94 



MEMOIR OF THE LATE MR. JOHN .TOST, OF BURY. 



constant desire to be useful, in various ways. For instance, 

 he amused himself by engraving the cypher upon a great 

 portion of the family plate there ; and brought his taste for 

 the mechanical arts, and his skill in several of them, to bear 

 practically in the manufacture of several barometers, which 

 he constructed, graduated, and engraved himself, and which 

 are still possessed by friends of his youthful years, who highly 

 value them, not only for the sake of the maker, but also 

 for their accuracy and excellence. One gentleman informs 

 me that the best barometer he ever possessed was wholly 

 made by Mr. Just. At the Kirkby Ijonsdale School he com- 

 pleted his scholastic education, under the care of the late 

 Rev. John Dobson. During this period, the change of his 

 circumstances, especially the leisure he possessed and the 

 exemption from farm labour, greatly favoured his studies, and 

 he continued to be distinguished for indefatigable industry 

 and for good conduct. At this early period of his life he 

 manifested a taste for antiquarian pursuits, by commencing 

 his investigation into the Roman Roads in the neighbour- 

 hood ; — doubtless stimulated to this branch of archgeological 

 inquiry by the existence of a Roman station at Natland, in 

 a bend of the river Kent, called the Water Crook, sup- 

 posed to be the site of the ancient Concangiura, where the 

 ramparts of the square fort are still discernible, and various 

 relics have from time to time been found. While a pupil 

 at Kirkby Lonsdale, he took advantage of a holiday one 

 winter's day, and walked thence to Borrow Bridge, on the 

 Lune — a distance of sixteen or seventeen miles — to examine 

 the fine Roman remains still existing there, and home 

 again in the evening. Those only who know this mountain 

 road can adequately estimate the arduous labour of this 

 undertaking. 



Mr. Just possessed a remarkably retentive memory, and 

 whatever he once read he seemed thoroughly and perma- 

 nently to make his own. A somewhat amusing instance of 



