Having pursued the road one mile further, for the purpose of visiting
the tender memorial of pious affection, so often described under
the name of Countess' Pillar, we returned to Emont-bridge, and from
thence reached Penrith, pronounced Peyrith, the most southern town of
Cumberland. So far off as the head of Ullswater, fourteen miles, this
is talked of as an important place, and looked to as the store-house of
whatever is wanted more than the fields and lakes supply. Those, who
have lived chiefly in large towns, have to learn from the wants and
dependencies of a people thinly scattered, like the inhabitants of all
mountainous regions, the great value of any places of mutual resort,
however little distinguished in the general view of a country. Penrith
is so often mentioned in the neighbourhood, that the first appearance
of it somewhat disappointed us, because we had not considered how
many serious reasons those, who talked of it, might have for their
estimation, which should yet not at all relate to the qualities, that
render places interesting to a traveller.
The town, consisting chiefly of old houses, straggles along two sides
of the high north road, and is built upon the side of a mountain, that
towers to great height above it, in steep and heathy knolls, unshaded
by a single tree. Eminent, on the summit of this mountain, stands the
old, solitary beacon, visible from almost every part of Penrith, which,
notwithstanding its many symptoms of antiquity, is not deficient of
neatness. The houses are chiefly white, with door and window cases of
the red stone found in the neighbourhood. Some of the smaller have over
their doors dates of the latter end of the sixteenth century. There
are several inns, of which that called Old Buchanan's was recommended
to us, first, by the recollection, that Mr. Gray had mentioned it, and
afterwards by the comfort and civility we found there.
Some traces of the Scottish dialect and pronunciation appear as far
south as Lancashire; in Westmoreland, they become stronger; and, at
Penrith, are extremely distinct and general, serving for one among
many peaceful indications of an approach, once notified chiefly by
preparations for hostility, or defence. Penrith is the most southern
town in England at which the guinea notes of the Scotch bank are
in circulation. The beacon, a sort of square tower, with a peaked
roof and openings at the sides, is a more perfect instance of the
direful necessities of past ages, than would be expected to remain in
this. The circumstances are well known, which made such watchfulness
especially proper, at Penrith; and the other traces of warlike habits
and precautions, whether appearing in records, or buildings, are too
numerous to be noticed in a sketch, which rather pretends to describe
what the author has seen, than to enumerate what has been discovered
by the researches of others. Dr. Burn's History contains many curious
particulars; and there are otherwise abundant and satisfactory
memorials, as to the state of the debateable ground, the regulations
for securing passes or fords, and even to the public maintenance of
slough dogs, which were to pursue aggressors with hot trod, as the
inhabitants were to follow them by horn and voice. These are all
testimonies, that among the many evils, inflicted upon countries by
war, that, which is not commonly thought of, is not the least; the
public encouragement of a disposition to violence, under the names
of gallantry, or valour, which will not cease exactly when it is
publicly prohibited; and the education of numerous bodies to habits of
supplying their wants, not by constant and useful labour, but by sudden
and destructive exertions of force. The mistake, by which courage is
released from all moral estimation of the purposes, for which it is
exerted, and is considered to be necessarily and universally a good
in itself, rather than a means of good, or of evil, according to its
application, is among the severest misfortunes of mankind. Tacitus has
an admirable reproof of it--
"Ubi manu agitur, modestia et probitas nomina superioris
sunt."
Though the situation of Penrith, looking up the vales of Eden and
Emont, is remarkably pleasant, that of the beacon above is infinitely
finer, commanding an horizon of at least an hundred miles diameter,
filled with an endless variety of beauty, greatness and sublimity.
The view extends over Cumberland, parts of Westmoreland, Lancashire,
Yorkshire, and a corner of Northumberland and Durham. On a clear day,
the Scottish high lands, beyond Solway Firth, may be distinguished,
like faint clouds on the horizon, and the steeples of Carlisle are
plainly visible. All the intervening country, speckled with towns and
villages, is spread beneath the eye, and, nearly eighty miles to the
eastward, part of the Cheviot-hills are traced, a dark line, binding
the distance and marking the separation between earth and sky. On the
plains towards Carlisle, the nearer ridges of Cross-fell are seen to
commence, and thence stretch their barren steeps thirty miles towards
the east, where they disappear among the Stainmore-hills and the huge
moorlands of Yorkshire, that close up the long landscape of the vale
of Eden. Among these, the broken lines of Ingleborough start above all
the broader ones of the moors, and that mountain still proclaims itself
sovereign of the Yorkshire heights.
