Chapter III: Part 3

If you seize the opportunities, which are many, you may have what you please by wishing for it. But the condition is in every case the same: the nature of the wish must be kept secret. You may journey to Jarrow, and sitting in Bede’s chair, make your wish; or, nearer at hand, there is a stone seat at Finchale Priory credited with the same power. If you see a horseshoe or a nail, pick it up, throw it over your left shoulder and wish; and wish also if you see a piebald horse, but you must manage to do so before you see its tail.

You may wish, too, when you first hear the cuckoo, and when you see the new moon.

Much reverence has in all ages been paid to wells. The Worm Well at Lambton was once in high repute as a wishing-well, and a crooked pin (the usual tribute of the "wishers") may be sometimes still discovered sparkling among the clear gravel of the bottom of the basin.

As late as 1740 children troubled with any infirmity were brought to the Venerable Bede’s Well, at Monkton, near Jarrow. A crooked pin was put in, and the well laved dry between each dipping.

Pins may sometimes be seen in Lady Byron’s Well at Seaham. There was a custom (which cannot now be practised, as the monument is railed in) of walking nine times round Neville’s Cross. "Then if you stoop down, and lay your head to the turf, you’ll hear the noise of the battle and the clash of the armour."

The weather-wise will tell you that if the leaves remain long upon the trees in autumn it is going to be a hard winter, and will bid you notice how the wind blows on New Year’s Eve:

"If on New Year’s Eve the night wind blow south,
It betokeneth warmth and growth;
If west, much milk and fish in the sea;
If north, much cold and storms there will be;
If east, the trees will bear much fruit;
If north-east, flee it, man and brute."

Candlemas Day (February 2) should also be observed:

"If Candlemas Day be fair and bright,
Winter will have another flight;
If Candlemas Day be clouds and rain,
Winter is gone, and will not come again."

Some pretend to prophesy the coming weather from that of the last three days of March. These are called the "borrowing days."

"March borrowed from April
Three days and they war ill;
The first o’ them war wind and weet,
The next o’ them war snaw and sleet,
The last o’ them war wind and rain,
Which gar’d the silly puir ewes come hirpling hame."

Of Michaelmas Day it is said: "So many days old the moon is on Michaelmas Day, so many floods after."

If it rains on Friday it is sure to rain on Sunday--“wet Friday, wet Sunday."

Watch the cat as she washes her face, and if she passes her paw over her ear it will rain to-morrow.

The oak and ash-trees are considered to prophesy the weather:

"If the oak bud before the ash,
We shall be sure to have a splash;
But if the ash bud before the oak,
We shall have weather as hard as a rock."

If you will begin the year auspiciously, be careful that your first foot "is a fair man." Men still go about to "bring the New Year in," and their guerdon is usually a glass of whisky. On no account should a woman be the first foot, for she would bring misfortune. But before this the New Year has been ushered in by the ringing of church bells, and sounding of buzzers from all the collieries.

Nothing should be allowed to go out of the house on this day, for that would mean a year of poverty, but as much as possible should be brought in, as that will insure a year of plenty; and for the same reason a new dress should be worn with money in its pocket.

Be careful to avoid seeing the first moon of the year through glass; courtesy to her, and wish.

The day before Shrove Tuesday is known as Collop Monday, and on it eggs and bacon should be eaten.

Pancakes, of course, are appropriate to Shrove Tuesday; in fact, it is better known in the North as Pancake Tuesday. Durham children still believe that on this day pancakes fall out of the mouth of the great medieval knocker fixed on the north door of the cathedral, and are sometimes seen bringing plates or baskets to receive the dole, and sugar with which to eat it.

The Pancake Bell still rings from the cathedral to call the faithful to confession, though neither confessional nor pancakes are existent.

Football usually begins now and continues till Easter.

Carlings, or grey peas soaked in water and fried in butter, are eaten on Carling Sunday.

"He who hath not a palm in his hand on Palm Sunday must have his hand cut off," so "palm crosses" were always made for Palm Sunday of willow catkins, tied up with ribbon, and kept till next year.

On Good Friday "hot cross buns," a sort of teacake made with spice and sugar, and marked with a cross, are always made; and fig pudding, or "fig sue," is eaten, in memory of the fig-tree cursed by our Lord when He rode to Jerusalem.

No blacksmith in the county of Durham would at one time drive a nail on this day, in memory of our Lord’s crucifixion.

Good Friday and Easter Sunday were both thought lucky days on which to cast the coats and caps of young children, or to short-coat them.

You must put on something new on Easter Sunday, or the birds will spoil your clothes.

Paste-eggs boiled hard and dyed with ribbons or wool, whinblossoms or onion peelings, are rolled on the grass, or "jauped" against each other till broken, and tansy puddings should be eaten.

Balls are often given to children and played with by them, this being a relic of the custom of playing at "handball" at Easter.

On Easter Sunday the boys may pull off the girls’ shoes; but on Easter Monday the girls may retaliate by pulling off the caps of the boys.

"All Fools’ Day" is still kept to some extent, chiefly by schoolboys, who send their victims to the chemist for oil of hazel, or "strap oil," which they receive in a dry form from the irate shop-keeper!

