FirLtp MEETINGS. 207 
English side brought him across with his cart for the conveyance 
of passengers or goods. 
The parish church of Bowness, which is said to date from 
about the year 1300, is a building remarkable for the unusual 
size and strength of buttresses supporting it, on the south side 
and at the east and west ends. Doubtless a stone roof at one 
time added to the weight resting on the walls. The bells are 
hung in a belfry of peculiar flattened shape. Within a porch are 
placed two disused bells, one of them bearing the date 1616, 
the other without any date or inscription, which are known as. 
“the stolen bells of Bowness.’’ The story is that they were 
carried off by a party of English raiders from the churches of 
Middlebie and Dornock, and that the Scotsmen by way of 
reprisal came over the Solway and took with them those of 
Bowness. These must have been sportive expeditions. It is 
said of the mosstroopers of earlier date that they would carry off 
anything which was neither too hot nor too heavy; but they 
generally, we fancy, sought something more utilitarian and less. 
unwieldy than church bells. The church was restored some 
nineteen years ago; but its fine old architectural features have 
been preserved, alongside the elegance of modern equipment. 
The baptismal font is a massive and curious piece of antique 
carving, which had lain neglected for generations in a village 
garden. 
Driving from Bowness to Burgh (which the Cumbrian pro- 
nounces Bruff), the way lay for some distance close to the Solway 
and along a road still wet from having been overflowed by the 
21-feet tide of the previous night. At Port Carlisle, a mile 
from Bowness, is another tiny altar stone, built into the wall of 
the Steam Packet Inn. The name of the inn and the island 
remanant of a stout stone pier belong to a period when this was. 
a busy shipping centre; but Silloth has long since superseded 
it as the port of Carlisle, and the barrier interposed by the Sol- 
way Viaduct prevents any ships from now reaching it. The 
“ dandy railway,’’ along which a one-horse car runs in the track 
of the old canal, links the stranded village on to the locomotive 
railway system at Drumburgh. At the latter place (three miles 
and three-quarters from Bowness) was a small military station 
of the Romans; and there is, in good preservation and serving 
as a farmhouse, a castle or fortified manor house of the Lords 
