Chapter IV: Part 4

Nor forth beneath the dewy dawn,
All radiant like the morn,
Shall Urswick's Knight lead up the lawn
Beside the scented thorn,
His bride into the blighted halls
Whence once she wildly strayed
In ages past, by Furness walls,
And with the Bekan played.

The sea-snake through the chambers roves
Of old Sir William's home--
Fair Aldingham, its bowers, and groves,
And fields she loved to roam:
And where the gallant Urswick graced
His own ancestral board,
Now ferns and wild weeds crowd the waste,
The creeping fox is lord.

But gracious spirits of the light
Shall call a welcome down
On her, the beauteous lady bright,
And lead her to her own.
Not to that home o'er which the tide
Unceasing heaves and rolls;
But through that porch which opens wide
Into the land of souls.

NOTES TO "BEKAN'S GHYLL."

In the Chartulary of Furness Abbey, some rude Latin verses, written
by John Stell a monk, refer to a plant called _Bekan_, which at
some remote period grew in the valley in great abundance, whence
the name of Bekansghyll was anciently derived. The etymology is
thus metrically rendered:

"Hæc vallis, tenuit olim sibi nomen ab herba
Bekan, qua viruit; dulcis nunc tunc sed acerba,
Inde domus nomen Bekanes-gill claruit ante."

This plant "whose juice is now sweet, but was then bitter," is
assumed to be one of the species of Nightshade which are indigenous
in the dell and flourish there in great luxuriance; probably the
Solanum Dulcamara, the bitter-sweet or woody nightshade, although
the Atropa Belladonna, the deadly nightshade, also grows among the
ruins of the Abbey. This "lurid offspring of Flora," as Mr. Beck
calls it, the emblem of sorcery and witchcraft, might well give the
name of Nightshade to that enchanting spot. But what authority the
monks may have had for their derivation it is now impossible to
ascertain. Various glossaries and lexicons are said to have been
consulted for _bekan_, as signifying the deadly nightshade but
without effect; "and after all," says Mr. Beck, "I am inclined to
believe that Beckansgill is a creation of the monastic fancy."

Bekan is Scandinavian, and a proper name: and has probably been
localised in this district by the Northmen from the period of its
colonisation. It is said to have been quite in accordance with
the practice of these rovers to give the name of their chiefs not
only to the mounds in which they were buried, but also in many
cases to the valley or plain in which these were situated, or in
which was their place of residence; or to those ghylls or small
ravines, which, with the rivers or brooks, were most frequently the
boundaries of property. Bekan's gill may be associated in some way
with one of the northern settlers whose name has thus far outlived
his memory in the district.

An interesting passage in Mr. Ferguson's "Northmen in Cumberland
and Westmorland" bears upon this subject. It refers to the opening
of an ancient barrow at a place called Beacon Hill, near Aspatria
in Cumberland, in 1790, by its proprietor. Speaking of the barrow,
Mr. Ferguson says:-- "From its name and its commanding situation
has arisen the very natural belief that this hill must have been
the site of a beacon. But there is no other evidence of this fact,
and as Bekan is a Scandinavian proper name found also in other
instances in the district, and as this was evidently a Scandinavian
grave, while the commanding nature of the situation would be a
point equally desired in the one case as the other, there can
hardly be a doubt that the place takes its name from the mighty
chief whose grave it was. On levelling the artificial mound, which
was about 90 feet in circumference at the base, the workmen removed
six feet of earth before they came to the natural soil, three feet
below which they found a vault formed with two large round stones
at each side, and one at each end. In this lay the skeleton of
a man measuring seven feet from the head to the ankle bone--the
feet having decayed away. By his side lay a straight two-edged
sword corresponding with the gigantic proportions of its owner,
being about five feet in length, and having a guard elegantly
ornamented with inlaid silver flowers. The tomb also contained
a dagger, the hilt of which appeared to have been studded with
silver, a two-edged Danish battle-axe, part of a gold brooch of
semi-circular form, an ornament apparently of a belt, part of a
spur, and a bit shaped like a modern snaffle. Fragments of a shield
were also picked up, but in a state too much decayed to admit of
its shape being made out. Upon the stones composing the sides of
the vault were carved some curious figures, which were probably
magical runes. This gigantic Northman, who must have stood about
eight feet high, was evidently, from his accoutrements, a person of
considerable importance."

The situation of Furness Abbey, in Bekan's Ghyll, justifies the
choice of its first settlers. The approach from the north is such
that the ruins are concealed by the windings of the glen, and the
groves of forest trees which cover the banks and knolls with their
varied foliage: but unluckily it has been thought necessary to
disturb the solitude of the place by driving a railway through
it, within a few feet of the ruins, and erecting a station upon
the very site of the Abbot's Lodge. A commodious road from Dalton
enters this vale, and crossing a small stream which glides along
the side of a fine meadow, branches into a shaded lane which leads
directly to the ruins of the sacred pile. The trees which shade
the bottom of the lane on one side, spread their bending branches
over an ancient Gothic arch, adorned with picturesque appendages
of ivy. This is the principal entrance into the spacious enclosure
which contains the Monastery. The building appertaining to it took
up the whole breadth of the vale; and the rock from whence the
stones were taken, in some parts made place for and overtopped
the edifice. Hence it was so secreted, by the high grounds and
eminences which surround it, as not to be discovered at any
distance. The Western Tower must have originally been carried to
a very considerable height, if we judge from its remains, which
present a ponderous mass of walls, eleven feet in thickness,
and sixty feet in elevation. These walls have been additionally
strengthened with six staged buttresses, eight feet broad, and
projecting nine feet and a half from the face of the wall; each
stage of which has probably been ornamented like the lower one now
remaining, with a canopied niche and pedestal. The interior of the
tower, which measures twenty-four feet by nineteen feet, has been
lighted by a fine graceful window of about thirty feet in height,
by eleven and a half in width; the arch of which must have been
beautifully proportioned. A series of grotesque heads, alternating
with flowers, is introduced in the hollow of the jambs, and the
label terminates in heads. On the right side of the window is a
loophole, admitting light to a winding staircase in the south-west
angle of the tower, by which its upper stories might be ascended,
the entrance to the stairs being by a door, having a Tudor arch,
placed in an angle of the interior. The stairs are yet passable,
and the view from the top is worth the trouble of an ascent.

