First, a correction to my post above:

Alan Bell Song Book was published in 1989 (NOT 1970!)

A Song for Mardale

2nd verse:

So, I stood on the bridge and I looked all around,
The dry walls still guarded, the fields bare and brown,
And close by the lane wandering on through the green,
The bones of the Dun Bull could clearly be seen.

Was this the place that Joe Bowman once stood
And called to his hounds away in Naddle Wood
Was this the door where he'd sounded his horn,
To summon the Hunt on a fine winter's morn?

3rd Verse:

The church was a ruin of dirty grey stone,
A jumble of timber and rock marked the homes;
Where the people once lived and worked all of their days,
The time long since passed, and now washed clean away.

Well, I know all your stories, and I feel your shame,
So I look to the dark clouds and the soft Autumn rain;
And as the lake rises to a silvery sheen,
You'll disappear like you never had been.


In his introduction, Alan Bell writes:

"The Lakeland valley of Mardale was flooded in 1939-1940, to become a reservoir called Haweswater. All the buildings, including several farms, the church, and the Old Dun Bull Hotel, were raised (sic) to the ground. However, the bridge over the beck was left standing, as were the dry stone walls dividing the fields. In the Summer of 1984, the waters receded and the hot sun dried out the mud to reveal the bridge and the dry stone walls intact. Grey piles of stones marked the church and the Dun Bull Hotel. armed with maps and photographs of what the valley of Mardale looked like, I wandered the valley. A sad place full of ghosts and a time lost"