THE LAKE DISTRICT AND ITS POETS.
We went to Windermere, and from there took the omnibus for Bowness—
One of the charmin’est little villages I ever sot my eyes on, as clean as my kitchen is when I git it all swept out. The housen are all built of stun, and some on ’em have little porches built out on ’em, but all on ’em overrun with ivy. And flowers and pretty climbin’ plants make every house attractive, and not a mite of dust or dirt—I wonder what they do with it?
The little tarvern where we stayed wuz so clean and comfortable that I wondered what the tarvern-keeper and his wife would say if they wuz sot down in some of our own small hotels. It wuz a lesson in perfect neatness and order, the hull place wuz.
And the landscapes all round the little village wuz pretty enough to frame, and we see ’em more or less all the while we stayed there; we made our headquarters there, and sallied out for excursions, a-lookin’ on picters on every side on us—green grass and foliage, high, tree-covered hills, little, lovely, clean, picturesque villages like them I have described, magnificent country seats, with grand entrances and porters’ lodges, and stately green parks, and fountains, and deers, and sleek herds of cattle walkin’ through on the velvet grass and green tree aisles, and cottages, and quaint old bridges, and dark stun churches half covered with ivy.
Bowness is on the shores of the lake. As I say, we put up at a good tarvern, and the next day we sot out on our sight-seein’.
The waiter at the tarvern told us as we sot out on our first excursion that we had better take our waterproofs and umbrells.
It is needless to say that I had my faithful umbrell in my hand, but the rest hadn’t, so they got theirn, and I went back for my waterproof, and glad enough we wuz, for before night we wuz ketched out in four different showers—good drivin’ ones, but short.
Martin, who had been ust to fur bigger lakes—Michigan, Ontario, Superior, and sech—wuz bitterly dissapinted in ’em, and sez he—
“A trout out of Lake Superior would die of thirst in one of these lakes.”