Chapter M: O A (9)

Lord Clifford was another brave but cruel warrior who was killed in a similar way. He had removed his helmet from some unexplained cause--possibly to relieve the pressure on his head--when a random arrow pierced his throat; but his death was to many a cause of rejoicing, for owing to his cruel deeds at the Battle of Wakenfield, he had earned the sobriquet of "the Butcher." While that battle was raging, the Duke of York's son, the Earl of Rutland, a youth only seventeen years of age, described as "a fair gentleman and maiden-like person," was brought by his tutor, a priest, from the battle-field to shelter in the town. Here he was perceived by Clifford, who asked who he was. The boy, too much afraid to speak, fell on his knees imploring for mercy, "both by holding up his hands and making dolorous countenance, for his speech was gone from fear." "Save him," said the tutor, "for he is a prince's son and, peradventure, might do you good hereafter." With that word Clifford marked him, and said, "By God's blood thy father slew mine, and so will I thee, and all thy kin," and, saying this, he struck the Earl to the heart with his dagger, and bade the tutor bear word to his mother and brothers what he had said and done. Not content with this, when he came to the body of the Duke, the child's father, he caused the head to be cut off and a paper crown to be placed on it; then, fixing it on a pole, he presented it to the Queen, saying, "Madame, your war is done--here is your King's ransom." The head was placed over the gates of York by the side of that of the Earl of Salisbury, whom Queen Margaret had ordered to be beheaded.

For some little time we had been walking through what was known as the "Kingdom of Elmet," but whether this was associated with the helmet of Grim we were unable to ascertain, though we shrewdly suspected it was an old Celtic word. We arrived at the village of Sherburn-in-Elmet, an important place in ancient times, where once stood the palace of Athelstan, the grandson of Alfred the Great, the first ruler of all England, who was crowned King of England in the year 925. In celebration of his great victory over the combined army of the Danes and Scots at Brunnanburgh, King Athelstan presented his palace here, along with other portions of the Kingdom of Elmet, to the See of York, and it remained the Archbishop of York's Palace for over three hundred years. But when the See of York was removed to Cawick, a more convenient centre, the Sherburn Palace was pulled down, and at the time of our visit only the site and a portion of the moat remained. We were much interested in the church, as the historian related that "within the walls now existing the voices of the last Saxon archbishop and the first Norman archbishop have sounded, and in the old church of Sherburn has been witnessed the consummation of the highest ambition of chivalric enterprise, and all the pomp attending the great victory of Athelstan at Brunnanburgh."

Here in the time of Edward II, in 1321, "a secret conclave was held, attended by the Archbishop, the Bishops of Durham and Carlisle, and Abbots from far and near, the Earls of Lancaster and Hereford, and many Barons, Baronets, and Knights. To this assembly Sir John de Bek, a belted Knight, read out the Articles which Lancaster and his adherents intended to insist upon." But what interested us most in the church was the "Janus Cross" The Romans dedicated the month of January to Janus, who was always pictured with two faces, as January could look back to the past year and forwards towards the present. The Janus Cross here had a curious history; it had been found in the ruins of an ancient chapel in the churchyard dedicated to the "Honour of St. Mary and the Holy Angels." One of the two churchwardens thought it would do to adorn the walls of his residence, but another parishioner thought it would do to adorn his own, and the dispute was settled by some local Solomon, who suggested that they should cut it in two and each take one half. So it was sawn vertically in two parts, one half being awarded to each. In course of time the parts were again united and restored to the church.

Arriving at Ferry Bridge, we crossed the River Aire, which we had seen at its source, but which here claimed to have become one of the most useful rivers in Yorkshire, for its waters were valuable for navigation and for the manufacturing towns near which they passed.

My foot, which had pained me ever since leaving York, so that I had been limping for some time, now became so painful that I could scarcely walk at all. Still, we were obliged to reach Pontefract in order to procure lodgings for the night, so my brother relieved me of all my luggage excepting the stick, in order that I might hobble along to that town. It was with great difficulty that I climbed up the hill to the inn, which was in the upper part of the town, and there I was painfully relieved by the removal of my boot, and found that my ankle was seriously swollen and inflamed. It might, of course, have arisen through over-exertion, but we came to the conclusion that it was caused through the repair of my boots at York. Before arriving there the heels were badly worn down at one side, and as I had been practically walking on the sides of my feet, the sudden reversion to the flat or natural position had brought on the disaster that very nearly prevented us from continuing our walk. We applied all the remedies that both our hostess and ourselves could think of, but our slumbers that night were much disturbed, and not nearly so continuous as usual.

(_Distance walked twenty-three and a half miles_.)