They also wear oak-leaves on Royal Oak Day; and the choristers of Durham Cathedral go to the top of the central tower and sing anthems. This, though now done in honour of the Restoration, was originally in thanksgiving for the victory of Neville’s Cross, and used to take place in October.

And it is schoolboys, too, who keep Guy Fawkes’ Day in remembrance, for the noise of crackers and fireworks and the excitement of a bonfire do very much appeal to them. Guys are now seldom carried about, but are sometimes burnt.

The "mell-supper" in the county of Durham (from the Norse _melr_, corn) is akin to the Northumbrian "kirn-feast," and is held when the last sheaf is brought in. When this is done, the farmer’s headman proceeds to "shout the mell":

"Blest be the day that Christ was born.
We’ve getten mell o’ Mr. ----’s corn.
Weel won and better shorn.
Hip, hip, hip, huzza, huzza!"

This last sheaf used to be dressed in finery and crowned with wheatears, hoisted on a pole, and all the harvesters danced round this "kern-baby," or harvest-queen, who afterward presided over the supper. Mummers, or "guisers," used to attend the feast, but all these usages are dying out, and the master often gives the harvesters money or ale instead of the supper. This is the old autumn feast of the ingathering of the corn, and in Brito-Roman times the image was that of the goddess Ceridwen, answering to Ceres. Later, it stood for the Virgin Mary.

You must not gather brambles after October, or the devil will come after you! He is evidently about at this time, for when the brambles are spoilt at the end of the season, it is said that "the devil has set his foot on the bummelkites," this being their local name.

Hallow E’en sports are still practised, the mystic apple so often appearing in Celtic fairy-lore, playing a great part in them. Apples are ducked for in a tub of water with the mouth, the hands being clasped behind the back. A small rod of wood is sometimes suspended from the ceiling, a lighted candle being fixed at one end, and an apple at the other. The apple has to be caught by the teeth when it passes before them, and if it is carefully pared, so that the peel comes off in one strip, and this is flung over the left shoulder, it will form the initials of the loved one’s name. Or it may be eaten before a mirror, and the lover’s face will be reflected therein; but on no account must the worker of this spell look backwards.

At Christmas-tide Yule cakes and "Yule dollies" are made, these last being quaint figures made of dough, with currants to mark their features and the outlines of their dress. Furmety (wheat boiled in milk) is eaten, the Yule log is burnt, and the Christmas stocking is hung up that gifts may be placed in it. Candles are still given by grocers; the fruiterer presents a bunch of mistletoe; children come round and sing carols, bearing a box containing figures of the Virgin and Child. The sword-dancers or "guisers" come, perform a dance and sing a song, the words of which vary considerably.

Finally, as many mince-pies as you eat at Christmas, so many happy months will you have.

Here is "a copious catalogue of things lucky and unlucky," at least of those considered as such in the Bishopric:

If you accidentally put on a stocking, or indeed any garment, inside out, it is most fortunate, and the mistake should not be rectified, you will turn the luck.

But if you put a button or hook into the wrong hole while dressing in the morning, something unpleasant will happen to you during the day.

"Sing before breakfast, cry before supper," is an oft-quoted proverb, perhaps deduced from the common belief that unusually high spirits portend coming misfortune.

When a child first puts on a dress with a pocket in it, its father should put some money into it; this means lifelong riches.

On putting on a new dress, a well-wisher will say to the owner, "I wish you health to wear it, strength to tear it, and money to buy another."

Similarly, when a young tradesman first dons his apron, it is well to say to him: "Weel may ye brook your apron." This, if said by a lucky person, will insure the young man’s success in life.

If a spider is found on the clothes, it means that money is coming to you; and if clothes must be mended while being worn, you will lose money.

If the hem of your dress persistently turns up, a letter is coming to you.

If your apron falls off, someone is thinking of you.

Those who can always guess the time accurately will never be married.

If the nose itches, you will be annoyed; if the foot, you will travel.

Itching of the right hand, money is coming to you; of the left, that you will have to pay money; of the ear, hearing sudden news.

If the right ear tingles, someone is defaming you.

If you shiver, someone is walking over your grave.

A blessing is still invoked on people when they sneeze.

Meeting eyebrows are fortunate; so is a mole on the neck, at least, it means health to the owner, but some say that it brings him in danger of hanging.

Always enter a house with your right foot first; to enter with the left foot brings ill luck to the inhabitants, and you must go back and repair the mistake.

If you stumble, by accident, in going upstairs, you will be married the same year; the same if you snuff out the candle (this omen is becoming rarer with the decline of tallow candles).

If two people wash their hands in the same basin, they are sure to quarrel before bedtime, but this may be prevented by making the sign of the cross over the water.

If your eyes are weak, have your ears pierced, it will benefit them.

If a loaf be turned upside down after cutting, it is unlucky. Along the coast they say that it causes a ship to be wrecked. The same if three candles are placed upon the table.

If a loaf breaks in the hand while cutting it, you part man and wife.

And spilling the salt is as ominous here as elsewhere, but you may amend your luck by throwing a pinch three times over your left shoulder with your right hand.

"Help me to saut, help me to sorrow," would be the answer to the person who should offer to place salt on the plate of another.

To cross the knife and fork is a sign of bad luck. To give a knife cuts love; it should always be paid for. Only last Christmas I gave a knife to an old friend, and she punctiliously sent a penny to me in payment for it.

