I
The annual Fair on Whitsun Wednesday is the gayest time of the whole
year at Sedbergh. For a few hours the solid grey town under the green
fells gives itself up to gaiety and merriment.
The gentry of the neighbourhood as well as the country folk for miles
around come flocking to the annual hiring of farm lads and lasses,
which is the main business of the Fair. Thoughts of profit and the
chance of making a good bargain fill the heads of the older
generation. But the youths and maidens come, eager-eyed, looking for
romance. At the Fair they seek to guess what Fate may hold in store
for them during the long months of labour that will follow hard on
their few hours of jollification.
'All manner of finery was to be had' at the Fair; 'there were morris
and rapier dances, wrestling and love-making going on,' and plenty of
hard drinking too. 'The Fair at Sedbergh' was the emphatic destination
of many a prosperous farmer and labourer on a Whitsun Wednesday
morning; but it was 'Sebba Fair' he cursed thickly under his breath as
he reeled home at night.
In truth seventeenth-century Sedbergh was a busy place, not only in
Fair week, but at other times too, with its stately old church and its
grammar school; to say nothing of the fact that, in these days of
Oliver's Protectorate, it boasted no less than forty-eight different
religious sects among its few hundred inhabitants. Only the sad-eyed
Seekers, coming down in little groups from their scattered hamlets,
exchanged sorrowful greetings as they met one another amid all the
riot and hubbub of the Fair; for they had tried the forty-eight sects
in turn for the nourishment their souls needed, and had tried them all
in vain.
Until this miraculous Whitsuntide of June 1652, when, suddenly, in a
moment, everything was changed.
The little groups of Seekers stood still and looked at one another in
astonishment as they came out from the shadow of the narrow street of
grey stone houses into the open square in the centre of the town. For
there, opposite the market cross and under the spreading boughs of a
gigantic yew-tree, they saw a young man standing on a bench, and
preaching as they had never heard anyone preach before. Behind him
rose the massive square tower, and the long row of clerestory windows
that were, then as now, the glory of Sedbergh Church. The tall green
grass of the churchyard was already trampled down by the feet of
hundreds of spell-bound listeners.
Who was this unexpected Stranger who dared to interrupt even the noisy
business of the Fair with the earnestness and insistence of his
appeal? He was a young and handsome man, with regular features and
hair that hung in short curls under his hat-brim, contrary to the
Puritan fashion; big-boned in body, and of a commanding presence. The
boys of the grammar school, determined to make the most of their
holiday, thought it good sport at first to mock at the Stranger's
garb. As he stood there, lifted up above them on the rough bench, they
could see every detail of the queer leather breeches that he wore
underneath his long coat. His girdle with its alchemy buttons showed
off grandly too, while the fine linen bands he wore at his neck
gleamed out with dazzling whiteness against the dark branches of
Sedbergh's majestic old yew-tree.
The preacher's words and tones and his piercing eyes quickly overawed
his audience, and made them forget his outlandish appearance. Even the
boys could understand what he was saying, for he seemed to be speaking
to each one of them, as much as to any of the grown-up people. And
what was this he was telling them? With outstretched hand he pointed
upwards, insisting that that church, the beautiful building, the pride
of Sedbergh, was not a church at all. It was only a steeple-house;
they themselves were the true church, their own souls and bodies were
the temples chosen by the Spirit of God for His habitation. No wonder
the schoolboys, and many older people too, became awed and silent at
the bare idea of such a Guest. None of the eight-and-forty sects of
Sedbergh town had ever heard doctrine like this before. Possibly there
might not have been eight-and-forty of them if they had.
Once during the discourse a Captain got up and interrupted the
Stranger: 'Why do you preach out here under the yew-tree? Why do you
not go inside the church and preach there?'
'But,' says George Fox, 'I said unto him that I denied their church.
'Then stood up Francis Howgill, a separate preacher, that had not seen
me before, and so he began to dispute with the Captain, but he held
his peace. Then said Francis Howgill, "This man speaks with
authority, and not as the Scribes."
'And so,' continues George Fox, 'I opened to the people that that
ground and house was no holier than another place, and that house was
not the Church, but the people which Christ is head of. And so, after
a while that I had made a stand among the people, the priests came up
to me and I warned them to repent. And one of them said I was mad, and
so they turned away. But many people were glad at the hearing of the
Truth declared unto them that day, which they received gladly.
'And there came one Edward Ward, and he said my very eyes pierced
through him, and he was convinced of God's everlasting truth and lived
and died in it, and many more was convinced there at that time.'
Convinced they were indeed, as they had never been convinced in all
their former lives; and now that they had found the teacher they
wanted, the hungry, thirsty Seekers were not going to let him go
again. Almost overturning the booths of the Fair, these solemn,
sad-eyed men jostled each other like children in their endeavours to
reach their new friend.
There at the back of the crowd solid John Camm, the prosperous
'statesman' farmer of Cammsgill, near Preston Patrick, could be seen
waving his staff like a schoolboy to attract the preacher's attention
as soon as the sermon stopped. 'Come home, young Sir! Come home with
me,' John Camm called out lustily.
But ruddy-cheeked John Audland, the linen-draper of Crosslands, had
been quicker than the elderly farmer. He was a happy bridegroom that
summer, and bringing his wife with him for the first time to Sedbergh
Fair. She--a Seeker like himself--had been known in her maiden days as
gentle Anne Newby of Kendal town: yet the ways of the dalesmen and of
the country people were in a measure strange to her, seeing all her
girlhood had been spent at her aunt's house in London town, where she
had received her education. Possibly she had looked forward not
without dread to the rough merry-making of the Fair; but she too had
kindled at the Stranger's message. Her shyness fled from her as, with
her hand locked fast in her husband's, the two pressed forward. The
crowd seemed to melt away at sight of their radiant faces, and almost
before the sermon was ended the young couple found themselves face to
face with the preacher. The same longing was in both their hearts: the
same words rose unbidden to their lips: 'Come back with us to
Crosslands, Sir! Come back and be the first guest to bless our home.'
George Fox smiled as he met the eager gaze of the young folk, and
stretched out a friendly hand. But an old slow man with a long white
beard had forestalled even the impetuous rush of the youthful bride
and bridegroom.
'Nay; now, good friends,' said Farmer Thomas Blaykling of Drawwell,
'my home is nigh at hand. For the next three days the Stranger is
mine. He must stay with me and I will bring him to Firbank Chapel on
Sunday. Come ye also thither and hear him again, and bring every
seeking man and woman and child in all these dales to hear him too;
and thereafter ye shall have him in your turn and entertain him where
ye will.'