The workmen employed by the late Lord G. Cavendish, state that
the rubbish in this tower, accumulated by the fall of the
superstructure, which filled up the interior to the window sill,
was rendered so compact by its fall, so tenacious by the rains, and
was composed of such strongly cemented materials, as to require
blasting with gunpowder into manageable pieces for its removal.
Prior to its clearance, it was the scene of some marvellous tales
disseminated and credited by many, who alleged that this heap
covered a vault to which the staircase led, containing the bells
and treasure of the abbey, with the usual accompaniments of the
White Lady, at whose appearance the lights were extinguished, the
impenetrable iron-grated door, and the grim guardian genius. Though
many essayed, none were known to have succeeded in the discovery
of this concealed treasure house, much less of its contents. The
inhabitants of the manor house, on one occasion, were roused
from their slumbers by a noise proceeding from the ruins, and on
hastening to the spot, discovered that it was made by some scholars
from the neighbouring town of Dalton, digging among the ruins at
midnight, in quest of the buried spoils.

Within the inner enclosure, on the north side of the Church at St.
Mary's Abbey in Furness, a few tombstones lie scattered about in
what has formerly been a part of the cemetery. One of these bears
the inscription, partly defaced,
HIC JACET ANA F.. ... ......TI FLANDREN...,
and commemorates one of the ancient family of Le Fleming.

Michael Le Fleming, the first of the name, called also Flemengar,
and in some old writings Flandrensis, was kinsman to Baldwin,
Earl of Flanders, father-in-law to the Conqueror; by whom he was
sent with some forces to assist William in his enterprise against
England.

After the Conquest was completed, and William was seated on the
throne of England, the valiant Sir Michael, for his fidelity,
and good services against the Saxons and Scots, received from
his master many noble estates in Lancashire; Gleaston, and the
manor of Aldingham, with other lands in Furness. William de
Meschines also granted him Beckermet Castle, vulgarly at that time
called Caernarvon Castle, with the several contiguous manors of
Frizington, Rottington, Weddaker, and Arloghden, all in Cumberland.

Sir Michael and his heirs first settled at Aldingham. By a singular
accident, the time of which cannot now be ascertained, the sea
swallowed up their seat at this place, with the village, leaving
only the church at the east end of the town, and the mote at
the west end, which serve to show what the extent of Aldingham
has been. About the same time, it is supposed, the villages of
Crimilton and Ross, which the first Sir Michael exchanged with
the monks for Bardsea and Urswick, were also swallowed up. After
this, they fixed their residence at Gleaston Castle; and it has
been conjectured, from the nature of the building, that the castle
was built on the occasion, and in such haste, as obliged them to
substitute mud mortar instead of lime, in a site that abounds with
limestone. Sir Michael, is said, to have also resided at Beckermet.

The little knowledge that we are now able to gather of the first Le
Fleming exhibits him in a very favourable light. He was undoubtedly
a valiant man; and was acknowledged as such by his renowned master,
when, with other Norman chiefs, he was dispatched into the north to
oppose the Scots, and awe the partisans of Edwin and Morcar, two
powerful Saxons who opposed themselves to the Conqueror for some
time after the nation had submitted itself to the Norman yoke, and
whose power William dreaded the most. His regard for the memory
of his sovereign he expressed in the name conferred upon his son
and heir, William. We have glimpses too that in his household
there was harmony and kindness between him and his children.
To the Abbey of Furness he was a great benefactor. There is an
affecting earnestness in the language with which in the evening
of his long life he declares in one of his charters--"In the name
of the Father, &c. Be it known to all men present and to come,
That I, Michael Le Fleming, consulting with God, and providing
for the safety of my soul, and the souls of my father and mother,
wife and children, in the year of our Lord 1153, give and grant to
St. Mary of Furness, to the abbot of that place, and to all the
convent there serving God, Fordeboc, with all its appurtenances,
in perpetual alms; which alms I give free from all claims of any
one, with quiet and free possession, as an oblation offered to
God"--_saltim vespertinum_, he pathetically adds, in allusion to
his great age--"at least an evening one." He adds, "signed by me
with consent of William my son and heir, and with the consent of
all my children. Signed by William my son, Gregory my grandson, and
Hugh." Few gifts of this kind show greater domestic harmony. That
Michael lived to a very advanced age is evident from this charter
signed eighty-seven years after the Conquest; supposing him to be
the same Michael Le Fleming who came over with the Conqueror. He
was buried with his two sons within the walls of the Abbey Church.
His arms, a fret, strongly expressed in stone over the second
chapel in the northern aisle indicate the spot where he found a
resting place; not the least worthy among the many of the nobility
and gentry who in those days were interred within the sacred
precincts of St. Mary's Abbey in Furness.

The lands in Furness, belonging to Sir Michael, were excepted in
the foundation charter of Stephen to the Abbey. This exception,
and the circumstance of his living in Furness, occasioned his
lands to be called Michael's lands, to distinguish them from the
Abbey lands; and now they are called Muchlands, from a corruption
of the word Michael. In like manner Urswick is called Much-Urswick
for Michael's Urswick; and what was originally called the manor of
Aldingham, is now called the manor of Muchland.

