, K eswick V a l e »
or to fit in council, to determine on controverfies, to compromife
all differences about limits o f land, or about inheritances, or for
the tryal o f the greater criminals * ; the Druids poffeffmg both
the office o f prieft and judge. The caufe that this recefs was
placed on the eail fide,, feems to arife from the refpeft paid by
the antient natives of this ifle to that beneficent luminary the fun,
not originally an idolatrous refpecl, but merely as a fymbol of the
glorious all-feeing Being, its great Creator.
In the fame plate with thefe Druidical remains, is engraven a fpe-
cies o f fibula cut out o f a flat piece of filver,.of a form better to be
expreffed by the figure than words. Its breadth is, from one exterior
fide to the other, four inches. This was difcovered lodged in
the mud, on deepening a fiffi-pond in Brayton Park in Cumberland, the
feat of Sir Wlilfrid Lawfon, and communicated • to me by Doftor
Brownrigg. With it was found a large filver hook, o f two ounces
weight. The length o f the ffiank from the top to the curvature
at bottom,i four inches and., three eights. The hook not fo
long..
Arrive near the, Elyfiiim of the North,, the vale o f Kefwick, a
circuit between land and water of about twenty miles. From an
eminence above,, command a fine bird’s eye view of the whole of
the broad, fertile plain,, the town of Kefiaick, the white church of
Crofwhaite, the boailed lake o f Derwentwater, and the beginning
of that of Bajfenthwaite, with a., full., fight o f the vaft circumjacent
mountains that guard this delicious fpot.
Dine. at. Kefwick, a fmall market town: where, and in the
neighborhood, are manufactures o f carpet», flannels, linfies and
*- Csf. de Bello Gal. litvvk
yam :
lyarn: the laft fold to people from Cockermouth, who come for i t
every market day.
Take boat on the celebrated lake o f Derwentwater. The form: D e rw e h tw a t e r
'is irregular, extending from North to South, about three miles
and a half ; the breadth one and a half. The greateft depth is
twenty feet in a channel, running from end' to end, probably
ibrmed by the river Derwent, which paffes through, and gives name
I to the lake.
The views on every fide are very different: here all the poffible-
variety of Alpine fcenery is exhibited, with all“ the horror o f precipice,
broken crag, or over-hanging rock; or infulated pyramidal
hills, contrafted with others whofe fmooth and verdant fides,
fwelling- into aerial heights, at once pleafe and fufprize the eye.
The two extremities of the lake afford molt difcordant pro-'
fpefts: the Southern is a eompofition o f all that is horrible; an-
immenfe chafm opens in the midil, whofe entrance is divided by
a rude conic hill, once topt with a caftle, the habitation o f the
tyrant of the rocks; beyond, a feries of broken mountanous crags,,
now patched with fnow, foar one above the other; overffiadow-
ing the dark winding deeps o f Borrowdale. In thefe black re-
ceffes are lodged variety of minerals, the origin of evil by their,
abufe, and placed by nature, not remote from the fountain o f it.
Itnm eft in vifcera term,
Quafqne recondiderat ftygiifyue removerat umbrie»,
Effodiuntur opes.
But the oppofite or northern view is in all refpecls a ftrong and
beautiful contrail: Skiddaw fliews its vail bafe, and bounding all
that part o f the vale, rifes gently to a height that finks the neigh