_Thursday, October 26th._

The great object of interest at Pontefract was the castle, the ruins of which were very extensive. Standing on the only hill we encountered in our walk of the previous day, it was formerly one of the largest and strongest castles in England, and had been associated with many stirring historical events. It was here that King Richard II was murdered in the year 1399, and the remains of the dismal chamber where this tragedy took place still existed. During the Wars of the Roses, when in 1461 Queen Margaret appeared in the north of Yorkshire with an army of 60,000 men, the newly appointed King, Edward IV, sent the first portion of his army to meet her in charge of his most influential supporter, the Earl of Warwick, the "King Maker." The King followed him to Pontefract with the remainder of his army, and the old castle must have witnessed a wonderful sight when that army, to the number of 40,660 men, was marshalled in the plains below.

But it was in the Civil War that this castle attained its greatest recorded notoriety, for it was besieged three times by the forces of the Parliament. Sir Thomas Fairfax was in charge of the first siege, and took possession of the town in 1644, driving the garrison into the castle. He had a narrow escape from death on that occasion, as a cannon-ball passed between him and Colonel Forbes so close that the wind caused by its passage knocked both of them down to the ground, Forbes losing the sight of one of his eyes. The castle was strongly defended, but just as one of the towers collapsed, a shot from the castle struck a match, and the spark, falling into Fairfax's powder stores, caused a tremendous explosion which killed twenty-seven of his men. In January 1645 Forbes sent a drum to the castle to beat a parley, but the Governor, Colonel Lowther, and his brave garrison said they would go on with the defence to the last extremity. The besiegers then began to lay mines, but these were met by counter-mines driven by the garrison, who now began to suffer from want of food. At this critical moment a Royalist force of 2,000 horse arrived under Sir Marmaduke Langdale, who had made a forced march from Oxford to relieve the garrison. He drove off the besiegers, first to Ferry Bridge, and afterwards to Sherburn and Tadcaster, inflicting severe loss, and so the garrison was revictualled. The Parliamentary forces, however, soon made their appearance again, and on March 21st, 1645, the second siege began. They again took possession of the town, and after four months of incessant cannonading the garrison capitulated and the castle was garrisoned by the other side.

The war continued in other parts of the country, and towards the end of it a conspiracy was formed by the Royalists to recover possession of the castle, which through the treachery of a Colonel Maurice was successful. Many of the garrison at that time lived outside the walls of the castle, and Maurice persuaded the Governor, Cotterel, to order them to move their homes inside, to which he assented, issuing an order in the country for beds to be provided on a certain day. Taking advantage of this, Maurice and another conspirator dressed themselves as country gentlemen, with swords by their sides, and with nine others, disguised as constables, made their appearance at the castle entrance early in the morning, so as to appear like a convoy guarding the safe passage of the goods. The Governor, who kept the keys, was still in bed, and the soldier on guard at the inside of the gates, who was in league with Maurice, went to inform him the beds had arrived. He handed over the keys, and, not suspecting treachery, remained in bed with his sword at his side as usual. The remainder of the conspirators then drew their swords, and the garrison, on condition that their lives should be spared, surrendered, and were put into one of the prison dungeons. The conspirators then went to the room of the Governor, who, hearing a noise, jumped out of bed and defended himself, but was soon wounded, disarmed, and placed in the dungeon along with the rest, while the Royalists took possession of the castle. This happened in June 1648.

The dungeons in the castle, which were still to be seen, were of the most awful description, for, sunk deep down into the solid rock, it was scarcely necessary to write over them--

Abandon Hope, all ye who enter here.

There was one dungeon under the Round Tower, which was reached by passing down some winding steps, into which no ray of light ever entered, as dark and dismal a place as could be imagined. Here Earl Rivers and his fellow peers were incarcerated, praying for their execution to end their misery. There was also a cellar for the storage of food and drink, sunk some forty or fifty feet in the solid rock, and capable of holding two or three hundred men, and this too was used as a dungeon by the Royalists. Here the prisoners taken by the Royalist army were confined, and many of their names appeared cut in the walls of solid rock. The history of these places, if it could be written, would form a chapter of horrors of the most dreadful character, as in olden times prisoners were often forgotten by their captors, and left in the dungeons to perish.

It was not without a tinge of satisfaction that we heard that the Earl of Lancaster, to whom the castle belonged, was himself placed in one of these dungeons after the Battle of Boroughbridge in 1322, and after being imprisoned there a short time, where he had so often imprisoned others, was led out to execution.

The third siege of Pontefract Castle happened in the autumn of 1648, for after the Parliamentarians had gained the upper hand, the castles that still held out against them were besieged and taken, but the turn of Pontefract Castle came last of all. Oliver Cromwell himself undertook to superintend the operations, and General Lambert, one of the ablest of Cromwell's generals, born at Kirkby Malham, a Yorkshire village through which we had passed some days before, was appointed Commander-in-Chief of the forces. He arrived before the castle on December 4th, 1648, but such was the strength of the position that though he had a large number of soldiers and a great service of artillery, it was not until March 25th, 1649, when scarcely one hundred men were left to defend the walls, that the garrison capitulated. Meantime the tremendous effect of the artillery brought to bear against them had shattered the walls, and finally Parliament ordered the castle to be dismantled. With the surrender of this castle the Civil War came to an end, but not before King Charles I had been beheaded.

