Page:A protest against the extension of railways in the Lake District - Somervell (1876).djvu/27

 nature is not, certainly, so flattering to average humanity as that of the Daily News; but it will, I trust, be sufficiently clear to the reader of the following pages, that the opposition of to-day is based, not on any desire to return to a position of exclusiveness—however logically tenable upon Wordsworth's hypothesis—but on a frank acceptance of the existing state of things, including what, to be quite plain, we may as well call 'cheap trips.'

The changes wrought, during the last thirty years, in our manufacturing centres, have certainly increased, rather than diminished, the difficulty of educating any one to the appreciation of nature in their immediate vicinity. And this alone should make the preservation of the Lake District an object of greater solicitude to the country at large than ever before.

In another respect our position is stronger than Wordsworth's. Not only have the Railways which were planned when he wrote been constructed, but others have been added, bringing travellers up to, or beyond, the edge of the district on every side.

It must be observed that there are two distinct points from which the question of extending a line of railway into the Lake District may be regarded. Either the minerals of the district are worth working, or they are not. Upon this matter I am not disposed to hazard an