From Baldwin's kinsman, the first Le Fleming, the founder of the
family in England, two branches issued. William, the eldest son of
Sir Michael, inherited Aldingham Castle and his Lancashire estates.
His descendants, after carrying the name for a few generations,
passed with their manors into the female line; and their blood
mingling first with the de Cancefields, and successively with the
baronial families of Harrington, de Bonville, and Grey, spent
itself on the steps of the throne in the person of Henry Grey, King
Edward the Sixth's Duke of Suffolk, who was beheaded by Queen Mary
on the 23rd of February 1554. This nobleman being father to Lady
Jane Grey, his too near alliance with the blood royal gave the
occasion, and his supposed ambition of being father to a Queen of
England was the cause of his violent death. By his attainder the
manors of Muchland, the possessions of the le Flemings in Furness,
were forfeited to the Crown.

Richard le Fleming, second son of the first Sir Michael, having
inherited the estates in Cumberland which William le Meschines had
granted to his father for his military services, seated himself at
Caernarvon Castle, Beckermet, in Copeland. After two descents his
posterity, having acquired by marriage with the de Urswicks the
manor of Coniston and other considerable possessions in Furness,
returned to reside in that district. The Castle of Caernarvon
was abandoned, then erased, and Coniston Hall became the family
seat for seven descents. About the tenth year of Henry IV. Sir
Thomas le Fleming married Isabella, one of the four daughters and
co-heiresses of Sir John de Lancaster, and acquired with her the
lordship and manor of Rydal. The manor of Coniston was settled upon
the issue of this marriage; and for seven generations more Rydal
and Coniston vied with each other which should hold the family
seat, to fix it in Westmorland or Lancashire. Sir Daniel le Fleming
came, and gave his decision against the latter, about the middle of
the seventeenth century. Since that event, the hall of Coniston,
pleasantly situated on the banks of the lake of that name, has been
deserted.

Singularly enough, the inheritance of this long line also has been
broken in its passage through the house of Suffolk. Sir Michael,
the 23rd in succession from Richard, married, in the latter part
of the last century, Diana only child of Thomas Howard, 14th Earl
of Suffolk and Berkshire, by whom he had one daughter, afterwards
married to her cousin Daniel le Fleming, who succeeded her father
in the title. This marriage being without issue, on the demise
of Lady le Fleming, the estates passed under her will to Andrew
Huddleston of Hutton-John, Esq., and at his decease, which occurred
shortly after, in succession to General Hughes, who assumed the
name of Fleming; both these gentlemen being near of kin to the
family at Rydal. The title descended to the brother of Sir Daniel,
the late Rev. Sir Richard le Fleming, Rector of Grasmere and
Windermere; and from him to his son, the present Sir Michael, the
twenty-sixth in succession from Richard, the second son of Michael,
Flandrensis, _the_ Fleming, who came over with the Conqueror, and
founded the family in England.

In this family there have been since the Conquest twelve knights
and seven baronets.

The article _le_ is sometimes omitted in the family writings before
the time of Edward IV., and again assumed. Sir William Fleming, who
died in 1756, restored the ancient orthography, and incorporated
the article _le_ with the family name at the baptism of his son and
heir.

Rydal Hall suffered much from the parliamentary party: the le
Flemings remaining Catholic to the reign of James II. For their
adherence to the royal cause in the reign of Charles I., they
were forced to submit to the most exorbitant demands of the
Commissioners at Goldsmiths' Hall, in London (23 Car. 1) and pay a
very great sum of money for their loyalty and allegiance. They were
very obnoxious to Oliver Cromwell's sequestrators, and subjected to
very high annual payments and compositions, for their attachment to
regal government.

THE CHIMES OF KIRK-SUNKEN.

Twelve sunken ships in Selker's Bay
Rose up; and, righting soon,
With mast and sail stretched far away
Beneath the midnight moon.

They sailed right out to Bethlehem;
And soon they reached the shore.
They steered right home from Bethlehem;
And these the freights they bore.

The first one bore the frankincense;
The second bore the myrrh;
The third the gifts and tribute pence
The Eastern Kings did bear.

The fourth ship bore a little palm
Meet for an infant's hands;
The fifth the spikenard and the balm;
The sixth the swathing bands.

The seventh ship bore without a speck,
A mantle fair and clean;
The eighth the shepherds on her deck
With heavenward eyes serene.

One bore the announcing Angel's song;
One Simeon's glad record;
And one the bright seraphic throng
Whose tongues good tidings poured.

And midst them all, one, favoured more,
Whereon a couch was piled,
The blessed Hebrew infant bore,
On whom the Virgin smiled.

They sailed right into Selker's Bay:
And when the night was worn
To dawning grey, far down they lay,
Again that Christmas morn.

But through the brushwood low and clear
Came chimes and songs of glee,
That Christmas morning, to my ear
Beneath Kirk-sunken Tree.

Not from the frosty air above,
But from the ground below,
Sweet voices carolled songs of love,
And merry bells did go.

From out a City great and fair
The joyous life up-flow'd,
Which once had breathed the living air,
And on the earth abode.

A City far beneath my feet
By passing ages laid;
Or buried while the busy street
Its round of life convey'd.

So to the ground I bent an ear,
That heard, as from the grave,
The blessed Feast-time of the year
Tell out the joy it gave;

The gladness of the Christmas morn.
O fair Kirk-Sunken Tree!
One day in every year's return
Those sounds flow up by thee.

They chime up to the living earth
The joy of them below,
At tidings of the Saviour's birth
In Bethlehem long ago.

