mountains were much higher. They are penetrated by innumerable intrusive
streaks and dykes of basalt, and E. Hull likens them to the roots of volcanic
mountains the trunk and branches of which have been removed by denuding
agents, just as if a mountain like Etna were to be cut down into a group of hills
rising to little more than half its present height.
Still more manifest is the action of volcanic forces in that part of North-eastern
Ireland which lies between Lough Foyle, Lough Neagh, and Belfast Lough.
This table-land of Antrim, above which Trostan Mountain rises to a height of
884
THE BRITISH ISLES.
1,817 feet, is almost wholly buried beneatli a sheet of lava of an average thickness
of 100 feet. Its aspect possesses none of the picturesqueness that distinguishes
the volcanic district of Auvergne, which is partly of the same tertiary age. There
are neither cones nor cup- shaped craters, for these have been swept away by
planing and levelling agents : wide tracts are almost perfectly level, and covered in
many places with glacial drift. But the scenery is bold and striking wherever the
table-land is bounded by noble escarpments, with precipitous flanks rising above
the surrounding valleys or the sea. Along the shores of Lough Foyle, the lava
rests upon softer cretaceous and triassic strata, and as these are undermined by the
percolation of water from springs or by rains, the foundations give way, and
the superstructure slips down the hillside, and lies a shapeless mass till it has
been still further disintegrated by frost, rain, and streamlet, and carried away
particle by particle into the ocean.* But elsewhere the lava rises boldly from the
Fi^. 193. — The Giants' Causeway.
sea in a series of terraces of dark columnar basalt, separated from each other
by bands of reddish bole. At the bold promontory of Fair Head, or Benmore
(630 feet), huge columns of basalt descend from the top of the cliff in one or two
sheer vertical sweeps for several hundred feet, the base of the cliff being strewn
with broken columns of trap heaped up in wild confusion.
The Giants' Causeway, a pavement formed of the tops of 40,000 columns of
basalt incessantly washed by the waves of the sea, is the most widely known
amongst the natural curiosities of the coast of Antrim and of all Ireland.
Geologists account for the marvellous regularity of these prisms by the large
quantity of iron which they contain. About one-fourth of these crystallized
masses consist of this metal, and this accounts for the extreme hardness of the
basalt, the smoothness of its faces, its weight, its magnetic properties, and the
* Edward Hull, " The Physical Geology and Geography of Ireland."
IRELAND
385
rust which covers it. According to the legend, the Giants' Causeway is the
remnant of a road which formerly led into Scotland, and, except that this
highway was not constructed by human hands, the legend is true. The
strait which now separates Ireland from Scotland, and which between Benmore
and the Mull of Kin tyre has a width of only 14 miles, had no existence at the
time when the volcanic agencies were most active. The sheets of lava extended
then from shore to shore, just as the mountains of Donegal were connected
with those of Scotland, with which they agree in geological formation and
direction. Eathlin Island, which lies off the coast of Antrim, between Benmore
and the Giants' Causeway, is a remnant of this ancient bridge of lava, and the
cliffs which bound it are formed of gigantic columns of basalt. It has been
Fig. 194.~The Giants' Causeway and Rathlin IsLAxn.
Scale 1 : 250,000
6- 30
WnfG
5°I0
Depth 0 lo 55
Fathoms.
2 Miles
recently proposed to join, by means of a tunnel, the extreme point of Scotland at
the Mull of Kintyre to the Irish coast at Cushendun Bay. Such a tunnel would not
only be much shorter than that proposed for the Strait of Dover, but no danger
whatever could arise during its construction from an irruption of the sea.
The most elevated mountains of the Ireland of to-day are far from piercing
the line of perennial snow, but there was a time when the whole of the country was
buried beneath a sheet of ice and snow. The volcanic rocks of Antrim, which are
partly covered with glacial drift, bear visible witness to the existence of glaciation,
and there is hardly a locality of Ireland which does not exhibit traces of the
ancient passage of glaciers. Boulder clay and gravels, erratic blocks, polished
rock surfaces, all tell the same tale— that the island formerly resembled Greenland.
The fine lines and groovings that mark the direction in which the ice sheets had
386
THE BRITISH ISLES.
moved have been carefully mapped, and they show that the ice travelled outwards
from a great central snow- field which extended obliquely across the country,
from the mountains of Connemara to the plateau of Antrim. To the north
of this field of snow, which included the plateau of Magheraboy, with its hills
grouped like the ribs of a fan, the groovings and striations are towards the north-
west, whilst on the opposite slope their direction is south and south-west, except
where the course of the ice was impeded or deflected by local mountain barriers.
The sheet of ice which at that period covered the plains of Ireland had a thickness
of 1,000 feet.*
But long before the ice planed and levelled vast tracts of the surface of Ireland,
the action of the water, operating through untold ages of our planet, had swept
Fig. 195.— The Table-land of Magheraboy.
Scale 1 : 200,000.
W.of G.
2 Miles.
away a considerable portion of the surface strata. The plain which occupies
nearly the whole of the centre of the island is a proof of this. The extent of this
plain coincides pretty nearly with that of the carboniferous limestone, but the
coal measures of this formation have been removed, and there remain as it
were merely the foundations of the ancient edifices. Only here and there, in
well- sheltered localities, a few shreds of the coal-bearing strata which formerly
overspread so large, a portion of the island still exist. The agents of denuda-
tion which deprived Ireland of her upper carboniferous strata were operative
* Maxwell Close, " Glaciation of Ireland ; " Hull, "Physical Geology and Geography of Ireland."
lEELAND. gg^
for many geological ages succeeding their deposition, during the whole of which
the greater part of the island remained above the level of the sea. Evidence
of local depression, such as is afforded by ancient peat bogs lying below the
sea-level,* is not entirely wanting, but the raised sea-beaches and terraces of
Antrim and Dublin are far more striking. The most continuous of these ancient
terraces is that which can be traced from Antrim southward as far as Wicklow
and upon which one of the wealthiest quarters of publin has been constructed.
The average elevation of this ancient sea-beach is 15 feet, and it corresponds in a
remarkable manner with the " 25-foot terrace " of Scotland, which, in Professor
Geikie's opinion, may have been elevated into dry land since the Roman
occupation of Britain. But whatever the extent of these local oscillations
of the land, the bulk of the island remained emerged during the whole of the
secondary and tertiary epochs. Whilst England, for the most part plunged
beneath the ocean, successively received the sedimentary deposits which account
for the variety of its geological formations, Ireland, on the contrary, was exposed
to the wasting influence of sub-aerial agencies which destroyed its superficial
strata. The waste resulting from this denudation was carried away by ocean
currents to the sister island, and piled above the vast stores of coal already
deposited over the English area, protecting them from sub-aerial waste on the
emergence of the land. Thus Ireland stripped herself to clothe her sister. This
debt, says Professor E. Hull, ought never to be forgotten.
The prodigious number of lakes scattered over the surface of Ireland is the
necessary consequence of the general configuration of the country. There are
lakes in the glens of the mountains, or at their foot, but by far the greater
number are to be met with in the plain. The rain falling over a level country
soon fills up the depressions in the soil, and in many instances these disconnected
sheets of water cover almost as great an area as the solid land which separates them,
and it only needs a local subsidence or depression of the surface through the
agency of a fault, or the formation of a barrier across the effluent draining them,
to combine all these separate basins into a lake of more considerable size. Thus it
was through the agency of a fault in the volcanic rocks that Lough Neagh was
formed. That lake, although the largest in the British Islands — it covers 153
square miles — is very shallow, and notwithstanding that its area is equal to two-
thirds of that of the Lake of Geneva, its cubic contents only amount to the twenty-
fourth part of those of the Swiss lake.f
The majority of the lakes which form so prominent a feature of the limestone
plain are of chemical origin. Their water contains carbonic acid gas, which dis-
solves the limestone in which they are bedded, and carries away enormous quan-
tities of carbonate of lime in solution. By this process the lakes are being
constantly enlarged. We have elsewhere described some of the "sinks" and
"swallows" met with in the calcareous regions of continental Europe. In
Ireland, too, the same phenomena may be observed, though not perhaps on so
* Kinahan, Quarterly Journal of the Geological Society, i. 1877.
t Hardman, Journal of the Royal Geological Society of Ireland, iv.
388
THE BRITISH ISLES.
large a scale as in the mountains bordering upon the Adriatic. Sometimes it
happens that the arch which covers one of the corroded hollows or channels gives
way, and the chasm thus created may give birth to a lake, or lay open an under-
ground river channel. It is thus that Lough Lene feeds both the Dell, a visible
affluent of the Boyne, and an underground channel which communicates with a
river flowing into Lough Ree. The great Lough Mask, which fills a rock basin
in Connemara, has apparently no outlet, except through an artificial canal connect-
ing it with the still larger Lough Corrib. But on closer examination it has
been found that it is drained by an underground river, which reappears in copious
springs at Cong. These springs, which immediately give birth to a large river,
Fig. 196.— The Underground Emissary of Lough Mask.
Scale 1 : 145,000.
S'ao" U/o-f Gr.
5 Miles.
were formerly held in high veneration, and an abbey was built by their side.
Several lakes, similar in all respects to that of Zirknitz, in the Carso, are to be
met with in the fissured limestone region of Western Ireland. During summer
they retire into underground cavities, and sheep browse upon the herbage which
springs up on their bed ; but soon the rainfall causes the hidden water to rise again
to the surface, the lake bed is once more filled, and sometimes it even overflows
and inundates the country around. One of the turloughs, or winter lakes, of
Galway occasionally expands until it is 2 miles wide.*
But whilst some lakes, owing to the erosive action of the water, are perpetually
* William Hughes, " Geography of the British Islands."
IRELAND. 889
enlarging their area, others grow smaller, and in the end disappear altogether,
although they receive the same amount of rain as before, and have not been drained.
Lakes of this kind are sucked up as it were by the vegetation by which they are
invaded. Bogs, or wet spongy morasses formed of decayed vegetable matter,
cover hundreds of square miles in Ireland, and frequently occupy the beds of
ancient lakes, as is proved by the heaps of fresh-water shells found at their
bottom. In many instances this process of displacement is still in course of
progress. The lakes invaded by the marsh plants grow gradually smaller until
they resemble wells, dangerous to the wanderer unaware of their existence.
Occasionally, too, the spongy mass pours forth a stream of mud. This happens
after heavy rains, which cause the bog to swell, until its coarse tissue of vegetable
matter is no longer able to resist the pressure exercised from below. The gases
shut in beneath the upper layers of turf then escape with a noise resembling that of a
volcanic explosion, and streams of water and liquid mud rush out through the open-
ing effected by them. One of these eruptions took place in 1821 in the peat bog of
Kinalady, near Tullamore, about the centre of the great plain. Rumbling noises
had been heard for some time from the bog, and its surface heaved like an agitated
sea, when at length a torrent of mud, 60 feet in depth, burst from a crevice,
overwhelmed the houses and trees that stood in its way, and spread itself over an
area of 5 square miles.* Sometimes calamities of this kind result from a want
of foresight on the part of peat-cutters. By removing the peat from the neigh-
bourhood of a lake, the rampart which retains the still liquid mass that occupies
the interior is sometimes weakened to such an extent as to be incapable of resisting
the pressure from within, and an eruption of mud is the result. The history of
Ireland abounds in instances of this kind. The wanderer who wends his way
across the bogs can tell at once when he is passing over a concealed lake, for
the soil beneath him quakes with every step he takes, and he feels as if he were
walking upon a carpet stretched out in mid-air.
The Irish bogs are amongst the most extensive in Europe, and even in the
veenen of the Netherlands we do not meet with such wide tracts of almost
deserted country, where mud cabins as black as the peat in the midst of which
they rise are rare objects. The bogs of Ireland cover an area of 4,420 square miles ;
that is, nearly the seventh part of the whole island, and in many instances they are
40 feet thick. Those spread over the great central plain have an average
thickness of 26 feet ; but supposing the available peat throughout Ireland to have
a depth of no more than 6 feet, a reserve of fuel equal to 15,000,000,000 cubic
yards lies on the surface. Peat is largely used in the country for domestic purposes,
but cannot compete with mineral coal in factories.
The Dutch bogs naturally divide themselves into hooge veenen and laage
reenen, and similarly in Ireland we have red bogs and black bogs, according
to the plants of which they are formed and their degree of moisture. The black
hogs, which supply nearly all the peat, occupy the plain and the deeper valleys of
the mountains. The vegetable matter of which they consist is undergoing gradual
* Jacob Noggerath, " Der Torf."
390 THE BRITISH ISLES.
mineralisation, and the peat found here and there almost resembles lignite. They
contain also the trunks of trees, known as bog- wood or black oak, from their
ebony colour, which is due to an impregnation with iron. Some of these trunks
dug up from the peat bogs have become so flexible in the course of their long
immersion that they can be cut into straps and twisted into ropes. Formerly the
peasants wove them into coarse nets, upon which they suspended their beds.
Mr. Kinahan is of opinion that, to judge from the layer of bog which covered
them, the trunks of oak dug up at Castleconnell, near the Shannon, must have
been buried at least fifteen hundred years.
The red bogs, owing to their position on the hillsides, are far less humid than
the black ones, and for the most part clothed with patches of heath. Most of the
mountains of Ireland are covered with bog from the foot to the summit ; even
rocky precipices have every vantage-point occupied by patches of bright bog,
presenting the appearance of hanging gardens. We may wander for days through
the hills without ever quitting these red bogs, now and then alternating with
quagmires. In several counties the hills seem to rise like islands above the vast
expanse of black bog surrounding them. The peasants say that the wanderer
in these deserts may chance to pick up a " hunger herb," in which case he runs a
great risk of dying of exhaustion ; but they ascribe to the influence of a mysterious
plant what in their state of poverty may often happen from sheer want.
- The bogs and lakes scattered broadcast over the country store up an immense
quantity of water ; but so considerable is the amount of rain that they are
able to feed numerous rivers in addition. The water of many of these rivers
is stained black with particles of humus ; and several amongst them, including
that which enters Youghal Harbour on the south coast, are known as " Black-
water." Indeed, the rivers of Ireland might be classified into white and black,
as are those of the basin of the Amazonas, according to whether their waters
contain tannin or not. All those which have a long course through bogs are of a
darkish hue, but several purify themselves in their passage through large lakes.
The streams which traverse the great limestone plain resemble chains of lakes
rather than rivers. The normal rivers of Ireland, those which have filled up the
ancient lake basins of their valleys, rise at a considerable elevation, and slope
down rapidly and regularly to their mouth. Amongst such is the Barrow, which,
after its junction with the Nore and Suir, falls into Waterford Harbour. Such
also are the Lee and Blackwater in the south, the Slaney and Lifiey in the east.
Even the Boyne, though rising in a region of swamps, has drained the ancient
lakes which formerly occupied its basin. The Foyle, in the north, is also one of
the rivers whose regimen has become regulated, whilst the Bann only traverses a
single lake, Lough Neagh. Yery striking is the contrast between rivers such as
these, and those which traverse the plain, sluggishly wandering from lake to lake.
Among these latter are the rivers that drain the lakes of Connaught — the Erne,
which is a lake-like expansion for the greater part of its course, and the Shannon,
the most considerable river of all Ireland.
The Owenmore, which drains the valley lying between Cuilcagh on the north
IRELAND.
391
and Slieve JNTakilla on the south, and which flows into the head of Longh Allen,
is the real head-stream of the Shannon, but popular tradition looks upon the
Shannon Pot as the veritable source. This is a copious fountain rising in a lime-
stone caldron, and fed by a subterranean channel which connects it with a lough
at the base of Tiltibane. Scarcely formed, the river is lost in Lough Allen
Fig. 197.— Upper Lough Ern|!.
Scale 1 : 200,000.
s^^£M^.d^^'<^^^ ^im-MK^^-^H
7° 1 30' W.of Gr.
2 Miles.
(160 feet above the sea), and thence to its mouth, for a distance of 209 miles,
the Shannon is navigable. On issuing from Lough Allen the river flows
sluggishly for 80 miles over the central plain, passing through Lough Eee
(122 feet) and Lough Derg (108 feet), when it enters the gorge of Xillaloe,
separating Slieve Bernagh from Slieve Arra, and with a rapid fall reaches
Limerick, where it becomes a tidal river. We may fairly ask how it happens
392
THE BRITISH ISLES.
that the Shannon, instead of flowing straight into Galway Bay, from which no
natural obstacle separates it, strikes across a mountain range formed of hard and
solid rocks, through which it had laboriously to cut itself a passage. It is quite
clear that the gorge of the Shannon is not a work of recent date ; it was scooped
out long before the great central plain had been denuded of the masses of softer
rocks which formerly covered it. Then this mountain range formed no obstacle,
for the river flowed at an elevation of many hundred feet above its present channel.
At that remote epoch it first began to scoop out the ravine through which
it now takes its course, and the work of erosion kept pace with the denudation
which swept away the coal measures of the great central plain. In this gorge, cut
Fig. 198. — The Falls of Doonass, at Castleconnell.
through Silurian slates and old red sandstone, the river has a rapid fell, and
before it reaches the maritime plain pours its immense volume over a ledge of
rocks. Castleconnell, with its lofty towers, fine mansions, and green lawns
descending to the waterside, commands this sublime spectacle of a foaming river
rushing onward through a congregation of huge rocks. The eye grows giddy
as it follows the hurrying eddies. But, at the foot of the fall, all is peace. The
deep and silent water, reflecting the trees that grow upon the banks, lies dormant ;
the current is hardly perceptible ; and the river resembles a lake shut in by ivy-
clad walls.
Below Limerick the Shannon enters its broad and winding estuary — one of
IRELAND.
893
those numerous indentations which vary the contour of Ireland's Atlantic coast.
The western seaboard of Ireland, like that of Scotland, and for the same reasons, is
far more indented than that facing the east. The bays of Leinster bear no com-
parison with the firths of Scotland. Cork Harbour, with its winding passages and
islands, is the only estuary along the south coast at all presenting the features of
a Scotch loch. The north-eastern portion of the coast, which faces the Scotch
Fig. 199.— The Mouth of the Shannon.
From an Admii-alty Chart. Scale 1 : 178,000.
S7 Z^&l^/'r'ii
TheUgU on .S,-unrryl ,/,„„.t „ HcJ.
2 Miles,
peninsulas of Galloway and Kintyre, is more varied in outline, while the Loughs
of Carlingford, Strangford, Belfast, and Larne penetrate far inland ; but it cannot
compare with the Atlantic coast, where, between Malin Head, in Donegal, and
Cape Clear, in the county of Cork, bays, creeks, and river estuaries rapidly succeed
each other. There are islands, too, and all of them, whether they occur singly or
in groups, are detached fragments of the mainland. They stud the bays, form
outlying promontories, and give rise to a variety of landscape features, presenting
122— E
894 THE BEITISH ISLES.
the greatest contrast to the uniform development of the east coast. On that side
of Ireland there are but two islands, Lambay Island and Ireland's Eye, near
Dublin Bay, besides the banks which mark the former extent of the coast, and
terminate with the Tuskar Rock in the south.
The reasons for this contrast must be looked for in glacial action ; for Western
Ireland, which is exposed to the moisture-laden winds of the Atlantic, remained
much longer buried beneath a sheet of ice and snow than the east, where the dry
winds blowing from the continent exercised more influence. But other agencies
have no doubt aided in the formation of these western firths. The elongated bays
of Kerry, for instance, so remarkable for their parallelism, appear to have been
scooped out by the chemical action of the waves, which dissolved the calcareous
rocks of the valleys, but respected the old red sandstone forming the promontories.
This chemical action is analogous to that which continually enlarges the lakes of
the central plain. In several instances these Irish firths, like those of Scotland,
terminate in lakes, as in the case of Ballinskelligs Bay, near the south- westernmost
promontory of Kerry, at the head of which lies Lough Currane. In the same
county of Kerry we meet with rocks which become calcined through the action of
the sea. The cliffs of Bally bunion, which rise in crags and needles to a height of
] 50 feet, are perforated by caverns at their foot. They enclose beds of bitumen
and deposits of pyrites, which a landslip occasionally exposes to the action of the
atmosphere. Whenever this happens the pyrites decompose spontaneously with a
considerable evolution of heat, sufiicient to set fire to the bituminous rocks, and
whilst the foot of the cliffs is then lashed by the waves, columns of smoke may be
seen curling up from its summit.*
The climate of Ireland' is essentially a maritime one, and even more humid
than that of Great Britain. The rainfall throughout the island averages
36 inches, and in the hills, which condense the moisture of the prevalent westerly
winds, the amount of precipitation is more considerable still. No other country
of Europe is so abundantly supplied with rain. Occasionally the downpour along
the western coasts is so considerable that the sea, for a great distance from
the land, becomes covered with a thick layer of fresh water. The fishermen drink
this water, and naturalists may witness the curious spectacle of two superposed
faunas — the one fluviatile, the other marine. The marine animals, on being brought
into the surface water, become paralyzed, whilst the fluviatile ones are poisoned on
being plunged into deep water. f Westerly and south-westerly winds prevail, and
they are frequently of great violence. The American cyclones, in their progress
to Europe, always pass over Ireland. Even the Irish Sea is exceptionally tem-
pestuous, owing to these south-westerly winds and the conflicting tidal waves which
meet within it.
The extreme humidity of the climate exercises a retarding influence upon the
harvest. Wheat is never cut before the beginning of September, and in excep-
* William Ainsworth, " Caves of Ballybunion," 1834.
t Edward Forbes, " Natural History of the European Seas."
IRELAND 395
tionally wet years its harvest has had to be postponed to the middle of October,
whilst the oats have been as late as November. Under the same latitude in Russia
the cereals are sown later and harvested a month or forty days earlier. Such is the
contrast produced by differences of climate ! But these disadvantages are attended
by corresponding privileges. The woods, meadows, fields, and gardens are clad
with verdure throughout the year, and entitle Ireland to the epithets of " Green
Erin " and the '' Emerald of the Seas." The rich verdure, murmuring streams in
every valley, mists spread over the hillsides, and clouds scudding along the skies
impart an aspect of sadness and placidity to nature which impresses the mind in the
same manner as do the sweetly melancholic strains of Irish melody.* The equability
of the climate enables many southern types of plants to flourish upon the island.
The inhabitants of Mediterranean countries, when they visit the Lakes of Killarney,
are surprised to see the strawberry-tree growing on the hillsides. Even in the
north of the island winter in the valleys sheltered against northerly winds is very
mild, the strawberry growing by the side of the cypress, as it does in Italy.
Ireland, as respects a portion of its flora, forms part of Lusitania, for about
ten species, including the arbutus, or strawberry-tree, are common to it and to the
Azores, Madeira, Portugal, and the Cantabrian coast. This points to the fact that
there was a time when Ireland formed part of territories now severed from it by
an irruption of the sea. Almost every one of the islands along the west coast
has a flora of its own, with which mingle plants from neighbouring botanical
regions, t
Ireland was formerly clad with forests, as is proved not only by the trunks of
trees found in the bogs, but also by many geographical names, such as Derry,
which means " Grove of Oaks." These forests disappeared in consequence of
wars and maladministration. Even during the Middle Ages wood had become so
scarce that in certain districts of the island it was cheaper to make the hoops for
barrels of whalebone. In the west, and more especially in the county of Mayo,
trees were so scarce about thirty years ago that the peasants imagined them to be
huge vegetables. Ireland is poorer in species of plants and animals than Great
Britain, and still more so than continental Europe, this being one of the penalties
attached to an insular position. In Belgium, for instance, we meet with twenty-
two species of reptiles ; in England with scarcely half that number ; in Ireland
with only five. Forbes concludes that these animals migrated westward along
the isthmus which formerly attached the British Islands to the continent. When
the sea swept away the connecting land all of these animals had not yet emigrated,
or, at all events, the colonies which they had planted were not numerous enough
to resist destructive agencies. The Irish peasants — a very superstitious race —
believe that serpents and toads formerly abounded on their island, but that
St. Patrick destroyed them. The promontory from which he flung them into the
sea is still pointed out, and although the experience of our zoological gardens
* Thackeray, " Irish Sketch-Book.
t G. nove, Proceedings of the Royal Irish Academy, July, 1876; Charles Martins, Sevue des Deux-
Mondes, 1st March, 1867.
396 THE BRITISH ISLES.
proves the contrary, the peasants maintain that every serpent dies as soon as it
touches the soil of Ireland. Geologists have discovered in Ireland the remains
of the mammoth and hippopotamus, and of numerous ruminants, including
deer and two species of the ancient ox. Three species of deer have been
discovered in the caves, peat mosses, and alluvial deposits of the country,
of which the red deer survives in the mountains of Killarney, whilst the
great Irish deer may have lived until towards the close of the twelfth century.
The abundance of deer must be attributed to the absence of animals of the feline
tribe, such as the hyena and cave lion ; and their only enemies were the wolf and
the bear, against which fleetness of limb and the power of natation afforded
trustworthy means of escape.*
The relative poverty of the Irish fauna reveals itself in the paucity of birds of
passage no less than in that of sedentary animals. Out of thirty species of con-
tinental birds which pass the summer in England, all but one extend their
journey as far as Scotland ; but, according to Harting, only eight or nine visit
Ireland, the rest being either deterred by the width of the Irish Channel, or
altogether unaware of the existence of that island. The magpie was formerly
looked upon as a new arrival in Ireland. This is a mistake ; but that bird, being
protected by superstition, has become very common, and during summer evenings
dense flocks descend upon the sown fields.
The People.
In accordance with a tradition formerly often quoted, lerne, or Ireland, is
indebted for its epithet of Insula Sacra to the fact that at the time of the
Deluge it floated like an ark upon the surface of the waters, and on its subsidence
gave their first inhabitants to the neighbouring islands. The Irish, therefore,
not only deny that their ancestors came from foreign lands, but they claim also to
have peopled all the neighbouring countries. As to the ancient monkish " annals "
of the country, they abound in so many legends that it is next to impossible to
discover the truth which underlies them. Irish chroniclers, who have endeavoured
to transform the mythology of their race into a regular history with dates and
genealogies, speak of the Firbolgs, or "men dressed in the skins of animals," as
the aboriginal inhabitants of the country. These " beings of the night " were
conquered by the " gods of day," or Tuatha-de-dananns, who were the people of
Dana, the mother of the gods.f These latter were acquainted with the metals,
and they made arms, tools, and musical instruments. But the Tuatha-de-
dananns were vanquished in turn by a third body of invaders, the warlike
" Milesians " of Spain, who came into the country eleven or fourteen centuries
before Christ, and overthrew the kingdom of Inis- Fail, the "Island of Doom."
The descendants of these Milesians, it is pretended, can be recognised, even at the
present day, by having an 0' or a Mac prefixed to their family names. It is only
natural that a proud people like the Irish, in its day of humiliation, should
*Hull, "Physical Geology," &e. ; Owen, " Palaeontology."
t D'Arbois de Jubainville, " Esquisse dela My thologie iiiandaise " {Eevue archeohgique, June, 1878).
IRISH.
e>s-cA^.
396 THE BRITISH ISLES.
proves the contrary, the peasants maintain that every serpent dies as soon as it
touches the soil of Ireland. Geologists have discovered in Ireland the remains
of the mammoth and hippopotamus, and of numerous ruminants, including
deer and two species of the ancient ox. Three species of deer have been
discovered in the caves, peat mosses, and alluvial deposits of the country,
of which the red deer survives in the mountains of Killarney, whilst the
great Irish deer may have lived until towards the close of the twelfth century.
The abundance of deer must be attributed to the absence of animals of the feline
tribe, such as the hyena and cave lion ; and their only enemies were the wolf and
the bear, against which fleetness of limb and the power of natation afforded
trustworthy means of escape.*
The relative poverty of the Irish fauna reveals itself in the paucity of birds of
passage no less than in that of sedentary animals. Out of thirty species of con-
tinental birds which pass the summer in England, all but one extend their
journey as far as Scotland ; but, according to Harting, only eight or nine visit
Ireland, the rest being either deterred by the width of the Irish Channel, or
altogether unaware of the existence of that island. The magpie was formerly
looked upon as a new arrival in Ireland. This is a mistake ; but that bird, being
protected by superstition, has become very common, and during summer evenings
dense flocks descend upon the sown fields.
The People.
In accordance with a tradition formerly often quoted, lerne, or Ireland, is
indebted for its epithet of Insula Sacra to the fact that at the time of the
Deluge it floated like an ark upon the surface of the waters, and on its subsidence
gave their first inhabitants to the neighbouring islands. The Irish, therefore,
not only deny that their ancestors came from foreign lands, but they claim also to
have peopled all the neighbouring countries. As to the ancient monkish " annals "
of the country, they abound in so many legends that it is next to impossible to
discover the truth which underlies them. Irish chroniclers, who have endeavoured
to transform the mythology of their race into a regular history with dates and
genealogies, speak of the Firbolgs, or "men dressed in the skins of animals," as
the aboriginal inhabitants of the country. These " beings of the night " were
conquered by the *'gods of day," or Tuatha-de-dananns, who were the people of
Dana, the mother of the gods.f These latter were acquainted with the metals,
and they made arms, tools, and musical instruments. But the Tuatha-de-
dananns were vanquished in turn by a third body of invaders, the warlike
" Milesians " of Spain, who came into the country eleven or fourteen centuries
before Christ, and overthrew the kingdom of Inis-Fail, the ''Island of Doom."
The descendants of these Milesians, it is pretended, can be recognised, even at the
present day, by having an 0' or a Mac prefixed to their family names. It is only
natural that a proud people like the Irish, in its day of humiliation, should
* Hull, "Physical Geology," &c. ; Owen, " PalEeontology."
t D'Arbois de Jubainville, " Esquisse dela My thologie irlandaise " {Revue archeohgique, June, 1878).
^^W^0y"
^^- <f-^.^-._ c^ j,.^
lEELAND. 39Y
take a delight in tlie past, and deify its heroes. The descendants of these ancient
Irish still celebrate the glories of other days, and sing with enthusiasm the high
deeds of their warrior ancestors, as if a share of the distinction achieved belonged
to themselves. Fin MacCumhal, the legendary king, whose name has been
changed into Fiugal by the Ossianic muse, is ever present to the mind of the
children of Erin. To him they dedicate the most beauteous sites of their island,
and everywhere they see the remains of his castles. Qi^ite recently those Irishmen
who leagued together in order to free their country from English rule assumed
the name of " Fenians," in memory of Fin, or Fion, who commanded the national
militia seventeen centuries ago.*
The similarity between Erse, or ancient Irish, and the Gaelic of the Scotch
Highlands justifies us in the belief that at the dawn of history the inhabitants of
lerne, Igbernia, or Hibernia were the kinsmen of the Caledonians of Scotland. But
quite irrespective of the Spaniards in Galway and Kinsale, many strange elements
have since those early days become fused with the Celtic population of the island.
Danes, or " Northmen," have frequently invaded the country. It is they who
gave a name to Dan-na-n-gall, or Donegal, and for over tw^o centuries they were
the masters of Dublin. Wexford and Waterford were likewise Danish towns.
The geographical nomenclature of the country furnishes a rough guide to the
relative importance of the constituent elements of the population. More than three-
fourths of the names are Celtic, f but there are many whose origin is evidently
Scandinavian. As a matter of course the largest bodies of invaders and colonists
arrived from the neighbouring island of Great Britain, and not only the English and
Scotch took possession of a part of the country, but the Welsh had their share
likewise. The barony of Forth, at the south-eastern point of Ireland, is said to
be inhabited by the descendants of Welshmen who came into the country with
Strongbow, about seven centuries ago. Welsh was spoken there up to the close
of last century, and the manners of the people conclusively prove that they are
the kin of the English Cymry. They are said to be more orderly and peaceable
than the native Irish around them, and also more happy, which may arise in
a large measure from their being the owners of the land they cultivate. If
Thackeray + may be believed, they took the most energetic measures for keeping
possession of their land, for they killed every stranger whom they suspected of an
intention of acquiring seignorial rights. Until recently there was not in these
*' Welsh Mountains " of Wexford a single large estate.
The English, no less than the Welsh, and others who preceded them, came
into Ireland as conquerors. According to an old legend, the first invader, in his
ardour to take possession, cut oif his right hand before he landed, in order that it
might seize upon the country a little earlier: hence the ''bloody hand" which
figures in the coats of arms of many noble families of Ireland. Arriving during
the latter half of the twelfth century, the English had to fight for more than four
* Sullivan, "New Ireland."
t Chalmers, " Caledonia."
X " The Irish Sketch-Book."
898 THE BRITISH ISLES.
hundred years before they had secured their conquest. The " pale," or barrier of
stakes, which formerly bounded the territories they held in Leinster, Meath, and
Munster, expanded or retreated according to the fortunes of war, and. even in the
days of Henry VIII. the English pale of Dublin extended only 20 miles. But
more than four centuries of partial occupation had done much to mingle the blood
of the two peoples, and to spread the use of the English language. In a subse-
quent age, during the great religious wars, Ireland was once more subjected to
devastation. The population of whole towns was either massacred or exiled
in a body, and the conquered territories were divided amongst English colonists.
Queen Elizabeth gave away 200,000 acres in the province of Munster ; James I.
confiscated six entire counties in Northern Ireland (Armagh, Cavan, Fermanagh,
Derry, Tyrone, and Donegal), with a view of ''planting " them with Scotch and
English Protestants, and later on, by a legal quibble, possessed himself of an
additional 500,000 acres in various parts of the island, which he likewise distributed
amongst colonists drawn from Great Britain.* During the Commonwealth one
of the first acts of the Parliament was to bestow 1,000,000 acres upon English
clergymen, and when the Catholics had been definitely defeated they were com-
pelled to move into the country districts of Connaught and Clare, as the towns of
this territory were to become exclusively Protestant. Their southern boundary
was to be the Shannon, and every Irishman found on the left bank of that river
might be killed without fear of legal consequences. "Go to hell, or go to Con-
naught " is a proverbial saying which originated at that time. There is no doubt
that many Irish Catholics,. or " Tories," remained in the provinces from which they
had been legally expelled. This was more especially the case as regards the
mountains of Tyrconnell, Galtymore, and Kerry, and the almost inaccessible bog
lands. Besides this, the new landowners themselves kept about them a number
of peasants to cultivate the soil. Nor were all the Protestants men of foreign
origin. These latter, however, formed at that time a very considerable portion of
the population of Ireland, and they were subsequently reinforced by the peaceable
immigration of Scotchmen into Ulster, where they assimilated the manners of
the people to those of the Lowlands on the other side of the Channel. As a result
of all these immigrations, there must have occurred a strong infusion of Anglo-
Celtic blood ; but in frequent instances the two races have lived side by side
without intermingling, and the stock of the people of Ireland appears to be
Celtic to this day. In Ulster we meet with "triple" towns, like those which
formerly existed in Greece and Italy. Downpatrick, for instance, has an Irish
quarter, a Scotch quarter, and an English quarter. Amongst emigrants of
various races there still remain to be mentioned the German " Palatines," who
settled near Galway at the commencement of last century.f It is, however, a
curious ethnological fact, and one reminding us of analogous features in the
fauna and flora of Ireland, that a gipsy has never been seen upon that island.
These wanderers, who are represented in every part of the world, including even
• * Lingard; Hallam; Gustave de Beaumont, " L'Irlande, sociale, politique et religieuse."
t J. G. Kohl, "Reisen in Irland."
IRELAND.
South America, have never yet crossed the narrow Irish Sea. Nor are Jews
numerous.
very
But whatever race element may preponderate in the Irish people, the ancient
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Proportion of Celtic-speaking Inhabitants.
10 to 25 per cent. 25 to 50 per cent. Over 50 per cent.
is now of very little importance. In Ireland it is understood hy a majority only in
portions of the west and south-west, and more especially in the counties of Mayo and
Waterford. In 1851 the districts in which Irish was the language of the majority
had an area of 9,325 square miles, with 1,328,938 inhabitants ; in 1871 their area
400 THE BRITISH ISLES.
was 5,293 square miles, with 545,658 inhabitants.* Altogether Irish was spoken in
1851 by 1,524,286 persons (23-26 per cent, of the population) ; in 1871 by only
817,875 persons (15-11 percent, of the population), and amongst these latter there
were only 103,563 who were unable to speak English. Erse, which is written in
the same characters as its predecessor berla feini, no longer suffices for giving
expression to all our modern ideas, and notwithstanding the efforts of resuscitation
made by the Society for the Preservation of the Irish Language, English has
become the language of civilised life, as in the other parts of the kingdom, and the
days of Irish are numbered. Not a newspaper is published in that tongue, and
the translations of the Iliad and of Moore's *' Irish Melodies," recently prepared
by the Most Rev. John McHale, are not works intended to meet a popular demand.
The older Irish literature, however, is very rich. It includes amongst others a
large number of manuscripts relating to the traditions of Ireland. Most of these
works show that the manners which existed at the time of their composition have
passed away. Amongst the many Irish documents and chronicles preserved in the
library of Trinity College are the " seven times fifty " histories, which the old
bards used to relate on festive occasions in the presence of chiefs and king. These
"histories" deal with massacres, battles, invasions, sieges, navigations, voyages,
visions, tragedies, and kindred subjects.!
But though Erse is on the point of being altogether superseded by a language
possessing greater vitality, and better adapted to give expression to contemporary
ideas, it will survive in the geographical nomenclature of the country. Mountains
will continue to be known as Slieve, Ben, or Knock ; hills, mounds, and rocks will
still remain Duns, Car ricks, Croaghs or Croghans, Cloghs, and Kens ; the words
Lough and Innish, or Ennis, will apply to lakes and islands ; a swampy plain
will be known as Curragh ; a watercourse as Ana, or Anagh ; towns and villages
will be recognised by the prefixes Kill and Bally; while Jfore (Great) and ^^^
(Little) will serve to distinguish neighbouring mountains, rivers, bogs, and inlets
of the sea.
Ogham inscriptions have been found far more plentifully in Ireland than in
the sister island, and they have given rise to incessant discussions amongst the
learned. This alphabet, which they succeeded in deciphering after bilingual
descriptions in Latin and Old Irish had been discovered in the south of England
and in Wales, + consists of lines, or groups of lines, attached to a single stem.
Several of these inscriptions, and apparently those of the latest date, read
backwards ; that is, from right to left. According to the ancient chronicles
the oghams were introduced into Ireland by the Tuatha-de-dananns many
centuries before the Christian era, and they certainly date back to a time when the
inhabitants were heathens. These characters are in all probability of an age
anterior to that of the Romans ; for we can hardly conceive that they should have
* Eavenstein, " On the Celtic Lacguages in the British Isles,' 1879.
t Brian O Looney, "On Ancient Historic Tales of the Irish Language," Proceedings of the Royal
Irish J^cademy, Decemher. 1875.
X Sam. Ferguson, Froceedings of the Royal Irish Academy, August, 1874.
i|ll|IlilllllIIIIIIIlllilll!lllllll!
IRELAND. 401
been invented after the much simpler Latin alphabet had become known.* Rut
however this may be, it can hardly be doubted that most of the stones with ogham
inscriptions were raised between the fifth and eighth centuries of our era, for they
bear Christian emblems. As to the relationship supposed to exist between the
oghams and the Scandinavian runes, the learned have not yet arrived at an
agreement.
Ancient stone monuments, which were formerly |br the most part attributed to
the Danes, abound in Ireland, and this applies more especially to rathH, or
sepulchral mounds. There are districts in which every hill-top is crowned with a
rath. The sixty-seven stones of Raphre, in Donegal, form an old temple similar to
Stonehenge ; the extensive entrenchments of Grianan, near Londonderry, cover a
whole hill. Elsewhere we meet with cromlechs rising above the heather. But
the most remarkable, and at the same time most mysterious, monuments of ancient
Ireland are the round towers scattered over the whole island. Of ancient struc-
tures of this kind eighty-three have been discovered, whilst in Scotland, where
similar towers were probably constructed by men of the same race, there are but
two, and in the whole remainder of Europe none at all. The round towers of
Ireland bear some resemblance to minarets. Several of them are built of
unhewn rocks, not touched by iron implements ; others are of hewn stone.
Most of them rise singly. Their height varies between 70 and 128 feet, with a
diameter of 10 to 16 feet, and the walls decrease in thickness with the height.
Excepting four instances, the openings which give access to the interior are at a
considerable elevation above the ground. t As in the case of the nuraghe of
Sardinia, these towers have been ascribed to the most diverse peoples, and whilst
there are some who look upon them as the work of Phoenicians or Carthaginians,
others prefer the claims of fire-worshippers, Greeks, or Danes. History is silent
as to their origin, but it is certain that the Danes were not the architects, for they
raised no such monuments in their Scandinavian homes, and we can hardly
conceive their doing so in foreign lands which they were about to colonise.
These round towers were most likely the spontaneous product of Irish archi-
tects, and were probably built between the ninth and twelfth centuries, some
as belfries and watch-towers, others as appendages to religious edifices. It
is true that none of the ancient ecclesiastical documents refer to them,+ unless,
indeed, they are clocteachs, or steeples, as Mr. Petrie supposes. The towers of
Kilkenny and several others stand on the site of Christian churchyards, which
can only have been opened after the arrival of St. Patrick, for all the dead lie
stretched out from east to west.§ But whatever may have been the origin of
these towers, there can be no doubt that the clergy held possession of them during
the Middle Ages, for churches and chapels have been raised in their vicinity. At
the present day Irish patriots look upon these round towers as the great national
* John Rhys, Proceedings of the Royal Irish Academy, December, 1875.
t Mr. and Mrs. Hall, *' Ireland, its Scenery and Character."
X J. Bourke, "The Aryan Origin of the Gaelic Race and Language."
9 Dunraven, " Notes on Irish Architecture."
402 THE BRITISH ISLES.
monuments of the country, and when they sought to render exceptional honour to
their champion O'Connell, they raised one of these minarets over his grave in the
cemetery of Duhh'n.
In many respects the Middle Ages, and even prehistoric times, continued longer
in Ireland than in Great Britain.* Lake dwellings, such as are now being explored
with so much curiosity in the lakes of the Alps, existed until quite recently
in the vast lowland region of Ireland. The nature of the soil was favourable to
their existence. After the great forests had been destroyed, an island, surrounded
by deep water, afforded, in fact, the most secure retreat. Several cranogues,
or wooden forts placed upon piles or artificial islands, continued to be inhabited
up to the beginning of the seventeenth century. The more remote a district, and
the less intercourse it had with strangers, the longer could ancient manners and
customs survive in it. The island of Aran, which lies out of the world, from which
it is defended by winds and waves, and abounds in cromlechs, raths, and barrows,
was the " Sacred Island" of the Irish Celts, as the islands of Sein, Mona, and lona
were sacred to the Britons of Armorica and Great Britain. Still more remote are
the islands of Inishkea, in the open Atlantic, off the coast of Mayo. Their inha-
bitants, living far away from high-roads of commerce and ignored by their con-
querors, were heathens in 1872, and probably are so still. When the wind
blows a tempest and renders fishing impossible, the islanders carry an idol, dressed
in wool, along the strand, in the hope that he may calm the sea : their wishes are
frequently fulfilled, when they respectfully restore their idol to its sanctuary.
Seals are numerous along the coasts of Inishkea, but the inhabitants take care not
to kill them, for they believe that the souls of their departed relatives reside in
them.t Inish Torragh, or Tory Island, near the coast of Donegal, has no gods
of its own, but it has a fisherman, elected by his three or four hundred companions,
for its king, and this potentate has power to exile those amongst the islanders
who refuse compliance with the ancient customs. + On Sliefe Callan, an almost
insulated mountain in the county of Clare, on the Bay of Liscanor, there stands an
altar raised in honour of the sun-god, and up to the close of the last century pigs
were sacrificed upon it, and flowers scattered over the turf around it.§
In a few of the more remote districts the aspect of the inhabitants is almost that
of savages, their small eyes, low foreheads, and tangled hair giving them the
appearance of Tatars. But as a rule the Irish are a fine race, notwithstanding the
small turned-up nose, which at once enables us to pick out a son of Erin amongst
a crowd of Englishmen. || The natives of Joyce's Country, in Connemara, are of
almost gigantic stature, with fine limbs and strong muscles. The men of Tipperary,
though smaller, are no less strong, and are distinguished for their agility and
grace. Comparative measurements made in the universities of the United Kingdom
* O'Cuny, " On the Manners and Customs of the Ancient Irish."
t Journal of the London A>ithropological Institute, ii. p. 447.
X A. M. Sullivan, "New Ireland."
§ Ferguson, " Evidences of Sun-Worship at Mount Callan," Proceedings of the Royal Irish Academy,
Decemher, 1875.
II Koget de Belloguet, " Ethnogenie Gauloise," ii.
