to ^utitjon 'yfallt^. 179 



The grey farmsteads stand under their sycamores, dis- 

 persed in the vale, and up the slope which meets the 

 Walna Scar track from Coniston. Rocky and wooded knolls 

 diversify the dale; and the full beck runs down to join the 

 Duddon, for which it is often mistaken. The Duddon, how- 

 ever, is unseen here : so deep lies the channel among the 

 rocks. The church is little loftier or larger than the houses 

 near. If it were not for the bell, the traveller would hardly 

 distinguish it as a church on approaching; but when 

 he has reached it, he will see the porch, and the little grave- 

 yard with a few tombs, and the spreading yew, encircled by 

 a seat of stones and turf, pn which the early comers sit and 

 rest till the bell calls them in. A little dial, on a whitened 

 post in the middle of the enclosure, tells the time to the 

 neighbours who have no clocks. Just outside the wall is 

 a white cottage, so humble that the stranger thinks it 

 cannot be the parsonage; though the climbing roses and 

 glittering evergreens, and clear lattices, and pure uncracked 

 walls make it look as if it might be. He walks slowly past the 

 porch and sees some one who tells him that it is indeed 

 ]Etotot "yZl^alket's dwelling, and who courteously invites 

 him to see the scene of those life-long charities. Here it was 

 that the distant parishioners were fed on Sundays with broth, 

 for which the whole week*s supply of meat was freely 

 bestowed. Hither it was that in winter he sent the benumbed 

 children, in companies, from the school in the church, to 

 warm themselves at the single household fire, while he him- 

 self sat by the altar during the whole of the school-hours, 

 keeping warmth in him by the exercise of the spinning wheel. 

 But the story is too well known, as it stands in WorcJ^worth's 

 works, to need repitition here — too well known, we should 

 think, to allow tourists to walk two miles from Ulpha Kirk and 

 back again, without visiting the home, in life and death, of 



N2 