NOTES TO "CHIMES OF KIRK-SUNKEN."

In the parish of Bootle is a small inlet of the sea, called
Selker's Bay, where the neighbouring people say, that in calm
weather the sunken remains of several small vessels or galleys can
be seen, which are traditionally stated to have been sunk and left
there on some great invasion of the northern parts of this island,
by the Romans, or the colonizing Northmen.

Various circles of standing stones, or what are generally called
Druidical remains, lie scattered about the vicinity of Black
Combe near the sea shore: several indicating by their name the
popular tradition associated with them, to which the inhabitants
around attach implicit credence, the spot beneath which lie the
ruins of a church that sank on a sudden, with the minister and
all the congregation within its walls. Hence, they say, the name
Kirk-Sank-ton, Kirk-Sunken, Kirk-Sinking, and Sunken Kirks.

THE RAVEN ON KERNAL CRAG.

A Raven alighted on Kernal Rock
Amid thunder's roar and earthquake's shock.
O'er the tumbling crags he rolled his eye
Round valley and lake, and hills and sky.
'Twas a gloomy world. He settled his head
Close into his shoulders and meekly said--
"Poor Raven!"

The Raven on Kernal Crag grew old:
A human voice up the valley rolled.
Bel was worshipp'd on mountain brows:
Men made huts of the forest boughs:
And wrapt in skins in ambush lay
At the base of his crag, and seized their prey.
An old Raven.

The Raven sat in his purple cloke.
A Roman column the silence broke.
He had watched the eagles around him fly:
He saw them perched on spears go by.
The legions marched from hill to hill.
He settled his feathers; and all was still--
Still was the Raven.

The Raven was thinking, on Kernal Stone.
The hammers of Thor he heard them groan:
Regin, and Korni, and Lodinn, and Bor,
Clearing the forests from fell to shore;
With Odin's bird on their banner upraised.
And he quietly said as he downward gazed--
"A Raven!"

The Raven on Kernal was musing still.
King Dunmail's hosts went up the hill,
In the narrow Pass, to their final fall.
With an iron gaze he followed them all;
Till, piled the cairn of mighty stones,
Was heaped the Raise o'er Dunmail's bones.
Ha! hungry Raven!

The Raven on Kernal saw, in a trance,
Knights with gorgeous banner and lance,
Castles, and towers, and ladies fair.
Music floating high on the air
Reached his nest on Kernal's Steep,
And broke the spell of his solemn sleep.
A lonely Raven.

That Raven is sitting on Kernal Rock;
Counting the lambs in a mountain flock.
Pleasant their bleat is, pleasant to hear,
Pleasant to think of; but shepherds are near.
Cattle are calling below in the vale,
Maidens singing a true-love tale.
List to them, Raven.

That Raven will sit upon Kernal Rock
Till the mountains reel in the world's last shock.
Till the new things come to end like old,
He will roll his eye, and his wings unfold,
And settle again; and his solemn brow
Draw close to his shoulders, and muse as now.
That Raven.

NOTES TO "THE RAVEN ON KERNAL CRAG."

Kernal Crag is a huge mass of solid rock, with a face of broken
precipice, on the side of Coniston Old Man. In that unique and
admirable Guide Book entitled "The Old Man; or Ravings and
Ramblings round Conistone," it is said; "on this Crag, probably for
ages, a pair of ravens have annually had their nest, and though
their young have again and again been destroyed by the shepherds,
they always return to this favourite spot; and frequently when
one of the parents has been shot in the brooding season, the
survivor has immediately been provided with another helpmate; and,
what is still more extraordinary, and beautifully and literally
illustrative of a certain impressive scripture passage--it happened
a year or two since, that both the parent birds were shot, whilst
the nest was full of unfledged young, and their duties were
immediately undertaken by a couple of strange ravens, who attended
assiduously to the wants of the orphan brood, until they were fit
to forage for themselves."

LORD DERWENTWATER'S LIGHTS.
1716.

You yet in groves round Dilston Hall
May hear the chiding cushat's call;
Its true-love burden for the mate
That lingers far and wanders late.

But who in Dilston Hall shall gaze
On all its twenty hearths ablaze;
Its courteous hosts, its welcome free,
And all its hospitality;

The grace from courtly splendour, won
By Royal Seine, that round it shone;
Or feel again the pride or power
Of Radcliffe's name in hall and bower;--

As when the cause of exiled James
Filled northern hearts with loyal flames,
And summers wore their sweetest smile
Round Dilston's Courts and Derwent's Isle;

Ere Mar his standard wide unrolled,
And tower to tower the rising told,
And Southwards on the gathering came,
All kindling at the Prince's name?--

The glory and the pomp are shorn;
The banners rent, the charters torn;
The loved, the loving, dust alone;
Their honours, titles carved in stone.

* * * * *

On Witches' Peak the winds were laid:
Crept Glenderamakin mute in shade:
El-Velin's old mysterious reign
Hung stifling over field and plain.

Around on all the hills afar
Had died the sounds foreboding war.
Only a dull and sullen roar
Reached up the valley from Lodore.

Through all the arches of the sky
The Northern Lights streamed broad and high.
Wide o'er the realm their shields of light
Flung reddening tumults on the night.

Then dalesmen hoar and matrons old
Look'd out in fear from farm and fold:
Look'd out o'er Derwent, mere and isle,
On Skiddaw's mounds, Blencathra's pile.

They saw the vast ensanguined scroll
Across the stars the streamers roll:
The Derwent stain'd with crimson dyes:
And portents wandering through the skies.

And prophet-like the bodings came--
"The good Earl dies the death of fame;
For him the Prince that came in vain,
A King, to enjoy his own again."--

The sightless crone cried from her bed--
"'Tis blood that makes this midnight red.
I dreamed the young Earl heavenward rode;
His armour flashed, his standard glow'd."