IRELAND. 408
prove that the young men of Trinity College, Dublin, do not yield in stature or
strength to their rivals of Oxford, Cambridge, Glasgow, or Edinburgh ; nay, that
they are even slightly their superiors. Even Englishmen* admit that most Irish-
women who are able to lead a life of ease and nourish their beauty are of more dis-
tinguished appearance than their own countrywomen ; they are at the same time
full of grace and open-hearted gaiety, and exhibit considerable taste in their
dress. There are few countries in Europe whose women possess so much true
dignity and self-respect. In many districts of Ireland even the peasant women,
notwithstanding the arduous labour which has fallen to their lot, are indebted to
their race for noble features and a proud carriage which would attract attention
anywhere.
It is wrong to judge all Irishmen from those amongst them who have been
depraved by years of oppression and hereditary poverty ; to reproach them with
their obsequious language and the profuse flattery they lavish upon their
superiors ; or to subscribe the cruel saying that you need only " put an Irishman
on a spit, and you will always find another Irishman to turn it." Even the
poorest Irishmen, notwithstanding their abject condition, still retain excellent
qualities. They love each other, assist one another in misfortune, and always keep
the door of their cabin hospitably open. Little suffices for their wants, and they are
gay even when deprived of all that renders life easy. The least benefit conferred
upon them lives ever after in their memory. Though great braggarts and not
very careful of the truth, owing to an excess of imagination, they are nevertheless
sincere and ingenuous at bottom, and religiously keep their word when once it has
been pledged. They love fighting for fighting's sake. In many respects they have
remained children, notwithstanding the hard experience of their lives. They are
full of natural spirits, and subject to fits of transport ; easily carried away by their
imagination, and addicted to idle fancies. They lack a sense of order, and are not
sufficiently persevering in their enterprises. Drunkenness is a vice no less general
in Ireland than in England. Between 1839 and 1845 there existed a prospect of
all Irishmen taking pledges of temperance and forswearing the use of usque-
baugh. At the time when the fervour evoked through the preaching of Father
Mathew was at its height, about half the population of the country pledged itself
to abstain from strong drinks. In a single day 13,000 persons turned teetotalers,
and in several districts all public-houses were closed. But in a poor country
the temptation to drink is strong, and the pledges were soon forgotten. Drunken-
ness received, indeed, a fresh impulse from the great famine. In many localities
the persons charged with the distribution of the charitable funds were at the same
time dealers in spirits, and what they gave with one hand they took back with
the other.
To Englishmen Irish '' bulls " are often a source of amusement, but for all
this, and notwithstanding their assumption of ingenuousness, Irishmen are, as a rule,
very shrewd. They are cunning when in dread of violence, but respond frankly
to kind words. Naturally intelligent and of inquiring mind, they attend the
♦ Thackeray, ''Irish Sketch-Book."
404 THE BEITISH ISLES.
schools with diligence. Until recently there existed in Ireland, as in Greece,
open-air or " hedge schools," in which the teacher, seated under a hedge, was
surrounded by his studious pupils. This custom dated from a time anterior
to 1830, up to which year all primary education, excepting that vouchsafed
through the agency of the Established Church, was interdicted.* The Irish are
vehement in their language, ardent in attack, and smart in repartee. They
excel in flights of fancy, and readily find a word to sum up a situation.
They are, in fact, born orators, and a greater number of truly eloquent speakers
have arisen amongst them than in England. Their writers possess no less verve
than their talkers, and the Irish newspapers are written with a persuasiveness
which we look for in vain in the journals published on the other side of St. George's
Channel. Bravery is a quality common to all Irishmen ; they have supplied the
armies of England with some of its most famous leaders, and from them its ranks
are largely recruited. During the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries thousands of
Irishmen died fighting in French regiments, for they turned lovingly to France
as to a country which professed the same religion, and shared with them the hatred
of England. The narrow bays on the south-western coasts were at that time the
trysting-places where young Irishmen desirous of entering the service of France
found vessels to carry them over the sea.
For two hundred years the Irish have been a conquered people, and are so
still. English rule, against which they have struggled so long, still weighs
upon them, and Irish patriots have not ceased to claim "Home Rule" in one
shape or another. The Isle of Erin is the only country in Europe which wholly
escaped Roman conquests, and never suffered from the invasion of barbarians.
The character of its civilisation was consequently more spontaneous, and although
ardent patriots exaggerate its importance, it certainly did exercise an influence
upon the development of Great Britain ; and Ireland, far from having invari-
ably been England's pupil, acted occasionally as her neighbour's instructress.
The conquest of Ireland by the English was virtually an irruption of barbarians,
which arrested the free flight of Irish genius ; and in losing their independ-
ence the inhabitants of Erin lost, at the same time, the prerogatives which that
independence had conferred upon them. From that day Ireland ceased to play
a part in European history. All civilisation vanished during the atrocious
wars which devastated the soil of Ireland and destroyed the population of whole
districts. Sir John Norris, one of the English leaders during the reign of
Queen Elizabeth, killed all the inhabitants of Rathlin Island, and the refugees
who had fled to it for shelter, sparing neither women nor children, but driving
all into the caverns, and killing them, as he states in his official reports, "as
if they had been seals or otters." t But the Irish avenged themselves in
1641, when they massacred at least 20,000 Englishmen and Scotchmen. For
this, however, Cromwell inflicted a terrible punishment upon them. We all
know how he treated Drogheda, with what tranquillity of mind he caused fire to
* Sullivan, ''New Ireland."
t Fronde, "The English in Ireland."
IRELAND.
405
be laid to the church of St. Peter, within which the defenders of the town had
sought a refuge. Cromwell thought of selling Ireland to the Jews, on their under-
taking to pay an annual rent of £2,000,000. '' It is no felony to kill an Irishman "
was a proverb of that period.
The greatest change introduced in Ireland by the English conquerors was
that which revolutionised the tenure of lands. Up to the close of the sixteenth
century there existed no individual property in the ^soil. The land belonged to
the septa, or clan, whose chieftain, elected for life, distributed it amongst the
members of the community, as was done in Russia until the abolition of serfdom.
There existed no large stone buildings in the rural districts, and the agricultural
nomads lived in miserable mud cabins, not superior to those of the present
day. When James I. succeeded to the English throne, he offered to convert into
feudal landowners the chieftains whom he found in possession, and few amongst
them resisted this tempting offer. Subsequently many turned rebels or engaged
in conspiracies, when the land was taken away from them, and handed over
to Scotch and English immigrants. The dispossessed septas, however, never
forgot that anciently the soil was the common property of all ; and even now,
in many villages, the descendants of the old chieftains are treated with defer-
ence, and entertained at the public expense, as if they were the elect of the
people.
Deprived of their land, the Irish were at the same time persecuted on account
of their religion. Even after the law which compelled all Irishmen to live beyond
the Shannon had become a dead letter, those amongst them who were Catholics
were denied the protection of the common law. For many years a premium was
paid to any one who turned Protestant, and the Protestant son of a Catholic
father might at once enter into possession of his father's goods, though the latter
was still living. The office of informer or " priest-hunter " became a profes-
sion which led to honours and fortune. Up to 1832 the Irish were represented
in Parliament exclusively by Protestants, and quite recently they were obliged to
pay tithes to the Anglican Church, of which they were not members. The mass
of the Irish people are much attached to the Catholic priests, whom they look upon
as the natural representatives of the national cause : they have forgotten that
it was Pope Adrian lY. who gave Ireland to the English, and that the priesthood
at that time zealously supported the cause of the invaders.
Poverty must naturally be very great in a country like Ireland, where most of
the soil is in the hands of great landowners ; where industry, except in a few
favoured districts, is hardly known ; and where, during the eighteenth century,
the development of various manufactures was stifled in the bad through the
jealousy of avaricious English monopolists. Only in Ulster did the farmers
enjoy security of tenure, for the privileges granted them by James I. made them
proprietors of all the improvements they had effected on the land. As long as
they paid their rent the landlord was not permitted to disturb them, unless,
indeed, he was prepared to compensate them for their improvements. These
privileges did not, however, extend to the other provinces. An absurd adherence
406 THE BRITISH ISLES.
to ancient routine and a too minute subdivision of the soil caused the agricultural
resources of the country to be wasted. In Donegal and other parts of Northern
Ireland large farms used to be leased to a number of persons, by whom they
were subdivided according to the quality of the soil, a portion of each field
being allotted to a separate tenant. When the father died, his separate lots
were again subdivided according to the number of his children, until only
a crumb remained to each. This method of subdivision, known as "rundale"
or '' runrig," could not, however, be applied to animals, which each of the tenants
was called upon to feed in turn. It is easily understood that the soil pro-
duced but little under so pernicious a system, and notwithstanding its natural
fertility and abundant rains, Ireland was incapable of feeding all her children.
Famine became permanent, and the animals hungered with their masters.
Famines* have been of frequent occurrence in Ireland. The most terrible
famine of the last century was that which occurred in 1739-40, but more terrible
still was the great potato famine of 1846-7, when over 1,000,000 persons
perished, notwithstanding the £10,000,000 advanced by Parliament for its relief
The population became reduced by about 2,500,000, and out of the 1,180,409
persons who emigrated to America, 25 per cent, are stated to have died within
twelve months after leaving. The wages paid to agricultural labourers from
the close of the French wars up to the time of this dreadful visitation are
variously estimated by political economists at 3d. or 4d. daily, a sum still further
reduced by periods of enforced idleness. About the middle of the century,
when the purchasing power of money had already considerably fallen, Irish
labourers earned between 2s. 6d. and 5s. a week If And such a pittance was
to suffice for the wants of a whole family. Need we wonder, after this, that
the Irish peasantry were condemned to a potato diet? That tuber had been
introduced into the island about the close of the sixteenth, or at the commence-
ment of the seventeenth century.:}: Ordinarily it yields an abundant crop,
but for that very reason has proved an affliction to the island, by rendering
its inhabitants improvident. The cultivator trusted to his potatoes to supply the
means of subsistence, and planted little else ; and when disease struck his staple
crop he was reduced to the necessity of eating his pigs, and that last resource fail-
ing, there remained nothing for him but to die. Shan Nan Vocht — " poor old
woman " — is the name which Irishmen mournfully bestow upon their native
country. §
During the famine of the black '47 the unfortunate people sought to
* Years of famine in Ireland since the birth of Christ :— 10— 15 , 76; 192 (first notice of emigra-
tion) ; 535—38 ; 664 ; 669 ; 700 ; 759 ; 768 ; 772 (famine from drought) ; 824-5 ; 895—97 (invasion of
locusts); 963-4 (parents sold their children) ; 1047; 1116 (people eat each other); 1153; 1188; 1200;
1209; 1227; 1262; 1271; 1295; 1302; 1314; 1316;, 1317; 1332; 1339; 1410; 1433; 1447; 1491;
1497; 1522; 1565; 1586 (consequent on the wars; human flesh eaten); 1588-9 (human flesh eaten);
1601—3 (cannibalism); 1650-51 (sieges of Limerick and Galway) ; 1690; 1727—29; 1739-40; 1765;
1801; 1812; 1822; 1831; 1845 (£850,000 expended by Government in relief of suff'erers) ; 1846-7;
1879. (Cornelius Walford, " On the Famines of the World," Journal of the Statistical Society, 1878.)
t Buckle, " History of Civilisation in England."
X D.uff'erin, " Irish Emigration, and the Tenure of Land in Ireland."
§ Sullivan, " New Ireland."
ieeland; 407
appease their hunger by eating fallen cattle and even grass. Some died quietly
in their cabins ; others, wandering aimlessly about, fell down by the roadside,
never again to rise ; even in the towns starving men and women sank down
exhausted, but the passers-by, accustomed to the sight, sought not to raise them
up. They waited for the police to remove tl/e obstruction. In many districts the
dead were no longer buried ; it was deemed sufficient to pull their cabins down
upon the corpses to serve as a sepulchral mound.* About 3,000,000, or nearly
one-third of the entire population, appealed to public charity for assistance ; but
what availed ordinary means of relief in so unparalleled a disaster ? Entire
districts, more especially in the west of the island, were almost desolated,
and the population sank from nearly 9,000,000 to 6,500,000. The famine
carried off many more victims amongst Celtic Catholics than amongst Anglicans
and Presbyterians, most of whom are of Scotch or English descent. These latter
were rich enough to emigrate, t whilst at the same time the embroidery of muslin,
carried on in most of the cabins of Ulster, the least Irish of the provinces of
Ireland, saved the lives of many of the inhabitants. +
In the course of last century only Protestant Irishmen emigrated to the
United States, whilst Catholics remained at home, and appeared to have almost
taken root in their townships ; § but after the great famine. Irishmen, of whatever
religion or race, readily found their way to a country which appeared to offer them
better chances of succeeding in life than did their own. Encouraged by England,
which thus got rid of a starving multitude, and by the United States, anxious to secure
labourers to till their uncultivated fields, emigration soon assumed the dimensions
of an exodus. In 1871, notwithstanding the great mortality which afflicts the new
arrivals during the early years of their residence, there already dwelt in the United
States 1,850,000 natives of Ireland. At the present time the American citizens of
Irish origin cannot be less than six or seven millions, and the enemies of England
have often looked to this multitude when desirous of provoking a war between
her and the American Republic. The Irish Americans maintain relations with
their fellow-countrymen in the old country, even after they have become citizens
of the United States, and during the seventeen years which followed the great
exodus they sent no less a sum than £13,000,000 in order to enable their relatives
to join them in their new homes.
Irishmen unable to emigrate can at least periodically migrate to the neighbour-
ing island, where they assist in the harvest and other agricultural operations.
During certain seasons of the year their help can hardly be dispensed with, and
* Sullivan, "New Ireland."
+ Decrease of the population of Ireland, 1834 — 1871 : —
Total Population. Catholics. Anglicans. Presbyterians.
1834 7,954,100 6,436,060 833,160 643,058
1841 8,175,125 6,614,000 874,000 652,000
1861 5,798,967 4,505,165 693,357 523,291
1871 5,412,377 4,150,867 667,998 558,238
Decrease per cent, since 1834 . . 32-0 38-6 21-7 13-0
X Duiferin, " Irish Emigration and the Tenure of Land."
§ Arthur Young, " Tour in Ireland."
408
THE BEITISH ISLES.
the wages which they receive in England are at least double or treble those which
they could earn in their own country. They are consequently able to return to
their families with a modest sum saved out of their earnings, after defraying the
expense of twice crossing the Channel. Most of these migrants annually flock to
the same districts, and are employed by the same farmers. But the number of
Irishmen who migrate with their families to England and Scotland, with a view
to permanently remaining there, is also large.* Indeed, the Irish element in the
population of Grreat Britain is far more considerable than it appears to be from the
census returns, which take note only of persons born in Ireland, and include the
children of Irish parents born in England among the rest of the population.
Every large town has its " Little Ireland " — always an inferior quarter, with
wretched tenements and ill- kept streets. There poor Paddy, a hewer of wood and
carrier of water, has established his new home. His services have become almost
indispensable, for he is often the only labourer who will consent to carry a burden
or to dig. He might grow wealthy, if it were not for his improvidence, and
Fig. 201. — Movement of the Popuxatiov in Ireland.
Inhabitants
.8.000.000
v
7.000.000
6.000.000
5.000.000
^.000.000
3.000.000
2.000.000
l.OOOOOO
\
1
1
1
i
1
1
fS
PaztV R^ius
although he generally marries among his own kin, his presence must in the end
displace the Anglo-Saxon element in our labouring class, which is almost daily
sustaining losses through emigration.
Ireland itself has grown in wealth in the course of the last twenty years.
Many estates of impoverished landowners have been thrown into the market
through the operation of the Encumbered Estates Court, and purchased by wealthy
tenant farmers or English or Scotch colonists. And this new class of owners
generally resides upon the land, instead of spending its revenues at Dublin or
abroad. A further increase in the number of landowners has been brought about
through the sale of a portion of the land formerly owned by the disestablished
* Natives of Ireland residing in Great Britain : —
1841. 1871.
England 292,935 566,540
Scotland 126,321 207,770
Ireland — 5,306,757
lEELAND.
409
Irish Churcli. At the same time the number of occupiers has grown less, and the
extent of their holdings more considerable, though even now the subdivision of
the land, more especially in Gal way and Mayo, is carried to a greater length than
Fig. 202. — Distribution ov Natives or Ireland in Great Britain.
Acfiordiii? to E. G. Ravenstein.
^-v
d
1 ,
mp ,
4r 1
n
r -^ ^
1 1 "*■
PilEl
f |j|i|i| ii "^
551
Belfast ^^
Tlilnik
_55-
1 /J9/6
?// S£A j III '-|^
Dublin "Y ^
J/
mMiiiirir 1 iiHIp^
f
f
\
501
V
^ ENGLISH
_50-
5- 0- W.of G.
E
Under 1 per cent. 1 to 4 per cent. 4 to 10 per cent. Over 10 per cent,
is compatible with good and profitable farming.* By virtue of the famous Land
* Number of holdings in Ireland : —
Holdings
above 1. but not
exceeding
5 Acres.
5 to 15
Acres.
15 to 30
Acres.
30 Acres
and over.
Total.
310,436
252,799
79,342
48,625
691,202
88.083
191.854
141,311
149,090
570,338
65,269
162,233
136,649
101,749
525,900
1841 .
1851 .
1879 .
In the latter year there were 50,140 holdings of less than an acre, in addition to the above. The total
number of " occupiers " was only 528,275, for in many instances landholders occupy more than one farm.
123-E
410 THE BRITISH ISLES.
Act of 1870 tenants can no longer be evicted unless the landowner is prepared to
compensate them for any " improvements " they may have made. This does not,
however, hold good in cases where tenants are unable or unwilling to pay the rent
agreed upon, and the evictions recently enforced have led to a renewal of the land
agitation, and to a demand for the abolition of landlords, and the creation of
peasant proprietors, or at all events for fixity of tenure at a rent considered
fair by the occupier. This agitation has unfortunately resulted in agrarian
crimes and murders, which it had been hoped were things of the past in Ireland.
Yet, comparing the Ireland of 1841 with that of 1880, the great progress in its
agriculture is undeniable. Since 1851 there has been a wonderful increase in
the number of cattle and sheep,* and the supplies forthcoming for the English
market are increasing with every year, whilst the sums received in return are
divided amongst a smaller number of people. We are not, perhaps, wrong in
assuming that the average income of Ireland is now about double what it was in
the middle of the century. Erin, in its . economical conditions, is, in fact, rapidly
being assimilated with Great Britain.
In both islands, however, there are still thousands who depend upon charity
for their means of subsistence. True, Irish towns in which the persons living in the
workhouse are more numerous than those who are called upon to maintain them are
no longer to be found ; nor, as was the case a generation ago, are there now parishes
where 4,000 inhabitants own between them only 10 mattresses and 8 paillasses.f
Hunger typhus no longer decimates the population, even though the potatoes
should fail for a season ; but the want of proper nourishment and the almost
total disregard of sanitary laws nevertheless shorten the lives of entire popula-
tions. Wretched mud cabins, filled w^ith the biting smoke of peat, and inhabited
by ten or twelve human beings, who sleep on the damp soil by the side of their
pigs, are still numerous. Along many parts of the coast the inhabitants eat sea-
weed, not by any means as a relish with their salad, as is done by the wealthy
citizens of Belfast, but because their gardens and plots of arable land do not yield
sufficient to satisfy their wants. Through a strange irony of fate, the poorest
Irishmen take most delight in dressing in swallow-tailed coats and breeches, and in
wearing black hats. Whole ship-loads of cast-off" garments of this description are
annually sent across the Channel. The clothing produced in the country itself
is coarse, but exhibits in its cut a considerable degree of good taste.
All the large towns of Ireland lie on the sea-coast. Situated near England
and Scotland, and at the western extremity of Europe, Ireland failed to create a
great capital in the interior of the island. Her centres of civilisation naturally
* Live stock : —
1851. 1879,
Horses and Mules .... 54?.,312 596,890
Cattle 2,967,461 4,067,778
Sheep 1,122,128 4,017,903
Pigs 1,084,857 1,072,185
t George Hill ; Mr. and Mrs. Hall, " Ireland ; " Amedee Pichot, " L'Irlande et le pays des Galles."
NEW TORI
livauoiml
Dranilfek P.^
Poolbi'Si Light He
DUBLIN BAY
P't. ^< Dalkev
Dixlkvv Ishiiid
LamisEmt
Kill'
hiUiiiey Bnv
Dlfi'ford
Bunk
♦j* 1 w: , )f Oivcuwicii
N 3cC?
LEINSTER.
411
sprang up on that side of her seaboard which presented the greatest facilities for
keeping up an intercourse with the commercial countries from which a double
channel separates her. In this feature of her political geography Ireland resembles
Spain, but the causes which have had the same effect in both countries are
different. In the Iberian peninsula the inhabitants principally crowd the sea-
shore because of the cold and sterility of the plateaux and mountains which fill the
interior of the country. In Ireland it is the necessity of commercial intercourse
which accounts for the existence of busy seaport towns, the vast bogs of the central
plain, which were formerly hardly passable, contributing, no doubt, in a certain
measure to that result. The most flourishing seaboard is naturally that which
faces England, and here, right opposite to Liverpool and Holyhead, on a spot
marked by nature as the site for a great city, Dublin, the capital of the entire
island, has arisen. Belfast, in the north, occupies relatively to Scotland a similar
position to that of Dublin ; whilst the two towns of Wexford and Waterford,
opposite to the estuary of the Severn, share in the commerce with Southern
England. Cork, with its admirable harbour, has actually become the great
Atlantic emporium of the islands. As to Limerick, Galway, Sligo, and London-
derry, in the west and north of Ireland, they have hardly more than a local
importance as outlets for inland districts.
Topography.
Leinster. — The province of Leinster occupies the south-eastern portion of
Ireland. Presenting a wide gap in its coast mountains towards England, which
opened a path into the great central plain, it was first to feel the heel of ^N^orman
and Saxon invaders. Nearly the whole of this province is English now, not only
in speech, but in a large measure also in blood. But the Irish tongue still lingers
in the range of uplands which extends to the westward from the Mourne
Mountains, and into which the natives of the soil were driven when the invaders
appropriated and divided their lands. Another Irish- speaking district lies to the
south-west, towards Waterford.*
The metropolitan county of Dublin occupies a narrow strip along the Irish
Sea, which extends westward into the plains of Meath, but comprises on the south
a portion of the Wicklow Mountains. Mount Kippure, on the southern border,
rises to a height of 2,473 feet. The centre of the county is traversed by the
Liffey, which discharges itself into Dublin Bay. The land is fairly cultivated.
Dublin, or Ballagh-ath-Eliath-Puihhluinne, has not always been the capital of
Ireland. There was a time when the kings were crowned on the Hill of Tara, or
Teamhair — that is, the " Great House " — 25 miles to the westward, and antiquarians
have there discovered the remains of a monument, from which was, perhaps,
taken that Stone of Fate (Saxum Fatale) which, after having long been kept in the
abbey of Scone, has found a last resting-place in Westminster Abbey. When the
* In 1851 52,868 persons in Leinster spoke Irish; in 1871 only 14,388.
412 THE BRITISH ISLES.
legitimate king sat down upon this stone, so says the legend, it resounded like the
voice of thunder, but it gave forth no sound for a usurper : since the introduction
of Christianity it has lost its virtue. But whatever may have been the dignities
conferred upon Tara, Dublin, or " Black water," was certainly superior to the
little inland burgh as a place of commerce. For over two centuries Danes and
Northmen — good judges of maritime positions — disputed its possession with the
Irish. The Irish names of two suburbs of the town still recall the sites which in
these early days were occupied by " black and white strangers ; " that is, by North-
men and Danes. In the beginning of the twelfth century Dublin was finally wrested
from the Scandinavians, only to fall soon afterwards into the hands of the English,
to whom it has belonged ever since. According to the vicissitudes of politics,
Dublin has known its periods of prosperity and decay. Early in the seventeenth
century it was the second town of the British Islands — as populous, with its 300,000
inhabitants, as were then Edinburgh and Bristol together. It sustained a great
loss in 1800, when a separate Parliament for Ireland ceased to exist, and sub-
sequently it suffered further injury through the misery entailed by the great
famine and emigration. These losses, however, have since been more than made
good.
As an industrial city Dublin enjoys some reputation for its poplins — the manu-
facture of which was introduced by the French— stout, whiskey, and a variety
of other articles. Within the last few years a most active provision trade with
England has sprung up, Dublin exports cattle, pigs, and various kinds of
agricultural produce, and imports merchandise for its own use and that of a great
part of Ireland. Railways converge upon it like the ribs of a fan, besides which
it is the terminus of the Grand Canal, which cuts the island in twain, and joins
the Irish Sea to Gralway Bay. Formerly the roadstead of Dublin, exposed
to easterly winds and cumbered with sand-banks, presented great difficulties to
large vessels, and the mouth of the Liff'ey formed only an inconvenient port,
although docks had been excavated by its side. But the extension of the northern
pier has led to the partial disappearance of the obstructive sands, and vessels
drawing 23 feet of water can now proceed to the quays of the town. Dublin,
like other maritime cities, is indebted to the skill of engineers for two outlying
ports. That of Kingstown, on the southern side of Dublin Bay, is conspicuous
from afar through the abrupt face presented by the hill in its rear, which has
furnished the granite for its piers. It is the station for the packet-boats, which
twice daily carry mails and passengers to Holyhead. The harbour of Howth, on
the northern side of the bay, is frequented only by fishing-boats. Constructed,
it is said, to facilitate the exportation of the granite quarried by a great
lord, it is almost dry at low water, and, moreover, difficult of access. Dublin,
with its outports, takes a prominent place amongst the maritime cities of the
British Islands, ranking next to London, Liverpool, Newcastle, Cardiff, Glasgow,
and Hull.
In shape the city resembles an oval, bisected by the Liffey, and almost sur-
rounded by canals. There are a few fine streets and open squares, equal to any in
LEINSTER.
413
England, besides several remarkable buildings, for the most part grouped around
the hillock upon which rises Dublin Castle, the official residence of the Lord-
Lieutenant of Ireland. Christ Church Cathedral, restored to the Roman Catholics,
is the most ancient church of Dublin, having been founded in 1038, and rebuilt at
the end of the twelfth and in the course of the fourteenth centuries. St. Patrick's
Cathedral, which has been taken possession of by the Protestants, is likewise a
mediaeval building, and stands by the side of the fou^tain irom which St. Patrick
baptized the heathen. Trinity College was founded in the sixteenth century as
a stronghold of Protestantism, but no longer enforces religious tests. It possesses
valuable natural-history collections, together with a library of over 200,000
volumes, containing amongst other treasures the Senc/nis Mor, or monument of
ancient wisdom, and various mediaeval manuscripts in Irish and Latin. The
Fig. 203.— View of Dublin from Phcenix Park.
Exhibition Palace of 1872 has been transformed into a museum and place of
amusement similar to the Crystal Palace at Sydenham. There are also an
Industrial Museum, a National Gallery, and other valuable collections
belonging to learned societies. Conspicuous amongst the buildings on the
northern bank of the river are the *' Four Courts " rising into a lofty dome, and
the Custom House. Among charitable institutions may be mentioned the Royal
Hospital for soldiers, in the suburb of IS'ew Kilmainham, the Blue Coat School,
and Steevens's Hospital. Femhrohe, Rathmines, and Rafhgar, with Donnybrool'y
in other times famous for its fairs, are suburbs of Dublin. Swift, Richard Steele,
Sheridan, Tom Moore, and the Duke of Wellington were born at Dublin, and
monuments have been raised in honour of them and other Irish worthies.
The environs of the gfeat city abound in pleasant walks. Phoenix Park, which
includes a zoological garden, covers an area of 1,750 acres. It is finely timbered.
414 THE BRITISH ISLES.
and bounding deer are plentiful within it. The fine botanical gardens at Giasnevin,
north from the city, are the property of the Royal Society. On the northern side
of Dublin Bay is Clontarf, famous as the scene of Brian Boroimhe's victory over
the Danes, with an old Norman stronghold. Farther in the same direction the
entrance to the bay is guarded by the rocky peninsula of Howth (563 feet), with
shaded woods, the ruins of an abbey overhanging the sea, and a magnificent view over
the bay. The people of Dublin often liken their bay to that of Naples, although
there is no Vesuvius screened by a Somma, and encircled with white and pink
villas, and the sky above is rarely as bright as that of the Mediterranean.
Opposite Howth we perceive Kingstowviy with its harbour covering 250 acres, and
virtually a suburb of Dublin. BlacJirock, a famous bathing-place, adjoins it on the
left ; Dalkey, an important seaport before Kingstown usurped its place, lies to
the south ; and Killiney, with its mountain of granite, upon whose sides quarrymen
swarm like ants, is beyond.
To the north of Howth are the fishing villages of Malahide, Rush, and Skerries.
Balbriggan, with a small port, is noted for its stocking manufacture. Liisk, Swords,
and Clondalkin, all within a few miles from the coast, can still boast the possession
of round towers ; whilst Finglas, to the north of Dublin, and Lucan, on the Liffey,
have mineral springs.
The county of Louth includes the hilly peninsula between Carlingford Lough
and Dundalk Bay (1,955 feet), and the low-lying maritime region which extends
thence to the river Boyne. That river is born in the Bog of Allen, and only washes
one large town on its way to the sea, namely, the ancient city of Brogheda^
4 miles above its mouth. The town is for the most part seated upon the lofty
northern bank of the river, here spanned by a railway viaduct 94 feet in height.
Its docks are accessible to vessels of 300 tons burden, and there are a large cotton-
mill, flax-mills, and other industrial establishments. The battle of the Boyne,
which cost the Stuarts a throne, was fought in the immediate vicinity in 1690.
A little above the field of battle, near the river, are curious prehistoric remains,
including the sepulchral tumulus of New Grange, which Llhuyd, the antiquarian,
laid open in 1699. Termonfeckin is now a favourite watering-place, but was formerly
the residence of the Archbishop of Armagh. Dundalk, on a flat site at the head
of a wide bay and the mouth of Castleton River, with a port accessible to vessels
drawing 16 feet of water, is an ancient city, where Edward Bruce was crowned
King of Ireland, and near which he was defeated and killed by the English
(1318). Dundalk distils whiskey, brews beer, spins flax, grinds corn, and makes
pins, but its commerce is inferior to that of Drogheda. Louth, to the south-west
of it, which gave its name to the county, is a decayed village. Ardee and Collon
are market towns in the interior of the county. Carlingford, on the lough of the
same name, has oyster beds, and grows in favour as a watering place.
Meath forms part of the central plain, with a few detached groups of hills.
It is drained by the river Boyne and its tributary, the Blackwater. At the
confluence of the two rivers stands Navan, the most populous town of the county,
and an episcopal city, with a Catholic college. Trim and Clonard, an old episcopal
LEINSTER. 415
see, are higher up, on the Boyne ; Slane, a poor village, with the ruins of a
castle and a monastery, is below. Half-way between Navan and Trim are the
beautiful ruins of Bective Abbey. Kells, a flourishing market town on the Black-
water, has a round tower on Lloyd Hill (422 feet). In the southern part of the
county are the Hill of Tar a (see p. 411) and the decayed town of Dunshaughlin.
Westmeath, like its neighbour, lies within the central plain, and its detached
heights attain no considerable elevation. Its main portion drains into the Shannon,
which forms the western boundary. There are numerous lakes scattered all over
the county. Mullingar, the county town, on the Koyal Canal, and in the vicinity
of a cluster of lakes rich in trout, has fairs for horses and cattle, and much trade
in agricultural products. Athlone, seated astride the river Shannon, near
where it issues from Lough Ree, spanned by a railway viaduct and a fine stone
bridge, is a place of considerable strategical importance, for it guards the passage
from Leinster into Connaught. Its castle is old and strong, and beside it stand
barracks for a large garrison. As is often the case in Ireland, there are a clean
*' new town,'' inhabited by men of Saxon race, and a wretched " Irish town."
Auburn, or rather Lishoy, which Oliver Goldsmith describes in his " Deserted
Village,'' is in the neighbourhood. The only other places of note in the county
are Moate-a-Grmogue, on the southern border, and Kilbeggan, on the Brosna,
which issues from Lough Ennell.
The county of Longford lies almost wholly within the basin of the Shannon,
which washes its western margin ; but its northern portion, where Lough Gowna
covers a large area, drains into the Erne. Longford^ on a branch of the Royal
Canal, is the seat of a Catholic bishop. !N^ear it are Ardagh, a poor village, after
which one of the dioceses of Ireland is named, and Edgeicorthstoum, a pretty
village in a flat country, the birthplace of Maria Edgeworth. Ballymahon is a
market town on the Inny, which flows through the southern part of the county.
Granard, on the water-parting between Inny and Erne, has a small linen trade.
King's County, and its neighbour Queen's County, were named in honour of
Philip II., of Spain, and his consort Queen Mary, during whose reign they
were first formed. The bulk of King's County consists of a plain descending
towards the Shannon and Liffey, dotted over with a few hills, including the
Croghan (761 feet), and culminating towards the south in the Slieve Bloom.
The Grand Canal intersects the county from east to west. Tullamorey on a river
flowing to thr^. Shannon, Philipstoivn, and Edenderry all lie on the Grand Canal,
and on the northern margin of the Bog of Allen, large portions of which have
been drained. On the Shannon are Shannon Bridge, with an old fort ;
Shannon Harbour, at the mouth of the Grand Canal, with marble quarries ;
and Banagher. Above Shannon Bridge are the ruins of the seven churches of
Clonmacnoise. Parsonstown, on the Birr, a small tributary of the Shannon, is
perhaps the prettiest town in the county. Near it lies Castle Birr, with Lord
Rosse's famous telescope.
Queen's County lies on the southern slope of the Slieve Bloom, and
along the Upper Barrow (which rises in it) and the Nore. Maryborough, the
416 THE BRITISH ISLES.
county town, stands on the river Triogue, which is tributary to the Barrow.
Near it is the rock of Dun-a-mase, with remains of the stronghold of the Kings of
Leinster. Portarlington, on the Barrow, was originally founded with the aid of
French and German Protestants. Mountmellick, at the foot of the Slieve Bloom,
has a cloth-mill and a foundry. Mountrath, only founded in the seventeenth
century, is the principal town in the valley of the Nore. It manufactures a little
cloth. Other places on the Nore are Borris-in'Ossory, anciently the seat of a
bishop, Abbey leix, Diirrow, and BaUinakilL
The county of Kildare forms part of the central plain, and is drained by the
rivers Liffey and Barrow. The Bog of Allen occupies a considerable area in the
north, but much of it has been drained and brought under cultivation. In its
midst rises the Hill of Allen, according to the Irish tradition Ossian's real
home. The village of Maynooth, with St. Patrick's College, founded in 1795 for
the education of the Catholic clergy of Ireland, and Carton Castle, the sumptuous
seat of the Duke of Leinster, lies near the northern boundary of the county, on
the Royal Canal. Ascending the Liffey, we successively pass Celbndge, Naa-s,
Newbridge, and KilciiUen, enclosed by a ring-shaped rampart. Naas, one of the
ancient capitals of Leinster, has a rath in its centre upon which the Parliament
of the kingdom used to deliberate. Newbridge has the ruins of an abbey and
cavalry barracks. The Curragh of Kildare, a famous sheep-walk and racecourse,
4,858 acres in extent, lies to the west of it, in the direction of the ancient city of
Kildare, whilom *' renowned for its saints," as is attested by the ruins of a cathedral
and a fine round tower, but now a poor village. In 1804 the United Irishmen
mustered their forces, to the number of 30,000 men, upon the Curragh, which is
now the site of a standing military camp.
On the Barrow are Monasterevan, with the ruins of an abbey, and Athy, a
flourishing market town, with a cloth factory. Bally fore, in a side valley of the
Barrow, used formerly to be inhabited by Quakers.
The county of Wicklow, with its range of bold mountains culminating in
Lugnaquilla, differs altogether from the flat and uniform stretches in the interior
of the island. No valleys of Ireland are more deservedly frequented by tourists
than those of the Dargle, Yartry, and Avoca, which rise in these mountains, and
at whose mouths are seated the three principal towns of the county. Bray, at the
mouth of the Dargle, is a favourite watering-place. Wickloiv, at the mouth of the
Yartry, has an indifferent harbour. Copper .and lead are mined in the neigh-
bourhood. Arklotc, at the mouth of the Avoca, consists of a fine upper town
and a poor " Fishery." The harbour is closed by a bar. Herring and oyster
fishing and mining are the principal occupations. Tourists make this town
their head-quarters when desirous of exploring the scenery of " sweet " Avoca,
ascending which they visit successively the copper mines ; the " Meeting
of the Waters " under Castle Howard ; Rathdrum, formerly noted for flannels ;
the ruins of Castle Kevin and the seven churches; Annamoe ; and Lough
Dan. On the western slope of the mountains are Baltinglas, Tinahely, and
Shillelagh,
LEINSTER. 417
The county of Wexford forms the south-easternmost corner of Ireland.
The coast is for the most part low. The interior consists of an upland, upon
which rise isolated hills. The river Slaney traverses the centre of the county,
whilst the Barrow bounds it on the west. Wexford, at the mouth of the Slaney,
is seated on a magnificent bay, and carries on a considerable trade, notwithstanding
that its harbour is closed Jjy a bar admitting no vessel over 200 tons burden.
It was here that the English first secured a footing upon Irish soil, and concluded
their first treaty, in 1169. The square keep of Carrick Castle, built about that
time, still remains. Enniscorthy, at the head of the navigation of the Slaney, is
built on the side of a steep hill. A little cloth is manufactured, besides which
there are breweries, distilleries, and flour-mills.. Higher up in the valley are the
mineral springs of Neicfown Barry. In the north-eastern part of the county are
Corfown, a fishing village, and Gorey, an inland market town. Bannow Bay,
on the south coast, is said to mark the site of a flourishing town, which was
swallowed up by the sea. There are ruins of ecclesiastical buildings at its head ;
whilst Fethard, a poor fishing village near its mouth, boasts the ruins of a Tintern
Abbey, founded in 1200, and named after the famous abbey in Wales, from which
it was peopled. The principal town on the Barrow is New Moss, which vessels of
800 tons burden can reach with the tide. There are distilleries and flour-mills.
It was near this place that, during the rebellion of 1 798, an undisciplined crowd
of 20,000 Irishmen was routed by a handful of English troops. The atrocities
committed during this rebellion by the peasantry in the county of Wexford defy
description. Duncannony a fishing village on the eastern side of Waterford
Harbour, is defended by a fort.
The county of Carlow is for the most part a fertile plain, shut in between
the hills of Wicklow and Kilkenny, and drained by the rivers Barrow and Slaney.
Carloiv, on the former of these i-ivers, is a handsome town, with a Catholic
cathedral and college. Bagnalstown is lower down on the same river. Leighlin-
hridge, with the ruins of Blackrock Castle, and Old Leighlin, with a cathe-
dral of the twelfth century, are in its neighbourhood. Tullow is the princi-
pal town on the Upper Slaney, which lower down flows past Enniscorthy and
Wexford.
The county of Kilkenny lies to the west of the Barrow. The Nore traverses
its centre, and the Suir bounds it in the south. The surface is mostly hilly,
but there occur also extensive plains, in the midst of one of which, on the
banks of the Nore, stands the county town of Kilkenny. On a rock in its centre
rises a castle built in the twelfth century, and now the residence of the Marquis
of Ormonde. Coarse woollen stuffs are manufactured, but the Kilkenny of to-day
is only a shadow of its former self, as is attested by its numerous ruins. Thomas-
town, also on the Nore, is the birthplace of Father Mathew. Near it are the ruins
of Jerpoint Abbey. Coal is worked in the northern part of the county, near
Castlecomer. In the valley of the King's Eiver lie Kells, founded by a follower
of Strongbow, but now a wretched village, and Callan. Johnstown and Urling-
ford lie to the north-west.
418
THE BEITISH ISLES.
Ulster. — Ulster consists of the counties of North-western Ireland, and is more
densely peopled than any other portion of the island. This population, however, is
crowded into the large towns in the east, where Scotch settlers introduced the
linen industry. The west of the province is wholly pastoral and agricultural,
and Irish is still spoken or understood there by many people. In 1871, out of
Fig. 204. — Cabxjngford Lough.
From an Admiralty Chart. Scale 1 : 169,000.
2 Miles.
84,923 persons who spoke Irish throughout the province, 77,788 resided in the
counties of Donegal, Tyrone, and Monaghan.
Down is a maritime county, extending from Carlingford to Belfast Lough.
The Mourne Mountains and other barren hills occupy a considerable area, but the
county consists for the most part of fertile hills sloping down inland towards
Lough Neagh. The linen trade is the principal resource of the inhabitants.
Newry, at the northern extremity of Carlingford Lough, and on the Newry
ULSTER.
419
River, has been raised solely through its industry to the eminent position it holds
among the maritime towns of Ireland ; for its harbour does not give access to large
vessels, which stop at Warrenpoint, romantically seated on the northern bank of
the lough. Below the latter, and right at the foot of the Mourne Mountains, is
Fig. 205. — Strangfokd Lough.
Scale 1 : 300,000.
W.of G.
5''40,
5°20'
Depth under 27
Fathoms.
Miles.
Rosstrevor, a watering-place, whose popularity is, however, eclipsed by that of
Newcastle, on Dundrum Bay. The narrow entrance to Strangford Lough is
guarded by the fishing villages of Strangford Sindi Portaferry. The lough, however,
is not much frequented by shipping. Doivnpatrick, the county town, near its
south-western side, notwithstanding its English, Scotch, and Irish quarters, is not a
place of much industry, whilst the large manufacturing town of Newtownards, finely
420 THE BEITISH ISLES.
seated at its northern extremity, prefers to export its produce through the neigh-
bouring Donaghadee, which has the advantage of lying on the open sea. Comber,
on the north-western side of the lough, is only a small place with a little linen trade,
like all the other towns of the county. Bangor and Holy wood are pleasant watering-
places on the Belfast Lough.
Banhridge, on the river Bann, which flows to Lough Neagh, is the centre of
the inland portion of the county. It is built on the steep declivity of a hill, with
footpaths often raised 25 feet above the pavement. Here and at Gilford, Dromore,
and Hillshorough the manufacture of linen is the staple trade. Near Gilford is
Tanderagee Castle, the seat of the Duke of Manchester, whilst Dromore was
formerly the residence of a bishop.
The county of Antrim forms the north-eastern extremity of Ireland, and
consists of a volcanic table-land, forming bold cliflfs along the coast, and sinking
down inland toward the plain bordering upon Lough Neagh and the river Bann.
It is the centre of the Irish linen industry.
Belfast, its capital, is the chief city of Ireland for its industry, though not the
first in population. In 1612 the land upon which this flourishing city has arisen
was given by James I. to one of his favourites, whose descendant, the Marquis of
Donegal, still owns the whole of it, with its palatial warehouses, factories, and
suburbs. Belfast, of all Irish towns, increases most rapidly in population. About
the middle of the seventeenth century it only had 7,000 inhabitants ; in 1821,
37,000 ; and at present about six times that number. Its shipping has increased
even at a more rapid rate, and Belfast is now abreast of Dublin, if not in advance
of it. As the narrow river Lagan afforded but scant shelter for shipping,
docks have been constructed, and a cut was formed in 1840 through sands
cumbering the lough, by which means vessels drawing from 16 to 20 feet of water
can now come up to the town with the tide. Most of the trade of the port is carried
on in steamers.
It is the linen trade, very ancient in the country, but much developed by
Flemish and French immigrants, which has made Belfast a prosperous city, and of
all its factories those devoted to the spinning and weaving of flax are still the
most important. A society for the Promotion and Improvement of the Growth
of Flax in Ireland has its seat in Belfast, and to its beneficial action must be
ascribed the fact that most of the raw material consumed in its factories is grown
in the country of which it is the industrial centre. In addition to flax-mills, there
are cotton factories, foundries, machine shops, and large establishments in which the
fancy boxes intended to hold Irish lace and other delicate textiles are made.
Belfast, at the same time, can boast important institutions for the education of the
people. It has its Museum and Botanical Garden, its non-sectarian Queen's
Colleges, and colleges of the Presbyterian and Methodist communities. Yet,
notwithstanding these educational agencies, there is no town in Ireland where
"assault and battery " is a more frequent offence, and the anniversary of the buttle
of the Boyne rarely passes without opposing mobs of Orangemen and Catholic
Home Hulers coming to blows.
ULSTEE.
421
The merchants of Belfast have studded the surrounding heights with villas,
and several villages, such as Legoniel, have become suburbs of the ever-spreading
city. Others, as Lisburn, on the Lagan, and Moira, are industrial depend-
encies. Carrickfergus, on the northern shore of the lough, is the ancient capital
of the surrounding country, and in early days its picturesque castle was one of the
principal strongholds of Ireland. At its foot William III. embarked when about
to rout the army of his father-in-law ; and subsequently, in 1759, Thurot, the
Frenchman, held possession of it for three days. Carrickfergus, in addition to
its linen trade, possesses a resource in the salt mines near it. Lame, at the
mouth of a small lough to the north of that of Belfast, is an outport of the
Fig. 206.— Belfast Lough.
