Page:EB1911 - Volume 28.djvu/718

 WILTSHIRE [], a south-western county of England, bounded N.W. and N. by Gloucestershire, N.E. and E. by Berkshire, S.E. by Hampshire, S.W. and S. by Dorsetshire, and W. by Somersetshire. The area is 1374.9 sq. m. A great upland covers two-thirds of the county, comprising, in the north-east, Marlborough Downs, with Savernake Forest; in the centre, the broad undulating sweep of Salisbury Plain; and in the south, the more varied hills and dales of the Nadder watershed, the vale of Chalk and Cranborne Chase. Large tracts of the Chalk are over 600 ft. above the sea, rising in many parts into steep and picturesque escarpments. Several peaks attain an altitude of 900 ft., and Inkpen Beacon, on the borders of Berkshire, Wiltshire and Hampshire, reaches 1011 ft. Scattered in thousands over the downs lie huge blocks of siliceous Tertiary grits, called sarsen stones or grey wethers, which were used by the primitive builders of Stonehenge and Avebury. The underlying Greensand is exposed in the deeper valleys of the Chalk, such as the vale of Pewsey, dividing Sahsbury Plain from Marlborough Downs, and the vale of Chalk, dividing the Nadder westward from the heights of Cranborne Chase. One of the most charming features of the county is its fertile and well-wooded valleys. Three ancient forests remain: Cranborne Chase, which extends into Dorset, was a royal deer-park as early as the reign of John, and, like Savernake Forest, contains many noble old oaks and beeches. The main part of the New Forest belongs to Hampshire; but No Man's Land and Hampworth Common, its outlying heaths and coppices, encroach upon the south-eastern corner of Wilts. Bentley Wood, 5 m. E. of Salisbury, and the Great Ridge and Grovely Woods between the Nadder and Wylye, are fine uplands parks. There is no great sheet of water, but the reservoir near Swindon, and the lakes of Longleat, Stourton and Fonthill in the south-west of Earl Stoke near Westbury, and of Bowood, Corsham and Seagry near Chippenham, deserve mention for the beauty of their scenery. The upper reaches of the Thames skirt the north-eastern border, and three other considerable rivers drain the Wiltshire Downs. The Kennet, rising west of Marlborough, winds eastward into Berkshire and meets the Thames at Reading. The Lower or Bristol Avon flows from its source among the Cotteswolds in southern Gloucestershire, past Malmesbury, Chippenham, Melksham and Bradford, where it curves north-eastward into Somerset, finally falling into the Bristol Channel. Besides many lesser tributaries it receives from the south the Frome, which forms for about 5 m. the boundary between Wilts and Somerset. The East or Christchurch Avon, which rises near Bishops Cannings in the centre of the county, flows east and south into Hampshire, and enters the sea at Christchurch. Close to Salisbury it is joined by the united streams of the Nadder and the Wylye; by the Ebble, which drains the vale of Chalk; and by the Bourne, which flows south by west from its head near Ludgershall.

Geology.—As has been said, about two-thirds of the surface of Wilts is occupied by a great Chalk upland. Cropping out from beneath the Chalk is a fringe of the Selbornian—Upper Greensand and Gault—the former is well exposed in the vale of Pewsey, west of Devizes, and along the margins of the vale of Wardour; it forms a broad, hilly tract from Mere through Stourton to Warminster. The Gault Clay runs regularly at the foot of the Upper Greensand; it is excavated in several places for brick-making. The Lower Greensand, which oversteps the underlying formations, appears from beneath the Gault at Poulshot and follows the same line of outcrop northwards; a small outlier at Seend is worked for the iron it contains. About one-third of the county lying on the north-west side of the Chalk downs, including a portion of the vale of the White Horse, is occupied by Jurassic rocks. The Upper Lias—the oldest formation in the county—forms the floor of the valley near Box; it is followed by the overlying Inferior Oolite and Fuller's Earth. Then succeeds the Great Oolite Series, which includes the famous building-stones of Bath, quarried at Winsley Down, near Bradford, and at Box, Corsham Down and other places in the neighbourhood. Above the freestones near Bradford comes the Bradford clay, with the well-known fossil Apiocrinus or pear-encrinite, followed by the Forest Marble limestones and clays. The rubbly Cornbrash crops at Westwood, Trowbridge, and Malmesbury. Further east lies the outcrop of Oxfordian strata, comprising the sandy Kellaways beds and overlying Oxford Clay, together forming a broad low-lying tract in which stand row bridge, Melksham, Chippenham and Cricklade. Rising up from the eastern margin of the Oxfordian vale is the irregular scarp formed by the Corallian oolitic limestones and marls. The iron ores of Westbury are obtained in this formation. Another clay-bottomed vale lies on the eastern side of the Corallian ground, from near Calne to Swindon, where it is exploited for bricks. It appears also between Seend, Coulston and Westbury; also between Mere and Semley. About the former place it is brought into apposition with Cretaceous rocks through the agency of an east to west fault. At Tisbury and near Potterne are small outcrops of Portlandian rocks which yield the familiar building stones of Tisbury and Chilmark. Limestones and clays of Purbeck age lie in the vale of Wardour about Teffont Evias. At Dinton in the same vale the Wealden formation just makes its appearance.

