Page:A tour through the northern counties of England, and the borders of Scotland - Volume II.djvu/104

 [ 5)2 ]

- Our route to Ulswater lake led us once more by the Druidical monuments already mentioned, which the road to Pooly divides from each other, and then wound through a country infinitely beautiful, diversified with gentle hills and broad valleys, in whose luxuriant bosoms many mansions of ancient and modern date are securely seated, defended from the tempests by the aerial height of the immense Saddleback, who, shooting into points, presents a singular contrast to the neighbouring round-headed mountains. Before us lay a rich carpet of meads and woods, backed by the dark precipices and rude summits of the august Helvellyn, the father of the Cumbrian mountains, and other heights which surround Ulswater. This extended scene, how- ever, gradually narrows as we approach the lake; the right screen is formed by the woody hill Dun- mallard, sanctified by the monastery of Benedictines, which formerly crowned its lofty head. On the other side we have steep declivities of verdant down. Turning over Pooly bridge, at the north- eastern extremity of the lake, we catch on a sud- den a grand reach of this beautiful piece of water, at least four miles in length, terminated by mea- dows covered with trees, and backed by mountains of every variety of outline. Our admirable road kept for the most part the northern margin of the

�� �