" With the Yorkshire Naturalists:' 3 



the spot on which we were standing was '* Hawk's '' yard 

 Mr. Hirst also pointed out the nature of the rock in the 

 neighbourhood, which he said he now believed to be 

 Yoredale shale. 



In conversation of this kind we strolled towards Bill's 

 o' Jack's, each member of the party looking after his own 

 speciality. Now it was a particular kind of moss that 

 attracted the attention of Mi. C. P. Hobkirk, or a fern 

 with a big long name that delighted Mr. Thomas Hick ; 

 or Mr. G. T. Porritt had fallen in love with a rare 

 caterpillar; or Mr. Prince would tell the name of a 

 bird, where it had come from, where it was going, and 

 what its business was, while Mr. Conacher searched dili- 

 gently for shells ; so that hardly a stone or a bird, or 

 a flower, or an insect was seen witbout its history, and its 

 uses being talked about and discussed. 



Arrived at Bill's o' Jacks, the party rested for a short 

 time to enjoy the scenery, which was all the more beautiful 

 because lie up with the glory of sunshine. An old poet 

 has sung : — 



" The sun when he hath spread his rays, 

 And shown his face ten thousand ways. 

 Ten thousand things do then begin 

 To show the life that they are in. 

 The heaven shows lively art and hue 

 Of sundry shapes and colours new, 

 And laughs upon the earth." 



And so on. So it was on Monday. The sun was in his 

 glory, and Irom amid the witchery of a soft blue sky 

 peered through the soft fleecy whiteness of silent clouds, 

 upon a magnificent panorama. The majestic sweep of 

 the hills, in verdure clad, and, it is no hyperbole to say, in 

 strength arrayed, stretched as far as the eye cnuld reach, or 

 until but dimly visible in the blue haziness of the distance, 

 through whicb glittered like crystal the silver streaks of 

 the mountain rills. Even such a common-place thing as 

 a reservoir in course of construction by real navvies in real 

 corduroys, looked picturesque in the verdant bosam of the 

 Greenfield valley ; surrounded on all sides by hills decked 

 with the heath with its full-round bells of brilliant pink, 

 the less pretentious heather, and the orange-blush leaves 

 of the bush of the bilberry. It was a day on which all 

 nature was filled with gladness, and the earth and the 

 heavens, the fields and the hills, were joying with an 

 exceeding great joy. 



Leaving the well-known rustic inn already mentioned, 

 we began a short but steep ascent in order to reach the 

 moors. It was tough work for the shoulders and knees, 

 and many a one stopped — of course, not for rest — but to 

 look at the beautiful landscape and to exclaim, or rather 

 to sigh as well as their gasps would allow them, " What — 

 a— splendid — view !" Here we encountered a specimen of 



