From all these legions, however, considerable drafts were taken to assist in the building of the wall from Tyne to Solway, the existing remains of which must now be described. At the two ends of its course, where it has had the ill-fortune either to meet with the fierce industrial energy of the dwellers by the estuary of the Tyne, or to attract the envious glances of the farmers of fertile Cumberland, the wall has practically ceased to exist, though it has seldom passed that way for more than two or three miles without leaving some traces, however faint, of its presence to reward the quest of the earnest antiquary. But in the central part of its course, where it has left the busy haunts of men and climbed the bleak moorlands and the steep basaltic cliffs of Western Northumberland and Eastern Cumberland, it still exists in what its great historian, Dr. Bruce, used to call “an encouraging state of preservation”. For twenty miles or more it goes striding over mountain and moor, religiously climbing every cliff and dipping down into every hollow of the sharply outlined, serrated, whinstone range. Sometimes we see only the rough rubble-work which formed the core of the wall, but more often the well-hewn square blocks which faced its northern and southern sides are still visible. The height attained by it is in one or two places as much as nine feet, but its more usual altitude is four to five feet. It was probably when perfect about seventeen feet high; and its width, as we know from the existing remains, varied from six to eight feet. The line of the wall once fixed, its builders seem to have pursued a nearly uniform plan, regardless of the help which they might have derived from natural defences. Thus in one place it crowns the heights of some steep basaltic cliffs at whose feet lies a small Northumbrian lake. No desperation of bravery would ever have caused a Brigantian chief to dash across that lake and climb those pinnacles of columnar basalt: still even here the wall pursues its undeviating course, and, so far as we know, retained its undiminished height. It is possible, however, that in such a case as this it was meant as a defence, not against barbarians, but against the weather. Snowstorms sometimes sweep violently across these bleak moorlands, and it may have been thought desirable to provide the Roman sentinel, pacing backwards and forwards between camp and camp, with some shelter from their fury.