1872.] TLDDEMAN- ICE-SHEET m NOKTH LANCASHIRE ETC. 473 



district. It consists of the entire thickness of the Millstone -grit and 

 Toredale series, and runs with a tolerably straight course from near 

 Chorley on the sea-side plain to and beyond the great watershed ; 

 its highest point is PendleHill, 1831 feet. The rocks of which it is 

 formed dip, for the greater part of their course, at very high angles 

 to the south-east. To this I shall again refer. 



The nibble runs along an anticlinal valley excavated in carbo- 

 niferous shales and limestones, which, from the alternations of hard 

 and soft rocks, crumble away quickly under denuding forces. 



Between the Kibble and the Lune lies a great rudely circular 

 patch of high moorlands intersected by small radiating valleys, which, 

 as it has no general name, I will call for the purposes of this paper 

 the Central FeUs. It is about 18 miles in diameter, and consists of 

 the Toredale and Millstone Grits, dipping gently north. The 

 highest point is Ward's Stone, 1836 feet, 5 feet higher than Pendle ; 

 but several of the Fells rise to nearly 1800 feet. Indeed, looking 

 from the hill-summits, one cannot but be struck by the apparently 

 uniform level to which all these Fell-tops rise, suggesting most vividly 

 a very old " plain of marine denudation." The summits show here 

 and there mounds of loosened rock in the last stages of disintegration. 

 Sometimes scars of grit occur, but only where some valley-slope in 

 close proximity has eaten into the foundation of the rock which 

 forms it. Generally the tops are rounded and void of any sharp 

 features, and for the most part clothed in peat-moss from 1 to 15 

 feet or more in thickness ; and they form a wild bleak country, 

 tenanted only by sheep and grouse, the plover and the curlew. North 

 of this tract the grits of which it is composed dip beneath the com- 

 paratively low district of the Ingleton coal-field; it is between 

 the 200- and 500-feet levels in the basin of the Lune. To the west 

 of this is the Lune, running south-west by Lancaster ; and again 

 west, separated by a low tract, lies the estuary of the Kent. 



The north-east corner of the map contains a high tract of country, 

 constituting one of the principal parts of the Pennine chain of hills. 

 On its south-east border lie the well-known hills of Ingleborough, 

 Pennigent, and Fountains Fell, rising respectively to the heights of 

 2373, 2231, and 2191 feet above the sea ; and on the north, Whernside 

 2414, Gragreth 2250, Widdale Fell 2203, &e. This high country is 

 separated from that west and south-west by a broad valley, which 

 runs along the Craven Faults. This may have been at some former 

 time a continuous line of drainage, but is now crossed by the water- 

 sheds between the Lune and the Kibble and the latter and the Aire; 

 and portions of it are now drained by all three of these rivers. It 

 has been already mentioned that the general course of the Lune and 

 Kibble is to the south-west; but the former, when running alongside, 

 and the latter through, this high tract, have a southerly direction. 

 The fact remains that over the greater part of this district these 

 rivers and their tributaries, and consequently the valleys, run to the 

 south-west. 



I now propose, first, to give a description of the scratches found 

 upon the solid rocks, distinguishing, where possible, between those 



