are the only further augmentations it receives worthy of notice, until it reaches the region of cultivation and human habitation among the meadows of Angram; when it receives from the right the waters of Stean Beck, a stream equal in magnitude to itself, which has drawn its waters from Herders Edge, and the many small streams known as Little Cross Gill Beck, Great Cross Gill Beck, Red Scar Dike, Skitter Gill Dike, West Gill Dike, Blowing Gill Dike, East Gill Dike, Blowing Gill Beck, Maiden Gill Beck, How Gill Sike, and Wissing Gill Sike. The situation of the farm-stead of Angram is secluded and lonely, the last house in the valley, standing on a tongue of land between two brooks, and fenced around by bleak heathy mountains; on the west Great Whernside, on the north Little Whernside, (1983 feet high), and on the south Aygill Pike, and hills ranging from 1600 to 1700 feet in altitude. The plough has not ascended so high as this place, and the country is nearly destitute of trees, the only exceptions being a few lonely alders by the sides of the streams. Below Angram the valley contracts, and the hills rise more abruptly from the river, especially on the southern side; limestone appears at the bottom, black and hard, above which are thick beds of millstone grit and shale, with coal; which last is worked on both sides of the valley, at Woogill on the left, and Scarhouse Edge on the right; the seam is little more than a foot in thickness, and the quality the best in the dale. The Lodge is the name of a couple of houses on the left, and Heathen Car, the significant name of another on the right the first undoubtedly takes its name from one of the hunting Lodges of the forest of Nidderdale; the other would almost tempt one to think that it had been named by some poor erring monk from Byland having been sentenced to pass his time here "in penance dree," for some slight breach of monastic rule, and deeming in his vexation of spirit that he had been driven beyond the pale of civilization gave it the name of Heathen Car.* Woodale is on the northern side, where is a fine avenue of trees and a rookery, things of rare occurrence here; this part of the dale being almost destitute of timber of any bulk, a few sycamores near the houses, and a thin line of indigenous trees by the sides of the river, constituting nearly the whole. There are many patches of underwood consisting of thorns and hazels (gorse is rare), scattered along the hill sides; small plantations of larch occur lower down, but planting has not been carried to any extent, even where it would have been the most profitable use to which the lands could have been put; besides clumps of timber would have sheltered the enclosed lands, and greatly improved the natural beauty of the valley. This scarcity of trees is owing chiefly to the tenure under which the land is held, being long leases, which reserve all woods and even underwoods, to the use of the lord of the fee, with the exception of what may be necessary for repairs on the premises. Woodale was the original home and for a long time the residence of the family of Horner,† which * Pronounced in the neighbourhood Hadencar, and found in nearly a similar form in ancient maps. In Blome's Britannia, 1673, it is Hathenker. In Spelman's Villare Anglkcanum, 1655, it is Hatherker, and Newhouses, which is the name of the next hamlet is Newthoas. + The name of Horner is very common in the dale; the Middlesmoor registers from their commencement are nearly half filled with them. If they have all been derived from one family it must have held a considerable estate, and have at different times been liberal benefactors to the township. George Horner was the owner of this place very early in the 17th century, from whom descended Simon Horner, who founded the school at Middlesmoor, in the year 1803. He married Elizabeth, daughter of Thomas Wickstead, of Nantwich, in Cheshire, and settled at Sunderlandwick, near Driffield in the East Riding; he attained the patriarchal age of 93 years, died July 29th, 1829, and was buried at Middlesmoor. Below Woodale the hard black limestone disappears, apparently depressed by a fault, and the river flows occasionally over a bed of coarse gritstone, until it reaches Newhouses, when the limestone again appears at a considerable height on the south side. Numerous small streams pour into the river from springs on both sides, though none of them are of much importance; a current derived from the levels of the Woogill coal-pits enters from the north above Newhouses, and stains the stones in its bed of a dark ochery hue, indicative of the presence of iron. The hills on the south are short uneven slopes, rising rapidly from the river, sometimes broken into scars, which disclose the beds of gritstone, plate, and shale. On the north the slopes are easier and of greater length; the been at a distant period. The following extracts will show their distribution at the beginning of the 18th century : 66 Lodge. George, son of Thomas Horner, bap. 2nd Nov. 1701." "Middlesmoor. Alice, daughter of John Horner, Curate, bap. ye 13th of Jan. 1703." "Woodale. George, son of John Horner, bap. ye 1st of Oct. 1704." "Westhouse. Mary, the wife of Thomas Horner, buried the 24th Feb. 1716." 