Scale 1 : 172,000.
G^W-of Q
lo-'So'
Porotfhore.
great city of IJlster. Along the coast are the fishing and watering places
of Gknarm, Ciis/iendun, and Ballycadle. If the latter has not grown into a large
manufacturing town, it is not the fault of its late owner, who founded glass
houses, tanneries, and breweries, built a quay, erected four churches, and endowed
several charities. Near the town are curious coal-pits, now abandoned, and off it,
at a distance of 5 miles, lies Rathlin Island. Bushmills, an old town where spades
and hoes are made, lies about a mile up the river Bush, to the west of the Giants'
Causeway (see p. 384). On the coast Dunluce Castle rises on an almost insulated
cliff. For f rush, on the north-western border of the county, is the port of the
manufacturing town of Coleraine, which stands 4 miles above the mouth of the Bann,
422
THE BRITISH ISLES.
spanned by a bridge 288 feet in length. Coleraine belongs to the county of
Londonderry.
Ballymoney is the most important town of Antrim in the valley of the Bann,
but lags far behind Ballymcna, on a small tributary of the Main, which takes
its course direct into Lough Neagh, entering it near the old county town of
Antrim. Ballymena is one of the most important flax and linen markets in
Ireland. Near it is Gracehill, a Moravian settlement founded in 1765. Antrim,
on the other hand, is a place of little note, except for its castle, its round tower,
Fig. 207. — Lough Foyle.
Scale 1 : 350,000.
5 Miles.
and the ruins of Shane's Castle, picturesquely seated on the shore of the
lake.
The county of Londonderry occupies only a narrow seaboard between the
river Bann and Lough Foyle, but expands in the south, where it stretches as far
as Lough Neagh. The greater portion of its area is covered with moorland hills,
but fertile tracts extend along the valleys and the coast. Londonderry, the county
town, on the river Foyle, is one of the most picturesque places in Ireland, still
surrounded by its ancient walls, which enclose a hill upon whose summit stands the
cathedral. Formerly plain Derry, the city took its present name when James I.
presented it, together with the surrounding country, to the twelve great livery
ULSTER. 428
companies of London, to whom it still belongs. A Doric column commemorates
tlie glorious siege of 1689. A few miles to the westward of Londonderry,
already beyond the borders of the county, are the Grianan of Aileach, remarkable
as a specimen of the fortifications erected by the ancient Irish. On the western
shore of Lough Foyle are Moville, a rising watering-place, and Greencastle, where
the outward-bound American mail-packets call for telegrams. The railway which
skirts the eastern shore of the lough runs for a considerable distance along an
embankment raised upon land formerly flooded by the sea, but now drained and
brought under cultivation. Newtown Limavady and Dimgiven are on the Roe,
which descends from the Sperrin Mountains and flows into Lough Foyle. Colerainey
on the Lower Bann, has already been referred to. It has for its outports Port-
stewart and Portrush. Higher up on the Bann is Kilrea, and near Lough
Neagh Magherafelt. All these towns of Londonderry largely depend for their
existence upon the linen industry.
Tyrone is an inland county, stretching from the Donegal Mountains to
Lough Neagh and its tributary, the Blackwater. It is traversed by the Foyle,
or Strule, and for the most part covered with hills, except in the east, where
an extensive plain of considarable fertility lies along the shore of Lough
Neagh. Omagh, the county town, stands on the river Strule (the Upper Foyle)
in a fertile district, and carries on trade in corn and linen. Newtown Stewart, at
the head of the navigation of the river, is a small manufacturing village ; whilst
Strahane, the most populous town of the county, owes its prosperity entirely
to the linen trade. In the plain bordering upon Lough Neagh are Cookstown,
with flax-mills; Stewartstown, with limestone quarries; and Dungannon, with
collieries at Coal Island. Clogher, an episcopal village, and Aughnadoy are on the
Blackwater.
The county of Armagh slopes from the barren mountains near the coast to
the fertile plain at the head of Lough N'eagh. Armagh, the seat of the Protestant
primate of all Ireland and of a Catholic bishop, is one of the most celebrated
and beautiful cities in the country. It is built on a hill, and its ancient cathedral,
founded by St. Patrick, looks down upon the amphitheatre formed by its
marble houses. Near it is a famous observatory, founded in 1789 by Primate
Robinson. Keady, to the south of Armagh, is a small manufacturing town.
Portadown, on the Upper Bann, is favourably situated for commerce, as a canal
connects it with Newry, and through the Bann and Lough Neagh with Ennis-
killen. Lurgan, to the east of the Bann, is the principal seat of the linen trade
in the county.
The county of Monaghan is intersected in its centre by a vale, through
which passes the Ulster Canal, and which the Inny drains into the Erne,
and the Blackwater into Lough Neagh. Lofty hills, culminating in Slieve
Beagh (1,258 feet), bound this vale in the north, and a somewhat lower range
separates it from the maritime plain of Louth. Monaghan, in the centre of
this vale, has a little trade in flax and corn, whilst Clones, on the Inny, is
interesting on account of its monastic ruins, supposed to date back to the fifth
424 THE BRITISH ISLES
century. Emyvale and Glassloiigh are unimportant places in the north-western
part of the vale. Ballybay is the principal town in the southern hills, while
Castleblayney and Carrickmacross are more important towns on the margin of the
maritime plain, the one near a lake at the head of the Fane, the other on the Glyde.
The county of Cavan extends along both sides of the Upper Erne, which rises
in Lough Gowna (214 feet) on its southern border, traverses Lough Oughter in
its centre, and before leaving it enters the Upper Lough Erne. This river sepa-
rates the county into two hilly portions, of which that in the west is the loftier
and less hospitable. Within the latter rises the Owenmore, the head-stream of
the Shannon. Cavan, the seat of rival bishops, lies in a fertile plain, and with
Belturbet, on the navigable Erne, and Cootehill, between the Annalee and a small
lough, it is the only noteworthy place in the county. Kilmore, a village to the
south of Cavan, was anciently the seat of a bishop. Ballycomiell, in the western
hills, is known for its romantic position.
Fermanagh stretches along both banks of the Erne, which within its limits
expands into the Upper and Lower Loughs Erne. The tract to the west of these
lakes rises into lofty hills (Guilcagh, 2,188 feet), but along their western shore
level tracts occur, where wheat and oats are grown with success. EnniskiUen,
midway between the lakes, on an island of the Erne, is an important military
station. Cutlery and plait are made. The Portora Royal School, the " Irish
Eugby," is near, and on Devenish Island, 1 mile below, there are ruins of
ecclesiastical buildings and a round tower. The inconsiderable towns of Newtown
Butler, Lisriaskea, and Lowtherstown are in the eastern portion of the county.
Belleek, on the Lower Erne, manufactures pottery.
Donegal, the north-western county of Ireland, is a wild highland region
(see p. 383), rich in picturesque scenery, but only to a small extent capable of
cultivation. Lifford, the county town, is a wretched village on the Foyle,
opposite Strabane. Stranorlar, in the valley of the Finn, tributary to that of the
Bann, has become of some importance as a tourists' head-quarter. On the hilly
peninsula of Inishowen, which lies between Loughs Foyle and S willy, are MoviUe
and Greencastle, on Lough Foyle ; Carndonagh, at the head of Trawbeaga Bay,
and near Malin Head (226 feet), the northernmost point of Ireland; and Buncrana,
a growing watering-place, on Lough S willy. Far more important than either of
these is Letferkenny, at the head of the lough just named. Rathmelton and
RathmuUen, on the western shore of Lough Swilly, are hardly more than fishing
villages, though nominally market towns. Along the coast, facing the open
Atlantic, we meet with the fishing villages of Dimfanaghy, on Sheep Haven;
Dunglotv, at the back of Aran and Rutland Islands; Ardara ; and Killyhegs.
Donegal, on the bay of the same name, and at the mouth of the Eask, is interesting
as the old capital of the county, biit is a mere village, ranking far behind
Ballyshannon, at the mouth of the river Erne.
CoNNATJGHT. — This province occupies the extreme west of Ireland, between
Donegal Bay and the river Shannon. Its population is the most purely Celtic oi
CONNAUGHT.
425
the island, if we except certain portions of Munster, and in 1871 no less than
39 per cent, of the inhabitants still spoke Irish. In no other part of Ireland is
education at so low an ebb.
Leitrim is a narrow strip of country stretching from Donegal Bay to the
central plain. Lough Allen separates its northern, mountainous portion from
the more level region, studded with numerous lakes, in the south. Manor Hamilton
in the fertile valley of the Bonnet, is the principal ^own in the northern part
of the county. Carrick- on- Shannon, the county town, is merely a village, and
Leitnm, the old capital, is even less important.
The county of Roscommon forms part of the central plain. It lies oeyond the
Shannon, and is bounded by the Suck in the south-west. Coal is won in the extreme
north of the county, on the banks of the Arigna, and near Kendue village. Boyle,
Fig. 208.— Galway Bay.
Scale 1 : 800,000.
10 Miles.
on a river of the same name, is a market town. Elphin, farther south, is an old
episcopal city. Eosconmion, with the ruins of an abbey and a castle, manufactures
coarse earthenware.
The county of Galway is divided by Loughs Mask and Corrib into two well-
marked regions. To the west lie the wild mountain land of Joyce's Country,
Connemara, and Jar Connaught ; whilst in the east a plain extends to the Shannon,
broken only towards the south-east, where Slieve Aughty, on Lough Derg, rises
to a height of 1,243 feet.
Galway, at the mouth of the river which drains Lough Corrib, and on the
north shore of a wide bay, occupies a favourable position for commerce, and as
early as the fourteenth century, soon after its foundation by an English colony, it
carried on a brisk trade with Spain. Andalusians and Castilians established
124— E
426
THE BEITISH ISLES.
themselves in the Irish city, and their influence became so great that Galvvay, in
the aspect of many of its old mansions, reminds the traveller of similar buildings in
Burgos and Toledo. This remunerative Spanish trade has ceased for centuries,
and Galway has not yet succeeded in establishing those connections with America
to which its position entitles it to aspire. There are marble works, a jute factory,
Fig 209.— KiLLALA Bay.
From an Admiralty Chart. Scale 1 : 148,000.
M
33
25
7S
'^ 29 28
26 •
23 S3
24 -1
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Z6 \^ 77
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2 ililes.
a foundrj^, works for extracting salts from seaweed, and salmon fisheries. The
Claddagh is a suburb inhabited by hardy fishermen. Galway is the seat of one
of the Queen's Colleges.
On the Atlantic coast of the county are BaUinahinch, with marble quarries, and
Clifden, a fishing village on Ardbear Haven. Oufjhterard, on the western
side of Lough Corrih, has a mineral spring, a lead mine, and limestone
MUNSTER.
427
quarries. Kinvara, on a southern arm of Galway Bay, is tte seat of a
Catholic bishop ; and a few miles to the south of it is Gorfy with the ruins of a
cathedral.
Amongst the towns in the eastern plain Tiiam, with its rival bishops and
Catholic college, occupies the first place, but commercially, as well as in population,
Ballinasloe can claim the precedence, on account of its great horse, cattle, sheep,
and wool fairs. Loughrea, on a small lough almost in the centre of the plain, is a
market town. Clonfert, an old episcopal city, and PoHumna, at the head of
Lough Derg, are merely villages.
Mayo, in its western portion, consists of wild mountain land, but to the east
of Loughs Conn and Mask it extends into the central plain which stretches
westward to the head of Clew Bay. All the large towns of the county lie
in this more level tract. Westjmit, near Clew Bay, frowned down upon by
Croagh Patrick (2,510 feet) and Cushcamcarragh (2,343 feet), and studded
with innumerable islets, has a small harbour. Ballinrohe, on a river tributary to
Lough Mask, is a decayed market-place. Castlibar, in the fertile valley of the
Moy, which flows northward into Killala Bay, is more attractive; but most
prosperous of all the towns of the county is Ballina, on the Lower Moy, only 7
miles from the bay, and with a port accessible to vessels of 200 tons burden. It
was here General Humbert landed on the road to his barren victory of Castlebar,
after which he proclaimed the Irish Republic. Killala, on the bay itself, is merely
a fishing village, with the residenoe of a Catholic bishop. On Blacksod Bay,
behind Mullet Peninsula, near Erris Head, are Bclmullet and Binghamstown, two
fishing villages.
The county of Sltgo is almost shut in by hills, which bound a beautiful
plain opening upon Sligo Bey. Upon an arm of this bay stands Sligo, the county
town, largely engaged in the salmon fishery and coasting trade. On another
arm, at the mouth of the Owenmore, rises Ballysadare, a fishing village, with
limestone quarries. On the upper course of that river is Balhjmofe, with the ruins
of an abbey, and near it Achonvay, the residence of a Catholic bishop.
MuNSTER. — Munster comprises the whole of South-western Ireland, from
Galway Bay to Waterford, and is richer in fine harbours than any other part of
Ireland. Within it lie some of the finest mountains of the island, and several of
its most productive vales. Irish is still largely spoken in the counties of Water
ford, Kerry, Clare, and Cork — altogether by about a fourth of the population.
The county of Clare occupies the peninsula between Galway Buy and the
estuary of the Shannon. It is a region of barren hills, cut in two by the fertile
valley of the Fergus, and abounding in tulloghs, or winter lakes, and underground
water-courses. Ennis, the county town, stands at the head of the estuary of the
Fergus, and is the ancient residence of the O'Brians. Clare, a village with a castle
used as barracks, stands l:elow\ Corofin and Kilfenora are higher up on the
Fergus. lulrmh, on the estuary of the Shannon, is a favourite watering-place,
and has some trade in fish and peat. A railway connects it with Kilkee, on the
428
THE BEITISH ISLES.
open Atlantic. Killaloe, at the point where the Shannon issues from Lough Derg,
is a bustling place, with quays, docks, warehouses, slate quarries, and a
remarkable cathedral, founded in the twelfth century. An old bridge joins it to
Ballina, in Limerick.
The county of Limerick lies to the south of the Shannon, and consists for the
most part of a plain of exceeding fertility, known on that account as the " Golden
Fig. 210.— SuGo Harbour.
From an Admiralty Chait. Scale 1 : 148,000.
•2 Miles.
Vale." Limerich, the county town, is seated in the midst of this plain ; but although
it is the natural maritime emporium of the whole of the Shannon valley, its
commerce is trifling, and even modern houses in the centra of the town wear
an' air of dilapidation. Vessels of 600 tons can reach its docks, but owing to it»
remote position on the western coast, the town is not able to compete with
MUNSTER.
429
Cork and DuLliii in the export of agricultural produce to England. The local
industry supplies fish hoops, gloves, lace, snuff, and army cloth, and the trade in
provisions is of some importance. There are several objects of antiquarian
interest, most prominent amongst them being the walls and towers of the old
castle, which rises on the left bank of the Shannon, and beneath which nestle the
houses of " English Town," joined by seven bridges to " Newtown Pery " and
" Irish Town." Casfleconnell, above Limerick, by the side of the Falls of Doonas,
has already been referred to.
In the fertile valley of the Maigue are Adare, Croom, Kilmalhck (one of the
oldest towns of Ireland, with ruins of walls and curious buildings), and Kilfinan€y
near which are the ruins of xirdpatrick Abbey. More considerable are the towns
in the basin of the Deel, to the west of the Maigue. Here stand Aakeaton,
formerly strongly fortified ; Rathhealf, an ancient place, near which settlements
Fig. 211.— EouND Tower of Croom.
of Palatines were formed in the seventeenth century ; Neiccastky where coarse cloth
is made ; and Ballingarry, with extensive ruins of ecclesiastical buildings. On
the Lower Shannon are Foynes and Glin, small villages engaged in the coasting
trade. Hospital, a village on the eastern border of the county, is noted for its
horse and cattle fairs.
The county of Kerry extends from the mouth of the Shannon to the Kenraare
River, and is indented by deep bays, the peninsulas between which are filled
with wild mountains. The peninsula of Corkaquiny, between Tralee Bay and
Dingle Bay, rises to a height of 3,127 feet. At its western extremity lie the
Blasket Islands. A second peninsula, filled with spurs thrown out from the
Macgillicuddy Reeks (3,414 feet), beyond the Lukes of Killarney, stretches
towards the Atlantic between Dingle Bay and the Kenmare River. The north-
eastern portion of the county is hilly, and abounds in broad and fertile valleys.
Tarberf, on the Lower Shannon, is a fishino^ village. Lidowel, in the fertile
430
THE BKITISH ISLES.
valley of the Feale, is the county town. Near it is Ardfcrt, anciently the seat of
a bishop. Tralee, the largest town of the county, is prettily situated on the
river Lee, and connected by a ship canal with its port at Blennerville. Bingle,
on the bay of the same name, formerly carried on an extensive traffic with Spain,
but is now limited to an insignificant coasting trade. At the mouth of this bay
lies Yalentia Island, which shuts in an excellent harbour, on wliich is seated
Caherciveen, a fishing village. Valentia Island, the ** capital " of which is
Knightstown, the residence of the self-styled "Knight of Kerry," has slate
quarries, but is principally known as the point of departure of the first Atlantic
Fig. 212. — Lakes of Killarney : Ross Castle.
cable. It forms, too, the western extremity of the arc of a circle of latitude
which has been measured across Europe. Its fame, however, is far inferior to
that of Killarney, a mere tourists' village, seated near the bank of its beautiful
lake. Kenmare, at the head of the bay called Kenmare River, has a copper mine
in its vicinity.
The county of Cork borders upon the Atlantic between Kenmare River and
Youghal Baj% and is traversed lengthwise by a succe8>ion of parallel hill ranges,
separated by the valleys of the Brandon, Lee, and Blackwater.
A llihies, on Kenmare River, is remarkable only on account of its copper mine.
f"*'-<'0
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MUNSTER.
431
Bantry, at the head of Ban try Bay, in which 14,000 Frenchmen were landed
in 1796 for the liberation of Ireland, is known only to artists and fishermen.
Castletoicri Berehaven^ on the same bay, is a fishing village. Rounding Mizen
Fig. 213.— Cape Clear Island.
From an Admiralty Chart. Scale 1 : 148,000.
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Head, we enter the bay which is bounded on the east by Clear Island,
and whose entrance is proclaimed afar by a lighthouse on Fastnet Rock.
Skibbereen, on an estuary of that bay, has some coasting trade ; but Baltimore,
nearer to the open sea, although it has given its name to a great American city,
432
THE BEITISH ISLES.
is merely a fishing village, in former ages exposed to tlie ravages of Algerian
man-stealers. Still proceeding eastward along the coast, we pass Bosscarhertj,
a small cathedral town, and Clonakilty, a small town with coasting trade and
fisheries, and reach Kinsale, the port of the Bandon valley, which, like Galway,
can still show a few Spanish mansions dating back to a time when Kinsale belonged
to Spain. For more than two centuries, from 1381 to 1601, Galicians and Cas-
tilians kept up frequent intercourse between this Irish town and their own ports.
Fig. 214. — CoKK Hakboxjr.
From an Admiralty Chart. Scale 1 : 178,000.
COKK
_2 Miles.
Bandon, the principal town on the river of that name, has a little woollen trade.
Dunmanicay, is a village on the Upper Bandon.
Cork, the third city of Ireland in population and commerce, occupied until the
early Middle Ages a small village, which the Irish called Corroch, or " Swamp,"
owing to the nature of the soil upon which it stood. Subsequently this village
became the capital of Munster. The old city occupies an island of the river Lee,
and several bridges place it in connection with the extensive suburbs on both
banks. Other islands are covered with gardens and public promenades. Cork
MUNSTER. 433
is a place of some industry, and amongst other articles supplies « Limerick
gloves." It has also some pretensions to be considered a seat of learning
and art, for it possesses a Queen's College, a museum, a public library, and
a number of learned societies. As the river Lee only admits vessels of 600
tons, the principal harbour of the town has been established lower down the
estuary. Descending the river in one of the steamers which ply on it, we
successively pass groups of houses, ship-yards, warejiouses, and watering-places
before we reach Queemtoicn, or the Cove. Nearly all the larger steamers and
sailing vessels do not go beyond Queenstown, for Cork is a harbour of refuge and
equipment rather than a trading port. More than half its foreign trade is carried
on with America. Strong forts defend the entrance to the harbour. On Spike
Island, in its centre, is a convict prison. Ptmage West, Black rock, and Monkstou-n,
on the western side of the harbour, are delightful watering-places. Cloi/ne, near
its eastern shore, has the ruins of a cathedral and a round tower. Midkton, on
the Owennacurra, which enters the north-eastern corner of the bay, is a small
market town with a distillery.
Amongst the villages in the neighbourhood of Cork, Blame// is certainly
most widely known, for in the grounds of its castle there lies a stone, kissing
which the humble worshipper is at once endowed with the persuasive eloquence
which forms so characteristic a feature of the people of Cork, but not with the
gift of unblushingly deviating from the truth, of which the people of Moncrabeau
make a boast. Macroom is the only noteworthy place in the valley of the Upper
Lee.
loiighcd, at the mouth of the Blackwater, here crossed by a wooden bridge
1,787 feet in length, is important for its fisheries. It was in its neighbourhood
that Sir Walter Raleigh planted the first potato — in the opinion of many, the
most fatal gift which the Old World ever received from the New. About 300,000
tons of seaweed are annually gathered on the beach of Youghal Harbour, to be
used as manure. On the Upper Blackwater are the towns of Fennotj and MalloWy
the former noted for its coach-building factory, the latter a cheerful market town:
both are beautifully situated. Buttevant, a decayed town, with the ruins of an
abbey, and iJoneraile, with marble quarries near it, are seated on the small river
Awbeg, which joins the Blackwater below Mallow. Kilcoleman Castle, where
Spenser wrote his " Faery Queen," stands near the latter. Kanturk and Millstreet
(Brisbane Castle is near it), in the Upper Blackwater valley, and Mitchehtown and
Charleville, on the northern boundary of the county, are small market towns.
The county of Waterford extends along the sea from the Blackwater to
Waterford Harbour, and is bounded inland by the Suir. Near its western
boundary rise the Knockmealdown Mountains, which throw off spurs, filling nearly
the whole of the county.
Waterford, the great port of Eastern Munster, stands on both banks of the Suir,
spanned by a bridge of thirty-nine arches. According to Thackeray, many of the
inhabitants still deserve what a poet, who accompanied Richard 11. to Ireland said of
them four centuries ago : " Watreforde, oti moult vilaine et orde y sent la gente."
434 THE BEITISH ISLES.
Henry II. landed at Waterford in order to take possession of Ireland, whicli had
been given him by the Pope, and ever since that time frequent intercourse with
England has been maintained. At the present day sixteen steamers depart everv
week for Milford Haven, Newport, Liverpool, Glasgow, Bristol, and London.
Portlaw, above Waterford, on the Eladagh, has a cotton-mill. Passage and Dunmore
are small villages below it, on the '* Harbour." On the coast are Tramore, with
a dangerous harbour ; the twin villages of Knockmahon and Bonmahon, with lead
mines ; and Dungarvan, on a shallow bay, with a large distillery. The Lower
Blackwater crosses the western extremity of the county. Lismore, an ancient
university city, with the ruins of a cathedral and an old castle, is now merely
a village, but its environs are as delightful as ever. A canal joins it to
Youghal at the mouth of the river. Cappoqiiin^ also on the Blackwater, has near
it the Trappist monastery of Mount Mellery, whose inmates have abjured the use
of flesh and stimulating drinks, but have reclaimed a large piece of once sterile
mountain land which lies around their abode.
The county of Tipperary is almost wholly drained by the river Suir, but its
north-western portion, beyond the Silvermine Mountains, slopes down to the
Shannon and Lough Derg. It has its *' Golden Vale " like Limerick, and is
more carefully cultivated than most parts of Ireland.
With the exception of Roserea, in a rich tract at the northern extremity of the
county, and of Nenagh, on the Shannon slope, all the towns of Tipperary lie within
the basin of the Suir. On descending that river we first pass Templemore ; then
IViurles, a prosperous market town, with a Catholic cathedral and St. Patrick's
College ; obtain a glimpse of the ruins of Holy Cross Abbey ; and then reach
Cashel, at the foot of its steep rock, crowned by the ruins of a tower, a cathedral,
a chapel, and a palace of the Kings of Munster. Tipperary lies in its Golden
Vale to the west of the Suir, and at the northern foot of the Galty Mountains.
Cahir, on the Suir, is a Quaker town, a fact proclaimed by its appearance of
comfort and cleanliness. Clonmel, the largest town of the county, carries on a
brisk trade. It is the birthplace of Sterne, the humorist. Its castle and forti-
fications were destroyed by Cromwell in 1650 after a protracted siege. North of
it lies the ancient town of Fcthard, with remains of the walls which formerly
protected it. Car rick- on- Suir, on the eastern boundary of the county, is a town of
considerable trade, and manufactures coarse cloth. '
Far out in the Atlantic, 250 miles west from the Hebrides, 300 miles from the
nearest point of Ireland, and altogether outside the submarine plateau upon which
rise the British Islands, the dumpy pillar of Pockall rears its head above the
water. That rock, which from afar might be taken for a vessel under sail, owing
to the sheet of guano which falls over its slope, is hardly a hundred yards in
circumference ; but it forms the summit of a huge range of submarine mountains,
rising in the same direction as the Faroer. This range, separated from the
MUNSTER. 485
Britisli Islands by an abyss 8,000 feet in depth, almost appears as if it were the
remnant of a land which at one time rose above the sea. Heaps of shells have been
discovered upon it, and even vast beds of fisb bones, which can only have accu-
mulated, on a beach subsequently submerged by a subsidence of the land. Shoals
of fishes sport around Rockall ; but its distance from the land, and the rude
tempests of tbe Northern Atlantic, have until recently 'prevented, the visits of
fishermen. Since 1860, however, Scotch fishermen hi^ve learned to appreciate the
importance of this " California " lying close to their doors, and they now frequent
this bank, supplying London and other British markets with live cod. From
this period that rock and the banks around it have formed part of the Britisli
Islands, not perhaps politically, but as a foraging ground.
I
1
tt
^5!5?^
^s
M
1
1
''^^Mijt^
1^
1
^
^S
^s
^K
^
1
^^
CHAPTER XVI.
STATISTICS OF THE UNITED KINGDOM.
Population.
P to the beginniag of the present century the population of the
British Islands was only known approximately, the estimates
being based upon the number of hearths or the yield of certain
taxes. Its increase during the whole of the Middle Ages can
have been only slow, for its growth was impeded by a want of
roads, the low state of agriculture, the rudimentary conditioa of industry, frequent
wars, and a neglect of sanitary laws ; and famines often carried off more men
m. a few months than had been added to the popuLtion in a generation. It is
probable that at the commencement of the seventeenth century the number
of inhabitants did not exceed 5,000,000. Since then the growth has been
continuous, for the construction of roads has rendered it possible to supply corn to
districts afflicted by bad harvests, whilst the increase of commerce and industry
has opened up fresh resources to the inhabitants.
When the first census was taken in 1801, it was found that the British
Islands were inhabited by 16,000,000 individuals, and their number has
more than doubled during the eighty years which have since elapsed.* At the
present time the population increases annually at the rate of more than 300,000
souls. Between ISt^l and 1871 the daily increase amounted to 500 persons,
and since then it has risen to a diurnal increment of ] ,000 souls, without there
being any sign of a reaction. The British Islands are amongst the most densely
populated countries of the world. In England the number of inhabitants
Population of the British Isles : —
England and Wales
Scotland .....
Ireland
Isle of Man and Channel Islands
Total .
1801.
8,^92,500
1,608.400
5,395,500
100,000
15,996,400
1871.
22,712,250
3,360,000
5,411,500
144.650
31,6-28.400
1880.
25,480,160
3,661,290
5,363,590
150^0_
34'655,(i40
STATISTICS OP THE UNITED KINGDOM. 487
to a square mile is greater thaD in any other European country of the same
extent.*
The population of the towns increases at a much more rapid rate than that
of the rural districts. This is the case in all commercial and manufacturing
countries, but nowhere else in Europe is the discrepancy so great as in England
and Scotland. The dwellers in towns have long outnumbered the rural popu-
lation of Great Britain, for out of 9 inhabitants 5 live in towns, and the
difference betM een the two is annually increasing. London alone includes the
fifth part of the population of England, and Glasgow occupies a similar posi-
tion with reference to Scotland. A time may come when the villages will be
superseded by agricultural factories and clusters of huge dwelling-houses,
as dependencies of the towns in their neighbourhood. The tiller of the soil is
fast being turned into a factory labourer, who readily changes his abode
according to the necessities of his work, and the number of citizens who
annually spend a few weeks or months in the country, whilst still keeping their
ordinary place of business in the towns, is annually increasing. Quite irre-
spective of the forcible ejection by greedy landlords of the inhabitants of entire
hamlets, there are not wanting villages which have become depopulated in the
course of the last generation. In the Scotch Highlands, in certain agricultural
counties of England, and even in Ireland the migration of the agricultural
population towards the great manufacturing towns has assumed such proportion
as to lead to a decrease of the population far greater than could be made up by
an excess of births over deaths. In reality the fecundity of marriages is pretty
much the same throughout the country, yet in the south-west and in other agri-
cultural counties of England the population increases but slowly, if it does not
decrease, whilst in London and the great manufacturing districts in the north
the increase is astounding. f The inquiries as to the birthplaces of the people
which have been made show very conclusively that the great centres of commerce
and industry do not so much draw towards them the inhabitants of smaller towns,
but that they exercise a most potent pow^r of attraction upon their immediate
neighbourhood. The inhabitants of the country surrounding the town flock
into it, the gaps they leave are filled up by immigrants from more retired
country districts, and so on, until the attractive force of one of these rapidly
increasing cities makes its influence felt to the most remote corner of the king-
dom. J Several counties, in which the number of factories is small, are more
Number of inhiibitants to a square mile : —
England and Wales . . . 392
Scotland . . . . . 52
Ireland 163
British Isles .... 244
France 180
German Empire . . . 201
Russia in Europe ... 34
Belgium 469
t Increase of the population of E.i gland, 1861—71 :—
Northern counties . 23 per cent. I Midland counties . . 9 per cent.
Yorkshire . . . 19 „ Eastern counties . . 7 „
North-western counties 15 „ | South-western counties . 2 „
i Ravenstein, " The Birthplaces of the People and the Laws of Mig- ation." London, 1 876.
438
THE BRITISH ISLES.
strongly represented in London than in their own county town. Having no
focus of attraction of its own, the rural population flocks to London, or to
some other manufacturing or commercial city. Whilst in Kerry, Mayo, and
Donegal, in Ireland, not 5 per cent, of the inhabitants are born beyond the limits
of these counties, and the local element of the population in the remainder of
Ireland as well as in many agricultural districts of England amounts to four-
fifths of the total population, there are other counties — such as Middlesex, Surrey,
Fig. 215. — Inckease or Decrease or the Population, 1861—1871.
According to E. G. Kavenstein.
V77?7A.
Increase.
OtolO
per cent.
10 to 20
per cent.
1125
20 to 30
per cent.
B30
Over 30
per cent.
Yorkshire, Dumbartonshire, Renfrew, Lanarkshire, or Edinburghshire, all of
them abounding in coal or in large towns — where less than three-fifths of the
resident inhabitants are natives.*
It is only natural that the death rate in the towns should exceed that of most
* In 1871 24,152,852 persons resided within the counties in which they were born, being 76-36 per
cent, of the total population of the British Isles. These constituted the " local element " of our map.
According to birthplaces there were 21,849,518 natives of England and Wales, 3,296,387 of Scotland,
6,085,395 of Ireland, 139,322 of the Isle of Man and the Channel Islands, and 258,677 persons born
abroad and at sea.
STATISTICS OF THE UNITED KINGDOM.
439
rural districts, for the impure air whicli the townsmen are compelled to breathe
must necessarily shorten their lives. Yet there are many towns — and London is
one of them — whose death rate is comparatively lighter than that of certain
country districts, for it is in large towns that we meet with the public institu-
tions whose attention to the laws of hygiene reduces the number of deaths.
Perhaps there is not in the whole United Kingdom a more safe retreat from
premature death than the gaol of Perth. All othep things being equal, the death
Fig. 216. — The Local Element of the Population
According to E, G. Ravenstein.
0 W.of G
E2M msi
Under 45 per cent. 45 to 75 per cent. 75 to 95 per cent. Over 95 per cent.
The map is shaded to exhibit the number of persons living in the counties in which they were bom.
rate of each town depends upon the purity of the drinking water, and whilst
wealthy towns have been able to provide themselves with excellent water by
constructing reservoirs on the uplands or in the mountain valleys, the villages
around have frequently nothing to look to but the rivulet soiled by the refuse of
their huge neighbour. Many of the townsfolk are able, moreover, to enjoy an
annual holiday, and to recruit their strength by a lengthened residence in bracing
mountain air or on the seaside. The towns and villages which border the lakes of
C'lmberland and the lochs Scotland — Lomond, Katrine, Awe, Rannoch, Errocht —
440
THE BEITISH ISLES.
are, in irutli, but *' suburbs of London." * The same migbt be said of Brighton
and of the many other watering-places which stud the coasts of the English and
Irish Channels, and of the North Sea. Have not Bath, Malvern, Leamington, and
Cheltenham been built expressly that Englishmen of wealth may enjoy themselves
whilst benefiting their health? And some of these watering-places are truly
sumptuous, abounding in almost palatial dwelling-houses replete with every
luxury and convenience.
The annual increase of the population is almost wholly due to an excess of births
over deaths, and would be still more considerable if the surplus were not reduced
Fig. 217. — Increase or Dfcrease of the Natives of each Coukty, 1861 — 1871.
According to E. G. Eavensteiiu
ENGLISH
0- \A/ofGr
Tf crease.
Increafe.
Over 15
per cent.
15 to 10
per ceut.
10 too
per ceut.
Olo 10
per cent.
10 to 20
per cent.
Over 20
per cent.
The map is shadfd to exhibit the increase or decrease of the natives of each county, ii-respective
ol such natives residing in the coimty of then- bhth or elsewhere in the United Kingdom.
by emigration. Even in Ireland, the population of which has only very recently
shown signs of a slight increase, the birth rate, ever since the great famine, has
been higher than the death rate. Taking the average for the last ten years, the
births exceeded the deaths annually to the extent of 430,000, and it is satisfactory
to be able to assert that whilst the birth rate is rising, the death rate is steadily
* N. Hawthorne, " Englisli Note-Books."
STATISTICS OF THE UNITED KINGDOM. 441
declining — a proof of the greater wealth of the people no less than of the beneficial
influence of sanitary improvements.* The number of marriages and births
fluctuates, as a matter of course, according to whether times are prosperous or the
reverse ; but upon the whole it is remarkably steady, far more so thun on the
continent. Still there are thousands of marriageable English men and women
who are either too poor to marry or dread the responsibility of becoming the
founders of a family. The number of females is larger than that of males, for
although more boys are born than girls, the mortality amongst the former is
greater, and in the end the female sex preponderates, f The normal increase of
the population is considerably retarded by the large number of persons living in
celibacy. If all Englishmen were to marry on attaining a marriageable age,
the population would double itself every twenty years, for to every marriage
there are four or five births. In England people marry younger and have more
children than in most other countries of Europe, and especially France. These
early marriages give birth to a feeling of responsibility, promote industry and
enterprise, and are conducive to a regular mode of life.
The rate of mortality is about the same in England as in France. Ordinarily
it is supposed to be somewhat less, but we must bear in mind that still-born children
find no place in the tables published by the Registrar-General.+ The British
Islands may certainly be included amongst the most salubrious countries of the
world. Medical men assert that Englishmen resist the ills that flesh is heir to
with great success. The mortality resulting from the surgical practice carried on
in English hospitals is less than half what it amounts to in French institutions of
the same class. " English flesh diff'ers from French flesh," says M. Velpeau.
The measles and scarlatina are attended with greater danger in England than on
the continent, but consumption is the great slayer on both sides of the Channel.
It carries off nearly one-half of the men and women who die between the ages of
twenty and thirty, and altogether causes the deaths of one-tenth of the population.
Next to it, bronchitis, pneumonia, convulsions, small-pox, diarrhoea, and heart disease
prove most deadly. And whilst diseases of the chest fasten upon those of delicate
constitution, gout attacks and kills men of sanguine temperament and full of
animal spirits.
Emigration carries ofi" annually a considerable proportion of the natural
increase of the population resulting from an excess of births. A regular emi-
gration movement first began after the great Napoleonic wars in 1815. It
* Rate of marriages, births, and deaths {pro mille of total population) : —
Scotland.
Marriages. Births. Deaths.
d-9 34-4 20 7
7-1 35 4 22-3
^•0 35 1 220
7-,5 35-1 22-7
7-0 34-5 2u9
It would be' perfectly useless to give similar statistics for Ireland, as the returns from that kingdom
are imperfect and altogether misleading.
t Between the years 1841 and 1S76 there were born 1,048 boys to every 1,000 girls, but in the total
population there were 1,054 f^-males to every 1,000 males.
X Bertillon, " EncycL.pedie des Sciences Medicales."
125 -E
1856-60
Enoland and \\
Marriages. Births.
8-3 34-4
'ales.
Deaths
21-8
1861—65
8-4
35-6
22-6
1866-70
8.2
35-3
21-4
1871—75
8-5
35-6
22 0
1876-79
7-8
35-9
21 0
442
THE BRITISH ISLES.
increased by degrees between 1841 and 1850, and culminated in a veritable
exodus, which threatened with depopulation several parts of Great Britain,
and more especially Ireland. In lc:^52 over 1,000 persons daily left the shores of
the United Kingdom in search of a new home in America or in one of the English
colonies. At no time, however, did the number of emigrants exceed the natural
increase resulting from an excess of births over deaths. After 1852 this emigra-
tion movement gradually subsided. About 1870 it received a fresh impetus, but
for the last few j^ears the number of emigrants has been small compared with
the total population ; for we must bear in mind that many of them return
after they have succeeded in amassing a competency abroad, and that, in
addition to this, considerable immigration of foreigners takes place. An influx
of immigrants thus counterbalances, in a large measure, the losses sustained
by emigration. Altogether about 8,000,000 natives of the British Islands have
emigrated since 1815. These millions of voluntary exiles, though sometimes
Fig. 218.— Total Emigration from the British Islands.
•?()0(M)()
200 000
100 000
1B13 1823 1835 1845 liJ55 i£65 Vi2b
UrPER Line :— Total Emigration. Lower Livb :— Emigration to the United States.
decimated by disease on reaching the country of their destination, have given
birth to other millions, and they and their descendants are now equal in numbers
to at least half the population of the British Isles.*
Statistics of emigration :-
Average Number of
Emigrants in
Years.
each Year.
1840—1849 .
149,478
18.50—1859 .
243,958
18G0— 1869 .
154,781
1870—1874 .
206,275
1875—1878 .
114,560
Destination of Emigrants per cent.
British North
United States. America. Australia.
57-3 30-8 9-8
64-8 10-1 22-6
69-9 8-3 18-6
72-4 12-2 11-7
60-9 6-2 29-5
The above table includes only emigrants of British birth, and not foreigners who embarked at
British ports.
The official returns of immigrants should be accepted with some hesitation. Compared with the
number of emigrants they are as follows : —
Brit-"sh-bom Excess of
Emigrants. Immigrants. Emigrants.
1,398,869 265,912 1,142,957
1,247,103 676,143 670,960
1863—1870
1871—1878
STATISTICS OF THE UNITED KINGDOM. 443
Agriculture.
The agricultural produce of the British Isles far from suffices for the wants of
the inhabitants. Since 1795 England has been compelled to import ever-
increasing quantities of cereals in order to feed its population. From year to
year more foreign wheat and wheaten flour enter into home consumption. Keduced
to its own agricultural resources, there would be food only for four months in bad
years, and for six with an abundant harvest.* Although cereals yield more prolific
harvests in England than in any other country of the world, f the cultivation of
wheat is nevertheless declining, for the immense supplies forwarded from America
and other countries keep down prices, and render wheat-growing less profitable
than it used to be. Farmers in recent years have paid more attention to cattle
and green crops than to cereals. The moist climate facilitates the conversion of the
arable land into vast meadows. The western counties, with their abundant rain-
fall, have ever been famous for their grazing husbandry and dairy-farming, whilst
the eastern counties continue to supply most of the corn, besides peas and beans.
It is now nearly a century since England, from having been an agricultural country,
became a manufacturing one. Up to about 1770 the export of cereals exceeded the
imports, but after this time the latter far exceeded the former, and with every year
the dependence of England upon foreign countries for her supplies of wheat has
become greater. Not a grain of corn is now grown in the country but what is
wanted for the support of the inhabitants. +
Only a comparatively small portion of the cultivated surface of the British
Isles is devoted to the production of so-called industrial plants, foremost amongst
which, in Kent, Sussex, Hereford, &c., are hops, and in Ireland flax. The sugar-
yielding beet-root is hardly cultivated at all, although the climate of England is
as well adapted to its growth as that of Belgium or Northern Germany. In very
many respects the rural economy of England differs from that of France and other
countries, in which the soil is divided amongst a multitude of small proprietors.
Extensive areas are devoted to the same crop, and the many-coloured rectangular
* Average annual consumption of wheat and wheaten flour in the United Kingdom from 1866 to
1875, 171,200,000 bushels, or 6 J bushels to each inhabitant.
t Average yield per acre in bushels : —
Average of
Wheat. Eye. Barley. Oats. Cereals.
Great Britain 28 34 37 44 36
Ireland 22 20 35 36 28
France 17 15 19 24 19
Portugal 12 8 16 18 13
" Statistique intemationale de 1' Agriculture," 1876.
X Imports and exports of wh' at (annual averages) : —
1760— 1770: excess of exports over imports . . . 41.900 tons.
1770—1780: „ imports 5,900 „
1780-1800: „ „ 100,000 „
1840-1850: „ , 600,000 „
1850-1S70: „ „ 2,000,000 „
LaspejTes, Deutsche Eeviie, i. No. 1, 1877.
444
THE BEITISH ISLES.
patches, whicli form so striking a feature in France, are hardlj^ ever met with.
Nature, indeed, has been permitted to retain her pristine beauty, despite the
interference of man ; at all events, the undulations and contours of the ground have
not been obliterated by a too minute and artificial subdivision of the soil. Most
of the ancient forests have ceased to exist, but hundreds of country residences stand
in the midst of parks, clumps of fine trees stud the meadows and hedges, and many
a village lies embosomed in orchards, whose verdure cleanses the atmosphere,
Fig. 219. — Land under Cultivation.
Proportion of Total Area under Cultivation.
I I ^^^ e^^^^. -..^^^..^ —^-^
Less then 10 to 39 30 to 50 50 to 70 70 to 90 Over 90
10 per cent, percent, percent, percent, percent, percent
and which regulates the rainfall just as the forests did in days of yore. Exten-
sive stretches of heath have been planted with pines and other conifers since the
middle of last century, more especially in the hills of Scotland and Ireland : some
of these modern plantations number as many as 50,000,000 trees. Although
British farmers are noted for the care with which they till their fields, there yet
remain extensive tracts of heath, moorland, and bogs, particularly in Scotland and
Ireland. These barren tracts not only stretch across cold mountain-tops, where
the temperature is not high enough to ripen crops, but they also invade the hilly
STATISTICS OF TEE UNITED KINGBOM. 4,5
ground, and even the lowlands.* More than a third of the area of the British Islands
remams uncultivated and th.s i« greater in proportion than in any other eounTry o
Western Lurope^ But .f the agricultural returns published by th'e Board of Sde
can be trusted, the cultivated area is increasing with every year No\LT
2,000,000 acres of heath and mountain land are'stated tJKeen br^ht u^^r
Fig. 22n.-LAND UNDER Corn Cr^ps.
5 io 10 10 W 20
per cent, per cent
20 to 30
per cent.
30 to 40 Over 40
per cent, per cenL
cultivation since 18()7. All this increase, however, is confined to grass land and
meadows, for the breadth sown with cereals has been declining for several years past.
* Agricultural statistics of the Brilisli IsIps (including the Isle of Man and the Channel Islands) :—
1871. 187fi. IftRO.
Acres. Per cent.
Corn crops (including whe;it) . 11,833.243 15 2
/^^eat 3,831,054
Green crops .... 5,271,398
Clover, sainfoin, and grasses . 6,236.588
Permanent past ure and meadows 22,525,76 1
Flax
Hops
Bare fallow
Cultivated area
Woods
174,269
60,033
565,886
46,667,173
2,500,461
4-9
6-7
80
29-9
0-2
01
0-7
59-8
3-2
For a more detailed statement see Appendix, pp. 494, 495.