Do not lend a pin, your friend may take one, but it is unlucky to give it.

Never begin anything on Friday, it will not prosper.

If you must pass under a ladder, cross your fingers and wish. The unsophisticated spit; and if you are walking with anyone wait for him to speak first, and any ill luck that may be coming will fall on his head.

"Spitting for luck" is still common enough. Hucksters and fish-women spit on the handsel (the first money they receive), and many horsedealers do the same. Colliers, when considering a strike, used to spit on one stone together, by way of cementing their confederacy, and schoolboys used to spit their faith when making a challenge to fight. This was considered a sacred pledge which it was thought a point of honour to fulfil.

It is wrong to point at the stars, or even to count them; you may be struck dead for doing so.

Hawthorn blossoms should not be brought into the house; they are as unlucky as peacock’s feathers, which also should never be brought indoors.

And evergreens should not be burnt.

"If you burn green,
Your sorrow’s soon seen."

The luck of three is much believed in. If you fail twice in trying to do a thing, you will probably succeed in the third trial. "The third time’s catchy time."

Servants say that if they break one thing they are sure to break three, a foreboding which not seldom comes true.

And when the minute-bell of the cathedral rings once it is bound to ring three times.

If you break a looking-glass, you will have no luck for seven years. Some say that it betokens a death in the house, probably that of its master.

If a black cat enters the house, it must by no means be turned away, for it brings good luck.

"Wherever the cat of the house is black,
The lasses of lovers will have no lack."

Kittens born in May are unlucky and useless, never keep them.

It is lucky, when you see the first lamb of the year, if its head is turned towards you; but unlucky, if its tail.

It is thought that hedgehogs suck cows as they lie asleep.

A toad is poisonous; do not touch it.

In all ages the flight and behaviour of birds have been thought worthy of notice.

When setting hens, the number of eggs should be odd (generally eleven or thirteen); if the number be even, you will have no chickens. A hen that crows brings ill luck, just as does a woman who whistles.

If the hens come into the house, or if the cock crows on the threshold, a visitor is coming. If you have money in your pocket and turn it when you first hear the cuckoo you will be rich all that year; but if your pocket be empty so it will remain. There is a small bird attending on the cuckoo, generally a meadow-pipit. It is called in Durham the cuckoo’s sandy, and is supposed to provide its patron with food.

When the peacock screams, it is going to rain.

The magpie is an unlucky bird because it would not go into the ark with Noah, but sat outside, "jabbering at the drowned world."

"One is sorrow, two mirth,
Three a wedding, four a birth,
Five heaven, six hell,
Seven the de’il’s ain sel’!"

But if you have the misfortune to see one magpie you may nullify the omen by making the sign of the cross, or, as some do, by waving a hand at the evil bird, and saying, "Mag, I defy thee."

The raven is thought to be an unlucky bird, though here in Durham city we should think better of it, for one made the fortune of Sir John Duck by dropping a gold piece at his feet when he was a poor out-of-work butcher-boy. He became a rich coal-owner, and in his memory coals are often called "ducks" in Durham; and the "Old Duck Main" still exists at Rainton.

If rooks, or crows, as we call them here, desert a rookery, it means the downfall of the family on whose property it is. Swallows, once sacred to the Penates, and honoured as the heralds of the spring, are lucky, and their nests must never be pulled down, as they bring good fortune to the place where they build, and it bodes ill luck if they leave a place they have once tenanted.

Naturally, much local lore has gathered round the cathedral, the great Mother-Church of the diocese. The death superstition relating to the minute-bell, the ringing of the Pancake Bell, and the legend of the knocker, have already been mentioned. The Curfew Bell still rings at nine (the hour of compline), not at eight, as in other places, but never on Saturday, because on the night of that day a man, who went alone to ring, was spirited away, and never seen again.

When, on May 29, the choristers go to the central tower, they sing anthems on three sides only, and except the western side, because it was from this point that the man leaped whose tombstone is seen below. It is a mutilated effigy of Frosterly marble, and is said to represent Hob of Pelaw, holding the purse of money for which he risked and lost his life, and the fossils in the marble are said, by schoolboys, to be the coins contained in it. Country people come, for some unknown reason, to draw their foot over the purse.

Curiously, the churchyard here is on the north side of the church. The cloisters are ceiled with Irish oak, so that they never harbour dust or cobwebs, and the saying goes that if the Protestants were not always doing something to the cathedral the Catholics could take it away from them!

There is no church at Butterby, and you will often hear a man who is not in the habit of attending Divine worship spoken of as a "Butterby churchgoer."

These old-world beliefs and stories are fast fading away before the advance of the schoolmaster; but they linger yet in the minds of old people, and it will be long before they are quite forgotten.

THE LEGENDS[6] OF DURHAM

BY MISS FLORENCE N. COCKBURN

The northern counties are all rich in legendary history, and the county of Durham has its full share.

Curiously, instead of most of the legends being of an ecclesiastical nature, as one would naturally expect in a county where the Church has predominated for many centuries, the contrary is the case. All the best-known legends are of deadly war waged with some uncouth or venomous monster, in which, without exception, some local hero, Jack-the-Giant-Killer-like, comes off victorious.

_The Dun Cow._

Visitors to Durham rarely leave without having the sculptured panel representing the famous Dun Cow on the cathedral front pointed out to them.

