o little forts at the mouth of the harbour, across which
in mediaeval time a chain was drawn.]

HEXHAM AND HADRIAN'S WALL

=How to get there.=--Train from King's Cross and St. Pancras _via_
Newcastle-on-Tyne. Great Northern Railway.
=Nearest Station.=--Hexham.
=Distance from London.=--289 miles.
=Average Time.=--Varies between 5-1/2 to 8 hours.

1st 2nd 3rd
=Fares.=--Single 40s. 10d. ... 24s. 4d.
Return 81s. 8d. ... 48s. 8d.

=Accommodation Obtainable.=--"Tynedale Hydropathic Mansion," etc.
=Alternative Route.=--Train from Euston and St. Pancras _via_ Carlisle.
London and North-Western Railway.

Hexham has a beautiful position, surrounded with woods and hills on
three sides, while the broad Tyne flows past the historic town. Above
the surrounding roofs the hoary Abbey Church rises, with its one low
central tower and flat roofs.

The history of Hexham begins with the granting of some land to St.
Wilfrid in 674, on which he built a monastery and church. A few years
later Hexham was made a See, and the "Frithstool" still remains from the
time when its cathedral received the right of sanctuary.

This early cathedral was destroyed by the Danes, and the building left a
battered ruin. When monasticism rose to its height, after the Norman
Conquest, a priory of Canons of St. Augustine was founded there. Its
wealth and numbers gradually increased until, at the end of the
thirteenth century, an entirely new building replaced the Saxon one, and
Hexham became exceedingly powerful.

Hadrian's Wall.--Three miles north of Hexham, at Chollerford, one may
see the remains of the piers of a Roman bridge over the North Tyne, and
close at hand is one of the best preserved forts of Hadrian's Wall. It
was about 124 A.D. that Hadrian started Aulus Plautorius Nepos on the
building of the line of continuous fortifications running from the mouth
of the Tyne to the Solway, a distance of over seventy miles. This was
built on the chain of hills overlooking the valley which runs from
Newcastle to Carlisle. The massive and astonishing ruins to be seen
to-day fill one with surprise, for they suggest to a considerable extent
the Great Wall of China. The remains of the wall proper are, as a rule,
8 feet thick, and are composed of hewn stone (the total height of the
wall was probably about 18 feet). Turrets and small forts are built into
the wall at frequent intervals. The object of t