A Run To The Lakes.

with proper submission to so high an authority , we venture to doubt Avhether this be the true solution ; and AA'ill continue to wonder that a region so naturally wild and romantic was aboriginally so barren of poetry and folk-lore . It was suggested to us that the whole thing may

be accounted for by the destruction of the Der-Aventwater family ; for it would seem that all the poetry and traditions of a highland people must cling , like the lay of the last minstrel , to the parent stock of the great baron or the feudal ¦ chief . If Ave suppose this to be the case , there

may CA en yet be relics of forgotten lays and mountain lyrics still floating about the region . But Southey , unlike Sir Walter Scott , was not the man to collect them . Wo learned quite by accident in KesAvick , that a long Jacobite lament On the gallant Earl of Derwentwater was orally

recited by an old woman in the neighbourhood till the day of her death ; and that a few stanzas are still remembered by a gentleman of that toAAii

who once had the good fortune to hear it . But if there is a lack of ancient poetry and tradition , it must be OAvned that the moderns have certainly done their utmost to supply fche deficiency The materials , to be sure , were rich and abundant ; but the quarryif Ave may use a professional

meta-, phor , has been uncommonly well worked , particularly on the upper beds . The fact is , the poets have fairly run riot in these Elysian fields . There is scarcely a mountain , hill , ov " pike " —there is not a lake , a waterfall , or rivulet—Ave might almost say there is hardly a tree or rock , on which some

of " the Lakers , " as Byron contemptuously styled them , have not contrived to affix their seal and superscription . Southey , Wordsworth , Coleridge , Christopher North , Sir Walter Scott , Thomas -de Quincey , Hartley Coleridge , Mrs . Radcliffe , Felicia HernansElizabeth SmithMiss JeAvsbury ,

, , and a whole legion of minor poets , Avhose very names would require a catalogue , have here succeeded , to a greater or less extent , in gilding * to their " airy nothings "

" A local habitation and a name . " Perhaps we shall be told that the gods have not made us poetical when Ave state , that in our opinion , even the master-minds do not show to the best adA r antage . We must own that Ave got rather tired of Soufchey's hexameters and

Wordsworth's pastorals , when studying * them , as the geologist would * say , in situ . As for the smaller minstrels who have chirped so melodiously on the margin of Grassmere or Buttermere , their rhymes are , for the most part , so licentious , and their apostrcmhes so exag'geratedas to overpower and

, obliterate whatever meaning they might have ofcherAvise possessed ; and they are therefore altogether destructive of the effect which they Avere intended to produce . Besides , it is rather a hard task on the weary traveller to be told and expected to recollect the names of all the poets who

have composed sonnets in praise of this lake or of that waterfall ! And the truth is the mere description of external nature , however life-like and beautiful , soon begins to pall even on the most voracious appetite . On the principle that " good Avine needs no bush , " Ave may safely say that the

English lakes require no extra poetic stimulus to excite admiration . Even the most prosaic mind cannot be unconscious of a certain awe and astonishment as he traverses those regions of floods and volcanoes ; and the true poet will , Ave suspect , always feel that the task of connecting

such mysterious operations of nature Avith the beauty of the landscape or the course of human destiny is a task beyond the reach of our poetry , perhaps of our philosophy . * But to proceed . The ride from Windermere to Keswick—which is commonly accomplished by

means of a mail-coach of the ancient type and three stout horses harnessed abreast , as in the Paddington omnibuses—is one Avhich may well

excite the astonishment of even an Alpine traveller . In place of winding round the bases ofthe mountains—like General Wade ' s excellent military roads in the Scotch Hig hlands—ifc seems to have been abruptly led over the haunches of some of the lesser hills . Accordingly , the gradients are in

some places so steep as to be rather dangerous , particularly at some of the narrow turnings , such as at Sniethwaite Bridge , about five miles from Keswick . We may mention that the lakers are rather proud of their bridges . " Travellers who may not have been accustomed to pay attention

to things so unobtrusive , " says Wordsworth , " will excuse me if I point out the proportions between the span and elevation of the arch , the lightness of the parapet , and the graceful manner in Avhich its curve follows faithfully that of the arch . "f This be a very poetical descriptionand it is almost

may , literally true—the Hues of the extrados and entraclos , or of the roadway and archway , seem to be drawn from the same centre , and somewhat resemble the construction of a tubular drain or sewer . We need not point out that " such unobtrusive things" are very difficult to get across ; and , in-