Last year, before we began our walk from London to Lancashire, we visited Whitehall and saw the window in the Banqueting-hall through which, on January 30th, 1649, about two months before Pontefract Castle surrendered, he passed on his way to the scaffold outside.

In its prime Pontefract Castle was an immense and magnificent fortification, and from its ruins we had a fine view on all sides of the country it had dominated for about six hundred years.

We were now journeying towards the more populous parts of the country, and the greater the mileage of our walk, the greater became the interest taken both in us and our adventures. Several persons interviewed us in our hotel at Pontefract, and much sympathy was extended towards myself, as my foot was still very painful in spite of the remedies which had been applied to it; but we decided not to give in, my brother kindly consenting to carry all the luggage, for we were very anxious not to jeopardise our twenty-five miles' daily average beyond recovery. My boot was eased and thoroughly oiled; if liquorice could have done it any good, we could have applied it in addition to the other remedies, as we had bought some both for our own use and for our friends to eat when we reached home. All we had learned about it was that it was made from the root of a plant containing a sweet juice, and that the Greek name of it was _glykyr-rhiza_, from _glykys_, sweet, and _rhiza_, root. After making a note of this formidable word, I did not expect my brother to eat any more liquorice; but his special aversion was not Greek, but Latin, as he said both his mind and body had been associated with that language through the medium of the cane of his schoolmaster, who believed in the famous couplet:

'Tis Education forms the common mind.
And with the cane we drive it in behind!

He was always suspicious of the Latin words attached to plants, and especially when quoted by gardeners, which I attributed to jealousy of their superior knowledge of that language; but it appeared that it was founded on incidents that occurred many years ago.

He was acquainted with two young gardeners who were learning their business by working under the head gardener at a hall in Cheshire, the owner of which was proud of his greenhouses and hothouses as well as of the grounds outside. As a matter of course everything appeared up to date, and his establishment became one of the show-places in the neighbourhood. The gardener, an elderly man, was quite a character. He was an Irishman and an Orangeman as well, and had naturally what was known in those parts as "the gift of the gab." The squire's wife was also proud of her plants, and amongst the visitors to the gardens were many ladies, who often asked the gardener the name of a plant that was strange to them. As no doubt he considered it _infra dig._ to say he did not know, and being an Irishman, he was never at a loss when asked, "What do you call this plant?" he would reply, "Oh, that, mum, is the Hibertia Canadensus, mum!" and a further inquiry would be answered in a similar manner--"That, mum, is the Catanansus Rulia, mum!" and again the lady would thank him and walk on apparently quite pleased and happy, probably forgetting the name of the plant before she had gone through the gardens. The young men were often at work in the houses while the visitors were going through, and of course they were too deeply engaged in their work either to see the visitors or to hear all the conversation that was going on, but they told my brother that they could always tell when the gardener did not know the real name of a plant by his invariably using these two names on such occasions, regardless of the family or species of the plant in question.

Pomfret was the local abbreviation of Pontefract, the name of the town, and "Pomfret Liquorice" claimed not only to be a sweetmeat, but a throat remedy as well, and was considered beneficial to the consumer. The sample we purchased was the only sweet we had on our journey, for in those days men and women did not eat sweets so much as in later times, they being considered the special delicacies of the children. The sight of a man or woman eating a sweet would have caused roars of ridicule. Nor were there any shops devoted solely to the sale of sweets in the country; they were sold by grocers to the children, though in nothing like the variety and quantity that appeared in later years. The most common sweet in those days was known as "treacle toffy," which was sold in long sticks wrapped from end to end in white paper, to protect the children's fingers when eating it, in spite of which it was no unusual sight to see both hands and faces covered with treacle marks, and thus arose the name of "treacle chops," as applied to boys whose cheeks were smeared with treacle. There was also toffy that was sold by weight, of which Everton toffee was the chief favourite. My brother could remember a little visitor, a cousin of ours, who could not speak very plainly, and who always called a cup a "tup," being sent to the village shop for a pound of coffee, and his delight when he returned laden with a pound of toffy, which was of course well-nigh devoured before the mistake was found out!

By this day we were ready for anything except walking as we crawled out of the town to find our way to Doncaster, and our speed, as might be imagined, was not excessive; for, including stoppages, which were necessarily numerous, we only averaged one mile per hour! There was a great bazaar being held in Pontefract that day, to be opened by Lord Houghton, and we met several carriages on their way to it. After we had walked some distance, we were told--for we stopped to talk to nearly every one we met--that we were now passing through Barnsdale Forest. We could not see many trees, even though this was formerly the abode of Robin Hood and Little John, as well as Will Scarlett.

