454 HISTORY OF THE BROWNEY VALLEY 



matter which begins by Neville's Cross, follows the line of the 

 Red Hills, and skirting the western side of the Wear Valley 

 passes by Aykleyheads and Kimblesworth to Plawsworth, and 

 can be traced through its successors on by Chester-le-Street 

 and Ravensworth to Marley Hill, where, so far as I know, 

 their existence ends. With these successors we have little 

 furtlier concern to-night, though they have exercised a pro- 

 found influence over the later history of the Wear. 



The Red Hills moraine, as for convenience we may call it, 

 the first of the series, claims now our exclusive attention. 

 The Browney tells us the story of its birth, and in the doing 

 of it carries us back to the last Ice Age, commonly known as 

 the Glacial Age, an age so recently departed that its foot- 

 prints are clearly discernible by the seeing eye, everywhere up 

 Browney Valley. 



Let me briefly summarize the doings of the ice in our 

 County of Durham in this Glacial Age. It had three periods, 

 one of advancing glaciers, a maximum period with ice-sheet, 

 and a last, of retreating glaciers. Neither the advancing nor 

 the retreating were probably unbroken ; the latter certainly 

 was not, as the Derwenthaugh evidence proves. 



Now the fossils of the preceding geological formations, the 

 Cretaceous and Tertiary, show that this land enjoyed a genial 

 clime, which gradually departed, leaving first our hills and 

 mountains covered with snow and ice, and later our valleys 

 too, until even the North Sea was invaded, our whole county 

 wearing an ice mantle. This was first purely a home product, 

 and being on a slope, was ever on the move in the direction of 

 the slope, namely from west to east ; hence our whole county 

 is strewn with local travelled stones whose home is always 

 found westwards. Remember that from the beginning of the 

 Glacial Age Durham had its own glacier, and though after- 

 wards dwarfed by greater ice-streams, it continued to have its 

 little say till the whole ice story was told. 



This Durham glacier with its neve occupied Upper Teesdale, 

 the whole of Weardale, and South Tynedale, its head being in 

 the Cross Fell range. 