The fearful maiden trembling spoke--
"The good Earl blessed me, and I woke.
The white and red cockade he wore;
He bade adieu for evermore."--

Far show'd huge Walla's craggy wall
The 'Lady's Kerchief' white and small,
Dropt when, pursued like doe from brake,
She scaled its rampart from the lake.

"I served my Lady when a bride:
I was her page:"--A stripling cried.
"I served her well on bended knee,
And many a smile she bent on me."--

--"Upon this breast, but twenty years
Are pass'd"--a matron spoke with tears--
"I nursed her; and in all her ways,
She was my constant theme of praise."--

Like flaming swords, that round them threw
Their radiance on the star-lit blue,
Flash'd and re-flash'd with dazzling ray
The splendours of that fiery fray.

--"When spies and foes watch'd Dilston Hall,
To seize him ere the trumpet-call"--
A yeoman spake that loved him well--
"I brought him mid our huts to dwell.

"We shelter'd him in farm and bield,
Till all was ready for the field,
Till all the northern bands around
Were arm'd, and for the battle bound.

"Then came he forth, and if he stay'd
A few short hours, and still delay'd,
'Twas for those priceless treasures near,
My lady and her children dear.

"I heard reproaches at his side!
--'Or take this jewelled fan'--she cried,
With high-born scornful look and word--
And I will bear the warrior's sword!'

"He called, 'To horse!'--his dapple grey
He welcomed forth, and rode away.
The white and red unstained he wore:
His heart was stainless evermore!"--

And thus the night was filled with moan.
And was the good Earl slain and gone?
For him the Prince that came in vain,
A King, to enjoy his own again.

From Derwent's Island-Castle gate,
In robe and coronet of state,
A phantom on the vapours borne,
Passed in the shadows of the morn.

Pale hollow forms in suits of woe
Appear'd like gleams to come and go.
And wreathed in mists was seen to rest
A 'scutcheon on Blencathra's breast.--

Full soon the speeding tidings came.
The Earl had died the death of fame,
By axe and block, on bended knee,
For true-love, faith, and loyalty.

And still, when o'er the Isles return
The Northern lights to blaze and burn;
The vales and hills repeat the moan
For him the good Earl slain and gone.

NOTES TO "LORD DERWENTWATER'S LIGHTS."

Lord's Island, in Keswick Lake, is memorable as having been the
home of James Radcliffe, third and last Earl of Derwentwater,
whose life and great possessions were forfeited in 1716, in the
attempt to restore the royal line of Stuart to the throne, and
whose memory is affectionately cherished in the north of England.
An eminence upon its shores, called Castle-Rigg, which overlooks
the vale of Keswick, was formerly occupied by a Roman fort, and
afterwards by the stronghold of the Norman lords, who were called,
from the locality of this their chief residence, de Derwentwater.
Their early history is wrapt in obscurity; but their inheritance
comprised the greater part of the parish of Crosthwaite, in
addition to possessions in other parts of Cumberland, and in other
counties. These became vested in the Radcliffe family in the reign
of Henry the Fifth, by the marriage of Margaret daughter and
heiress of Sir John de Derwentwater, with Sir Nicholas Radcliffe,
of lineage not less ancient than that of his wife, he being of
Saxon origin, and of a family which derived its name from a
village near Bury in Lancashire. In later time the Norman tower on
Castle-Rigg was abandoned, and its materials are said to have been
employed in building the house upon that one of the three wooded
islands in the lake, which is called Lord's Island, and upon which
the Radcliffe family had a residence. This island was originally
part of a peninsula; but when the house was built, it was separated
from the main land by a ditch or moat, over which there was a
draw-bridge, and the approaches to this may still be seen. Of
the house itself, little more than the moss-covered foundations
remain. The stones, successively, of the Roman Castrum, of the
Norman Tower, and of the lord's residence, are said to have been
subsequently used in building the town-hall of Keswick.

The estate of the Derwentwater family seems to have originally
extended along the shores of the lake for nearly two miles, and
for a mile eastward of the shore. On one side of it lies the
present road from Keswick to Ambleside, on the other its boundary
approached Lodore, whilst the crest of Walla Crag, divided it
from the common. There, surrounded by a combination of grandeur
and beauty which is almost unrivalled in this country, the
Knightly ancestors of James Radcliffe, the third and last Earl of
Derwentwater, whose virtues and whose fate have encircled his name
with traditional veneration, had their paternal seat.

This chivalrous and amiable young nobleman was closely allied by
blood to the Prince Edward, afterwards called "the Pretender," in
whose cause he fell a sacrifice; his mother, the Lady Mary Tudor,
a natural daughter of King Charles II. and Mrs. Davis, being first
cousin to the Prince. He was nearly the same age as the Prince,
being one year younger: and in his early childhood was taken to
France to be educated, when James the Second and his consort were
living in exile at St. Germain's, surrounded, however, by the noble
English, Scottish, and Irish emigrant royalists, who followed the
fortunes of their dethroned monarch. The sympathies of his parents
having also led them thither, the youthful heir of Derwentwater
was brought up with the little Prince, at St. Germain's, sharing
his infantine pleasures and pastimes, and occasionally joining his
studies under his governess the Countess of Powis. A friendship
thus formed in youth, nurtured by consanguinity, strengthened by
ripening age, and cemented by the extraordinary good qualities of
the young nobleman, and his power to win affection and esteem,
culminated in that attachment and devotion to the cause of his
Prince and friend, which terminated only with his life.