It was in this forest that Robin, hearing of the approach of the Bishop of Hereford, ordered his men to kill a good fat deer, and to make a repast of it by the side of the highway on which the Bishop was travelling. Robin dressed himself and six of his men in the garb of shepherds, and they took their stand by the fire at which the venison was being roasted. When the Bishop came up, with his retinue, he asked the men why they had killed the King's deer, and said he should let the King know about it, and would take them with him to see the King.

"Oh pardon, oh pardon," said bold Robin Hood,
"Oh pardon, I thee pray.
For it becomes not your Lordship's coat
To take so many lives away."

"No pardon, no pardon," said the Bishop,
"No pardon I thee owe;
Therefore make haste and come along with me,
For before the King ye shall go."

Then Robin pulled his bugle horn from beneath his coat and blew a long blast, and threescore and ten of his followers quickly appeared--

All making obeysance to Robin Hood,
'Twas a comely sight to see;
"What is the matter, master?" said Little John,
"That you blow so heartily?"

Robin replied that the Bishop of Hereford refused all pardon for slaying the deer, and had said they must at once accompany him to the King. Little John then suggested that they should cut off the Bishop's head and throw him in a grave; but the Bishop craved pardon of the outlaw for his interference, and declared that had he known who was on the road, "he would have gone some other way."

"No pardon, no pardon," said bold Robin Hood,
"No pardon I thee owe;
Therefore make haste and come along with me,
For to merry Barnsdale you shall go."

So thither they led the Bishop, and made him sup with them right merrily and royally.

"Call in a reckoning," said the Bishop,
"For methinks it grows wondrous high;"
"Lend me your purse, master," said Little John,
"And I'll tell you by and bye!"

Little John took the Bishop's cloak
And spread it upon the ground.
And out of the Bishop's portmanteau
He told three hundred pound.

"Here's money enough, master," said Little John,
"And a comely sight to see;
It makes me in charity with the Bishop,
Though he heartily loveth not me."

Robin took the Bishop by the hand,
And he caused the music to play;
And he made the Bishop to dance in his boots.
And glad he could get away!

We heard all sorts of stories from the roadmen, some of which might not be true; but in any case about seven miles from Doncaster we reached Robin Hood's Well, at the side of the road. It was quite a substantial structure, built of soft limestone, and arched over, with a seat inside--on which doubtless many a weary wayfarer had rested before us. The interior was nearly covered with inscriptions, one dated 1720 and some farther back than that. We had a drink of water from the well, but afterwards, when sitting on the seat, saw at the bottom of the well a great black toad, which we had not noticed when drinking the water. The sight of it gave us a slight attack of the horrors, for we had a particular dread of toads. We saw at the side of the road a large house which was formerly an inn rejoicing in the sign of "Robin Hood and Little John," one of the oldest inns between York and London. We called at a cottage for tea, and here we heard for the first time of the Yorkshireman's coat-of-arms, which the lady of the house told us every Yorkshireman was entitled to place on his carriage free of tax! It consisted of a flea, and a fly, a flitch of bacon, and a magpie, which we thought was a curious combination. The meaning, however, was forthcoming, and we give the following interpretation as given to us:

A flea will bite! and so will a Yorkshireman;
A fly will drink out of anybody's cup! and so will a Yorkshireman;
A magpie will chatter! and so will a Yorkshireman:
And a flitch of bacon looks best when it's hung! and so does a
Yorkshireman.

We fancied a Lancashire man must have written that ditty.

The moon was shining brightly as we left the cottage, and a man we met, when he saw me limping so badly, stopped us to inquire what was the matter. He was returning from Doncaster, and cheered us up by pointing to the moon, saying we should have the "parish lantern" to light us on our way. This appeared to remind him of his parish church, where a harvest thanksgiving had just been held, with a collection on behalf of the hospital and infirmary. He and seven of his fellow servants had given a shilling each, but, although there were "a lot of gentry" at the service, the total amount of the collection was only one pound odd. The minister had told them he could scarcely for shame carry it in, as it was miserably small for an opulent parish like that!

We arrived at Doncaster at 8.30 p.m., and stayed at the temperance hotel in West Laith Street. The landlord seemed rather reluctant about letting us in, but he told us afterwards he thought we were "racing characters," which greatly amused us since we had never attended a race-meeting in our lives!

(_Distance walked fourteen miles_.)

