THE PROVINCIAL HISTORY OF ENGLAND.
C -.YORK SHIRE :-GEOG RAVI Y. THAT great block of territory in the North-East of England to which is now given the name of Yorkshire constitutes, it need hardly be said, the largest county of England. Its area in square miles is 5,961, comprising 3,654,636 statute acres, inhabited by a population which in 1861. reached to 2,01:5,541. "It is about the size of the entire Peloponuesus, is half as large as Holland, and very nearly half as large as modern Belgium." Of the entire acreage about 2,500,000 acres are supposed to be arable, meadow, or pasture. The configuration of the county can hardly be described accurately as a whole ; but it may be called in general terms an irregular pentagon, consisting of a triangle, with the apex at the extreme south limit of the county, and on the base of this a very irregular oblong, resembling the two shoulders of a human body, with one arm hanging down. Its seaboard extends between the mouth of the Tees on the north, and the estuary of the Heather on the south, both of which rivers discharge their waters into the German Ocean, which is its only neighbour on the north- east. On the south-east it is bounded by the Humber and Lincoln- shire ; its southern extremity rests on Nottinghamshire and Derby- shire; Cheshire and Lancashire are its neighbours on the south-west and west ; Westmoreland covers its north-west frontier ; and Durham and the German Ocean complete the boundary on the north. The county is now divided into three Ridings (a corruption of Thridings, i.e., Thirdings, a division of territory found also in South Norway), the North, East, and West Ridings ; and a smaller separate district called the City of York and Ainsty ; but this last, except so far as the city is concerned, has been united with the West Riding.
The key to the physical geography of Yorkshire is the great valley of the Ouse and its feeders, which stretches from near the river Tees, in the northern part of the county, to the estuary of the Humber, in the south, with a general direction from north to south south-east. The high land on the east of this valley forms a bold coast line, the surface rising in some parts very suddenly to a great elevation. From the Tees a very irregular coast, consisting of high cliffs abounding in fossils, runs in a south- easterly direction to Whitby. At this point the cliff line is pierced by the small river Ed:. A few miles further to the south-east the coast line turns more to the south, and after being indented by the dangerous Robin Hood's Bay, proceeds south south-east to Scarborough, where an irregular promontory, projecting to the east, with an arm towards the south, forms a semicircular harbour and shelter from the easterly gales. South of Scarborough the coast line again inclines more to the east to Filey Point, near the boundary between the North and East Ridings. From Filey Bay, on the south of this, the coast runs nearly in a straight line to Flamborough Head, the extremity of a range of chalk cliffs six miles long. From the Head the coast line turns westward, and then sweeping round to the south, forms the capacious Bridlington Bay, where the sea has gradually swept away the villages of Auburn
Hartburn, and Hyde. There is a small harbour in this bay, at Bridlington Quay. From this to the pointed promontory which terminates in the Spurn Head, and forms the northern boundary of the estuary of the Humber, the coast line (running south-east and south) is generally very low, and exposed to the inroads of the sea. The Heather, which formerly encroached much on the lands about Spurn Head, has more recently receded, and left exten- sive tracts of marsh land. Part of this appeared as an island in the reign of Charles I., but is now only separated by a ditch from the mainland, and in 1851 contained 530 acres. It is still called Sunk Island. Along the preceding coast line of Yorkshire the cliffs generally rise to a height of from 70 to 150 feet, but in several parts are much higher, and on the south side of Robin Hood's Bay are 893 feet above the sea. From Spurn Bead to the confluence of the Ouse and Trent the line of the Humber is westward, inclin- ing a little to the north.
To the south of the estuary of the Tees commence, with Bramsby Moor, 784 feet in elevation, the Eastern Moorlands, which extend about thirty miles from east to west and fifteen miles from north to south, and form a wild, hilly district, "intersected by numerous picturesque and fertile valleys. North of Northallerton, where the scarped extremity of these highlands turns eastward, it overlooks the vale of Cleveland, which slopes down to the Tees. Towards the northern and western escarpments of the moorlands there are some very beautiful prospects." Botton Head rises to 1,485 feet, Loosehoe Hill to 1,401 feet, Black Hambleten to 1,246 feet, and Roseberry Topping to 1,102 feet. The eastern moorlands are separated by the valley of the Dement. runaing from near Scarborough south-west into the valley of the Ouse, from the Yorkshire !Voids, which seldom rise above 600 feet, and are broken by numerous deep winding valleys. In that part of these Welds called Holderness is the largest lake in the county, lionises, Mere, a mile and three-quarters long, with a greatest width of three-quarters of a mile. The western side of Holderness is remarkable for a fenny district, " The Cars," extending nearly twenty miles from north to south, with an average breadth of about four miles. The parts reclaimed from the Humber include the Holderness Drainage (more than 11,000 acres), the Beverley and Bramston Drainage, and the Keyingham Drainage (5,500 acres). Until about the close of the eighteenth century the \Voids " were little better than a large rabbit- warren," but are now extensively cultivated.
