THE NATURALIST IN NIDDERDALE. 355 
part of the lower slopes of the Pennine chain, which may truly be 
called the nursery of the famous breed of Yorkshire shorthorns. 
The cattle are subject to a disease which causes them to swell up 
about the eyes and tail, when they are said to be “ betwenged” 
(Anglo-Saxon thweng, a charm, or phylactery). 
Quitting the zone of cattle-grazing country we may now turn 
to Nidderdale proper. For the first six miles from Great Whern- 
side the valley takes an easterly course, and both sides are 
marked by lines of fine escarpment—a@ propos of which it may 
be observed that this kind of scenery, terrace rising above terrace, 
which has been so faithfully depicted by Turner, is peculiar to 
the valleys of the Pennine chain, not only as regards England, 
but Europe, as neither Norway, the Hartz, nor Switzerland show 
anything of the kind. To return, however, below this the valley 
turns to the south, after which only the eastern side continues 
to be steep. The margin of each terrace is frequently marked 
by a line of wood, but the slopes and terraces are grazing land. 
Nearly all the enclosed land on the sides of the dale as high as 
Woodale, 1000 feet, has been ploughed. It was ploughed straight 
up and down. No doubt this was necessary, as the slopes are so 
steep that heavy showers would wash away the soil. 
Agriculture has never been a complete success in the dale, 
and within these twenty years the last of the ploughed land in 
the dale north of Pateley Bridge has been “‘ swathed.” Several 
late harvests, and some never got at all, have the credit, locally, 
of having contributed to this result; but the true explanation 
demands a wider view. The dalesmen themselves say that oats 
often failed, and wheat would not ripen; but that, as oatmeal was 
almost their only article of food, they and their fathers were 
obliged to put up with bad crops and imperfect success, as they 
were too poor to fetch oatmeal from the better districts. Though 
from such names as “‘ Rye Close” one would infer that rye had 
once been cultivated in the dale, there has been none grown for 
the last eighty years, and all the old inhabitants say that they 
never heard of any being grown. However, in the winter of 
1799-1800 wheat bread was very dear, and the inhabitants of 
Lofthouse fed upon rye bread. Nidderdale is now one large 
grazing field. Not only are the young shorthorns nursed here, but 
vast flocks of sheep are reared on the moors. ‘“ Sheep-gates,” or the 
right to turn sheep on to the moors, are let in specified numbers 