The legend runs that the monks, having fled from Chester-le-Street and rested with the body of the saint for some time at Ripon, were desirous of returning to Chester. "Coming with him (St. Cuthbert) on the east side of Durham to a place called Ward-lawe, they could not with all their force remove his body from thence, which seemed to be fastened to the ground, which strange and unexpected accident wrought great admiration in the heart of the bishops, monks, and their associates, and, ergo, they fasted and prayed three days with great reverence and devotion, desiring to know by revelation what they should do with the holy body of St. Cuthbert, which thing was granted unto them, and therein they were directed to carry him to Dunholme (Durham). But being distressed because they were ignorant where Dunholme was, see their good fortune. As they were going a woman that lacked her cow did call aloud to her companion to know if she did not see her, who answered with a loud voice that her cow was in Dunholme, a happy and heavenly echo to the distressed monks, who by that means were at the end of their journey, where they should find a resting-place for the body of their honoured saint."

_The Brawn of Brancepeth._

At what time the brawn, or boar, ceased to exist as a wild animal in Britain is uncertain, but it was at one time a common inhabitant of our British forests, and protected by the law in the tenth and eleventh centuries.

The village of Brancepeth (a corruption of Brawn’s path) is said to have derived its name from a formidable brawn of vast size, which made his lair on Brandon Hill, and walked the forest in ancient times, and was a terror to all the inhabitants from the Wear to the Gaunless. The marshy, and then woody, vale extending from Croxdale to Ferry Wood was one of the brawn’s favourite haunts. According to tradition, Hodge of Ferry, after carefully marking the boar’s track near Cleves Cross, dug a pitfall, slightly covered with boughs and turf, and then, toiling on his victim by some bait to the treacherous spot, stood, armed with his good sword, across the pitfall--“at once with hope and fear his heart rebounds."

At length the gallant brute came trotting on its onward path, and, seeing the passage barred, rushed headlong on the vile pitfall to meet its death. It is generally believed that this champion of Cleves sleeps in Merrington churchyard, beneath a coffin-shaped stone, rudely sculptured with the instruments of the victory--a sword and spade on each side of a cross.

Another stone, supposed to be the remnant of a cross, stands on the hill near the farm of Cleves Cross, and is said to have probably been raised on the same occasion. It was not unusual, in England or abroad, when a man had slain a boar, wolf, or spotted pard, to bear the animal as an ensign in his shield. We believe that the seal of Roger de Ferry still remains in the treasury at Durham, exhibiting his old antagonist, a boar passant. The seal of his daughter Maud, wife of Alan of Merrington, shows the boar’s head erased.

_The Pollard Boar._

A family of the name of Pollard was seated at an early period in the parish of Bishop Auckland; and one of their estates was called Pollard’s Dene, and the ceremony of presenting a falchion to the Bishop soon after his entrance into the See was performed by the possessors of Pollard’s lands.

The legend of how a Pollard gained this land runs as follows:

The King offered to anyone who would bring the head of a wild boar, which destroyed man and beast, to his palace "a princely guerdon," and the Bishop of Durham, who passed the greater part of the year at Auckland Castle, having also promised a large reward, a member of the ancient family of Pollard determined to kill the brute, or die in the attempt. So this courageous knight armed himself, mounted his trusty steed, and rode to the lair of the boar, and noted its track. After tying his horse to a tree, out of its regular course, he climbed a beech-tree under which the monster often passed, and shook down a large quantity of ripe beechmast.

There he waited until the boar came, and had the satisfaction of seeing it make a good meal. In time it showed signs of drowsiness, and commenced moving from the place. Pollard, feeling that the time had come for action, made an onslaught on the boar. After so hearty a meal, it was not in a fighting humour, but nevertheless made a fierce resistance, and taxed to the utmost the prowess of the knight. The encounter lasted the greater part of the night, and the welcome rays of the sun burst forth as he severed the head from the trunk of the boar. Having cut out its tongue and placed it in his wallet, he decided to rest for a short time under a tree; but a deep sleep overcame him, and led to a serious disappointment, for when he awoke he discovered that the head had been taken away. He was in great despair, for he had not the trophy to take to the King to obtain the promised prize; so, mounting his horse, he rode to the Bishop and told his tale, and, showing the tongue, his lordship, who was about to dine, rejoiced to hear the good news, and, as a reward, promised the knight as much land as he could ride round during the hour of dinner. When he next came before the prelate, he startled the latter by intimating that he had ridden round his castle, and claimed it and all it contained as his meed. The Bishop was loath to part with his stronghold, but was bound to admit the validity of the claim, and eventually made a compromise by granting him an extensive freehold estate known to this day as Pollard’s Land. These broad acres were given with the condition attached that the possessor should meet every Bishop of Durham on his first coming to Auckland, and present to him a falchion with this speech: "My lord, I, in behalf of myself as well as several others, possessors of the Pollard’s lands, do humbly present your lordship with this falchion, at your first coming here, wherewith, as the tradition goeth, he slew of old a mighty boar, which did much harm to man and beast; and by performing this service we hold our lands."

Hutchinson, rather curiously, quotes a letter signed "R. Bowser," commencing: "Sir, inclosed you have the speech my brother Pewterer gave me out of Lord Bishop Cosin’s old Book," in which the boar is described as "a venomous serpent."