On the western aide of the Valley of the Ouse lie the 1Vestern Moorlands of Yorkshire, which have a much greater general eleva- tion than the Eastern Moorlands.. They form part of the great moorland district of England, extending southwards to the Derby- shire and Staffordshire hills, and occupying the whole western portion of the county. The highest elevation of this range within the county is Bow Fell, near Sedbergh, which attains an elevation of 2,911 feet; but several other elevations attain heights of from 2,200 feet to upwards of 2,300 feet. The mountain masses here indeed "are only inferior to those of Cumberland and Westmoreland," and contain "some of the grandest rock scenery in England." This group of hills is divided by the comparatively low region of Ribblesdale " into two portions, the North-western and the South- western ;" and may be further subdivided into Upper Teesdale, the extreme north-western corner of Yorkshire, with Rokeby and the neighbourhood of Barnard Castle; Richmond and its neighbourhood, —Swaledale and Arkengarthdale ; Leyburn and its neighbourhood, —Mash= and Hackfall, Wensleydale and Gatsdale to Sedbergh ; Upper lirltarfdale and the hills forming Langstrothdale Chase ; Nidikrsdale ; Shipton and its neighbourhood,—North-east Craven, and Lower Wharfdale ; Ilkley and its neighbourhood ; Settle and its neighbourhood,—Ribblesdale, Upper Airedale ; Ingleton and its neighbourhood ; South-west Craven, Lower Ribblesdale and Forest of Bowland. Distinct in character from both the eastern and western moorlands, the great valley of the Ouse and its tributaries, and the Yorkshire Welds, is "the forest district of the neighbourhood of Sheffield," in the southern extremity of the county—over which the great forest of Sherwood once extended— and of which the centres are the towns of Sheffield, Barnsley, and Rotherham.
"It is computed that the drainage of about seven-ninths of the entire area of Yorkshire, or about 4,500 square miles, runs into the basin of the Humber, and, with the exception of the district between the Wolds and the sea, the whole of this district pours its waters into the Ouse. This Northern Ouse, as it is sometimes called, is formed mainly by the union of the Ure or Yore and the Swale, and its total length, whether reckoned from the source of the Ure or the Swale, is 130 to 135 miles. The former of these two upper streams of the Ouse—the Ure—rises in the mountains at the western extremity of the North Riding, near the borders of Westmoreland, and flowing first south-east and then east along Yoredale and Wensleydale, and receiving several small tributary streams, falls, a little below Askrigg, over a succession of limestone rocks, forming what is called the Aysgarth Force, and passes to Middleham, and thence past Masham to the boundary line of the North and West Ridings, still recruited from time to time by small streams ; then with a very irregular course by Tanfield to Ripon. Here it quits the boundary line of the two Ridings, and enters the West Riding, but soon rejoins the boundary near Boroughbridge, and passing thence by Aldborough, forms a junc- tion with the Steak. This last river is formed by the junction of two streams at Maker in the western moorlands, a little to the north-west of Askrigg. Thence it flows with an irregular eastward course to Richmond, then somewhat southwards, receiving, among other tributaries, the river Gulling. Passing still southwards, a little to the west of Northallerton, it receives near that town the Bedalebeek, and further on, in the latitude of Thirsk, the Wishe stream from the western escarpment of the eastern moorlands. Thence its course is very tortuous, in a general south-south- easterly direction, to its junction with the Ure, before which it receives two considerable streams, one of which, the Codbeck, flows by Thirsk. From the point of junction of the (ire and Swale, the united streams, variously called by their names or the Ouse, continues in an irregular course, south-east, forming the boundary of the North Riding as far as York, receiving the rivers Linton and Nedd, the latter a considerable stream from the Great Wharnside and Black Fell mountains, near Kettlewell, in the west moorlands. At York the main stream receives the river Foss on its left side, and flows southward, a little to the west, to Cawood, receiving a little above that town on its right side the river Wharje, from the western moorlands. In its remaining course the Ouse forms the boundary between the West and East Ridings. It passes in a very irregular course by Selby, and receiving the Derwent on its left and the Aire on its right side, proceeds very tortuously near Howden, and by the port of Goole, where it is joined by the Dutch River or Dun Navigation, to its junction with the Trent at Faxfleet, whence the united stream, thenceforward called the Humber, passes onwards into the German Ocean.
