dipping beds of Tertiary sands and clays, beneath which the Cretaceous strata dipped. At some period subsequent to this deposition there was a movement of elevation, which appears to have thrown the whole mass of rocks into a fold along an anticlinal axis running west and east, which was flanked to north and south by synclinal hollows. In these hollows the Tertiary rocks were protected from erosion, and remain to form the London and the Hampshire Basins respectively, while on the anticlinal axis the whole of the Tertiary and the upper Cretaceous strata have been dissected away, and a complex and beautiful configuration has been impressed on the district of the Weald. The general character of the landscape in the Eastern Division is a succession of steep escarpments formed by the edges of the outcropping beds of harder rock, and long gentle slopes or plains on the dip-slopes, or on the softer layers; clay and hard rock alternating throughout the series.
The contrast between the lower grounds of the Western and the Eastern Divisions is masked in many places by the general covering of the surface with glacial drift, which is usually a stiff clay composed on the whole of the detritus of the rocks upon which it rests, though containing fragments of rocks which have been transported from a considerable distance. This boulder clay covers almost all the low ground north of the Thames Basin, its southern margin fading away into washed sands and gravels.
The history of the origin of the land-forms of England, as far as they have been deduced from geological studies, is exceedingly complicated. The fact that every known geological formation (except the Miocene) is represented, proves of itself how long the history has been, and how multifarious the changes. It must suffice to say that the separation of Ireland from England was a comparatively recent episode, while the severance of the land-connexion between England and the continent by the formation of the Strait of Dover is still more recent and probably occurred with the human period.
Natural Divisions.—The four prominent groups of high land
rising from the plain of the Red Rocks are: (1) the Lake District,
bounded by the Solway Firth, Morecambe Bay and the
valleys of the Eden and the Lune; (2) the Pennine
Region, The
western division. which stretches from the Scottish border to the
centre of England, running south; (3) Wales, occupying
the peninsula between the Mersey and the Bristol Channel, and
extending beyond the political boundaries of the principality to
include Shropshire and Hereford; and (4) the peninsula of Cornwall
and Devon. They are all similar in the great features of their
land-forms, which have been impressed upon them by the prolonged
action of atmospheric denudation rather than by the original order
and arrangement of the rocks; but each group has its own geological
character, which has imparted something of a distinctive individuality
to the scenery. Taken as a whole, the Western Division
depends for its prosperity on mineral products and manufactures
rather than on farming; and the staple of the farmers is live-stock
rather than agriculture. The people of the more rugged and remoter
groups of this division are by race survivors of the early Celtic stock,
which, being driven by successive invaders from the open and fertile
country of the Eastern Division, found refuges in the less inviting
but more easily defended lands of the west. Even where, as in the
Pennine region and the Lake District, the people have been completely
assimilated with the Teutonic stock, they retain a typical
character, marked by independence of opinion approaching stubbornness,
and by great determination and enterprise.
Lake District.—The Lake District occupies the counties of Cumberland, Westmorland and North Lancashire. It forms a roughly circular highland area, the drainage lines of which radiate outward from the centre in a series of narrow valleys, the upper parts of which cut deeply into the mountains, and the lower widen into the surrounding plain. Sheets of standing water are still numerous, and formerly almost every valley contained a single long narrow lake-basin; but some of these have been subdivided, drained or filled up by natural processes. The existing lakes include Windermere and Coniston, draining south; Wastwater, draining south-west, Ennerdale water, Buttermere and Crummock water (the two latter, originally one lake, are now divided by a lateral delta), draining north-west; Derwent water and Bassenthwaite water (which were probably originally one lake), and Thirlmere, draining north; Ullswater and Haweswater, draining north-east. There are, besides, numerous mountain tarns of small size, most of them in hollows barred by the glacial drift which covers a great part of the district. The central and most picturesque part of the district is formed of great masses of volcanic ashes and tuffs, with intrusions of basalts and granite, all of Ordovician (Lower Silurian) age. Scafell and Scafell Pike (3162 and 3210 ft.), at the head of Wastwater, and Helvellyn (3118), at the head of Ullswater, are the loftiest amongst many summits the grandeur of whose outlines is not to be estimated by their moderate height. Sedimentary rocks of the same age form a belt to the north, and include Skiddaw (3054 ft.); while to the south a belt of Silurian rocks, thickly covered with boulder clay, forms the finely wooded valleys of Coniston and Windermere. Round these central masses of early Palaeozoic rocks there is a broken ring of Carboniferous Limestone, and several patches of Coal Measures, while the New Red Sandstone appears as a boundary belt outside the greater part of the district. Where the Coal Measures reach the sea at Whitehaven, there are coal-mines, and the hematite of the Carboniferous Limestones has given rise to the active ironworks of Barrow-in-Furness, now the largest town in the district. Except in the towns of the outer border, the Lake District is very thinly peopled; and from the economic point of view, the remarkable beauty of its scenery, attracting numerous residents and tourists, is the most valuable of its resources. The very heavy rainfall of the district, which is the wettest in England, has led to the utilization of Thirlmere as a reservoir for the water supply of Manchester, over 80 m. distant.
