Seal- Bark. 185 



abode there. Sixteen were once killed in a day, but 

 now not one remains. (Crede Mr Bolton.) 



Seal-Bark Rocks seem the broken bones of a ruined 

 mountain, carried to the summit of the precipice, and 

 flung over as so much waste. Scrambling among them 

 and the great masses of tall whortle that fill the spaces 

 between, so enormous is the confusion that we are cast 

 back in thought to the earliest throes of chaos, which 

 here seems to have a memento. Refreshing is it at the 

 same moment, to see the one solitary mountain-ash, 

 with its delicate and acacia-like foliage, that gives to 

 its locality the name of Wicken-hole " wicken " or 

 " quicken " being the local appellation borne by this 

 beautiful tree and to note the pretty spring of water 

 called "Fair- well." To continue over the moors is a 

 work of great labour, so that, for the return, it is best to 

 retrace our steps along the margin of the stream. 



If, instead of going up to " Bill's o' Jack's," we bear 

 to the left of the road, hard by appears a summit 

 called " Pots-and-Pans," a name with as little euphony 

 in it as the former, and quite as characteristic of the 

 district. It has reference to a great quantity of rough 

 and dissevered rock upon the summit, of the same 

 general character as the fragments at Seal-Bark, but in 

 several places seeming to bear the marks of rude tools, 

 which tradition or fancy associates with the Druids. 

 There seems to be no doubt that druidical remains have 

 been found in the neighbourhood. The interest of 