_Friday, October 27th._

Our host at Doncaster took a great interest in us, and, in spite of my sprained ankle, we had a good laugh at breakfast-time at his mistaking us for "racing characters." My brother related to him his experiences on the only two occasions he ever rode on the back of a horse unassisted. The first of these was when, as quite a young boy, he went to visit his uncle who resided near Preston in Lancashire, and who thought it a favourable opportunity to teach him to ride. He was therefore placed on the back of a quiet horse, a groom riding behind him on another horse, with orders not to go beyond a walking pace; but when they came near the barracks, and were riding on the grass at the side of the road, a detachment of soldiers came marching out through the entrance, headed by their military band, which struck up a quickstep just before meeting the horses. My brother's horse suddenly reared up on its hind legs, and threw him off its back on to the grass below, or, as he explained it, while the horse reared up he reared down! He was more frightened than hurt, but the groom could not persuade him to ride on the horse's back any farther, so he had to lead the horses home again, a distance of two miles, while my brother walked on the footpath.

It was years before he attempted to ride on horseback again, but this time he was mounted upon an old horse white with age, and very quiet, which preferred walking to running; this second attempt also ended disastrously. It was a very hot day, and he had ridden some miles into the country when he came to a large pit, on the opposite side of the road to a farmhouse, when, without any warning, and almost before my brother realised what was happening, the horse walked straight into this pit, and, in bending its head to drink at the water, snatched the bridle out of his hands. He had narrowly escaped drowning on several occasions, and was terrified at the thought of falling into the water, so, clutching hold of the horse's mane with both hands, he yelled out with all his might for help--which only served to make the horse move into a deeper part of the pit, as if to have a bathe as well as a drink. His cries attracted the attention of some Irish labourers who were at work in a field, and they ran to his assistance. One of them plunged into the water, which reached half way up his body, and, taking hold of my brother, carried him to the road and then returned for the horse. He was rewarded handsomely for his services, for my brother verily believed he had saved him from being drowned. He was much more afraid of the water than of the horse, which was, perhaps, the reason why he had never learned to swim, but he never attempted to ride on horseback again. On the wall in front of the farmhouse an old-fashioned sundial was extended, on the face of which were the words:

Time that is past will never return,

and on the opposite corner were the Latin words _Tempus fugit_ (Time flies). My brother seemed to have been greatly impressed by these proverbs, and thought of them as he led the white horse on his three-mile walk towards home; they seemed engraven upon his memory, for he often quoted them on our journey.

My ankle seemed to be a shade easier, and, after the usual remedies had again been applied, we started on another miserable walk, or limp, for we only walked twelve miles in twelve hours, following the advice of our host to take it easy, and give the ankle time to recover. We rested many times on the road, stopped to talk to many people, got to know all about the country we were passing through, read papers and books, called for refreshments oftener than we needed them, wrote letters to our friends, and made copious entries in our diaries---in fact did everything except walk. The country was very populous, and we attracted almost universal sympathy: myself for my misfortune, and my brother for having to carry all the luggage.

Doncaster takes its name from the River Don, on which it is situated, and it was the only town in England, after London and York, that possessed a "Mansion House." We had walked for five days over the broad acres of Yorkshire and had seen many fine horses, for horse-breeding, we found, was a leading feature in that big county, and horses a frequent subject of conversation. Doncaster was no exception to the rule, as the Doncaster Races were famous all over England, and perhaps in other countries beyond the seas. We were too late in the year for the great St. Leger race, which was held in the month of September, and was always patronised by Royalty. On that occasion almost every mansion in the county was filled with visitors "invited down" for the races, and there was no doubt that agricultural Yorkshire owed much of its prosperity to the breeding of its fine horses. The racecourse was situated on a moor a little way out of the town, the property of the Corporation, and it was said that the profit made by the races was so great that the Doncaster people paid no rates. This might of course be an exaggeration, but there could be no doubt that the profit made by the Corporation out of the moor on which the races were held would largely reduce the rates of the town.

Doncaster races owed their origin to a famous Arab horse named Rasel-Fedawi (or the "Headstrong"), which was purchased from the Anazeh tribe of Arabs by a Mr. Darley, an Englishman who at that time resided at Aleppo, a Turkish trading centre in Northern Syria. This gentleman sent the horse to his brother at Aldby Park in Yorkshire, and what are now known as "thoroughbreds" have descended from him. His immediate descendants have been credited with some wonderful performances, and the "Flying Childers," a chestnut horse with a white nose and four white legs, bred from a mare born in 1715, named "Betty Leedes," and owned by Leonard Childers of Doncaster, was never beaten. All sorts of tales were told of his wonderful performances: he was said to have covered 25 feet at each bound, and to have run the round course at Newmarket, 3 miles 6 furlongs, in six minutes and forty seconds. After him came another famous horse named "Eclipse" which could, it was said, run a mile a minute. When he died in 1789 his heart was found to weigh 14 pounds, which accounted for his wonderful speed and courage. Admiral Rous records that in the year 1700 the English racehorse was fifteen hands high, but after the Darley Arabian, the average height rose to over sixteen hands. It was said that there were races at Doncaster in the seventeenth century, but the great St. Leger was founded by General St. Leger in 1778, and the grand stand was built in the following year. The Yorkshire gentlemen and farmers were naturally all sportsmen, and were credited with keeping "both good stables and good tables." The invitation to "have a bite and a sup" was proverbial, especially in the wold or moorland districts, where hospitality was said to be unbounded.

