The "Dancing Bear" was a splendidly shaped
specimen, and then there was a "Boat Rock," with bow and stern complete.
But on the "Mount Delectable," as our guide called it, there was a very
romantic courting and kissing chair, which, although there was only room
for one person to sit in it at a time, he assured us was, in summer
time, the best patronised seat in the lot.
We remunerated him handsomely, for he had worked hard and, as "England
expects," he had done his duty. He directed us to go along a by-lane
through Sawley or Sawley Moor, as being the nearest way to reach
Fountains Abbey: but of course we lost our way as usual. The Brimham
Rocks were about 1,000 feet above sea-level, and from them we could see
Harrogate, which was, even then, a fashionable and rising inland
watering-place. Our guide, when he showed us its position in the
distance, did not venture to make any poetry about it, so we quote a
verse written by another poet about the visitors who went there:
Some go for the sake of the waters--
Well, they are the old-fashioned elves--
And some to dispose of their daughters,
And some to dispose of themselves.
But there must be many visitors who go there to search in its bracing
air for the health they have lost during many years of toil and anxiety,
and to whom the words of an unknown poet would more aptly apply:
We squander Health in search of Wealth,
We scheme, and toil, and save;
Then squander Wealth in search of Health,
And only find a Grave.
Pages:
528
529
530
531
532
533
534
535
536
537
538
539
540
541
542
543
544
545
546
547
548
549
550
551
552