From this point the conversation leads to the mention of two individuals, who by their several fortunes were, at different times, driven to take refuge at the small and obscure town of Hawkshead on the skirt of these mountains.

Their stories I had from the dear old dame with whom, as a school-boy, and afterwards, I lodged for the space of nearly ten years.

The elder, the Jacobite, was named Drummond, and was of a high family in Scotland; the Hanoverian Whig bore the name of Vandeput,[15] and might, perhaps, be a descendant of some Dutchman who had come over in the train of King William.

At all events, his zeal was such, that he ruined himself by a contest for the representation of London or Westminster, undertaken to support his Party, and retired to this corner of the world, selected as it had been by Drummond for that obscurity which, since visiting the Lakes became fashionable, it has no longer retained.

So much was this region considered out of the way till a late period, that persons who had fled from justice used often to resort hither for concealment, and some were so bold as to not unfrequently make excursions from the place of their retreat for the purpose of committing fresh offences.