The Earl appears to have visited Dilston, his ancestral home in
Northumberland, for the first time in 1710, when he was in his
twenty-first year; and in the spring of the same year he spent
some time on the Isle of Derwent, where the ancient mansion of the
Radcliffes was then standing. During a considerable portion of the
two next succeeding years, his chief residence appears to have been
at Dilston, where he lived in the constant exercise of hospitality,
and in the practice of active benevolence towards not only the
peasantry on his wide estates, but all who needed his assistance,
whether known to him or not, and whether Papist or Protestant. He
seems to have taken great delight in rural pursuits, and in the
pleasures of the chase, and in the charms of nature by which he
was surrounded.

On the 10th of July 1712, when he had completed his 23rd year, he
espoused Anna Maria, eldest daughter of Sir John Webb, of Canford,
in the county of Dorset, Bart. His acquaintance with this charming
young lady began in the early springtime of their lives, when
both were receiving their education in the French capital. The
lady had been placed in the convent of Ursuline Nuns in Paris for
instruction: and they had frequent opportunities of seeing each
other at the Chateau of St. Germain's, where the exiled monarch
took pleasure in being surrounded by the scions of his noble
English and Scottish adherents, who were then living at Paris.

On the rising of the adherents of the house of Stuart under
the Earl of Mar in August 1715, it was very well known to the
government, that the Earl's religion, his affections, and
sympathies, were all on the side of the exiled heir of that
family, and that his influence in the north of England was not
less than his constancy and devotion. A warrant was issued for the
apprehension of the Earl and his brother, the government hoping
by thus, as it were, gaining the move in the game, to prevent the
exercise of the Earl's influence against King George. A friendly
warning of the attentions which were being paid to him at Whitehall
reached the Earl in time; and on hearing that the government
messengers had arrived at Durham, on their way to arrest him and
his brother, they withdrew from their home, and proceeded to the
house of Sir Marmaduke Constable, where they stayed some days.
The Earl afterwards took refuge in the home of a humble cottager
near Newbiggin House, where he lay hidden some time. He remained
in concealment through the latter part of August, and the whole of
September. During this time of anxiety and surveillance, all the
money, and even all the jewels of the Countess, are said by local
tradition to have become exhausted: and to such straits was she
reduced, that a silver medal of Pope Clement XI. struck in the 14th
year of his Pontificate (1713), for want of money is said to have
been given by her, when encompassed by the Earl's enemies, to a
peasant girl, for selling poultry, or rendering some such trifling
service.

Early in October it was represented to the Earl that the adherents
of the exiled Prince were ready to appear in arms, and to be only
waiting for him and his brother to join them. It would appear
that at this critical moment, the Earl, influenced by many
considerations, personal and domestic, as well as prudential,
wavered in his resolution; and tradition avers that, on stealthily
revisiting Dilston Hall, his Countess reproached him for continuing
to hide his head in hovels from the light of day, when the gentry
were in arms for their rightful sovereign; and throwing down her
fan before her lord, told him in cruel raillery to take it, and
give his sword to her. Something of this feeling is attributed to
her in the old ballad poem entitled "Lord Derwentwater's Farewell,"
wherein the following lines are put into his mouth:--

"Farewell, farewell, my lady dear:
Ill, ill thou counselled'st me:
I never more may see the babe
That smiles upon thy knee."

The popular notion that the Earl was driven into his fatal
enterprise by the persuasions of his lady is evidently here
referred to. But the amiable and gentle character of the Countess,
that affectionate and devoted wife, whom the Earl in his latest
moments declared to be all tenderness and virtue, and to have
loved him constantly, is a sufficient refutation of the popular
opinion, which does so much injustice to her memory. Nevertheless
there is historical reason for believing that the Earl did suddenly
decide on joining the Prince's friends, who were then in arms;
and his lady's persuasions may have contributed to that fatal
precipitation. On the 6th of October, the little force of horse
and men, consisting of his own domestic levy, was assembled in the
courtyard of his castle; arms were supplied to them; the Earl, his
brother, and the company, crossed the Devil's Water at Nunsburgh
Ford; and the fatal step was irrevocably taken. Old ladies of the
last century used to tell of occurrences of evil omen which marked
the departure of the devoted young nobleman from the home of his
fathers, to which he was destined never to return; how on quitting
the courtyard, his favourite dog howled lamentably; how his horse,
the well-known white or dapple gray, associated with his figure
in history and poetry, became restive, and could with difficulty
be urged forward; and how he soon afterwards found that he had
lost from his finger a highly prized ring, the gift of his revered
grandmother, which he constantly wore.

It is not necessary to dwell upon the details of this unfortunate
and ill-conducted enterprise, in the course of which James III.
was proclaimed in town and village, in Warkworth and Alnwick, in
Penrith and Appleby, Kendal and Lancaster, to the final catastrophe
of the little band at Preston. There, hemmed in by the government
troops, the brave and devoted friends of the royal exiles, who
had been led into this premature effort contrary to their better
judgments, and went forth with a determined loyalty which good or
bad report could not subdue, saw reason to regret, when too late,
their misplaced confidence in their leaders. Already they saw
themselves about to be sacrificed to the divided counsels of their
comrades and the incapacity of Foster, their general. Defensive
means imperfectly planned, and hastily carried out, enabled them
to hold the approaches to the town for three or four days against
the Brunswickers, whom they gallantly repulsed, in a determined
attack upon their barricades. But overmatched by disciplined
troops; out-generalled, and out-numbered; and finding resistance
to be unavailing; on the morning of Monday the 14th of October
they surrendered at discretion to the forces sent to oppose them.
Being assembled in the market place to the number of 1700, they
delivered up their arms, and became prisoners. The young Earl was
sent to London, which he reached on the 9th of December, and was
conducted to the Tower on the capital charge of high treason.
Unavailing efforts were made by his wife and friends to save him.
It appears that on the 20th of February his life was offered to him
by two noblemen who came to him in the tower, in the name of the
King, if he would acknowledge the title of George I. and conform to
the Protestant religion: but these terms were refused by him. The
offer of his life and fortune was repeated on the scaffold, but he
answered that the terms "would be too dear a purchase." The means
proposed to him, he looked upon as "inconsistent with honour and
conscience, and therefore I rejected them." He went to the block
with firmness and composure: and his behaviour was resolute and
sedate. In an address which he delivered on the scaffold, he said
"If that Prince who now governs had given me my life, I should have
thought myself obliged never more to have taken up arms against
him." And the axe closed, by a "violent and vengeful infliction,"
the brief career of the beloved, devoted, and generous Earl of
Derwentwater. He was twenty-seven years of age.

