The rocks were lined
with mosses, which had become as fleecy-looking as wool, as they were
almost petrified by the continual dropping of the spray from the
lime-impregnated water that fell down the rocks. There were quite a
variety of mosses and ferns, but the chief of the climbing plants was
what Dickens described "as the rare old plant, the ivy green," which not
only clung to the rocks, but had overshadowed them by climbing up the
trees above. To see the small dark cave it was necessary to cross the
stream in front of the waterfall, and here stepping-stones had been
provided for that purpose, but, owing to the unusual depth of water,
these were covered rather deeply, with the result that all the available
spaces in our boots were filled with water. This was, of course, nothing
unusual to us, as we had become quite accustomed to wet feet, and we now
looked upon it as an ordinary incident of travel. The cave was said to
have been the resort of goblins, and when we wondered where they were
now, my brother mildly suggested that we might have seen them if we had
possessed a mirror. We had seen a list of the names of the different
mosses to be found in the Malham district, but, as these were all in
Latin, instead of committing them to memory, we contented ourselves with
counting the names of over forty different varieties besides hepaties,
lichens, ferns, and many flowers:
Hie away, hie away,
Over bank and over brae,
Where the copsewood is the greenest,
Where the fountains glisten sheenest.
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