Gray's Journal Entry: ‘Thirlmere or Wyburn Lake, also called Leathes-Water, is a narrow irregular sheet of water, indented with numerous little bays, about four miles in length, skirting, on its eastern side, along the immense base of Helvellyn, and receiving supplies from numerous torrents that precipitate themselves down the sides of that huge mountain, as well as from the surrounding mountains, which cast a deep brown shade over the surface of the water. . . . There is one peculiar feature belonging to Thirlmere, which distinguishes it from all the other lakes of Cumberland and Westmorland. About the middle, the land projects upwards of three hundred feet, and contracts the water to the size of a small river, rapid but not deep, over which has been thrown an Alpine bridge of three arches, if such they may be called, which consist only of one or two stout oaken planks with a hand-rail for the passenger’s security. The approach to this bridge is over a rude causeway of rough stones, upon which the arches are fixed; and beyond these the lake instantly resumes its former breadth.’ |