Countrystride #37: Hardwicke Rawnsley - Lakeland champion

...in which we celebrate the remarkable life of Canon Hardwicke Drummond Rawnsley, campaigner, author and co-founder of the National Trust. As we wander from Rawnsley's old parish church of St Kentigern's, Crosthwaite, into Keswick, we chat with publisher and bookseller Stephen Matthews about the poet-priest's many passions – from rural crafts to Skiddaw bonfires; about the 'muscular Christianity' that made the Wolds-born orator a man of the people, and of the tireless campaigning punctuated by depressions that sealed Rawnsley's legacy as a Cumbrian Great.

• You can buy Steve's books A Canon in Keswick and A Peopled Landscape at BooksCumbria.
• You can also visit the Matthews' wonderful second-hand bookshop, Bookcase, at bookcasecarlisle.co.uk