nearly disused now; but formerly, when the buyers from the West Riding
manufacturing districts had frequent occasion to go up into the North to
purchase the wool of the Westmorland and Cumberland farmers, it was
doubtless much travelled; and perhaps the hamlet of Cowan Bridge had a
more prosperous look than it bears at present. It is prettily situated;
just where the Leck-fells swoop into the plain; and by the course of the
beck alder-trees and willows and hazel bushes grow. The current of the
stream is interrupted by broken pieces of grey rock; and the waters flow
over a bed of large round white pebbles, which a flood heaves up and
moves on either side out of its impetuous way till in some parts they
almost form a wall. By the side of the little, shallow, sparkling,
vigorous Leck, run long pasture fields, of the fine short grass common in
high land; for though Cowan Bridge is situated on a plain, it is a plain
from which there is many a fall and long descent before you and the Leck
reach the valley of the Lune. I can hardly understand how the school
there came to be so unhealthy, the air all round about was so sweet and
thyme-scented, when I visited it last summer. But at this day, every one
knows that the site of a building intended for numbers should be chosen
with far greater care than that of a private dwelling, from the tendency
to illness, both infectious and otherwise, produced by the congregation
of people in close proximity.

The house is still remaining that formed part of that occupied by the
school. It is a long, bow-windowed cottage, now divided into two
dwellings. It stands facing the Leck, between which and it intervenes a
space, about seventy yards deep, that was once the school garden. This
original house was an old dwelling of the Picard family, which they had
inhabited for two generations. They sold it for school purposes, and an
additional building was erected, running at right angles from the older
part. This new part was devoted expressly to schoolrooms, dormitories,