A learned man wrote on one occasion that "an honest walk is better than a skilled physician. It stimulates heart, brain, and muscles alike, sweeping cobwebs from the mind and heaviness from the heart." But this was probably not intended to apply to a man with a sore foot, and it was difficult to understand why the ankle failure had come so suddenly. We could only attribute it to some defect in the mending of the boot at York, but then came the mystery why the other ankle had not been similarly affected. The day was beautifully fine, but the surroundings became more smoky as we were passing through a mining and manufacturing district, and it was very provoking that we could not walk through it quickly. However, we had to make the best of it, imagining we were treading where the saints had trod, or at any rate the Romans, for this was one of their roads to the city of York upon which their legions must have marched; but while we crossed the rivers over bridges, the Romans crossed them by paved fords laid in the bed of the streams, traces of which were still to be seen.

We made a long stay at Comsborough, and saw the scanty remains of the castle, to which Oliver Cromwell had paid special attention, as, in the words of the historian, "he blew the top off," which had never been replaced. And yet it had a very long history, for at the beginning of the fourth century it was the Burgh of Conan, Earl of Kent, who with Maximian made an expedition to Armorica (now Brittany), where he was eventually made king, which caused him to forsake his old Burgh in England. Maximian was a nephew of King Coel, or Cole, the hero of the nursery rhyme, of which there are many versions:

Old King Cole was a jolly old soul,
And a jolly old soul was he;
He called for his ale, and he called for his beer,
And he called for his fiddle-diddle-dee.

But he seemed to have been a jolly old sinner as well, for he formed the brilliant idea of supplying his soldiers with British wives, and arranged with his father-in-law, the Duke of Cornwall, to send him several shiploads from the "old country," for British women were famous for their beauty. His request was complied with, but a great storm came on, and some of the ships foundered, while others were blown out of their course, as far as Germany, where the women landed amongst savages, and many of them committed suicide rather than pass into slavery. Who has not heard of St. Ursula and her thousand British virgins, whose bones were said to be enshrined at Cologne Cathedral, until a prying medico reported that many of them were only dogs' bones--for which heresy he was expelled the city as a dangerous malignant.

Troublesome times afterwards arose in England, and on the Yorkshire side, Briton and Saxon, and Pict and Scot, were mixed up in endless fights and struggles for existence. It was about this period that Vortigern, the British King, invited Hengist and Horsa, the Saxon Princes, to lend their assistance against the Picts and the Scots, which they did for a time; and when Hengist asked for a residence in his country, the King gave him Conan's Burgh, which was then vacant. Conan was never again seen in England, but in 489 his great-grandson Aurelius Ambrosius became King of the Britons. In the meantime the Saxons had so increased in numbers that they determined to fight for the possession of the country, and, headed by Hengist, who had turned traitor, fought a great battle, in the course of which Eldol, Duke of Gloucester, encountered Hengist in single combat, and, seizing him by the helmet, dragged him into the British ranks shouting that God had given his side the victory. The Saxons were dismayed, and fled in all directions, and Hengist was imprisoned in his own fortress of Conisborough, where a council of war was held to decide what should be his fate. Some were against his being executed, but Eldol's brother Eldad, Bishop of Gloucester, "a man of great wisdom and piety," compared him to King Agag, whom the prophet "hewed to pieces," and so Hengist was led through the postern gate of the castle to a neighbouring hill, and beheaded. Here Aurelius commanded him to be buried and a heap of earth to be raised over him, because "he was so good a knight." A lady generally appeared in these old histories as the cause of the mischief, and it was said that one reason why King Vortigern was so friendly with Hengist was that Hengist had a very pretty daughter named Rowena, whom the King greatly admired: a road in Conisborough still bears her name.

Aurelius then went to Wales, but found that Vortigern had shut himself up in a castle into which Aurelius was unable to force an entrance, so he burnt the castle and the King together; and in a wild place on the rocky coast of Carnarvonshire, Vortigern's Valley can still be seen. Sir Walter Scott, who was an adept in selecting old ruins for the materials of his novels, has immortalised Conisborough in his novel of _Ivanhoe_ as the residence, about the year 1198, of the noble Athelstane or Athelstone, who frightened his servants out of their wits by demanding his supper when he was supposed to be dead.

