Lays and Legends of the English Lake Country

by John Pagen White

The English Lake District may be said, in general terms, to extend from Cross-Fell and the Solway Firth, on the east and north, to the waters of Morecambe and the Irish Sea; or, more accurately, to be comprised within an irregular circle, varying from forty to fifty miles in diameter, of which the centre is the mountain Helvellyn, and within which are included a great portion of Cumberland and Westmorland and the northern extremity of Lancashire. After the conquest of England by the Normans, the counties of Cumberland and Westmorland, the ancient inheritance of the Scottish Kings, as well as the county of Northumberland, were placed by William under the English crown. But the regions thus alienated were not allowed to remain in the undisturbed possession of the strangers. For a long period they were disquieted by the attempts which from time to time were made by successive kings of Scotland to re-establish their supremacy over them. Supporting their pretensions by force of arms, they carried war into the disputed territory, and conducted it with a rancour and cruelty which spared neither age or sex.