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The remaining head cannot easily be returned to farms into the teens of miles away, so to obviate expense the Shepherds’ Meet has come into existence. Formerly of great importance, the festival has now fallen to the bare exchange of sheep and an excuse for holiday. The gatherings are usually at places central to a wide area of fells farms; for example, that held at Mardale attracts the men of that dale, of Swindale and Mosedale, of Bannisdale and Boroughdale, Longsleddale, Kentmere and Troutbeck. There are also famous meets held in Eskdale, Langdale, Wastdale, and at Thirlspot under the shadow of mighty Helvellyn. To these the shepherds of the various districts bring on an appointed day such ‘strays’ as have not been disposed of, and here come also those who have animals missing from their flocks.

The shepherds working on that great wilderness of mountains between High Street and Fairfield meet at the little whitewashed inn on the summit of Kirkstone Pass. If you are lucky enough to gain accommodation there on a night in late November, you will be roused at daybreak by the quavering plaints of many sheep. Shepherds are early risers; as the day is mainly given over to amusement, they naturally endeavour to get all business done as early as possible. As you stand in the roadway, you see many knots of sheep moving towards the hostelry, in the narrow field behind which a labyrinth of pens has been constructed. As the small flocks pass it, their bleatings are thrown from the squat white walls of the house as from an excellent sounding-board, and the steep ribs of Red Screes echo the sound backward and forward, fainter each time, till it passes beyond the ear’s perception. In the gray light the scene around is particularly wild; above the great rocks carrion crows are wheeling and sounding their raucous notes; in the lofty crag towering to the left of the great rift in the mountain wall a raven is croaking and a pair of buzzards skirling. Nearer at hand, unmoved by the stir and clamour, dingy sparrows and a few dirty-gray stonechats are flitting about on their morning business. After a few minutes passed in the road, comparing this noisy dawn with last nightfall, when the gray shades crept from eastward, blotting out distant mountains and well-like valleys ere darkness stalked down to this lonely place from the heights, I turned to where the sheep had been penned. At my elbow was a young farmer of Troutbeck, in search, he said, of five animals which had been missing from his farm since last July.