YORKSHIRE
DALES AND FELLS
A COMPANION VOLUME
BY THE SAME AUTHOR
YORKSHIRE
COAST AND MOORLAND SCENES
BY GORDON HOME
CONTAINING 32 FULL-PAGE ILLUSTRATIONS
IN COLOUR
PRICE =7s.= =6d.= NET
_The Pall Mall Gazette_ says: “We must express our real regret that it
is materially impossible to reproduce some specimens of the charming
illustrations, which are at least as great an attraction as the writing
of Mr. Home’s book. Of these there are thirty-two, among which it would
be invidious to select any for special commendation when all are
delightful. Let it suffice to say that they bring the water of envy into
the mouth of the Londoner who can only ‘babble o’ green fields,’ while,
beyond the range of his opportunities, the Yorkshire moors are clothing
themselves in all the glory of their vernal beauty. Perhaps Mr. Home’s
pen and pencil may tempt some of us to spend the summer holidays in the
county of the White Rose, where he has gathered so fragrant a posy.”
_Published by_
A. & C. BLACK, SOHO SQUARE, LONDON, W.
AGENTS IN AMERICA
THE MACMILLAN COMPANY
64 & 66 FIFTH AVENUE, NEW YORK
[Illustration: FOUNTAINS ABBEY
IS one of the finest ruined monasteries in England, and its wonderfully
rich setting in the sylvan splendours of Studley Royal make it still
more noteworthy. The velvet turf, the rushing waters of the Skell, the
magnificent trees, and the solemnity of the ruins, combine in producing
an ineffaceable memory.]
YORKSHIRE
DALES AND FELLS
PAINTED &
DESCRIBED
BY
GORDON HOME
[Illustration: colophon]
PUBLISHED BY A. & C.
BLACK·LONDON·MCMVI
Preface
This book is a companion volume to that entitled ‘Yorkshire Coast and
Moorland Scenes,’ which was published in 1904.
It describes a tract of country that is more full of noble and imposing
scenery than the north-eastern corner of the county, although it has
none of the advantages of a coast-line. Beyond this, the area covered by
the present volume is larger than that of the earlier one, and the
historic events connected with its great over-lords and their castles,
with the numerous monasteries and ancient towns, are so full of
thrilling interest that it has only been possible to sample here and
there the vast stores of romance that exist in some hundreds of volumes
of early and modern writings.
GORDON HOME.
EPSOM,
_April, 1906_.
Contents
CHAPTER I
PAGE
THE DALE COUNTRY AS A WHOLE 1
CHAPTER II
RICHMOND 13
CHAPTER III
SWALEDALE 47
CHAPTER IV
WENSLEYDALE 71
CHAPTER V
RIPON AND FOUNTAINS ABBEY 115
CHAPTER VI
KNARESBOROUGH AND HARROGATE 125
CHAPTER VII
WHARFEDALE 139
CHAPTER VIII
SKIPTON, MALHAM, AND GORDALE 149
CHAPTER IX
SETTLE AND THE INGLETON FELLS 165
INDEX 173
List of Illustrations
1. Fountains Abbey _Frontispiece_
FACING PAGE
2. Richmond Castle from the River 20
3. Richmond from the West 30
4. Swaledale in the Early Autumn 48
5. Downholme Moor, above Swaledale 56
6. Muker on a Stormy Afternoon 64
7. Twilight in the Butter-tubs Pass 72
8. Hardraw Force 78
9. A Rugged View above Wensleydale 82
10. A Jacobean House at Askrigg 90
11. Aysgarth Force 98
12. Bolton Castle, Wensleydale 104
13. View up Wensleydale from Leyburn Shawl 110
14. Ripon Minster from the South 18
15. Knaresborough 126
16. Bolton Abbey, Wharfedale 142
17. Hubberholme Church 144
18. The Courtyard of Skipton Castle 150
19. Gordale Scar 160
20. Settle 166
THE DALE COUNTRY AS A WHOLE
CHAPTER I
DESCRIBES THE DALE COUNTRY AS A WHOLE
When in the early years of life one learns for the first time the name
of that range of mountains forming the backbone of England, the youthful
scholar looks forward to seeing in later years the prolonged series of
lofty hills known as the ‘Pennine Range.’ His imagination pictures
Pen-y-ghent and Ingleborough as great peaks, seldom free from a mantle
of clouds, for are they not called ‘mountains of the Pennine Range,’ and
do they not appear in almost as large type in the school geography as
Snowdon and Ben Nevis? But as the scholar grows older and more able to
travel, so does the Pennine Range recede from his vision, until it
becomes almost as remote as those crater-strewn mountains in the Moon
which have a name so similar.
This elusiveness on the part of a natural feature so essentially static
as a mountain range is attributable to the total disregard of the name
of this particular chain of hills. In the same way as the term
‘Cumbrian Hills’ is exchanged for the popular ‘Lake District,’ so is a
large section of the Pennine Range paradoxically known as the ‘Yorkshire
Dales.’
