THE CORONATION BONFIRE ON SKIDDAW

THE storm of Coronation Day that raged round Skiddaw had given way to calm and sunlight. It was determined• though the glass still stood at rain, to fire the beacon, or so much of it as it was hoped had not been blown away by the furious winds of the preceding day and night.

The day improved. Telegrams were despatched to the com- mittees in charge of bonfires on neighbouring heights, and away at four o'clock in the afternoon started the rocket-men and the builders to repair any havoc that the wind might have played with the peat stack on the summit. For though we had securely fastened the larch-pole tripod round which the peats had been built with iron rope and heavily weighted the whole mass with stone, so fierce was the wind at the time of building that one of the builders was lifted clean off his feet, and the storm had increased in violence since that day.

Going up some hours later, I passed through the larches of Latrigg to the Gale, and beard the cuckoo calling from the green-grey slopes of Skiddaw as the ancient Roman guard had done, who held their little outlook camp here, and could not help thinking how at the call of that "wandering voice." —the one familiar voice in a strange land—those mea of old time had been cheered with thoughts of home. They, too, probably on just such an evening as this, had seen bonfires in olden time, for it was Midsummer Eve, and on Midsummer Eve the Brigantes hereabout would doubtless have lit their fires in yonder Druid Circle on Castrigg Fell, and rolled their burning wheels of straw for Beltane festival down the slopes of Skiddaw.

The winds were laid, and all the mountain ranges stood clear against fair sky. No evening could have better suited our purpose. Climbing up by the but on to Jenkin, the only sound that broke the silence was the chirruck of the grouse on Lonscale. " Come back I Come back !" they cried from the bronze green heather. "No, no," said I, "we are going forward. We are bound for Skiddaw top in honour of the King."

Suddenly, on far-off Glaramara, the flood of golden light appeared, emphasized by the grey slate-blue of all the Borro- dale hills. The green bilberry and fern of the neighbouring slope seemed suddenly to be flushed with the emerald of a new spring, and I knew that the afterglow had begun.

Presently all the town of Keswick at our feet appeared to have put on the festal attire of illumination before the time, and far-off house windows on the slopes burned like jewels. The light streaming from the north-west, though its golden source was hidden from us by the mass of Skiddaw Low Man, struck over the heights of Castrigg Fell on to Helvellyn, and the blue mountain wall from Shoulthwaite to Thirlspot glowed into molten gold. The shadows of neighbouring hills, darker for the glow, seemed to mark off this great shining mass into the shape of a crown. Helvellyn was determined, whether a flare upon its top was lit or no, to do honour to the crowning of the King.

The radiance grew and grew. Every rock and gully upon its flank seemed to burn like living jewels. " Cush man," said a Cumbrian shepherd close by me, as he leaned upon his staff, "Ah hey' follerd t' sheep for forty year upon these hills, and nivver seen the likes o' yon," and the dog by his side seemed as appreciative as his master. "Bonfire or nea bon- fire, it's wuth If dim' up Skidda to-neet fur sec a sight as that noo. Ah wadn't ha' missed it for punds."

As he spoke there shot up into heaven a great pillar of rainbow from over the shoulder of Blencathra. I had never seen a rainbow at a quarter past nine at night in my life before, and took it as a sign of hope for the new King's reign. The mystery and magic of it all lay in the fact that we could not see the mystery-maker, for between us and the light in the north the great mountain mass of Skiddaw stood blue-grey.

Meanwhile the gold upon Helvellyn went to rose. The little tarn of Tewfit upon Naddle shone ruby-red. Presently beyond the purple waste of Matterdale and the vaporous distance beyond, the whole range of Crossfell began to burn, and when, as suddenly as it had flamed into being, the flanks of Helvellyn passed back into grey-blueness the mountain wall far to the east stood up like a rosy bar of morn upon the lilac haze of distance.

Still up we went, feeling each step more light and easy for the beautiful cool air, till the path beyond Jenkin beneath the "Little Man" was reached and the waste of Skiddaw Forest lay in pure purple beneath us. Climbing up over the rough shales of Broad-end, we passed the village school- master in charge of the "flare," and made our way along the 'pridge towards the upstanding pile of the Skiddaw bonfire. Derwentwater and Bassenthwaite lay below us faint silver still washed with gold ; the islands on the former lay as black as jet. The great littoral plain rolled towards what seemed a mighty river hung in air. This was the Solway, and beyond it Criffel and the Scotch hills stood ghostly grey.

Now we could see the glory of the mystery-maker of that afterglow. Above the white Solway water, above the grey- blue hills, the molten bars of sunset stood revealed, whilst sailing up towards the zenith, from time to time like rosy galleons " cloudlets " passed away and faded in middle air.

