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[Illustration: A MISTY MORNING, NEWBY BRIDGE, WINDERMERE]
THE ENGLISH LAKES
PAINTED BY A. HEATON COOPER * DESCRIBED BY WM. T. PALMER * PUBLISHED BY
ADAM AND CHARLES BLACK * LONDON * MCMVIII
[Illustration: Lotus Logo]
AGENTS IN AMERICA
THE MACMILLAN COMPANY
64 & 66 FIFTH AVENUE, NEW YORK
First Edition _July_, 1905
Second Edition _October_, 1908
CONTENTS
PAGE
CHAPTER I
INTRODUCTION 1
CHAPTER II
BY STEAM YACHT ON WINDERMERE 9
CHAPTER III
BY WORDSWORTH'S ROTHAY 30
CHAPTER IV
RYDAL AND GRASMERE 36
CHAPTER V
ESTHWAITE WATER AND OLD HAWKSHEAD 49
CHAPTER VI
CONISTON WATER 60
CHAPTER VII
THE MOODS OF WASTWATER 79
CHAPTER VIII
THE GLORY OF ENNERDALE 98
CHAPTER IX
BY SOFT LOWESWATER 106
CHAPTER X
CRUMMOCK WATER 116
CHAPTER XI
BUTTERMERE 124
CHAPTER XII
THE CHARMS OF DERWENTWATER 137
CHAPTER XIII
BASSENTHWAITE 156
CHAPTER XIV
THIRLMERE FROM THE MAIN ROAD 165
CHAPTER XV
HAWESWATER AND THE BIRDS 178
CHAPTER XVI
ULLSWATER, HOME OF BEAUTY 185
CHAPTER XVII
MOUNTAIN TARNS 203
LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS
1. A Misty Morning, Newby Bridge, Windermere _Frontispiece_
FACING PAGE
2. Furness Abbey in the Vale of Nightshade 4
3. Windermere from Wansfell (sunset) 8
4. Swan Inn, Newby Bridge, Windermere 12
5. Near the Ferry, Windermere: Skating by Moonlight 16
6. The Old Ferry, Windermere 20
7. Old Laburnums at Newby Bridge, Windermere 24
8. Windermere and Langdale Pikes, from Lowwood 28
9. A Glimpse of Grasmere (evening sun) 30
10. Wild Hyacinths 32
11. Dungeon Ghyll Force, Langdale 34
12. Dove Cottage, Grasmere 36
13. Skelwith Force, Langdale 40
14. Sunset, Rydal Water 42
15. Grasmere Church 46
16. Esthwaite Water: Apple Blossom 50
17. An Old Street in Hawkshead 52
18. Sheep-Shearing, Esthwaite Hall Farm 56
19. Dawn, Coniston 60
20. Charcoal-Burners, Coniston Lake 62
21. Brantwood, Coniston Lake: Char-fishing 64
22. Coniston Village: the Old Butcher's shop 66
23. Moonlight and Lamplight, Coniston 68
24. An Old Inn Kitchen, Coniston 70
25. The Shepherd, Yewdale, Coniston 72
26. Stepping-Stones, Seathwaite 74
27. Winter Sunshine, Coniston 76
28. Daffodils by the Banks of the Silvery Duddon 78
29. A Fell Fox-hunt, Head of Eskdale and Scawfell 80
30. Wastwater, from Strands 82
31. Wastwater and Scawfell 84
32. Wastdalehead and Great Gable (towards evening in autumn) 86
33. Wastwater Screes 88
34. Wastdalehead Church 90
35. Nearing the top of Styhead Pass, Wastdale 92
36. Wastdalehead, Wastwater 94
37. Ennerdale Lake at Sunset 98
38. The Pillar Rock of Ennerdale 100
39. Loweswater 106
40. The Old Post Office, Loweswater 108
41. Crummock Water, from Scale Hill 116
42. Crummock Water and Buttermere 120
43. Head of Buttermere 124
44. Honister Pass and Buttermere 128
45. The Borrowdale Yews (evening) 132
46. Lodore and Derwentwater (a summer's morn) 136
47. Derwentwater, from Castle Head (a bright morning) 138
48. By the Shores of Derwentwater 142
49. Grange in Borrowdale (early morning) 144
50. Crosthwaite Church, Keswick 148
51. Druid Circle, near Keswick (moonlight) 150
52. Falcon Crag, Derwentwater 152
53. The Vale of St. John, near Keswick 154
54. Derwentwater and Bassenthwaite Lake, from High Lodore 156
55. Bassenthwaite Lake (a breezy morn) 160
56. Bassenthwaite Lake and Skiddaw 162
57. Raven Crag, Thirlmere 166
58. Thirlmere and Helvellyn 168
59. Haweswater 178
60. Shap Abbey 182
61. Ullswater, from Gowbarrow Park (a sultry June morn) 186
62. Ullswater, Silver Bay 188
63. Ullswater: the Silver Strand (afterglow) 190
64. Hazy Twilight, Head of Ullswater 192
65. A Mountain Path, Sandwick, Ullswater 194
66. Brougham Castle, Penrith 198
67. Angle Tarn, Esk Hause 204
68. Dalegarth Force, Eskdale 206
69. Blea Tarn and Langdale Pikes 210
70. A Sudden Shower, Blea Tarn 212
71. Kirkstone Pass and Brothers' Water 214
72. Stepping-stones, Far Easedale, Grasmere 216
73. Little Langdale Tarn 218
74. Elterwater and Langdale Pikes 220
75. Seathwaite Tarn, Duddon Valley 222
_The Illustrations in this volume have been engraved and printed in England
by the Hentschel Colourtype Ltd._
THE ENGLISH LAKES
CHAPTER I
_INTRODUCTION_
The present book, it must be understood, treats the English Lakes rather
apart from various other elements comprised in what is known as the Lake
District. There is so much to say of the waters and their immediate
