8 



The heath is another most charming faunal area, from the fact 

 that some few scattered portions are still in their primitive con- 

 dition, as in the neighbourhood of Woodhall Spa and the warrens 

 and commons of Scotton, Manton, Twigmoor, Crosby and 

 Brumby, in the north-east. The Ermin Street, that great milit- 

 ary highway of the Romans, which passed through the gates of 

 their chief fortress, Lincoln, followed the ridge of the oolite from 

 south to north — to east and west of this was a wide, open and 

 continuous stretch of elevated tableland, the road running 

 ' through leagues of purple heather where the pink and purple 

 shading of the common and cross-leaved heaths, intermingled 

 with the yellow blooms of the petty whin and sheets of pale 

 blue hairbell, and the darker blue gentian [Gentiana pneunionanthe). 

 A glorious land it was to cross in those days, the long, lone, 

 level line of a well-kept war path, stretching like a ribbon over 

 the heath, and marked at short intervals with high stones or 

 posts as a guiding line in fog or snow, in a solitude but rarely 

 broken, except by the footfall of the legionaries and the dismal 

 creakings of the baggage train and provision carts, while above 

 under the blue heaven the lark carolled as it does now, and the 

 plaint of the golden plover sounded sweet from off the moorlands. 



The north-east corner of Lincolnshire, notwithstanding recent 

 changes and trade encroachments, is still rich in animal and 

 plant life, and presents a wide field for future research. Further 

 westward, and beyond the Trent, lies the Isle of Axholme; some 

 portion adjoining the great deer chase of Hatfield and Lind- 

 holme, in Yorkshire, was once the hunting-ground of English 

 kings. We must turn to the pages of historians, such as Leland, 

 De la Pryme, Dr. Stonehouse and others if we wish to learn its 

 ancient condition before the enterprise of the Dutchman Ver- 

 muyden transformed its wastes and swamps and demon-haunted 

 solitudes into fertile lands, and at the same time banished its 

 indigenous flora and fauna. In fact, the entire district, including 

 Thorne waste, beyond our border, and portions also east of 

 Trent, resembled the " tundras " of Lapland and northern Asia, 

 and, like these, were the breeding-homes of innumerable wild- 

 fowl and waders. Most suggestive of a not remote Arctic 

 character are the lingering of such plants as Selaginella selagino- 

 ides, Lycopodium alpinum, recently discovered by the Rev. W. 

 Fowler, also Andromeda poli folia, and Empetrum nigrum, on Thorne 

 waste, Myrica gale, generally, and the impressions of leaves of 

 some Arctic willow in the laminated silts and peaty alluviums. 



