Melmerby is one of the finest types of a fell-side rural village left in Cumberland, with its cheerful dwellings scattered here and there--single or in groups,--its old manor hall and miniature church, and its spacious green spreading over fully fourteen acres of land. The village nestles close under Hartside, one of the Crossfell range of mountains, on the direct road from Penrith to Alston, over which the pack-horse bell continued to tinkle, clear and loud, to a much more recent period than it did on the great highways of commerce. This interesting fact has not been overlooked by Miss Powley, in her _Echoes of Old Cumberland_. When the staunch pack-horse gang of yore The Fell's unbroken rigours faced, With stores for miners 'mid the moor, The Dane's stronghold at ten miles passed; Then up the steeps their burden bore, For trackless, treeless, ten miles more. *....*....*....* When the staunch troop, with travel sore, Passed up within the Helm-cloud's veil, And 'scaped the blast--yet heard it roar Below in many a western dale;-- When they, to crown the march severe, Defiled through summits bleak and brown; With sudden speed, and louder cheer, Came clattering down to Alston town, Round which the wide fells darkly peer, And grasping winter cheats the year. The Melmerby folk to this day are pastoral in occupation, intercourse, and habits. Their conversation, running for the most part on rural topics, is plentifully interlarded with such expressions as "Fetchin' t' kye heàm," "Fodderin' t' sheep," and "Takin' t' nag to t' smiddy." Occasionally, the blood runs warmer with excitement and curiosity, when a shrill cry like the following rings through the village streets, "Run wid t' rèapes, lad! A coo's i' t' mire!" At the Gale, within a mile of the village, where the land rests principally on a limestone bottom, the produce of cream is not of that dubious quality known to pent-up city dames, but so rich and thick that a spoon will almost stand upright in it. The cream of this dairy has frequently been tested with one of the old copper pennies of George the Third coinage, which formidable weight it always bore triumphantly on the top.