Page:The National Gazetteer - A Topographical Dictionary of the British Islands, Volume 3.djvu/916

Rh YORKSHIRE. 904 YORKSHIRE. commerce, manufactures, and the arts, and only 4J per cent, by agriculture. In this division are situated the manufacturing towns of Leeds, Sheffield, Bradford, Huddersfield, Halifax, Wakefield, Rotherham, Keighley, Ripon, Barnsley, Doncaster, Bingley, and Dewsbury, together containing above half a million of inhabitants. The manufactures are chiefly woollen, cotton, and silk, hardware, cutlery, arms, machinery, and an almost inde- scribable variety of useful articles ; but a fuller account of these will be found under the several headings of the places named above, each of which possesses its peculiar industries. The West Riding is also rich in coals and ironstone, which are extensively worked, chiefly in the neighbourhood of Leeds, Sheffield, Bradford where the seams are thickest Wakefield, and Barnsley ; there are likewise mines of copper and lead, and quarries of lime- stone, freestone, and grindstone. The great Yorkshire coalfield lies chiefly to the W. of the Vale of York, between the Aire and Don, being comprised "within a circle which extends across the Derbyshire border, and may be defined as described by a line drawn through Todwick, Conisbrough, Elmsall, Pomfret, Aberford, Horsforth, Wilsden, Halifax, where the coal strata are thinnest, and Huddersfield, where the circle again crosses the Derbyshire border. This circle encloses about 45 miles by 20, consisting of carboniferous strata 4,000 feet thick, but only about 40 feet of coal, in 20 consecutive layers or beds, from 1J to 10 feet each in thickness, the top seams being usually of inferior quality, the next good for furnaces, and the lower, which are at an average of 200 feet below the surface, of excellent qua- lity, interlaid with beds of ironstone ; the other inter- vening strata chiefly consist of clay, shales, and sand- stone. In the vale of York the strata chiefly belong to the New and Lower Red sandstone formations, with magnesian limestone in places which last is exten- sively quarried for burning into lime. Within this Vulcanian district all kinds of manufactures most flourish. To the N. and VV. of the carboniferous -forma- tion, gritstone prevails as far down as Sheffield, and in the north-western portion of the West Hiding, com- prising the mountainous district of Craven, carboni- ferous limestone and slaty rocks prevail. For registra- tion and statistical purposes, the West Riding is shared into 29 registration districts, but as many townships are still under the Gilbertine, or local Act, and not under Poor-law unions. The boundaries of these divisions do not always correspond. The North Riding, which com- prises the maritime portion of the county, between the rivers Derwent and Tees, has neither such large nor populous townships and parishes as the West Riding, but is better divided than that district. Its chief towns are Scarborough and Whitby, both parliamentary bo- roughs, the inhabitants of which are chiefly engaged in ship-building, ship-owning, the coal trade, and various branches of nautical enterprise. Richmond and Malton are likewise parliamentary boroughs, each returning two members to parliament, and Northallerton and Thirsk one each- the former being also a sessions town. There are also the market towns of Easingwold, Helmsley, Leyburn, Stokesley, Bedale, Guisborough, Pickering, Reeth, Askrigg, Hawes, Kirby Moorside, Masham, Middleham, and Yarm, and the port of Hiddlesborough. About 14 per cent, of the inhabitants of this district live by agriculture, and only 12 per cent, by commerce and manufactures, contrasting remarkably with the West Riding. Of the surface nearly one half is uncultivated, and about a quarter unimprovable moorland. Along the coast are Filey Head, a mass of coral ragstone: Scarborough port and castle; Ravenhill camp, where the Danes landed under Hubba in 876 ; the Peak Alum works, situated on the Alum slate rocks, which in some places attain an elevation of 900 feet above the sea; Robin Hood Bay, named by the Romans Dunum Sinus, with its lias cliffs abounding in remains of saurians and other fossils; Whitby port; Stoupe Brow Cliff; Mulgrave CastU; Runswick Bay; Easington heights ; Redcar and Scars reefs, composed of Rod