cave-returning tigress from a day's search in the desert for a drink of blood. Then the attitudes-the postures—of Jonathan! How like a Christian, indeed, when by a dexterous movement of the shoulder, changing the ebb of tide again into flow! Good example is seldom lost when set by the wise to the simple; and there was a striking illustration afforded now of that salutary truth. Still each man, as he knelt, gave the same round of toasts we had given, and in the same order of succession, only beginning uniformly because instinctively with Christopher. Jonathan, last of all, was stung with his own serpent. The bite was manifestly immortal; and he sprung from knees to feet, as if from Scafell he would have shot into the sky.

We were now prepared to part. So, deploying in grand style from the summit, down the side of the mountain, whose forehead seemed to gloom with grief to lose eight such jolly guests, we called a halt on a platform of Lingmell (so called is the mighty base of all those heights), looking in the direction of Barnmoor Tarn (where there are jack-like crocodiles), and after some moments' silence, with cordial fist-grasp bade each friend in succession a God-bless-ye Farewell. Nor were Toes-nor the Son of Toes-nor Seathwaite, displeased to see that we wiped our eyes with our sleeve, on ejaculating over and over again more than once or twice either the same benediction on one head-hoary now, and thin the hair thereon, that we stammered as we said, striving and struggling at the same time at an ineffectual smile-"God-bless-ye, VICARS-God-bless-ye, WOOLPACK-and may thy honest face not be missed at the door, if ever it be our lot again to visit Eskdale." Nor was the old man unmoved, as hat in hand he stood before us, with the breezes playing

"Round the bald polish of that honour'd head;"

and as he bowed and took his departure, looking after him going down the hill, we said in a low tone, but overheard by the Adelphi "Eheu! fugaces, Posthume! Posthume! labuntur anni!” We have heard people say that it is more fatiguing to them to descend than to ascend a mountain. They complain of their knees. We never complain of our knees; but they would be weak, indeed, were we to credit such a falsehood. Infinite are the modes of descent; but all easier

You may

than the one of ascent, which is always difficult. descend in leaps, jumps, springs, and spangs, like a greyhound, or a deer, or a frog, wondering the while at your own elasticity; making no bones of stones, and tilting at times like a ship over the billows. Or you may go down the greensward," smooth sliding without step," as if you were a stream. Or, like a rock loosened from its bed of moss, what is to prevent you?-nothing that we can see-from performing the distance-a mile in two minutes-head-over-heels, wheel-fashion, till you lose all semblance of the species, and seem but a shiver of schist suddenly inspired with animation. Or with long steady strides you may pursue your own shadow, and catch it at the bottom. All these pastimes are pleasant. But one there is apt to be painful; though your knees are not-so far as we can see-the chief sufferers—the reverse. We are, supposing you, not trundling, but in one posture-you will pardon us for naming it—to wit, on your posteriors-sliddering down the sward, which simply wears

away your breeches then scluttering down the skrees, which simply tears your drawers - then bouncing off one block on upon another-and so on-which in a few minutes simply makes your bottom as black as if you had been blown up with gunpowder in celebrating the King's birthday, or assisting at a great national jubilee in honour of reform. This last mode, which, you perceive, is complex, if too far pursued, would change Apollo into a Dutchman. It is never adopted voluntarily by a man whose understanding is in the right place; though, now that we recollect, we saw it practised for short distances, and apparently unawares this very day by the Adelphi. Buckskin can't stand it; and for weeks after any prolonged exploit as above, the performer must sleep on his face, and eat all his meals on his feet. Moons must renew their horns before he can venture on 66 some horseback;" and the probability indeed is, that he will be for ever disqualified for serving his country, either as a light or heavy dragoon; nay, perhaps not even in the most stationary of the sedentary employments. In case of early death, humanity would suggest, on the arrangement of the last rites, that the body should be coffined in the same posture in which the living man had so long in vain wooed sleep. If dug up in after ages, how many conjectures-and the nearest

how wide of the truth-as to the reason of the singular position of the skeleton!

The Four kept sinking east, in constellation, as the sun kept sinking west; and in the cool of the early evening, or late afternoon, a dubious but delightful hour, mild and mellow, before any perceptible gloaming, they found themselves breasting through the brushwood, "path or no path, what cared they," that clothes the lowest ridge as it dips down upon the many-walled fields and meadows of Upper Wastdale-while whirr, whirr, went a brace of partridges or call them rather a pair-for they are breeding-from the first grass-plat-the hen having left, for a few minutes to feed, her nest in some ridge not far off; - had she been disturbed in sitting, not till our foot had absolutely kicked her would she have left her eggs, and away then had she huddled, as if wounded, on trailing wings. The bonny "paitrick" loves the corn-braird, and the rye-grass, and the potato-shaws; and here are all three; for far up as they are among the hollow of the hills, level nearly are these small sweet estates with the sea; plough and harrow have been busy, and gone to rest in the shed; in another month the mower will be whetting his scythe-and in little more than two, the reaper will be flourishing his sickle-for summer treads fast in this solitude on the feet of spring, and in sunny seasons like this, when the entire year promises to be benignant, the stranger would be surprised to see how soon the yellow patches, sprinkled here and there among the bright green after-grass, and the dimmer pastures, give notice of the approach of

autumn.

