BOTANY 
village of Threlkeld are extensive quarries of granitic rock for street pavement. Owing ina 
great measure to these rocks being much affected by cleavage and to their being well jointed, 
they tend to give rise to screes, and especially is this the case below the foot of each crag. 
These screes or masses of loose rock fragments of varying sizes, from their very nature pre- 
sent a great variety of surface—wet or dry, sunny or shady, bare rock or thin soil—and are the 
chosen abode of a great variety of plants, many of which, our bonniest ferns and club-mosses 
among the rest, are rare in other less favoured situations. 
A series of hills of inferior elevation lies along the north-western base of the Cumbrian 
group. These have a very distinct and remarkable outline, conoidal or plum-pudding shaped. 
They include Great and Little Mell Fells, Soulby Fell, and Dunmallet at the foot of Ulls- 
water. Great or Wester Mell Fell, as it is sometimes called, attains an elevation of 1,760 
feet. The rest of the series are of inferior altitude. They consist of masses of conglomerate 
of variable thickness, generally considered as forming part of the Upper Old Red Sandstone. 
In the extreme north-western angle of the area, the cliffs composing the lofty promontory 
known as St. Bees Head, rising upwards of 300 feet in perpendicular altitude above the sea 
at their base, and continued at gradually decreasing height to the mouth of the river Derwent 
below Workington, belong to the New Red Sandstone formation. 
Between the shore-line and the loftier mountains, and amongst the foothills of the range, 
large deposits of iron hematite ores have been discovered and extensively worked during the 
last half-century. Large works have been established for the smelting of these ores and the 
manufacture of steel rails, etc., for railway purposes, which are largely exported to all parts 
of the globe. The furnaces are at Millom, Cleator Moor, Whitehaven, Harrington, Working- 
ton and Maryport. The ports of export are the three last-mentioned towns and Whitehaven. 
So small an interval separates the sea from the mountains in this area that the rivers 
are but short in their course; the descent being so rapid that, with the single exception of 
the Derwent, they are little serviceable for purposes of navigation. ‘They include the Esk, 
Irt, Mite, Calder and Ehen. 
The botanical productions of this area ‘include of course many plants of an alpine 
character not to be met with elsewhere in the county, or even in England. The following 
are deserving of special mention, taking them in the order observed by the compilers of the 
London Catalogue as under: halictrum alpinum, L., is found on Scawfell Pikes, overlapping, 
Salix herbacea ; also near Sprinkling Tarn, Styhead Tarn and Great End; summit of Black 
Sail pass; Hanging Knott at about 2,000 feet, with Funcus triglumis, L., and on Little Hel- 
vellyn, 2,400 feet, where it flowers in great plenty, and there the writer saw it for the first 
time in a fully developed stage, although he had for years noticed it by the edge of rills at a 
lower altitude. Epimedium alpinum, L., mentioned by old writers as occurring on Skiddaw, 
Blencathra and Carrock, is now confined to gentlemen’s pleasure grounds, as about White- 
field House, Overwater ; Gilgarran, Whitehaven, etc. Silene acaulis, L., crags of Mickledore, 
and on the black rocks of Great End (1,500-2,000 feet). It occurs at several stations im- 
mediately beyond the border line which divides Cumberland from the adjoining county of 
Westmorland. Lychnis alpina, L., is found only on one of the lake hills (Hobcarten, over 
the vale of Lorton), said to have been first gathered by a schoolboy when searching for 
‘cill’ for the home manufacture of slate pencils (Wilson Robinson). A/chemilla alpina, L., 
abundant on most of the Lakeland hills of the slate formation. It is found on Scawfell, Great 
End, Lingmell, Great Gable (up to 2,750 feet), Red Pike, Pillar, on the Ennerdale and 
Wastdale hills, Honister, etc. Saxifraga oppositifolia, L., high slate crags; very rare; near 
the summit of Scawfell. In the writer’s opinion this plant may be overlooked when not in 
bloom, or passed by as Thymus Serpyllum, Fr., the more likely as it flowers early in the season. 
Saxifraga nivalis, L., near the summit of Scawfell; Helvellyn; Legberthwaite Fells, on the 
western or Thirlmere slope. Epilobium alsinefolium, Vill., on the Helvellyn group of hills, 
Great Gable, Styhead Pass, Ashness Ghyll, Whinlatter, etc. Saussurea alpina, DC., high 
slate cliffs; very rare; near Floutern Tarn. A specimen in the writer’s possession was 
gathered by him at some risk on the cliffs of Little Helvellyn, just over the Westmorland 
border in 1882. At the same date Saxifraga stellaris, L., was observed in bloom within a few 
feet of the highest peak on Helvellyn proper. The following Hieracia, viz. H. alpinum, 
L., H. chrysanthum, Backh., H. anglicum, Fr., H. pallidum, and H. argenteum, Fr., have 
all been found on the lofty cliffs of Scawfell, Glaramara, Great Gable, or Great End. 
Oxyria digyna, Hill., high wet slate crags, not uncommon ; Piers Ghyll, Mickledore, Sty- 
head Tarn, Wastwater Screes, Honister, Helvellyn Screes, over Wythburn, ‘ Eandem in Westm. 
et Cumbria montosis observavit T. Lawson et nos etiam olim’ (J. Ray, 1690). Salix herbacea, 
79 
