452 Report of Meetings for 1881. By Jas. Hardy. 



provided, and proceeded under tlie guidance of Mr Thomas Artie 

 and the Eev. J. F. Bigge to cross by the Newcastle Eoad the 

 long stretch of high moors between the Eailway Station and Els- 

 don. The sandstone upheavals are not very high. The boggy 

 tracts feed small streams that cut down to the subjacent sand- 

 stone. A more abrupt congeries of rocks on the left hand is 

 called "Wolf Crag, bearing witness in its designation to the prim- 

 eval animals of the wild, with which the Umfraviles, Lords of 

 Eedesdale, had to combat for the conservancy of their rights, and 

 doubtless a favourite meet of the wolf hunters of pristine times. 

 Similar to it at the present day, where these hunts are still con- 

 ducted, we read of the forests of Brittany, where one — that of 

 Conveau — is described as " a forest of rock, scrub and heather ; 

 the last waist deep, and affording a rare cover for the wolves, 

 foxes and deer that frequent it f'^ all which this might well be 

 seven or eight hundred years ago. Here we enter Elsdon parish. 

 Outcrops of limestone succeed, which supply road metal, and 

 yield a better pasturage, Ottercaps being regarded as one of the 

 best grazing farms on these heights. These " green gairs," and 

 the patches of marshy ground broke up the continuity of the 

 heather, and mitigated the sombre moory aspect. Fuel is pro- 

 curable in the peat mosses. British camps are traceable on some 

 of the hill-faces, and the more projecting swellings are capped 

 with modern piles of stones or ancient commemorative cairns. 

 At length, encircled by hills with green slopes extending down 

 into low meadows, the valley of the Eede appears. Eedesdale is 

 a quiet pastoral valley, remarkable at this season for its verdure ; 

 its features are gently moulded, and mostly rounded, with no 

 very salient prominences. A dark massive mountain, with a 

 stone summit rises in front, called Padon's or Peden's Pike, so 

 named from Mr Alexander Peden, one of the most noted of the 

 outed Scotch Ministers in the reign of Charles II., who held con- 

 venticles on it among the wild borderers. In his life it is re- 

 corded that he was near the Borders in 1679. A stone still known 

 as "Peden's Pulpit," at the apex of Euberslaw in Eoxburgh- 

 shire recalls the same or similar visits. Pike, crag, law, head, 

 Tcnow, dod, edge, rig, it may be observed, predominate in the no- 

 menclature of the Eedesdale eminences. In the Harbottle direc- 

 tion the blue pike of Darden is pre-eminent, and another heath 

 darkened elevation called the King's Dod. This ridge coalesces 

 * Wolf Hunting and Wild Sport in Lower Brittany, p. 14. 



