I do not think I have been able to tell the world anything new about the poet or his surroundings. But the man 'who hedn't a bit of fish in him, and was no mountaineer,' seems to have been in the eyes of the people always at his studies; 'and that because he couldn't help it, because it was his hobby,' {58} for sheer love, and not for money. This astonished the industrious money-loving folk, who could not understand the doing work for 'nowt,' and perhaps held the poet's occupation in somewhat lighter esteem, just because it did not bring in 'a deal o' brass to the pocket.' I think it is very interesting, however, to notice how the woman part of the Rydal Mount family seemed to the simple neighbourhood to have the talent and mental ability; and there must have been, both about Dorothy Wordsworth and the poet's daughter Dora, a quite remarkable power of inspiring the minds of the poor with whom they came in contact, with a belief in their intellectual faculties and brightness and cleverness. If Hartley Coleridge was held by some to be Wordsworth's helper, it was to Dorothy he was supposed by all to turn if 'ivver he was puzzelt.' The women had 'the wits, or best part of 'em,'--this was proverbial among the peasantry, and, as having been an article of rural faith, it has been established out of the mouths of all the witnesses it has been my lot to call. {59} WITH THE BLACK-HEADED GULLS IN CUMBERLAND. There is no part of the Cumberland coast so full of witchery and romance as the point where Muncaster Fell comes down to the sea. The rivers of Irt, Mite and Esk, with their memories of the pearl-fisheries of olden time, swirl down toward the ancient harbour of the mythic 'King Aveling's Town.' One cannot look across the pool at full tide without thought of how the Vikings pushed their ships ashore here, when they came from Mona's Isle to harry Cumberland. But the sound of earlier civilisations is in our ears as one gazes across the Ravenglass sand-dunes; for here beside us is the great cavern of ancient oaken-logs and earth, wherein the Cymri buried their dead in prehistoric time, and there within a stone's throw still upstands the seaside residence of some great Roman {60} general, who was determined apparently to enjoy a well-heated house, and to do honour to the _genius loci_. No one who visits 'Walls' Castle, as it is called, but must be struck with the remains of the 'tepidarium,' and the little niche that held the statue of the tutelary god, or a bust of the presiding Cæsar, within the ample hall.