Acres. Per cent.
11,030,280 14-2
3,381,731
4.832,293
6,557,748
24,056,840
119,085
71,789
650,210
47,318.240
2,516,000
4-3
6-2
8-4
309
0-2
0 1
0-8
60-7
3-6
Acres.
10,672,086
3,065,895
4,746,293
6,389,225
24,717,092
166,521
66,705
828,779
47,586,700
2,740,000
Per cent.
13-7
4-0
6-1
8-2
31-7
0-2
0-1
M
61-2
446 THE BRITISH ISLES.
There still remain in England and Wales about 2,600,772 acres of common
lands, of which 1,150,000 acres are supposed to be capable of cultivation, whilst a
great portion of the remainder might be rendered productive by planting it with
trees, or as pasturage. The encroachment upon these common lands by the lords of
the manors and others forms a dark chapter in the history of the country. Between
1760 and 1845 no less than 5,000,000 acres were enclosed by virtue of private Acts
of Parliament, which altogether set aside the interests of the public. In the year
1845 the first Act was passed which recognised the rights of the public, and no
enclosures are now permitted without a portion of the common dealt with being
reserved as a recreation ground. About 620,000 acres have been enclosed since
1845. But though many of the commons have been enclosed, the old rights of
way have been fought for, in most instances with success, and the villages in the
agricultural counties have preserved their delightful footpaths, which wind in the
meadows or along the banks of rivulets fringed with shade-throwing trees.*
The British Islands form a Imd of large estates. The landowners who have
found a place in the new Domesday Book published in 1876 are more numerous
than had been supposed ; for their number throughout the United Kingdom,
but exclusive of the metropolis, is no less than l,173,683o We must bear in
mind, however, that this number includes no less than 852,438 owners of
houses or small gardens, whose aggregate estates do not amount to more than
852,438 acres, which is far les.3 than the Duke of Sutherland can call his own
(1,358,548 acres). Nor must we lose sight of the fact that many owners hold
property in more than one county, and are counted twice or more^ as the case may
be. Deducting these, as well as owners who hold public property in trust, as it
were, we find that the probable number of private owners holding one acre and
upwards is 229,630 in England, 15,865 in Scotland, and 28,715 in Ireland,
making altogether 274,210 for the United Kingdom f Twelve persons hold
between them no less than 4,440,500 acres, and over two-thirds of the soil of the
British Isles are the property of about 10,000 individuals. Vast estates, whose
value is continually increasing, are in the hands of members of the royal family,
of the Church, the municipalities, and the two Universities of Oxford and Cam-
bridge.+ The members of the English aristocracy, taken as a body, are the
most powerful landowners in Europe, and their hold upon the land keeps up and
consolidates their power in the state. Peers and peeresses hold no less than
15,500,000 acres throughout the United Kingdom — that is, each about 29,600
acres — yielding an income of £25,000.
* Hugh Miller, " J'irst Impressions of England and the English."
t Abstract of the Domesday Book : —
T Q-n^nTrriAra T.o-nflfiTrniana T,nnflr»TeTlP'"S
Total
Landowners.
972,H36
132,131
68,716
1.173,683
England and Wales
Scotland
Ireland
United Kingdom
I andowners
holding under
an Acre.
703.289
1 1 3,005
36,144
852.438
I-andowners
holding 1 to
500 Acres.
259,340
16,542
26,111
301,993
Landowners
holding over
1,000 Acres.
10,207
2,584
6,461
19,252
t Increase in the value of landed property between 1857 and 1877 :— In England, 21 per cent. ; iB
Scotland, 26 per cent. ; in Ireland, 6 per cent. (James Caird, " The Landed Interest."')
STATISTICS OF THE UNITED KINGDOM. 447
lu Ireland and Scotland the estates are even larger than in England.* In
Ireland, owing to the financial embarrassments of many of the landowners, about
one-sixth of the land has lately changed hands, in addition to which' about
6.000 peasant proprietors have been created in consequence of the sale of a
portion of the estate of the disestablished Irish Church. In Scotland, however,
no changes of this kind have taken place through the intervention of Parliament,
and 93 per cent, of the total area is held by 3,745 pijoprietors. There are land-
owners in that kingdom who from the highest of the mountains within their
demesnes cannot survey all they are lords of, and several of the Hnest lakes of
Scotland lie wholly within the bounds of a single park.
The population of the British Islands has considerably increased since the
Norman invasion, but there is no reason to believe that the number of landowners
has grown less since William the Conqueror divided all England amongst his
followers. The old Domesday Book, or register of lands, framed by order of that
king, and carefully preserved in the Record Office, enumerates in England 9,271
tenants in capite and under tenants, and 44,531 tenants in socage, i.e. tenants by
hereditary right, who rendered knightly service, or paid a fixed rent in exchange
for the land they held. The 108,407 villaim, who held an intermediate posi-
tion between burgesses and serfs, were originally only tenants at will, and at
the mercy of their lords, but in course of time they developed into copyholders,
and their estates passed from father to son. It was these villains who formed the
bulk of that stout yeomanry which conferred such conscious strength upon the
people of mediaeval England. The old Saxon custom of dividing the land in equal
portions amongst all the children still sui-vives in a few parts of the country, and
more especially in the county of Kent, where it is known as gavelkind,! and
during the centuries which immediately succeeded the Norman conquest must
have largely increased the number of landowners. The yeomen^ according to
Macaulay, about the middle of the seventeenth century still constituted one-
seventh of the total population.
But what has become of Old England, with its peasant proprietors and
country gentlemen ? No doubt small capitalists and even working men are
intent upon carving out of the land a small plot which they may call their own,
and which is just large enough for a house and a small garden. In these laudable
efforts they are assisted by numerous Building Societies, and around Birmingham
the number of these small freeholders already exceeds 13,000. But the peasant
* Proportionate size and annual value of landed properties : —
Proper' ion of total Area Proportion of total A nnual Talue
relumed per cent. _^ returned per cent. -,.^5^^^
Size of Estates. aMWa"es. Sconand. Ireland. K n^dom. and Wales. Scotland. Ir3land. Kingdom
7.3 0-7 M 3-8 44-4 43 3 i7o 421
10-9 15-9 18-1 110 15-5 168
9-5 8-0 6-5 6-7 lO'O 69
Under 50 acres
50 to 100 acres
500 to 1,000 acres .
1,000 to 20,000 acres
Over 20,000 acres .
2«1 3-4
100 3-1
49 7 34 6
6-9 58-2
58-7 48 3 27-5 27-5 4o-7 29-4
T^(vo Too'o Tmvo 1000 u)oo loo-o loo-o irn^o
t Shaw-Lefevre, Fortnightly Review, vol. xxi. New Series.
448 THE BRITISH ISLES.
has gone, and his place is filled by the agricultural labourer. Small estates are
being swallowed up by large. The law of entail, which prevents numerous land-
owners from selling or dividing their estates, no less than the universal tendency
of landed proprietors to enlarge the boundaries of their domains, more than
balances the small changes eiFected by these purchasers of small freehold plots.
There are counties in which estates of middling extent have ceased to exist. The
ancient manor-houses stand empty, or have been converted into farmsteads. In
Dorsetshire, for instance, there are 129 rural parishes, out of a total of 252,
without a single resident landowner. The only portion of the British Islands in
which the subdivision of the soil is carried to the same extent as in France is the
Channel Islands, and there prosperity is universal.
The vast estates carved out of the British Islands are naturally divided into
farms, and most of these are far larger in extent than are the plots owned by the
vast majority of continental peasant proprietors. The size of farms averages 56
acres in England, 57 in Scotland, and 26 in Ireland.* The tenure under which
farmers hold their land varies considerably, and although leases are granted in
numerous instances, and as a rule throughout Scotland, the bulk of the English
farmers are tenants at will. Oftentimes, however, farmers remain on the same
estate for generations, and in these cases the relations between landlord and
tenant are not unlike those which existed between the Roman patrons and
their clients. Not only does the landlord rest content with a small rent, but
he expends a considerable portion of his income upon improvements, such as
drainage works, labourers' cottages, and homesteads. t Within the last few years
landlords of this class, in consideration of a succession of bad harvests, have
voluntarily granted a reduction of rent. Nevertheless many farmers have given
up their holdings in despair. In Ireland tenants virtually enjoy a fixity of
tenure — subject, of course, to the payment of rent ; and outgoing tenants are
entitled to compensation for any unexhausted improvements which they may
have made.
In proportion as estates grew large, so did the agricultural population decrease
in numbers. If the census returns can be trusted in this respect, it fell from
2,084,150 in 1851 to 1,833,650 in 1861, and to 1,447,500 in 1871. Farming has
almost become a manufacturing industry, and the steam applied to agricultural
machinery of every description does more work than is performed by human hands.
The labourers whose services have been superseded by this powerful agent join
their brethren in the manufacturing and mining towns, or seek new homes across
the ocean. No other country in Europe enjoys such advantages for the develop-
ment of steam culture as the British Islands. Coal and iron are cheap and
* Number and average size of farms : —
Number of
Averape Area.
Number of
Avenge
Occupiers.
A cres.
Occupiers.
Area.
1874.
1874.
1879.
187!).
England and Wales
480,178
o6j
57)
Scotland
81,007
554,823
58
Ireland
590,000
26
528,275
29
t De Laveleye, "Patr"a Belgica," tome ler.
STATISTICS OF THE UNITED KINGDOM.
449
abundant, skilled artificers are numerous, and the nature of the soil and its
distribution are favourable. Hence steam -ploughs are more numerous than in
all the other countries of Europe together.*
It is somewhat curious that notwithstanding the increase in grass land, the
live stock of the United Kingdom should have decreased to a considerable extent
within the last few years. t This decrease is solely due to the prevalence of
cattle plague and other diseases. Irelan«l is far ricW in cattle than the eastern
island ; but although Great Britain has, proportionately to its population, fewer
Fig 221. — DisTRTBVTTox OF Cattle.
r~]
N ORTH
SEA
'evmoustle/
Merof Gr.
Head"! of Cattle to the Sqnare IVIile.
Under'25. 25to50. 50to75. 75 to 1^^ to 126 10 l«)^to Over 1 75.
cows and oxen than many other countries of Europe, this deficiency is in a large
measure compensated by superior weight and quality.^: No other country m
* 8team-ploughs about 1876 :-Briti8h Isles, 2,000 ; Germany, 104 ; Austria-Hungary, 25 ; France,
U ; Russia, 9 : Rumania, 7 ; Italy, 3 ; total, 2,062.
t Live stock of the British Islands (for further particulars see Appendix, p. 49o) :-
ICO 187*5 1 o7o» JOoU.
'«5- 2,715,307 2,790,887 2,81)9,066 2,9u0,464
CaWe ■ ' ■ 0 083 416 9.718,503 10,162.787 9,761,667 9,833,072
She™' ■ ■ ■ 3o'"o 8 2 32,246,642 33,491,948 32,.571,922 30,180,411
h1 ■ ■ ' 3 189 16? 4,178,000 3,496,167 3,768.019 2,849,888
X Heads 'of ho'med 'cattle' to 100 inhabitants .- In Great BriUin, 20-3; Ireland 74 3 ; France, 308
Holland, 39-6 ; Belgium, 23-6 ; Sweden, 47-1 ', Switzerland, 37-2 ; Denmark, 69 4, &o.
450
THE BRITISH ISLES.
the world has succeeded to the same extent in breeding domestic animals which
excel in strength and size, supply better meat, or yield superior wool. The
aboriginal breed of cattle, which was distinguished for long horns and an ungainly
body, has been almost totally superseded by improved varieties,* in many
instances the result of intentional intermixtures. The North Devonshire cattle
are of a high red colour, with horns of middling size, short and curly hair, and
thin flexible hides. They are active, admirably calculated for draught, fatten
easily, and afford excellent beef. The Hereford cattle are obviously descended
from the same stock, but they are of larger size and of a darker red colour. Theii
Fig. 222. — DisTRiBUTioy of Skefp.
NORTH
SEA
&0
Mer of Gr.
Number of Sheep to each Siuare Mile,
Under 50. 50 to 100 to 200 to 300 to 4u0 to 500 to Over 600.
100. 200. 300. 400. 500. 600.
faces and bellies are white. They fatten readily on coarse pastures, but are inferior
as milkers. Amongst the short-horned breeds of Holderness and Teeswater (or
Durham) the latter is held in the highest estimation, for they are superior
milkers and fatten rapidly. The Highland cattle of Scotland are classed among
the middle horns. They are small, active, and hardy, but their beef, when
fattened on the rich pastures of the lowlands, is beautifully grained, and not
surpassed by any other. The black or brindled cattle of Galloway are the most
celebrated amongst the polled breeds, and their beef is second only to that of the
* Wilson, "British Farming."
STATISTICS or THE UNITED KINGDOM. 45I
Highlanders. The Ayrshire cows enjoy the highest reputation as milkers, and
perhaps next to them rank the cows of Suffolk.
Sheep are even more important than cattle, for they can he hred and fed
upon those extensive tracts of downs which could not support other animals.
The breeds of Great Britain are usually divided into two classes, one of which
produces long or combing wool, and the other short wool. The former includes
the Dishley, or New Leicester breed, which owes ; its celebrity and its name
to Robert Bakewell, the famous breeder. It has no horns, and its mutton
is of fine grain and superior flavour. The short-woolled breeds include the
Southdowns of England, the Cheviots, the black-faced or heath breed, and the
dun-faced or mountain breed— the two latter almost extlusively in the Scotch
Highlands. The Southdowns are equally valued for their fine wool as for their
mutton. Merino sheep have been judiciously crossed with Southdowns and
other breeds, but as English farmers are obliged to look to the meat market as
well as to that for wool, they find it more profitable to keep to the native breeds.
Pigs in great variety abound in every part of the British Islands. Yorkshire
is more especially noted for the quantity and quality of its hams, whilst Wilts,
Hampshire, and Berkshire are credited with producing the best bacon. Goats
are reared in the hilly di^^tricts, but they play a very subordinate part in the rural
economy of the country.
Amongst the poultry there are several varieties which are appreciated by
continental breeders. Dorking fowls are no'ed for their size, and readily distin-
guished by having five toes to each foot. Buckinghamshire is famous for its
ducks, the Lincolnshire fens for their geese, and Norfolk and Suffolk for turkeys.
Englishmen have every reason to be proud of the noble breeds of horses which
they can call their owm, and which, varying in size and other qualities, are
admirably adapted for the purposes for which they are intended. The large black
horses bred in the midland counties excel in strength and weight, and are
peculiarly well fitted for draught. Yorkshire produces excellent saddle horses,
Cleveland bays are much sought after as coach horses, whilst Suffolk has a peculiar
breed of farm horses. The Clydesdale horse is held in the highest esteem in
Scotland. The ponies and shelties of the Highlands and islands of Scotland are
the smallest animals of the kind in the kingdom, but they are generally hand-
some, active, sure-footed, and capable of enduring much fatigue. As to the
English racehorse, it is descended in a nearly direct line from Arabs, Persians,
and Barbs, and perhaps unsurpassed for symmetry and swiftness. Some of the
other breeds have derived considerable advantages from having been judiciously
crossed with it.
Mining.
England occupies a foremost place in the world for its agriculture, but incon-
testably marches at the head of all as a mining country. Its " Black Indies " have
been a greater source of wealth to it than would have been either Mexico or
California. It is to coal England is indebted for its superiority as a manufacturing
452
THE BRITISH ISLES.
state and its widespread commerce, which have in turn proved powerful agents in
securing her political ascendancy. How many centuries, nay, how many decades
longer will this coal hold out ? This is a pregnant question, the solution of which
Fig 223.— DiSTHiHunoN of Coal in Great Bkitaiv.
According to Hull.
0- WofG
Coal within
1,()00 feet of
the smfiice.
Coal at a
depth of 1,000
to 2.000 feet.
Coal at a depth
of from 2,000
to 4,000 feet.
will affect, in a large measure, the destinies not only of the British nation, but of
the whole world.
Geologists have ascertained that the carboniferous strata originally covered a
vast portion of the British Islands as with a sheet, but that the destructive and
STATISTICS OF THE UNITED KINGDOM. 453
levelling agency of denudation has planed off all the inequalities of the surface
un ,1 here renamed only the coal basins, such as we see them at the present day
Sfll these coal basms have an area of 12.000 square mUes, and thev are the most
m,portant m Europe, and those which are ut.lised to the greate'st advantage.
They have been worked at least since the age of the Romans, for cinders of coal
have been found on the hearthstones of Uriconium, and galleries of an anterior
Fig. 224.— Coal Basix.s.
~
^ yti iTffPrriTiTffll
"
^ M iW
^ W d ^f" •=■
/ ^i - f ^
i
^^ "^ Jj IP
-\
X
\ 4> «f|}f$'|fflfMin^
55*
' 41
ftfk*^f TIL
55'
■ ' ^ ^1 ilk
^
i/jll
II
^|P>^
6
i 11 1 1111111 II !|IJ3^ii^^pia«it^>
, JiT^^^y
i
e^""-"" ^
^
_
10 0
WofG
JNon- caibonuerous.
Cual basiiiB.
date to the Saxon invasion have been discovered in the mines of Wigan. In 1670
the English coal mines already supplied more than 2,000,000 tons of fuel a year ;*
a century later triple that amount was extracted from them ; and still another
century nearer our own days, in 1870, they yielded 110,000,000 tons. The
quantify of coal annually raised since then has averaged 125,000,000 tons, worth
Thomas Wright ; Edward Hull, « The Coalfields of Great Britain.'
454
THE BRITISH ISLES.
over £43,000,000.* At present this quantity is very nearly equal to what is
raised in all the rest of the world, but the time has not long passed since the pre-
ponderance of England as a coal-producing country was still more marked, for in
1860 the British Islands yielded fully two-thirds of all the coal raised throuo-hout
Fig. 225. — The Cakboniferous Formation before Denudation.
According to Hull.
£A/GLfSH
0' WofGr
[mnni
Various
Formations.
Carboniferous
Formation.
i\iQ world. Hence, though the production has kept increasing, with slight fluctua;-
* Coal production of the United Kingdom : —
1851 .
1856 .
1^61 .
1865 .
1871 .
1876 .
1877 .
1879 .
Coal raised.
Coal exported.
Tons.
£
Tons.
—
—
3,468,545
66,645,450
16,663,860
5,879,800
83,635,200
20,908,800
7,855,100
101,630,500
25,407,600
10,142,260
117,352,000
35,205,600
12,748,000
133,344,800
46,670,700
16,299,100
134,610,7u0
47,113,770
15,420,000
133,808,000
46,832,000
16,442,300
STATISTICS OF THE UNITED KINGDOM. 455
tions, the relative importance of the English coal mines has become less, and the
political economists of England were justified in busying themselves with this coal
question after Professor Jevons had raised his cry of alarm * There is no fear,
of course, of the stores of coal becoming altogether exhausted, for down to a depth
of 4,000 feet they are estimated to amount to no less than 146 milliards of tons.
That which causes apprehension is the proximate exhaustion of those coal seams
which lie nearest to the surface, for the cost of raising the coal increases with the
depth to which the miner has to descend in search of it, and the working of the
mines may in the end prove unremunerative. Several of the coal basins— as, for
instance, that of Coalbrookdale — have already been partially abandoned ; others,
including that of South Staffordshire, will probably be worked out by the end of
the nineteenth century. In the meantime other countries whose coal basins are
superior in extent to those of the British Islands might come to the front, and
deprive England of her pre-eminence as a coal-producing country.! The coal-
mine owners are very largely dependent upon manufacturers for their prosperity,
for the crises which disturb the industrial world always exercise an influence
upon the cost of the fuel consumed in the factories. Hence, notwithstanding
the quantity of coal raised or exported exhibits an increase, the money
paid for it may have been less, and such has virtually been the case of late.
France for many years to come will no doubt remain England's best customer for
coal, owing to the irregular distribution of her stores of fuel ; but other markets
may be shut through a slight displacement of the balance of trade. The coal
trade is, moreover, one of those which suffers most from strikes, and is attended
with the greatest risk to human life. The precautions now taken to prevent
accidents are no doubt greater than formerly, but nevertheless of the thousand
miners who are annually killed in the underground galleries of England and
Scotland, the vast majority perish in coal mines.
Of the coal raised about one-sixth is used for domestic purposes ; a third is
employed to feed the engines of factories, steamboats, and railways ; and over one-
fourth is consumed in the manufacture of iron. Most of the iron ore occurs in the
neighbourhood of the coal beds, and this is a capital advantage. The iron industry
of England is of paramount importance, for it supplies about one-half of the cast
iron employed throughout the civilised world. + It has often been said that the
consumption of iron affords a true gauge by which to measure the prosperity of a
country, and there is a great deal of truth in this. Up to 1740 the iron manu-
facturers of England only made use of charcoal in their smelting works; but after the
first successful experiments had been made with mineral coal, charcoal gradually
became disused, and by 1796 had been almost completely abandoned. Since then
* Jevons, " The Coal Question," 1866.
t Principal coal basins of the world, according to Neumann-Spallart :—
China . . 193,460 square miles.
United States 192,380 „
Hindustan . 34,730 „
British Isles . 8,930 „
t Say 7,000,000 tons out of a total production of 14,000,000 tons,
Germany . . 3,570 square miles.
France . . 1,890 „
Belgium . . 890 „
456
THE BEITISH ISLES.
the manufacture of iron has attained a wonderful development in England,
and still more so in Scotland, and until recent years the production increased
every decade by hundreds of thousands of tons. The blast furnaces of Great
Britain are equal to an annual production of 1-0,000,000 tons of iron and
steel ; but in no single year have more than 7,000,000 tons been actually
produced, and of late more than half the available furnaces have occasionally had
their fires extinguished. 'No other branch of industry has suffered more from the
depression of the years 1872 — 79 than that of iron, but happier conditions of
international trade have led to a wonderful revival. English iron-masters have
more especially been intent upon reducing the cost of producing iron, and in this
respect they have been eminently successful. In 1787 the Muirkirk Iron Company
in Ayrshire expended 9 tons of coal in the production of a ton of pig iron ; in
1840 the average consumption of coal to effect the same result was 3 J tons ;
in 1872, 2 J tons; and at present it does not probably exceed 2 tons. Equally
important are the new processes introduced into the manufacture of steel, and the
" age of iron " is likely soon to be succeeded by an " age of steel."
In comparison with iron the other metals won in the British Islanls are
of small importance. Cornwall and Devonshire yield copper and tin ; Northum-
berland, Yorkshire, Derbyshire, Shropshire, Wales, Lanarkshire, and the Isle of
Man yield most of the lead. Zinc is principally found in the Isle of Man and in
Wales.*
Manufactures.
Next to coal mining and iron-making there is no branch of manufacture in
which the British Isles are so deeply interested as in that of textiles ; or, in other
words, the spinning of yarn from the raw material, and afterwards converting it
into manufactured goods. f Of the various groups of this trade, that in cotton is
by far the most important, and the one in which the prosperity of Great Britain
is most bound up. In 1861 England supplied half the cotton goods consumed
throughout the world. The quantity of English produce has increased since then,
notwithstanding frequent oscillations ; but continental Europe and the United
* Minerals raised and metals produced from British ores : —
Estimated Value at the Place
Quantities.
of Production.
1872.
1879.
1872.
1879.
Tons.
Tons.
Coal
123,497.316
133,808,000
£46,311,143
£46,832,000
Pig-iron
6,741,929
6,995,337
18,540,304
14,988,342
Fine copper .
6,703
3,462
683,2 .2
222.507
Metallic lead
60,420
51,635
1,208,411
755,489
White tin .
9,560
9,532
1,459.990
689 163
Zinc .
6,191
6,554
118,076
95 809
SUver from lead
62,892,002
33,346,202
157,320
70,905
Gold .
—
44,702
—
1,790
Other metals
—
—
2,500
1,2 0
Salt .
1,785.000
2,558,368
892,500
1,279,184
Clays .
2,430,538
2,878,489
65H,300
717,143
Other minerals (ex
ing stones, slate
cludi
3,&C.
agbu
) .
ild-^
—
546,131
—
343,031
t Bevan, *' Industrial Geography of Great Britain," 1880.
STATISTICS OF THE UNITED KINGDOM. 457
States have made even greater progress, and Great Britain has thus relatively lost
ground. The English cotton-mills contain as many spindles and power-looms as
those of all the rest of the world combined ; but owing to the powerful competition
which English manufactures have been compelled to meet, it has repeatedly
become necessary to work short time, or to stop work altogether. Continental
manufacturers produce certain kinds of goods of a superior quality, and they have
succeeded in depriving England of some of her most prpfitable markets, whilst the
cotton industry of the United States, fostered by high protective duties, has taken
a considerable development. Americans are not only no longer compelled to go
to England for their cotton stuffs, but they have the audacity to send manufactures
of their own into Lancashire. Even India has begun to compete with Eno-land in
supplying her native population with cotton clothing.*
Whilst the cotton industry has its principal centres in Lancashire and the
adjoining parts of Yorkshire and Cheshire, and in Lanarkshire, the manufacture of
woollens is far more scattered. The West Riding of Yorkshire enjoys, however, a
pre-eminence in the production of woollen cloth, worsted, and shoddy. The famous
West-of-England cloths are manufactured in Wiltshire, whilst N'ewtown, in
Montgomeryshire, is the head-quarter of the Welsh flannel trade. Hawick and
Galashiels, on the Tweed, produce principally woollen hosiery. In many parts of
the country, and especially in Scotland, wool spinning and knitting are largely
carried on as a domestic industry. The carpet manufacture forms an important
branch of the woollen trade. It is principally carried on at Wilton, near
Salisbury ; Kidderminster ; Glasgow and Kilmarnock, in Scotland ; and to some
extent at Dewsbury and Leeds, in Yorkshire. In quantity the production of
the English woollen-mills far surpasses that of those of France, but not always in
quality.
The flax and linen trade, though carried on to some extent in Scotland and
Yorkshire, is essentially one belonging to the north of Ireland, and Belfast
surpasses all other towns of the world in the quantity and quality of its linen.
Much of the flax consumed in the Irish linen -mills is produced in the country,
and the farmers of Ulster would come off badly if they had not their flax crop
to fall back upon. Dundee and Arbroath are the principal seats of the hemp
and jute manufacture, but nearly all the raw material required has to be imported
from Eussia, India, New Zealand, and other countries.
The silk trade depends for all its raw material upon foreign countries, and
for a considerable time past it has been in a depressed condition. It is princi-
pally carried on at Macclesfield and Congleton, in Cheshire, Derby, Nottingham,
Manchester, London, and a few other places. Silk-weaving is an old industry
in the districts of Spitalfields and Bethnal Green, in London, whcrs it was first
introduced by French Huguenots.
* Raw cotton imported, exported, and retained for home consumption: —
Imported (lbs.). Exported (lbs.). Retained (lbs.).
1868 . . . C3?^B:761,616 322,713,328 1,0U6,048,288
1871 1,778,139,716 362,075,616 1,416,064,160
I8/.5 . . . 1,492,351,168 262,853,808 1,229,497,360
1879 . . . 1,469,358,464 188,201,888 1,281,156,576
126— E
458 THE BEITISH ISLES.
!N"otting"ham, Derby, and Tiverton are the principal centres for the produc-
tion of machine-made lace, whilst pillow lace is largely turned out in the counties
of Devonshire, Buckinghamshire, Oxfordshire, and Bedfordshire. The art of
making lace is taught in all the dame schools of these districts, and is cultivated
as a domestic industry.
The hosiery trade is carried on both in factories and in the cottages of the
workers. Leicestershire is the centre of the w^oollen hosiery manufacture ;
Nottingham turns out cotton, merino, and silk hosiery ; and Hinckley common
cotton goods. The elastic-web trade, which combines india-rubber with cotton,
silk, or wool, is limited to two towns, viz. Loughborough, in Leicestershire, and
Coventry, in Warwickshire.*
Hardly inferior in importance to the textile industries is the manufacture
of hardwares, and of all kinds of ware in which metals are employed. It embraces
a wide range of objects, from pins and steel pens to powerful machinery, from
nails to heavy ships' anchors. Hand-made wares are almost entirely manufactured
in the Blick Country, to the west of Birmingham, where Dudley, Cradley, and
Halesowen are the great nail-making towns. The men, women, and children
employed on hand-made wares work long hours and earn little, and their life is of
the hardest and most cheerless. Far more prosperous are the workers in the nail
factories, and still more those employed in the making of anchors.
The manufacture of locks is almost entirely confined to Walsall, Wolverhampton,
and Willenhall, in South Staffordshire, and each of these towns is noted for a par-
ticular kind of lock. Most of the men employed in this branch of industry
work at home. Walsall is, moreover, the principal centre for the manufacture of
saddlers' ironmongery.
Pins are principally made in Birmingham, and in no other trade has time-
saving machinery been introduced with greater effect. Redditch, in Worcester-
shire, is the centre of the needle trade, which was first introduced by Germans.
The manufacture of cutlery employs between forty and fifty thousand people, of
whom the majority belong to Sheffield, Birmingham, and Wolverhampton. Shef-
field knives are known throughout the world, but the high reputation of English
tools has not been able, in every market of the world, to triumph over the very keen
* Textile industries of the United Kingdom
(1875 and 18
79):-
1875.
1879
Factories.
Spindles.
Power Looms.
Opera'ives.
Factories.
Spindles Tower Looms. Operatives.
Cotton .
. 2,665
41,881,789
468,118
479,515
2,674
39,527,920
614,911
482,993
Woollen
1,800
3.323,881
57,090
134,605
1,732
3,337.607
56,944
134,344
Shoddy .
962
102,080
1,437
3,431
U7
83.702
2,110
5,079
Worsted
818
2,582.450
81,747
142.097
693
2,096,820
87,393
130,925
Flax .
449
1,555,135
41,980
128,459
400
1,264,766
40,448
108,806
Hemp .
61
22,542
22
5,211
58
22,043
74
4,780
Jute
no
230,185
9,599
37,920
117
212,676
11,288
36,354
Silk
125
1,336,411
io,(;o2
45,559
706
842,538
12,546
40,985
Lace
311
—
—
10,873
283
—
—
10,209
Hosiery-
1.6
—
—
11,980
18*j
—
—
14,992
Hair and )
elastic web j
111
42,770
2 826
6,55 1
119
7,105
—
—
6,169
Total .
7,288
61.077.243
667,«21
1,005,704
47,38.s,072
725,714
975,636
-
==■
£==Sb
■
STATISTICS OF THE UNITED KINGDOM. 459
competition with American and German makers. The cutlers of Sheffield are a
'singular class of workers, very tenacious of their old customs, and jealous even ol
such alterations as would improve their sanitary condition. The grinders prefer
to die young from the disease engendered by inhaling the dust which flies off the
metal and the grindstones, and known as " grinder's rot," rather than use any
simple appliance which would remedy the mischief.
S^eel pens, screws, and buttons of every description are pnncipally made at
Birmingham. Nuts and bolts are produced at Darlaston and Wolverhampton, in
Staffordshire, and near Newport, in Monmouthshire. Wire-making is carried on
at Wolverhampton, Manchester, Sheffield, Warrington, and Newport.
Birmingham enjoys a reputation for its cheap jewellery, and no other place
in the world can compare with it for low price joined to excellent quality ; whilst
the district of Clerkenw^ell, in London, supplies a more expensive class of goods, and
is also noted for its watches. Another great seat of watchmaking is Prescot, in
Lancashire, where machinery is largely employed. Electro-plated and Britannia-
metal ware are principally produced in Birmingham and Sheffield, and several of
the establishments in these towns enjoy a world-wide reputation.
Birmingham is famous, too, for its fire-arms, and holds a position in England
analogous to thut of Liege in Belgium. But if there is one branch of manu-
facture more than another that England excels in, it is that of machinery
of every kind. The agricultural-implement works of Fowler at Leeds, Howard
at Bedford, and Ransome and Sims at Ipswich, rank amongst the first establish-
ments of the kind in the world. Manchester, Leeds, Birmingham, Newcastle,
Crewe, and Glasgow are the chief seats of those vast engineering works which
have done so much to make England a name for locomotives, steam-engines, and
machinery of every description. Ship-yards are met with in nearly every seaport
town, but the Tyne, the Clyde, Burrow-in-Furness, and Birkenhead are more
especially noted for their iron and steel ships.
Pottery-making in all its multitudinous branches, from the coarsest stone-
ware to the most expensive china, flourishes more especially in that district
of Northern Staffordshire which is known as the Potteries. Worcester has long
been celebrated for its china, and there are large pottery works at Lambeth in
London, and at a few other places, but two-thirds of all the pottery is made in
Staffordshire. Cornwall, Devonshire, and Dorsetshire supply much of the clay
used in these works. The glass trade is a good deal more scattered. Some of
its principal localities are Newcastle, Sunderland, and the banks of the rivers
Tyne and Wear generally ; St. Helen's and Pavenhead, in Lancashire ; Bir-
mingham ; Stourbridge, in Worcestershire; Glasgow and Alloa, in Scotland; and
London.*
The textile industries alone give employment to about a million factory hands,
independently of the large number of persons who indirectly depend upon them.
The industrial population of the United Kingdom numbers about 5,000,000
individuals, not counting their dependants. This multitude finds employment
* Bevan, "Industrial Geography of Great Britain," 1880.
460
THE BEITISH ISLES.
in the numerous factories, some of the principal amongst which we have men-
tioned, and in a variety of other occupations. English bricklayers, Scotch
masons, Welsh smiths, and Irish navvies are at work all over the country building
towns, factories, and railways. Mr. Fairbairn, in 1865, estimated the power
of the steam-engines employed throughout the country as equivalent to the
strength exercised by 3,650,000 horses or 76,000,000 labourers. At the pre-
sent day we may fairly assume that their power equals that of 100,000,000
human beings, and if these could be distributed in equal shares amongst the
inhabitants of the British Islands, every one of them would have three slaves
at his disposal, with muscles of steel that never tire, and requiring no other
food than coal. The annual produce of the British manufacturing industries
has been estimated at £500,000,000, and is sixfold what it was in 1815 ; whilst
the revenue derived from land and houses has, during the same epoch, only risen
from £36,000,000 to £180,000,000. The wages of English factory hands vary
considerably according to age, sex, skill, and the branches of industry, but upon
the whole they are about a fifth higher than those paid to Frenchmen under
similar conditions. They fluctuate, however, to a considerable extent, and there
occur periods of depression when they fail altogether, and reduce thousands of
families to the verge of starvation. Women and children are employed in large
numbers, more especially in the textile industries, and although the factory laws
have limited the hours of labour during which they may be employed to fifty-
seven hours a week in the case of women and young persons between the ages of
fourteen and eighteen, and to thirty-eight hours in the case of children between
ten and fourteen, there can be no doubt that hard work exercises a baneful
influence upon the physique of the factory population. Nearly all medical men
are of opinion that the population of Lancashire and Yorkshire exhibits signs of
physical degeneration.
The number of children physically unfit for work on the completion of the
thirteenth year appears to be increasing.
Commerce.
Foremost amongst the nations as a manufacturing country, England holds a
similar position with reference to its foreign and inland commerce. Its exports
and imports are equal in amount to those of France and Germany combined, and
since 1866 they have never been less than £500,000,000 a year.* Between 1865
and 1879 the imports per head of the population have varied between £9 Is. 5d.
and £11 15s. lOd. ; the exports of British produce between £5 lis. Id. and £8 Is.
These are very large amounts when compared with those of other countries.
Imports.
Year.
1-66.
18 :o .
1872 .
1875 .
1877 .
1879'.
1880 (esti-
mate) .
Merchandise.
£271,072,2>5
303,257,493
354,693,624
373,939,577
394,419,682
362,S»91,87o
Bullion.
£21.462,211
29,455,668
29,608,012
32,264,789
37,152,799
24,155,538
British
Produce.
£165,835,725
199,586,322
256,257,347
223,465,963
198,893,065
191,531,758
Exports.
For. and Col.
Produce.
£52,995,8 il
44,493,755
58.331.487
58,146.360
53.452,955
57,251,606
Bullion.
Value of Mer-
chandise tran-
shipped in Ports of
the United Kingdom.
£15.092,524
18,919,690
30.355.861
27.628,042
39,798,119
28,584,912
£6,469,519
10,940,601
13,896,760
12,137,064
12,182,241
10,975,669
420,000,000 16,700,000
223,000,000 60,000,000 19,300,000 12,000,000
STATISTICS OF THE UNITED KINGDOM.
4G1
Taking the average of ten years (1868—78), the imports ;?/w5 exports of France only
amount to £9 7s., those of Germany to £6 8s., and those of the United States to
£5 a head of the total population.
The kindred nation of the United States is that with which Great Britain
carries on the most extensive commerce. France ranks next, then follow
Germany, British India, Australia, Holland, Russia, Belgium, British North
America, and China. But if we arrange the foreigi^ and colonial customers of
England according to the value of British and Irish produce received by each, they
rank in the following order : — United States, British India, Germany, Australia,
France, Holland, Russia, Turkey, Cape Colony and Natal, Brazil, British North
America, Belgium, and Italy.* There is not a maritime country in existence hut
Fig
\ 226. — Fluctuations of British Commercr.
Mill.
fll;
.I'ip
,100
340 ^
II* in 187^.
300
A
_/\
/^ V-
/
7.10
/
2,50
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s
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6* J
^5GM,l|..n
^.1871.
7f)o
/ \
200
/ \
J
/ \
^
/ \
A'
V
160
cC''
y i
hfo
V
/ ,. A
(&
-Kr i
' /^'s
? /\ \
/ '^
c /\
/ ^
too
^y / V
i <?'^
100
'^ /\/ /
•^ /VV
v^
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' / r^
o^
X?
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ao
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o" ,^^y ^
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\^/ ,rS
-j>^ V'f'V
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-"^"""''—.^^
N_^\^^-v-
'^2SP^::^
16
VO IS 10 1820 1830 1840 I860 1860 1870 Ji
f80
its ports are frequented h}^ British vessels, and London and Liverpool are to
many amongst them the great links which attach them to the rest of the world.
As a great manufacturing country, England draws from abroad not only a
considerable proportion of the raw materials used in its factories, but also a
large share of the food consumed by its closely packed population. Cotton, wool,
flax and hemp, corn, live animals, and provisions of every description ; timber ; and,
amongst manufactured articles, silks and woollens, figure most prominently in
the imports. Foremost amongst the exports are cottons, woollens, iron and
steel, coal, machinery, linen, and manufactured goods of every kind. The customs
revenue, almost exclusively levied upon tea, coffee, spirits, wine, and tobacco, yields
annually about £20,000,000, and nearly one-half of it is collected in London.
* For more detailed information see Appendix, pp. 498, 499.
402 THE BRITISH ISLES.
But whilst English merchants allow no opportunity to escape them for securing
new markets for the products of British industry, whether amongst the savages
of Polynesia or the uncultured negroes of Inner Africa, they find themselves
shut out, by high protective duties, from the ports of muny civilised nations which
formerly were amongst their best customers. Nor are the British colonies the
last in seeking to foster a native industry at the expense of that of the mother
country.* Rival nations, which look up to England as their instructress in the pro-
cesses of manufacture, have gained in experience and strength, and now compete
with her in the open markets of the world. The balance of trade represented by the
value between exports and imports has recently turned so much against England
as to cause some anxiety. t
But it is clear ihat this difference cannot represent so much loss to the national
capital, and must be made up from other sources. One of these is supplied by the
dividends earned by English capital invested in foreign Government loans and
industrial undertakings. There is hardly a country in the world which is not
indebted to English enterprise and English capital for railways, telegraphs, and
water works, or for a development of its industrial and commercial resources.
Nearly all the submarine telegraph cables belong to England ; the mines of Brazil,
the railways of the Argentine Republic, and many of the sugar-mills of Egypt are
the property of English capitalists. The material labour of half the world is
carried on through the counting-houses of the City, and in the banks in Lombard
Street the profits resulting from this immense activity keep accumulating. The
annual income which England derives from her investments in foreign countries
cannot be much less than £30,000,000. :|:
English capitalists are aware, however, that the profits derived from manufac-
tures may diminish in course of time, or disappear altogether, and they have con-
sequently spared no effort to become the ocean carriers of the entire world. The
profits yielded by the shipping trade do not figure in the statements of exports and
imports, but they are very considerable. Britain owns about half the mercantile
* From the following statement of British exports it will be seen that their value in the case of
France has increased 186 per cent, since the conclusion of a commercial treaty in 1861, whilst the
exports to the United States, notwithstanding the increase of population, are now less than they were in
1860, and those to British America have fallen immensely since the adoption of protective duties : —
British North
France. United States. America.
1850 . . . £2,401,956 £14,891,961 £3,235,051
1855
1860
1865
1870
1875
1879
6,012,668 17,318 086 2,885,331
5,249,861 21,613,111 3,737,574
9,062,095 21,227,956 4,707,728
11,643,139 28,335,394 6,784,195
15,357,127 21,868,279 9,036,583
H,9a8,857 20,321,990 5,445,130
otal exports in £ : —
1870 .... 59.176,916
1875 .... 92,327,254
1879 .... 114,-08,511
t Excess of total imports over
1855 .... 26,851,550
I860 . . . . 44,977,990
1865 .... 52,250,709
j Robert Giffen, " Recent Accumulations of Capital in England," estimates the total capital of the
United Kingdom at £6,113,000,000 in 1865, and at £8,018,000,000 in 1875, being an increase of 40 per
cent, in ten years;
STATISTICS OP THE UNITED KINGDOM. 469
fleet of all Europe, and including the colonial shipping, more than a third of
hat of the whole world.' Th.a enormous fleet, ma,>ned by over 200,000 sailors
keeps increasmg from year to year in tonnage and efficiency, if not in the numbe;
of vessels The tonnage of the steam- vessels is steadily becoming greater, and a
time can be foreseen when it will equal or surpass that of the sailing vessels.f
Fig. 227.-S10KN0WAY : Return op the Fishino Fleet.
The British marine is far too large to find employment in the commerce of the
United Kingdom, vast though that commerce be. It puts in an appearauce in
* Number and tonnage of vessels belonging to the United Kingdom : —
Year.
Sailing Vessels.
Tons.
Steam-vessels.
Tons,
1865
26,069
4,936,776
2,718
823,533
1870
23,189
4,577,855
3,178
1,112,934
1875
21,291
4,206,897
4,170
1,345,579
18<-9
20,538
4,068,742
5,027
2,511,233
t Tonnage of sailing vessels built and registered in 1871 — 75, 629,003; of steam-vessels, 1,431,343
the same for 1876—79, 649,628 and 929,605 tons.
464
THE BRITISH ISLES.
nearly every port of the world, and successfully competes with foreigners in their
own waters.* When the Suez Canal, which now joins the Mediterranean to the
Red Sea, was first projected, it was feared by some that it would unduly profit
Greek, French, and Italian ship-owners ; but M. de Lesseps was right when he
predicted that England, of all maritime nations, would derive the greatest advan-
tages from it. The commercial interests of England in India and the East exceed
Fig. 228.— Wreck Chart.
O'Mer ofGr
— Foimdered.
• Damaged.
those of all other nations, and the capital required for the construction of steamers
adapted for navigating this canal was readily forthcoming.!
English mariners have not only taken possession of the fishing banks around
the British Islands, but also frequent the waters of Newfoundland, Iceland,
* More than two-thirds of the foreign and colonial trade of the United Kingdom is carried on in
British bottoms.
t Bagehot, "Lombard Street."
STATISTICS OF THE UNITED KINGDOM.
465
Baffin s Bay, and Sp.tzbergen. There are several ports, sueh as Stornoway in
the Outer Hebrides, which have beeome trysting-places of hundreds of fishing-
boats which sometimes sail i„ company, like flocks of gulls taking to flighl
The British fisheries employ about 26,000 boats, manned by 60,000 men, and
their produce yields a considerable surplus for exportation to the continent*
Fig. 229.— Canals axd Navigable Rivers
13 10
Srale l: 8.000.000.
E.G.RavensleiaDel.
The Engllsli marine is still further reinforced by a flotilla of 3,400 pleasure yachts,
varying in size from a few to 750 tons, some amongst them being veritable
floating palaces.
British ship-owners are not only called upon to make good the losses resulting
* Annual value of herrings and other fish, the j)roduce of British fisheries, exported 1875 — 79,
£1,294,470.
466 THE BEITISH ISLES.
from vessels becoming unserviceable on account of their age, but also those they
sustain through shipwreck.* Disasters of this kind occur most frequently in the
vicinity of the great shipping ports, along the dangerous east coast, and amidst
the rocks of the Orkneys and Shetland Islands. As far as they can be provided
against by lighthouses, light-ships, sea-marks, and lifeboats, no pains have been
spared, for there is not another coast in the world which is equally well provided
with all that can mitigate the dangers inseparable from the navigation of the sea.