Lady Derwentwater, who had been unceasing in her efforts to save
her husband, and solaced him in his confinement by her society
and tender care, after his death succeeded eventually in having
his last request in the Tower fulfilled. She had his body borne
to its last resting place in the peaceful chapel at Dilston to be
interred with his ancestors. She made a short sojourn at Dilston
before leaving it for ever; and then repaired with her little son
and daughter to Canford, under the roof of her parents.

Before leaving the North, the Countess visited the house and
estates at Derwentwater; and while there her life seems to have
been in some danger; for the rude peasantry of the neighbourhood,
to whom her southern birth and foreign education, as well as the
principles and attachments in which she was brought up, were
doubtless uncongenial, blamed her, in the unreasoning vehemence
of their grief, for the tragic fate of their beloved lord and
benefactor. Accordingly, not far from the fall of Lodore, a hollow
in the wild heights of Walla Crag is pointed out by the name of
Lady's Rake,[5] in which the noble widow is said to have escaped
from their vengeance. Her misfortunes needed not to be thus
undeservedly augmented. A more pleasing version of the story of her
flight is, that the Countess escaped through the Lady's Rake with
the family jewels, when the officers of the crown took possession
of the mansion on Lord's Island. No doubt this loving woman did her
utmost for the release of her lord. And this steep and dangerous
way has a human interest associated with it which has given a
special hold upon the hearts of the Keswick people. In old times
a large white stone in among the boulders used to be pointed out
as the Lady's Pockethandkerchief, and that it still hung among the
crags, where no one could get at it.

In June, 1716, the Countess was living at Kensington Gravel Pits,
near London: whence she soon afterwards went to Hatherhope; and
subsequently made a brief sojourn under the roof of her parents at
Canford Manor; after which she took up her residence at Louvaine.
Here she died on the 30th of August, 1723, at the early age of
thirty; having survived her noble husband little more than seven
years; and was interred there in the Church of the English regular
Canonesses of St. Augustine.

The white or gray horse of the Earl is historical. Shortly before
the rising, and when he was in danger of apprehension, the
following short note was written by him:--

"Dilston, July 27th, 1715.
"Mr. Hunter,

"As I know nobody is more ready to serve a friend than yourself,
I desire the favour you will keep my gray horse for me, till we
see what will be done relating to horses. I believe they will be
troublesome, for it is said the D. of Ormond is gone from his
house. God send us peace and good neighbourhood,--unknown blessings
since I was born. Pray ride my horse about the fields, or any where
you think he will not be known, and you will oblige, Sir, your
humble servant,

"DERWENTWATER."

"He is at grass."

In the first sentence the reference is made to the jealous penal regulation, which forbade a Roman Catholic to possess a noble animal of height and qualities suited to military equipment.

From tradition preserved in the family of Mr. Hunter of Medomsley, the person addressed, there is every reason to believe that the gray horse mentioned in the above letter, was the identical steed which was brought by the son of Mr. Hunter to Bywell, and taken thence by Lord Derwentwater's servant to Hexham for his lordship's use; and upon which the devoted Earl rode from Hexham, with the gallant champions of the Prince's right, on the 19th of October following.

A man named Cuthbert Swinburn, then 90 years of age, who was born at Upper Dilston, and whose family resided there for some generations, related to a correspondent of W. S. Gibson, Esq., the author of Memoirs of the Earl of Derwentwater, that he remembered the young Earl, and saw him pass their house riding on a white horse, and accompanied by several retainers, on the morning when he joined his neighbours in the Prince's cause.

In a ballad relating to that fatal expedition it is said--

"Lord Derwentwater rode away
Well mounted on his dapple gray."

And in the touching verses well known as "Derwentwater's Farewell," his "own gray steed" is one of the earthly objects of his regard to which he is supposed to bid adieu.

Of the house on Lord's Island, itself, only some low walls now remain. A few relics of the mansion are preserved in the neighbourhood. The ponderous lock and key of the outer door, the former weighing eleven pounds, are preserved in Crosthwaite's museum. The door itself, which was of oak studded with knobs and rivets, was sold to a person named Wilson, of Under Mozzer, a place thirteen miles from Keswick. A bell, probably the dinner bell of the mansion, is in the town hall of Keswick, and is of fine tone. A fine old carved chair is preserved in the Radcliffe Room at Corby Castle, and known as "My Lady's Chair." In Crosthwaite's museum is preserved another ancient one of oak, which came from Lord Derwentwater's house, and has the Radcliffe arms carved upon it. And a stately and most elaborately carved oak bedstead which belonged to Lord Derwentwater was purchased at the sale of the contents of his house on Lord's Island, by an ancestor of Mr. Wood, of Cockermouth, in whose family it has remained, highly valued, ever since 1716.

Many articles of furniture, some family portraits, and other property, that once belonged to Dilston Hall, still linger in the vicinity of that place, where they are greatly treasured.

