TWO STORIES.
Not long ago, I had occasion to call at a house in Little Langdale, and the friend who accompanied me was joined, whilst waiting in the fold, by a fine ruddy and lively little fellow who had not then attained the dignity of his first breeches. He was, by way of starting a conversation, accosted with the question most common under such circumstances, “What is your name?” The answer was ready, “Jimmy o’ t’ Fell-foot!” “What other name have you?” “I have nin!” and neither his questioner nor his grown-up brother, who came up during the conversation, could prevail upon the youngster to assert his right to any other designation than “Jimmy o’ t’ Fell-foot.”
Another anecdote illustrating the power of this custom and then we'll march on. Mr Tyson, the much respected incumbent of Seathwaite, had, and perhaps still has a son settled in London, and a worthy statesman, one of his parishioners, having business requiring his presence in town, was furnished with Mr Thomas Tyson’s address, which, with some difficulty, he contrived to make out, and greatly astonished the servant who opened the door to his knock by asking, in a dialect very distinctly not that of a Cockney, “If ye pleese, does Tom o’ t’ Priest’s leeve here?”
Continue your course down the vale, again passing through the farm-yard and holding on along the foot of the fell by a road which has become somewhat more rugged, you, by and bye, re-approach the river and arrive at the Birks Bridge—the which I may guarantee to be much better worth an examination than those paltry stepping stones that disappointed you so grievously. The Duddon, for some distance above and below this bridge, considerably narrows and deepens, and loses the general rapidity of its current, passing through a chasm, A SLIGHTED BEAUTY.the jagged rocky walls of which rise perpendicularly to a considerable height above the surface, and sink to a depth a good deal below the level of the river’s bed above and below the chasm (whether this be “the Faëry Chasm” which Mr Wordsworth has pressed into his service as a subject for one of his sonnets, not knowing, can’t say, but it may perhaps do as well for it as any other). At a point where opposite portions of these rocky walls jut out so as to render the space between extremely narrow, the little arch of the bridge springs boldly across the void, the jutting portions of rock forming piers more substantial and durable, barring earthquakes, than any artificial structure for the same purpose in the kingdom. The water on the lower side of the bridge is still and very deep, I should say nearly two fathoms, and bears a beautiful tinge of faint blue, but is so clear that, if you happened to wear blue spectacles, you might very well fancy that you were staring down into a river course destitute of water. The best view of this little bridge and its picturesque natural adjuncts is to be gained by fastening your steed to the gate at its further end, and descending to a little platform of rock nearly on a level with the surface of the water about twenty yards below the bridge, and, when there, I think you will agree with me that this neglected atom of scenery is a full compensation for the fatigue of even a longer and rougher ride than you have undertaken on this joyful occasion, as Saunders Mucklebackit’s mother called her grandson’s funeral.
Remount your Bucephalus and canter away down the dale past the farms of Troutwell and Browside, through scenery which suggests a couplet from “The Lady of the Lake,” for assuredly
“Crags, knolls, and mounds confusedly hurled,
The fragments of an earlier world,”
THE “CHERISHED” OF DUDDON.applies with equal propriety to Seathwaite as to the glorious scenery around Loch Katrine. As you approach the farm of Nettleslack, you must make up your mind to quit either the river or your poney, for the road diverges from the Duddon, which now assumes a course where
“It seems some mountain, rent and riven,
A channel to the stream hath given.