button to main menu   West's Guide to the Lakes, 1778/1821

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Page 207:-
trees, both sown and planted, oak, spruce, Scotch fir, &c. all which thrive wonderfully. There is an easy ascent to the top, and the view far preferable to that on Castle-hill (which you remember) because this is lower and nearer the lake; for I find all points that are much elevated, spoil the beauty of the valley, and make its parts, which are not large, look poor and diminutive [1]. While I was here, a little shower fell, red clouds came marching up the hills from the east, and part of a bright rainbow seemed to rise along the side of Castle-hill.
From hence I got to the parsonage a little before sun-set, and saw in my glass a picture, that if I could transmit to you, and fix it in all the softness of its living colours, would fairly sell for a thousand pounds. This is the sweetest scene I can yet discover in point of pastoral beauty; the rest are in a sublimer style.
Oct. 5. I walked through the meadows and corn-fields to the Derwent, and crossing it went up to How-hill; it looks along Bassenthwaite-water, and sees at the same time the course of the river, and a part of the upper lake, with a full view of Skiddaw: then I took my way through Portinscale village to the Park, a hill so called, covered entirely with wood; it is a mass of crumbling slate. Passed round its foot, between trees and the edge of the water, and came to a peninsula that juts out into the lake, and looks along it
[1] The picturesque point is always thus low in all prospects: a truth which though the landscape-painter knows, he cannot always observe; since the patron who employs him to take a view of his place, usually carries him to some elevation for that purpose, in order, I suppose, that he may have more of him for his money. Yet when I say this I would not be thought to mean that a drawing should be made from the lowest point possible; as for instance in this very view, from the lake itself, for then a fore-ground would be wanting. On this account, when I sailed at Derwent-water, I did not receive so much pleasure from the superb amphitheatre of mountains round me, as when, like Mr. Gray, I traversed its margin; and therefore think he did not loose much by not taking boat.
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gazetteer links
button -- "Cockshut" -- Cockshot Wood
button -- "Park" -- Fawe Park
button -- "How Hill" -- How Hill
button -- Portinscale
button -- Skiddaw
button -- station, Cockshot Wood
button -- station, Crosthwaite Vicarage
button -- station, Derwent Water by boat
button -- station, Fawe Park

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