desire seized me of visiting remote regions. My
first impulse was to go and see Paris. It was a trivial objection to
my aspiring mind, that I did not understand a word of the language,
since I certainly intend some time of my life to see Paris, and equally
certainly intend never to learn the language; therefore that could be
no objection. However, I am very glad I did not go, because you had
left Paris (I see) before I could have set out. . . . My final resolve
was, a tour to the Lakes. I set out with Mary to Keswick, without
giving Coleridge any notice, for my time, being precious, did not admit
of it. He received us with all the hospitality in the world, and gave
up his time to show us all the wonders of the country. He dwells upon
a small hill by the side of Keswick, in a comfortable house, quite
enveloped on all sides by a net of mountains: great floundering bears
and monsters they seemed, all couchant and asleep. We got in in the
evening, travelling in a post-chaise from Penrith, in the midst of a
gorgeous sunshine, which transmuted all the mountains into colours,
purple, etc., etc. We thought we had got into fairyland. But that
went off (as it never came {108} again; while we stayed we had no more
fine sunsets), and we entered Coleridge's comfortable study just in the
dusk, when the mountains were all dark with clouds upon their
heads. . . . Coleridge had got a blazing fire in his study; which is a
large antique, ill-shaped room, with an old-fashioned organ, never
played upon, big enough for a church, shelves of scattered folios, an
Aeolian harp, and an old sofa, half bed, etc. And all looking out upon
the last fading view of Skiddaw, and his broad-breasted brethren: what
a night! . . . We have clambered up to the top of Skiddaw, and I have
waded up the bed of Lodore. In fine, I have satisfied myself that
there is such a thing as that which tourists call _romantic_, which I
very much suspected before: they make such a spluttering about it, and
toss their splendid epithets around them, till they give as dim a light
as at four o'clock next morning the lamps do after an illumination.
Mary was excessively tired when she got about half-way up Skiddaw, but
we came to a cold rill (than which nothing can be imagined more cold,
running over cold stones), and with the reinforcement of a draught of
cold water she surmounted it most manfully. Oh, its fine black head,
and the bleak air atop of it, with a prospect