Farming of Lancashire. 



17 



belong to the Southern ; and Lancaster, though it has produced a 

 few tall chimneys, cannot find in them much to be proud of, they 

 are evidently exotics, they do not thrive as in the south, nor in- 

 crease in number ; coals are brought from a distance, and the old 

 county town, with its ancient castle and quiet sombre-looking 

 streets, cannot in the nineteenth century be classed amongst the 

 busy and bustling scenes of manufacturing industry. 



We are therefore now in a purely agricultural district; the 

 whole appearance of the country is changed : the trees, no longer 

 blackened and begrimed with the smoke, wear their natural 

 colour ; the air is pure and the sky clear ; and the ruddy looks of 

 the inhabitants plainly testify that they do not live in mills, 

 nor pass the best of their days in driving the shuttle. Tall and 

 strong of limb, and intelligent in countenance, there certainly is 

 no physical hindrance to their being as good farmers as any in 

 England. 



The soil of this division, on the eastern parts and mountainous 

 slopes of Longridge, Bleasdale, and Wyresdale Fells is thin, and 

 of a black moorish nature ; the lower portions of the sides of the 

 hills and the valleys formed by them are commonly somewhat of 

 the nature of the holms, with brooks and rivulets running through 

 them. At the foot of the hills and through the townships of 

 Goosnargh, Barton, and Claughton, and for the most part along 

 the line of the Preston and Lancaster Railway, the soil is of a 

 stronger quality, in many parts amounting to a stiff clayey loam. 

 The Fylde is that tract lying to the westward of the above-named 

 railway, and bounded by the Ribble, the sea, and the Lune ; in 

 this low-lying country almost every kind of soil is found, from a 

 stiff clay to sand or bog, but the greater part is clayey loam and 

 alluvium, intersected in many parts with large and deep mosses, 

 such as Pilling, RawclifTe, Nateby, &c. To understand the 

 nature of the soils of this division, and the geological relations of 

 Clougha (the northern ridge of Wyersdale), Bleasdale Moors, 

 and Longridge with each other and with the Fylde, the annexed 

 sketches, taken from Professor Phillips' ' Report on the Vicinity 

 of Lancashire,' may be of service ; all the hills are capped by 

 lower millstone grit, resting on the limestone shale ; this section 

 is made on a line drawn from north to south : — 



Clougha. 



VOL. X. 



C 



