The small estate on which Hollins is situated is divided from Towneley
Park by a road and a wall, and on the opposite side its boundary, for
most of the distance, is the rocky stream that has been already
mentioned. The stream had a great influence on my whole life, by giving
me a taste for the beauty of wild streams in Scotland and elsewhere. It
is called the Brun, and gives its name to Burnley. The rocks are a
sandstone sufficiently warm in color to give a very pleasant contrast to
the green foliage, and the forms of them are so broken that in sunshine
there are plenty of fine accidental lights and shadows. It was one of my
greatest pleasures to follow the course of this stream, with a
leaping-pole, up to the moors, where it flowed through a wide and
desolate valley or hollow in the hills. As the aspect of a stream is
continually changing with the seasons and the quantity of water, it is
always new. The only regret I have about my residence near the Brun is
that I did not learn at the right time to make the most of it in the way
of artistic study; but I did as much, perhaps, as was to be expected
from a boy who was receiving a literary and not an artistic education.

The defect of the Brun was the absence of pools big enough for swimming
and boating, but it gave a tantalizing desire for these pleasures, and I
was as aquatic as my opportunities would allow. In June, 1850, my first
catamaran was launched on a fish-pond. I built it myself, with an outlay
of one pound for the materials. It was composed of two floats or tubes,
consisting of a light framework of deal covered with waterproofed
canvas. These were kept apart in the water, but joined above by a light
open framework that served as a deck, and on which the passengers sat.
The thing would carry five people, and was propelled by short oars.
Being extremely light, it was easily drawn on a road, and was provided
with small wheels for that purpose. This boyish attempt would not have
been mentioned had it not been the first of a long series of practical