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as she appeared on his first visit : — " Her mother and she were 

 spinning woollen yarn in the back kitchen. On our going into it 

 the girl flew away as swift as a mountain sheep, and it was not till 

 our return from Scale Force we could say we first saw her. She 

 brought in part of our dinner, and seemed to be about fifteen. Her 

 hair was thick and long, of a dark brown, and though unadorned 

 with ringlets, did not seem to want them. Her face was a fine 

 oval, with full eyes, and lips as red as vermillion. Her cheeks had 

 more of the lily than the rose, and although she had never been 

 out of the village — and I hope will have no ambition to wish it — 

 she had a manner about her which seemed better calculated to set 

 off her dress than 'dress her'; she was a very Lavinia, 



Seeming when unadorned, adorned the most. 

 When we first saw her at her distaff, after she got the better of her 

 first fear, she looked an angel, and I doubt not she is the reigning 

 lily of the valley." Mr. Budworth, with whom Mary seems to 

 have been a great favourite, again visited "The Fish" some years 

 after writing the above description of her. On this occasion he 

 was present at a dance or merry night, held for the benefit of the 

 local fiddler, where he mixed freely with the company. "They 

 were," he says, "the very rosiest cheeked mortals I ever saw. The 

 men kept excellent time, and ratded on the floor with a variety of 

 steps ; the women danced as easily as the men determinedly. The 

 dance was never long, and the moment the fiddler ceased another 

 set that were ready called a fresh tune and began. I was glad to 

 notice a black eyed youth hand out Mary and another young girl 

 and call for a reel ; and I honesdy say I never saw more graceful 

 dancing or a woman of finer figure to set it off than Mary of 

 Buttermere." Mary was the only daughter of Mr. and Mrs. 

 Robinson, an old couple who kept "The Fish" inn; and the 

 author of the foregoing eulogium afterwards deplored that he had 

 not left poor Mary to blush unseen, instead of introducing her to 

 the public by the glowing delineation of her rustic beauty given in 

 his "Fortnight's Ramble to the Lakes," in which he published the 

 account of the places visited by him and other matters in connec- 

 tion therewith, during his rambles through the Lake Country. 