surroundings that no space has remained to describe mountain, pass, and
tarn in the manner their beauties merit. Other limits to the book are
due to the writer's promiscuity of taste. I am interested in most
things--antiquities, fauna, flora, sports, geology, entomology, and the
like; but in not one of these subjects have I that erudite knowledge
which might render my work of profit. This book is written to interest
those who love out-of-doors without claiming any particular study there.
Of the paintings--I can only commend them to notice. In my humblest
manner I assert that only an artist who feels the beauty of his
environment thoroughly could produce work so stamped with the innate
character of our Lakeland.
Of the history of the English Lakes little need be said. We are in a
backwater, so to speak, of events; only the outer edges of great affairs
have touched us. The mountains have been the last home of the invaded
after their defeat in the field and their banishment from the accessible
level lands. Druidical, and perhaps more ancient, remains are plentiful,
along with relics of Roman, Norseman, and Saxon; but these at best only
evidence sparse occupation. So far as history shows, no really great
campaign has been fought out in our wilds--the battlefield of Dunmail
(and only legend fixes that) is almost the only extensive one within the
heart of the fell country. Great religious changes--the Dissolution of
Monasteries, the Reformation, the rise of Nonconformity--have been far
more striking in their results than ever were the fortunes of war. The
mountains of Lakeland and Scotland stand blue on a common horizon, and
the alarms and reprisals of Border feud were not unknown. But the hardy
warriors from nor'ward did not often risk operations here, where
conditions were so unfavourable to their feverish but unsustained method
of warfare. The Civil War brought strife between the squires, but no
great action was fought, yet in outlying districts the name of Cromwell
is not forgotten in weird tale. Though the land of the Lakes has been
free from war in the sense of great happenings, it has been far from a
peaceful country.
Our lakes are fifteen in number, ranging from the lordly Windermere and
Ullswater, ten and a half and nine miles long respectively, to
Loweswater and Rydalmere, which hardly exceed the larger tarns in area.
Our mountain ranges contain the most elevated ground in
England--Scawfell Pike, Scawfell, Helvellyn, and Skiddaw being over
three thousand feet in height, and several others approaching that
level. About thirty minor waters are scattered over the area known as
the Lake District; but I must not make a guidebook of my volume.
My story of the Lakes will be told in the manner it has discovered
itself to me. I do not claim originality of method, nor will my reader
find much savouring of literary symmetry and style within these covers.
My wanderings cover a long series of years, and my recollections are as
disconnected as they well can be. I have kept no diary of things seen,
and scarcely regret the omission. There is no pile of data to confuse
me; trivial impressions have passed away, leaving a harvest of perfect
pictures to describe. And if I fail in putting these to paper, my
attempt has at least been sincere.
Much has been written of the dalesmen. Some writers deprecate everything
we have, from our mountains, the faces of which they hardly know and the
mysteries of which they have never dreamt of, down to our social
customs, which often they have neither witnessed nor studied. To these
nothing need be said, but to our over-laudatory friends I must say that
"to gild the lily" is not kind. Dalesman though I am, our faults are
quite visible to me, and "don't pinch us" for them. I meet the dalesman
on equal terms. With him at "dipping" eve I have slept, star-embowered,
on the open fells. Many curious yarns of the uplands are believed only
by the wandering tourist: inner lore of the mountain life is reserved
for the home-sanctum. Where, in my wandering story, I feel myself
competent to introduce the men of the land, the pictures are as faithful
as I can make them. They have a store of stories, yet unprinted, in the
wilder glens: stories of weird things, of splendid heroisms among the
flocks and fells.
