Lord Durham filled a larger place in the eyes of his contemporaries than many statesmen who have been better remembered. He was in his lifetime regarded as a great popular leader; and his accession to supreme political power was for some years considered probable by many; his opinions were, however, too extreme to command the confidence of any considerable party in parliament before 1840. That Brougham hated him and Melbourne feared him, is a tribute to his abilities; and in the first Reform Act, of which he was the chief author, and in the famous Report on the principles of colonial policy, he left an indelible mark on English history. His personal defects of character did much to mar the success of a career, which, it must be remembered, terminated at the age of forty-eight. He was impatient, hot-tempered, hypersensitive to criticism, vain and prone to take offence at fancied slights; but he was also generous and unvindictive, and while personally ambitious his care for the public interest was genuine and untiring.
By his first wife Durham had three daughters; by his second, who was a lady of the bedchamber to Queen Victoria but resigned on her husband’s return from Canada, he had two sons and three daughters. The eldest son, Charles William, the “Master Lambton” of Sir Thomas Lawrence’s celebrated picture, died in 1831; the second, George Frederick d’Arcy (1828-1879), succeeded his father as 2nd earl of Durham. The latter’s son, John George Lambton (b. 1855), became 3rd earl in 1879.
See Stuart J. Reid, Life and Letters of the First Earl of Durham (2 vols., London, 1906); The Greville Memoirs, parts i. and ii. (London, 1874-1887); Richard, duke of Buckingham and Chandos, Memoirs of the Courts and Cabinets of William IV. and Victoria (2 vols., London, 1861); William Harris, History of the Radical Party in Parliament (London, 1885); Harriet Martineau, History of the Thirty Years’ Peace (4 vols., London, 1877); William Kingsford, History of Canada, vol. x. (10 vols., Toronto, 1887-1898), H.E. Egerton, Short History of British Colonial Policy (London, 1897).
(R. J. M.)
DURHAM, a northern county of England, bounded N. by Northumberland, E. by the North Sea, S. by Yorkshire, and W. by Westmorland and Cumberland. Its area is 1014.6 sq. m. It is wholly on the eastern slope, the western angle being occupied by spurs of the Pennine chain, exceeding 2300 ft. in height at some points on the Cumberland border. West of a line from Barnard Castle by Wolsingham to the neighbourhood of Consett the whole of the land, excepting narrow valleys, lies at elevations exceeding 1000 ft. This area represents roughly one quarter of the total. The principal rivers rising in these hills are the Derwent, tributary to the Tyne, forming part of the county boundary with Northumberland, the Wear and the Tees, which forms almost the whole of the boundary with Westmorland and Yorkshire. The dales traversed by these rivers in their upper parts, though sufficiently strongly contrasted with the dark, barren moors surrounding them, yet partake of somewhat the same wild character. Lower down, however, are beautiful and fertile valleys, the main rivers flowing between steep, well-wooded banks; while the lesser streams of the coastal district have carved out denes or ravines on the steep flanks of which vegetation is luxuriant. Castle Eden Dene, 7 m. N.W. of Hartlepool, is famous for its beautiful trees and wild flowers. The coastward slope is fairly steep in the northern half of the county, but it is steady, and the coast itself has no striking scenic features, save where the action of the waves upon the magnesian limestone has separated great masses, leaving towering fragments standing, and fretting the face of the rock with caverns and arches. The cluster of rocks named the Black Halls, 6 m. N.W. of Hartlepool, best exhibits these features. Other natural phenomena include the Linnkirk caves near Stanhope in Weardale in which numerous fossils and bones, with evidence of habitation by man, have been discovered; and the Hell Kettles, S. of Darlington, near the junction of the Tees and the Skerne, four cavities filled with water, reputed to be unfathomable, and measuring from 80 to 120 ft. in diameter. The water is sulphurous.
Except in the moorlands of the west only a few scraps of the county have been left in their natural state; but these portions are of great interest to the student of natural history. The ballast-hills at Shields, Jarrow and Hartlepool, formed by the discharge of material from ships arriving in ballast from foreign countries, are overgrown with aliens, many of which are elsewhere unknown in this country. Nearly fifty different species have been found. Stockton was almost the last retreat in England of the native black rat. Of the former abundance of deer, wild ox and boar every peat bog testifies by its remains; the boar appears to have existed in the reign of Henry VIII., and records of red deer in the county may be traced down to the middle of the 18th century.