Some measure of the inland trade of the British Islands is afforded by a
consideration of the state and extent of means of communication, and the incessant
movement of goods and passengers along the high-roads, canals, and railways. The
inland trade has grown quite as rapidly as the commerce with foreign countries.
In 1763 it was only once a month that a coach started from London for
Edinburgh, spending between twelve and sixteen days on the journey. As
recently as 1779 a daily courier, travelling at the leisurely rate of 4 miles an
hour, sufficed for carrying the mail between Ireland, Liverpool, Manchester, and
thirty-two other towns. t In 1784 mail-coaches were first substituted for mounted
postmen of this description. In 1755 there was not in England a single
navigable canal, and transport by land had to be effected along a limited number
of badly kept turnpike roads.+ There existed, it is true, an old canal, the
Eossdyke, excavated by the Romans, and made navigable again in 1670, and the
navigation of several rivers had been improved, but the Bridgwater Canal,
commenced in 1759, is justly looked upon as the precursor of the existing system
of canals. Towards the close of last century the construction of canals was taken
in hand with vigour, and between 1790 and 1810 — that is, whilst the bloody wars
with France made so heavy a call upon the national resources — no less than
£28,000,000 were expended upon the improvement of inland navigation. § All
the more important basins are now joined to each other ly means of canals.
Barges can piss from the Thames into the Severn ; they can climb the slopes of
the Pennine range by means of locks, and proceed from the JS^orthern Atlantic
through the Caledonian Canal into the North Sea. Ireland, too, has been provided
with a system of canals which connects the Shannon and Barrow with Dublin, and
Lough Erne with Belfast. It is generally supposed that the introduction of
railways has largely reduced the traffic over canals, and in some instances this is no
doubt the case. Railways have found it to their interest to buy up canal companies,
in order to avoid the necessity of competing with them ; but they are by no means
inclined to allow their investments to remain unprofitable, and they divert to them
a portion of the traffic, which would otherwise block their roads. It may safely be
assumed that the traffic over the canals is now increasing instead of diminishing. II
* Between January Ist. 1873, and May 16th, 1880, 1,965 British vessels of a burden of 729,194
tons, and 10,827 lives, were lost at sea, being an annual average of 266 vessels, b8,467 tons, and 1,466
lives.
t "William Tegg, " Posts and Telegraphs."
X Ch. Dupin, "Force commerciale de la Grande-Bretagne.
§ SutclifFe, " Treatise on Canals and Reservoirs."
II Total length of canals, 2,931 miles; traffic (in England and Wales only), 25,110,000 tons in 1868,
30,000,000 tons in 1879; gross revenue yielded (United Kingdomj, £1,007,413 in 1875, £2,993,373 in 1878.
STATISTICS OF THE UNITED KINGDOAT.
4G7
England may justly feel proud of having been the first to open a railway for
passenger traffic, which took place in 1825. No other country of Europe has since
then expended so large a capital upon the development of its railway system
and nowhere else are locomotives called upon to carry an equal amount of
merchandise or a larger number of travellers. On an average every inhabitant
Fig 230.— Railway Map.
Scale 1 : 7,500,000.
W .of Gr
100 Miles.
of the United Kingdom travels twenty times in each year by rail, whilst every
Frenchman only does so three times. The railways of the British Islands
belong to ninety-two distinct companies, but the bulk of them are nevertheless
owned by a few powerful ones, such as the Great Western, the North-Western,
the Midland, the Great Eastern, the South- Western, the Great Northern, the
468
THE BEITISH ISLES.
Nortli British, and the Caledonian, which have bought up many of the smaller
concerns and increased their revenues, though not always with a due consideration
for the interests of the public. On an average the net revenue of the railway
companies amounts to about one-half of the gross receipts. English railway
engineers have not been called upon to surir.ount elevated mountain ranges, but
they have thrown bold viaducts across river estuaries and arms of the sea, and
constructed tunnels beneath houses and rivers. The cost of carrying some of the
Fig. 231.— Valentia and its Telegraph Cahles.
Scale 1 : 225,000.
W. of G .
lines through populous towns has in many instances been prodigious. The number
of railway accidents is unfortunately very considerable, a circumstance due in a
large measure to the frequency of the trains and the speed at which they
travel.*
* Railway statistics for 1879 :— Length of lines, 17,696 miles ; capital (including loans), £717,003,469 ;
gross receipts, £61,776,703; working expenses, £32,045,273; net earnings, 4*14 per cent.; passengers
conveyed, 680.000,000. Rolling stock :— 13,174 engines, 39,877 coaches, 381,246 waggons. Accidents :—
1,074 persons killed, 5,827 persons injured (iacluding railway employes), 154 collisions.
STATISTICS OF THE UNITED KINGDOM. 469
If further evidence were wanted to prove the commercial ascendancy of
England, it would be furnished by its postal and telegraph business. The tele-
graph lines of the British Islands are of less length than those of several other
countries, but the number of messages forwarded along them is greater than
elsewhere, and an average Englishman writes three letters to every one penned
by another European.* Submarine cables connect the British Islands with each
other and with all countries of the world. The j^rincipal points of departure
of these cables are Penzance, near the Land's End, and Valencia, at the south-
western extremity of Ireland.
Social Condition.
There are not wanting prophets of ill omen who point to the decrease of English
exports as a proof of decay ; but for the present, at all events, England is the
richest country in the world. Mr. Giffen,t who bases his computations upon
the income-tax returns, asserts that English capital has increased annually since
1865 at the rate of £180,000,000, and that the national wealth is consequently
growing very rapidly. This wealth, however, is very unequally distributed, for
England is at one and the same time a country of immense fortunes and
of the extreme of poverty. More than a million persons, able-bodied men,
women, and children, are wholly or partially dependent upon the parochial
authorities for their support. The duty of maintaining its own poor was
cast upon each parish throughout the country by the well-known statute of
Elizabeth (1601), frequently amended since, but nevertheless the basis of the
existing system. About 1830 the pressure from an indiscriminate giving of alms
had become almost unbearable, and there were parishes which broke down under
the burden. The height of the poor rates sometimes compelled landlords to give
up their rents, and farmers their tenancies, from sheer inability to pay them.
In the village of Cholesbury, in Buckinghamshire, only 35 persons out of
a total population of 139 souls supported themselves. In the parish of Sunder-
land, which at that time had 17,000 inhabitants, no less than 14,000 persons
were in receipt of relief from the poor rates. + This was the alarming state of
things when, to inquire into the working of the Poor Laws, a royal commission was
appointed, whose labours resulted in the Poor- Law Act of 1834. This Act revived
the workhouse test and the wholesome restrictions upon voluntary pauperism,
which had been removed from a feeling of mistaken humanity. England is
divided, for Poor-Law purposes,' into a number of " Unions," consisting on an
average of twenty-five parishes or townships each. Each of these unions has
its Board of Guardians, elected by the ratepayers. In Ireland the Poor Law
is administered in pretty much the same manner as in England, but in Scotland
Poor-Law unions are unknown. The relief is there granted by the parochial
* In 1879-80 there were delivered by post 1,128.000,000 letters (33 per head of the population),
345,000,000 book packets and newspapers, and 115,000,000 postcards: 23,385,416 messages were
forwarded by telegraph.
t "Eecent Accumulations of Capital in England."
X Pretyman, "Dispauperizatiou."
470 THE BEITISH ISLES.
authorities, and these are almost exclusively under the influence of the Church
and the landed proprietors.
The growing wealth of England as a whole has not by any means enriched
the landed proprietors and merchants only, for the middle and even the lower
classes have largely shared in it. There can be no doubt that the number of
paupers has greatly diminished. Since 1849, notwithstanding the very considerable
increase of the population and the fluctuations unavoidable in a country mainly
dependent upon commerce aud manufactures, the number of paupers exhibits a
very satisfactory decrease,* and this decrease becomes still more striking if we
take into account only the able-bodied adults. f It will thus be seen that at least
a portion of the wealth which annually flows into the British Islands, instead of
swelling the fortunes of great merchant princes, finds its way into the pockets of
the needy ; indeed, we need only enter the houses of the working classes in order
to obtain an idea of the general ease enjoyed by the mass of the people. The
furniture is substantial, the floor carpeted, and the chimney mantelpiece not
devoid of '* ornaments." The English artisan in the enjoyment of regular wages
in, in fact, much better lodged than the majority of French peasants and small
tradesmen. The savings of the English working classes are enormous. They
do not all find their way into the savings banks,+ but are largely invested in
the funds of friendly and other co-operative associations of every description.
Friendly Societies, or, as they are called in an Act of Parliament passed in
1793 for their regulation, " Societies of Good Fellowship," have existed in the
British Islands from very remote times. The most powerful amongst these
associations, whose principal object it is to provide against sickness and death, are
the Manchester Unity of Odd Fellows and the Ancient Order of Foresters,
whose •* lodges," or " courts," are to be found in every town and in many villages
of the United Kingdom. They muster about a million members, and have saved
up a capital of nearly seven millions sterling. Of Co-operative, Industrial,
and Provident Societies there are about 1,500, with 300,000 members, and
annual sales to the extent of £15,000,000 sterling. The foremost place
amongst this class of societies is due to the Equitable Pioneers of Rochdale,
* Number of paupers relieved from the rates on January 1 &t in England and Ireland, and on May 14th
in Scotland : — •
England and
Pe- centage of
Wales.
Scotland.
Ireland.
Total.
Popu] tion.
1849
934,419
82,367
620,747
1,637,523
61
1^53
798.822
75,437
141,822
1,016,081
3-7
1858
908,186
79,199
50,582
1,037,967
3-6
1863
1,142,624
78,717
66,228
1,287,569
4-1
1871
1,081,926
123,576
74,692
1,280,094
4-1
1877 .
728,350
96,404
78,528
803,282
2-4
1880
837,940
98,0(10
100,856
1,036,796
3-0
t Able-bodied adults relieved on January 1st of each year in England and Wales :— 1849, 201,644
1863, 253,499 ; 1877, only 92,806 ; 18S0, in consequence of a succession of years of depression, 126,228.
X Savings banlss at the close of 1879 : —
Depositors.
Capital.
Old Savings Banks .
1,506,714
£43,797,805
Post-Office Savings Banks
3,347,828
32,102,134
STATISTICS OF THE UNITED KINGDOM. 471
who cannot claim to have originated co-operation, but who have given a wonder-
ful impulse to the movement. Very important, likewise, are the Building
Societies, which expend annually about £2,000,000 upon the purchase of land
and houses. As to the Trade Unions, whose principal object it is to regulate,
and, if possible, to raise the wages of the industrial classes, their number is very
considerable. Mr. Howell estimates it at 3,000, with 1,250,000 members, and an
annual income of nearly two millions sterling. One of the most numerous
amongst this class of societies is that of the agricultural labourers, which at one
time numbered 90,000 members, but has recently greatly fallen off : one of the
most powerful is that of the mechanical engineers.*
Crime has diminished at such a rate and with such steadiness as to make it
certain that there can be no question of a fluctuation merely due to temporary-
causes, f We cannot doubt after this that, owing to the progress of education and
other causes, manners in England have become milder. Although assaults and
murders are still more numerous than in France, they decrease from year to year.
As to the minor offences, it is difficult to institute a comparison between the two
countries, and if they are more numerous in France, this may be due to the
greater severity of French magistrates. All Ireland swells the criminal statistics
to a less extent than the metropolis, in which about one-third of the crimes
placed on record are committed. Drunkenness is one of the most widely spread
vices in England,+ and a foreigner walking through the towns is, above all, struck
by the large number of drunken women he meets with in the streets. Insanity,
resulting from an abuse of strong drink, is becoming very frequent. Yet it is
from drink and its abuse that the English Government derives a considerable
proportion of its revenue ; and the Established Church, too, takes its share, for it
is the proprietor of several hundred much -frequented public- houses.
It cannot yet be asserted that all the children of the United Kingdom are
in the receipt of even an elementary education, nor could the schools accommo-
date them if their parents desired to send them there. Great progress has
nevertheless been made in public education within the last few years. Up
* Friendly societies, &c., as far as returns have been received (1878) :—
Number. Meftibers. Total Assets.
England and Wales . . • 12,300 4,692,175 £12,148,«U9
Scotland 06O 569,275 667,366
Ireland 331 42,551 151,824
British Isles .*.... 13,181 5,304,001 12,967,709
t Kumher of criminal offenders convicted : —
1849
1853
1858
1863
1871
1877
1879
England and , n, . . ^^^ *fH.'-^ ^^
Wales. Scotland. Ireland. Total. PopuLition.
21001 3,274 21202 45,477 1-2
20,756
12,525
Scotland.
Ireland.
3,274
21 202
2,821
8,714
2,850
3,350
2,438
3,285
2,184
2.257
2.009
2 300
2,090
2,207
32,291 M
13.246 2,850 3,350 19.446 0?
15.799
11 946
11,912 2.009 2 300 16,251 0-5
21,522 0-7
16,387 0-5
16,822 0-
t Dawson Bums estimates the beer, wine, and spirits consumed in 1873 at 152,478,920 gallons,
being equal to 7,260,000 gallons of pure alcohol. The enormous sum of £126,000,000, or £2 16s. a head,
was expended, according to him, upon drink.
472
THE BEITISH ISLES.
to 1818, in which year Parliament for the first time concerned itself with
the subject, the establishment of schools was left to private initiative. In
1833 an annual grant of £20,000 was voted, and increased in 1839 to
£30,000, its dispensation being intrusted to a Committee of the Privy Council,
who appointed inspectors to report on the schools desirous of participating in
Government aid. These and other measures, more especially the establishment of
Fig. 232.— Educational Map.
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The shading exhibits the proportion of adults unable to write.
m
Under 5 5 to 10
per cent. per cent.
10 to 20
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30 to 40 Over 40
per cent. per cent.
training colleges for teachers, had powerfully promoted public education; but
they had shown, too, that voluntary efforts were not sufficient to meet the
wants of all children of school age. Hence the Act of 1870, which provided for
the establishment of board schools in all those districts in which the school
accommodation was insufficient, and adopted compulsion as a means of filling
the schools. A similar Act for Scotland was passed two years afterwards. As
to Ireland, it had already been provided with a system of '' national schools."
STATISTICS OP THE UNITED KINGDOxM
47»
The system of higher education as now existent is by no means the outcome of
a plan laid down in advance. It is due to the initiative taken by religious bodies,
educational societies, and private individuals, and Parliament is slow to interfere
with schools not founded or subventioned by the State. At the present time
about 20,000 primary schools in England and Scotland, affording accommo-
dation to one-seventh of the population, are in receipt of Government aid, and are
regularly inspected. The number of persons unable to write is annually
decreasing as the younger generation grows up. Illiterates are most numerous
in Western Ireland, in Wales, in the Scotch Highlands— that is, in those districts
where many of the inhabitants still speak Celtic— and in certain manufacturing
districts of England and Scotland.
The number of children who attend superior schools in England is less
than in France. The English public schools and colleges, which give an edu-
cation analogous to that of the French *' Lycees," are attended by only 20,000
pupils, whilst the corresponding French schools count 157,000 pupils. Schools of
this kind are considered higher than the grammar schools, and are looked upon as
being intended only for the rich or titled, whilst in France they are thrown open
to all the children of the middle classes, and help to recruit them.*
The State seldom interferes directly with higher education. It does not con-
cern itself with the superintendence of the educational establishments intended for
the upper classes, but leaves the supreme control of each of them to its own special
governing body. The members of the governing body are variously appointed,
e.g. the University of Oxford may send two representatives, or the Lord Chan-
cellor one, and so on. To some of the great endowed schools the State has
granted charters of incorporation : in several of them the process of eliminating
ancient abuses has been singularly slow. The use of the terra ^* public school " is
nearly as inaccurate as it is frequent, but, to speak exactly, it means a school
possessing a charter of incorporation, and in which the advantages of the endow-
ment belong equally to all her Majesty's subjects. At Winchester, the oldest
of the public schools, there are " Foundation Scholars" and "Exhibitioners," who
are maintained wholly or in part at the expense of the institution, and, far
outnumbering them, ** Commoners," whose parents pay for their board and instruc-
tion. The annual cost of keeping a boy at one of these schools averages £120.
At Eton and Harrow it is considerably more, but these two in particular are
frequented by the sons of wealthy Englishmen anxious to become acquainted and
associate with men of birth. In all the great schools, as indeed at both the great
universities, the spirit of athleticism rules supreme. While, on the one hand, the
statesmen of England, many of its bishops, judges, and leading scholars trace the
beginnings of their successes to the manly breadth of tone of a public school ; on the
other, specimens of bigoted ignorance and despotic stupidity are but too frequent.
At the two great Universities of Oxford and Cambridge the ecclesiastical element,
until the middle of this century, largely predominated. Cambridge had originally
a great name for the study of mathematics only ; Oxford for that of the Greek
* Matthew Arn. Id, Fortnightly Review, November, 1878.
127-E
474 THE BRITISH ISLES.
and Latin classics. We say originally, for, in accordance with the requirements of
the present day, there are already to be found in both flourishing schools of law,
histor}^ science, medicine : theology has, of course, always been prominent.
There no longer exist religious tests, and amongst the ** fellows " of colleges there
are now even men who are the declared enemies of the Church as by law
established. A large proportion of the students, especially of the less wealthy,
take holy orders on leaving the university ; but even this number does not
suffice for the vastly increased needs of the Church, and the bishops loudly cry
out for more university men as candidates for ordination. Formerly Oxford was
the great stronghold of the Tories, Cambridge that of the Whigs ; but now
the latter holds moderate views, whilst Oxford represents the extremes of both
parties in the State — those of the most rigid Conservatives no less than those of
the most extreme social reformers.*
The monopoly formerly enjoyed by the ancient seats of learning was
destroyed by the foundation of the University of London, which was empowered
to grant degrees to all, without distinction of rank, sect, party, creed, or place of
education. The " colleges " from which the majority of the London graduates
are drawn are scattered all over the countrj^ The schools at which a profes-
sional training may be obtained are very numerous, and constantly increasing.
Medical schools exist in connection with most of the large hospitals ; the
*' benchers " of the four Inns of Court have taken steps to provide facilities for
studying law ; a Royal School of Mines is doing excellent service in training
geological surveyors and mining engineers ; and there are, of course, the usual
schools for the professional education of military and naval officers. But
there is no great technical high school, such us the Ecole Polytechnique of
Paris, and it is quite evident that English civil engineers of the old school
prefer a practical training to a course of theoretical knowledge imparted at
engineering colleges. Something in the way of elementary technical education is,
however, effected in the Science and Art Schools, which depend upon the South
Kensington Museum, and which are attended by 90,000 pupils, and great hopes
are entertained of a technical university recently projected by the great livery
companies of the City of London.
As to the teaching to be obtained through newspapers, books,t and public
lectures after the school and university days are over, it is exercising a growing
influence upon the life of the nation Other countries may have established
newspapers before England did so, but the strength of the press as a political power
was first felt here during the revolution which led to the downfall of Charles I.
Public meetings, which have become so great a feature of political and social life,
were first held in 1769, in accordance with the formalities still observed at the
present day.
* Universities of England : — Oxford, Cam>nidge, London, Durharri, Manchester (Victoria University).
Of Scotland : — Glasgovs^, Edinburgh, St. Andrews, Aberdeen. Of Ireland : — Trinity College, Dubliu,
and the Royal Irish University.
t Numberofbookspublished:- 1875, 4,854, 1870,4,885; 1877,5,095; 1878,5,31c; 1879,5,834. The
number of newspapers is about 1,900.
CHAPTER XVII.
GOVERNMENT AND ADMINISTRATION.
HE United Kingdom, in many respects, is still governed by feudal
institutions. Wherever we look, whether to the tenure of the
land or the administration of local affairs, we still find traces of an
order of things very different from what has been established by
the English colonists who have made themselves a new home in
Australia or New Zealand. The three kingdoms are each governed separately,
and in many instances their laws not only differ, but are contradictory of one
another. The administrative divisions of each kingdom, the counties or shires,
differ considerably in size, and the old county boundaries coincide in but few
instances with those of the Registrar- General of Births, Deaths, and Marriages.
The old ♦* hundreds " into which the counties are divided possess hardly more
than an historical interest at the present day. When these divisions were first
constituted ten free families occupied 100 hides of land, or a "tything," and
ten of these ty things were formed into a hundred. But so great have been the
changes in the population since these early times, that whereas there are some
hundreds the population of which has hardly increased, there are others which
count their inhabitants by many thousands. In several counties the hundreds
are known as wapentakes, wards, laths, or liberties. These, however, are
not the only administrative divisions, for there is hardly a department of
government which has not subdivided the United Kingdom to suit its own
purposes, and the confusion which arises from this indiscriminate parcelling
out of the land is sometimes very great, and ought certainly to have been
avoided.*
A very prominent position amongst the local divisions of the kingdom must be
accorded to the municipal boroughs, originally no doubt of Roman foundation,
but subsequently remodelled in accordance with the spirit of the Anglo-Saxons,
* The 52 counties of England are separated, for parliament) ry purposes, into 95 divisions, 185
boroughs, 13 districts of boroughs, and 58 contributory boroughs; for sessional pu poses tbey include 700
petty sessional divisions and 97 boroughs, having commissions of the peace. There are 818 hundreds, or
analogous divisions, and 621 lieutenancy subdivisions. The police know only 455 police districts of
countits, and 167 boroughs and towns, having their own police. There are also 40i highwiiy di.-tricts
721 local board districts, 14,916 civil parishes, &c.
476
THE BRITISH ISLES.
Scale 1 : 3,500,000.
and furnished with charters by the Norman kings. Some of these ancient
municipal towns have dwindled into mere villages, a few have even altogether
disappeared, but several of them have grown into large and important cities.
Other populous towns, whose rise only dates from the modern development
of industry, have likewise claimed incorporation, and charters have been
granted them by Parliament. There existed at the time of the 1871 census
224 of these municipal boroughs, all of them, with the exception of the City of
London and a few small decayed places of little note, governed by the Muni-
cipal Corporation Reform Act of 1832. Each corporation consists of a mayor,
aldermen, and councillors, the two latter being elected by the burgesses, the
mayor by the aldermen and council-
Fig. 233.-YURKSHIKE AND EuTLANDSHIKE CONTRASTED. J^^g^ rj^^^ ^^y^j. ^^^ eX-mayOr of
all boroughs are justices of the
peace, and in many of the more
important amongst them stipendiary
magistrates have been appointed.
The corporation generally attends
to police, paving, lighting, drainage,
and local improvements, and in a
few instances supplies gas and water.
Almost equally extensive is the
power of self-government of the 575
towns or districts which have elected
to be regulated by the Local Govern-
ment Act of 1858, and each of which
has its local board. The county
authorities, on the other hand, are
appointed by the Crown. The Lord-
Lieutenant, in former times, had
command of the military forces
of the county, but his duties now
are hardly more than honorary.
He still recommends persons for
commissions in the militia, or for appointment as deputy -lieutenants and county
magistrates. These last, united in courts of quarter or general sessions,
are the real governors of the counties, for they regulate the expenditure and
impose the rates for its defrayal. The sherifF, who returns the juries, executes
the judgments of the courts, and is in his county the principal conservator of the
peace, is annually appointed by the Crown. Each civil parish has its overseers of
the poor, who look to the assessment and collection of the poor, county, police,
and other rates. Poor-Law Unions consist of several civil parishes united for the
purpose of administering relief to the poor. Each of these unions has a board of
guardians, partly elected by the ratepayers and owners of property, and partly
conmsting of resident county magistrates and other ex-officio members. All these
, 50 Miles.
GOVERNMENT AND ADMINISTRATION. 477
persons engaged in the local government of the country render their services
gratuitously.
Political representation in the United Kingdom, iu accordance with the tradi-
tions of the Middle Ages, is not an inherent right, but a privilege dependent
upon being properly qualified. Changes in the old electoral laws have no doubt
brought the English practice more in consonance with modern ideas ; but this
renders existing inequalities all the more striking. ^ By the last Reform Bill,
passed in 1867, the electoral franchise in English counties is enjoyed
by all freeholders, by copyholders and tenants for life whose estate has a
clear annual value of £5, and by occupiers of lands or tenements of the ratable
value of £12 and upwards. In boroughs the franchise is attached to the occupa-
tion of a dwelling-house separately rated to the poor rates, or of a lodging of tbe
annual value of £12. In Scotch boroughs all householders paying rates have
the franchise, whilst in Irish boroughs a house rental of £4 or an unfurnished
lodging worth £10 a year confers this privilege. The universities are likewise
entitled to send their representatives into Parliament.* It is quite clear that
the conditions attached to the franchise exclude from its exercise not only
many of the artisans who live in towns, but also the entire body of agricul-
tural and other labourers. More than two-thirds of the adult male population
are shut out from every exercise of political rights, and in Ireland, where poverty
is great, only one man out of eight enjoys the privileges of an elector. The
county members represent, in fact, the landed proprietors and the farmers ; the
borough members the middle classes. "Women, though allowed to vote for school
boards and in parochial matters, when properly qualified, have not hitherto been
granted the political franchise.!
Owing to changes in the population, the existing distribution of seats amongst
the constituencies does not represent their numerical proportions. Several large
towns are not represented at all, whilst some small places of no importance
whatever, by virtue of ancient charters or acts of royal favour, considered to
confer historic rights, still return one or two members to Parliament. As
an instance we may mention Croydon, with over 100,000 inhabitants, which
is not represented at all, whilst Marlborough, with less than 700 voters, returns
one member. To every member of Parliament there are theoretically about
50,000 inhabitants; but there is hardly a large town in the United Kingdom
where this proportion is adhered to. London, for instance, with its immense
population, would be entitled to nearly 100 representatives, but is compelled
to rest content with 22, besides which, the various quarters of the metropolis
are very unequally favoured, the " City " enjoying a decided preponderance over
the other boroughs.
* Composition of the House of Commons : —
England and Wales. Scotland.
Borough members . . 293 26
County members . . . 187 32
University members . . 5 2
t In 1877 the number of electors was 2,911,339, viz. 1,771,521 in boroughs, 1,115,100 in counties,
and 26,718 in universities.
Ireland.
TotaL
37
356
64
283
2
9
478 THE BEITISH ISLES.
The origin of the House of Commons is lost in the darkness of the Middle
Ages, but it is almost universally admitted that the third estate was summoned
to the councils of the nation for the first time in 1264. Simon de Montfort, in
his struggle with Henry III., felt constrained to seek allies amongst the towns,
whose representatives were subsequently invited to take their seats by the side of
the peers and great ecclesiastics in Pailiament. The Commons have not lost ground
since that period, and at the present time they virtually hold the reins of govern-
ment, not directly, but through a council of ministers. The House does not,
indeed, dictate the names of the ministers to the sovereign ; but inasmuch as the
existence of a Cabinet is dependent on the possession of a majority in the
House of Commons, the wishes of the latter have to be considered in the
appointments made by the Crown. Parliament is summoned by the sovereign,
and may be prorogued or dissolved by him. It meets annually, and although its
normal duration is fixed at seven years, it has not once happened, since the union
with Ireland, that the House of Commons has died a natural denth.
The House of Lords consists of peers who occupy their seats by here-
ditary right, by creation of the sovereign, by virtue of office — as in the case
of the English bishops — or as elected representatives of the peerage of Scotland
and Ireland. The House of Peers takes precedence of the House of Commons, and
the royal "speech " or message is read within it, the peers being seated, whilst the
Commons, headed by their Speaker, attend below the bar. For many years
the peers looked upon the House of Commons as a sort of dependency to their own
House, in which they found place for their younger sons, relatives, and dependants;
but the Lower House, having acquired the exclusive right of voting the supplies,
is now at least equal to it in importance.
The executive power is nominally vested in the Crown, but practically
exercised by a Cabinet, or committee of ministers, appointed by the sovereign.
The " leader^" or recognised chief of the most powerful party in the House of
Commons, is, as a rule, summoned to fill the office of First Lord of the Treasury, or
Prime Minister, and he selects his colleagues amongst those members of the two
Houses who are friendly to his views. Every Cabinet, in addition to the First
Lord, includes the Lord Chancellor, the Lord President of the Council, the Chan-
cellor of the Exchequer, and the Secretaries of State. As a rule, however, several
other ministerial functionaries have seats in the Cabinet, those most frequently
admitted being the Chief Commissioner of Works and Buildings, the Chancellor of
the Duchy of Lancaster, the First Lord of the Admiralty, the President of the
Board of Trade, the Postmaster- General, the Chief Secretary for Ireland, and the
President of the Local Government Board. Numerically this Cabinet is stronger
than that of any other state whose constitution is modelled upon that of England ;
but the traditions of an ancient kingdom and the needs of a widespread colonial
empire amply account for this. The Privy Council consists of a large body of men
of high birth and eminence, sworn to " truly and impartially advise " the sovereign ;
but the functions formerly exercised by it have devolved upon the Cabinet or the
Judicial Committee, and it is now very rarely that the Council is assembled to
GOVERNMENT AND ADMINISTRATION. 479
deliberate on public affairs, and on these occasions only those councillors attend
who are specially summoned. Although England has not inaptly been described
as an oligarchic republic, the sovereign is supposed to wield not only the executive
powers, but also a portion of the legislative ones, for no Act of Parliament can
become law without his signature. But the royal signature is rarely refused,
and if the influence exercised by royalty is very great in England, this is chiefly
due to the deference exhibited by the leaders of the H9uses of Parliament, and the
feeling of respect and loyalty which penetrates all classes of the people. The
succession to the crown is settled on the heirs of Princess Sophia of Hanover,
being Protestants. The Queen, by virtue of a recent Act of Parliament, bears
also the title of Empress of India. She enjoys a civil list of £385,000, and, in
addition, the revenues of the Duchy of Lancaster, amounting to about £45,000
annually. The Prince of Wales is paid an annuity of £40,000, and the revenues
of the Duchy of Cornwall (£66,000). The other annuities payable to the members
of the royal family amount to £121,000, making a total civil list of £656,000 —
a small sum, when compared with what is paid to the reigning families of some
other countries.
The law throughout the British Empire is administered in the name of the Queen
Empress. The inferior criminal jurisdiction in the counties is exercised by Justices
of the Pejce, appointed by the Crown on presentation by the Lord- Lieutenant.
These unpaid magistrates hold petty sessions for the summary disposal of minor
offences, and courts of quarter sessions for the trial of more serious crimes and
misdemeanours. In boroughs these duties are generally discharged by stipendiary
magistrates and recorders, also appointed by the Crown. Minor civil cases are
disposed of in county courts, but all more serious law business, whether of a civil
or criminal nature, is referred to one of the divisions of the High Court of
Justice in London, whose jurlges annually go on circuit and hold assizes in the
principal towns of the kingdom. There is a Court of Appeal, presided over by
the Lord High Chancellor, and the House of Lords is the final Court of Appeal.
The procedure of English criminal courts is scrupulously careful to surround
the accused with every safeguard to insure a fair trial. He need reply to no
questions which may incriminate him, and it is for his accusers to produce evidence
establishing his guilt. The verdict of the jury — an institution which has spread
from England into nearly every country of the world — must be unanimous.
The Lord High Chancellor, in addition to his other titles, bears that of " Keeper
of her Majesty's Conscience," and the sovereign, since Henry YIIL, has called him-
self Defender of the Faith. These titles point to the existence of a State Church,
and in reality half a century has scarcely elapsed since every Government official was
required to be a member of the Church as by law established, and no marriage was
valid except it had been celebrated by a minister of this Established Church. In
Ireland the Anglican Church was disestablished in 1871, and its ministers and
members now occupy legally the same footing as do the members of other
480
THE BEITISH ISLES.
churches, including that of Rome. But in England the Protectant Episcopal
Church is still the Established Church, and many of its clergy are paid by
tithes. The bishops of the Church of England enjoy an average income of
£5,200 apiece, and the cathedral establishments possess a numerous staff of
archdeacons, deans, canons, and other dignitaries, who are likewise in receipt
of considerable salaries derived from ancient foundations.
The average annual
Fie. 234,— Diocesan Map op the Beitish I8LAnd8.
:Naxne« of Biooesea are
printed. iiv BLOCK LETTERS
mZpiscopaL Sees or
CathedraL lowng.
N O R T
Mer. of 0° Gr.
value of a " living " is about £300, in addition to which the incumbent is
usually placed in possession of a parsonage. Besides the rights of presentation
pertaining to the Queen, the Lord Chancellor, the bishops, and the various public
bodies, there are thousands of livings in the gift of private individuals.*
* Of 13,076 livings, of an annual value of £4,176,317, 8,151 (£2,535,760) are in the gift of private
persons;- 3,472 (£1,109,171) in the gift of the hi^hops; 774 (£318,500) inthe gift of universities and
schools ; 679 (£212,886) in the gift of the Lord Chancellor, &c.
GOVEEXMENT AND ADMINISTRATION. 481
Out of tbirty-one bishops connected with English sees only twenty-four
have a seat m the House of Lords, though all alike are - Lords " by courtesy
Nor are the seven bishops of the Episcopal Church of Scotland, and the two
archbishops and ten bishops of the Church of Ireland, admitted to the House
of Lords. There are also sixty-two colonial and eleven missionary bishops
in connection with the Church of England.
In Scotland the Established Church is Presby teria^i in principle, and is governed
by Kirk Sessions, Presbyteries,
Synods, and the General Assembly, ^'^- 235.— Distribution of the Roman Catholics.
which consists of both clerical and
lay deputies from each of the pres-
byteries, and representatives from
the universities and royal burghs.
This Church, since 1843, has ceased
to be the Church of the majority,
for in that year the enforcement of
an obnoxious patronage act, since
repealed, led to the formation cf
a Free Church, whose adherents
are nearly as numerous as those of
the mother Church.
Foremost amongst Dissenting
bodies are the Wesleyan Methodists,
the Independents or Congregation-
alists, the Baptists, and (in Wales)
the Calvinistic Methodists. Not
very numerous, but influential
through wealth, education, and
cohesion, are the Quakers.
It is only during the last fifty
years that full political rights have
been granted to Roman Catholics
and Jews — to the former in 1832,
to the latter in 1858. The Jews
are nearly all to be found in the large towns, four-fifths of them living in
London.* The number of Homan Catholics has very much increased in the
course of the century. f In the reign of Queen Elizabeth they are said to have
constituted one- third of the total population, but in 1699 they had dwindkd
down to an insignificant fraction. These were the times of penal enactments,
and although after 1787 the laws were not very rigorously enforced, and an
Over 10 per cent. 5 to 10 per cent. Under 5 per cent.
* Number of Jews in Great Britain (1877}, 51,250, of whom 38,880 live in London. Jews in Ireland
(1871), 258.
t Roman Catholics in England, 1699, 27,696; 1767, 67,916; 1845,284,300; 1851, 758,800; 1861,
927,500; 1880, 1,120,000.
482 THE BEITISH ISLES.
Act ameliorating the position of the Boman Catholics had even been passed, their
numbers did not increase, and remained almost stationary till about the middle
of the present century, when the great influx of Irish immigrants caused it to sprint
up by a sudden bound. The Irish immigration altogether swamped the older
English Roman Catholics, who had survived the period of prosecution, and our
map (p. 481) shows very distinctly that they are most numerous in those counties in
which the Irish element is most strongly represented. The *' Ritualistic" movement
in the Anglican Church may have brought a few converts to the Church of Rome, but
a somewhat careful inquiry into the religious statistics of Great Britain enables us
to state with confidence that the increase in the number of Roman Catholics is
more than accounted for by Irish immigration, that there have been none of
those wholesale conversions of Protestants which are occasionally talked about, and
that since the decrease of Irish immigration there has likewise been a decrease
in the proportion of Roman Catholics. At all events, they increase no
longer.
Religious zeal Is very great amongst Englishmen, and still greater amongst
Scotchmen. This religious fervour of the British Islanders manifests itself
in the enormous sums which are annually collected by voluntary agencies
for building and endowing churches and chapels, printing Bibles and tracts,
and sending missionaries into every quarter of the world. Ethnically this
zeal for religious propaganda, exhibited at all times, is a remarkable pheno-
menon. Julius Caesar stated, and modern researches have confirmed his
opinion,* that it was from Great Britain the Druid missionaries spread rll
over Gaul with the intent of converting the natives. Subsequently, when the
ancient gods had been overthrown by Christianity, It was again by British
missionaries that the new faith was carried into the woods of Germania, and
the sacred oaks hewn down. Nearly all the numerous Protestant sects which
have sprung into existence since the Reformation are plants of British growth,
disseminated from England and Scotland into other parts of the Chrictlan world.
Nor Is there any country at the present day which supports a greater number
of missionaries In heathen lands, or expends larger sums upon religious
objects, t
England, whose travellers, missionaries, and merchants have invaded every
quarter of the globe, has become the great colonial power of the world, holding
sway over one-fifth of the total population of the globe, and equal In extent to all the
* D'Arbois de Jubainville ; Ernest Desjardin's *' Description de la Gaule Romaine," ii.
t Population of the British Islands according 1o religious belief (an estimate for 1880) : —
Protes^^ant Episcopal
other
Roman
Churches.
Protestants.
Catholics.
Jews.
England and Wales .
19,314,000
5,000,000
1,120,000
46,000
Scotland .
80,500
3,225,000
350,000
5,400
Ireland
660 000
590,000
8,815,000
4.111,000
300
Total .
20,054,500
5,584,000
61,700
GOVERNMENT AND ADMINISTRATION.
488
colonies and foreign possessions of the other European states combined.* But
notwithstanding the vast extent of her colonial empire, Great Britain is content
with a standing army numerically far inferior to the forces maintained by any of
the other great powers. The conscription of continental Europe is unknown, and
the forces of the United Kingdom are without exception dependent upon voluntary
enlistment for their recruits. These latter usually join between the ages of
seventeen and twenty, and they enlist for a short term of three years' service, after
which they enter the army reserve. In this they remain for nine years, drawing
a small monthly allowance, on condition of their rejoining their regiments when
called upon. Service in the army can scarcely be said to be popular in England,
and the number of deserters is very large, amounting on an average to 31 per
cent, of the recruits enlisted.
The regular forces, numbering close upon 200,000 men, are primarily intended
for service in the colonies, India, and abroad. In case of need they can be reinforced
by the Militia, the Yeomanry, and the Volunteers, and although military martinets
may occasionally sneer at these latter, they will no doubt prove useful auxiliaries
in case of peril, more especially in the defence of the national territory. f
None of the inland towns of the British Islands are fortified, for though
the mediaeval walls and castles of some amongst them are objects of interest to
archaeologists and admirers of the picturesque, they possess little military value.
Suggestions have been made for constructing a series of entrenchments on the
heights which screen London on the south, and opposite to one of the breaches in
which, at Aldershot, a military camp of exercise has been established, but nothing
further has been done in the matter. Along the coast, however, fortifications of a
very formidable character are numerous, and not a bay or estuary turned towards
the continent has been left without its artificial defences. But it is to her
navy that England looks as her main defence against foreign aggression, and no
European colonies (according to Behm and Wagner) : —
Area.
Sq. Miles.
British Colonies .... 8.344,492
Dutch „
French „
Spanish „
Portuguese „
Danish „
Russia in Asia
763,365
237,600
170,070
705.980
75.130
6.340.000
16,636,637
Population.
254,992,100
27,106,000
6,44'',600
8.714,000
3,644,000
130,600
14,171,000
Total . _ ^^
For a detailed statement on the British Colonies see Appendix, pp. 502, 503.
315,206,300
t Effective strength of the militarj' forces of England, January
/ At Home
Regular Forces < In Colonies .
( In India
1st, 1880: —
^ ( 1st Class
Army Reserve \ ,
Militia .
Yeomanry
Volunteers
Total
91.421
32,744
67,639
16,651
22.021
113 484
10,508
206.265
560,73.*?
484
THE BEITISH ISLES.
pains are spared to keep at tlie "head of all maritime powers. The English fleet
of ironclads, headed by the Inflexible, a vessel of 11,406 tons displacement, with
engines of S,000 horse-power, plated armour between 16 and 24 inches in thickness,
and four 81-ton guns, is superior in strength to the combined ironclad fleets of
any two of the other powers, and looking to the resources which England
commands with respect to everything relating to the construction, repair, and
maintenance of modern men-of-war, it will be easy for her to maintain her
pre-eminence.* The navy is manned by 45,800 sailors and 13,000 marines, in
addition to whom there exists a navul reserve of 20,000 men.
But however formidable the military and naval forces may appear. Great
Britain is still more powerful from a financial point of view, and in this respect
occupies quite a privileged position amongst the states of Europe. The national
debt is no doubt greater than that of any other country, with the exception of that
of France ; but since the termination of the great wars at the beginning of the
century it has been reduced to the extent of £70,000,000, and looking to the large
increase in the productive forces of the nation, its burden is felt much less now
than was the case half a century ago. This decrease of the debt is all the more
remarkable as £20,000,000 were expended to release the slaves in the British
colonies, and £10,000,000 for the relief of the Irish famine in 1847. The annual
The British Navy October, 18?0 (including vessels under construction) : —
Ironclads.
Turret ships, Ist class
„ others .
Broadside vessels
Barbette slip {CoUinqwood)
Torpedo ram [Polyphemus)
Corvettes ....
Gunboats . . . -
Floating batteries
Condemned ironclads employed i
in harbour service . . I
Total
Screw Stkamer^.
Ships
Frigates .
Corvettes .
Sloops
Gun vessels
Gunboats
Steam cruisers
Steel dispatch boats
Torpedo vessels
Surveying vessels
Troop and store vessels
Harbour service (tugs, &c
Total
Num>ier.
15
15
44
30
49
82
3
2
2
2
17
13
T74
Number.
9
12
26
1
1
3
3
2
13
Paddle Steamers,
Dispatch boats .
Yachts
Sloops
Coastguard cruisers
Other vessels .
Tugs, &c. in harbour service
Total'
69
Guns.
42
49
406
10
19
12
16
191
7I5
Tons.
85,342
52,015
203,217
9.150
2,640
12,834
3,795
3,688
64,541
Horse-power.
61,320
34,927
142,375
7,000
5,500
11,803
2,213
33,153
437.222
298.291
Guns.
399
365
592
162
179
210
30
20
6
7
35
2
Number.
Guns.
4
8
5
5
5
25
4
4
13
27
22
—
63
69
Sailing Vessels.
Drill, training, and gunnerv ships
Stationary, receiving, and depot
Brigs
Sloops
Schooners
Coastguard cruisers .
Harbour service
Total
Armour-clads .
Screw steamers
Paddle steamers
Sailing vessels .
Total
Number.
18
12
5
2
6
22
119
Summary.
Number.
69
27t
.03
184
580
Guns.
248
76
42
12
6
22
"4O6
Gnns.
745
2,007
69
406
3.227
And in addition a numerous torpedo flotilla. The
most powerful ships of the Britieh navy are the
Ivflexihle, Brfadnotight, Devastation, Thunderer,
Mqjestir, Colossus, 2^eptune, ColUngwood, Agamemnon,
and Ajax.
GOVERNMENT AND ADMINISTRATION. 495
charge for interest aad management of the debt has been reduced £4,000,000
smce 1817-partly of course, by paying off the principal, but more by the
reduction of the mterest.* This decrease in the charges of the debt, added to
the greater productiveness of taxes and duties resulting from increased prosperi.v
of the people, has enabled the Government to reduce taxation, and to introduc'e
Fig 236.— Breaches
m THE North Downs and the Camp of Aldershot.
Scale 1 : 160,000.
2 Miles.
financial reforms. To what extent this has been effected may be judged from the
fact that while, in 1861, imperial taxation, direct and indirect, amounted to 45s. a
bead of the population, in 1879-80 it only reached 34s.
Whilst the national taxation has thus undergone a considerable reduction,
the local taxation has risen during the same period from about £18,000,000 to
£37,000,000, or from 13s. to 228. per head. I^or must we lose sight of the
fact that the imperial budget is closely connected with that of India, which
almost regularly results in a deficit. It having been found impossible to raise
a revenue in India sufficient to defray the expenses of government, England
is perpetually being called upon to pledge her credit to meet the deficiency.
The Chancellor of the Exchequer is therefore bound to husband his resources
with the greatest care, in order that he may be prepared to meet the dangers
The National Debt :—
1775 (commencenient of American -war)
1793 (commenceinent of the French wars) .
1817 (consolidation of English and Irish Excheqn ers)
1838
1853 (hefore Crimean war) ....
18o6 (termination of Crimean war)
1880
Annual Chargre Debt, after deduct-
Principal, fimded for Interest and ing Balances in
and unfunded. Management. £:
£128,583,635 £4,471,571
239,350 148 9,208.495
840,850,491 32,038,291
792,306,442 29,461,528
771,335,801 27,804.844
833,857,515 28,191,977
774,014,235 28,111,810
Lxcbequer.
