A Visit To The English Lakes.

indulge in a game of " nap " with the two other visitors , and inscribe our names and opinions in the never-failing visitors' book . In the morning we get up too late for the ten o ' clock coach ! But we hardly regret having to stay a little longer at Ambleside , and visit the Mechanics' Institute , and look at the then we to Stock Gill Forcea fine double waterfallabout

papers ; go , very , seventy feet high , and rather full of water . The grounds , into which threepence entrance is demanded , are tastefully laid out with ferns and a few rustic seats . Dinner over , we purpose seeing " ' fair Rydal Mount , " a lovely cottagelike building , almost hidden by a profusion of roses and ivy , before leaving , and take the nearest road to it .

" Low and white yet scarcely seen , Are its walls of mantling green ; Not a window lets in light But through flowers clustering bright ; Not a glance may wander there But it falls on something fair . " Wordsworth makes the beautiful fall the subject of a poem : —

" While thick above the rill the branches close , In rocky basin its wild waves repose . Inverted shrubs , and moss , and gloomy green , Cling from the rook with pale wood-weeds between ; Save that aloft the subtle sunbeams shine On wither'd briars , that o ' er the crags recline ; Sole light admitted there , a small cascade Illumes with sparkling foam the impervious shade . "

We reluctantly leave the sylvan scene after feasting our eyes on it , and catch the afternoon coach for Keswick . A polite and intelligent Austrian seated with us is delig hted with the scenery , which he describes as '• ' too beautiful , " and praises the lakes beyond anything he has seen , the Rhine included . One of the company treats us to a little amateur horn blowing . " A second time in Grasmere ' s happy vale , " we gain fresh views from the coach of Coleridge ' s house , Rydal , and Grasmere , " which meets our last lingering look with farewell gleam , " as we pass the celebrated Swan Inn . We now see Helm Crag for the first time , with its " strange fantastic summit , round yet jagged and splintered ., " resembling " a lion , and a lamb , " or , according to Wordsworth -.

—" The astrologer , sage Sidrophel , Where at his desk and book he sits , Puzzling on high his curious wits ; He whose domain is held in common With no one but the ancient woman , Cowering beside her rifted cell As if intent on magic spell ; Dread pah-, that , spite of wind and weather , Still sit upon Helm Crag together . "

Others say these " gaunt , shapeless things resemble " a mass of antediluvian ruins , " or " some gigantic building demolished , " and "a number of stones jumbled together after the manner of the Druids . " We leave " The ancient woman seated on Helm Crag , " and make the pass of Dummail Raise , with a cairn forming the boundary between Westmoreland and Cumberland . Steel Fell looms over us on our left , and Seat Sandal on our right . This cairn is said to have been formed in 945 bthe Anglo-Saxon king Edmundto commemorate

y , the defeat of Dummail , the last king of Cumbria . Tradition says that Edmund put out the eyes of the son before his father , and then put them both to death . ( To be continued . )