xxii INTRODUCTION. 



of coal and ironstone has determined the location of some of 

 the world's greatest industries ; and the coal-mining districts 

 of the West Riding afford one of the clearest demonstrations 

 of the transforming influence of human agencies upon the 

 surface of a country. The air is laden with smoke above, 

 vegetation is checked and stunted, while the foulness and 

 inky blackness of the rivers can only be paralleled by that of 

 the streams of the neighbouring county palatine of Lancaster. 

 Naturally well-wooded, the district still retains that 

 characteristic in parts, more especially in the southern portion, 

 where the noble Chase of Wharncliffe, overlooking an extensive 

 prospect in the Don valley, and the fine parks about Barnsley 

 and Wakefield, still afford a shelter to woodland species of 

 birds, some of considerable interest — such as the Nightingale 

 and the Pied Flycatcher — though the inimical influence of 

 smoke has long told upon the trees. The district is also 

 interesting as within it is situated Walton Park — the sylvan 

 domain wherein for many years Charles Waterton extended 

 complete protection to living things of all kinds. In an old 

 ivy tower there nested in one spring seven pairs of Jackdaws, 

 twenty-four pairs of Starlings, four pairs of Ring-doves, the 

 Barn Owl, the Blackbird, the Redbreast, the Redstart, the House 

 Sparrow, and the Chaffinch. A walled bank, in the natural- 

 ist's garden, was fitted with drain-pipes, intended for nesting- 

 holes of Sand Martins, which took advantage of the hospitality 

 offered them, and upwards of fifty pairs nested there. Large 

 numbers of Magpies, Jays, and Carrion Crows bred in the 

 Park ; an extract from one of Waterton's note books states 

 that on 15th December 1863 he counted more than a hundred 

 of the latter birds preparing to go to roost. Here flourished 

 a famous Heronry, which after the death of Waterton was 

 disturbed and finally dispersed. But the continued presence 

 of so dense a population and the ever-increasing demands 

 of modern commerce are gradually breaking up and destroying 

 what suitable habitats the district still possesses, hastening 

 the process of extinction which is continually going on, and 

 thus diminishing a fauna which was never at any time a very 

 rich one. 



