Page:Transactions of the Natural History Society of Northumberland, Durham, and Newcastle-upon-Tyne (1867).djvu/117

Rh and for the same distance on the north separates Durham and Northumberland. Round the head of the dale sweeps a continuous crescent of high barren grassy or heathery fell, several of the peaks of which exceed 700 yards, whilst the passes into Cumberland, Teesdale, and Allendale are all from 500 to 600 yards in elevation. Due south of Allenheads, only a very short distance from the highest point of the road from Allendale to Wear Head village, Stangend Rigg attains 2075 feet. At the extreme north-west of the county Kilhope Law reaches 2206 feet, with a view extending northward over Whitfield Fell to Simonside and the Cheviots. The four peaks of the western watershed ridge, proceeding from north to south, are Knoutberry Hill (2195 feet), (the knoutberry is Rubus chamaemorus, which grows on the upper part of all these fells in profusion), Dead Stones (2326 feet), Burnhope Seat (2368 feet, the highest point in the county), and Ashgill Head (2274 feet). From the village of St. John's Chapel five glens radiate towards the south-west, west, and north-west, like spokes from the axis of a wheel, Kilhope, Welhope, Burnhope, Irishope, and Harthope. On the west side of the boundary peaks just mentioned, we have the Main Limestone at an elevation of 700 yards. In Kilhope, Welhope, and Burnhope it forms crags along the edge of the fells at from 550 to 600 yards, so that everywhere in the peaks masses of gritstone overlie it. Proceeding eastward, before reaching any of the villages, Burtreeford Dike is encountered, which throws down the beds towards the east not less than 90 fathoms. This crosses the upper part of Irishope, bending due north across the lower part of Burnhope and the united burns of Kilhope and Welhope, turns a little eastward, so as to margin with limestone crags the highest point of the Weardale and Allendale road, and then crosses the county boundary. None of these western hopes show much of the limestone cliff. In Burnhope there is a curious bank of crumbling dark-coloured shale with a natural wood of birch, alder, and stunted willows, in which grow Crepis succisaefolia, Carduus heterophyllus, and Hieracium gothicum and tridentatum. At Wearhead (1100 feet), the highest village in the dale, the stream has already attained a considerable size. Black Dene on the north is a steeply