Just below Alston we once more set foot on Northumbrian soil. The Ayleburn and the Gildersdale waters flow from opposite directions along the county boundaries, the one from high moorlands, by the old manor-house of Randalholme, the other from the peaty morass where once flourished the great forest of Gildersdale. Henceforth the country assumes a more gentle aspect. The lead-mines have been left far behind; the river lies broad in the sunlight, or darkens under the shadow of trees; there are gentler undulations in the hills, and
“Long fields of barley and of rye
That clothe the wold and meet the sky.”
The remains of Whitley Castle, which is the modern and inappropriate name of a Roman station, are to be seen shortly after the Gildersdale Burn has joined the Tyne, and here, also, one comes upon an ancient Roman road, the Maiden Way, along which it may have been that “a woman might walk scatheless in Eadwine’s day.” Hereabouts the river is pleasantly fringed, and cool, and full of shadows and deep reflections. At brief intervals it is joined by some new tributary, pouring noisily out of a little valley of its own. Of these one of the most interesting is the Knar, which comes down in a boisterous and scurrying manner from a region of wilderness and lofty fell, where the red deer lingered latest in these parts, and where the remains of ancient forests may be discovered in the soft and treacherous moss.
Very rich in interest and beauty are some of the glens through which these mountain rivulets flow, with sudden precipices, and narrow defiles, and rock-strewn gorges, and the charm of moss and fern and overhanging tree. Knaresdale Hall, which is no more than a farmhouse in these days, is some distance lower down the South Tyne than the spot at which the Knar Burn brings its contribution to the constantly broadening stream. It dates back to rough seventeenth century times, and was as strongly built as became the home of the doughty lairds of Knaresdale. But the noblest of South Tyne castles is that of Featherstone, or Featherstonehaugh. It stands in a fine park opposite to where the river is joined by Hartley Burn. When Lord Marmion was feasting full and high at the castle of Norham, on Tweedside—
“A northern harper rude
Chanted a rhyme of deadly feud;
How the fierce Thirlwalls, and Ridleys all,
Stout Willimondswick,