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Visit to Brougham
Hall
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A VISIT TO BROUGHAM HALL,
In a letter addressed to James Dearden, Esq. of the
Orchard and Handle Hall, Lancashire.
MY DEAR DEARDEN - You ask me for some account of the old
embattled mansion of Brougham Hall, the seat of the
ex-Chancellor Lord Brougham, and which through the kindness
of his lordship I visited last autumn.
The domain is in Westmorland, though upon the extreme border
and nigh unto Cumberland, and is situated amid a succession
of gradually diminishing woody hills and green headlands,
which connect the open country with the mighty mountainous
chain surrounding the lakes.
The nearest town is Penrith, and from hence a pleasant walk
of a mile or so on the Shap road brings you to the gate,
after passing through a succession of inclosures sprinkled
with old gabled cottages and farm-houses, clothed in a most
luxuriant garb of wild rose and honeysuckle, intermingled
with the darker ivy. The first distinct view from the road
is immediately after passing the old British remain "King
Arthur's round table," and before ascending the celebrated
and no less picturesque bridge of Lowther, so well known as
the spot where Cluny Macpherson engaged the advanced guard
of the Duke of Cumberland in 1745, and brought off the
artillery belonging to the Highland army. From this place
the old hall assumes a very imposing appearance. Grey,
venerable, and massive, it crowns the summit of a
precipitous bank, and from its resemblance has been not
inaptly termed the Windsor of the North.
The principal feature from this point of view is a huge
square tower, embrasured and machicolated, rising above and
connecting itself with various masses of embattled
buildings, and grouping in the most pictorial fashion with
the aged trees which feather the steep descent to the river.
Nothing could be more picturesque than it was as I first saw
it, sometimes for a moment reposing its darkened and shadowy
mass of battlements and towers upon the white, driving,
fleecy clouds, and the next standing out in high relief upon
a back-ground of deep blue sky or deeper cloud, with all its
small irrregular and diamond-paned casements sparkling and
glittering in the sun. Crossing Lowther Bridge, the vsitor
leaves the main road through the park gate, and passing for
a short distance through the wood, finds himself beneath the
terrace immediately in front of the great tower, which seems
to have been constructed, from the situation and direction
of the machicolations, with the intention of defending this
part of the approach.
The road now winds round the base of the buildings, splayed
down and but-
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