We have two classes of tourists: "The Strenuous Life" and "The Lotos
Eaters," I divide them by their tastes. Others call them "Visitors,"
"Tourists" and "Trippers." The first they adore--they take a "cottage
furnished" perhaps, and anyway are profitable in a staid, comfortable
manner; the second they tolerate--he is a man of hotels and boarding
houses, here to-day, and to-morrow "away ower t'fell," but, by reason of
his plenty, worthy attention; the third they despise; many seem to think
that the day-visitor ought to be put down--by violence preferably.
To revert to my own division of our visitors, I feel that my tastes join
me in both types. I like the peaceful vales and lakes where the
"lotos-eaters" idle the summer hours away, and perhaps the detailed
descriptions of so many days of ease may incline the reader to believe
that I care nothing for the fells. But I love the breezy uplands, the
miles of free moor, the peaks and the crags.
[Illustration: FURNESS ABBEY IN THE VALE OF NIGHTSHADE]
A few words about accommodation and routes of travel are unavoidable.
There are huge hotels with fashionable prices, smaller ones that are as
comfortable or more so, at a fifth of the cost, and boarding houses in
large numbers. But sometimes in August there are more tourists than can
be comfortably put up even in our village-towns. However, the Lake
District is small, and, if Ambleside be thought full, there is Grasmere
not far away and Bowness within five miles. All three places are
unlikely to suffer from excess of visitors at the same time. Of the
remoter dales let me tell you a story. Two young men wandered into a
certain dale-head where there are but two homes for tourists. At the
first they asked for a couple of rooms. "We haven't _one_ to spare." The
way had dealt hardly with them, and at the second they moderated their
request to "two rooms, but if quite necessary we don't mind sharing
one."
"Why, bless thee, my lad," said outspoken old Mother, "ther's three to
ivvery bed, an' two to ivvery table awreddy. But mappen I can put you up
in t' barn with them others." The barn across the yard had been pressed
into service as a bedroom; but at the prospect these townsmen shivered,
thanked the good lady, and walked wearily towards the dale-foot three
miles off (where the excess of tourists was still great, though not so
marked). The moral is, if you intend to make any place a centre for your
journeys engage a room there, but--I was just preparing for repose when
a knock came to my door. "Hello," I answered. "Please, sir, there's
another lady just come in, and will you give up your bedroom for her?" I
slept in less comfortable quarters that night, with half a score others
who, by chivalry or improvidence, were without rooms.
Three railway systems touch the Lake District. The London and
North-Western runs up one side with its main line, and casts a branch
from Oxenholme to Windermere, which is a very popular way to reach the
Lakes. From its terminus regular lines of coaches run to Coniston,
Ullswater, and Keswick, as well as to Bowness, Ambleside, and Grasmere.
A new company is putting on more motor-cars to cope with the traffic
between the terminus and Ambleside and Grasmere. The main London and
North-Western line at Shap is near Haweswater, an area growing in renown
among tourists. At Penrith it is near Ullswater, and regular coaches
connect with the steamers there. A company has exploited motor-traffic
from Penrith to Patterdale, partly for passengers, partly to carry the
output of the Glenridding lead mines.
The Furness Railway is _the_ railway of the Lake District. From
Carnforth, where it connects with the London and North-Western main line
and with the northern arm of the Midland Railway, it sweeps round
Morecambe bay to Ulverston. Here it throws branch the first to connect
the steam-yachts on Windermere with the outer world. By means of these
tourists are poured into Bowness and Ambleside in great numbers. A line
of coaches connect Ulverston with the foot of Coniston Lake. The main
Furness line passes through warrior Barrow to the Duddon, where branch
the second goes off winding through the hills to Coniston. From Coniston
there is coach connection with all parts of the Lake Country. The main
line has not yet, however, finished with the Lakes. It crosses the
Duddon and swerves round the foot of Black Combe to Millom of the
hematite beds, then away through a beautiful district between the fells
and the sea to Ravenglass and to Seascale, where a good road leads up to
Wastwater. At Sellafield another branch is thrown through Egremont,
within a few miles of Ennerdale Lake. The London and North-Western comes
on to the scene again here, a branch bearing southward from Carlisle and
tapping a district rich in iron ore, but fringed with lovely valleys.
The Lake Country is also served by the Cockermouth, Keswick, and Penrith
line, as important for the north as the Furness line is to the south. It
connects the London and North-Western at Penrith with the Furness at
Whitehaven, passing by Derwentwater and Bassenthwaite. At Threlkeld it
is nearest Thirlmere, at Troutbeck it is nearest Ullswater, while from
Cockermouth the tourist may easily reach Loweswater, Crummock, and
Buttermere.
The North-Eastern and Midland Railways both come into Penrith, which is
an important junction for the Lakes, and an interesting town in itself.
It is not my intention to give any space to a description of the
internal traffic of the country--it is plentiful and good.
[Illustration: WINDERMERE FROM WANSFELL
Sunset]