Pennine Region.—The Pennine Region, the centre of which forms the so-called Pennine Chain, occupies the country from the Eden valley to the North Sea in the north, and from the lower Tees, Yorkshire Ouse and Trent, nearly to the Irish Sea, in the south. It includes the whole of Northumberland and Durham, the West Riding of Yorkshire, most of Lancashire and Derbyshire, the north of Staffordshire and the west of Nottinghamshire. The region is entirely composed of Carboniferous rocks, the system which transcends all others in the value of its economic minerals. The coal and iron have made parts of the region the busiest manufacturing districts, and the centres of densest population, in the country, or even in the world. The whole region may be looked upon as formed by an arch or anticline of Carboniferous strata, the axis of which runs north and south; the centre has been worn away by erosion, so that the Coal Measures have been removed, and the underlying Millstone Grit and Carboniferous Limestone exposed to the influences which form scenery. On both sides of the arch, east and west, the Coal Measures remain intact, forming outcrops which disappear towards the sea under the more recent strata of Permian or Triassic age. The northern part of the western side of the anticline is broken off by a great fault in the valley of the Eden, and the scarp thus formed is rendered more abrupt by the presence of a sheet of intrusive basalt. Seen from the valley, this straight line of lofty heights, culminating in Crossfell, presents the nearest approach in England to the appearance of a mountain range. In the north the Pennine region is joined to the Southern Uplands of Scotland by the Cheviot Hills, a mass of granite and Old Red Sandstone; and the northern part is largely traversed by dykes of contemporary volcanic or intrusive rock. The most striking of these dykes is the Great Whin Sill, which crosses the country from a short distance south of Durham almost to the source of the Tees, near Crossfell. The elevated land is divided into three masses by depressions, which furnish ready means of communication between east and west. The South Tyne and Irthing valleys cut off the Cheviots on the north from the Crossfell section, which is also marked off on the south by the valleys of the Aire and Ribble from the Kinder Scout or Peak section. The numerous streams of the region carry off the rainfall down long valleys or dales to the east and the south, and by shorter and steeper valleys to the west. The dales are separated from each other by high uplands, which for the most part are heathery moorland or, at best, hill pastures. The agriculture of the region is confined to the bottoms of the dales, and is of small importance. Crossfell and the neighbouring hills are formed from masses of Carboniferous Limestone, which received its popular name of Mountain Limestone from this fact. Farther south, such summits as High Seat, Whernside, Bow Fell, Penyghent and many others, all over 2000 ft. in height, are capped by portions of the grits and sandstones, which rest upon the limestone. The belt of Millstone Grit south of the Aire, lying between the great coal-fields of the West Riding and Lancashire, has a lower elevation, and forms grassy uplands and dales; but farther south, the finest scenery of the whole region occurs in the limestones of Derbyshire, in which the range terminates. The rugged beauty of the south-running valleys, and especially of Dovedale, is enhanced by the rich woods which still clothe the slopes. There are remarkable features underground as well as on the surface, the caverns and subterranean streams of Yorkshire and Derbyshire being amongst the deepest that have yet been explored. Compared with the rugged and picturesque scenery of the Lower Carboniferous rocks, that of the Coal Measures is, as a rule, featureless and monotonous. The coal-fields on the eastern side, from the Tyne nearly to the Trent, are sharply marked off on the east by the outcrop of Permian dolomite or Magnesian limestone, which forms a low terrace dipping towards the east under more recent rocks, and in many places giving rise to an escarpment facing westward towards the gentle slope of the Pennine dales. To the west and south the Coal Measures dip gently under the New Red Sandstone, to reappear at several points through the Triassic plain. The clear water of the upland becks and the plentiful supply of water-power led to the founding of small paper-mills in remote valleys before the days of steam, and some of these primitive establishments still