Dr. Longley, created Bishop of Durham in the year 1856, was the last Bishop to whom the falchion was presented.

The crest of the Pollard family is an arm holding a falchion. As to the missing head, it is related that while Pollard slept the head of the Northumbrian family of Mitford passed, saw what had occurred, seized the head, and rode with all speed to the King, and gained the reward. The champion Pollard also sought an interview with His Majesty, and giving the facts, showed that the head presented had not a tongue; he was, however, dismissed without any recompense, the King declining to entertain a second claim.

There is in the parish church of St. Andrew’s Auckland an old wooden effigy representing a knight in a suit of chain armour, cross-legged, with his feet resting on a boar, and it is generally believed that this monument was erected in memory of our hero.

In sequel it should perhaps be added that the Mitfords have for many centuries borne as their crest two arms holding a sword pierced through the head of a boar; and as a commentary, perhaps, upon the principle that fortune

helps those who help themselves, they flaunt the pious motto:

GOD + CARYTHE + FOR + US.

_The Cau’d Lad of Hilton._

The grey old castle of Hilton has long had the reputation of being haunted by a bar-guest, or local spirit, known as the "cau’d lad of Hilton," or "cowed lad of Hilton." His history, however, seems to be rather mixed, and to partake of the nature of the genuine ghost as well as that of a brownie. This brownie was seldom seen, but often heard engaged in playing pranks in the great hall, or in the kitchen after the servants had retired for the night. If they left the kitchen orderly and clean, the brownie, angered at having his work taken out of his hands, would throw all the crockery and kitchen utensils about the room, so that when the servants appeared in the morning a picture of confusion met their eyes. Of course, as a rule, they found it worked best not to attempt to leave things tidy, and then the brownie would exert himself through the night, and all would be straight and clean for the maids when they rose.

The servants, however, engaged by the last Baron thought his pranks rather wearisome, and determined to attempt his banishment by the usual means employed in such cases--that is, by leaving for his express use some article of clothing, or some toothsome delicacy to tempt his palate. They resorted to a green cloak and hood as the best means of driving him away. However, the brownie knew what they were after, and many a time during the making of the cloak and hood could be heard singing in the dead of night--

"Wae’s me, wae’s me!
The acorn is not yet
Grown upon the tree,
That’s to grow the wood,
That’s to make the cradle,
That’s to rock the bairn,
That’s to grow the man,
That’s to lay me."

The green cloak and hood were finished at length; the servants laid them down before the fire in the great kitchen, and watched at a prudent distance. At midnight the "cau’d lad" glided in, surveyed the garments, put them on, frisked about, and when the cock crew disappeared, saying--

"Here’s a cloak and there’s a hood:
The Cau’d Lad of Hilton will do no more good."

And so disappeared for ever.

The appearance of this brownie seems to have been confused with another ghost.

The apparition of a boy who was killed by one of the Barons often used to be seen--sometimes, it is said, with his head under his arm.

A Baron of Hilton, many years ago, ordered his horse to be got ready. He was a passionate man, and a fearsome one to cross. The stable-boy foolishly fell asleep. For awhile the lord waited for his horse, and then, in a lively temper, went off to the stable and found the sleeping boy. He struck the boy with a hay-fork and killed him there and then. Horrified at what he had done, he covered the body with straw till night, and then threw it into a pond at the south side of the park, where, many years afterwards, the skeleton of a boy was discovered. So runs the legend.

It is interesting to note that a boy named Roger Skelton was killed by Robert Hilton, a brother of the then Baron, in July, 1609.[7]

There was a haunted room in the castle called the "cau’d lad’s room," which was never used. Here, it is said, the spirit of the murdered boy made its residence. For many years there has been no appearance of the ghost, though there are persons who affirm that, if they have not actually seen it, they have heard it about the castle.

_The Lambton Worm._

In Plantagenet days the Lord of Lambton had a godless son, who desecrated the Sabbath by fishing in the Wear, and while so doing he hooked a strange worm with nine breathing-holes on either side of its throat. This queer find he threw into a well near by, since known as "the Worm Well," and here the worm grew until it was too large for the well. It then emerged, and betook itself by day to the river, where it lay coiled round a rock in the middle of the stream, and by night to a neighbouring hill, round whose base it would twine itself. Meanwhile it continued to grow so fast that it soon could encircle the hill three times. This hill, which is on the north side of the Wear, and about a mile and a half from old Lambton Hall, is oval in shape and still called the Worm Hill. In the meantime the heir of Lambton had turned over a new leaf, and departed as a Crusader to the Holy Land. The worm still grew, and came daily ravaging for food. The milk of nine cows hardly sufficed it for a meal, and if this were not forthcoming it slayed both man and beast. Many knights tried their prowess against the worm, but with no avail, for no sooner was the worm cut in two than the pieces grew together again. The poor Lord of Lambton was in sore trouble when, after seven long years, the heir of Lambton returned home, a much sadder and wiser man. Seeing the result of his former evil practices, he determined to kill the enormous beast. Several attempts he made without success, because the parts would come together whenever he cut it in two. At last he consulted a witch of the neighbourhood, and she told him if he came to the fight clothed in armour studded with razors, and stood in the swift stream, he would conquer; but that he, like Jephthah, must kill the first living creature that met him after the victory. So to meet this latter difficulty he told his old father to listen, and when he gained the victory he would blow three notes upon his bugle, then his father was to loosen his favourite greyhound, which would come to the bugle’s call.