£766,850,671
828,255,894
770,770,807
486 THE BEITISH ISLES.
which lurk in the future. His resources are no more inexhaustible than are
those of any other state.
It would be bold to hazard a prediction as regards England's position as a
great power in the immediate future. Her interests are more complex, and through
her numerous colonies she is brought into direct contact with a greater variety of
nations, than can be said of any other state in the world, ancient or modern. N"ot
an event or commercial crisis can take place in any part of the world without
England being affected by it. No other state organism is equally sensitive to
outside impressions, and the fate of Great Britain depends more or less upon the
destinies of all those nations with which it entertains commercial relations.
Several amongst the British colonies, such as Canada, New Zealand, and
Australia, are financially independent, and give weight to the material and moral
influence of the empire of which they are members. Colonies such as these are an
accession of strength, and can never become a source of danger. But this is not
the case as respects India, where a handful of Englishmen have succeeded in
imposing a government upon millions of natives. English forts and settlements
dot the southern shores of all Asia, and English politics are thus interwoven with
those of Arabs, Persians, Bur mans, Malays, and Chinese. And as India affords no
natural base of operations, it is absolutely necessary to keep open by sea and land
all those routes which connect it with the great natural focus of British power.
No other nation disputes the free use of the ocean highway around South Africa,
whilst the route through the Mediterranean, the Suez Canal, and the Red Sea is
sufficiently protected by the fortifications of Gibraltar, Malta, and Aden. In
taking possession of Cyprus and assuming a kind of protectorate over Asia Minor,
England keeps her eyes upon those routes which will one day join Constantinople
to the Gulf of Persia. But farther north there are other roads, which join the
Black Sea and the Caspian to the passes leading through the Hindu-Kush, and
by means of these, it is feared, it will be possible to threaten and intercept the
routes leading to India. Russia, a great military power, naturally seeks to secure
an outlet towards the south, and looks to the acquisition of ports in the Archipelago
and on the Gulf of Persia. England's task has been to put up a barrier against
Russian encroachments. Will she be sufficiently strong to keep Russia to the north
of the huge mountains which stretch from the Balkans to the Himalayas ? Upon
this depends her future, not indeed as a nation, but as the preponderating power
of the Mediterranean and of continental Asia. England boasts that for several
generations past the revolutions which have convulsed other countHes have stopped
short of the narrow strait which separates her from the continent. Whilst the
nations of continental Europe and of America have been violently shaken by civil
wars and revolutions, England has experienced only gentle waves of transmission..
But the future is pregnant with great events, and England, like every other nation,
will be called upon to play her part in this new drama of the world's history.
APPENDIX
STATISTICAL TABLES.
I.— AREA AND POPULATION.
Ail towns 'jf 2,500 inhabitants are included in this table. Towns lyinp within two counties are given under the county in
which most ot the inhabitants reside.
ENGLAND.
Counties.
Bedforb . .
Berks . . .
Buckingham
Cambridge .
Chester . .
Cornwall .
Cu
MBERLAND
Area.
Sq Miles.
462
752
Population.
1871.
I
733 !
i
!
820 i
1,064
1,356
1,516
146,257
196,475
175,879
186,906
661,201
362,343
220 253
379,394
1881.
149,473
218,363
176,323
185,594
644,037
330,686
250,647
481,914
Towns (1881).
Luton, 23,960 ; Bedford. 19,533 ; Leighton Buzzard,
4,696; Dunstable,^ 4.627; Biggleswade, 4,244.
Reading. 42,054; Windsor, 12,273; Newbury, 10,144 ;
Maidenhead, 8.220; Abingdon, 6,684; Wantage,
3,295; Wallingford, 2,808; Wokingham, 2,868;
Farringdon, 2,738 ; Hungerford. 2,309.
Ayle-bury, 28,907; Chipping Wycombe, 10,618;
Great Marlow, 6,778 ; Slough, 4,509 ; Buckingham,
3 585; Newport Pagnell, 3,666; Elo.i, 2,806;
Olney, 2,647.
Cambridge, 35.363; Wisbeach, 9,249; Ely, 8,166;
March, 5,864 ; Whittlesea, 4,297.
Stockport, 69,663; B rkenhead, 84,006; Maccles-
field, 37,514 ; Chester, 36,794 ; Sialybridge. 22,786 ;
Dukinfield, 14,085 ; Crewe, 24,386 ; Wallasey
(New Brighton, &c.), 14,819; Hyde, 28,630;
Runcorn, 12,443 ; Conglelon, 11,116 ; Altrincham,
8,478 ; Bebington, 6,940 (viz. Lower Bebington,
3,768 ; Higher Bebinaton, 3,172) ; Nantwich,
Sale, 5,673; Sandbach, 5,259; Lymm,
Witton-ciim-Twambrook (near Nortliwich),
Bollington, 3,668; Knutsfoni, 3,597;
Bredbury, 3,596 ; Middlewich, 3,085 ; Weston and
Parkgate, 2,838 ; T-irpoiley, 2,652.
Truro, 10,619; Redruth, 10,685 ; Penzance, 12,409 ;
Camborne, 7,757 ; St. Ives, 6,445 ; Falmouth,
6,973 ; Liskeard, 4,636 ; Bo.imin, 5,061 ; Phillack,
4,165 ; St. Austell, 3,803; Helston, 3,432 ; Penryn,
3,466 ; Launceslon, 3,217 ; Ludgvan, 2,960 ;
Madron, 2,927.
Carlisle, 35,884 ; Whitehaven, 19,295 ; Penrith,
8,317 ; Workington, 7,979 ; Maryport, 7,443 ;
Cleaton Moor, 6,529 ; Cockermouth, 7,188 ; Holme
Cultram, 4,087 ; VVigton, 3,425 ; Ktswick, 2,777 ;
Brampton, 2,617.
Derhy 81,168 ; Glossnp, 19,674 ; Chesterfield, 12,221 ;
IIkest<m, 9,662; Belper, 8,527; Ripley, 5,639;
Heanor, 4,888 ; ClaycrosH, 4,802 ; Matlock, 3,834;
Buxton, 3,717 ; Alfreton, 3,680 ; Wiiksworth/
3,338 ; Melbourne, 2,502.
5,67;
4,641
4,229
488
APPENDIX.
Area and Population {continued).
Counties.
Devon
Area.
Sq. Miles.
2,586
DOKSET
Durham .
Essex
Gloucester
Hereford .
Hertford .
Huntingdon
Kent . . .
980
1,012
1,595
1,258
833
630
359
1,570
Lancashire
Population.
1871.
601,374
195,537
685,089
466,436
534,640
125,370
192,226
63,708
848,299
2,819,495
603 595
191,028
867,258
576,434
572,433
121,062
203,039
59,491
977,706
3,454,441
Towns (1881).
Plvmou'h, 73,794; Devonport, 48,939; Exeter,
37,665; Torquay, 21.657; Bari.stiple, 12,282;
Tiverton, 10,462 ; Tavistock, 6,879 ; Bideford,
6,-512 ; Teignmouth, 6,751 ; Woolboroiigh, 6,082 ;
Exmouth, 6,614; Dartmouth, 5,725 ; Lower Brix-
ham, 4,941 ; Iifiacombe, 4,721 ; St. Mary Church,
4,472; Northam, 4,336; Crediton, 4,222 ; Oitery
St. Mary, 4,110; Toines, 4,089; South Molton,
3,340; bawl ish, 3,622; Paignton, 3,590; Tor-
rington, 3,445 ; Honiton, 3,358 ; Sidmouth, 3,360 ;
Topsham, 2,514.
Weymouth with Melcombe -Re.'is, 13,715 ; Po '1p,
12,310; Portland Island, 9,907; Bridport, 6,795;
Dorchester, 7,567; Shert'Orne, 5,545; B andford
Forum, 3,373; Lyme Regis, 2,047 ; Wareham,
6,360; Shaftesbury, 2,312.
Sunderland, 116,542 ; Gateshead, 65.803 ; South
Shield-., 56,875; Stockton, 41,015; Darlington,
35,104 ; West, Haitlepool, 21,110 ; Jarrow, 25,469;
Durham, 14,932 ; Hartlepuol, 12,361 ; Bishop
-Auckland, 8,736 ; Dawdon (Seaham Harboui),
7,132 ; Felling, 6,244 ; Consett, 5,961 ; Souihwick,
5,937; Houghion-le-Spriiig, 5,276; Tow Law,
4,968; Spenny Moor, 4,627; Bei.fieMsidp, 4,432;
Barnard Casile, 4,306; Leadsrate, 3,677; Rydon,
3,251 ; Blandon-on-Tyne, 2,969.
West Ham, 62,919; Colchesier, 28,374 ; Chelmsf-rd,
9,318; R.mford, 6,33); Harwich, 7,842 ; Halstead,
6,783; Barking, 5,766; Safleron Walden, 6,060;
^Faldon, 5,468; Waliham Holy Cross, 5,197;
Wanstead, 5,119; Brain'ree, 4,790; Brentwood,
3.737; Witham, 3,347 ; Coggeshall, 2,916 ; South-
end, 2,508.
Bristol, 206,874 ; Cheltenham, 43,9" 2 ; Gloucester,
36,521 ; Ciicklade, 51,951 ; Stroud, 40,587 ;
Tewkesbnry, 5,,100; Bisley, 4,985; Cirencester,
8,431; Tutbury, 3,349 ;" Westbury-on-Severn,
2,495; Dursley, 2,413 ; Wotton- under- Edge,
2,314.
Hereford, 19 821; Leominster, 6,044; Ross, 3,586;
Led^u.y, 2,9(i7; Kington, 2,126.
St. Albans, 10.931 ; Hitchin, 7.630 ; Cheshunt,
7,518; Watford, 7,461 ; Hertford, 7,747; Bishop
Stortlord, 6,2o0 ; Hemel Hempstead, 5,996 ; Ware,
4,917 ; Berkhamsted, 4,083 ; Tring, 4,045; Barnet,
3,720.
Huntingdon, ^,228; Godmanchesfer, 2,188; St.
Ives, 3,002; St. Neot's, 3,200; Ramsey, 2,378.
L 'ndon, partof, 218,179 ; Chatham. 46,788; Roches-
tar, 21,307 ; Dover, 30,'>70; Maidstone, 29,623;
Tunhridge Wells, 22.873 (viz. Tunbridge Wells,
19 410; Southborou^-h, 3,463) ; Gravesetid, 23,302;
Canterbury, 21,704; Ratnsgate, 14,640; Sheer-
ness, 13,956 ; Folkestone, 18,986 ; Margate, 16,030;
Deal, 8,500 ; Bromley, 10 674 ; Sittingbourne,
9,611; (viz. Sittingbonrne, 6,148; Milton, 3,463) ;
A*<hford, 8,458 ; Dartford, 8,298 ; Tunbridge,
8,209; Faversham. 8,616; Whitstable, 5,481;
Sevenoaks, 4,118; Tenterden, 3,620; Hythe,
4,173; Wrotham, 3,201; Sandwich, 2,846.
Liverpool, 552.508 ; Manchester, 341,414 ; Salford,
176,235 ; Riisholme, 7,430 ; Gorton, 21,616 ;
Levensholme, 2,742; Opensbaw, 11.108; Moss
Side, 5,311 ; Bradford, 7,168 ; Newlon Heath,
18,103; Crumpsa 1, 5.342; Bootle-cum-Liriaire,
27,374; Oldham, 111.343; Preston, 96,537;
Bolton, 105,414 ; Blackburn, 104,014 ; Roch-
dale, 68,866 ; St. Helen's, 57,403 ; Burnley,
58,751; VVigin, 48,194; Bury, 52,213; Ashtwi-
nnder-Lyne, 37,040; Warrington, 41,452; Ac-
crington, 31,435 ; Southport, 32,206 ; Over
Darwen, 29,744 ; Hey wood, 22,979 ; Farnworth
19,380 (viz. Farnworth, 13,550 ; Kearsley, 5,830) ;
Counties.
APPEISTDIX.
Akea and Population {continued).
489
Leicestek .
Lincoln . .
Middlesex . .
Monmouth .
Northampton .
KORTHUMBER-
LAND . .
Nottingham
Oxford . .
800
2,762
Population.
283
576
2,119
984
2,016
882
738
269,311
436,599
321,258
469,919
2,539,765
195,448
438,656
243,891
386,616
319,758
177,975
2,920,485
211,267
444 749
272,555
434,086
.391,815
179,559
Towhb (1881).
Eccles, Barton, Winton, and Monton, J 8.915 ;
Barrow-m-Fuiness, 47,100; Lnncaster, 20,663;
Bacun, 17,199; Chorley, 16,864; Middleton,
14,587 ; Widnes, 14,357 ; Swinton and Pendle-
bury, 14,052; Ii.ce-in-Makerfield, 11,989; Stret-
ford, 11,945 ; RadcliflFe, 11,446; IJindley, 10,627 ;
Oswaldtwistle, 10,283 ; Mossley, 10,578 ; White-
field, 9,054 ; Halliwell, 8,706 ; Newton-in-Maker-
field, 8,244; Clithero, 10,176; Littleborough,
7,934; Garston, 7,840; Haslingden, 7,698; Ul-
verbton, 7,607 ; Athcrton, 7.531 ; Colne, 7,375 ;
Prestwich, 6,820 ; Droylsden, 6,768 ; Padiham,
6 675; Bedford Leiph, 6,610; Tvldesley wiih
Shackerley, 6,408 ; Oimskirk, 6,127; Blackpool
14,229; Prestcot, 5,990; Failsworth, 5,685;
West Leigh, 5,590; Nelson, 5,580; Milnrow,
5,505; Pennington, 5,423; Clayion-le-Moors,
5,390; Denton, 5,117; Great Harwood, 4,©07 ;
Much Woolton, 4,643; Astley Bridge, 4,559;
Church, 4,450 ; Fleetwood, 4,428 ; Ramsbottom,
4,204 ; Leyland, 3,839 ; Ki.kliam, 3,593 ; I ythHm,
3,257; Brierfield, 3,115; Fulwood, 3,079 ; Poul-
ton-le-Saiids, 3,005 ; L-es, 2,919.
Leicester, 122,376; Loughborough, 11,588; Ashby-
de-la-Zouch, 7,302 ; Hinckley, 0,902 ; Melton
Mowbray, 5,011 ; Whit wick, 4,277 ; Market Har-
borough, 2,362; Castle Donington, 2,154.
Lincoln, 37,313 ; Great Grimsbv, 28,503 ; Boston,
14,941; Louth, 10,691; Spalding, 9,111; Stam-
ford, 8,773; Gainsborough, 7,564; Holbeach,
6,332; Grantham, 16,886; Homcastle, 4,865;
Barton-upon-Humber, 4,332 ; Crowle, 3,813 ; New
Sleaford, 3,592; Bourne, 3,098; Alford, 2,881;
Market Rasen, 2,815 ; Long Sutton, 2,727 ; Crow-
land, 2,459.
London, part of, 2,211,671, of whom 74,897 are in the
City of London : the entire Metropolis, 3,254,260 ;
Tottenham, 22,869 ; Enfield, 16,054 ; Edmonton,
13,860; Hornsey, 11,746; Brentford, 11,091;
Twickenham, 10,633 ; Ealing, 9,959 ; Hounslow,
2,294 ; Chiswick, 8,508 ; Acton, 8.306 ; South
Hornsey, 7,611 ; Uxbridge, 7,497 ; Harrow-on-the-
Hill, 4,997; Teddiniiton, 4,063; Staines, 3,464;
Hampton Wick, 2,207-
Newport, 35.313 ; Abersychan, 14,569 ; Tredeg-ar,
12,389 ; Biaenavon, 9,736 ; Monmouth, 6 111;
Poutypool, 4,834; Abergavenny, 4,803; Chep-
stow, 3,347, Panteague, or Panteg, 2,761 ; Upper
Llanvrechva, 2,552.
Norwich, 87,842 ; Great Yarmouth, 46,159; King's
Lynn, 18,539; Thetford, 4,032; D.ss, 3,851;
Swaffham. 3,700; Dereham, 3,687; Wells-next-
the-Sea, 3 044; North Walsham, 2,842; Down-
ham Market, 2,752.
Northampton, 51,881 ; Peterborough, 21,228; Wel-
lingborough, 9,385; Kettering, 7,184 ; Daventry,
3,859; Oundle, 2,829 ; Towcester, 2,465; Brackley,
2,154.
Newcastle-upon-Tyne, 145,359 ; Tynemouth, 44,118 ;
Bedlingtonshire, 13.494; Berwick-upon-Tweed,
13,998 ; Walker. 8,888 ; Cowpen, 6.464 ; Alnwick
and Canongate, 6,218 ; Morpeth, 4,566 ; Hexham,
5.331; Wallsend, 4,169; Cramlington, 4,167;
Willington Quay, 4,096 ; South BIyth, 2,918.
Nottingham, 186,575; Basford, 13,038; Newark,
14,018; Mansfield, 11,824; Worksop, 10,409;
Sutton-in-Ashfield, 7,574 ; Lenton, 6,315 ; Arnold,
4,634; Hucknal Torkard, 4,257; East Retford,
9,748.
Oxford, 35.264; Banbury, 3,600; Henley, 4,523;
Chipping Norton. 4,167 ; Bice>ter, 3.018 ; Witney,
2,976; Woodstock, 7,033; Thame, 2,823.
128— E
490
APPENDIX.
Area and Population (continued).
Counties.
Rutland . .
Shkopshike .
SOMEKSET
Southampton
(Hampshire)
Stapford
Suffolk .
Surrey
Warwick
"Westmoreland
Wiltshire . .
Worcester
Area,
g. Miles.
148
1,291
1,640
1,613
1,144
1,484
755
1,443
885
783
1,352
738
Population.
22.073
248,111
463,483
544,684
858,326
348,869
18SI.
21.434
248,014
469,109
593,470
981,013
356,893
1,091,635 1,436,899
417,456
634,189
05.010
257,177
490,505
737,339
64.191
258,965
338,837 I 380,283
Towns (1881).
Oakham, 2,911 ; Uppingham, 2,464.
Shrewsbury, 26,478 ; Coalbronkdale, Ironhrids<e,
Madeley, Bioseley (included in IMuch Wenlock
Borough); Oswestry, 7,847; Wellington, 5,926;
Bridgenoith, 5,885 ; Ludlow. 5,035 ; Market Dray-
ton, 4.039; Whitchurch. 3,696 ; Newport, 3,202 :
Shiffnal, 2,190; Much Wenlock, 18,442.
Bath. 51 814; Taunton, 16,614; Bridgwater, 12,007 ;
Weston- super - Mare, 10,470 ; Frome, 9,377 ;
Yeovil, 8,479 ; Wellington, 5,119; Wells, 4,634 ;
Shepton-Mallet, 4,363 ; Clevedon, 4,039 ; Midsomer
Norton, 4,010 ; Glastonbury, 3,719 ; Crewkerue,
3,557 ; Ilminster, 2,431.
Portsmouth, 127,989 ; Southampton, 60,051 ; Shirley
5,339; Aldershot, 21,682; Winchester, 17.780;
Ryde, 11,461; Newport, 9,357; Gosport, 7,366;
Fareham, 7,023 ; Bournemouth, 5,906 ; West
Cowes 5,730 ; Basingstoke, 6 681 ; Andover, 5,653;
Ventnor, 4,841; Lymin^ton. 2,410; Romsey, 4,204 ;
Alton, 4,092; Havant, 2,634; Sandown, 2,320;
Christchurch, 28,535; Petersfiehl, 6,546.
Wolverhampton, 75,766 ; Walsall, 58,795 ; West
Bromwich, 47,918; Hanley, 48,361; Tipton,
29,445; Burslem, 26,522; Weduesbury, 12,443;
Bilston, 24,188; Rowley Regis, 23,534; Sedyky,
37 355 ; (viz. Lower Sedgley, 22,900 ; Upper
Sedgley, 14,455) ; Burton-upon-Trent, 39,288 ;
Lom/ton, 18,620; Smethwick, 17,158; Newcastle-
under-Lyme, 17,508; Willenhall, 15.902; Stoke-
upon-Trent, 19.261 ; Stafford, 19,977 ; Darlaston,
14,416; Tunstall, 13 540; Leek, 11,331; Brierley
Hill, 11,046; Fenton, 10,299; Lichfield, 8,349;
Quarry Bank, 6,332; Heathtown, 5,268; Har-
bome, 5,105; Tamworth, 4,891; Kidsgrove,
4,162; Stone, 3,732; Wed..esfield, 3,730; Small-
thorne, 3,609; Uttoxeter, 3,604; Rugeley, 3,375 ;
Cheadle, 2,920.
Ipswich, 50,546; Lowestoft, 15,246; Bury St.
Edmunds, 16,111; Sudbury, 6,584; Beccles,
5,721; Newmarket, 4,534; Woodbridge, 4,403;
Stowmarket, 4,097 ; Eye, 6,293 ; Hadleigh, 3,575 ;
Bungay, 3,503.
London, part of, 749,522; Crovdon, 55,652 ; Reigate,
18,662; Kingston-on-Thames, 20,648; Richmond,
15,113; Guildford, 10,858; Wimbledon, 9,087; Sur-
biton, 7,642; Epsom, 6,276; Dorking, 5,418; Fam-
ham, 4,461 ; Chertsey, 3,146; Godalming, 2,505.
Brighton, 107,546; Hastings, 42,258 ; Eastbourne,
10,361; Horsham, 9,552; Chichester, 8,114;
Worthing, 7,415; Lewes, 11,199: Rye, 4,224; New
Shoreham, 42,559 ; Battle, 3,495 ; Littlehampton,
3,272 ; Arundel, 2,748 ; Bognor, 2,811 ; Uckfield,
2,214; Midhurst, 7,221.
Birmingham, AQQ,11^\ Coventry, 42, 1 1 1 ; Leaming-
ton, 22,979; Warwick, 11,800; Rugby, 8,385;
Nuneat-n, 7,399; Stratfoid- on - Avon, 8,054;
Atherstone, 3,667 ; Bed worth, 3,405 ; Kenilworth,
3,335 ; Chilvers Coton, 2,658.
Kendal, 13,6!)6 ; Appleby, 1,989.
Salisbury, 14,792; Trowbridge, 11,508; Swindon,
11,720 (viz. New Town, 7,628 ; Old Town, 4,092) ;
Devizes, 6,645 ; Weslbury, 6,014 ; Warminster,
5,786; Bradford-on-Avon, 4,871; Chippenham,
1,352; Marlborough, 3,343; Calne, 2,474;
Malmesbury, 6,881 ; Wilton, 8,802.
Dudlev, 46,252; Worcester, 33,956 ; Kidderminster,
24,270 ; Oldburv, 16,410 ; Balsall (suburb of
Birmingham), 13^,615 ; Stourbridge, 9,378 ; Broms-
{irove, 6,967; R-ddiich, 6,135; Great Malvern,
5,693 ; Eveeham, 5,112 ; Droitwich, 3,761 ; Stour-
port (Lower Milton), 3,081; Bewdley, 3,088;
Halesowen, 2,984 ; Pershore, 2,826.
Counties.
Yo UK SHI RE (East
Eiding) . . .
Yorkshire
(North Eiding)
YoRKSHmE(West
Eiding & City)
Area.
Sq. MUes.
1,173
2,128
2,766
APPENDIX.
Area and Populatiox {continued).
491
Population.
268,466
293,278
1,874,61]
Towns (1881).
315,460 Kmgston-upon-Hull, 154,240; Beve-ley, 11425-
Bri.llmgton, 6,203 ; Great Driffield, 5,067 ; Cot-
tinghani, 4,010; Pocklingtun, 2,622.
346,260 M\ddle8borongh 55,934 ; ScarLorough, 30.504 •
Whitby, I4,6h ; S.mth Stockton, 6,764; Guis-
b.,rough, 6,202 ; Mnlton, 8,754 ; R,. hmond, 4,502 •
?'i'?r^^'T^t'-^? ' Pickering, 3,689; Normanby
3,5d6; Thirsk, 6,312; Northallerton, 5,445
Hmderwell, 2,579 ; Skeltou-in Cleveland, 2,561.
2,224,844 Leeds, 309,119; Sheffield, 284,508; Bradford 183 032-
Hudderslield, 81,841 ; Halifax, 73,630 ; York'
49,530; Wakefield, 30,854; Rutherham, 34,782';
Dewsbury 20,637 ; Barnsley, 29,790 ; Batiey,
2^,505; Keighley, 19,775; Doi.caster, 21,139;
North Bierley, 14,433 ; Todmorden, 11,998 ;
Shipley, 11,757; IVloiley, 9,607; Ohsett-with-
Orawthorpe, 9,190; Biiigley, 9,062; Heckmond-
wike, 8,300; Goole, 7,680; Ovenden, 7,371;
feowerby Bridge, 7,041 ; Eawmarsh, 6,8(!9 ; Harro-
gate, 6,843; Ripen, 7,390; Cle-kheaton, 6,583;
Mland, 6,432; Brighonse, 6,370; Caetlefoid, 6,268;
Idle, 6,253; Seiby, 6,193; Sowerby, 6,079; Bir-
PtaU, 6,044; Skipton, 6,042 ; Gul.ar, 6,033-
Qi.eensbury, 6,012 ; Raslrick, 5,896 ; Otlev, 5,856;
Windhill, 5,783; Oakworlh, 5,683 ; Thornlon,
5,674 ; Eccle^hill, 6,622 ; Pontefract, 8,798 ;
Thornhill, 5,285; Yeadon, 5,246 ; Knaresbo.ougli,
5,000 ; Dartun, 5,197 ; Linthwaite, 5,047 ; Womb-
w. II, 5,009; Nether Soothill, 4,927; Henley,
4,906; Eaildon, 4,784 ; Woold.ile, 4,454; Drigh-
hngton, 4,338 ; IMexborongh, 4,316 ; Meltham,
4,229; Greetland, 4,114; Ciayton, 4,074; Long-
wood, 4,055 ; Knotiingley, 4,039 ; Horhurv, 3.977 ;
Hfbden Bridge, 3,894; Faislev, 3,829; Tong
Street, 3,740; Northowram, 3,725; Upper Soot-
hill, 3,469 ; Denholme Gate, 3,469 ; Kirkburton,
3,442 ; Quickuiere, 3,358 ; Whitwood, 3,342 ;
Warley, 3,341 ; So^land, 3,264 ; Calverley, 3,195 ;
Guiseley, 3,185; Wilsden, 3,127; Shell, 3,091;
Southowrani, 3,091 ; Midgley, 3,065; Luddenden
Poor, 2,968; Skelmnnthorpe, 2,953; Ravensthorpe,
2,910 ; Allerton, 2,906 ; Haworth, 2,884 ; Birken-
shaw, 2,833 ; Slaithwaite, 2,781 ; Ded worth,
2,747 ; Silsden, 2,714 ; Kukheaton, 2,646 ; Thurl-
stone, 2,6s9 ; Thorne, 2,618 ; llkley, 2,511 ; Tad-
caster, 2,443.
Anglesey
Brecknock .
Cardigan
Carmarthen
Carnarvon .
Denbigh . .
Flint . . .
Glamorgan .
302
719
693
947
577
602
264
810
51,040
59,901
73,-141
115,710
106,121
105,102
76,312
397,859
WALES.
51,416 j Holyhead, 5,916 ; Amlwch, 2,968 ; Beaumaris, 2,239.
67,746 i Brecknock, 6,247; Byrnmawr, 5,739; Hay, 1,777.-
70,270 ' Aberystwitti, 7,088 ; Cardigan, 3,669.
12i,846 Llanelly, 14,973 ; Carmarthen, 10,514 ; Llandovery,
2,035.
119,349 Carnarvon, 10,268 ; Bangor, 7,722 ; Bethesda, 6,297 ;
Ynyscynhaiarn (Tremadoc and Portmador), 4,367 ;
Pwllheli, 3,242; Llandudno, 2,762; Conway,
3,254.
111,740 Ruahon, 15,150 ; Wrexham, 10,978 ; Dtnbis;h, 6,536 ;
Ruthin, 3,033 ; Llangollen, 2.798
80,687 Flint, 5,096 ; Rhyl, 4 229 ; Mold, 3,978; Holywell,
3,540 ; St. Asaph, 1,900.
511,433 Swansea, 65,597; Merthyr Tydvil, 91,373; Cardiff,
82,761; A>erd>ire, 36,112; Aberaven, 4,859:
Neath, 10,409 ; Roath, 7,991 ; Mountain Abh,
7,457 ; CaF.ton. 7.061 ; Cw.ndu 5,836 ; Briton
Feiry, 4,803; Bridgend, 3,539; Llantrisaint,
2,039.
492
APPENDIX.
Area and Population (continued).
Counties.
Area.
Sq Miles.
Population.
1871.
1881.
Towns (1881).
Merioneth .
MONTGO.VIEKY .
Pembroke . .
Eadnor . . .
Total (England
and Walei) .
602
758
615
432
46,598
67,623
91,998
25,430
52,038
65,718
91,824
23,528
25,974,439
Towyn, 3,307; Dolgelly, 2,357.
Welshpool, 7,107; Newtown and Llanllwchaiarn,
4,874; Llanidloes, 3,421; Machynlleth, 2,042.
Pembroke, 14,156; Haverfordwest, 6,398; Tenby,
4,75U; Milford, 3,252.
New Radnor, 6,705 ; Presteigne, 1,910.
58,225
22,723,266
SCOTLAND.
Aberdeen
Argyll
Ayr .
Banff. . .
Bekwick .
Bute . . .
Caithness .
Clackmanxan
Dumbarton .
Dumfries
Edinburgh
Elgin . .
Fife . .
Forfar
Haddington
Invermess . .
Kincardine . .
KlVROSS . . .
Kirkcudbright
Lanark . . .
Linlithgow
Nairn . .
Orkney . .
Peebles . .
Perth . .
Renfrew
Ross and
MARTY .
Roxburgh
Selkirk .
Shetland
Cro-
1,972
3.335
1,149
647
464
225
700
50
270
1,103
367
488
513
890
280
,324
38S
78
954
889
127
200
3!)0
356
2,601
254
3,247
670
260
550
244,603
75,679
200.809
62,023
36,486
16,977
39,992
23,747
58,857
74,80S
328,379
43,612
105,735
237,567
37,771
87,531
34.630
7,198
41,859
765.339
40,695
10,225
31,274
12,330
127,768
216,947
80,955
53,974
14,005
31,608
267,990
76 468
217,519
62,736
35,392
17,657
38,865
25,680
75,333
76,140
389,164
43,788
171,931
266,360
38 502
90,454
34,464
6,697
42,127
904,412
43,510
10,455
32 044
13,822
129,007
263,374
78,547
53,442
25,564
29,705
Aberdeen, 105,190; Peterhead, 10,953; Fraserburgh,
6,683; Inverurie, 3,048; Huntley, 3,519; N.w
Pitsligo. 2,056; Turriff, 2,804.
Campbeltown, 7,693 ; Dunoon, 4,692 ; Oban, 4,046.
Kilmamock, 25,844 ; Ayr, 20,987 ; Ardrossan, 4,036
Beith, 4,037; Catrine, 2,638; Cumnock; 3,345
■Dairy, 5,010; Galston, 4,085; Girvan, 4,505
Hurlford, 4 385 ; Irvine, 8,517 ; Kilhimie, 3,405
Kilwinning, 3,469 ; Largs, 3,079 ; Maybole, 4,474 :
Kewmilns, 2,860 ; Saltcoats, 5,096 ; Stevenston,
3,556; Stewarton, 3,130; Troon, 2,383.
Banff, 7,871 ; Buckie, 4,176 ; Keith, 4,3;59.
Eyemouth, 2,825 ; Dunse, 2,4;57.
Rothesay, 8,329.
Wick, 8,053 ; Thurso, 4,055.
Alloa, 10,600 ; Tillicoultry, 3,732 ; Dollar, 2,014,
Dumbarton, 14,172; Kirkintillock, 7,456; Helens-
burgh, 7,693; Alexandria, 6,17^; Renton, 4,319 ;
Bonhill, 2,940.
Dumfries, 12,629 ; Langholm, 4,209 ; Annan, 3.366.
Edinburgh, 235,902 ; Leith, 59,485 ; Musselburgh,
7,880 ; Dalkeith, 6,931 ; Portobello, 10,673.
Elgin, 7,533 ; Forres, 4,030 ; Lossiemouth, 3,497.
Kirkcaldy, 23,315; Dut.fermline, 17,084; St An
drews, 6,458 ; Anstiuther, 4,702 ; Burntisland
4,271; Cupar, 5,010; Djsart, 2,659; Ferryport-
on-Craig, 2,630; Leslie, 3,768 ; Leven, 2,501
Newburgh, 2,777.
Dundee, 140,230 ; Arbroath, 21,785 ; Brechin, 9,031
Broughty Ferry, 7,923; Carnoustie, 3,221 ; Forfar,
12,817 ; Kirriemuir, 4 390 ; Montrose, 14,994.
Dunbar, 3,661 ; Haddington, 4,043; Tranent, 2,235.
Inverness, 17,385.
Stonehaven, 4,957.
Kinross, 1,960.
Castle Douglas, 2,565 ; Dalbeattie, 3,865 ; Kirkcud-
bright, 2,571.
Glasgow, 617,161; Airdrie, 16,335; Coatbridge,
17,500; Motherwell, 12,904; Baillieston, 2,927:
Carluke, 3,867 ; Hamilton, 18,517 ; Lanark, 4,910 ;
Larkhall, 6,503; Newmains, 2,682; Rutherglen,
11,265 ; Stonehouse, 2,615; Strathaven, 3,812;
ToUcross, 3,533 ; Wishaw, 13,112.
Borrowstounness, 5,284; linlithgow, 3,913 ; Bath-
gate, 4,887, Aimadale, 2,642; Crofthead, 3,000.
Nairn, 4,156.
Kirkwall, 3,947.
Peebles, 3,495.
Perth, 28,980; Blairgowrie, 4,537; Alyth, 2,377;
Auchterarder, 2,666; Crieff, 4,469.
Greenock, 66,704 ; Paisley, 56,638 ; Barhead, 7,495 ;
Gourock, 3,336 ; Johnstone, 9,267 ; Kilbarchan,
2,548; Pollockshaws, 9,363; Port Glasgow,
13,294; Renfrew, 4,855.
Stornoway, 2,693 ; Dingwall, 1,932.
Hawick, i 1,336; Kelso, 4,687; Jedburgh, 3,402.
Galashiels, 9,040 ; Selkirk, 6,090.
Lerwick, 4,045.
Counties.
Stikling
Sl'THERLAND
Wigtown . .
Total (Scotland)
Area.
Sq. Miles
467
2,126
512
30,836
APPENDIX.
Area and Population (continued).
Population.
493
1871.
98,218
24,317
38,830
1881.
112,443
23,370
38,bll
3,360,018 3,735.573
Towns (1881).
Stirling, 16 012; Alva, 4,961 ; Bannockbum. 2,549;
t\".o? °*^^"«"' 3,005; Denny, 4.08(1; Falkirk,
15,599; Giangemouth, 4,660; Kilsyth, 5,405;
Lennoxtown, 3,249. ^ «'.'»"-',
Golspie, 956.
Newton Stewart,^ 2,645 ; Stranraer, 6,415 ; Wigtown,
Ij i £lOm
IRELAND.
LEINSTER.
Caklow . .
Dublin . .
KiLDARE .
Kilkenny
Ki.n'g's
Longford
Louth
Meath
Queen's .
Wfstmeath
Wexford
WiCKLOW
Total
346
354
51,650
405,262
46,568
418 910
654
797
772
421
318
904
664
83,614
109,379
75,J^00
64,501
84,021
9o,oo8
79,771
75 804
99,531
72,852
61,009
77,684
87.469
73,124
709
901
78,432
132,656
71,798
123,854
780
78,697
70,386
7,619
1.339,451
1.278,989
Carlow, 7,185; Bagnalstown, 2,141 ; Tullow, 2,050.
Dublin, 249,602 (Parliamentary Borough, 271,150) ;
Balbriggan. 2,413; Blackrock, 8 902; Clont^rf,
4.210 ; Dalkey, 3,234 ; New Kilmainham, 5,391 ;
Eathmines and Eathgar, 24,370; Skerries, 2,227 ;
Pembroke, 23,222.
Athy, 4,181 ; Newbridge, 3,372; Naas, 3,808.
Kilkenny, 12,299; Callan, 2,340.
Tullamore, 5,098 ; P.-rsonstown, 4,955.
Longford, 4,380.
Drogheda, 12,297; Dundalk, 11,913; Ardee. 2.622.
Kells, 2 822 ; Trim 2,010.
Mountmeilick, 3,126; Marj-borough, 2,872; Port-
arlington, 2,357.
Mullingar, 4,787.
Wexford, 12,163; New Ross, 6,670; Fnniscorthv,
5,666 ; Gorey, 2,450.
Arklow, 4,777; Wicklow, 3,391; Bray, 6,535.
MUKSTER.
Clare . . .
COKK . . .
Kerry
Limerick
TiPPERARY
Waterford
Total
1,294
2,890
147,864
517,076
141457
495,607
1.853
1,064
196,586
191,936
201.039
180,632
1,659
216,713
199,612
72J
123,310
112,768
9,481
1,393,485
1,331,115
Ennis, 6,307 ; Kilrusb, 3,805.
Cork, 80,124; (Phrliamentary Borough, 103,650);
Queenstown, 9,755 ; Fermoy, 6,454 ; Kinsale,
5,386; Bandnn, 3,997 ; Youghal, 5,396 ; Malb.w,
4,439 ; Middleton, 3,358 ; Clonakilty, 3,676 ; Skib-
bereen, 3,631 ; Macroom, 3,099 ; Mitchelstown,
2,467 ; Charleville, 2,266 ; Bantry, 2,632 ; Passage
West, 2,440 ; Dunmanway, 2,049.
Tralee, 9,910 ; KiUarney, 6,651 ; Listowel, 2,965.
Limerick, 38,562 ; (Parliamentary Borough, 48,670) ;
Eathkeale, 2,549; Newcastle, 2,186.
Carrick-(in-Nuir, 6,583 ; Clonmel, 9 325 ; Nenagh,
5,422 ; Tipperary, 7,274 ; Thurles, 4,850 ; Cashel,
3,961 ; Templemore, 2,8oO ; Caher, 2,469 ; Ros-
crea, 2,801.
Waterford, 22,457 (Parliamentary Borough, 28,860) ;
Dungarvan, 6,306; Tramore', 2,036; Lismoro,
1,860.
CONNA TIGHT.
Galway . . .
Leitrim . .
Mayo . . . .
Roscommon .
Sligo . . . .
Total . .
2,448
248,458
242,005
613
2,131
95,562
246,030
90,372
245,212
950
721
140,670
115.493
846,213
132,490
111,578
6 863
821,657
Galway, 15,471 (Parliamentary Borough, 19,180);
Balliuasloe, 4,772 ; T-oughrea, 3,159; Tuam, 3,567.
Carrick-on- Shannon, 1,420.
Ballina, 5,760; Castlebar, 3,855; Westport, 4,469;
Ballinrobe, 4,772.
Athlone, 6,755; Boyle, 2,994; Roscommon, 2,117.
Sligo, 10,808.
494
APPENDIX.
Akea and Population (continued).
Popvilation.
Counties.
Sq. Miles.
1871.
1881.
Towns (1881).
ULSTER.
Antbim . . .
1,193
420,170
421,943
Belfast, 208, 122 ; Ballymena, 8,883 ; Lisbum, 10,755
Carrirkfergus, 10,009 ; Lame, 4,716 ; Legoneil,
3,497; Ballymoney, 3,049: Antrim, 1,647.
Armagh . .
513
179,260
163,177
Lurgan, 10,135; Armagh, 10,070; Portadown, 7,850
Cavan . . .
746
140,735
129,476
Cavan, 3,u50 ; Belturbet, 1,807.
Donegal
1,870
218,334
206,035
Ballyshannon, 2,840 ; Letterkenny, 2,188.
Down ....
954
277,294
272,107
Newry, 14,808 ; Newtownards 8,676 ; Banbridge
5,609; Donaghadee, 2,370 ; Downpatrick, 3,419
Holywood, 3,293 ; G.lford, 1,324 ; Bangor, 3,006
Dromore, 2,491.
Fermavagh . .
714
92.794
84,879
Enniskillen, 5,712.
Londonderry .
818
173.906
164,991
Londonderry, 29,162; Coleraine, 5,899; Newtown
Limavady, 2,954.
MONAGHAN . .
500
114,969
102,748
Monaghan 3,369; Clones, 2,216; Carrickmacross
2,002 ; Castleblayney, 1,810.
Tyrone . . .
1,260
215,766
197,719
Strabane, 4,196 ; Omagh, 4,126 ; Dungannon, 4,084
CookstowD, 3,870.
Total . .
8,568
1 833,228
1.743,075
Ireland . . .
32,531
5,412,377
5,174,836
UNITED KING-
DOM . . .
121,592
31,484,661
35,241,482
Isle of Man .
227
54,042
53,558
Douglas, 13,972; Ramsey, 3,934; Peel, 3,513
Castletown, 2,320.
Channel Islands
76
90,596
87,702
St. Helier, 16,715 ; St. Peter Port, 16,166.
II.— AGRICULTURAL STATISTICS OF THE BRITISH ISLES.
The Totals include the Isle of Man and the Channel Islands.
Description.
1876.
1878.
1880.
1884.
/ England ....
Cora Crops .... ^^^^nd ! ! ! !
\ Ireland
Acres.
7,528,543
512,178
1,410,929
1,916,808
Acres.
7,274,811
491 868
1,400,967
1,831,521
Acres.
6,993,699
478,116
l,403,8b7
1,766,424
Acres.
6,645,139
463,651
1,375,940
1,599,629
Total
11,399,030
11,030,280
10,672 086
10,113,264
/ England ....
Wheat J^^T A
) Scotland ....
' Ireland
3,128,547
111,797
102 137
158,995
3,041,241
101,81:^
75,363
154,041
3,381,731
2,745,733
89,729
73,976
148,635
2,530,711
77,611
66,716
69,009
Total
3,514,088
3,065,8!)5
2,750,588
/ England ....
Oafq ^ ) Wales
^"^^ ■ ' ' z ' - Scotland . . . .
' Ireland
1,421,951
237.170
1,004,888
1,501,867
1,430,376
234 986
1,033,545
1,412,846
1,520,125
239 526
1,(137,254
1,381,943
4,191,716
1,620,264
249,204
1,045,895
1,347,395
Total
4,176,177
4,124,238
4,276,866
/England ....
Green Crops (including 1 Wal^s
Potatoes) . . . . i Scotland ....
\ Ireland
2,848,473
131,085
684.549
1,370,155
2,680,983
122.708
687.319
1,317,863
2,959,134
120.073
697.446
1,247,359
2,687,504
125,382
674,817
1,221,413
Total ....
5,057,029
4,832, -293
4,746,293
4,733,860
/England ....
Potatoes ..... f^l?^ ^
Scotland ....
, Ireland
320,477
44.505
157,671
900,587
301,852
40,816
165,763
846.712
324,931
38,940
187,061
820,728
360,025
41,176
163,847
798-,942
Total
1,431,879
1,369.092
1,380,578
1,373,835
APPENDIX.
496
Agricultural Statistics
OF THE British Isles (continued).
Descriptiou.
1875.
1878.
1880.
1884.
/England ....
Clover, Sainfoin, and ) VVale.s
Grasses under rotation 1 Scotland .'
\ Ireland .... *
Acres.
2,608,106
360,596
1,385,369
1,944,676
Acres
2,785,097
356,486
1,431,524
1,942,716
Acres.
2,646,241
332,353
1,455,745
1,909,907
Acres.
2,644,806
310,157
1,526,442
1,962,730
Total
6,337,953
6,557,748
6,389,225
6,392,402
Permanent Pasture, or ( ^"^,^^^*^ • • . .
Gra>8 not broken up ( ,, ^7^ ,
iu rotation .... ^co^land ....
\ Ireland
10,536,283
1,666,313
1,110,025
10,409,3-29
11/009,580
1,748,201
1,153,515
10,116,191
11,461,866
1,805,750
1,159,353
10,261,266
12,197,566
1,886,235
1,207,019
10 346,308
Total
23,772,602
24,056,840
24,717,092
25,667,206
Flax 1 Great Britain . . .
\ Ireland
6.751
101,174
7,261
111,817
8,985
157,534
2,247
89,197
Total
107.999
119,085
166,521
91,444
TT^„„ 1 Cultivated only in
**°P' ( England ....
Bare Fallow or un- } Great Britain . . .
ciopped Arable Laud j Ireland
69,172
657,979
10,864
71,789
632,423
16,943
66,705
812,666
15,366
69,268
749,699
23,560
Total
570,005
650.210
828,778
842,617
Orchards 1
Market Gardens . . . > Great Britain only .
