;]Suttermete. 293 



notably a parsonage, which altogether form a community fully 

 entitled to the name of village. To this may be added, that 

 agriculture has improved the meadows and slopes, and, 

 what is very important, the principal roads are good and 

 well kept, except in places where the excessive steepness 

 suggests looseness of surface to check the wheels. 



Butter Mere is rather more than a mile and a quarter long ; 

 its broadest part is half-a-mile across ; and, its greatest 

 depth, 90 feet. The water contains trout and char, the lat- 

 ter, however, are not so abundant as they are in Crummock. 

 Boats may be had at the inns, and good ^Hfefjing in the lakes 

 is promised to those who enjoy the sport. The streams are 

 also well-stocked with fish, which cannot be said of those in 

 the district generally. For, notwithstanding the large quan- 

 tity of water, it is a notorious fact that fish is often im- 

 ported for residents and tourists. This, however, does 

 not apply to our present head-quarters : the veritable char 

 will be placed before the guest, for which, in London, 

 as much as los. a pound is sometimes paid. While our 

 travelling companion is being regaled with this delicacy 

 at a very moderate cost, we may tell the story of the 

 * Beauty of Buttermere, ' which every one who comes here 

 ought to know, in the words of Mr. Payn. 



*The course of true love, even after marriage, has not 

 always run smoothly, even at pastoral Buttermere. Every- 

 body has heard of poor Mary of that Ilk ; a little tract about 

 her was once published, and 'Mary of Buttermere'' had, in 

 its day, though among a different class, almost as great a 

 circulation as " The Dairyman! s Daughter ; and, the story, 

 now long forgotten, may have some interest for the present 

 generation. An individual calling himself the Hon. Colonel 

 Hope, visited the Cumberland Lakes in August, 1802, and 



