DERWENTWATER, FROM CASTLE HEAD
A bright morning
Derwentwater is lap-lapping merrily against the stony beaches beyond the green sward, every wave wearing a sunlit crown. The great hollows of the mountain range are now filled with battling vapour; from right and left round lower summits they move to desperate attack—dun curls of skirmishers in front, heavy phalanxes of infantry grey behind. Down the air comes a whisper of riot and war, and with soundless impact we see the two hordes meet, shock, and mingle. Jagged as with unseen artillery, the battle sways from end to end; then, like a bolt of Jove, over brawny Skiddaw hurls a deluge of rain-sodden grey, the strife ceases, a sharp, steady line of mists cuts off the seen from the unseen. Now a grey shadow steals over the land, the bubbling life is chilled from the waters, and they rattle black and harsh against the cobble-stones. But on Grange fell the russet bracken is bathed in ephemeral sunshine. The shadow in the air grows darker, the distance is obscured with the grime of rain. The nearer hills, the fields, the town, are blotted out ere the full fury of the squall shakes our window and shrieks among the island trees. Like crest of cruelly spurred horse, the waves toss high, the mad gusts catch the rising gouts, wrench them clear into the air and hustle them along to crash in resounding sheets far up the shore. No boat was, we recollect with pleasure, visible before the squall descended: it would go hard with such a one just now. One experience of a squall on a mountain lake is enough for the most daring. I remember my baptism in such manner vividly. The yacht had but one sail spread to the breeze, but maniac Boreas caught it, pinned us down while water poured into the well, wrenched and screamed and worried at the mast and gear till that went overboard with a crash, then, with a final paroxysm, spun the hulk round and passed away over a waste of churning, creaming waters. More comfortable to face the gale with thin glass in front than to fare like that. The trees bend like switches, but the gloom is now rising from north-east. In a minute a flood of sunlight is pouring down, waking to brilliance the flooded lawn, and making sparkle the drop-decked boughs. Look into the wake of the retiring storm. The lake is still leaping white and racing along; a dim film hides the crags above Grange: now it passes, so quickly as almost to make one start at the rapid change. It would be dowly living at Derwent Isle when fog dark and drear hid lake and town: one might feel lonesome when the blizzards whistled and fumbled against window and door, and the waves crashed without the snug retreat. But how joyous this morning, when the sun is aloft and day has risen refreshed from the bath of night and is newly beginning a pageant of song and life and changing colour!
Further up the lake is Lord’s Isle, where once lived the Earls of Derwentwater. On the attainder and execution of the last of the title the mansion fell into ruins: some of its stone was used in building Keswick market-hall. The last earl was much loved in Cumberland; he was staunch to the Stuarts, as were most Northern gentry, and intrigued widely to bring about their return. When the first Pretender landed, bringing such sorry allies and little promise beyond, the earl foresaw that insurrection would be useless and dangerous to the participants. He argued that, although the Stuart was in Scotland, no rebellion need be attempted in the North of England until the party there were better prepared. In the secret council the earl was held little better than a traitor; at home his wife accused him of cowardice, demanding his sword and horse that a Derwentwater, though a woman, might take the accustomed place in the battle for King James. The earl was no coward: he took the mocked sword from his wife, and cast himself into the turmoil of rebellion. It is history that the rising was crushed with ease, and that as a ringleader the earl was beheaded on Tower Hill. Powerful men at court sued unavailingly for the young noble’s pardon. Money was lavished on the king’s favourites in vain. To raise funds the countess came north to the island-home; the Cumbrians, incensed at her forcing the Earl into the plot to save his honour at her hands, gave her a chilly reception. Legend luridly asserts that her horses were stolen while she was on the island, and that she and her servants were threatened. At dead of night a boat was rowed to near Lodore, where the lady landed and escaped by way of the fells to Penrith and the south. With her she carried a large quantity of jewels, which were offered to save the young husband’s head. The ravine by which the countess climbed to the open moors is pointed out as Lady’s Rake. If it were my province here to examine the story in detail, I would find that it was hardly to escape the Derwentwater tenants that the lady left in such haste. She was, for her share in the late rebellion, marked for arrest, or at least observation, by the Hanoverian authorities.
Seven islands dot Derwentwater: on no other mere are islands the feature we see here. Instead of snags of rock sticking up from deep water, with trees keeping precarious hold in clefts and crannies, these are level, well-wooded places, standing behind ample shallows.
Having passed Lord’s Island, with its sorrowful story of a life risked and lost for a banished prince, Lodore is the next point. Every one knows by repute Southey’s poem-de-force describing the terrific rush of its waters. After heavy rain the old poet’s description can be tested—at the expense of a wetting. Down a wide stair from the moorland, bristling with crags and boulders and outstanding seams, come the waters—their frolic can often be heard at Keswick, though Greta is charging, headlong, noisily down its rugged course. The moment you enter the gully—should you desire to see the heart of its beauty—you are swathed in spray; never in flood-time can you see more than a few yards ahead; your eyes film with moisture; the air to your lungs is choky with mist; the day is gloomed with spindrift. You see a white front of water hurtling down from invisibility: it eddies at your side, then drops away in gathering water-smoke. Nothing can you hear at such a time but continuous liquid thunder. Say the luxurious, there is then but little to see except the watery path you are climbing? Once I climbed this ravine at flood-time. As I passed into the zone of water-smoke, there were blurred visions of tumbling cascades, shadows of huge rocks dimly seen across the ravine, dripping branches of shrubs and plants among the streaming rocks. Then, what a transformation! A flash of sunlight swept into the hollow way. An atmosphere of shifting jewels of rainbow hue above, around; strings and clusters of pearls and diamonds dripping down reddish crags veined and barred with gold and silver; grasses poising delicate racemes of turquoise; mosses adorned with tiaras of ethereal beauty, ruffles of ivory spray caressing the currents of rich emerald. The brief glow faded, and all became grey and black and dull green again. For a glimpse of another such fairyland I would face stress much wilder than greets one in the gap of Lodore.
BY THE SHORES OF DERWENTWATER
Another ravine in the cliff near by possesses a beautiful waterfall, but Barrow Cascade is on private ground and the free rambler can hardly be brought to see it. The head of Derwentwater is so grown with weed that a path has to be cut to allow boats to reach Lodore landings. Near here the once wonderful Floating Island anchors. A mat of vegetable fibre lying on the lake-bed at times becomes inflated with natural gas and rises to the surface. In 1864 a second floating isle put in an appearance, and during that dry summer it seemed likely that many acres of adjoining lake-floor would follow suit. Floating Island shares fell to tremendous discount and have never recovered. The Derwent here enters the lake by two channels through ooze and tangled water-grass. Few lakes have so extensive shoals as Derwentwater: for acres hereabout you may look over the boat’s side through some feet of clear, amber water at the growing reeds, white spathes piercing the mud, green stems, and hasty leaves unfolding ere they reach the upper air, or thin waving threads linking a tuft of foliage on the surface with unseen roots beneath; all kinds of pond-life creeping and swimming about. Where the lake-bed lies fallow the eye rests on soft levels of mud, with a passing host of minnows, a red-necked perch, or even a trout or pike. Here and there rock-spines pierce the level floor, or perchance a bank of pebbles, large and small, set in smooth mosaic, blood-red of granite picked out with sea-blue slate, grey pebbles of volcanic ash intermingled with knobs of salmon sandstone, and conglomerate of every colour and shape. Watch the sunlines creeping and chasing and quivering as little ripples undulate the lake’s surface.
GRANGE IN BORROWDALE
Early morning