Occasionally the fells are what is locally known as “top clear.” At such a time you climb steadily upwards to find yourself at last clear of the clinging grey vapour, and beneath you lies an apparently endless sea of white, stretching into the far distance. Out of this ocean of mist rises peak after peak of the mountain ranges, looking like islands dotted in every direction. If the sun is shining at the time, the glorious panorama will well repay you for your strenuous climb.
Most people have heard of the “Spectre of the Brocken”; well, I have seen exactly the same thing from the summit of Red Screes, which overlooks the top of the Kirkstone Pass.
I was standing on the summit of this mountain one winter’s morning, whilst hounds were working out the drag of their fox on the breast far below. The mist was rising from the lower slopes like a grey curtain, while the sun shone against my back, throwing my shadow on to the screen of vapour. There it became enlarged to enormous proportions, and as I moved the huge shadowy giant aped my actions, until I began to think I was “seeing things.”
I have at times seen some extraordinarily fine rainbow effects amongst the crags, just as the rain began to cease and the sun broke through the clouds.
Next to mist, rain and wind, particularly the latter, handicap followers of the fell hounds. Rain wets you through, but you don’t mind that; it is all in the day’s work, but when it is combined with a driving wind which stops your breath and all but lifts you off your feet it becomes rather too much of a good thing. Once on Wetherlam I saw two coupled terriers lifted bodily off the ground by the wind, and the huntsman’s cap suddenly left his head and departed swiftly into thin air. If it be freezing at such times your clothing, eyelashes, etc., become coated with hoarfrost, and the icy blast penetrates to your very marrow. In the face of such a wind you have to constantly turn round to get your breath, and all sounds beyond the shriek of the gale are obliterated.
Shelter where and how you will, and strain your ears to the uttermost, it is impossible to hear the cry of hounds unless they happen to be very near you. Even on a still day sound is very deceiving. All the hills throw back an echo, and you can easily imagine hounds to be on the far side of a dale, when in reality they are on your own side, but under and beneath you. On one occasion hounds were racing with a glorious cry, apparently near the summit of a mountain which separated us from the dale beyond. Every moment we expected to see them appear over the wall on the skyline, whereas in reality they were on the opposite side of the valley beyond, running through the breast at a high altitude.
Most of the fell country carries a good scent, except sometimes in early autumn and spring, when the sun dries up the dew quite early in the morning. Directly the bracken is beaten down by snow and rain, and the land holds moisture, hounds can work out a drag, and hunt and run with the best.
Although I have descanted upon the bad weather in the fell country, it must not be thought that the winter months are wholly given over to mist, rain, frost and wind. No, there are days when the sun shines brightly on a white world, and the views from the tops are magnificent. The snow is damp but not too deep, and hounds drive along as if tied to their fox. The air is still and clear, enabling one to hear the music at a great distance, and, with good visibility, hounds can easily be seen threading their way through the rough ground across the wide dale. Scent is often very good indeed in damp snow, though at times it may be just the reverse. “There’s nowt sae queer as scent,” unless perhaps it be a woman.
Apart from hunting, I often think that visitors make a mistake in not coming to the fells in winter. Grand as the views are in summer, they are equally fine, if not finer, in winter, when the weather is frosty and settled.
I have already spoken of the impracticability of the fells as a riding country, for if—