190 VEGETATION OF THE PEAK DISTRICT [CH. 



to 2088 feet (636 ra.) at Soldier's Lump. The latter is the 

 highest altitude attained by any Pennine summit south of the 

 Great Whernside group. The Peak occupies an area of about 

 three square miles (nearly 80 ares). It is clad throughout its 

 entire length and breadth with peat which is about twelve feet 

 (363 cm.) deep on the average. The peat is dissected by very 

 numerous stream channels, formed in the manner just indicated. 

 The summits of the resulting " peat-hags " are, on the whole, 

 dominated by the bilberry ( Vaccinium Myrtillus) ; but the crow- 

 berry (Empetrum nigrum) and the cloudberry (Rubus Chamae- 

 morus) are locally very abundant, forming plant societies. Here 

 and there extensive patches of bare peat occur. 



The bulk of the peat, all in fact except the lowest layer, is 

 composed of the remains of the cotton-grass. The lowest layer 

 is black, very much compressed, and very deficient in air. When 

 wet or damp, this layer is slippery, like wet soap, to the touch : 

 when dry, it is sometimes brittle and shiny, not altogether 

 unlike Whitby jet. Such peat, which is typical of the highest 

 peat moors, is quite structureless ; and one can only speculate 

 as to the plants of which it is the remains. On the sandstone, 

 underneath the peat, there is a thin layer of brittle, reddish- 

 brown ferruginous " pan " (" Raseneisenstein ") : on the shale, 

 however, true " pan " (" Ortstein ") occurs below the peat (cf 

 Tansley, 1911 : 103). Remains of trees have not been found 

 on the plateau of the Peak, but only on its slopes, where 

 remains of birch were noted in a gully at an elevation of 

 about 1800 feet (549 m.). 



The Peak is not an imposing mountain. Viewed fi-om the 

 east or south, only its grassy slopes can be seen. From Ashop 

 dale, on the north, the Edge, as it is called, of sandstone rock 

 stands out rather boldly. From the west, the steep and rocky 

 slopes of Kinderscout provide a wild and picturesque landscape. 

 This view is especially fine, in the spring when the young 

 red and green shoots of the bilberry, and in the autumn when 

 the richer brown and golden colours of the dying fronds of the 

 bracken contrast with the sombre green of the heather and 

 crowberry and the forbidding blackness of the precipices and 

 large and loosely scattered boulders. Only on the Glossop and 

 Sheffield high road, at its highest elevation four miles out of 

 Glossop, may a general view of the summit be obtained ; and 