Nursery Grounds . . \
Woods and Plantations , England ....
(Gorse L-inds and ) Wales
Garden Shrubberies Scotland ....
excepted) .... Ireland
154,584
3S,957
12,042
2,187,078
318 P65
165.415
37,273
12,251
2,187,078
328687
179,596
44,490
11.957
1,435,434
162,135
811,703
330,000
194.723
52,976
12,502
1,466,038
162,786
829,476
332.000
Totiil
2,605,743
2,515,765
2,740,000
2,790,000
Cultivated Area (Crops, ( ^''^^^"^ ....
Bare FaJow, and ^ales
Grass) Scotland . . . .
V Ireland
24,112,300
2,696,143
4,607,898
16,753,000
24,417,816
2,746,511
4,690,206
15,337,051
24,596,266
2,767,616
4,738,127
15,357,856
24,844,490
2,809,558
4,811,813
15,242,837
Total
47,313,789
47,318,246
47,686,700 | 47,84u,977
LIVE STOCK.
Horses (kept for agri- I ^^^^^ Britain
cultural purposes, orU^^^^^^ ^ ^
tor breeding) . . . )
Total . .
Horsps, others (esti- \ r^^y^^g^l
mated) j
/ England
Cattle J^^ir« • •
i Scotland
\ Ireland . .
Total . .
England
Wales
Scotland
Ireland .
Pigs (exclusive of those
kept in towns and by
Cottagers) ....
Total .
England
Wales .
Scotland
Ireland .
Total .
Number.
1,341.290
469,996
Number.
1,412,402
504,750
NumbOT.
1,421,180
499,2><4
Number.
990,490
480,846
1,819,687
1,927 066 1.929.680
1 471,336
971,200
4,218,470
651,274
1,143,080
4,116.288
972,000
4,034,553
6' 8,189
1,096,387
3,985.120
980,000
4,158,046
654.714
1,099,286
3.921,026
423,887
4,461,668
680,879
1,136,604
4,112,-267
10,162,787
9,761,6o7 9.871,153 | 10,4'^2,762
19,114 634
2,951 810
7,100,994
4,254 027
18 444,004
2,925,806
7,036 396
4,095,134
16,828,646
2,718,316
7,072.088
3.561.361
16,426.064
2 656.^ 97
6,983.293
3,-243,572
33,491,948
32,571,922 30,239,o20 1 29,376,787
1,875,357
203,348
151,213
1,252,066
2,124,722
218,337
140,189
1,269,399
1,697,914
182,003
120,925
849,046
2,207,444
217,387
159,560
1,306,196
3,495,167
3,768,019
2.863,483
3,906,206
496
APPENDIX.
III.— IMPORTS OF MERCHANDISE INTO THE UNITED KINGDOM
CLASSIFIED.
Quantities.
Value
in£.
1879.
1883.
1879.
1883.
Food : —
Corn and Flour .
cwts.
136,743,743
150,763,140
61,261,437
67,622,367
Rice .
n
6,857,330
7,747,725
3,480,351
3,176,426
Potatoes .
„
9,357,179
5,149,509
2,696,885
1,585,260
Cattle and Calves
No.
247.768
474,750
4,639,431
9,332,242
Slieep and Lambs
„
944,888
1,116,115
2,252,824
2,518,382
Beef .
cwts.
812,237
289,214
1,937,428
633,456
Meat, salted or fresh
,,
153 284
804,794
440,726
2,260,941
„ preserved .
J>
567,877
610,4 0
1,690,099
1,763,842
Pork .
»
441.209
376,899
691,362
761,871
Bacon and Hams .
4,917,631
3,695,992
8,880,223
10,036,326
Butter .
>>
2,045,399
2,334,473
10,379,451
11,773,933
Cheese
»
1,789,721
1,799,704
3,824,017
4,890,400
Lard .
»
840,819
853,541
1,420,881
2,247,016
Fish .
1,160,140
1,295,754
1,652,957
2,307,966
Eggs . .
No.
766,707,840
950,000,000
2,295,720
2,732,056
Sugar and Molasses
cwts.
21,514,436
20,770,031
22,344,555
20,831,042
Spices .
lbs.
36,873,775
55,720,484
927,889
1,536,702
Currants and Raisins
cwts.
1,734,050
1,614,893
2,481,056
2,480,996
Oianges and Lemons
bshls.
3,433,059
4,477,043
1,317,961
1,704,826
Olive Oil .
tuns
26,198
31,053
1,179,' 21
1,198,935
Oil-seed Cake .
tons
217,184
10,524
1,631,277
366,489
Seed, Clover and Grass
cwts.
344 795
24S.531
755,333
1,839,510
Yeast, dried
>»
194,726
260,904
508,158
730,823
Drinks and Stimulants :—
Tea
lbs.
184,076,472
222,262,431
11,262,593
11,542,931
Coffee .
cwts.
1,609,386
1,405,134
7,089,100
4,936,^66
Cocoa .
lbs.
26,155,788
995,934
1,089,417
82,663
Wine .
galls.
15,162,857
15,559,795
5,365,250
6,451,953
Spirits (proof)
M
13,546,877
9,836,937
3,000,737
1,914,568
Hops .
cwts.
262,765
129,905
1,217,938
1,089,246
Tobacco ....
lbs.
42,452,778
59,596,373
1,968,652
2,860,827
Raw Materials (principaliy used
in manu-
factures) : —
Cotton, ra w .
cwts.
13,119,272
15,485,121
36,180,548
46,042,296
Flax and Hemp .
j>
2,943,728
2,999,035
5,312,597
6,267,589
Jute
M
4,759,363
7,385,028
3,257,497
4,528,429
Silk, raw and thrown .
lbs.
4,003,163
3,471,026
3,504,380
2,879,044
,, knubd, husks, and waste
cwts.
38,268
62,064
479,399
899,783
Wool
lbs.
417,110,(199
494,428,802
23,564,064
24,865,638
Goal's Hair or Wool .
,,
10,072,700
13,634,822
743,615
1,051,982
H des, tanned and untanned
cwts.
1,326,168
1,196,84^
6,126,257
3,802,862
Skins .....
No.
20,491,288
14,532,179
2,834,795
2,866,134
Indigo and other principal dying
and tanning stuffs .
cwts.
2,101,778
1,861,079
3,487,887
4,082,569
Rags and other paper-making
materials ....
tons
207,706
317,092
1,560,520
2, 346, 6 H
Seeds, Flax and Linseed
qrs.
1,651,083
2,323,397
4,095,132
4,786,903
„ Rape
>»
361.474
767.127
761,670
1,662,714
Cotton . . . .
tons
179,166
248 531
1,449,541
1,839,510
Oil, Fish ....
tuns
yo,i96
17,156
589,304
604,746
„ Palm ....
cwts.
881,329
749,422
1,344,788
315,559
„ Seed ....
tuns
15,865
10,524
608,975
1,366,489
Petroleum ....
galls.
43,280, -.^gi
70,526.996
1,38>,534
2,170,298
Caoutchouc ....
CWIS.
150 601
229,101
1,626,290
3,652,817
Gutta-percha
„
51,416
63,800
419,417
476,881
Tallow and Stearine .
„
1,174,907
1,038,277
2,106,927
2,101,617
Guano ....
tons
77,015
74,221
704,448
724,608
Copper, Ore and Regulns .
>j
133,976
163,781
2,260,834
2,936,208
Silver Ore ....
724.515
1,030,542
Pyrites of Iron or Copper .
„
4S1,392
601.288
1,050,545
1,356,083
Saltpetre and Cubic Nitre .
cwts.
1,417,522
2,337,472
1,070,803
1,466,793
Drugs, -unenumerated .
691,140
1,123,874
Wood and Timber
»» »
.
loads
tons
4,725,289
45,154
6,609,942
112,944
10,750,502
17,742,660
APPENDIX.
497
Imports of Merchandise into the
Manufactukes : —
Silk mnnufactures
Woollen „
,, Yarns .
Cotton mMniiffictures .
Iron and Steel in bars .
„ wrought or mannfartur. d
Copper, unwrought or pa
wrought .
Tin . .
Lead, pig and sheet
Zinc .
Glass . .
Paper, writing or printing
Leather Gloves .
Artificial Flowers
Clocks
"Watches
Chemical manufactuies and
products .
Total .
In addiiion, Merchandise for transhipment
Bullion imported ....
United Kingdom classified (continued).
Quantities.
1879.
lbs.
Ions
cwts.
tons
cwts.
tons
cwts.
dozen pairs.
No.
10,909,372
95,549
2,246,387
994,960
335,266
102,089
987,485
1,147,621
238,088
12,752,964
829,916
15,533,441
,122,895
3,880,076
38,097
521,048
102,089
309,425
1,377,932
1,160,104
1,666,298
720,321
419,368
Value in £.
12,841,918
6,637,675
1,401,121
2,286,599
878,357
1,721,701
2,924,719
1,143,965
1,531,038
910,055
1,574,179
445,271
1,286,030
471,145
543,441
458,688
889,838
362,991,875
11,554,462
6,251,281
2,004,231
2,340,064
1,236,735
2,870,813
2,413,796
2,442,959
1,305,388
408,206
1,605,892
1,245,861
1,939,487
452,824
468,664
611,188
1,549,929
426,891,579~
10.975,669
24,155,538
11,689,318
17,223,802
lY.— EXPOETS OF BEITISH PEODUCE CLASSIFIED.
Quantities.
Value in £.
1879.
1883.
1879.
18a3.
Food : —
Com and Flour .
cwts.
762,128
131,794
700,495
83,074
Butter ....
„
36,677
30,404
235,500
212,214
Fish of all sorts .
—
—
1,417,256
1,882,098
Sugar, refined
cwts.
896,243
1,155,787
971,080
1,236,682
Salt ....
tons
959,644
1,004,313
561,949
645,009
Provisions, not otherwise de
scribed .
—
—
921,985
588,134
Drinks and Stimulants: —
Beer and Ale
brrls.
412,392
456,109
1,755,331
1,820,259
Spirits, Biitish
galls.
1,692,495
2,732,856
452,412
809,644
Raw Materials : —
Coals, Cinder, Fuel
tons
16,442,296
22,775,R34
7,206,799
10,645,910
Wool ....
lbs.
15,703,900
19,443,100
941,278
1,029,999
Oil, Seed
galls.
12,605,800
20,154,700
1,388,630
1,863,520
Manufactures : —
Cotton, yarn .
lbs.
235,635,500
264,772 000
12,106,961
13,509,732
„ manufactures .
yds.
3,724,648,800*
4,538,888,500
51,867,092
55,534,666
Wool and Worsted, yarn
lbs.
33,378,500
33,488,500
3,714,230
3,266,488
,, ,, manufacture.
3 vds.
251,254,700*
255,905,700
15,861,166
18,315,557
Linen and Jute, yarn .
"lbs.
31,000,900
38,855,000
l,27^,079
1,326,787
,, „ manufactures
yds.
324,365,200*
389,512,100
7,436,280
7,941,159
Silk, thrown, twist, and yarn
—
—
694,735
705,825
„ manufactures
yds.
4,724,010
7,687,992
1,697,209
1,254,603
Haberdashery and Millinery .
—
—
3,486,920
3,879,768
Apuarel and Slops .
—
—
3,208,941
3,633,804
Hats of all sorts .
doz.
779,493
1,057,826
897,657
1,137,085
Leather, and manufactures o
—
—
3,566,054
4,031,931
Bags, empty .
doz.
5,039,415
4,408,287
1,437,816
1,137,682
Iron and Steel
tons
2,883,484
4,043, b08
19,417,363
28,590,216
Telegraph Wire .
—
—
2,500,637
1,237,823
Machinery .
—
—
7,279,205
13,433,081
Hardware and Cutlery .
—
—
3,028,271
3,756,449
Copper and Copper ware
cwts.
973,524
1,055,018
3,082,479
3,676,473
Lead . . . .
tons
36,776
39,315
666,966
563,144
Piece goods only. The value includes goods of every description.
498
APPENDIX.
Exports
OF British Produce classified {continued).
Quan
titles.
Value in £.
1879.
1883.
1879.
1883.
Tin ....
cwis.
124,474
107,437
418,:^53
524,049
Earthen and China waie
—
—
1,79»,956
2,333,1G7
Glass ....
—
» — .
793,033
l,08i,374
Paper, writing and printing
cwts.
377,687
697,923
915,925
1,284,862
Stationery .
—
—
665,995
882,793
Books, printed
cwts.
95,439
123,025
956,616
1,174,929
Alkali ....
)»
6,337,611
6,947,000
2,010,027
2,124,962
Painters' Colours .
—
—
1,030,914
1,277,913
Chemical products
idise iran-
—
—
2,037,148
1,369,778
Total .
—
—
191,531,758
239,799,473
In addition, Foreign Merchai
shipped
,
—
—
10,975,669
11,689,318
Bullion exported .
—
—
28,584,912
16,414,211
v.— IMPORTS AND EXPORTS ACCORDINO TO COUNTRIES.
- 1879.
1883.
1879.
1883.
Foreign Countries s
md 1879.
1883.
Exports of
"UvificVi
Exports of
Exports of
Exports of
British Possession
s. Imports.
Imports.
Foreif^n, and
C^olonial
Produce.
Foreign, and
Colonial
Produce.
Bri ish Pro-
duce only.
Biitish Pro-
duce only.
£
£
£
£
£
£
Europe.
Heligtdand
—
—
66
4
60
Channel Islands (Bri
ti h) . 737,793
39,211
813,166
764,394
598,835
562,868
Gibraltar (British)
35,969
151,578
739,665
800,799
677,687
724,625
Malta (British) .
184,891
241,509
954,054
1,159,264
768,558
988,028
Russia
. 15,876,586
20,976,182
10,607,083
7,629,883
7,644,629
5,036,614
Sweden and Norway-
8,392,723
16,113,391
3,928,682
5,416,972
2,486,256
3,b68,822
Denmark and Icelan
i . 4,675,090
2,998,072
1,984,767
2,597,807
1,647,967
2,265,959
Germany .
. 21,604,890
27,907,626
29,623,776
31,781,370
18,591,545
18,787,635
Holland .
. 21,959,384
25,115,586
15,452,752
15,87^,330
9,353,151
9,506,246
Belgium .
. 10,725,739
16,178,345
11,887,442
14,755,012
5,106,479
8,327,941
France
. 38,459,096
38,636,022
26,558,333
29,409,335
14,988,857
17,567,512
Portugal .
3,025,228
3,463,500
2,427,118
2,374,590
1,899,039
1,962,184
Azores and Madeiia
215,332
150,069
137,793
182,529
111,318
134,865
Spain
8,398,776
11,623,633
3,758,717
4,876,243
2,940,188
3,785,034
Iialy.
3,233,594
3,392,446
6,039,778
8,194,823
4,983,676
7,121,948
Austria .
1,685,602
2,337,896
1,047,045
1,545,260
799,0^5
967,529
Greece
l,861,19i
1,905,635
1,081,437
1,442,454
944,336
1,288,876
Turkey in Europe
971,313
1,899,262
4,521,406
3,924,045
4,157,925
3,419,482
Rumania .
1,373,002
3,516,442
1,097,432
122,661,512
1,402,441
997,078
1,342,619
Total, Europe
. 143,416,204
176,616,435
134,129,555
78,696,669
87,658,787
America.
British North Americ
.a . 10,445,694
12,283,727
6,118,862
10,109,596
5,445,130
9,155,927
United States .
. 91,818,295
99,238,960
25,518,789
36,732,506
20,321,990
27,372,968
British West Indie
3 and
Honduras
7,302,921
5,141,782
3,101,161
3,957,419
2,810,326
3,576,114
Foreign West Indies
3,150,782
1,287,657
3,232,892
3,956,904
2,517,509
3,000,748
Mexico and Central A
merica 1,968,6'^9
1,846,169
1,513,886
2,480,602
1,415,751
2,391,512
Brazil
4,749,816
6,138,521
5,986,008
7,015,333
6,685,054
6,648,470
Falkland Islancls (Br
itish) 63,420
79,772
16,631
28,536
12,035
21,9-4
Other parts of Ameri(
la . 10, 36 •2,965
11,817,669
7,191,162
11,562,793
6,721,285
11,073,659
Total, America
. 129,862,592
137,834,257
52.679,291
75,843,689
44,929,080
63,243,534
Africa.
Egypt .
8,890,052
10,008,659
2,2 8,105
3,501,492
2,143,681
3,367,300
Barbary .
1,017,349
1,727,434
603,303
855, 2S2
528,002
780,775
Canary Islands .
340,6^3
156,026
229,932
204,716
173,545
194,423
British West Coast
588,760
729,615
846,355
926,014
744,160
855,486
Foreign .
1,473,516
147,744
1,056,864
1,901,597
836,424
391, •'^80
4,556,784
Cape of Good Hope (B
ntish) 4,610,379
5,895,909
6,369,876
5,000,251
5,853,037
Mauritius (British)
641,836
414,953
366,541
580,558
341,257
506,423
All other parts of Afi
rica . 175,172
180,000
628.291
350,850
598,733
278,832
Total, Africa
. 17,737,74-
19,335,424
12,309,267
13,422,343
11,218,839
10,931,303
APPENDIX.
499
Imports and Exports according to Countries {coniinueO).
Foreign Countries and
British Possessions.
1879.
1883.
1879.
Exports of
1883.
Exports of
1879.
1883.
Imports.
Imports.
British,
Foreign, and
British,
Foreign, and
Exports of
Bri.ish Pro-
Exports of
British Pro-
Colonial Pro-
Coloninl Pro-
duce only.
duce only.
duce.
duce.
^sia.
£
£
. ■■ . 1
£
£
Turkey in Asia.
2,502,148
3,566,037
3.184,188
3,485,960
3,050,315
3,270,293
British India .
24,698,213
38.882 829
22,714,682
33,382 786
21,374,404
31,874,084
Straits Settlements (Briiish)
2,565,361
4,643,016
2.182,637^
2,793,106
2 029,018
2,624.001
Ceylon (British)
3,568 965
2,172,736
827,119
759,079
780,918
725,047
Dutch East Indies .
1,784.140
4,091,013
1,657,451
2,:i04 870
1,643,416
2,276,088
Spanish East Indies .
1,480,821
1,670,076
612,883
1,248,613
599,024
1,216,904
China ....
11,049,300
10,137,739
5,140,074
4,5-J8,202
4,649,978
4,224,854
Hung Kong (British)
1,327,085
1,171,986
3,128,227
3.047,470
2,947,984
2,891,477
Japan ....
450,945
663,092
2,997,522
2,601,272
2,638,002
2,276.573
All other parts of Asia
349,803
573,885
5o7,619
326,765
535,837
318,972
Total, Asia
49,776.781
67,572,409
43,002,402
54,478,123 40,248,896
51,698,293
Australia (British) .
21,942,319
25,936,201
17,959,705
26,839,490
16,270,736
24,216,452
Iblands of the Pacific
166,738
121,639
171,087
149,708
167,388
141,377
North Whale Fisheries
89,494
111,949
—
79
150
—
British Possessions .
78,942,638
—
66,508,973
61,002,111
—
Foreign Countries
284,049.237
—
182,274,391
—
130,529.647
—
Grand Total
362,991,875
401,388,525
248,783,364
277,873,710 |191,o31,758
213,531,927
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APPENDIX.
VII.— STATISTICAL VIEW OF THE BRITISH EMPIRE.
Area.
8q. Miles.
Pop. 1881.
Impoits.
Exports.
Revenue.
Debt.
£
£
£
£
Europe.
United Kingdom
121,592
35,241,000
387.147,400
277,368,300
.81,265,000
774,044,000
Isle of Man
227
63,000
—
—
62 400
149.000
Channel Islands
73
87,000
813.200
737 800
100,000
250,000
HeligoLmd
0-2
2,000
—
15,249,440
9 800
3,500
Malta
143
150,000
15,935,900
—
189.600
312,880
Gibraltar .
2
18,000
739,700
36,000
43.200
—
Total, Europe
122,037
35,551,000
404,636.200
293,391,640
81.669,900
774,757,380
Asia.
•
Cyprus . . . •
3,708
185,000
100 000
55,000
152.000
British India .
908,971
199,452,000
44,857,650
64,919,100
66,749,000
146,684,000
Feudatory States
655,000
57,430,000
—
—
—
Ceylon ....
24,702
2,630,000
4,980 920
4 438,140
1,642,610
662,600
Straits Settlements .
1,445
600,000
13,420,500
12,739,100
366,500
105,000
Nicobar Islands
725
5,000
_
—
—
—
Andamitn ....
2,550
13,500
Laccadive Islands
744
6,800
Aden ....
8
30,000
—
—
—
—
Perim ....
5
10
Kamaran (Red Sea) .
61
500
Kuria Muria Is aiids .
21
Labuan ....
30
5,000
157,520
156,600
7,500
North-eastern Bocneo
19,000
250,000
Keeling Island .
8
400
—
—
Hong Kong
32
270 000
—
—
185.000
—
Total, Asia
1,617.013
260,878,210
63,516 5 0
82,307.740
69.102,610
147,412,600
Africa.
Gimbia . . . .
21
15.000
165.000
204 300
25.700
Sierra Leone
468
60,000
350.000
350.000
160 000
Gold Coast and Lagos
17,000
680,000
877,800
970,790.
156,000
300
St. Helena
47
6 240
87,700
40,000
14,200
12,260
Ascension ....
34
300
Tristan da Cunha
45
80
—
Cape Colony and Depend-
encies ....
241,300
1,250,000 6,588,730
532,840
3,232,000
6,986,400
Damara and Great Nama-
qua Lmd
200,000
137,000
—
—
—
—
Natal ....
18,7o0
41'i 000
1,712 600
694,200
369,400
632 000
Mauritius and dependencies
1,090
377,000
229,350
3,777,400
789,600
700,(jU0
New Amsterdam
26
—
St. Paul ....
3
Sokoira
1,380
4,100
Mosha (G. of Tajura)
0-4
—
—
—
—
Total, Africa
480.164
2 845,720
12,018,180
9 569,630
4,906,900
7.338,000
Australia.
Queensland . .
669,520
214,000
3,436.100
3,190,420
1,559,100
8,935,350
New South Wales
325,0 0
752,000
14,768.900
12,996,900
4,983,850
11,688,120
Victoria .
88,198
862,000
16,161,900
14,925,700
4,504,000
17,022,100
South Australia
903,690
280 000
5,719,600
5,355,000
1,693,000
5,329,600
West Australia.
1,0 .8,000
30 000
379,100
428,600
163,340
184,560
Tasmania .
26,215
116000
1,3 '24, 800
1,316 700
381,900
1.747,400
New Zealand
105,342
544,000
8,755,600
6,016,500
4,167,900
22,608,310
Norfolk Island .
17
600
—
Cliatham Island
628
200
Auckland Islands
197
Lord Howe's Island
3
40
Fiji Islands
8,034
124 000
136,600
146,850
61,000
85,000
Rotumah, &c. .
80
3 000
—
—
—
South-east New Guinea .
50,000
3.151,921
—
—
—
—
—
Total, Australia .
2,92^,740
50 682 600
44.343.570
17,413.090
67,600,440
'
APPENDIX.
508
Statistical View of the British Empire {continued).
America.
Dominion of Canada
Newfoundland
Bermuda
Honduras .
West Indies
British Guiana
Falkland Islands
Southern Georgia)
Total, America
Grand Total
(with
Area.
Sq. Miles.
3,470,000
40,200
41
7,560
13,320
85,425
6,500
3,623,048
8,997,186
Pop. 1881.
Imports.
4,325,000
161,400
14,000
27,000
1,320,000
252,000
1,500
6,100,900
17,075,900
1,430,980
243,700
191,490
5,6':>5,620
2,150,710
36,790
308,301,570
26,755,190
557,608,740
JSjtports.
14,894,000
1,173,100
66,460
131,000
5,382,980
/2, 507, 600
61,100
24,205,240
Revenue.
4,785,000
212,300
26,900
40,400
1,409,000
409,260
11,600
6,894, 4u0
Debt.
34,991,600
280,300
12,000
6,000
1,134,000
303,660
36,726,960
453,817,820 179,976,960 1,033,835,380
The statements in th's table are taken from the latest available returns, and in many instances
they are merely approximate.
Bullion is included in nearly all instances and so is the value of merchandise sent in transit. This
accounts for the high figures given for Malta.
INDEX.
Abberley Hills, 104
Abbeyleix, 416
Abbey Mills, 171
Aberaeron, 66
Aberafon, 72
Aberdare, 72
Aberdeen, 367, 36H
Aberdour. 331
Ahtrdovey, 64
Abergavenny, 73
Abergwilli, 69
Abermaw, 64
Abernethy, 362
Aberportb, 66
Abersychan, 73
Aberystwith. 66
Abingdon, 157
Acerington, 276
Achill Island 383
Achonray, 427
Acton, 165
Adare, 429
Ailsa Craig. 309
Airdrie, 316
Aire Kiver, 225
Akeman Street. 156
Alcester, 107, 156
Aldborough. 214, 253
Aide River, 212
Aldeburgh, 214
Alder. Hen, 337
Aldershot, 140
Alexandra Palace, 165, 192
Alexandria, 321
Alford. 232. 367
Alfreton. 244
Allan River, 364
Allen, Bog of, 414, 416
Allen, Hill of, 416
Allen, Lough, 391
Allendale, 296
AUihies, 430
Almond, Glen, 363
Almond Hiver, 325
Alness. 374
Alnwick, 296
Alloa, 330
Allonby, 287
Alresford 137
Alsh, Loch, 317, 373 •
Alston, 289, 296
Alton, 110
129 -E
Altrincham. or Altringham, 265
Alum Bay, 141
Alva, 330
Alyth, 363
Ambleside, 285
Amesbury, 135
Amersham, 16 i
Amlwch, 62
Ancholme River, 229
Andover, 137
Anglesey, 52, 53. 62
Anglesey (Hants), 139
Anglia, East, 212
Angus, 364
Anker River, 108
Annalee River, 424
Annamoe, 416
Annan, 313
Annandale, 313
Anstruther, 331
Anton River, 137
Antoninus, Wall of, 305, 329
Antrim, 420, 422
Antrim, Plateau of, 383
Appleby, 285
Applecross, 373
Aran Island, 402, 424
Arasaig, 372
Arbroath, 366
Arbuthnot, 367
Ardaiih, 415
Ardara, 424
Ardee, 414
Ardfert, 430
Ardgower, 377
Ardnamurchan, 377
Ardrishaig, 377
Ardrossan, 315
Argyll District, 377
Argyllshire 377
Arigna River, 425
Arkaig, Loch, 372
Arklow, 416
Armadale, 328
Armagh, 423
Arnold, 245
Arran Island, 308, 315
Arrochar, 321
Arrow River. 107
Artach, Dubh, 352
Arun River, 142
Arundel, 142
Ascot, 161
Ashbourne, 244
Ashburton, 90
Ashby-de-la-Zouch, 245
Ashdown, 157
Ashford, 206
Ashton-in-Makerfield, 275
Ashton-under-Lyme, 269
Askeaton, 429
Askrigg, 253
Astley, 270
Atherstone, lOS
Atherton, 270
Athlone, 415
Athol, 363
A thy, 416
Attow, Ben. 336, 372
Auburn, 415
Auchterarder, 364
Auchtermuchty, 331
Aughnacloy, 423
Avoca River, 383, 416
Avcch, 374
Avon River, 89, 97, 106, 122, 135
137
Avon River (Lanark), 316
Avonmoutli, 115
Awe, Loch. 335, 377
Axbridge, 120
Axe Edge, 238
Axe River, 119
Axeholme, 229, 236
Axel. 229
Axminster, 94
Axmouth, 94
Aylesbury, 162
Aylesbury, Yale of, 161
Aylsham, 218
Ayr, 314
Babbacombe, 79
Bacup, 270
Badenoch, 372
Badnagown Forest, 373
Bagnalstown. 417
Bake well, 243
Bala, 64
Balbriggan, 414
Balclutha, 320
Baldock, 164
BallachuUsh, 377
Ballater, 369
606
INDEX.
Ballina. 427, 429
Ballinahinch, 426
Ballinakill, 416
Balliuaskelligs Bay, 394
Ballinasloe, 4 27
Ballingarry, 428
Ballinrobe, 427
Balloch, 321
Ballvbay. 423
]Jallybunion Cliffs, 394
Bally castle, 421
Ballyconuell, 424
Ballymahon, 415
Ballymena, 422
Bally money, 422
Ballymote, 427
Bally sada re, 427
Bally shannon, 424
Bally tore, 416
Balmerino, 332
Balmoral, 336, 369
B.lquhidder, 364
Balsall, lOo
Baltimore, 431
Baltinglas, 416
Bampton-in-the Bush, 156
Banagher, 415
Banavie, 373
Banbridge, 420
Banbury, 156
liandon, 432
Bangor, 61
Bangor (Down). 420
Bangor (Isycoed), 60
Bann River, 390, 420, 422
Banff, 371
Bannoc.vbum, 3 29
bannow Bay, 417
Bantry, 431
Bantry Bay, 382
Bardon Hill, 244
Barking. 2-9
Barmouth, 64
Barnard Castle, 289
Barnet. Chipping or High, 163
Jiarnsley, 259
Barnstaple, 94
Barra, 348, 361
Barra Head, 347
Barrhead, 319
Barrow. 245
Barrow River. 390, 417
Barrow-in-Furness, 278
Barton, 269
Barton-upon-Humbcr, 232
Basford, 245
Basingstoke, 140
Basingwerk Abbey. 59
Bass Rock, 309, 325
Bassenthwaite Water, 289
Bath, 119
Bathgate, 328
Batley, 258
Battle, 144
Battock, Mount. 364
Beachy Head 128, 141
Beaconsfield, 161
Beaminster, 131
Beauly, 373
Beaumaris, 62
Bebington, 264
Beccles, 151, 215
liedford. 224
Bedford (Lane). 270
Bedford Level, 222
Bedminster, 116
Bedworth, 108
Beeston Rock, 262
Beith, 315
Belfast, 420
Belfast Lough, 418, 420
Belleek, 424
Bellingham, 296
Bell Rock Lighthouse, 366
Bellshill, 316
Belmullet, 427
Belper, 242
Belturbet, 424
Bel voir. Vale of, 246
Benbecula, 348
Benfieldside, 293
Benmore, 384
Berkeley, 112, 114
Berkhamsted, 163
Berkshire, 157
Beriiera, 348
Bervie, 367
Berwick-on- Tweed, 298
Berwickshire, 323
Bethesda, 62
Bethnal Green, 180
Beverley, 253
Bewdley, 104
Bhein Mhor (Lewis), 348
Bicester, 156
Bideford, 95
Biggar, 315, 322
Biggar, Plain of, 305
Biggleswade 225
Billericay, 210
Billingham, 290
Bilston, 242
Bilslon (Liverpool), 264
Binchester, 291
Bingham, 246
Binghamstown, 427
Bingley, 2-")6
Birkdale, 275
Birkenhead, 263
Birmingham, 109
Birnam Wood, 363
Birr River, 415
Birstall, 258
Bishop Auckland. 291
Bishop's Castle, 103
Bishop Stortford, 163
1 ishop Wearmouth, 293
Bisley, 114
Bittern, 137
Black Country, 105, 241
Black Isle, 373, 375
Black Mountains, 49
Blackburn, 2' 6
Blackdown Hills, 119
Blackheath, 203
Blackpool, 277
Blackrock, 414
Blackrock (Cork), 433
Blacksod Bay, 427
Blackstairs Mountain, 383
Black water River (Essex\ 210
Blackwater River (Ireland), 382,
390, 414, 423, 433
Blaenavon. 73
Blair-Athol, 363
Blair Drummond, Bog of, 305
Blairgowrie, 363
Blandford Forum, 132
Blarney, 433
Blasket Islands, 429
Blaydon, 293
Bleasdale Moors, 266
Blenheim Park, 156
Blennerville, 430
Blyth, 296
Bodmin, 87
Bogie River, 368
Bognor, 142
Bogs of Ireland, 389
Bollington, 265
Bolton-le-Moors, 270
Bonar, 375
Bonchurch, 141
Bonhill, 321
Bonmahon, 434
Bonnet River, 425
Bootle-cum-Linacre, 275
Border raids, 282
Boroughbridge, 253
Borris-in-Ossory, 416
Borrowdale, 288
Borrowstounness, 328
Boston, 229
Botallack, 81, 82, 85
Bothwell Bridge, 316
Bourne, 230
Bournemouth, 137
Bovey Tracey, 91
Bowden Downs, 265
Bowness, 285
Box Hill, 199
Boyle, 425
Bovne River, 390, 414
Brackley, 228
Bradford (Lane), 269
Bradford (Yorks), 257
Bradford- on- Avon, 136
Bradwell, 210
Braemar, 367
Braintree, 210
Bramber, 142
Brampton, 286
Brancepeth, 291
Biay, 160
Bray. 416
Brechin, 366
Brecknock, 73, 74
Brecknock Beacons, 49
Brecon, 74
Bredbury, 265
Brendon Hills, 119
Brent River, 164
Brentford. 165
Brentwood, 209
Bressay Sound, 354
Brevdon Water, 212
Bridge of Allan, 329
Bridge of Earn, 353
Bridgend, 72
Bridgenorth, 103
Bridlington, 253
Bridport, 131
Bridgwater, 120
Brierfield, 276
Brierley Hill, 242
Brigg, 232
Brighouse, 257
Brightling, 144
Brightlingsea. 211
Brighton, 142
Brill, 162
Bristol, 115
Bristol Channel, 98
Brit River, 131
Britford, 134
Briton Ferry, 72
Brixham, 90
Broadlands, 137
Broadstairs, 206
Bromley, 203
Bromsgrove, 104
Bromyard, 1 1 8
Broom, Loch, 342, 373
Broomielaw, 319
Brora, 375
Broseley, 103
I'rosna River, 415
Brough-under-Stainmore, 286
Broughs, 355
Broughton, 278
Broughty Ferry, 366
Brown Willy, 77
hroxbourne, 163
Brue Level, 119
Brynmawr, 74
Buchan, 368, 371
Buchan Ness, 336
Buckhaven, 3iil
Buckie, 371
Buckingham, 162
Buckingham Palace, 181
Buckinghamshire, 161
Buckstone, 117
Bade Haven, 87
Builth, 74
Buncrana, 424
Bungay, 215
Burford, 156
Burghead, 371
Buruham, 210
Burnley, 276
Burntisland, 331
Burton-upon-Trent, 240
Bury (Lane), 270
Bury St. Edmunds, 215
Busby, 319
Bushey Park, 164
Bushmills, 421
Bute, 309, 315
Bute, Kyles of, 309
Butte vant, 433
Buxton, 244
Cader Idris, 48
Caerleon, 54, 73
Caerphilly, 72
Caerwys, 59
Caherciveen, 430
Cahir, 434
Cairngorm Mountains, 335, 371
(- airn Gower, 363
Caithness, 336, 376
Calder, Mid and West, 328
Calder River, 255, 257
Calderbank, 316
Caldron Linn, 330
Caldron Snout, 289
Callan, 417
Callander, 364
Callernish, grey stones of, 356
Calne, 135
Cam River, 225
Camborne, 87
Cambrian Mountains, 10
Cambridge, 225
Cambuslang, 316
Cambusnethan, 316
Camelford, 87
Campbelltown (Inverness), 373
Campbeltown (Argyll), 377
Campsie Fells, 329
Canisbay, 376
Canni, 359
Cannock Chase, 240
Canterbury, 206
Cantire. See Kintyre.
Canton, 72
Cappoquin, 434
INDEX.
Caradoc Hills, 101
Carberry Hill, 327
Cardiff, 72
Cardigan, 66
Cardross, 321
Carisbiooke, 141
Carlingford, 414
Carlingford Lough, 411, 418
Carlingford Mountains, 383
Carlisle, 286
Carlow, 417
Carluke, 316
Carmarthen, 54, 69
Carnarvon, 61, 62
Carndonagh, 424
Carnoustie, 366
Carrantuohill, 382
Carrick, 314
Carrick Castle, 417
Carrick Hills. 302
Carrick Roads, 85
Cirrickfergus, 421
Carrickmacrnss, 423
Carrick-on-Shannon, 425
Carrick-on-Suir, 434
Carron, Loch, 373
Carron River, 305, 329, 366
Cart River, 319
Cartmel, 278
Cashel, 434
Cassiobury, 163
Castle Acre, 219
Castle Ashby, 228
Castlebar, 427
Castle Barton, 228
Castle Birr, 415
Castleblayney, 423
Castle Campbell, 330
Castlecomer, 417
Castleconnell, 392, 429
Castle-Donington, 245
Castle Douglas, 313
Castleford, 257
Castle Gordon, 371
Castleton, 244
Castleton-in-Braemar, 370
Castletown, 301, 377
Castletown-Berehaven, 431
Castor, 228
Catmose, Vale of, 228
Catrine, 315
Cavan, 424
Cawdor Castle, 371
Cawood, 255
Celbridge, 416
Chaifont St. Giles, 162
Chapel Allerton, 257
Chard, 121
Charlestown, 85
Charleville, 433
Charlton, 203
Charmouth, 131
Charnwood Forest, 244
Chatham, 204
Cheadle, 241
Cheddar, 120
Chelmsford, 210
Cheltenham. 113
Chepstow, 73
Chernside, 324
Chertsey, 164, 202
Cherwell River, 153
Chesham, 162
Cheshire, 262
Cheshunt, 163
Chesil Bank, 123, 131
Chester, 262
607
CTiesterfield, 244
Chester- loStreet, 292
Chevening, 204
Cheviot Hills, 10, 302
Chichester, 142
Chiltern Hills, 12, 147, 161
Chippenham, 135
Chipping Campden, 1 1 7
Chipping Norton, 156
Chipping Ongar, 209
Chipping Wycombe, 161
Chislehurst, 203
Chiswick, 165
Chorley, 276
Christchurch, 137
Church, 276
Churchill, 156
Church Stretton, 103
Chumet River, 241
Cirencester. 117
Cisbury Hill, 142
Clackmannan, 330
Clackmannanshire, 829
Clacton, 211
Claddagh, 426
Clare, 427
Clare (Suffolk), 214
Claycross, 244
Clayton-le-Moors, 276
Clear Island, 431
Cleaton Moor, 287
Cleckheaton. 258
Clee Hills, 96, 101
Cleethorpe, 232
Cleeve Hill, 97
Clent Hills, 104
Cleobury-Mortimer, 103
Clerkenwell, 180
Clesham (Harris), 348
Cleuch, Ben. 329
Clevedon, 120
Cleveland Hills, 235, 250
Clew Bay, 427
Cley, 218
Cleyton-next-the-Sea, 218
Cliefden, 160, 161
Clifden, 426
Clifton, 116
Clifton Moor, 286
Clitheroe, 276
Clogher, 423
Clonakiity, 432
Clonard, 414
Clondalkin, 414
Clores, 423
Clonfert, 427
Clonmacnoise, 415
Clonmel, 434
Clontarf, 414
Cloyne, 433
Clun, 104
Clun Forest. 101
Clwyd River, 315
Clwyd, Valley of, 60, 61
Clydach, 74
Coalbrookdale, 103
Coalport, 103
Coatbridge, 316
Cobham. 200
Cockenzie, 325
Cockermouth, 289
Coggeshall, 210
Coirebhreacain, 353
Colchester, 210
Coldstream, 324
Cole, 352
Coleford, 117
508
INDEX.
Coleraine, 421, 423
Coll. 377
Collie, 276
Colney Hatch, 1 65
Collon, 414
Colonsay, 377
Colyton, 94
Colzean, 314
Comber, 420
Coineragh, 382
Comrie, 364
Cong, 388
Congleton, 265
Congleton Edge, 262
Coniston, 278
Coniston Old Man, 266
Connaught, 424
Connel Sound, 340
Connemara, 383, 425
Consett, 293
Conway, 61
Cookham, 160
Cookstown, 423
Cootehill, 424
Coquet River, 296
Corfe Castle, 132
Cork, 432
Cork County, 430
Cork, Cove of, 433
Corkaquinny, 429
Cornish Heights, 77
Cornish Peninsula, 75
Cornwall, 84
Cornwall, Cape, 77
Corofin, 427
Corrib, Lough, 388. 425
Corryarrick Pass, 372
Corryvrekan, 353
Corsham, 136
Corstorphine, 325
Cortown, 417
Corwen, 64
Cotswold Hills, 12, 97, 112, 135,
146
Cottingham, 253
Coventry, 108
Cowal. 377
Cowbridge, 72
Cowes, 141
Cowpen, 296
Craigleith, 325
Cramlington, 296
Crannoges. or Cranogues, 29, 402
Craven, 246, 253
Crediton, 94
Creetown, 313
Creuddyn, 61
Crewe, 265
Crewkerne, 121
Criccieth, 62
Cricklade, 136
Crieff, 364
Criffel, 313
Croaghaun. 383
Croagh Patrick, 427
Crofthead 328
Croghan Hill, 415
Cromarty, 374
Cromartyshire, 373
Cromer, 218
Croom, 429
Crosby, Great, 275
Cross Fell, 2 4, 279
Crossness Poict, 171
Crowland, 229
Crowle, 236 •
Croydon, 201
Cruachan, Ben, 335
Crystal Palace, 192
CuehuUins, 347
Cucktield, 145
Cuddesdon, 156
Culham College, 157
Cullen, 371
Cullercoats, 296
Culloden Moor, 373
Culross, 364
Cumberland, 286
Cumberland, Lakes of, 281
Cumbrae. Great and Little, 315
Cumbrian Mount ans, 10, 279
Cumnock, 315
Cunningham, 314
Cupar-Angus 363
Cupar (Fife), 331
Currane, Lough, 394
Cushcamcarragh, 4 27
Cushendun, 421
Cushendun Bay, 385
Cwmdu, 72
Cyfarthfa, 72
Dalbeattie, 313
Dalgetty, 331
Dalkeith, 327
Dalkey, 414
Dalmellington, 314
Dalriads, 309
Dairy, 315
Dalton, 278
Didwhinni, 373
Dnn, Lough, 416
Dane's Dyke, 234
Danes in Ireland, 397
I Janes in Scotland, 310
Darent River, 202, 203
Dargle River, 416
Darlaston, 242
Darlington, 289
Dart River, 76
Dartford, 203
Dartmoor, 11, 76, 77
Dartmouth, 89
Darvel, 315
Darwen, Lower, 276
Darwen, Over, 276
Daventry. 228
Dawley Magna, 103
Dawlish, 91
Deal, 207
Dean, Forest of, 97, 112
Deanston, 364
Dearham, 287
Dearig, Ben, 373
Deben River, 212, 214
Dee River (Scotland), 313, 333,
367
Dee River (Wales), 59
De^l Basin. 429
Delabole, 87
Denbigh, 61
Denbighshire, 60
Denny, 329
Dent, 255
Denton, 270
Deptford, 202
Derby, 242
Derby, West, 275
Dereham, East, 218
Derg, Lough, 391, 425
Derry, 422
Derwent River, 235, 242, 289, 293
Dertwentwater, 288
Devenish Island, 424
Devil's-bit Mountain, S82
Devizes, 135
Devon River, 330
Devonport, 87
Devonshire, 87
Dewsbury, 258
Didsbury, 269
Dingle, 430
Dingle Bay, 382
Dingwall, "374
Dinorwic. 62
Diresdh Mor, 373
Diss, 218
Dochart, Loch, 363
Dodman Head, 85
Dogger Bank, 3
Dolgelly, 64
Dollar, 330
Don River (Aberdeen), 367
Don River (Yorks), 249, 259
Donaghadee, 420
Doncaster, 249
Donegal, 424
D.megal, Highlands of, 383
Doneraile, 433
Donny brook, 413
Doon, Water of, 314
Doonas, Falls of. 429
Dorchester, 132, 156
Dorking, 200
Dornoch, 375
Dornoch Firth, 334
Dorsetshire^, 131
Douglas (Isle of Man), 301
Doune. 364
Dove River, 238
Dovedale, 241
Dover, 207
Dover, Strait of, 5
Doveran River, 333, 368
Dovercourt. 211
Dowlais. 72
Down County, 418
Downham Market, 219
Downp.itrick, 419
Downs, North and South, 12, 128,
141, 147
Downs Roadstead, 153, 207
Dresden, 240
Driffield, Great, 253
Drogheda, 414
Droitwich, 104
Dromore, 420
Dropmore, 161
Droylsden, 270
Drumouchter Pass, 363, 373
Dublin, 411
Dudley, 105. 242
Dufftown, 371
Dukinfield, 265
Dumbarton, 320
Dumfries, 313
Dun-a-mase, 416
Dunbar, 325
Dunblane, 364
Duncannon, 417
Duncansby Head, 336
Dundulk, 414
Dundee, 304
Dundrum Bay, 419
Dunfanaghy, 424
Dunfermline, 331
Dungannon, 423
Dungarvan, 434
Dungeness, 130
Dungiven, 423
Dunglass Point, 305, 320
INDEX.
