xviii YORKSHIRE— PHYSICAL ASPECT. 



deep and narrow * doughs ' or ravines, are, in comparison with the 

 Fells of the north-west, of but shght interest to the naturalist. 

 Homogeneous in their geological structure, and presenting no 

 other soils than the barren and unproductive peat-laden and 

 heather-covered millstone grit, they afford little variety in their 

 fauna. The high moors are inhabited by grouse — more strictly 

 preserved here than elsewhere — and by occasional pairs of curlew, 

 golden plover, snipe, black grouse, ring ouzel, and less frequent 

 still an odd pair of dunlin ; the streams are the haunt of the 

 dipper, the grey wagtail, and sandpiper, while the lower parts 

 of the valleys are inhabited by such birds and animals as are able 

 to maintain their ground against man and his works. For the 

 south-western moorlands are situate between the two great coal- 

 fields and manufacturing districts of Yorkshire and Lancashire, 

 and are not only of easy access to a vast population, but within 

 the direct influence of the clouds of smoke which accompany the 

 manufacture of cotton upon the one side, and woollens and 

 worsteds upon the other. 



The Manufacturing District. — At the foot of the south- 

 western moorlands, and to the east of them, the great Yorkshire 

 coalfield stretches from Leeds and Bradford to Halifax, H udders- 

 field, Wakefield, Barnsley, and Sheffield. Within this compara- 

 tively limited area is congregated the great mass of the population 

 of Yorkshire, for here the presence of coal and ironstone has 

 determined the location of some of the world's greatest industries; 

 and the coal-mining districts of the West Riding aff"ord one of the 

 clearest demonstrations of the transforming influence of human 

 agencies upon the surface of a country. The air is laden with 

 smoke above, the rivers run black and polluted below, vegetation 

 is checked and stunted, animal life is scarcely able to maintain its 

 ground, and fish have long been banished from rivers whose foul- 

 ness and inky blackness can only be paralleled by that of the 

 streams of the neighbouring county palatine of Lancaster. 



Naturally well-wooded, the district still retains that charac- 

 teristic in parts, more especially in the southern portion, where 

 the noble Chase of Wharncliffe, overlooking an extensive prospect 



