his version was the correct one.

"But," interposed Mr. Spedding, "we feel that our English Church service is full of consolation and help at such a time. We would not for all the world be without either the service in church or the prayers at the grave side." Na, na,” replied Carlyle, "I tell ye at such times silence is best." There are those who would fain have that library filled again with the voices of old time. Tennyson's deep-chested tones, Fitzgerald's laugh, Monckton Milnes' wit, Carlyle's strong Northern brogue, James Spedding's dignified speech, and Tom Spedding's humour. For these the silence is not

best.

It would be ungracious to the literary associations of the neighbourhood, to pass from Keswick without a remembrance of how that old Crosthwaite Vicarage, whose ivy-swathed walls upon its terrace-garden height are well-nigh hid from view by its screen of limes, was the birthplace of Mrs. Lynn Linton.

All who wish to know of her memories of Crosthwaite in the olden time will read her autobiographical sketch in Christopher Kirkland, but it is sad enough reading. That she, the youngest of the children, motherless at the age of five months, should have been left to the mercy of a set of passionate boys, who, as she grew up, teased her, and bullied her till she became as furious as a little wild beast; and to the tender care of a father, who "believed in Solomon and the rod, and put religious correction as well as muscular energy into his stripes," was bad enough; but when one realises that in her high temper and bravery she was

generally selected to do the necessary apple-stealing, and any bit of family work that would end in disgrace; and was always, failing the detection of the culprit, pitched upon to be made a public example of, one wonders the child grew up with any heart at all. I never pass by the cupboard beneath the stairs to my study, which is left just as her father knew it, without hearing the from the rod in the darkness.

sobs of the poor child smarting "I do not suppose a

week passed," she writes, " without one of these memorable outbreaks, with the rod and dark closet under the stairs to follow." Not unfrequently does the figure of the father unmoved by her sobs come before me; and the strange interview of the tyrannical bishop, his father-in-law, with the widowed vicar of Crosthwaite, sounds out of the silence.

"In the name of heaven, Mr. Lynn, what do you mean to do for your children ?"

"Sit in the study, my Lord, and smoke my pipe, and commit them to the care of Providence."

But the rough and tumble of those old days when the neighbouring parsons would, like the priest of Uldale, work afield during the week, then go down to the public house for Saturday night, "strip to t' buff," and having floored their men, go home to prepare their sermons for the next morning, puts Vicar Lynn in fair contrast with the clerics of his time. For Vicar Lynn, as all averred, was a gentleman: and then the voice of him,-to hear Vicar Lynn read a lesson in the parish church, was worth coming miles for.

As we read Christopher Kirkland, we seem to see how the little dare-devil girl grew up in surroundings which forced her to think and act for herself, drove her for solace to the "huts where poor men lie," and made the woods and hills her daily teachers. Readers of Lizzie Lorton will realise what the outcome of this early education in human nature was to the writer of that interesting tale of our country side. And those who take Mrs. Lynn Linton's Lake Country in hand, will find with what "inevitable eye" she made the fields and valleys of her beloved home her 66 'never failing friends." Warm-hearted as she was, and is, in much of her writings, the undertone of combative opposition to the conventional, and to things as they are, seems to be a voice that began to find utterance in that vicarage garden of "Eden," as she called it, where all alone she stole apples for her brothers at their bidding, and would not tell; and where first she plucked the fruits of the Tree of Knowledge, and found so few to help, to counsel, or encourage her.

CHAPTER VIII

COCKERMOUTH, BRIDEKIRK, BRIGHAM, PARDSEY CRAG

THE WORDSWORTHS AT COCKERMOUTH: FEARON FALLOWS:
TICKELL: SIR JOSEPH WILLIAMSON: ABRAHAM FLETCHER:
JOHN DALTON: ELIHU ROBINSON: FOX AND THE
EARLY QUAKERS

We take train now and cross the valley towards Braithwaite, and the hills of Barf and woods of Wythop. are bent on a visit to the birthplace of our Cumbrian poet, and as we go we pass the resting-place of his brother laureate. There, high up on the Crosthwaite Tower in pleasant summer days, would Robert Southey sit for hours, and "muse o'er flood and fell."

It is worth while keeping a good look out as we pass the Crosthwaite Churchyard for a sight of the pink-grey Shap granite pillar in shape of an early cross, upon the brow of the hill, that marks the grave of one of the most remarkable of our later Carlisle bishops.

There rests Harvey Goodwin, of whom the Latin inscription records that he tired not in defending the faith

of his fathers by his words and writings, "but especially by that book The Foundations of the Creed." Upon the affection of this good shepherd of his flock had the fells and dales laid a hold, strong as they did upon that humbler shepherd "Michael." "Michael." He first learned the joy of scenery in this vale, and coming, as he came, from the flats and fens of Norfolk to our hills, when preparing for his undergraduate course, his mind was marvellously impressed. No wonder that he, whose eyes were constantly lifted to the hills, whence came his aid, should wish when they closed in death, to lie here.

It is true, as Coleridge once wrote to William Godwin, that "mountains and mountain scenery put on their immortal interest, when we have resided among them and learned to understand their language, their written characters and intelligible sounds, and all their eloquence so various, so unwearied." But even the passing traveller, when he speeds across the valley and looks back at old "Skiddhr," may feel impressed by its sense of restful bulk and quiet calm, and may think that this old moraine in the valley where, more than thirteen centuries ago, St. Mungo first planted the cross in sight of Skiddaw, is a fair place for the resting of all mountain shepherds or shepherds of men, that shall have their toil in earth, or their joy in heaven.

Now the train rattles over the Derwent. The shallows and alders of Wordsworth are there to the right; up on the left, near the "Village-of-the-ford-of-the-Parliament " Pord-thing-scales, the Portinscale of our day-there may be seen a grey arched bridge; there was situate one of the