This message is from: " Dave McWethy" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Thursday Dave took off by himself to record Scots. His project is to make a package that is an evening's entertainment. A bottle of scotch, 6 glasses, some smoked salmon and two CD's, intended for three couples to enjoy. The CD's are to be recordings of guys reading poetry, telling tales, jokes, etc. It is okay of some of the accents are impossible to understand, and in fact desirable.
Tommy Fawcett knew who to send him to, from his horse event acquaintance. The first guy is known to recite Tam O' Shanter on the least provocation, which Dave was to try to give him. And a second guy. Then we had an appointment with Tim Douglas on Friday. Barbara lent me her mother's car and I went downtown for the morning. Penrith's sign on the edge of town says it is a market town, and so it was. It is the place the surrounding country comes to shop. I had thought "market town" meant that there were livestock sales, and there might be. I didn't see that. I wandered around. Had tea and scone. Bought a new pair of moleskin pants and a new sheepdog whistle. I always try to get new whistles since I am looking for another I can play tunes on. Most play some notes but not all. I got a pretty good one. At the farm they were putting up haylage in a huge bunker. When Tommy was done with his part (he has two grown sons who farm with him), he hitched his two Lusitano geldings in a tandem and we went down the road. This is why I stayed instead of going with Dave. They went well, quietly but with great energy. In the evening Barbara made a lamb dinner. I had expressed great enthusiasm for mutton, and she had a freezer full. Barbara urged us to go through the Lakes Region. We went on back roads, first coming to Lake Ullswater. This was an area much inhabited by Norsemen. Noone I talked to knew the origin of the name Ullswater. I know that ulls means white in Norwegian, so I think it was '"whitewater". The "by" is a Norse suffix, like in Appleby, something like "town". This area was inhabited by Romans earlier. Their word "chester" meant "camp". Lots of layers of language hinting at history. Hadrian's Wall was not far north of us. Scot continued to invade the border until - when? 1850's or 1750's. George Bowman had pointed at a high hill when we were driving his horses. He said it was Beacon Hill, where the English would light a fire to warn that the Scots were coming. He said "they would steal our wives and rape our sheep!" We took a road from Wrynose (pronounced "rhinos") to Hardknott. Much of it was one lane, and fortunately with little traffic. Once over the highest pass we started down hill and came to a Roman fort high up on the rocky hill in a most unlikely spot. That meant it was not built over, as many were. It had housed 500 soldiers defending from the Scots. There were a string of forts over to the port of Ravensglass. The guess is that they intended to invade Ireland from there, but they didn't. Ravensglass became a port to supply these forts. Up on that bleak hill we could try to imagine a walled town of soldiers in the winter, shivering in their togas, cursing the damp winds off the Irish Sea. We followed the coast for a while, then back through Carlisle, and into the Scottish side of the border, to get nearer Tim Douglas' farm. We stayed at a farm B&B, and went into town for supper. Servings are always more generous in Scotland. We got plates of food enough for three meals, and pints of "heavy", Scottish Ale, McEwans or Youngers, the best brew in the world by far. I told Dave my experience was that one pint was nice, and two were nice, but I got a little unsteady. After three (maybe twice this happened, before I established a trend) I threw up afterwards. Unimpressed, Dave drank three. His capacity was more than mine, anyway. The next morning he told me he was in agony in bed, with evil chemistry going on in his gut, and a lot of burping.