66 Sykes. Ann Horner, buried July ye 20th, 1719, widow. "Bouthwaite. William Horner, buried the 19th of February, 1711." "Stean. Mary, daughter of Roger Horner, bap. ye 1st of March, 1712." enclosed land of greater extent and value; the meadow fields have generally in some part of them a small barn, in which the hay is housed to be eaten by cattle in the winter. Some patches of arable land begin to appear, but rarely a whole enclosure. Behind Woodale rises Deadman's Hill, the boundary of Nidderdale in that direction; a short distance from which, on the moor are two small lakes, bearing the names of Woogill Tarn and Coverdale Tarn. Newhouses is a very small hamlet, situate almost close to the river, over which is a bridge of a single arch, the first by which it is crossed. Notwithstanding * The ancient name of this hill was probably Nidderhow or the lower hill, in contradistinction to the Whernsides, which it nearly adjoins on the east. The present name is said to have been given it, on the discovery of human bodies, found embeded in the peat, in a perfect state of preservation, due to the properties of the matter among which they were buried. The tradition is, that these were the bodies of three Scotch pedlers, who were in the habit of travelling through the dales with drapery goods twice a year, occasionally carrying large sums of money with them; and that they were murdered for the sake of their money in a house in the upper part of the dale, and the dead bodies conveyed on a sledge to this place and buried at midnight, on the boundary line between two parishes and two divisions of the county; the actors in this "most foul and bloody murder" deeming that by so doing they would baffle the ends of justice, should any discovery or judicial enquiry be made. No legal enquiry ever was made; the friends of the missing men some time after made search for them, they could be traced into Nidderdale and even to a certain house there, but no further. Nothing was known to directly criminate any one, and enquiry was dropped. Many years afterwards these bodies were found by workmen digging peat, when rumour again told the tale of the murdered Scotchmen, and even pointed to the place where the deed was done, declaring that there were stains of blood on the stairs which could not be effaced. "Aged matrons shake their withered heads, and say That stain of guilt can ever wash away." All accounts concur (and it is nearly in the mouth of every one), that more than one hundred years have elapsed since the deed was done, consequently the actors must have gone to their final account long ago. the name this spot has long been inhabited, and, though in Stonebeck Up, and consequently in the forest of Middlesmoor, at the general dissolution of the monastic orders, belonged to the Abbey of Fountains, and in a valor of the estates of that house, is styled "Logia de Newhouse in Nedderdale," and stated to be of the annual value of 60s. No vestige of the old lodge is visible, the present buildings are all modern. The Nidd, from its rise to a short distance below this place, flows in an easterly direction, and thence southward until it passes Lofthouse, and joins How Stean Beck. The valley here is deep and narrow, on the right the Mountain limestone, in Thedra Wood, forms a lofty mural precipice, and on the left, close to the river is Beggarmote Scar, a lofty, ragged, weather-beaten cliff, above which, on the steep hill side, is a tangled brake of underwood. Here the township of Fountains Earth comes down to the water on the eastern side. Near the foot of Beggarmote Scar, a swallow in the bed of the river, called Manchester Hole, absorbs a large quantity of the water at all times, and in very dry seasons the whole of it. On the eastern side, about ten yards distant from the ordinary river bed, are two gaping fissures in the earth; at the bottom of which the water can be heard, and occasionally seen. The sides of these openings are clad with mosses and ferns, and appear to be a favourite habitat of the Hart's tongue, or Scolipendrum Vulgare, the fronds of which attain a large size. About a quarter of a mile lower down is the great natural curiosity called GOYDON POT, a subterraneous cavern in the rock, which, * * Professor Phillips derives the name from the Celtic Gof, Ogof, a Is not the very significant word Gob, mouth, from the same cavern. J |