The Don, which forms a junction with the Aire just below Snaith, rises near Saltersbrook, upon a high ground near the borders of Cheshire, and passes east and south-east to Sheffield ; thence north-east by Rotherham and Doncaster to Thorne, where it turns north to its junction with the Aire. The Ribble rises in the north-western extremity of the West Riding, and flows west and then south to the county boundary at Grindleston, thence to the south-west along the boundary till it passes into Lancashire. The Tees, which forms the boundary between Yorkshire and Dur- ham, and receives several feeders from the former county, will be mentioned more particularly when we speak of Durham.
Yorkshire is also supplied with several canals, bringing it into direct water communication with the other parts of the kingdom, but they nearly all belong to the West Riding.
The great Vale of the Ouse, or of York, stretching directly through the centre of the county, is occupied entirely by the red- sandstone series of rocks, resting along its western border "from the southern limit of the county to a point between the rivers Ure and Swale, on a much narrower belt of magnesian limestone. On the East the red sandstone is overlaid by the lies, which extends down the valley of the Esk nearly as far as Whitby, and appears in patches along the coast and inland. On the nos, and forming the mass of the north-eastern hills, rest the series of Bath and Oxford collies. A patch of Kimmeridge clay intervenes between the Oxford oolites and the chalk which forms the Wolds. Holderness is entirely a district of submarine forest and of rolled fragments brought from various and distant regions. The marshes of the lower courses of the rivers Ouse, Derwent, and Don are of more recent growth. The coal formation underlies the magnesian limestone from the border of the county as far as Leeds, then turns west to a point below Bradford, and winding round south-east by Huddersfield and Penistone, again reaches the Yorkshire border south of Sheffield. It is bordered west by the millstone-grit series, which extends irregularly quite across the county, and is pierced by large masses of Yordale and Scar limestone. The grits and limestones form the mountainous and picturesque districts of the south-west and north-west. A small patch of Silurian rock extends from Westmoreland into Yorkshire by Sedbergh and Dent, and thence round to Settle. The upper valley of the Tees is of volcanic trap, and a remarkable basaltic dyke extends from Cockfield Fen, in Durham, across the north of Yorkshire nearly as far as Whitby."
These geological formations give a very distinct character to the
several divisions of Yorkshire which meet at the city of York. The West Riding, by far the largest and most populous, has become one of the great manufacturing districts of England, owing in a great measure to the presence of coal and iron in great abundance. These are the principal natural productions of York- shire. The ironstones of the coal mines have been worked from the Roman period, and the working has never been entirely neglected, though the ironstones are not equal in value to the iron ores of Lancashire, Cumberland, and the Mendip Hills, but surpass them in quantity of yield. The Cleveland Hills, in the north-east corner of Yorkshire, "form the most important portion of the great belt" called the "new iron fields of England," discovered about the year 1850. "There were in Yorkshire in 1857, 347 collieries, pro- ducing annually 8,875,440 tons of coal. The coal-field of this county belongs to the great coal-field of Nottinghamshire and Derbyshire.
The minor natural products of the county are the lead of Swale- dale and Nidderdale ; the jet from the cliffs near Whitby ; alum from the same neighbourhood ; "excellent building-stone from the Tadcasterand Huddlestone quarries; and black and grey marble found in vast quantities throughout Nidderdale and Dentdale." The staple manufactures of Yorkshire are woollen and worsted.
Some parts of Yorkshire are extremely fertile, such, for instance, as the Vale of York, and the districts of Cleveland and Holderness. The climate varies greatly and necessarily with the different eleva- tions of the land, but is generally healthy except in the marsh dis- tricts. Agriculture is "in a medium state" of development- inferfor to that of Northumberland and Lincolnshire—and it is more of a grazing than an agricultural county. There are bred vast numbers of horses, the most valuable being the Cleveland bays. There are a considerable number of short-horned cattle, but the long-horned predominate. The county supplies most of the cows used in the London dairies ; the quantity of butter yielded is not proportionate to that of milk. The sheep are very numerous and of every variety, calculated a few years ago at about 1,200,000 head, producing annually about 28,000 packs of wool. Many hogs are kept, and the haws of the county are celebrated. "Property in the West and North Ridings is very much sub- divided," but in the East Riding it is less subdivided than in most parts of England, and "many families in that Riding have held their estates for centuries." The majority of farms in the county are unusually small, and generally held from year to year and by tenants-at-will, and "the farm-houses and buildings are, for the most part, rather indifferent."
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