_Belliver Tor._--Turn squarely to the right two miles from Two
Bridges on the Moreton Hampstead Road.
_Blackingstone Rock._--A true tor, though not on Dartmoor. It is a
fine piece of rock two miles east of Moreton Hampstead. It is of
loaf-like form, and gave a difficult climb until a staircase of
solid and obtrusive construction was put there.
_Brent Tor._--A curious cone of volcanic rock a long mile
south-west of Brentor Station, and fully four miles north of
Tavistock.
_Fur Tor._--About six miles in a northerly direction from Merivale
Bridge, Two Bridges, or Princetown.
_Hey Tor._--Four miles west of Bovey Tracy; was quite a nice climb,
but has been spoilt by artificial aids.
[Illustration: A TYPICAL TOR (HEY TOR, DARTMOOR)]
_Links (Great) Tor._--About two miles east of Bridestow station.
_Longaford Tor._--Strike off to the left about halfway between Two
Bridges and Post Bridge.
_Mis Tor (Great and Little)._--Two miles north from Merivale
Bridge. They are fine objects, especially the larger.
_Row Tor._--On the West Dart some four miles north of Two Bridges.
It has a very striking block of granite on it.
_Sheep's Tor._--About two miles east of Dousland Station. It is
finely shaped.
_Shellstone Tor._--Near Throwleigh, about halfway between Chagford
and Oakhampton.
_Staple Tor._--Under a mile north-west from Merivale Bridge, and
four miles east of Tavistock.
_Vixen Tor._--One mile from Merivale Bridge, or four miles north
from Dousland Station. It is near the Walkham River, and is almost
the only tor which has a distinct reputation as a climb. It is got
at by means of the cleft shown in the illustration. Here it is
usual to 'back up.' The struggles of generations of climbers are
said to have communicated a high polish to the surface of the
cleft.
_Watern Tor._--Five or six miles west of Chagford, on the left bank
of the North Teign. It has three towers of friable granite much
weathered.
_Yar Tor._--Halfway between Two Bridges and Buckland-in-the-Moor;
it has a curiously fortified appearance.
=Vixen Tor.=--One of the finest of the Devonshire _Tors_ (q.v.).
[Illustration: VIXEN TOR (DARTMOOR)]
=Walker's Gully= is the precipice in which ends the East Scree, between
the _Pillar Rock_ and the _Shamrock_. It is named after an unfortunate
youth of seventeen who was killed by falling over it on Good Friday,
1883. He had reached the rock with four companions, and found there two
climbers from Bolton, who had been trying for nearly three hours to find
a way up, and were apparently then standing in or near Jordan Gap.
Seeing Walker, they shouted to him for advice as to the ascent. He
thereupon endeavoured to join them by sliding down on the snow; but he
had miscalculated the pace, and when he reached the rock at which he had
aimed, it was only to find that his impetus was too powerful to be
arrested. He shot off to one side, rolled over once or twice, and then
darted away down the steep East Scree, passing the Bolton men, who could
not see him owing to that position, and disappeared over the precipice.
=Wallow Crag=, a long mile south of Keswick, is abrupt but not high, and
somewhat incumbered by trees. It contains _Lady's Rake_, and _Falcon
Crag_ is really a continuation of it. Both are too near Keswick to
please climbers, who do not enjoy having their every movement watched by
waggon-loads of excursionists.
=Wanthwaite Crags= (Cumberland, sh. 64) rise on the east side of the
stream which flows, or used to flow, from Thirlmere. There is good
climbing in them, and they are easily reached from Keswick (1 hour), or
Grasmere, taking the Keswick coach as far as the foot of Thirlmere; and
Threlkeld station is nearer still (half an hour). The rocky part has a
height of 600 to 700 ft. Bram Crag, just a little south, is really part
of it.
=Wastdale.=--There are two valleys of this name, one near Shap in
Westmorland, and the other and more famous in Cumberland, at the head of
Wastwater. It is the Chamouni of England, and would be the Zermatt also,
only it lacks the charm of a railway. Fine climbs abound among the
various fells which hem it closely in. (See under the heads of
_Scafell_, _Lingmell_, _Great Gable_, _Pillar_, _Yewbarrow_, _Steeple_,
_Red Pike_, and _Great End_.) A well-filled 'Climbing book' is kept at
the inn, where also are some fine rock-views and a very complete set of
large-scale maps. Men with luggage must drive up from Drigg Station;
those who have none can walk over _Burnmoor_ from Boot Station in one
hour and a half or less.
=Westmorland=, as a climber's county, is second only to Cumberland.