Our motions have been long watched from the most hospitable of houses. On his way down Sty-Head, Thomas himself had seen some creatures crawling on the threshold of Mickle Door, who he knew were human-an hour afterwards he told the mistress to look and say what she saw on the Pike-then a shepherd from Kirkfell had come in, asserting that there were lakers, or planners, or something of that sort, on the top of Scaw; and the whole household had been eyeing us from the court before the porch, as in diminished numbers, but increased dimensions, we were seen wending down Lingmell, and to disappear like outlaws into the good greenwood. So that, on joining the out-of-door folks, on our speedy arrival at

the wished-for port, the assemblage under the sycamores had much the semblance of a wedding-Christopher, of course, with his ardent eyes and uncontrollable countenance, the Bridegroom.

Mrs Tyson is a woman of deeds, not of words; though by the chimney-nook, or in the seat below the porch, or in the arbour in the corner of the garden, when seated beside her husband, in company with a few friends, she takes her quiet part in the conversation in a way worthy the mistress of such a household. There was no need now to drop so much as a hint out of the tail of our eye to expedite tea. There already is the second china-set! (the first, shown and used too on rare occasions, is superb, and would not shame a suite of drawingrooms), and we know the pot to be a princess of a pourer. In that capacious bosom the "fragrant lymph" in a few minutes waxes clear and brown as amber, and comes curving out of that bold beak like a rainbow. That is cream! a mouse falling into the jug might leap out again as if his feet had touched terra firma. Here alone of all the domiciles in the dales do we meet with marmalade. For our own single selves we cannot with truth say that we are hungry; yet we feel we can do a leetle, just so as not to distress host or hostess by any suspicion stealing upon them, on "hospitable thoughts intent," that we are sickly; and a man must needs be sickly indeed whose stomach would be coy towards such bread and butter; a few slices of cold meat, and but a few, change the meal into a light supper; and those eggs which have seen but one sun, and never will see another, in their softness furnish an amiable contrast with those hard yolks on the Pikes, which we had to break between two stones, like nuts or shellfish. We beware of eating much near sunset, in case of the nightmare. At such a season we seldom drink anything stronger than water, but such ale (go paint the perfume of the violet), so far from bringing a hag to sit on your breast, will put into your arms an angel. When friends meet, however long and far they may have been parted, let them not all break out simultaneously into one gabble like geese on a green, when with no contemptible flight in its way, comes flapping to rejoin the flock, a leash of adventurous ganders, that had an hour ago flown off to push their fortunes some hundred yards from their birthplace, and in all changes of

VOL. VI.

F

clime had found no spot like the margin of the pool in which they had played as goslings. Silence should be the soft, smooth, silken, or velvet ground on which simple words are lovingly inlaid, so that the conversation-if fancy may be permitted thus to dally with the affections, and accept the similitudes which unconsciously joy doth offer-is even like some fair embroidery, where flowers are sweetly disposed, not profusely lavished, and though artlessly dropt there, as it would seem, yet so true the sentiment that assigned them all their places, that the confusion of colour is harmony itself, and Feeling has in truth done the work of Genius.

It has been so with us this evening, and this humble household. In calling it humble, we were thinking of the high mountains by which it is overshadowed; for intelligence, as well as integrity, characterises the Statesmen of the Dales; nor in their seclusion are they ignorant of the world. Knowledge has found its way into the remotest regions; and the full-grown trees have sown the greensward among the shelter of the rocks, so that everywhere around are arising green scions that need no other tendance than to keep open their roots to the dews and sunshine. Yes-the Dalesmen of the North of England are an intellectual people. When families are large, their sons not unfrequently settle in cities, and come back to pass the evening or afternoon of life among the scenes of its morning or meridian, with an independence won by that industry which is a virtue of the race. Not a few enter college at Oxford or Cambridge; and their names are sometimes found high on the list of honours. Others less ambitious, pursue their studies at breezy St Bees by the sea-cliffs, and are ordained as Literates, and ever afterwards contented with a humble cure and a humble chapel-curate and schoolmaster in one, busy all the week, and never absent on Sabbath. Such a man was with us in the early part of the evening; and left us, we presume, to look over his sermon for to-morrow, which was written perhaps long ago, nay perhaps printed; but not a whit the worse for that, as far as we can see, and probably much the better; and 'tis a pity to think how many excellent discourses lie undisturbed in dust, well worthy being preached during the year, at diverse times and sundry places. The congregations in the hill-chapels, though orthodox, are not critical; they are satisfied with the doctrine that satisfied