48 Beport of Meetings for 1885. By Jas. Hardy. 



limits on one side, and the heights near Yardhope and Holystone, 

 coming more fully into sight as we descend, on the other. In 

 the great slack below us is Ohesterhope with its dean whitened 

 with flowering hawthorns ; and lower down approaching the 

 Coquet are the green fields and meadows of Bickerton. 



We pass a nameless large boulder on a heathery moor, where 

 Tormentil sheds a transient gleam of twinkling yellow stars in 

 summer-time, and examine "Little Church" Crag, in which 

 there is a shallow cavern roofed like a church. On this moor 

 there was an open British grave. 



Several tumuli were now within reach, some of them excavated 

 by Canon Greenwell with results recorded in "British Barrows;" 

 but we would have to make a considerable detour to have in- 

 cluded them. Of two cists discovered by Canon Greenwell, one 

 was empty ; the other was completely filled with fine sand, among 

 which was a little charcoal and two small pieces of pottery. It 

 would have required half a day to master even the topography 

 of the rugged moors above, and their spots of interest ; for we 

 were coming within the precincts of where chance excavations 

 and fortuitous accident have revealed something of the history, 

 the dress, the weapons, and the funeral customs of the brachy- 

 cephalic people, who so labouriously constructed the neighbouring 

 strongholds, and deposited their dead on the breezy uplands, or 

 alongside their deep cut roadways.* 



"Where the ancient road that crosses along the north of Simon- 

 side descends to join that which traverses by the pass already 

 mentioned, the back moors, the sides are strongly defended on 

 the slope with trenches and ramparts, twelve in number. There 

 are similar warlike defences to be seen at the foot of Eass-castle, 

 to fortify the pass where the public road from Hebburn issues 

 out on the moor ; and the road from Eglingham where it enters 

 Beanley moor has been protected in like manner by great earth- 

 works. These instances shew some common concert of tribes of 



* For the discoveries of British graves, ornaments, implements, and 

 weapons in the neighbourhood, see, Geo. Tate, Px'oc. Soc. Ant. Scot, iv., p. 

 CO, etc; Dr. Davis, Crania Britannica, ii., p. 2, etc; Canon Greenwell, 

 British Barrows, pp. 431-2 ; Tate, Ber. Nat. Clnb. Proc. v., pp. 160, 170 ; 

 Hist, of Alnwick, i., pp. 21-2 ; (fig. ;) T. Arkle, Ber. Nat. Club Proc. viii., 

 pp. 176-177. (Bronze Swords ;) Dr. Evans, Stone Implements, p. 409 ; Bronze 

 Implements, pp. 285, 389. A bronze sword and 2 bronze rings were dis- 

 covered in some works undertaken by Sir. W. G. Armstrong, F.R.S. at 

 Cragsidc. — British Barrows, p. 433. 