Geology.—The uplift of the Pennine hills causes nearly all the stratified rocks of Durham to dip towards the east or south-east. Thus the oldest rocks are to be found in the west, while in passing eastward younger rocks are continually met. In the hilly district of Weardale and Teesdale the Carboniferous Limestone series prevails; this is a succession of thick beds of limestone with intervening sandstones and shales. Some of the calcareous beds are highly fossiliferous; those at Frosterley near Stanhope are full of the remains of corals and the stone is polished as a marble. Much of the higher ground in the west is capped by Millstone Grit, as at Muggleswick and Walsingham commons. The outcrop of this formation broadens eastward until it is covered by the Durham coalfield which occupies the centre of the county from Newcastle and South Shields to Barnard Castle. The Coal Measures are about 2000 ft. thick and contain upwards of 100 seams of coal, including many of great importance—the Brockwell coal, Low Main coal and High Main coal are some of the well-known seams. Fireclays of great value are obtained from beneath many of the coal seams. Apart from the coals, the Coal Measures are made up of beds of sandstone and shale, the former called “post” and the latter “plate” by the local miners. Permian magnesian limestone succeeds the Coal Measures on the east, it reaches from the Tees to South Shields in a broad tract and occupies the coast between that town and Hartlepool. Remarkable concretionary forms are found in the Fulwell Quarries simulating honeycomb and coral structures. The stone is quarried at Marsden for the manufacture of Epsom salts; it is also used for lime-making and building. Fish remains are not uncommon in it. The sandstones and marls seen between the magnesian limestone and the Coal Measures at South Shields, Newbottle and several miles farther south are usually classed as Permian, but they may possibly prove to belong to the lower series. In the south-east corner of the county, by Darlington, Stockton and Seaton Carew, the low ground is made of Triassic rocks, red marls and sandstones with beds of gypsum and rock salt. Coal Measures undoubtedly underlie the Permian and Triassic strata. Normal faults traverse the district, mostly from east to west. Great dykes and sills of basalt lie in the Tees valley above Middleton and one, the Great Whin Sill, may be followed in an easterly direction for over 120 m. The Cockfield dyke and Little Whin Sill are similar intrusions of basalt. Lead mines have been extensively worked in the limestone districts of Weardale and Teesdale; the limestone itself is quarried on a large scale for fluxing in the ironworks. Glacial deposits obscure the older rocks over much of the county, they contain travelled stones from the Pennines and Cheviots. Submerged forests appear off the coast at West Hartlepool and other points. A small patch of Silurian occurs near Cronkley on the Tees; here slate pencils were formerly made.
Agriculture.—Near the river Tees, and in some places bordering on the other rivers, the soil is loam or a rich clay. At a farther distance from these rivers it is of inferior quality, with patches of gravel interspersed. The hills east of the line from Barnard Castle to Consett are covered with a dry loam, the fertility of which varies with its depth. West of the line the summits and flanks of the hills are in great part waste moorland. Only some two-thirds of the total area of the county are under cultivation, and nearly two-thirds of this are in permanent pasture. There are also nearly 60,000 acres of hill-pasture. Of the diminished area under corn crops oats occupy more than one-half, and barley much exceeds wheat. Nearly two-thirds of the average under green crops are occupied by turnips, as many cattle are raised and have a long-standing reputation. The cows are especially good yielders of milk. The sheep are also highly esteemed, particularly the Teesdale breed. Those of Weardale are small, but their mutton is finely flavoured.
Mining.—The mountain limestone contains veins of lead ore and zinc ore. The beds of coal in the Coal Measures have long been a source of enormous wealth. The mines are among the most extensive and productive in the kingdom. At Sunderland the coal trade furnishes employment for hundreds of vessels, independently of the “keels” or lighters which convey the coal from the termini of the railways and tramways to the ships. The seams worked extend horizontally for many miles, and are from 20 to 100 fathoms beneath the surface. The Frosterley marble has been quarried for many centuries near Stanhope for decorative purposes, in Durham cathedral and elsewhere taking the place of Purbeck marble, while in modern houses it is used chiefly for chimney-pieces. Ironstone is worked in the neighbourhood of Whickham and elsewhere. Excellent slate is quarried at several places. The neighbourhood of Wolsingham abounds in fine millstones. The Newcastle grindstones are procured at Gateshead Fell; and firestone for building ovens, furnaces and the like is obtained in various parts of Durham, and exported in considerable quantity.