253 



The farmers were all making hay while the sun shone with 

 its full summer force, the crops being plentiful and good. 



The party passing down the valley of the Breamish were glad 

 to resume their vehicles at ''Ingram Glidders," and so drove on- 

 ward by Powburn and Crawley Dene to head-quarters at the 

 Castle Inn, Whittingham, where half exhausted nature was 

 plentifully restored. 



The only plant deserving special notice, though all the ordinary 

 wild flowers were abundant, but much less varied than in Upper 

 Teesdale, was the ''Wood Yetch," Vicia syhatica, "not uncom- 

 mon," says Bentham in his Handbook of the British Flora (1858), 

 "in Scotland, and occurs in most hilly wooded districts of Eng- 

 land and Ireland." It was seen in luxuriant perfection in Eod- 

 dam Dene, hanging from a high brae many feet down towards 

 the path. It was met with again once or twice afterwards in 

 Crawley Dene. The Wood Yetch as seen during this excursion 

 quite justified what Sir Walter Scott has sung of it growing by 

 the banks of Greta, in Canto lY. of "Eokeby." 

 " Yon tufted knoll, with daisies strown, 



Might make proud Oberon a throne, 



While, hidden in the thicket nigh, 



Puck should brood o'er his frolic sly ; 



And where profuse the wood vetch clings 



Round ash and elm, in verdant rings. 



Its pale and azure-pencilled flower 



Should canopy Titania's bower." 

 The second day's drive was in a westerly direction, by Esling- 

 ton Hall, Netherton, and Biddlestone Edge, to Alwinton and 

 Linbridge, where, by a succession of small but impetuous and 

 boiling falls, the Coquet bursts from its porphyritic barrier and 

 runs through a winding and gradually widening valley on its way 

 to Harbottle. The deep clear pools of this justly celebrated 

 stream afforded, every now and then, opportunities for a cooling 

 bath and invigorating swim, which gave at least a temporary re- 

 lief from the almost tropical heat of the sun. The party lunched 

 in the shade of the banks of the Usway, a little above Shillmoor, 

 where this burn joins the Coquet. During their drive to Alwin- 

 ton they heard the Corncrake in a field mown the day before. 



