THE HIGHEST INN IN ENGLAND. 327 



" Just over in that there wood," pointmg to a 

 little copse not far away. 



''Lately?" 



" Oh yes ! " 



"Well, how lately?" 



"Oh, a matter o' two year ago." 



Wliilst searching for materials on the hills 

 dividino- Yorkshire from Westmorland in the 

 neighbourhood of Shunnerfell and Nine Standards 

 we had occasion to stay for a little time at Tan 

 Hill, the highest inn in England and the highest 

 inhabited house in Yorkshire. It enjoys an elevation 

 of 1,727 feet above sea-level and a corresponding 

 degree of isolation. Some idea may be gathered 

 of the distance it lies from " the busy haunts of 

 man" when it is stated that during the sununer 

 months an eighteen-gallon cask of ale lasts a whole 

 month, and in winter three. In fact, eleven con- 

 secutive weeks have sometimes passed without as 

 much as the shadow of a stranger crossing the 

 threshold. 



The landlord, in si)itc of being an old man 

 of between seventy and eighty years of age, all 

 spent immured amongst the gloomy solitude of the 

 lonely liills, was as merry as a schoolboy, and 

 laughed at his own jokes until the tears ran down 

 his wrinkled cheeks. 



Although the Education Acts, the popular print- 

 ing press, and the iron road have filled the remotest 

 parts of our land with a hazy and belated know- 

 ledge of the wag of the world, it is surprising how 

 utterly, and to me picturesquely, outside the pale 

 of modern thought and feeling some of the sturdy 

 old hillsmen of our country still remain. This old 

 fellow went to Barnard Castle to see a solicitor 

 about his licence, and couldn't tell the time upon 