Yorkshire feasts were famous, and corresponded to the "wakes" in Lancashire and Cheshire. There was a record of a feast at Conisborough on the "Morrow of the Exaltation of the Holy Cross," September 15th, 1320, in the "14th year of King Edward, son of King Edward," which was carried out by Sir Ralph de Beeston, one of our Cheshire knights, and Sir Simon de Baldiston (Stewards of the Earl of Lancaster), to which the following verse applied:

They ate as though for many a day
They had not ate before.
And eke as though they all should fear
That they should eat no more.
And when the decks were fairly cleared
And not a remnant nigh,
They drank as if their mighty thirst
Would drain the ocean dry.

A curious old legend was attached to the town well in Wellgate, which formerly supplied most of the inhabitants of Conisborough with water; for once upon a time, when the town was suffering from a great drought, and the people feared a water famine, they consulted an old man known by the name of St. Francis, who was very wise and very holy. He told the people to follow him singing psalms and hymns to the Willow Vale, on the Low Road. There he cut a wand from a willow tree, and stuck it into the ground, and forthwith a copious supply of water appeared which had flowed steadily ever since. The wand had been so firmly and deeply stuck into the ground by St. Francis that it took root and grew into a large tree.

In 1863 there was a great flood in Sheffield, which did a lot of damage, and amongst the debris that floated down the river was noticed a cradle containing a little baby. It was rescued with some difficulty, and was still alive when we passed through the town, being then eight years old.

After leaving Conisborough we lost sight of the River Don, which runs through Mexborough; but we came in touch with it again where it was joined by the River Rother, at Rotherham. Here we crossed over it by the bridge, in the centre of which stood the decayed Chapel of our Lady. On our way we had passed to our right Sprotborough, where in 664 King Wulfhere when out hunting came to a cave at the side of the river where a hermit named St. Ceadde or St. Chad dwelt, the country at that time being "among sheep and distant mountains which looked more like lurking-places for robbers and dens of wild beasts than dwellings of men." There were many objects of interest on each side of our road, including, a few miles to the left, Roche Abbey, the seat of the Earl of Scarborough, and to the right Wentworth House, one of the largest private houses in England, and the seat of Earl Fitzwilliam, the owner of the far-famed Wharncliffe Crags, which are skirted by the waters of the River Don.

It was in Wharncliffe Forest that Friar Tuck, the jolly chaplain of Robin Hood, had his abode; and below the crags, in the bed of the River Don, there was a rock that appeared to be worn by the friction of some cylindrical body coiled about it. This was supposed to be the famous Dragon of Wantley, an old name for Wharncliffe. It was here that the monster was attacked and slain by Guy, the famous Earl of Warwick. Near the top of the crag, which was formerly a hunting-seat, stood a lodge where an inscription on a stone in the floor of the back kitchen stated that "Geoffrey de Wortley, Knight of the body to the Kings Richard III, Henry VII, and Henry VIII, built this Lodge for his pleasure, so that he might hear the red deer bray." In the lodge too was a most ponderous boot said to have been worn by Oliver Cromwell at the Battle of Marston Moor. We stayed at Rotherham for the night.

(_Distance walked twelve miles_.)

_Saturday, October 28th._

The inn where we stayed the night had not been very satisfactory, as, although the cooking was good, the upper apartments were below the average. We took to the road again as early as possible, especially as a decided improvement showed itself in the condition of my swollen foot, and we were able to make a little better progress. For some days we had been walking through a comparatively level country, but from the appearance of the hills to our right as well as before us, we anticipated a stiff climb. It was not until we approached Sheffield that the tug of war began, and, strange to say, I found it easier to walk uphill than on a level surface. Meantime we continued through a level and busy country, and were in no danger of losing our way, for there were many people to inquire of in case of necessity. At one time it had been a wild and lonely place, known as Attercliffe Common, and we were told that Dick Turpin had been gibbeted there. We had often heard of Turpin, and knew that he was hanged, but did not remember where, so we were anxious to see the exact spot where that famous "knight of the road" ended his existence. We made inquiries from quite a number of people, but could get no satisfactory information, until we met with an elderly gentleman, who informed us that it was not Dick Turpin who was gibbeted there, but a "gentleman" in the same profession, whose name was Spence Broughton, the only trace of him now being a lane that bore his name. As far as he knew, Dick Turpin had never been nearer Sheffield than Maltby, a village five miles away, and that was on his ride from London to York. He was hanged at Tyburn.