Having made all preparations, the heir started on his mission. Standing in midstream, he waited the onset of the worm. It came, and seeing its enemy, wound itself about him; but as it tightened its hold, the razors cut it into many pieces, which, falling into the water, were swept away by the current, and so were unable to grow together again. Thus the victory was won, and the bugle sounded; but the old lord, overjoyed at the thought of his son’s victory, forgot to let loose the hound, and ran himself to meet the conqueror. Here now arose a difficulty; the son would not be a parricide. He went again to the witch, and she told him that the only alternative was the doom that none of his family should die a peaceful death, to the seventh, or some say the ninth, generation. Tradition sayeth that this alternative was accepted, and that no head of the family died on his bed for several centuries after.

There are two stone figures of some antiquity preserved at Lambton Castle. One of these is apparently an effigy of our hero in the middle of the fray, only the worm has ears, legs, and a pair of wings. The other figure is a female one, and marked by no very characteristic features.

_The Sockburn Worm._

The legend of the Sockburn worm is very similar to that of the Pollard boar. It is recorded in an old manuscript that Sir John Conyers, knight, slew a monstrous and poisonous wyvern, or worm, which had devoured many people in fight, for the scent of the poison was so strong no person could stand it. But before making this enterprise,

having but one son, he went to the church of Sockburn in complete armour, and offered up his only son to the Holy Ghost. The place where this great serpent lay was called Graystane. The gray stone is still pointed out in a field near the church. For more than six hundred years the manor of Sockburn was held by the singular service of presenting a falchion to the Bishop of Durham on his first entering the diocese, and it was the duty of the Lord of the Manor of Sockburn, or his representative, to meet His Grace at the middle of Sockburn Ford, or on Croft Bridge, which spans the River Tees, and after hailing him Count Palatine and Earl of Sadberge, to present him with a falchion, saying: "My Lord Bishop, I here present you with the falchion wherewith the champion Conyers slew the worm, dragon, or fiery flying serpent which destroyed man, woman, and child, in memory of which the King then reigning gave him the manor of Sockburn, to hold by this tenure, that upon the first entrance of every Bishop into the county this falchion should be presented." The Bishop, after receiving the weapon in his hand, promptly and politely returned it, and at the same time wished the Lord of Sockburn health and a long enjoyment of the manor.

This ceremony was last performed in April, 1826, when the steward of Sir Edward Blackett, the Lord of Sockburn Manor, met, on Croft Bridge, Dr. Van Mildert, the last Prince-Bishop of Durham. The tenure is mentioned in the inquisition post-mortem held on the death of Sir John Conyers in the year 1396. The falchion was formerly kept at the manor-house of Sockburn: the blade is broad, and 2 feet 5 inches long, and on the pommel of the weapon, which is of bronze, are two shields; on one side are the three lions of England, as borne by the Plantagenet monarchs from John to Edward III., and the eagle displayed on the other side is said to belong to Morcar, the Saxon Earl of Northumberland. This relic was also represented on one of the stained-glass windows of Sockburn Church. On a marble monument, placed to the memory of an old member of the Conyers family, the serpent and falchion were sculptured.

_The Pickled Parson._

The present rectory house at Sedgefield, erected by the Rev. George, Viscount Barrington, was preceded by a castellated edifice, which, after serving the purpose of a rectory house for some years, was burnt down in 1792. During a lengthened period previous to the destruction of the old house the inhabitants of Sedgefield appear to have been greatly disturbed by the visits of an apparition known as the "Pickled Parson," which, it was confidently declared, wandered in the neighbourhood of the rector’s hall, "making night hideous." Whose wandering shade the ghost was supposed to have been is explained as follows: A rector’s wife had the ill-luck to lose her husband about a week before the farmer’s tithes fell due. Prompted by avarice, she cunningly concealed his death by salting the body of her departed spouse, and retaining it in a private room. Her scheme succeeded, she received the emoluments of the living, and the next day made the decease of the rector public.

_The Picktree Brag._

Picktree, near Chester-le-Street, is famous for two reasons--first, because it was the home of the heroine of the popular song, "Ailsie Marley," and, secondly, because it was the haunt of one of those mischievous goblins known as the Picktree Brag. Sir Cuthbert Sharp gives an account of the apparition, as told by an old woman of respectable appearance, of about ninety years of age, living near the spot, probably at Pelton. The old woman said: "I never saw the Brag distinctly, but I frequently heard it. It sometimes appeared like a calf with a white handkerchief about its neck, and a bushy tail. It came also like a galloway, but more often like a coach-horse, and went trotting along the lonnin, afore folks, settin’ up a great nicker and a whinney every now and then; and it came frequently like a dickass, and it always stopped at the pond at the four lonnin ends, and nickered and whinnied. My brother saw it like four men holding up a white sheet. I saw then sure that some near relation was going to die, which was true. My husband once saw it in the image of a naked man without a head. I knew a man of the name of Bewick that was so frightened that he hanged himself for fear on’t. Whenever the midwife was sent for it always came up with her in the shape of a galloway. Dr. Harrison wouldn’t believe in it, but he met it one night as he was going home, and it ’maist killed him; but he never would tell what happened, and didn’t like to talk about it, and whenever the Brag was mentioned he sat tremblin’ and shakin’ by the fireside. My husband had a white suit of clothes, and the first time he ever put them on he met the Brag, and never had them on afterwards but he met with some misfortune; and once when he met the Brag, and he had his white suit on (being a bold man), and having been at a christening, he was determined to get on the Brag’s back, but when he came to the four lonnin ends the Brag joggled him so sore that he could hardly keep his seat, and at last it threw him off into the middle of the pond, and then ran away, setting up a great nicker and laugh, just for all the world like a Christian. But this I know to be true of my own knowledge, that when my father was dying the Brag was heard coming up the lonnin like a coach and six, and it stood before the house, and the room shaked, and it gave a terrible yell when my father died, and then it went chatterin’ and gallopin’ down the lonnin as if yeben and yerth was comin’ together."