509
(
Dunglow, 424
Dunham Masse v, 265
Dunkeld, 363
Dunkerry Beacon, 1 1 9
D unman way, 432
Dunmore, 434
Dunmow, Great, 210
Dunoon, 377
Dunnotar Castle, 367
Dunse, 324
Dunsinane, 363
Dunshaughlin, 415
Dunstable, 225
Dunstanborough, 297
Dunster, 121
Dunwich, 214
Durdham Downs, 116
Durham, 291
Durham Coal-field, 282
Durhamshire, 289
Durrow, 416
Dursley, 114
Dutch River, 236
Dymchurch, 208
Dysart, 331
Eaglesham, 319
Eaing, 165
Ivamont River. 286
Earlsferry, 331
Earlston, 324
Earn, Bridge of, 363
Eastbourne, 143
Eaton Hall, 263
Eccles, 269
Eccles-by-the-Sea, 151
P'ddi achillis, 375
EiJdystone, 89
Eden River, V86
Kden River (Fife), 331
Fdenderry, 415
Edgcumbe, Mount, 87
Edge Hills, 153, 156
Edgeworthstown, 415
Edinburgh, 325
Edmonton, 165
Egham, 202
Egremont, 287
Eigg Island, 350, 359
Eigg, Scuir of, 350
Eil, Loch. 333
EUand, 257
Elgin, 371
Ellesmere, 103
Ellesmere Port, 263
Elphin, 425
Elstow, 225
Elswick. 295
Ely, 223, 227
Emyvale, 423
Enfield, 165
Ennell, Lough, 415
Ennis, 427
Enniscorthy, 417
Enniskillen. 424
Epping Forest, 209
Epsom, 200
Ep worth, 232
Epvnt Hills, 49
P:rith, 2U3
Erne, Lough. 424
Erne River, 390
Errigal, Mount, 383
Erris Head, 427
Errocht, Loch, 337, 303
Errol, 362
Erwash River, 244
Esk, Glen (Forfar), 364
Esk River, 325, 327
Eskdale, 313
Essex, 209
Esthwaite Water, 278
Etive, Loch, 340, 377
Eton, 160
Etruria, 239
Ettrickdale, 322
Ettrick Pen, 322
Evenlode River, 153
Evesham, 105
Fwe, Loch, 339, 373
Ewell. 200
Exe River, 75, 76
Exeter, 93
Exmoor, 75, 119
Exmouth, 92
Eyemouth, 324
Fair Head, 384
Fair Island, 345
Fal River, 77
Falkirk, 329
Falkland, 332
Falmouth, 85, 86
Fane River, 424
Fareham, 139
Faringdon, 157
Farnham, 200
Earn Islands, 297
Farnwoith, 270
Fastnet Rock, 431
Faversham, 205
Feale River, 430
Felhng, 293, 294
Fenians, 397
Fenny- Stratford, 162
Fens, 220
Fenton, 240
Fergus River. 427
Fermanagh County, 424
Fermoy, 433
Ferrindonald, 374
Ferryport-on-Craig, 332
Festiniog, 64
Fethard, 417, 434
Fife Ness, 331
Fifeshire, 331
P'iley, 251
Findhorn, 371
Findhorn River. 333, 371
Findon, 367
Fingal's Cave, 351
Finglas, 414
Finn River, 424
Firbolgs, 396
Fishguard, 68
Flamborough Head, 235
Flanders Moss, 329
Flannan Islands, 348
Flatholm, 98
Flaxlev, 1 1 7
Fleet, Loch, 310
Fleetwood, 277
Flemings in Scotland, 310
Flint, 69
Flintshire, 58
Flodden Field, 298
Fochabers, 371
Foleshill, 108 '
Folkestone, 208
Fordingbridge, 137
Fordoun, 367
Foreland, South, 207
Forest, New, 136
Forest Ridge, 141
Forfar, 364, 366
Formatin, 368
Formby Head, 275
Forres. 371
Forth Barony, 397
Forth, Firth of. 324
Forth River, 306, 329
Foi-trose, 374
Foul Island, or Foula, 345
Foulshicls, 322
Fowey, 8»)
Foyers Falls, 371
Foyle, Lough. 423, 424
Foyle River, 390, 423
Foynes. 429
Fraserburgh, 371
Freevater, 373
Freshwater Gate, 141
Frodingham 229
Frogmore House, 161
Frome,.120
Frome River, 115, 118, 131
Fulham, 165
Fulwood, 277
Fiimess, 265, 277
Fylde, 266
Fyne, Loch, 364, 377
Gaels, 358
Gainsborough, 232
Gairioch, 367
Gala River, 322, 326
Galashiels, 322
(Talloway, 3<)6
Galston, 315
Galty Mountains, 434
Galtymore, 382
Gal way, 425
Gareloch, 321, 373
Gareton Hill, 325
Garlieston, 315
Garmouth, 371
Garnock River, 314, 315
Garroch, Glen, 363
Garry, Glen, 363. 371
Garstang, 277
Garston, 271
Gartsherrie, 316
Gatehouse of Fleet, 313
Gateshead, 293, 294
German Ocean, 3, 4
Giants' Causeway, 384, 421
Gifford, 325
Gilford, 420
Gilsland Spa, 286
Gipping River, 214
Girvan, 314
Girvan Water, 314
Glamorganshire, 69
Glanford Brigg, 232
Glasgow, 316
Glas Miel, 305
Glasnevin, 414
Glasslough, 423
Glastonbury, 120
Glenarm, 421
Glencoe, Pass of, 377
Glenelg, 372
Glengariflf, 382
Glenluce, 314
Glenmore, 333, 371
Glenroy, Parallel Roads of, 339
Glin, 429
Glossop, 214
Gloucester, 1 1 2
Gloucestfrshire, 111
Glyde River, 424
510
INDEX.
Goat Fell, 308
Godalming, 200
Godmanchester, 225
Golcar, 2o8
Golspie, 375
Goodwin Sands, 152
Goole, 249
Gordale Scars, 255
Gorey, 4 1 7
Gorhambury, 163
Gort, 427
Gorton, 269
Gosport, 139, 140
Gourock, 319
Govan, 319
Gowan, 309
Gower, Carse of. 362
Gower, Peninsula of, 51, 54, 70
Gowna, Lough, 415, 424
Gracehill, 422
Graham's Dyke. 329
Grain, Isle of, 202, 205
Grampians, 9, 335
Granard, 415
Grangemouth, 329, 338
Grantham, 230
Granton (Edinburgh), 327
Grasmere, 285
Gravesend, 203
Greencastle, 423, 424
Greenhaigh Castle, 277
Greenhill, 105
Greenhithe, 203
Greenlaw, 324
Greenock, 319
Greenwich, 202, 203
Gretna Green, 313
Gretna Hall, 288
Grianan, 401, 423
Giimsby, Great, 232
Grinstead, East, 145
Guildford, 200
Guisborough, 250
Gwennap, 81
Haddington 325
Haddingtonshire, 325
Haddon Hall, 243
Hadleigh, 214
Hadrian's Wall, 283
Hales Owen, 105
Halifax, 257
Halkirk, 377
Halliwell, 270
Halstead, 211
Haltwhistle, 296
Ham, West, 209
Hambleton Hills, 250
Hamden, or Hamhill Quarries, 121
Hamilton. 316
Hamoaze, 87, 89
Hampden House, 162
Hampshire, 136
Hampstead, 165
Hampstead Heath, 164
Hampton, 164
Hampton Court, 164
Handsworth, 110
Hanley, 240
Han well, 165
Harbome. 242
Harlech, 64
Harlow, 209
Harris, 348
Harrogate, 255
Harrow-on-the-Hill, 135
Hart Fell, 315, 322
Hartland Point, 77
Hartlepool, 290
Hartley, 296
Harwich, 211
Harwood, Great, 276
Haslemere, 200
Hnslingden, 270
Hastings, 145
Hatfield, 163
Hathersage, 244
Havant. 140
Haverfordwest, 68
Haverhill, 214
Hawarden, 59
Hawes, 253
Hawick, 322, 323
Hawkshead, 278
Haworth, 256
Hawthornden, 328
Hay, 74
Hayfield, 244
Hayhole, 294
Havle, 87
Hay ling, 140
Heanor, 244
Heathtown, 242
Hebrides, 346
Heckmondwike, 258
Helensburgh, 321
Helmsdale, 375
Helmsley, 250
Helston, 85
Helvellyn, 284
Hemel-Hempstead, 163
Henley-in-Arden, 107
Henley-on-Thames, 157
Hereford. 1 1 8
Herefordshire, 117
Heme Bay, 206
Hertford, 1h3
Hertfordshire, 162
Hexham, 296
Hevwood, 270
Higham Ferrers, 228
Highbridge, 120
High Force, 289
Highgate, 165
Highlanders, 359
High Wilhays, 76
High Wycombe. 161
Hillsborough, 420
Hilsea Lines, 139
Hinckley, 245
Kindley, 276
Hipswell, 253
Hirst, 348
Hirt, 348
Hitchin, 164
Hoddesdon, 163
Holbeach, 229
Holdemess, 236, 246
Holker Hall, 278
Holkham Hall, 218
Holland, 220, 229
Holland, New, 232
Holme Cultram, 286
Holmsdale, 204
Holyhead. 63
Holv Island, 297
Holy Loch, 342
Holyrood, 326
Holy town, 316
Holywell (Flint), 59
Holy wood, 420
Homildon Hill, 297
Honiton, 94
Horbury, 116
Horncastle, 229
Hornsea, 253
Hornsey, 165
Horsham, 145
Hospital, 429
Houghton-le- Spring, 292
Houuslow, 165
Howden Pans, 294
Howe of Fife, 331
Howth, 412, 414
Hoy, i44
Hucknal Torkard, 2 15
Huddersfield, 257
Hughenden, 161
Hull, 252
Humber. 233
Humbleton Hill, 297
Hungerford, 157
Hunstanton C'lift", II
Huntingdon, 225
Huntly, 370
Hurlet, 319
Hurlford, 315
Huist, 270
Hyde, 265
Hythe, 203
Ickworth, 215
Idle River, 245
Jlchester, 121
Ilford, 209
llfracombe, 95
Ilkeston, 244
Ilkley, 255
Ilminster, 121
Ilsley, 157
Ince-in- .M akerfield, 276
Inchgarvie, 328
Inglewood Forest, 286
Inishkea, 402
Inishowen, 424
Inish Tonagh, 402
Inverleithen, 322
Inny Eiver, 415, 423
Inverary, 377
Invergordon, 374
Inverkeithing. 331
Inverness, 373
Inverness-shire, 371
Inverurie, 370
lona, 357
Ipswich, 214
Ireland's Eye, 394
Irish Sea, 6
Ironbridge, 103
Irthing River, 286
Irvine, 315
Irvine River. 3 1 4
Isis River, 136, 146
Isla. Glen, 364
Islay, 353, 377
Isle River, 121
Isleworth, 164
Itchin River, 1 37
Ivel River, 121
Jar Connaught, 425
Jarrow, 293
Jeantown. 373
Jed lUver, 323
Jedburgh, 323
Johnshaven, 367
Johnstone, 319
Johnstown, 417
Joyce's Country, 383, 402, 425
Jura, 353, 377
INDEX.
611
Kaims. 337
Kamesburgh, 315
Kanturk, 433
Katrine, Loch, 306, 3G4
Keadue, 425
Keady, 423
Kearsley, 270
Keeper Hill, 382
Keighley, 255
Keith, 371
Keld, :^53
Kells, 415
Kells (Kilkenny), 417
Kelso, 323
Kelvedon, 210
Kelvin Water, 329
Kendal, 285
Kenilworth, 106
Kenmare, 430
Kenmare River, 382. 430
Kennet River, 135, 136, 157
Kensington, South, 189
Kent, 202
Kent River, 285
Kentmere, 285
Kent's Hole, 91
Kerry County, 429
Kerry Mountains, 381
Kersey, 214
Kesteven, 229
Keston, 203
Kettering, 228
Keswick, 288
Kew, 165, 202
Kew Gardens, 191
Keynsham, 120
Kidderminster, 104
Kidsgrove, 240
Kidwelly, 69
Kilbarchan, 319
Kilbeggan, 415
Kilbirnie, 315
Kilcullen, 416
Kildare, 416
Kilfenora, 427
Kilfinane, 429
Kilkee, 427
Kilkenny, 417
Killala, 427
Killaloe, 428
Killamey, 430
Killarney, Lakes of, 381, 429
Killiecrankie Pass, 363
Killiney, 414
Killybegs, 424
Kilmainham, New, 413
Kilmallock, 429
Kilmarnock, 315
Kilmore, 424
Kilrea, 423
Kilrush, 427
Kdsyth, 329
Kilwinning, 315
Kimbolton, 225
Kimmeridge, 132
Kinalady, Bog of, 389
Kincardine, 367
Kincardine (Per h), 364
Kincardineshire, 366
Kinghorn, 3 a
King's County, 415
King's Lynn. 219
King's Tdver, 417
Kingston Lacy, 132
Kingston-on-Thames, 202
Kingston-upon-Hull, 252
Kingstown, 412, 414
Kington, 118
Kingussie, 373
Kinlochewe, 339
Kinnaird, 329
Kinross, 331
Kinross-shire, 330
Kinsale, 432
Kintore, 370
Kiutyre, 342, 377
Kinvara, 427
Kippen, 329
Kirk Alloway, 314 '
Kirk Braddan, 301
Kirkby Lonsdale, 285
Kirkby Stephen, 286
Kirkcaldy, 331
Kirkcudbright, 313
Kirkham, 277
Kirkhill, 373
Kirkintilloch, 321
Kirkpatrick-Durham, 313
Kirkstall Abbey, 257
Kirkwall, 377
Kirriemuir, 366
Klibrech, Ben, 375
Knapdale, 377
Knaresborough, 254
Knighton, 74
Knightstown, 430
Knockmahon, 434
Knockmealdown Mountains, 382
433
Knoidart, 372
Knole, 204
Knottingley, 257
Knowsley, 275
Knutsford, 265
Kyle, 314
Lagan River, 421
Lagore, Lake of, 29
Laleham, 164
l.ambourn, 157
Lambay Island, 394
Lamlash, 315
Lamlash Bay, 309
liammermuir Hills, 302, 325
Lampeter, 67
Lanark, 315
Lancaster, 277
Lancashire, 265
Lanchester, 291
Landguard Fort, 211
Landore, 72
Landport, 139
Land's End, 77
Langholm, 313
Langport, 121
Laorbein, 372
Largo, 331
Largs, 315
Larkhall, 316
Larne, 421
Lasswade, 328
Lauder River, 323
Laugharne, 69
Launceston, 87
Laurencekirk, 367
Lawers, Ben, 33d, 363
Lea River, 163
Leadgate, 293
Lcadhills, 315
Leamington, 1C6
Leatherhead, 200
Lechlade, 1 1 7
Ledburv, 119
Ledi, Ben, 364
Lee, 203
Lee River, 390, 430
Leeds, 256
Leek, 241
Legoniel, 421
Leicester, 244
Leigh, 270
Leighlin, Old, 417
Leighlinbridge, 417
Leighton Buzzard, 225
Leinster, 411
Leinster, Mount, 383
Leith, 327
Leith Hill, 199
Leith, Water of, 325
Leithen Water, 322
Leitrim, 425
Lene, Lough, 388
Lennox Hills, 329
Lennoxtown, 329
Lenton, 245
Leominster, 118
Lerwick, 377
Leslie, 331
Lttterkenny, 424
Leven, 331
Leven, Loch, 331, 335
Leven River, 306, 320
Leven Water (Renfrew), 319
Levensholme, 2(^9
Levin, Loch, 377
Lewes, 142
Lewis, 348, 356, 359, 361, 374
Lewis, Butt of, 347
Lewisham, 203
Leybourne, 253
Ley land, 277
Lichfield, 240
Lickey Hills, 104
Liddel River, 322
Liddisdale, 322
Liiefey River, 390, 416
LiflFord, 424
Limerick, 428
Lincoln, 231
Lincolnshire, 228
Lindisfanie, 297
Lindsey, 214, 229
Linlithgow, 328
Linlithgowshire, 328
Linnhe, Loch. 3i2, 377
Linthwaite, 258
Lisburn, 421
Lishoy, 415
Liskeard, 87
Lismore, 434
Lisnaskea. 424
Listowel, 429
Litchurch, 242
Littleborough, 270
Littlehampton, 142
Liverpool, 271
Lizard Point, 77
Llanberis, 47
Llandaff, 72
Llandilofawr, 69
Llandovery, 69
Llandrindod, 74
Llandudno. 61
Lin nelly, 69
IJanerchymedd, 63
Llanfair Caer Eiuion, 66
Llanfyllin, 66
Llangefni, 63
Llangollen, 61
Llanidloes, 66
Llanrwst, 61
512
INDEX.
Lloyd Hill, 415
Lochaber, 3 7 "2
Locher Moss, 313
Lochgelly, 331
Lochgilphead, 377
Lochinver, 375
Lochmaben, 3 1 3
Lochy, Loch, 372
Lockerbie, 313
Loddon River, 1 59
Lodore Falls, 2bS
Logierait, 363
Lomond, Ben, 306, 335, 364
Lomond Hills, 330
Lomond, Loch, 17, 306, 320, 338
London, 165—199
Londonderry, 422
London Docks, 195
Long Ashton, 120
Longdonvale, 265
Longford, 415
Long Island, 348
Long, Loch, 320
Long Mountain, 49
Long Mynd, 96, 101
Longships Light, 76
Longstone Rock, 297
Long Sutton, 229
Longton, 240
Looe, East and West, 86
Lome, 377
Lome, Firth of, 335
Lossie River, 37 1
Lossiemouth, 371
liOstwithiel, 86
Lothian, 324
Lothian, East and Mid, 325
Lothian, West, 328
Lothing, Lake, 212, 214
Loughborough, 245
Loughrea, 427
Louth, 414
Louth (Lincoln), 232
Louther Hills, 302, 313, 315
Lowestoft, 2i4
Lowtherstown, 424
Lucan, 414
Ludgvan, 85
Ludlow, 103
Lugar, 315
Lugnaquilla, 383, 416
Lugwardine, 118
Lui, Ben, 363
Lundy Island, 79
Lune River, 277, 285
Lurgan, 423
1-usk, 414
Luss, 321
l^utcn, 225
Lutterworth, 245
Luvdan, Loch, 363
Lybster, 376
Lydd, 208
Lydney, 117
Lyme Regis, 12?, 131
Lymington, 137
Lymm, 265
Lyndhurst, 137
Lynmouth, 95
Lyn Water, 331
Lypiatt Park, 114
Lytham, 277
Macclesfield, 265
Macclesfield Forest, 262
Macdhui, Ben, 335
Macgillicuddy Reeks, 382, 429
Machynlleth, 66
Macroom, 433
Madeley, 103
Madron, 85
Magheraboy, Plateau of, 386
INlagherafelt, 423
Maidenhead, 160
Maidstone, 204
Maigue River, 429
Main River, 422
Mainland (Orkneys), 344
Mainland (Shetlan'd), 345
Malahide, 414
Maldon, 210
Malham Tarn, 255
Malin Head, 424
Mallow, 433
Malmesbury, 135
Mrtlton. 24 9
Malvern, Great, 105
Malvern Hills, 96, J 04
Malvern Link, 105
Mambury, 132
Mam Soul, b72
Man, Isle of, 299
Manchester, 267
M anningtree. 211
Manor Hamilton, 425
Alansfield, 246
Mar, 367
Marazion, 85
March, 227
Maree, Loch, 339, 373
Margate, 206
Mark, Glen, 364
Market Bosworth, 245
Market Deeping, 229
Market Drayton, lu3
Market Harborough 245
M arket Weighton, 252
Markinch, 331
Marlborough, 136
Marlborough Downs, 11, 132, 136
Mario w, Great, 161
Marston Moor, 249
Ma.ry borough, 415
Mary hill, 319
Marykirk, 367
Marylebone, 181
Maryport, 287
Mask, Lough, 388, 425
Matlock, 242
Mauchline, 315
May bole 314
Maynooth, 416
Mayo County, 427
Mealfourvounie, 372
M earns, 366
Meashow. tumulus of, 356
Meath, 414
Medina, 141
Med way River, 150, ^02
Meeting of the Waters, 383, 416
Melcombe Regis, 131
Meldrum, Old, 370
Melksham, 136
Mellery, Mount, 434
Meltham, 2 8
Melton Mowbray. 245
Menai Bridges, 53
Mendip Hills 98, 119
Menteith, 364
Merionethshire, 64
Merrick, Mount 303, 314
Merse River, 323
Mersev River, 2«7
Merthyr Tydvil, 72
Methven, 363
Mevagissey, 85
Mexborough 260
Middleham, 253
Middlesborough, 249
Middlesex, 164
Middleton, 270
Middleton-in-Teasdale, 2s9
Middlewich, 264
Midhurst, 145
Midleton, 433
Midsomer Norton, 120
Milesians, 396
Milford Haven. 67
Milford, New, 68
Millom, 288
Millport, 315
Millstreet, 433
Milnathort, 331
Milngavie, 329
Milton, 205
Minch. 347
Minchinhampton, 114
Minehead, Izl
Milcham, 201
Mitcheldean, 117
Mitchelstown, 433
Mizen Head, 431
Moate-a-Urenogue, 415
Moel Tryfaen, 50
MoflFat. 313
Moidart, 372
Moira, 421
Mold, 59
]\Iole River, 2oO
Molesey, 200, 202
Molton South, 95
Monadhliadh Mountains, 371
Monaghan, 423
Monasterevan. 416
Monkstown, 433
Monkton-near- Yarrow, 293
Monkwearmouth, 293
Monmouth, 72, 73
Montgomery, 65
Montrose, 366
Moorfoot Hills, 302, 325
Moors (York), 246, 249
Moran, Loch, 372
Moray, 371
Moray Firth, 336
More, Ben, 335
More, ben (Assynt), 373, 375
More, Pen (Mull). 351
More, Ben (Perth). 363
More, Ben (Uist), 348
Morecambe, 277
Morecambe Bay, 267, 277, 286
Moriston, Glen, 371
Morley, 258
Morpeth, 296
Morven. 342, 377
Morwelham Quay, 89
Mossley, 270
Mostyn, 59
Motherwell. 316
Mottram, 265
Mountain Ash, 72
Mount Harry, 14 3
Mountmellick, 416
Mountrath, 416
Mount's Bay, 78
Mourne Mountains, 383, 418, 419
Mousa, Brough of, 355
jMousehole, 83
Moville, 423, 424
Mow Copt, 238
Much Wenlock, 103
Muich Dhui, Ben, 335
Muilrea, 383
Muirkirk, 315
Mull, 351, 377
Mull, Sound of, 342
Mullet Peninsula, 427
MuUingar, 415
Munster, 427
Musselburgh, 327
MusweU Hill, 165, 192
Naas, 416
Nailsea, 120
Nairn, 371
Nairn liiver 333, 371
Nairnshire, 371
NantUe, 62
Nantwich, 264
Navan, 414
Neagh, Lough, 17, 387, 390, 418,
420
Neath, 72
Needles, 125, 141
Neilston, 319
Nelson, 276
Nen Kiver, 223, 227
Nenagh, 4;i4
Nephin Beg, 383
Nephin, Mount, 383
■Ness (Lewis), 357
Ness, Loch, 333, 371
Nether Hoy land, 259
Neville's Cross, 291
Nevin, 62
Nevis, Ben, 335
Newark-upon-Trent. 245
Newbattle Abbey, 328
Newbridge, 416 '
Newbridge (Pontypridd), 72
Newburgh (Aberdeen), 370
Newburgh (Fife;, 332
Newbury, 158
Newcastle (Down), 419
Newcastle (Limerick), 429
Newcastle-on-Tyne, 294, 295
Newcastle-under-Lyme, 240
Newent, 117
New Forest, 12,7
New Galloway, 313
New Grange, 414
Newhaven (idinburgh), 327
Newhaven (Sussex), 143
New Lanark, 315
Newland, 117
Newmarket. 215, 227
Newmilns, 315
Newnham, 117
Newport (Fife), 332
Newport (Isle of Wight), 141
Newport (Monmouth;, 73
Newport Pagnel, 162
Newport (Pembroke), 68
Newport (Salop), 103
New Quay, 66, 87
New River, 165
New Ross, 417
Newry, 419
Newton Abbot, 91
Newton (Aberdeen), 356
Newton Heath, 269
Newton-in-Makerfield, 275
Newtonmore, 373
Newtownards, 419
Newtown Barry, 417
Newtown Butler, 424
Newtown Limavady, 423
INDEX.
Newtown (Montgomery), 66
Newtown Stewart, •123
Nidd River, 254
Nidderdale, 254
Nithsdale, 313
Nore River (Ireland), 390 415—417
Norfolk, 216
Normanby, 250
Northallerton, 250
Northam, 95
Northampton, 227, 228
North Berwick, 325
Northfleet, 203 ^
Northleach, 117
Northmen in Scotland, 357
North Sea, 3, 4
North Shields, 293, 291
Northumberland, 293
Northumbrians, 284,
North WaLham, 218
Northwich, 264
Norton, 260
Norwich, 216
Norwood, 201
Nottingham, 245
Nuneaton, 108
Nuneham Courtney, 156
Oakham. 228
Oakingham, 159
Oakley, 331
Oban, 377
Ochll Hills, 329, 331, 362
Ock River. 157
Offa's Dyke, 103
Oghams, 400
Oich, Loch, 371
Oldbury, 105
Oldham. 270
Old Man of Hoy, 344
Olney, 162
Omagh, 423
Openshaw, 269
Orford, 214
Orknej^s, 343, 361, 377
Ormesby, 250
Orme's Head. 61
Ormskirk, 276
Orwell River, 212, 214
Oswaldtwistle, 276
( swestry, 103
Otley, 255
Otterburn, 296
Ottery St. Mary, 94
Oughter, Louiih, 424
Oughterard, 426
Oundle, 228
Ouse River, 162, 223, 224, 233, 234
Owenmore River, 390, 424, 427
Oxford, 153
Oystermouth, 72
Padiham, 2"6
Padstow, 83, 87
Paignton, 90
Paisley, 319
Palatines in Ireland, 398
Panshanger, 163
Par, 85
Parkgate, 264
Parsonstown, 415
Partick, 319
Passage 434
Passage West, 433
Pateley Bridge, 254
Patrington, 253
Peak of Derbyshire, 233
513
Pease, or Peaths Bridge, 324
i'eebles, 322
I'eel, 301
Pegwell Bay, 206
Pembrey, 69
Pembroke, 67, 68
Penarth, 72
I'endlebury, 269
Pendle Hill, 276
Penistone, 259
Pennine Chain, 10, 234, 279
Penuycuick, 32S
Penrhyn, Port, 01
Penrith, 286
Penryn, 85
Penshurst, 204
Pentland Firth, 343
Pentland Hills, 304, 325
Penzance, 84
Pershore, 105
Perth, 362, 363
Peterborough, 228
Peterhead, 371
Petersfield, 140
Petherton, South, 121
Petworth, 145
Pevensey, 143
l^evensey Level, 141
Pewsey, Vale of, 132
Philipstown, 415
Phillack, 87
Pickering, 249
Pickering, Vale of, 246
Pints, 309, 355
Pillesdon Pen, 131
I^tsligo, New, 371
Pitteuweem, 331
Plaistow, 209
Plumstead Marshes, 203
Plymouth, 87
Plymouth Sound, 14
Plympton, 89
Plynlimmon, 49
PockHngton, 252
Polden Hills, 119
PoUockshaws, 319
Pomona, 344
Pontefract, 257
Pontypool, 73
Poole, 132
Poole Harbour, 131
Poor Man's Dyke, 128
Porchester, 139
Porlock, i21
Portadown, 423
Portarlington, 416
Portaferry, 419
Port Bannatyne, 315
Port Carlisle, 286
Port Clarence, 290
Port Glasgow, 319
Porthcawl, 72
Porthcurno, 85
Portishead. 120
Poitland Breakwater, 124
Portland, Isle of, 122, 131
Portlaw, 434
Portmadoc, 62
Portobello, 327
Portora School, 424
Port Patrick, 314
Portree, 373
Portrush, 421, 423
Portsea, 139, 140
Portskerra, 375
Portskewet, 100
Portsmouth, 127, 139
514
INDEX.
Portsoy, 371
Portstewart, 423
Portumna, 427
Potteries, 239
Poulton-le-Sands, 277
Prescot, 275
Presteigne, 74
Preston, 276
Prestonpans, 325
Prestwich. 269
Prince's Risborough, 1G2
Prince Town, 77, 89
Purbeck Cliffs, 125
Purbeck, Isle of, 132
Purfleet, 210
Putney, 202
Pwllheli, 62
Quantock Hills, 119
Quarry Bank, 2J^2
Queensberry Hill, 315
Queensborough, 205
Queen's County, 415
Queensferry, 328
Queensferry, North, 331
Queenstown, 433
Quiraing, 347
Quorndon, 245
Radcliffe. 270
Radnor, 74
Radnor, New, 74
Radstock. 120
Raglan, 73
Ramsay, 301
Ramsbottom, 270
Ramsey, 225
Ramsgate, 206
Rannoch, Loch, 363
Raphre, stones of, 401
Rathdrum. 416
Rathgar, 413
Rathkeale, 429
Rathlin Island, 385
Rathmelton, 424
Rathmines, 413
Rathmullen, 424
Ravenglass, 288
Reading, 158
Reculvers, 151
Redcar, 252
Redditch, 105
Redhill, 200
Redruth, 87
Ree, Lough, 383, 391
Reeth, 253
Reigate, 200
Renfrew, 319
Renton, 321
Retford, 246
Rhea, Kyle, 347
Rhinns of Galloway, 306, 314
Rhuddlan, 59
Rhyl, 59
Ribble Hiver 255, 276
Ribchester. 276
Ribston, 255
Richborough, 206
Rickmans worth, 163
Richmond (Surrey), 202
Richmond (Yorks), 253
Ringwood, 137
Ripley, 244, 254
Ripon, 253
Rivington Pike, 275 .
Roath, 72
Rochdale, 270
Rochester. 204
Rockall, 434
Roeness hill, 345
Romford, 209
Romney March, 130, 202
Homney, New, 208
Romsey, 137
Ronaldsha, 343
Roodee (Chester), 263
Roscommon, 425
Roscrea, 434,
Rosehall, 316*
Rosehearty, 371
Roseneath, 321
Rosherville, 204
Roslin, S28
Woss County, 373
Ross (Hereford), 118
Rosscarbery. 432
Rossendale Forest, 270
Rosstrevor, 419
Kothbury, 296
Rotherham, 260
Rothes, 371
Rothesay, 315
Roundhay, 257
Round Towers, 401
Rowley Regis, 242
Roxburgh, 322, ^23
Ruabon, 60
Rugeley, 240
Rum, 359, 361. 377
Rumbling Bridge, 330
Runcorn, 264, 271
Runny mead, 161
Rush, 414
Rusholme, 269
Rutherglen, 316
Ruthin, 6 1
Rutland Island, 424
Rutlandshire, 228
Rydal. 285
Ryde, 141
Rye, 145
Ryton, 293
St. Abb's Head, 324
St. Albans, 162
St. Andrews, 331
St. Asaph, 60
St. Austell 85
St. Bees, 288
St. Bernard, Mount, 245
St. Blazey. 86
St. Briavels, 117
St. Bride's Bay, 51
St. Catheiine's Down, 126
St. Clears. 69
St. Cross. 137
St. David's, 68
St. Helen's, 275
St. Ives (Cornwall), 87
St. Ives (Hunts), 225
St. Kilda, 348. 354
St. Margaret's Bay, 207
St. Margaret's Hope, 377
St. Mary Church, 91
St. Mary's Cray, 203
St. Mawes, 85
St. Michael's Mount, 78, 85
St. Neot's, 225
St. Ninian's. 329
St. Paul's Cathedral, 185
Salcombe Regis, 89
Sale, 265
Salford, 267
1 Salisbury, 133
Salisbury Plain, 11, 124, 132
Salop, 101
Saltaire, 256
Saltash, 89
Saltburn-by-the-Sea, 252
Saltcoats, 315
Saltfleet, 232
Samson, 79
Sandbach, 265
Sandford, 94
Sandgate, 208
Sandhurst, 141, 159 '
Sandley Mere, 236
Sandowu, 141
Sandringham, 219
Sandwich, 206
Sarum, Old. 133
Savemake Forest, 136
Saundersfoot, 68
Scarborough, 251
Scarbra, 353
Scilly Islands, 77, 79
Scone, 363
Scotch Lowlanders, 309
Scuir-na-Gillean, 3i7
Seaford, 14 3
Seaforth, 275
Seaham, 291
Sealand, 58
t-'eaton Carew, 290
Sedburgh, 255
Sedgemoor, 121
Sedgley, 242
Seend, 135
Seghill, 296
Selby, 249
Selkirk, 322
Selsey Bill, 13
Settle, 255
Seven Hunters, 348
Sevenoaks, 204
Severn River, 96
Shaftesbury, 132
Shakspere's Cliff, 130
Shane's Castle, 422
Shannon Harbour, 415
Shannon River, 390
Shap, 286
Shap Fell, 10, 284
Sharpness Docks, 100
Sheep Haven, 424
Sheerness, 205
Sheffield, 259
Shepperton, 164
Sheppey, Isle of, 202, 205
Shepton-Mallet, 120
Sherborne, 132
Sherwood Forest, 245
Shetland Isles, 345, 354, 357, 377
Shiel, Loch, 372
Shifnal, 103
Shillelagh, 416
Shin, Loch, 334, 375
Shipley, 256
Shirley, 139
Shoeburyness, 210
Shooter's Hill, 202
Shoreham, New, 142.
Shorncliffe, 208
Shotley Bridge, 293
Shrewsbury, 101
Shropshire, 101
Sidlaw Hills, 362, 364
Sidmouth, 94
Silbury Hill, 136
Silchester, 141
Silkstone, 259
INDEX.
515
Silvermine Jlountains, 382
Sittingbourne, 205
Skelton-in-Cleveland, 250
Skerries, 414
8kerryvore, 352
Skibbereen, 431
Skiddaw, 288
Skipton, 255
8kye, Isle of, 347
blane, 415
Slaney River, 390, 417
Sleaford, 230
Sleat Sound, 342
Sleugach, 373
Slieve Aughty, 382, 425
Slieve Beagh, 423
Slieve Bernagh, 382
Slieve Bloom, 382, 415
Slieve Callan, 402
Slieve Donard, 383
Slieve Felim, 382
Slieve Partry, 383
Sligo, 427
Slough, 162
Smallthorne, 240
Smethwick, 110, 242
SnaeFell, 301
Sneinton, 245
Snowdon, 1], 47, 48
Sodor, 301
Soho. 110
Sole Bay, 214
Solent, 127
Sol way Moss, 313
Somerset House, 186
Somersetshire, 119
Sorrel, Mount, 245
Southampton, 138
Southampton Water, 127
Southend, 210
Southport, 275
Southsea, 139
South Shields, 293
Southwold, 214
Sowerby, 257
Spalding, 229
Spean, Glen, 372
Spelsbury, 1£6
Spenny Moor, 291
Sperrin Mountains, 383
Spey River, 333, 371
Spitalfields, 180
Spithead, 13, 127, 139
Spittal, 298
Spurn Head, 236
Stack Rocks (South Wales), 13
Staffa, 351
Stafford, 240
StaflPordshire, 238
Staines, 164
Stalybridge, 265
Stamford, '229
Stamford Bridge, 24 9
Standard Hill, 245
Stanhope, 291
Stanley, 363
Start Point, 76
Steepholm, 98
Stennis, Loch, 340
Stennis, standing stones of, 353
Stevenston, 315
Stewarton, 315
Stewar'stown, 423
Steyning, 142
Stilton, 225
Stiper Stones, 101
Stirling, 329
Stockbridge, 137
Stockport, 265
Stockton-on-Tees, 289
Stoke, 240
Stoke Poges, 162
Stoke Prior, 104
Stokes Bay, 139
Stoke-upon-Trent, 230
Stonehaven, 366
Stonebenge, 135
Stonehouse (Devon), 87
Ston^ house (Lanark), 316
Stonyhurst, 276
Stony-Stratford, 162
Stornoway, 374
Stour River, 131, 202, 206, 214
Stourbridge, 104
Stourport, 104
Stowmarket, 214
Stow-on-the-Wold, 117
Strabane, 423
Strangford, 419
Stranorlar, 414
Stranraer, 314
Stratford (Essex), 209
Stratford-on-Avon, 106
Strathavon, 316
Strathbogie, 368
Strathclyde, 305, 320
Strathdearn, 371
Strathglass, 372
Strath Ire, 364
Strathmore, 333
StrathpeflFer, 374
Strathspey, 371, 372
Stretford, 269
Strichen, 371
Stroma, 343
Stromness, 377
Strood, 204
Stroud, 114
Studley, 107
Sudbury, 214
Suffolk, 214
Suir River, 390, 434
Summerseat, 270
Sunart, Loch, 377
Sunbury, 164
Sunderland, 293
Sunningwell, 157
Surrey, 199
Sussex, 141
Sutherland, 375
Sutton Coldfield, 111
Sutton-in-Ashfield, 246
Swaffham, 219
Swainsbost. 375
Swanage, 132
Swanscombe, 203
Swansea, 70
Swilly, Lough, 424
Swindon, Old and New, 136
Swinton, 269
Swords, 414
Tadcaster, 249, 255
'J'ain, 374
Tamar River, 76, 77, 87
Tame River, 238, 240
Tamworth, 240
Tara, Hill of, 415
'Jarbat Ness, 373
Tarbert, 377, 429
Tarbert, Glen. 377
Tarbert, Loch, 342
Tarbolton, 315
Tarporley, 263
Tarring, 142
Ti.ttershall, 229
Taunton, 121
Taunton, Vale of, 11, 119
Tavistock, 89
Tay Bridge, 304
Teddington, 1L4
Teignuiouth, 91
Teniplemore, 4 34
Tcnbury, lo5
Tenby, 68
Tenterden, 208
Termonfeckin, 414
Tetbury, 114
'I'eviotdale, 323
Tewkesbury, 112
Thame, 156
Thames Haven, 210
Thames River, 146
Thanet, Isle of, 152, 206
Thaxted, 210
Thetford, 215
Thirlemere, 269
'J'hirsk, 250
Thomastown, 4 1 7
Thome, 249
ThornhiU, 258
Thomliebank, 319
Throston, 290
Thule, 346
Thurles, 434
Thurlstone, 259
Thurso, 376
Tilbury, 204, 210
Tilgate Forest, 129
Tillicoultry, 330
Tilt, Glen, 363
Tinahely, 416
Tintagel, 87
Tipperary, 434
Tipperary, men of. 402
Tipton, 242
Tiree, 362, 377
Tiverton, 94
Tobermory, 377
1'odmorden, 257
Tollcross, 316
Tongue, 375
looting, 201
Topsham, 92
Torphichen, 328
Torquay, 90
Torridon, Loch, 373
Torrington, i'5
Tory Island, 402
'J'otnes, 90
Tottenham, 165
Towcester, 228
Tower of London, 182
'J'owlaw, 291
Towton, 219
Towyn, 64
Toxteth, 276
I'ralee, 430
Tramore, 434
Tranent, 325
Tranmere, 263
Tredegar, 73
Tregaron, 67
Tremadoc, 62
Trent River, 232, 233, 238, 245
Tre Taliesin, 54
Trim, 414
Tring, 163
Troon, 315
Trossachs, 364
Trostan Mountain, 383
616
INDEX.
Trowbridge, 136
Truro, 85
Tuam, 427
Tuatha-de-dananns, 396
Tuirsachan, 'SbQ
Tullamore, 415
TuUow, 417
Tunbridge Wells, 204
Timstall, 240
Turriff, 370
Tuskar Rock, 394
Tweed River, 3'il
Tweedmouth, 298
Twerton, 120
Twickenham, 164
Tyldesley, 270
Tvndrum, 363
Tynemouth, 294
Tynwald, 301
Tyrone County, 423
TTaish, Ben, 373
TJckfield, 145
Uist, 348, 357
Ullapool, 373
lUleswater, 284
Ulster, 398, 418
Ulverston, 277
Undercliff (Isle of Wight), 126
Uppingham, 228
Upton on-Severn, 105
Ure River, 234, 253
Urlingford, 417
Urquhart, Glen, 371
Uttoxeter, 241
Uxbridge, 165
Valentia Island, 430
Ventnor, 141
Verne Hill, 124
Verniew, 275
Virginia Water, 161
Vorlich, Ben, 320
Vyrnwy, 275
Wakefield, 258
Wales, 46
Walker, 294
Wallasey, 263
Wallingford, 157
Wallsend, 284, 294
Walney Island, 278
Walsall, 242
Walsoken, 227
Waltham Abbey, 209
Waltham Cross 163, 209
Walthamstow, 209
Walton, 164, 202
Walion-on-the-Hill, 27)
Walton-on-the-Naze, 2 1 1
Wandsworth, 201
Wanlockhead, 313
Wanstead, 209
Wantage, 157
Ward Hill, 344
Ware, 163
Wareham, 132
Warkworth, 296
Warminster, 135
Warrenpoint, 419
Warrington, 270
Warwick, 105, 106
Wash, the, 221
Wastwater, 288
Watchet, 121
Waterbeach, 221, 227
Waterford, 433
Waterloo, 275
Watford. 163
Watt's Dyke, 103
Wavertree, 275
Weald, 11, 122
Weardale, 291
Wearmouth, 293
Weaver Hill, 238
Wednesbury, 242
Wednesfield, 242
Welland River, 223, 227, 229
Wellingborough, 228
Wellington (Salop), 103
Wellington (Somerset), 121
Wells, 120
Wells-next -the-Sea, 218
Welsh Hills, 10
Welshpool, 65
Wemys, 331
Wendover, 162
WenlockEdge, 101"
Wensley Dale, 252
West Bromwich, 242
Westbury, 136
Westbury-on-Severn, 117
Westbury-on Trym, 116
Westerham, 204
Westmeath, 415
Westminster Abbey, 183
Westmoreland, 284
Weston-super-Mare, 98, 120
Westport, 427
Westward Ho ! 95
Wetherby, 255
Wexford, 417
Weybridge, 202
Weyhill, 137
Weymouth. 131
Whalley, 276
Wharfe River, 234, 255
Wheal Cock, 81
Wheal Owles, 85
Whemside, 234
Whitby, 250
Whitchurch, 103
Whitefield, 270
Whitehaven, 282. 287
White Horse Vale, 135, 157
Whithorn, 314
Whitstable, 206
Whittlesea, 227
Whittlesea Mere, 221
Whitwick, 245
Wick, 376
Wicklow, 416
Wicklow Mountains, 382
AVidnes, 271
Wigan, 276
Wight, Isle of, 125
Wigton, 289
Wigtown, 314
Willenhall, 242
Willing-ton Quay, 294
Wilton, 134
Wiltshire, 132
Wimbledon, 201
Wimborne, 132
Winchelsea, 141, 145
Winchester, 137
Winchcombe, 117
Windermere, 284, 285
Windsor. 160
Winksworth, 244
Winslow, 162
Winster, 244
Wirral, 263
Wisbeach, 227
Wishaw, 316
Witham, 210
Withernsea, 253
Witney, 156
Witton, 264
Wivenhoe, 211
Wobum, 225
Woking, 200
Wokingham, 159
Wolsingham, 291
Wolverhamptou, 242
Wolverton, 162
Woodbridge, 214
Woodhead Tunnel, 259
Woodhouse Moor, 257
Woodstock, 156
Wookey Hole, 29, 120
Woolborough, 91
Wooldale, 258
Wooler, 297
Woolthorpe, 230
Woolwich, 202, 203
Woolwich, North, 209
Worcester, 104
Workington, 282, 287
Worksop, 246
Worle Hill, 120
Worm's Head, 70
Woisborough, 259
Worsley. 269
Worstead, 218
Worthing, 142
Wortley, 259
Wotton-under-Edge, 114
Wrath, Cape, 336
Wrekin, 96, 101
Wrexham, 60
Wroot, 236
Wrotham, 204
Wroxeter, 102
Wye River. 98, 243
Wylam, 296
Wymondham, 218
Wyre, Forest of, 101
Wyvis, Ben, 273, 376
Yardley Chase, 228
Yarmouth, Great, 218
Yarmouth (Isle of Wight), 141
Yarrowdale, 322
Yeovil, 121
Yes Tor, 76
Ynyscedwin, 74
York, 246
York Wolds, 235, 246
Youghal, 433
Ystalyfera, 74
END OF VOL. IV.
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