THE COCKER AT KIRKGATE (p. [300]).
Ennerdale Water, a few miles to the north, receives its first influx from the river LIZA, locally known as Lissa Beck. It is a lovely valley, and there is no overcrowding of population. The last house is the farmhouse of Gillerthwaite, and further progress upwards to the mountains is by footpath only. This is in truth the only excuse for mentioning the Liza, though it might serve as an opportunity for singing the praises of the Great Gable, formerly known as the Green Gable. It is one of the most conspicuous of mountain heads, and its frowning peak meets the view from great distances. Pillar Mountain, which is nearer Ennerdale Plain, is almost exactly the same height—2,927 feet, which is about seven yards less than the Gable—and it has a pinnacled and abrupt descent almost to the confines of the lake. Ennerdale Water at one time had the character of being the best fishing resort in the Lakes. “The Anglers’ Inn” is not, as may be supposed, an establishment of modern growth, for it is bepraised in the literature of forty years ago. The bold headland projecting into the water at the western end was more than half a century back well known as Angler Fell, for a reason which the term itself explains, and at that time one of the curiosities of the lake was a collection of loose stones which, according to tradition, had been placed at the head of the shoal by unknown mortal or supernatural hands. Anyhow, the heap was always pointed out as a mystery until a scientific visitor explained it away by pronouncing it to be the remnant of an old moraine.
Though not so deep as Wastwater, Ennerdale Water can boast its twenty-four fathoms, and the familiar statement is made as to its immunity from ice, the fact being that it is only in the severest frosts that these uncommonly deep lakes are affected. At the lower end the river Ehen takes up the duty of carrying the overflow to the sea, describing a long and semicircular course that from opposite St. Bees becomes by quick swerve a journey due south. The valley thence is of a pastoral character, and is perhaps best known from the establishment on its banks (long before the Cleator Iron Works sent up their smoke) of the little town of Egremont, with its ruins of a strong fortress. It was this that suggested the Cumberland tradition told by Wordsworth in the poem “The Horn of Egremont Castle.”
“Scarcely ever have I seen anything so fine as the Vale of St. John,” Southey exclaims; and the Valley of St. John which is named more than once in Scott’s “Bridal of Triermain” is always accepted as the same. It is in the country of Helvellyn, of Thirlmere, of the river GRETA, and Keswick is its capital. The Greta, however, is known by sectional names, even after it issues from the mere, which has the distinction of being, while one of the minor lakes, the highest in altitude. The other lakes are generally something between 200 and 300 feet above sea level. This is over 500 feet, and its precipitous borderings here and there are in accord with its unusual elevation.
The stream which has to make so steep a descent before it is received by the Derwent is generally spoken of as St. John’s Beck as it trends northward through the namesake vale, Naddle Fell on the one side, and Great Dodd on the other, keeping watch and ward, deeply scored; Saddleback always looming grimly ahead beyond Threlkeld, with Skiddaw as near neighbour. At this stage the Glenderamakin makes conjunction from the east, and, united, the streams become the Greta. From Threlkeld it takes a new course, westerly to Keswick, and its scenery is of the highest beauty as it hurries past Latrigg, otherwise known as Skiddaw’s Cub. Greta in this short length of established identity is not to be denied, as Greta Bridge, Greta Hall (the home of Southey for forty years), and Greta Bank testify. Half a mile from Keswick, over the bridge, is Crosthwaite, the old parish church in whose God’s acre Southey was buried.
The tourist in Lakeland will bring back his special impression of “the very finest view,” according to his individual tastes and, maybe, temperament. A well-ordered ballot would probably, however, place at the head of the list that prospect—never to be adequately described—from Castlerigg top. For water there are Bassenthwaite and Derwentwater; for giant mountain forms, Skiddaw and Saddleback; for cloud-capped and shadowy fells, the highlands of Buttermere and Crummock, with “the mountains of Newlands shaping themselves as pavilions; the gorgeous confusion of Borrowdale just revealing its sublime chaos through the narrow vista of its gorge,” as De Quincey described them; and for the softer toning and the human interest, the valley of the Greta and the goodly town of Keswick are in the nearer survey. Out of town the river becomes moderately tranquil, and enters the Derwent at the northernmost point of Keswick Lake or Derwentwater.
Derwentwater is the most oval in outline of any of the lakes, and it has the bijou measurements of three miles in length, by a mile and a half in breadth. Foreshores of foliaged slopes or herbaged margins give play to an imposing presentment of cliff and wooded knoll, with dark masses of fantastic mountains behind; the clear water is studded with small islands of varying form and bulk, and in its centre is St. Herbert’s Isle, sacred to the memory of a “saintly eremite” whose ambition it was to die at the moment when his beloved Cuthbert of Durham expired, so that their souls might soar heavenwards in company. After hot summers a phenomenal floating islet, of bog-like character and covered with vegetation, rises at a point about 150 yards from the shore near the far-famed waters coming down from Lodore. Scafell is somewhat a far cry from Keswick, but one of the most impressively comprehensive views of Derwentwater, as of Windermere and Wastwater in a lesser degree, is to be obtained from the summit.
The river DERWENT, known alternatively as the Grange, rises at the head of Borrowdale, flows along the middle of the valley, and enters the lower part of the lake near the Falls of Lodore. Issuing from the further extremity, augmented by the Greta, it flows north-westwards to pay tribute to Bassenthwaite Water, which, after Derwentwater and its strong features of interest, is somewhat of an anti-climax; yet it is a fine lake some four miles in length, with woods on the Wythop shore, and Armathwaite Hall at its foot commanding a full view of the lake. The Derwent, renewing its river-form on the outskirts of this wooded estate, turns to the west, and arrives at Cockermouth, so named from the river which here joins it from the south.