sandstone; the ports of Cleveland and Middlesborough, at the entrance to the Tees. The East Riding is about the size of an average shire, being of the extent of 1,201 square miles, or 768,419 acres. It is bounded on the S. by the firth of the Humber and the shire of Lincoln, on the N.E. by the shore of the North Sea, on the N. by the North Riding, and on the W. by the West Riding, and is in circuit about 170 miles, of which 80 are coast-line, for the most part low and sandy. The chief feature, as influencing the geographical character of the district, is the Humber, with the Ouse and its branches falling in on the W. On the Humber is the great town and port of Hull, or Kingston-upon-Hull, anciently called Alms, one of the leading commercial towns in England, with safe anchorage in 5 to 6 fathoms water, leading up to Goole port. The other considerable towns are Beverley, a sessions and market town, Sculcoates, Bridlington, Great Driffield, Howden, Pocklington, Hedon, Patring- ton, South Cave, and Market Weighton, all market towns. Much of the land is in cultivable wolds or rich lowlands, watered by the Hull river, the feeders of the Ouse, and the brooks falling into the Humber. The sea-shore and the shore of the Humber facilitate navi- gation, and the Ouse and Hull are navigable and canalised. About 13 per cent, of the people live by commerce, navigation, and manufactures, and 12 per cent, by agriculture. The progress of the population has been considerable, chiefly owing to the great in- crease of manufactures in the West Riding, and thereby of the export and import trade through Hull, which is a shire of itself, having its own assizes and separate juris- diction. Even in the districts of the East Riding more purely agricultural, the population has vastly increased owing to the improvements in husbandry, which have been carried out on a great scale during the present century. Warrens have been converted into good sheep lands, marshes been drained, lands enclosed, and a little timber planted on the Wolds, which are now well culti- vated. The principal artificial manures made use of are chalk, ground boras, wreck or sea-weed, and shell-marl, which last is obtained in Holderness and near Market Weighton, where bones of the elephant, rhinoceros, bison, and other extinct quadrupeds have been found. The farms in Yorkshire are generally large, averaging from ,200 to 1,500 rental, and are generally held by yearly tenure. The Keyingham and Hedon levels drain into the Humber, and the Lambwith, Holderness, Barnston, and Beverley levels into the Hull. The county has long been noted for the excellence of its breed of horses, especially coach and saddle-horses, which are reared in great numbers in the North and East Ridings, round Cleveland Bay, and are sold at the fairs of Beverley, Malton, York, and Howden, the capital of this district, where the largest horse-fair in England is held. The West Riding is famous for the Craven breed of long-horned cattle, and Holderness for its short-horned, or Teeswater breed. The Penistone breed of sheep is supposed to be indigenous, but a cross between the Leicester and South Down are now generally pre- ferred on the Wolds. In the East Riding, where the surface is not overlaid by post-tertiary deposits, the chalk crops up in hard chalky swelling wolds, extending over a space of 30 miles by 20, or about 400,000 acres, principally laid out in sheep-walks. Beyond the chalk, which is never found N. of Hunmanby, a thin border of greensand, coral rag, and lias extends, often rising into hills of considerable elevation ; and thence all the rest of the East Riding, as far as the Ouse, forms part of the vale of York, previously described. Formerly the whole of Yorkshire, with the exception of the north-western portion of the North Riding, which belonged to the diocese of Chester, was in the diocese of York, but since the formation of the bishopric of Ripon, by an Order of Council dated October 5, 1836, the county is ivided between the dioceses of York and Ripon in the following proportions the archdeaconry of York comprising the West Riding, the archdeaconry of the East Riding, and the archdeaconry of Cleveland, constitute the diocese of York, and are under the immediate charge of the arch- bishop of tho province of York, who is also primate of