28 GEOLOGICAL EXCURSION. 



it rushes over the edge, it is stopped by a projecting rock; on whose sur- 

 face it has deposited a magnificent fringed stalactile cushion, which splits 

 up the water, throwing it on sides in glancing lines of foam; and in rainy 

 weather forming a fine fountain-like shoot. This is the finest waterfall in 

 these dales, and the gloomy fissure which it has formed is very grand. 

 We gathered the Lesser Rue Weed, {Thalidram minus ^ which grows in 

 great profusion in the moist fissures of the rocks. 



Leaving Girsdale we rode down the valley of the Aire to Kirkly Malham, 

 then ascended the hills on the Moor road to Settle, (let no admirer of 

 the beautiful be tempted by the smoothness of the way to go to Settle 

 by the lower road.) When we reached the highest point of the moor we 

 found that we were crossing the last spur of the mountains, as they sunk 

 into the valley of Craven. The sun was setting behind a dark cloud, the 

 edges of which were fringed with golden light: a few bright red islands 

 of cloud floated in a waste of pale green weird-looking sky, which filled 

 up the horizon, fading as the eye followed it into the deep blue of the 

 zenith: the rays which streamed from behind the dark cloud lightened up 

 the tops with a deep red glow, and threw into a deep purple shadow the 

 base of the beautiful fells which rise round Bolton and the Wharfe, and 

 stretch in long lines athwart the whole of the eastern horizon. They 

 threw up in strong relief the grand slope of Pendle Hill, which bounded 

 the view and the valley to the south, and shed a golden mist on the three 

 summits which form the highest point of Bolland Forest, throwing into 

 shade the deep valleys which indent the whole district; while a gush of 

 light barred by lines of purple shadow filled the valley at our feet, and 

 slept on the still pools which glanced like burnished brass. 



To stand where we stood, on the wide moors with the dark hills rising 

 ridge beyond ridge behind us and before us, this lovely scene with the 

 fresh breeze of evening sighing past us — no sound breaking the stillness 

 but the cry of the startled lapwing, and the gentle monotonous drone of 

 a little brooklet, as it fell drowsily from rock to rock, watching the 

 changing light as it stole up the hill sides and died away on their sum- 

 mits, leaving one after another cold and dark, and making the rest more 

 brilliant, could not but cause the gazer to feel how lavish Nature is of 

 her beauties, to any one who will but seek her in her wild solitudes. 



Descending from the moors, we found ourselves in Settle almost before 

 we could see the town, so closely does it nestle itself under a huge rock : 

 the Eibble, as it emerges from its narrow dale into the open valley flows 

 round it. 



At Giggleswick, near Settle, at the point where the Limestone abuts 

 upon the Millstone Grit, which is here thrown down some hundred feet in 

 the line of southern dislocation connected with the Craven Fault are Gig- 



