What time the timid traveller hears His cheek is seen to change, "At no great distance from Nibthwaite, I was quite delighted with a pool of water surrounded with firs. The water was as clear as crystal, so that I could see the green moss, and the grey rock, and the red weeds, and the speckled newts, or water-lizards, and other things at the bottom, as plainly as if they had been at the top. The whole scene reminded me of an island in the South Seas, of which I had been reading." me. "What island was it? Please to describe it to "I will. "Right in the middle of Papietee harbour is a bright green island, called Motoo-Otoo, one circular grove of waving palms, and scarcely a hundred yards across. It is of coral formation; and all round, for many rods out, the bay is so shallow that you might wade anywhere. Down in these waters, as transparent as air, you see coral plants of every hue and shape imaginable- antlers, tufts of azure waving reeds, like stalks of grain, and pale green buds and mosses. In some places, you look through prickly branches down to a snow-white floor of sand, sprouting with flinty bulbs; and crawling among these are strange shapessome bristling with spikes, others clad in shining coats of mail, and here and there round forms all spangled with eyes.' "Well! that is a very curious account. I shall not soon forget Motoo-Otoo at Tahiti. What other things did you see; for you meet with something curious everywhere?" "In the neighbourhood of Walney Scar, I passed by an antiquated thick stone wall; grey, venerable, and beautifully adorned with wall-flowers. There is something very sweet in the thought that the wall-flower never flourishes more than when it is hiding the cracks and crevices of an old ruin. 'Flower of the solitary place! 'Sweet wall-flower! sweet wall-flower! Full many a soft and sunny hour Of boyhood's thoughtless glee; In woodland pastures green, "I told you a little of Furness Abbey, which is about six miles to the south-west of Ulverston, a markettown in Lancashire. Conishead Priory is only two miles from Ulverston, and pleasant indeed is its situation. The mansion is a modern one, and very splendid, occupying the site of the old priory, founded by William of Lancaster, the fourth in descent from the first baron of Kendal, Ivo de Taillebois, in the reign of Henry II. Standing as it does, in a large and well-wooded park near the shore of Morecambe Bay, Conishead Priory has been called 'The Paradise of Fulness.' One of the best places from which to get a good prospect from Ulverston of the surrounding country and Morecambe Bay, is from the slope behind the old church. In the church is a window of stained glass, after Rubens, and an altarpiece, after sir Joshua Reynolds, which excite some attention, and the lover of antiquity is sure to take especial notice of the old tower and Norman doorway. Wherever travellers and tourists wander, they follow out their several tastes and inclinations; and thus, while one is attracted by a priory, a church, a painted window, and an old tower, another is equally interested in a frowning crag, a lonely tarn, a meandering stream, and a hollow oak-tree. Still it becomes us all, however agreeable and glowing earthly objects may be, while we enjoy them to look above them; And strive, though bright the scenes that round us rise, 102 CHAPTER IX. LOITERINGS ABOUT WAST WATER. Scenery of Wastdale.-Different ways of visiting Wastdale.-Redbreast, Blueback, and Yellowhead.-The fall above Skelwith bridge. Colwith Force.-Little Langdale Tarn, and Blea Tarn.— Mill Beck.-Pike o' Stickle and Harrison Pike.-Dungeon Gill Force. The old birch-tree.-Woods.-Blea Tarn.-Fellfoot, Wrynose, and Hardknot.-Eel Tarn and Bleaberry Tarn.-Strands.— Wast Water.-Devoke Water.-Ruins of Barnscar.-The storm. -The Screes.-The ravine of Hawl Gill.-Mountains.-Wastdale lit up with sunshine. "Now for the lakes! now for the lakes!" cried out Paul Ritter, throwing up his cap and again catching it as he joined his father in the garden. "I must tell you now about Wast Water," said Mr. Ritter; "and if I cannot say much for the beauty of the lake, I can say a great deal for the sublimity of the mountainous scenery around it. The secluded and desolate appearance of Wast Water impressed me strongly. There was the quiet lake, with the shivering Screes rising up on one side, and the mountain Seatallan on the other. I have already told you that the word screes usually means loose stones lying on the face of steeps, or at the foot of a precipice. Though the lake is almost as straight as a line, there is one part of it that I never saw." "Is there? How could that be? What part was it that you did not see?" "It was the bottom of it, Paul, for Wast Water is two hundred and seventy feet deep." 66 Oh, oh no wonder at all, then, that you did not see the bottom of it." "Some tourists visit Wast Water from Whitehaven, by Egremont, Calder Bridge, and Gosforth, taking care to inspect Wotobank and the ruins of Calder Abbey. Of the abbey the remains are nothing more than a square tower of the church, with the pointed arches and fine clustered columns which support it, all overrun with luxuriant ivy and embowered with sycamores. What the monks who once lived there would say to their monastery, could they see it now, I cannot tell." But the years have roll'd on, And the abbey is going." "The monks will never see their monastery again, that is certain. What kind of monks were they? 66 They were Cistercian monks from the abbey of Furness, and the monastery was founded by Ranulph de Meschiens in the year 1134. But I must tell you of the hill called Wotobank, of which the following anecdote is related. 666 A lord of Beckermet, with his lady and servants, |