DAFFODILS BY THE BANKS OF THE SILVERY DUDDON
CHAPTER VII
THE MOODS OF WASTWATER
I never think of Wastwater without recalling some exciting hours—Wastwater surrounded by crag-set mountains and wide bouldery moorlands where foxes rule wild and strong. Under Tommie Dobson, that genius among fell-land huntsmen, a pack of wiry hounds has been raised in the bordering dales. In pursuit ruthless, untiring, determined; a chase from dawn to night, over country bristling with difficulties, is no unusual thing to them. Screes, miles of frittering mountain rampart, Yewbarrow, ridged like a Napoleon’s hat, Scawfells, impending over great piles of fragments, Gable; about these are benks and earths and borrans innumerable. Never a season do they fail the hunt; never do they fail for redskins to plunder flock and poultry roost. Then the wilds to Ennerdale—I had climbed the slope of Gable before the meet at dawn on a spring day, the crisp air became full of music—what finer sounds than those from a foxhound’s throat!—the turf was springy and dry, the sky flecked with high-sailing clouds. To climb the rocky terraces was delightful; to hunt—the exhilaration needs experience, it is beyond my words to describe. No pink coat was in the knot of men below; and a follower on horseback is seldom seen at a meet by Wastwater. Hounds unkennelled as they left the short lane from the inn, and soon above the babble of eager questers rose the clear peal of a true find. To one line gathered the pack, and away! Not often does Reynard give so good a chance. Over the tall drystone walls surged the hounds, at first in a compact bunch, then, as pace began to tell, dribbling out into a line. Out of the fields, and into the intakes of Mosedale; and ever higher rose the note of the chase, ever smarter the gliding forward of the clan. A check! From Gable’s lofty flank I saw hounds halt at a dark grey patch of stones, circle it almost in silence. Reynard has gone aground; the huntsmen and the fleeter followers come up. The scent drew the pack in and out, over wall and beck, through dead bracken and crackling heather, three or four good miles, but the huntsman, judging the true route, reached the borran in less than a mile. The hounds called away, terriers are put “in” and possibly will have Reynard out ere long. Nowhere but in the fells are terriers really used after foxes—nowhere else, the dalesmen proudly say, are dogs capable of doing such work. After a considerable delay two white dots stray out on to the dark grey stones—Reynard has been killed in the dark recesses.
A FELL FOX-HUNT, HEAD OF ESKDALE AND SCAWFELL
The sun is now high, the cloud flecks are gone, the air has become warm. Long ago foxes ceased to be afoot, and hours of careful work by huntsman and hounds may be necessary to find another fair scent. But even the pattern of all wiliness, like the human votaries at his shrine, sometimes overreaches himself. After a tedious march it is refreshing to hear hounds speak to a piping line. Reynard, lying out in a pile of boulders, has heard the coming pack. He steals away—too late, for a keen-sighted dalesman has viewed him away. Ten minutes of frenzied rushing, and the fox is reached. Ruby in the van seizes him, and over go both at the impact. The hound, aged but plucky, loses his grip and Reynard is free again; down the scree, in the very access of terror, the redskin flies, but with a couple of bounds Chorister has him fast. The iron jaws crunch into the fox’s spine, and though together they roll near twenty yards the grip never falters. There is no “worry” at the death; the hounds, now that their enemy is dead, take little further notice of him. Ofttimes the death is compassed a mile away from the nearest follower, but occasionally a fair number view the finish. And to do this you may have to come pell mell down some rotten “rake.” We saw hounds stream over a patch of snow on a near-by hill: a dalesman pointed out Reynard dead beat a hundred yards in front. “The Gate,” called some one, “who’s going down?” Six of us rushed for the head of that precipitous scree-shoot. The angle of descent was terrible, but, hunting mad, we leapt and slid, stumbled and jolted down. A thousand feet plumb drop, with a hail of loose stones roaring behind us. The rake-foot was narrow, between perpendicular rocks, and in single file we raced down. No one tried to halt; if it were thought of, the gathering pelt of stones decided in favour of forward. Shades of Silver Howe! In the madness of the guide-race you never saw the like of this. But after five minutes of real, tearing life—oh! it’s good to have lived through such a time!—we were running down the smoother grass. The hounds were probably quite close by—running mute for the death—and across the roaring, flooded beck within a score yards came the fox. We halted in silence—back up, tongue lolling, moving stiffly and with evident pain, he was the scourge of the fells, but a respected foe at that. Thrice had he been chased far, now came for him the end. Two outstripping hounds shot across a cove which was bank-high in snow, leapt at him, and all was over.
Wastwater, its bed hewn and filled by Almighty power in the beginning to contrast the silvern temporalities of a level mere with the solid, silent, rugged eternities of rock around. There is always some pleasure to the hale of body and mind in climbing from Wastwater, whether by pony-track, mountain-path, or dangerous puzzle route up the cliffs. In early October I had to cross to Wastwater from Keswick. In the golden glory of afternoon we passed up Borrowdale. One side the glen sloomed in dying bronze of bracken, the other was grey with nude birches below, chocolate with heather above. We left the main road and passed into the desolate mountain land. As the sun declined, clouds, at first mackerel but now dull and heavy with rain and night, floated majestically from behind the western mountains. Shortly in a low cloud cornice Gable’s head was buried, and billow after billow of mist possessed the higher ground: at Rosthwaite the glow of day, here the portents of night and foul weather. “Fraternal Three” and the old wad-mine took but a moment’s attention, then away, up the narrow dell.
WASTWATER, FROM STRANDS
Night fast closed round. Our last look back barely showed the curve of Borrowdale. Gillercombe, scored by tremendous ravines, presided over a scene of almost indescribable wildness. The wind roared and boomed above, the steady drift of fine rain was in our faces. Hoarsely down its rugged bed the beck sang in accord. Grey light and dashing water, with gloom intense above and a rain-sodden world below, our path uncertain, picked out by boulders. Bogs of sphagnum, sponged a foot high with water, runnels where in summer are hollows filled with wee splinters, the rills all shouting becks, and the becks flooding torrents. Our boots full of water, wet to the thigh, we still squelched on. In a while we came to a narrow footbridge, and crossed the chief torrent. “Where is the path?” I knew not, nor cared. Swinging bogs were all about; a grisly light crept through the clouds in front: that showed the pass-head, and was my guide. Now, we stood within twenty yards of Stye Head Tarn—what a scene! Half invisible, a patch of wind-spurned waters, dark mountains sweeping upward, cloven by black ghylls, whitish beards of cloud stealthily moving along and hiding the higher ground in ghostly embrace. The sounds—the tongues of many waters, and the night wind weirding among crags and crannies. Ten minutes more, our path in a long curve swept down the rock-shelves toward the dale. What a gulf of gloom, the waterfalls roaring and possessing the night! Take care, take care, the way is full of stumbling-blocks, of pitfalls; to the right is steep rock, to the left a precipice. Over it—crane your neck and see if foothold is visible beneath. Such is Stye Head Pass at night.