These northern ghosts or goblins have been very well described in the following verse attributed to Ben Jonson:

"Sometimes I meete them like a man,
Sometimes an ox, sometimes a hound,
And to a horse I turn me can,
To trip and trot about them round.
But if to ride
My backe they stride,
More swift than wind away I go;
O’er hedge and lands,
Through pools and ponds,
I whirrey laughing, ho, ho, ho!"

NAME-PLACES IN THE DURHAM DALES

BY WILLIAM MORLEY EGGLESTONE

When Julius Cæsar conquered Britain, he found the island peopled by Celts--a branch of the great family of nations called the Aryan, or Indo-European, which spread over the world from Central Asia. The Western branches, which rolled in successive waves over Europe, included the Celts, who, according to the Greek traveller Pytheas, were in the fourth century before the Christian era quite at home in Britain, for he there saw growing in the fields corn which the farmers took in sheaves to the barns, in which were threshing-floors.

In Weardale, situated in the western and mountainous part of the county of Durham, and surrounded by brown and heath-clad fells, the ancient Briton lived in the limestone caves, and hunted in the oaken forests. In the Wear Valley, near Hamsterley, and about seven miles east of Stanhope, there is a remarkable relic of the ancient Britons. This ancient fortification--like many other works constructed by the Britons of old, such as the Dene Holes of Essex and the Cliff Castles--has its name, and is called The Castles. The treasure of Heatheryburn Cave, at Stanhope, consisted of bone knives and pins, boar tusks, bronze and jet ornaments, spearheads and bronze celts, with prehistoric human skulls, showing considerable activity of the natives who manufactured and formed the various rude implements. Apart from these landmarks, there have come down to us in names of places the Celtic roots the _ray_ and the _tay_, which we find in Lang Tay, the name of a small but long tributary stream of water in Burnhope; and in Reahope, a tributary hope to Stanhope, and which empties its waters into Stanhope Burn, a tributary of the River Wear.

The Roman power seems to have been extended to Weardale, for the two Roman altars found at Bolihope and Eastgate, and the denarii found at Westgate, prove that this lead-mining dale was well known to those ruling and wall-building people.

Soon after the Romans left, the Anglo-Saxons--including the Jutes, the Saxons, and the English--established themselves along the eastern coast of Britain, and these tribes of the Teutonic family took a firm grasp of the land, and planted the roots of the English nation.

Though little more in the early Saxon period than a dense forest, in which wild animals and ancient Britons found shelter, Weardale ultimately became an Anglo-Saxon district, influenced by the blending of the Scandinavian element in dialect and names of places, owing to its proximity to the Danelagh on the south, and the Norwegian settlement in Cumberland on the west. The whole of the Palatinate appears to have remained Saxon through the Danish rule except the northern banks of the Tees. We know little of Weardale at this period. Situated amidst mountains, and lying next the Strathclyde, it was probably as much Celtic as Saxon; but the division of counties, however, was made in 953 by the Saxon Edred, or Eadred, and the Weardale people would know their county, for, on the bleak and heather-clad fell of Burnhope, the limits of the Palatinate is marked by a pile of stones, called "eade stones"--evidently King Eadred’s stones--the boundary established by that Saxon monarch. Weardale and Teesdale, however, under the power of the Normans, were destined to be turned into desolate wastes; yet, as we shall see, the Saxon names of places survived the desolation of fire and sword.

If we examine the names of places in the Bishopric of Durham a century or so after the Danish rule had ceased and the Norman rule had been established, we shall find a large percentage of Saxon suffixes. In the Boldon Buke, A.D. 1183, there are some 151 names of manors, wards, vills, etc., in which, with a few other names in charters of about the same period, we have 45 endings, or suffixes, in 175 names of places. The Anglo-Saxon test-word, _ton_, figures in no less than 34 of these principal names of places: as Darlington, a settlement of the Deorlings; Stockton, the stockaded town; Haughton, the haugh town; Morton, the moor town; Norton, the north town; Essington, the home or settlement of the Essings, as the Herrings gave a name to Herrington. Of the other Saxon suffices we have: _ley_ 25, _burn_ 14, _don_ 8, _worth_ 6, _ford_ and _ham_ 5 each; and the Celtic _hope_, common in the Anglo-Saxon North, occurs 8 times. Thus, 8 endings take up 105 of the names of places in Boldon Buke, the remaining 70 names having 37 endings. The Danish test-words, _by_ and _thorpe_, only occur once each--Killerby and Thorp. These names do not show that the Vikings made permanent settlements north of the Tees. In Teesdale we find in Domesday Book, A.D. 1086, Lontune, Mickleton, Lertinton, and Codrestune, having the Saxon ending _tun_ or _ton_; but though the names of these places were English, the places themselves were, or had been, belonging to a Dane, for they were then in the hands of Bodin, and had formerly been Torfin’s--a person named from the Scandinavian god Thunder, or Thor. Hundredestoft and Rochebi have the Danish _toft_ and _by_, and, like many other names, such as Thorsgill and Balders Dale, point to the influence and power of the Scandinavians and their heathen worship in the neighbouring dale of the Tees.