It is because the hills are so big that the valleys are deep, and it is
owing to the great watersheds that these long and narrow dales are
beautified by some of the most copious and picturesque rivers in
England. In spite of this, however, when one climbs any of the fells
over 2,000 feet, and looks over the mountainous ridges on every side,
one sees, as a rule, no peak or isolated height of any description to
attract one’s attention. Instead of the rounded or angular projections
from the horizon that are usually associated with a mountainous
district, there are great expanses of brown tableland that form
themselves into long parallel lines in the distance, and give a sense of
wild desolation in some ways more striking than the peaks of Scotland or
Wales. The thick formations of millstone grit and limestone that rest
upon the shale have generally avoided crumpling or distortion, and thus
give the mountain views the appearance of having had all the upper
surfaces rolled flat when they were in a plastic condition. Denudation
and the action of ice in the glacial epochs have worn through the hard
upper stratum, and formed the long and narrow dales; and in Littondale,
Wharfedale, Wensleydale, and many other parts, one may plainly see the
perpendicular wall of rock sharply defining the upper edges of the
valleys. The softer rocks below generally take a gentle slope from the
base of the hard gritstone to the river-side pastures below. At the
edges of the dales, where waterfalls pour over the wall of limestone--as
at Hardraw Scar, near Hawes--the action of water is plainly
demonstrated, for one can see the rapidity with which the shale
crumbles, leaving the harder rocks overhanging above.
Unlike the moors of the north-eastern parts of Yorkshire, the fells are
not prolific in heather. It is possible to pass through Wensleydale--or,
indeed, most of the dales--without seeing any heather at all. On the
broad plateaux between the dales there are stretches of moor partially
covered with ling; but in most instances the fells and moors are grown
over at their higher levels with bent and coarse grass, generally of a
browny-ochrish colour, broken here and there by an outcrop of limestone
that shows gray against the swarthy vegetation.
In the upper portions of the dales--even in the narrow river-side
pastures--the fences are of stone, turned a very dark colour by
exposure, and everywhere on the slopes of the hills a wide network of
these enclosures can be seen traversing even the most precipitous
ascents. Where the dales widen out towards the fat plains of the Vale of
York, quickset hedges intermingle with the gaunt stone, and as one gets
further eastwards the green hedge becomes triumphant. The stiles that
are the fashion in the stone-fence districts make quite an interesting
study to strangers, for, wood being an expensive luxury, and stone being
extremely cheap, everything is formed of the more enduring material.
Instead of a trap-gate, one generally finds an excessively narrow
opening in the fences, only just giving space for the thickness of the
average knee, and thus preventing the passage of the smallest lamb. Some
stiles are constructed with a large flat stone projecting from each
side, one slightly in front and overlapping the other, so that one can
only pass through by making a very careful S-shaped movement. More
common are the projecting stones, making a flight of precarious steps on
each side of the wall.
Except in their lowest and least mountainous parts, where they are
subject to the influences of the plains, the dales are entirely innocent
of red tiles and haystacks. The roofs of churches, cottages, barns and
mansions, are always of the local stone, that weathers to beautiful
shades of green and gray, and prevents the works of man from jarring
with the great sweeping hillsides. Then, instead of the familiar
gray-brown haystack, one sees in almost every meadow a neatly-built
stone house with an upper story. The lower part is generally used as a
shelter for cattle, while above is stored hay or straw. By this system a
huge amount of unnecessary carting is avoided, and where roads are few
and generally of exceeding steepness a saving of this nature is a
benefit easily understood. Any soldier who served in South Africa during
the latter part of the war would be struck with the advantages that
these ready-made block-houses would offer if it were ever necessary to
round up a mobile enemy who had taken refuge among the Yorkshire fells.
Barbed-wire entanglements, and a system of telephones to link them
together, would be all that was required to convert these stone barns
into block-houses of a thoroughly useful type, for they are already
loopholed.
The villages of the dales, although having none of the bright colours
of a level country, are often exceedingly quaint, and rich in soft
shades of green and gray. In the autumn the mellowed tints of the stone
houses are contrasted with the fierce yellows and browny-reds of the
foliage, and the villages become full of bright colours. At all times,
except when the country is shrivelled by an icy northern wind, the
scenery of the dales has a thousand charms. By the edge of fine rivers
that pour downwards in terraced falls one finds hamlets with their
church towers, gray and sturdy, and the little patch of green shaded by
ash-trees, all made diminutive by the huge and gaunt hillsides that
dominate every view. Looking up the dales, there are often glimpses of
distant heights that in their blue silhouettes give a more mountainous
aspect to the scenery than one might expect.
In some of the valleys, such as Swaledale, the nakedness of the
yellow-brown hills is clothed with a mantle of heavy woods--but enough
has been said by way of introduction to give some notion of the general
aspect of the dales, and in the succeeding chapters a closer scrutiny
can be made.
The ways of approaching the Dale Country from the south are by means of
the Great Northern, Midland, or Great Central routes to York, where one
has all the North-Eastern service to choose from. Ribblesdale is
traversed by the Midland Main Line, so that those who wish to commence
an exploration of these parts of Yorkshire from Settle, Skipton, or
Hawes, must travel from St. Pancras Station.
RICHMOND