Wensleydale generally used to be famed for its hand-knitting, but I think Askrigg must have turned out more work than any place in the valley, for the men as well as the womenfolk were equally skilled in this employment, and Mr. Whaley says they did their work in the open air ‘while gossiping with their neighbours.’ This statement is, nevertheless, exceeded by what appears in a volume entitled ‘The Costume of Yorkshire.’ In that work of 1814, which contains a number of George Walker’s quaint drawings, reproduced by lithography, we find a picture having a strong suggestion of Askrigg in which there is a group of old and young of both sexes seated on the steps of the market-cross, all knitting, and a little way off a shepherd is seen driving some sheep through a gate, and he also is knitting. The letterpress describes how a woman named Slinger, who lived in Cotterdale, used to walk to and from Hawes Market with her goods on her head, knitting steadily all the way. Knitting-machines have long since killed this industry, but Askrigg has somehow survived the loss. Grandfather-clocks are still made in the little town, as they have been for a great number of years. We have already noticed an old Askrigg clock at Muker, and if we keep our eyes open we shall come across others, as well as examples from Leyburn, Middleham, and other places in the dale that possessed a clock-maker. It is interesting to those who wish to get a correct idea of a place before visiting it to know that they may easily be led astray by even the best guides. When we read in Murray that Askrigg is a ‘dull little town of gray houses,’ we are at once predisposed against the place, although we might know that all the houses in the dales are gray. No suggestion is given of the splendid situation, and one might imagine that all the houses, with the exception of the one near the church, are featureless and quite uninteresting. This, of course, would be a total misapprehension, for many of the buildings are old, with quaint doorways and steps, and there are mossy roofs that add colour to the stone, which is often splashed with orange and pale emerald lichen. In writing of Hawes, on the other hand, Murray omits to mention the lack of picturesqueness in its really dull street, merely saying that ‘the town itself is growing and improving.’ Not content, however, with this approval of the place, the guide goes still further astray by stating that the dale in the neighbourhood of Hawes ‘is broad and open, and not very picturesque’! I cannot help exclaiming at such a statement, although I may be told that all this is a mere matter of individual opinion, for is not Wensleydale broad and open from end to end, and is not Hawes situated in the midst of some of the wildest and noblest fells in Yorkshire? It is true that the town lies on the level ground by the river, and thus the views from it do not form themselves into such natural pictures as they do at Askrigg, but I am inclined to blame the