In the five northern counties, Worsaae returns Danish-Norwegian place-names in the following order: Westmorland 158, Cumberland 142, Durham 23, Northumberland 22, and Yorkshire in its three Ridings 405. The ending _by_ occurs 167 times in Yorkshire, and _thorpe_ 95 times; whilst 7 of each are ascribed to Durham, and but 1 of the latter only to Northumberland. Yorkshire, however, on a closer inquiry, shows over 250 names of places containing the element _by_, and over 160 of that of _thorpe_, the former predominating in the North and West, and the latter in the East and West Ridings. Of the 83 names ending in the Norwegian test-word _thwaite_, as mentioned by Worsaae, 80 occur in the northern district, Yorkshire 9, Lancashire 14, Westmorland 14, and in Norwegian Cumberland 43, whilst there are no _thwaites_ in Durham or Northumberland. The evidence adduced from names of places thus goes to prove that the Angles of Durham and Northumberland, though under the yoke of the Danes during the ascendancy of the Scandinavian power, have, from their first settlement, continued on their adopted soil through all the vicissitudes incident to the descents of the Britons from the western mountains, the inroads of the Picts and Scots, the ravages of the Vikings, and the subduing marches of the powerful William of Normandy.

Northumbria, as of old, may be divided into two provinces in respect to its place-names--Deira, the district of the Danes, and Bernicia, the district of the Angles, the central boundary-line being the River Tees. The Norse _beck_ and Anglo-Saxon _burn_ distinctively mark this line between these districts in the upper reaches of the valleys of the Wear and Tees. The mountain-range from Burnhope Seat, at the western confines of Durham, eastward to Paw Law Pike, forms the south division between the parishes of Stanhope in Weardale and Middleton in Teesdale. The principal tributaries of the Tees, on the south of this ridge, are _becks_, whilst those on the Wear side are _burns_. In Weardale, at the north-western extremity, Scraith _Burn_ and Langtay _Burn_ contribute to Burnhope _Burn_. On the Tees side, rising within half a mile or so of the above burns, Ashgill _Beck_ contributes its waters to Harewood _Beck_. Farther eastward we have Harthope _Burn_ on the Weardale side, and Harthope _Beck_, which runs into Langdon _Beck_, on the Teesdale side, both streams rising on Harthope Fell, and within a few yards of each other.

Continuing eastward, we find several _becks_ on the southern border of the county of Durham. In 1672 a Teesdale stream was named Raygill Burn, having the Celtic _ray_, the Norse _gill_, and the Saxon _burn_. In the adjoining parish of Wolsingham, in the Wear valley, nearly all the tributaries are named _becks_ in the Ordnance map, but these are, with one or two exceptions, originally all _burns_. In an old document of Queen Elizabeth’s time we find in this parish, Wascrow _Burn_, Westerharehope _Burn_, Hadderly Clough _Burn_, Houselop _Burn_, Bradley _Burn_, Collier _Beck_ and Ells _Beck_. There do not appear to be more than two _becks_ in this parish, Ells Beck and Holbeck, the latter a small runner near Holbeck House, the home of the Craggs family, one of whom was the Right Hon. James Craggs, Secretary of State.

In the Wolsingham names of streams that of Wascrow is generally now called Waskerley; its real name, however, appears to be Westcrau, from _crau_, a crag or rock, and _west_; or its adjectival component might be _wæs_, water. Houselop is Ouselhope, the hope of the _Ousel_ or _Ouse_, Welsh _wysg_, Erse _uisge_, water. Ouse is a common river name.

Having so many Anglo-Saxon names of places in the eastern part of the Bishopric of Durham, it is natural to suppose that the settled families of the Angles would send offshoots along the banks of the Wear, up into the dale where the river had its source. Wolsingham--the Saxon metropolis of Weardale, for its ancient manor included the whole of the Wear valley westward--is the _ham_ or home of the sons or descendants of a family of Franks, represented in Kemble’s English settlement names in Wælsingas, and in the German Walasingas, a family who probably settled in the South of England and sent their sons to the North, for Durham, according to Taylor, contained no original Anglo-Saxon settlements.

East of Wolsingham but a few miles is Witton, the _ton_, or town of witness, Anglo-Saxon _witena-gemot_. North of Weardale lie Hunstanworth and Edmundbyres, so the dale of the Wear is surrounded by towns having the Anglo-Saxon suffixes, _ton_, _ham_, and _worth_, except the Danish _byre_ of St. Edmund.