The hills we could see were those of the Pennine range, with which we must have formed acquaintance unconsciously when farther north, as although the high hills in the Lake District, through which we had passed, were not included in the range, some of the others must have been, since the Pennines were bounded on one side by Cumberland, Westmorland, and Lancashire, and on the other by Northumberland, Durham, and Yorkshire, attaining an elevation of 3,000 feet in the north and 2,000 feet in the south. The Pennines here were described to us as the "backbone of England," for they were looked upon as being in the centre, equidistant from the east and west coasts, and hereabouts thirty miles in breadth. The district verging upon Sheffield was well known to the Romans as producing the best iron in the world, the ore or iron-stones being obtained in their time by digging up the earth, which was left in great heaps after the iron-stones had been thrown out; many of these excavations were still to be seen. In manufacturing the iron they took advantage of the great forests around them to provide the fuel for smelting the ore, for it was a great convenience to have the two elements so near at hand, as it saved carriage from one to the other. Forests still existed thereabouts in the time of Robin Hood, and were well known to him and his band of "merrie men," while his jovial chaplain, Friar Tuck, had his hermitage amongst their deep recesses. Many woods round Sheffield still remained in the time of Mary Queen of Scots, who passed some portion of her imprisonment at the old Manor House, which was then a castellated mansion. Visitors were now conducted up a narrow flight of stairs to a flat roof covered with lead, from which that unfortunate Queen had looked out over the hills and forests, and breathed the pure air as it passed over them. But now all appeared to be fire and smoke, and the great works which belched them forth seemed a strange and marvellous sight to us after walking so long through such lonely districts.

Sheffield has a world-wide reputation for its cutlery and for its other productions in brass, iron, and steel, for the manufacture of which pure water of a particular variety was essential. The town was well provided in that respect, for no less than five rivers flowed towards Sheffield from the Pennine range above. From the finest steel all sorts of things were made, ranging from the smallest needle or steel pen up to the largest-sized gun or armour-plate. It would no doubt have interested us greatly to look through one of the works, but such as we passed were labelled "No admittance except on business," which we interpreted to mean that no strangers were allowed to enter, lest they might carry away with them the secrets of the business, so we walked slowly onward in the hope of reaching, before nightfall, our next great object of interest, "The Great Cavern and Castle of Peveril of the Peak." Passing along the Ecclesall Road, we saw, in nicely wooded enclosures, many of the houses of manufacturers and merchants, who, like ourselves in after life, left their men to sleep in the smoke while they themselves went to breathe the purer air above, for Ecclesall was at a fair elevation above the town. But one gentleman whom we saw assured us that, in spite of the heavy clouds of smoke we had seen, the town was very healthy, and there was more sunshine at Sheffield than in any other town in England.

Shortly afterwards we came to a finger-post where a road turned off towards Norton and Beauchief Abbey. Norton was the village where the sculptor Chantrey, of whom, and his works, we had heard so much, was born, and the monument to his memory in the old church there was an attraction to visitors. Chantrey was a man of whom it might safely be said "his works do follow," for my brother, who always explored the wild corners of the country when he had the opportunity, was once travelling in Wales, and told a gentleman he met that he intended to stay the night at the inn at the Devil's Bridge. This was not the Devil's Bridge we had crossed so recently at Kirkby Lonsdale, but a much more picturesque one, which to visit at that time involved a walk of about thirteen miles in the mountainous region behind Aberystwyth.

"Have you ever seen that fine monument by Chantrey there?" asked the gentleman.

"No," said my brother in astonishment, knowing the wild nature of the country thereabouts.

"Well," he said, "mind you go and see it! Here is my card, and when you have seen it, write me whether you have seen a finer monument in all your life."

My brother found the monument in a small church about three miles from the hotel in the hills above. He was very much astonished and deeply impressed by the sculpture, acknowledging in his promised letter that it was by far the finest he had seen. The origin of it was as follows:

The owner of the estate had an only child, a daughter, lovely, clever, and accomplished, but slightly deformed in her back. When she was twenty-one years old she was taken by her parents to London to have her back straightened, but never recovered from the operation. The statuary represented the daughter lying on a couch, her father standing at the head looking down into the eyes of his dying daughter, while her mother is kneeling at the foot in an attitude of prayer. The daughter's instruments of music and painting, with her books, appear under the couch, while every small detail, from the embroidery on the couch to the creases in the pillow, are beautifully sculptured.

This great work of art cost £6,000, and was exhibited in London for some time before it was placed in the small church of Hafod. It was said to have made Chantrey's fortune.

Beauchief Abbey, we were informed, was built by the murderers of Thomas a Becket in expiation of their sin, but only a few fragments of the buildings now remained. We halted for rest and refreshments at the "Fox House Inn," which stood at a junction of roads and was formerly the hunting-box of the Duke of Rutland.

We had by this time left the county of York and penetrated about four miles into Derbyshire, a county we may safely describe as being peculiar to itself, for limestone abounded in the greater part of its area. Even the roads were made with it, and the glare of their white surfaces under a brilliant sun, together with the accumulation of a white dust which rose with the wind, or the dangerous slippery mud which formed on them after rain or snow or frost, were all alike disagreeable to wayfarers. But in later times, if the worthy writer who ventured into that county on one occasion, had placed his fashionable length on the limy road when in a more favourable condition than that of wet limy mud, he might have written Derbyshire up instead of writing it down, and describing it as the county beginning with a "Big D."