ENGLISH AGRICULTURE. 85 



has ceased to exist. The domain of agriculture has ended. 

 I remember when I was a youth studying farming in mid- 

 Northurnberland looking over these moors and heaths, and 

 being told that I might walk without meeting a fence from that 

 portion of mid-Northumberland down to the Peak of Derbyshire. 

 The tourist could pass right down through the moorlands of 

 Durham into the dales, moors, and uplands of West York- 

 shire, and might actually continue all the way down until he 

 came to Dovedale and the Peak district of Derbyshire ; so 

 that when we take into consideration the coal and manu- 

 facturing districts of Yorkshire, and the manufacturing and 

 coal districts of Lancashire, and the fine extent of dales and 

 pastoral lands from the Peak of Derbyshire up to North- 

 umberland, it is clear that so far as a survey of agricultural 

 lands is concerned we have come to the end of our task. 



There is one more formation which has not been named, 

 and which must not be omitted, and that is the old red 

 sandstone, which comes up below the mountain limestone 

 from the depths beneath. The old red sandstone, as might 

 be expected, is to be found upon the far west and north ; 

 for instance, it first comes to the surface on the north bank of 

 the river Severn, forming a portion of Monmouthshire, Here- 

 >rdshire, and a small part of Worcestershire. It crosses to 

 lrecknockshire,and very generally gives soils of extraordinarily 

 ligh fertility. Like many other formations, it is divided by 

 geologists into upper, middle, and lower. We may dismiss 

 upper and lower as giving districts in which the soils are 

 Hnarkably poor, as, for instance, in Sutherlandshire and in 

 trts of Gloucestershire. But the middle members, or the 

 >rnstones and the marls, give soils of high fertility, so that 

 old red sandstone is spoken of as highly fertile. This 

 so in the county of Mon mouth and in Herefordshire, where 

 lere is splendid land, adapted for the growth of hops, fruit, 

 id well adapted for wheat. In the counties of Hereford, 