The Northumbrian and Cumbrian peasantry believed that miraculous appearances marked the fatal day on which the Earl of Derwentwater was beheaded. It was affirmed that the "Divel's Water" acquired a crimson hue, as if his fair domains were sprinkled with the blood of their gallant possessor; and that at night the sky glowed ominously with ensanguined streams. "The red streamers of the north" are recorded to have been seen for the first time in that part of England, on the night of the fatal 24th of February, 1716; and in the meteor's fiery hue, the astonished spectators beheld a dreadful omen of the vengeance of heaven. The phenomenon has ever since been known as "Lord Derwentwater's Lights." On the 18th of October, 1848, a magnificent and very remarkable display of aurora borealis was witnessed in the northern counties. The crimson streamers rose and spread from the horizon in the form of an expanded fan, and the peasantry in Cumberland and elsewhere said at the time, that nothing like that display had been seen since the appearance of "Lord Derwentwater's Lights," in February, 1716, which may therefore be presumed to have been of a crimson or rosy hue.

FOOTNOTE:

[5] This hollow, in the summit of Walla Crag, is visible from the road below. Rake, the term applied in this country to openings in the hills like this, is an old Norse word, signifying a journey or excursion. It is now commonly applied to the scene of an excursion as the Lady's Rake in Walla Crag, and the Scot's Rake at the head of Troutbeck, by which a band of Scottish marauders is said to have descended upon the vale.

THE LAURELS ON LINGMOOR.

High over Langdale, vale and hill,
The swans had winged their annual way;
By Brathay pools and Dungeon-Ghyll
The lambs as now were wild at play;
The mighty monarchs of the vale,
Twins in their grandeur, towered on high;
And brawling brooks to many a tale
Of lowly life and love went by.

There cheerful on the lonely wild
One happy bower through shine and storm,
Amidst the mountains round it piled,
Preserved its hearth-stone bright and warm;
Where now a mother and her boy
Stood parting in one fond embrace;
The shadow of their faded joy,
Between them, darkening either face.

"I'll think, when that great city's folds
Enclose me like a restless sea,
Of all this northern valley holds
In its warm cottage walls for me.
I'll think amidst its ceaseless roar,
Within these little bounds how blest
Was here our life, and long the more
For that far-off return and rest."--

Forth sped the youth: the valley closed
Behind him: adamantine hills,
Like giants round the gates reposed
Of his lost Eden, frowned; the rills
With fainter murmurs far away
Died in the distance; and at length
He stood amidst the proud array
Of London in his youth and strength.

He came when mid the moving life
The Terror and the Plague went by.
He walked where Panic fled the strife
Of Strength with Death the Shadow nigh.
The shaft that flew unseen by night,
The deadly plague-breath, striking down
Thousands on thousands in its flight,
Made soon the widow's boy its own.

Ah! woe for her! in that far vale
The sorrow reached her; for there came
Dread tidings and the mournful tale,
Dear relics and the fatal Name.
All in the brightness of the noon
She bent above those relics dear;
And ere the glimmering of the moon
The Shadow from his side was near.

And forth from out her home there stalked
The Terror with the name so dread;
It pass'd the dalesman as he walked;
It dogg'd the lonely shepherd's tread;
It breathed into the farms; it smote
The homesteads on the loneliest moor;
And shuddering Nature cowered remote;
All fled the plague-struck widow's door.

Alone, in all the vale profound:
Alone, on Lingmoor's mosses wide:
Alone, with all the hills around
From Langdale head to Loughrigg's side;
Alone, beneath the cloud of night,
The morning's mist, the evening's ray;
The hearthstone cold, and quenched its light;
The Shadow wrestled with its prey.

And day by day, while went and came
The sunlight in the cheerless vale,
Her hearth no more its wonted flame
Renewed, the opening morns to hail:
Glow'd not, though beating blasts and rain
Drove in beneath her mournful eaves,
Through Springs that brought the buds again,
And Autumns strew'd with fading leaves.

No human foot its timorous falls
Led near it, venturing to unfold
The scene within those mouldering walls,
The mystery in that lonely hold.
Nor on that mountain side did morn
Or noon show how, or where, for rest
That Earth to kindlier earth was borne--
The kinless to the kindred breast.

Only the huntsman on the height,
The herdsman on the mountain way,
Looked sometimes on the far-off site
How desolate and lone it lay.
Till when the years had rolled, their eyes
Saw wondering, where that home decay'd,
A little plot of green arise
Contiguous to the ruined shade.

A little grove of half a score
Of laurels, intertwining round
One nameless centre, blossomed o'er
That homestead's desolated bound;
And where their leaves hang green above--
A lowly circling fence of stone
Sprang, reared by Powers that build to Love
When man, too weak, forsakes his own.

And there where all lies wild and bare--
Where mountains rise and waters flow,
From Langdale's summits high in air,
To Brathay pools that sleep below--
A green that never fades, one grove
Of brightest laurels rears its boughs;
While o'er that home's foundations rove
The wild cats, and the asses browse.

There, if the song birds come, their notes
Are hushed, that nowhere else are still:
And when the winds pipe loud, and floats
The mist-cloud down from Dungeon-Ghyll,
Again the cottage-eaves arise
Within it, as of old, serene,--
Its lights shine forth, its smoke up flies,
And fades the grove of laurels green.

But dimly falls the gleam of morn
Around it; on the ferns the shade
Of evening leaves a look forlorn
That elsewhere Nature has not laid.
So, lonely on its height, so, drear,
It stands, while seasons wax and fail,
Unchanged amid the changing year,
The voiceless mystery of the vale.

NOTES TO "THE LAURELS ON LINGMOOR."