But the beauty of that evening sky lay not so much in the long lingering bars of sunset as in the great clear ocean inlet of opal light that seemed to flood in from some aerial Atlantic between headlands covered with black forest growth, the purple black clouds of night. Suddenly, like some vast lighthouse tower on one of these forest headlands, a light was seen, and the planet Venus, lighting her torch, conjured forth from Bassenthwaite a marvellous reflection of its world of flame. Star called to star, and suddenly we were aware of Jupiter glorious above the pike of Grizedale to the west.

But we had other work to do than look at stars or evening sky, for the bonfire was still in building. A sturdy helper stood on the pile, fifteen feet high, deftly placing into position the peats that, first soaked in a barrel of paraffin, were being thrown up to him. Then all the light brushwood that had been prepared for the bonfire top was stowed into place between the upstanding horns of the larch poles, round which the pile had been built. These were well trampled down, more peats added, a sack of shavings dipped in paraffin was packed away, and, descending from his perch, he and other stalwart helpers deluged the mass with paraffin thrown on to it by buckets or sprayed on to it by garden syringes, and the bonfire waited for the torch.

At 9.55 a ship's signal rocket went up and broke with a loud report. We could hear the echo like distant thunder from the hills across Bassenthwaite, and in a moment from the heights of Grizedale, Catbels, and the King's How in Borrodale other thunder-makers sailed to heaven. So quiet was the air that the bonfire-builders on Grizedale Pike, above the Whin- latter Pass, heard distinctly the echo of the signal rocket that was fired on Scafell Pike miles to the south. Then a magnesium rocket sailed up, and we saw a globe of light in answer on far Helvellyn and Scafell top, and we knew that there were watchers on those heights also determined to share our offering of loyalty to the King.

" It is 10 o'clock," shouted the bonfire-builder, and bidding all the people come to windward the torch-holder applied a light to his torch and touched the shavings on the top of the pile. It must have astonished all who had never seen a peat bon- fire, well paraffined, lit before, to see how in a moment, with a great roar of jubilance, the whole of that mass from top to bottom blazed out into light, and sent out its banner of flame for a hundred feet or more above the Crosthwaite Vale. Then the roar of the ten thousand tongues of flame was for a moment drowned in the hearty singing of the National Anthem and the cheers that followed.

Many bonfires had been lit on the previous night, but here and there steady stars were seen to jewel the dark-blue carpet of the plain, and rockets were observed to sail up and bang like globes of light and disappear. From Gummers How in the south to Wigton in the north the bonfire-makers were busy. As for our neighbours, the most beautiful bonfire was the one that glowed on Grizedale Pike. Barrow burned brightly in answer to Catbels for a short time, and one of the most beautiful immediate effects was the red fire upon Helvellyn top.

It was a disappointment to us all that the "flare" which had been kindly lent by Messrs. M`Murtrie for Helvellyn could not be got up at the short notice given, but our " flare " on Broad End burned like a splendid torch, and must have been seen fax and wide. Scafell answered us bravely with

its rockets, and those who were in charge of that height bad been able at short notice to work a bonfire light that burned for a considerable time.

Not the least beautiful part of our celebration on Skiddaw was the way in which rockets at the summit and the burnings of green and red light were answered by the rockets and coloured lights at Skiddaw Broad End. The nearest fire on the east was the fire at Caldbeck, seen in the Caldew gap. which by its brightness and length of burning must have been of considerable size.

Some of us, leaving the roar of the pyre at the summit, went off through quiet air to Broad End to watch the festal fires on Derwentwater. The boats seemed " like fireflies tangled in a golden braid," and rockets from Crow Park sailed up and broke in answer to our own.

At 11 o'clock a bouquet of rockets ascended from Skiddaw High Man and fell into stars of red, white, and blue. Again the National Anthem rang out clear, and leaving the fire still burning furiously we turned our backs upon it and began the descent.

Only those who have bad to stumble through semi-darkness down over the Skiddaw shales and through the broken turf and pitfall on Jenkin side can know the difficulty of such descent, and a week after they will still probably be reminded that certain muscles in their stumbling and recovering themselves were brought into play which had not been brought into play before. But the but is reached at last, and the delight of the ease gained for foot as we traversed the Gale meadows and passed down through the larches of Latrigg more than com- pensated for the sorrow of the descent.

The cool air of the valley was sweet with elder flower. Belated lovers came wandering up through the shadows to see the sunrise from Skiddaw, with such sunrise doubtless in their hearts that they might well have forgone the climb. No voice but the corncrake was heard in the meadows, and the solemn quiet of Skiddaw, restored to its ancient tranquillity, sank into one's soul.

The afterglow upon Helvellyn, the gorgeous fire upon Skid- daw top, seemed passed as suddenly as a dream, so strange the contrast between quiet vale and jubilant mountain peak ; but the memory of the bewitching evening climb, ar.c1 all the Coronation joy upon that ancient height, will live for ever.