A

HANDBOOK FOR TRAVELLERS

IN

DURHAM

AND

NORTHUMBERLAND.

WITH TRAVELLING MAP.

LONDON:

JOHN MURRAY, ALBEMARLE STREET.

1864.

mho might of Translation is reserved.

HENRY MORSE STEPHENS

D4M9

LONDON: PRINTED BY WILLIAM CLOWES AND SONS, STAMFORD STREET,

AND CHARING CROSS.

PREFACE.

THE Handbook for Durham and Northumberland has been drawn up from minute personal investigation, during many months spent in wandering through even the least inhabited parts of the counties described. Those portions of the book, however, which are of more general interest, are due to the assistance which the Editor has verbally received from the natives of the two counties, especially from those of Northumberland, to whose kindness and hospitality he is deeply indebted. The chief local authorities on antiquities, architecture, botany, agriculture, mining, &c., also kindly looked over and corrected the MS. before it was submitted to the press.

To a certain extent this volume is on a different plan from the Handbooks which have preceded it. The interest of the northern counties rests mainly on the habits and customs of their people, both as they are seen at present, and as they are handed down by the ballads and traditions of former times. There is scarcely an old peel tower on a desolate moorland in Northumberland which has not been the scene of some heroic exploit or romantic adventure during the rude state of border society which preceded the Union; and a resident, to whom these stories are familiar, would consider no Handbook of any value that confined itself to the mere description of places and buildings, which would be all that would be required in a southern county.

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