Langdale is perhaps the pick of it, but about Patterdale, Mardale, and
Kentdale abundant work may be found, and there are few parts of the
whole county which have not small local climbs of good quality set in
the midst of charming scenery. Defoe's account of it is extremely
amusing:
'I now entered _Westmorland_, a county eminent only for being the
wildest, most barren, and frightful of any that I have passed over in
_England_ or in _Wales_. The west side, which borders on _Cumberland_,
is indeed bounded by a chain of almost unpassable Mountains, which in
the language of the country are called _Fells_.... It must be owned,
however, that here are some very pleasant manufacturing towns.'
The notion of lake scenery being rendered tolerable by manufacturing
towns is one which may be recommended to the Defence Society; but Mr.
Defoe has not done yet:
'When we entered at the South Part of this County, I began indeed to
think of the mountains of Snowden in North Wales, seeing nothing round
me in many places but unpassable Hills whose tops covered with snow
seemed to tell us all the pleasant part of England was at an end.'
=Westmorland's Cairn= is a conspicuous object at the edge nearest to
Wastwater of the summit plateau of _Great Gable_. There is a wide-spread
impression that this cairn, which is built in a style which would do
credit to a professional 'waller,' was intended to celebrate a climb;
but Messrs. T. and E. Westmorland, of Penrith, who built it in July
1876, wished to mark a point from which they 'fearlessly assert that the
detail view far surpasses any view from _Scafell Pikes_, _Helvellyn_, or
_Skiddaw_, or even of the whole Lake District.' At the same time the
short cliff on the edge of which the cairn stands is full of neat
'problems,' and it is customary to pay it a visit on the way to Gable
Top after a climb on the _Napes_.
=Wetherlam=, in Lancashire, is about 2,500 ft., and has some crags on
the north side among which here and there good climbing may be found.
They can be reached in about an hour and a half from either Coniston or
the inn at Skelwith Bridge. In an article signed 'H.A.G.' (i.e.
Gwynne), which appeared in the _Pall Mall Gazette_ in April 1892, the
following description of a part of it is given: 'On the west face there
is a bold cliff that stands between two steep gullies. The cliff itself
can be climbed, and in winter either of the gullies would afford a good
hour's hard step-cutting. Just now, after the late snowstorm, the
mountaineer would have the excitement of cutting through a snow-cornice
when he arrives at the top. The precipice itself is fairly easy. I
happened to find it in very bad condition. All the rocks were sheeted
with ice and extremely dangerous. In one part there was a narrow, steep
gully ending in a fall. It was full of snow and looked solid. I had
scarcely put my foot on it when the snow slipped away with a hiss and
left me grabbing at a knob of iced rock that luckily was small enough
for my grasp. This climb, however, in ordinary weather is by no means
difficult.'
=Whernside=, in Yorkshire, was considered even as late as 1770 to be the
highest mountain in England, 4,050 ft. above the sea.
=White Gill=, in Langdale, Westmorland, nearly at the back of the inn at
_Millbeck_, derives its chief interest from the loss of the two Greens
there, so graphically described by De Quincey.
This and the other gills between it and _Stickle Tarn_ afford good
climbing up the walls by which they are enclosed.
=Winter Climbs.=--Only a few years ago a man who announced that he was
going to the Lakes in the depth of winter would have been thought mad.
Exclamations of this kind are even now not unfrequently called forth at
that season of the year; yet they seem to have little or no effect in
diminishing the number of those who year by year find themselves somehow
attracted to the little inns which lie at the foot of Snowdon or of
Scafell Pikes.
On Swiss mountains winter excursions have been made even by ladies, and
perhaps the British public was first rendered familiar with the idea by
Mrs. Burnaby's book on the subject. But, in truth, the invention is no
new one, and those bold innovators who first dared to break through the
pale of custom and to visit North Wales or the Lakes in mid-winter were
richly repaid for their audacity; for there is hardly any time of year
at which a trip to Lakeland is more thoroughly enjoyable.
In the first place, there is no crowd. You can be sure that you will get
a bed, and that the people of the house will not be, as they too often
are in the summer time, too much overworked to have time to make you
comfortable, or too full of custom to care much whether you are
comfortable or not. Out of doors there is the same delightful
difference. You stride cheerily along, freed for a time from the din of
toiling cities, and are not harassed at every turn by howling herds of
unappreciative 'trippers.' The few who do meet on the mountains are all
bent on the same errand and 'mean business'; half-hearted folk who have
not quite made up their minds whether they care for the mountains or
not, people who come to the Lakes for fashion's sake, or just to be
able to say that they have been there, are snugly at home coddling
themselves before the fire. You will have no companions but life-long
lovers of the mountains, and robust young fellows whose highest ambition
is to gain admission to the Alpine Club, or, having gained it, to learn
to wield with some appearance of dexterity the ponderous ice-axes which
are indispensable to the dignity of their position. Then what views are
to be had through the clear, frosty air! How different are the firm
outlines of those distant peaks from the hazy indistinctness which
usually falls to the lot of the summer tourist! What sensation is more
delightful than that of tramping along while the crisp snow crunches
under foot, and gazing upward at the lean black crags standing boldly
out from the long smooth slopes of dazzling white! There is no great
variety of colour; for the rocks, though a few are reddish, are for the
most part of grey in varying shades; yet there is no monotony.