In the south-eastern corner of the county there are tracts of Tertiary Reading Beds and London Clay east of Downton and on the Clarendon Hills; these are covered by Bagshot Beds at Alderbury and Grinstead, also on Hampworth Common. Outliers of Reading Beds and London Clay occur about Great Bedwin; the sarsen stones previously referred to represent the last remnants of a mantle of Tertiary rocks which formerly covered the district. Here and there drift gravels and brick earths, besides low-level river gravels, rest upon the older rocks.

Agriculture.—Some five-sixths of the total area, a high proportion, is under cultivation, but a large amount of this is in permanent pasture. The soil, a heavy reddish loam, with a subsoil of broken stones, in the north-west, but lighter in the chalk region, is essentially that of a pastoral country, although there are wide tracts of richer land, suitable for wheat and beans. Oats, however, are the largest grain crop. There is a small acreage classified as hill pasture. The green crops consist mainly of turnips, mangolds and swedes. Baconcuring is carried on. Large numbers of sheep are bred on the downs, and dairj'-farming is practised in the north-west. There are manufactures of condensed milk. An agricultural college is established at Downton.

Manufactures.—A majority of the hands employed in factories and workshops are occupied in the locomotive works of the Great Western railway at Swindon. There are also large engineering works at Devizes. Cloth is still woven, though in greatly diminished quantities, at Trowbridge, Melksham, Chippenham and other places where water-power is available. Carpets are woven at Wilton, haircloth and coco-nut fibre at Melksham, silk at Malmesbury, Mere and Warminster. Portland and Bath stone are quarried for building purposes, while iron ore from mines near Westbury is smelted in that town.

Communications.—Three great railway lines traverse Wiltshire from E. to W., throwing out a number of branch lines to the larger towns. In the N. the Great Western main line passes through Swindon on its way from London to Bath. A second line of the same system runs also to Bath from Hungerford, by way of Devizes. South of Salisbury Plain the South-Western main line goes through Salisbury and the southern quarter of Wilts on its way into Somerset. The chief branch line is that between Salisbury and Westbury on the Great Western. The Midland & South-Western Junction railway runs north from Andover by Swindon, Cricklade and Cirencester. Swindon, Salisbury and Westbury are the three centres of railway traffic. The Avon is navigable as far as Salisbury, and goods are carried on the Thames & Severn Canal in the N.E., and on the Kennet & Avon Canal across Salisbury Plain. These waterways were formerly connected by a branch of the Berks & Wilts Canal, which runs S.W. from Berkshire, through Swindon and Melksham, but was closed in 1899.

The area of the ancient county is 879,943 acres, with a population in 1891 of 264,997 and in 1901 of 273,869. The area of the administrative county is 864,105 acres. The county contains 29 hundreds. The municipal boroughs are—Calne (pop. 3457), Chippenham (5074), Devizes (6532), Malmesbury (2S54), Marlborough (3887), Salisbury, a city and the county town (17,117), Swindon (45,006), Wilton (2203). The urban districts are—Bradford-on-Avon (4514), Melksham (2450), Trowbridge (11,526), Warminster (5547), Westbury (3305). Other small towns are Cricklade (1517), Downton (1786), Highworth (2047), Mere (1977), Pewsey (1722), Wootton Bassett (2258). The county is in the western circuit, and assizes are held at Salisbury and Devizes. It has one court of quarter sessions, and is divided into 16 petty sessional divisions. The boroughs of Devizes and Salisbury have separate courts of quarter sessions and commissions of the peace, and the borough of Marlborough has a separate commission of the peace. There are 335 civil parishes. Wiltshire is mainly in the diocese of Salisbury, but a considerable part is in that of Bristol, and small parts in those of Gloucester, Oxford and Winchester. It contains 322 ecclesiastical parishes or districts, wholly or in part. The county is divided into five parliamentary divisions, each returning one member—Northern or Cricklade, North-western or Chippenham, Western or West-