Southward, rise the wonders of Westmoreland, Shapfells, ridge over
ridge, the nearer pikes of Hawswater, and then the mountains of
Ullswater, Helvellyn pre-eminent amongst them, distinguished by the
grandeur and boldness of their outline, as well as the variety of
their shapes; some hugely swelling, some aspiring in clusters of
alpine points, and some broken into shaggy ridges. The sky, westward
from hence and far to the north, displays a vision of Alps, Saddleback
spreading towards Keswick its long shattered ridge, and one top of
Skiddaw peering beyond it; but the others of this district are inferior
in grandeur to the fells of Ullswater, more broken into points, and
with less of contrast in their forms. Behind Saddleback, the skirts of
Skiddaw spread themselves, and thence low hills shelve into the plains
of Cumberland, that extend to Whitehaven; the only level line in the
scope of this vast horizon. The scenery nearer to the eye exhibited
cultivation in its richest state, varied with pastoral and sylvan
beauty; landscapes embellished by the elegancies of art, and rendered
venerable by the ruins of time. In the vale of Eden, Carleton-hall,
flourishing under the hand of careful attention, and Bird's Nest,
luxuriant in its spiry woods, opposed their cheerful beauties to the
neglected walls of Brougham Castle, once the terror, and, even in
ruins, the pride of the scene, now half-shrouded in its melancholy
grove. These objects were lighted up by partial gleams of sunshine,
which, as they fled along the valley, gave magical effect to all they
touched.
The other vales in the home prospect were those of Bampton and Emont;
the first open and gentle, shaded by the gradual woods of Lowther-park;
the last closer and more romantic, withdrawing in many a lingering
bend towards Ullswater, where it is closed by the pyramidal Dunmallard,
but not before a gleam of the lake is suffered to appear beyond the
dark base of the hill. At the nearer end of the vale, and immediately
under the eye, the venerable ruins of Penrith Castle crest a round
green hill. These are of pale red stone, and stand in detached masses;
but have little that is picturesque in their appearance, time having
spared neither tower, or gateway, and not a single tree giving shade,
or force, to the shattered walls. The ground about the castle is broken
into grassy knolls, and only cattle wander over the desolated tract.
Time has also obscured the name of the founder; but it is known, that
the main building was repaired, and some addition made to it by Richard
the Third, when Duke of Gloucester, who lived here, for five years,
in his office of sheriff of Cumberland, promoting the York interest
by artful hospitalities, and endeavouring to strike terror into the
Lancastrians. Among the ruins is a subterraneous passage, leading to a
house in Penrith, above three hundred yards distant, called Dockwray
Castle. The town lies between the fortress and the Beacon-hill,
spreading prettily along the skirts of the mountain, with its many
roofs of blue slate, among which the church rises near a dark grove.
Penrith, from the latter end of the last century, till lately, when
it was purchased the Duke of Devonshire, belonged to the family of
Portland, to whom it was given by William the Third; probably instead
of the manors in Wales, which it was one of William's few faulty
designs so have given to his favourite companion, had not Parliament
remonstrated, and informed him, that the Crown could not alienate
the territories of the Principality. The church, a building of red
stone, unusually well disposed in the interior, is a vicarage of small
endowment; but the value of money in this part of the kingdom is so
high, that the merit of independence, a merit and a happiness which
should always belong to clergymen, is attainable by the possessors of
very moderate incomes. What is called the Giant's Grave in the church
yard is a narrow spot, inclosed, to the length of fourteen or fifteen
feet, by rows of low stones, at the sides, and, at the ends, by two
pillars, now slender, but apparently worn by the weather from a greater
thickness. The height of these is eleven or twelve feet; and all the
stones, whether in the borders, at the sides, or in these pillars,
bear traces of rude carving, which shew, at least, that the monument
must have been thought very important by those that raised it, since
the singularity of its size was not held a sufficient distinction. We
pored intently over these traces, though certainly without the hope of
discovering any thing not known to the eminent antiquarians, who have
confessed their ignorance concerning the origin of them.