Page:Transactions of the Natural History Society of Northumberland, Durham, and Newcastle-upon-Tyne (1867).djvu/118

100 sloping short, wooded hollow shaped like the letter Y. There are not here, as in Allendale, many fir plantations at a considerable height on the moor, little crag is to be seen, but the stream is broad, and its channel pleasantly diversified by shelves and boulders of massive blue limestone rock. The population of the dale is considerable; neat, wide-spreading villages, with churches, chapels, and school-houses succeeding each other rapidly at the bottom of the valley, while farm-houses dot the green fields that extend up the hill-side. The ridge in this part is 1000 feet above the stream and the bank is tolerably steep, the distance between the watershed line on the north and south being generally about 6 miles. The upper part of Weardale resembles Wensleydale or Swaledale far more than it does Teesdale, Allendale, or North or South Tynedale. Teesdale is much wilder in its scenery, and altogether exceptional in its botany, and none of the Northumbrian dales have the limestone in their upper part. The village of St. John's Chapel, 2 miles east from Wear Head, is perhaps the most convenient centre for exploring the upper part of the dale; the neighbouring ravine of Harthope, where a little stream tumbles over a succession of limestone edges, is the most picturesque bit of scenery in the neighbourhood. From St. John's Chapel eastward to Stanhope, a distance of 6 miles, the villages are fewer. On the south the glens of Swinhope, Westenhope, and Snowhope, each about 3 miles in length, open out into the main dale, and on the north the more considerable dale of Rookhope, 8 miles in length from the north-west, beginning within a very short distance of Allenheads. In Rookhope are the valuable mines of the Weardale Iron Company, and the limestone shows itself at 1100 feet.

The bridge over Stanhope Burn, at the west end of the town, is 670 feet above sea-level, and the limestone crops out on the hill-side at 800 to 850 feet. The moor upon the north of the town is still 1000 feet above it, the highest point being 1712 feet above sea-level, whilst on the south Monk's Moor, in the direction of Middleton, attains 1854 feet. Frosterley, which is situated 2 miles lower down, is about 500 feet high, and the limestone 150 yards. Above it Bollihope, a glen from the south-west