It is true that January days have one fault; they are too short. Or
shall we not rather say that they seem so because--like youth, like life
itself--they are delightful? They would not be too short if they were
passed (let us say) in breaking stones by the roadside. After all, the
hills hereabouts are not so big but that in eight or nine hours of brisk
exertion a very satisfactory day's work can be accomplished. In short,
youth and strength (and no one can be said to have left these behind who
can still derive enjoyment from a winter's day on the Fells) can hardly
find a more delightful way of spending a week of fine frosty weather.
=Wrynose.=--The pass between Dunnerdale and Little Langdale, and the
meeting-point of the three counties of Cumberland, Westmorland, and
Lancashire.
It would seem that we are poorer than our ancestors by one mountain, for
all the old authorities speak of this as a stupendous peak. _Defoe's
Tour_ (1753) says: 'Wrynose, one of its highest Hills, is remarkable for
its three Shire Stones, a Foot Distance each.' The name properly
understood would have put them right. The natives pronounce it 'raynus,'
and I have not the least doubt that it represents 'Raven's Hause.'
Indeed, in early charters the form 'Wreneshals' is actually found, and
the intermediate form 'Wrenose' is found in a sixteenth-century map.
=Yewbarrow= (2,058 ft.; Cumberland sh. 74) is a narrow ridge a couple of
miles long, which, seen end-on from the shore of Wastwater, has all the
appearance of a sharp peak. There is climbing at the north end about
_Door Head_ and _Stirrup Crag_, while towards the south end there are
two very interesting square-cut 'doors' in the summit ridge, apparently
due to 'intrusive dykes,' and beyond them the little climb called Bell
Rib End.
=Yorkshire= (see _Attermire_, _Calf_, _Craven_, _Gordale_,
_Ingleborough_, _Malham_, _Micklefell_, _Penyghent_, _Pot-holes_,
_Whernside_)--a county whose uplands fall naturally into three great
divisions, only one of which, however, demands the attention of the
mountaineer. The chalk _Wolds_ in the East Riding, and the moorland
group formed by the _Hambleton_ and _Cleveland Hills_, may be dismissed
here with a mere mention. The third division, which constitutes a
portion of the _Pennine Chain_, and, entering the county from
Westmorland and Durham on the north, stretches in an unbroken line down
its western border to Derbyshire on the south, approaches more nearly to
the mountain standard. Even in this division, however, only that portion
which lies to the north of Skipton attains to any considerable
importance. It is in this latter district--in _Craven_, that is, and in
the valleys of the Yore, the Swale, and the Tees--that we must look for
the finest hill scenery in Yorkshire. Most of these mountains consist of
limestone, capped in many cases by millstone grit, and of such summits
some twenty-five or thirty rise to a height of 2,000 ft. Very few of
them, however, exhibit individuality of outline, and, with the exception
of the low lines of limestone precipice which occasionally girdle them,
and of the wasting mill-stone bluffs which, as in the case of _Pen-hill_
or _Ingleborough_, sometimes guard their highest slopes, they are
altogether innocent of crag. If any climbing is to be found at all, it
will probably be among the numerous 'pot-holes,' or on the limestone
'scars,' such as _Attermire_ or _Gordale_, which mark the line of the
Craven Fault. The _Howgill Fells_, north of Sedburgh, form an exception
to the above remarks. (See _Calf_.)
Although the climber may find little opportunity to exercise his art
among the Yorkshire mountains, yet the ordinary hill-lover will discover
ample recompense for the time spent in an exploration of these hills and
dales. The ascent of _Micklefell_, of _Great Whernside_, of _Penyghent_,
or of _Ingleborough_, whilst not lacking altogether the excitement of
mountain climbing, will introduce him to many scenes of novel character
and of astonishing beauty. It is only fair to mention that the Yorkshire
waterfalls are second to few in the kingdom.
It is necessary to add a word or two with regard to the coast. The
rapidly wasting cliffs to the south of Flamborough are too insignificant
for further notice. Flamborough Head, where the chalk attains to a
height of 436 ft., is noticed elsewhere. (See _Chalk_.) The line of
coast from Flamborough to Saltburn, passing Filey, Scarborough, and
Whitby, presents an almost unbroken stretch of cliff, which, however,
will find greater favour with the landscape-lover than the climber.
These cliffs, which consist chiefly of the oolite and lias series, are
throughout crumbling and insecure, and are very frequently composed of
little more than clay and shale. _Rockcliff_, or _Boulby Cliff_,
however, near Staithes, merits a certain amount of attention. In
addition to not a little boldness of outline, it enjoys--or, at any
rate, enjoyed--the reputation of being the highest cliff (660 ft.) on
the English coast.
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