AND ANGLING SONGS. 231 



burgh, Christopher North taking the lead, and sustaining it 

 triumphantly past the winning-post. 



At the time of my visit to Elleray, the yachting rage, so 

 vividly depicted by Lockhart in his Life of Sir Walter Scott, had 

 subsided, and at Bowness the larger class of sailing craft belong- 

 ing to the Professor, which had taken part in the celebrated 

 regatta, had been hauled up, unrigged, and allowed in several 

 instances to fall into a state of complete disrepair. The boating 

 establishment was under charge of Billy Balmer, the factotum at 

 Elleray in all sporting matters, whose appearance and accom- 

 plishments, taken into connexion with his rich Cumberland 

 humour, indicated great individuality of character. Billy was of 

 short stature, fair-complexioned, and flaxen-haired, with a clear 

 blue intelligent eye. Of his age, when I first saw him, it was 

 difficult to judge. He was probably upwards of sixty. With 

 the Professor he stood in high favour, and was retained by him 

 to the last at Bowness as a dependant, free of service. Billy's 

 tastes led to an intimate acquaintance with the habits of most of 

 the animals, fishes as well as birds and quadrupeds, native to the 

 Lake district. This acquaintance included a thorough knowledge 

 of the game-cock, its points and mode of training. It extended 

 also to a fair average notion of the treatment required by the in- 

 habitants of the stable, the kennel, and the poultry-yard ; but 

 the old boy evidently was most at home, so to call it, when 

 abroad in the covert or at the river-side. An angler he was not, 

 in the true sense of the term, but he had all the enthusiasm of 

 one, and without caring to handle -the rod himself, could give 

 the most invaluable instructions to others, both as to the places 

 where, and the manner how, to do execution in beck or tarn. 

 His attendance upon the Professor in his fishing excursions in 

 the Lake district may partly account for this proficiency, but it 

 was to be traced also to an indulgence when young in those 

 roving and inquiring inclinations, which no doubt tend to poach- 



