YEWDALE BECK—THE PARSONAGE—OAK COTTAGE—HOLLIN-HOW—FAR-END—THE
SAW MILLS—YEWDALE—“GIRT WILL’S GRAVE”—HOLME
GROUND—TILBERTHWAITE—HODGECLOSE—SLATE-QUARRIES.
This ramble being, in play-bill phrase, positively our last performance
here this season, I am inclined to make it a pretty long one;
therefore, you had better order out your pony, and be off without loss
of time.
You may canter along the road to the village as far as Yewdale
bridge, and, crossing it, turn to your right, and proceed along a
narrow, shaded, and rugged lane up the banks of the stream. The house
across a field or two to your left, with some fine oaks beside it,
is the Parsonage, both the house and grounds of which have been much
beautified and extended by the present incumbent. You soon gain the
high road at a neat little house called Oak Cottage; and may notice
a little beyond it a handsome, but not very large residence, called
Hollin-how, and near to that, close under the beetling precipice, a
picturesque group of new cottages and old farm buildings, bearing the
odd title of Far-end.
Continuing to skirt the brook, you pass a pool close under the road,
and divided from it only by a few trees and bushes growing upon the
steep high bank, and I may now inform you that this pool, called
Cawdrell, or Cauldron Dub, has been haunted, as also has Yewdale
Bridge, for a century or two, by certain apparitions who develope their
incorporealities in a somewhat eccentric manner, of which I shall tell
you more directly.
[Sidenote: AN EXORDIUM.]
These neat new buildings to your right, are mills erected by Mr
Marshall, for sawing timber and for cutting and polishing the blue
flag-stones worked from a quarry at the back of the Guards hill. The
land round the saw-mills is divided into garden allotments, let at easy
rents to the neighbouring cottagers, and the industrious attention
paid by the allottees to the delving, clearing, and cropping of their
several parcels, is a pleasing proof of the high estimation in which
they hold the privileges thus accorded them. I should have mentioned
that Lady le Fleming has devoted a field adjoining the church-yard to
the same excellent purpose.
Move on, and, as you pass the Saw-mills, you enter the vale of Yewdale,
on which, and on its charms, seeing that I have long ago exhausted
my vocabulary of praise, it were but repeating a thrice-told tale to
say much more respecting it. But, that you may not ride up Yewdale
“in solemn silence,” as, according to the newspapers, they drink to
dead men at public dinners, “I'll tell you a tale without any flam” in
connection with Yewdale and Cauldron Dub.
It is a story possessing a fair allowance of tragic incident, and
in some hands might be worked up into something worth while; but I
am a wretched story-teller, and regret exceedingly that I cannot
recapitulate its leading particulars in the racy and terse, aye, and
poetical, albeit broadly provincial phraseology of my rustic informant.
In good time here we are at the very fittest spot for the commencement
of my story, about a quarter of a mile above the Saw-mills, where, by
craning over the hedge to your right, you may perceive, near to the
verge of the precipitous bank of Yewdale Beck, and a few yards from
the road side, a long narrow mound which seems to be formed of solid
stone covered with moss, but which a nearer inspection would shew
to be composed of several blocks fitted so closely together as to
prove the mound to have had an artificial, and not a natural origin.
You observe it is somewhere between three and four yards long. That
singular accumulation of lichen-clad rock has been known for centuries
amongst the natives of Yewdale and the adjacent valleys, by the
romance-suggesting designation of “Girt Will’s Grave.” How it came by
that name, and how Cauldron Dub and Yewdale Bridge came to be haunted,
my task is now to tell.
[Sidenote: A GIGANTIC SQUATTER.]
Some few hundred years ago, the inhabitants of these contiguous dales
were startled from their propriety, if they had any, by a report that
one of the Troutbeck giants had built himself a hut, and taken up his
abode in the lonely dell of “The Tarns,” above Yewdale Head. Of course
you have read the history and exploits of the famous Tom Hickathrift,
and remembering that he was raised at Troutbeck, you will not be much
surprised when I tell you that it was always famous for breeding a race
of extraordinary size and strength, for even in these our own puny
days, the biggest man in Westmorland is to be found in that beautiful
vale.
The excitement consequent upon the settlement of one of that gigantic
race in this vicinity soon died away, and the object of it, who stood
somewhere about nine feet six out of his clogs—if they were in fashion
then—and was broad in fair proportion, became known to the neighbours
as a capital labourer, ready for any such work as was required in
the rude and limited agricultural operations of the period and
locality—answered to the cognomen of “Girt (great) Will o’ t’ Tarns,”
and, once or twice, did good service as a billman under the Knight of
Conistone, when _he_ was called upon to muster his powers to assist in
repelling certain roving bands of Scots or Irish, who were wont, now
and again, to invade the wealthy plains of Low Furness.
[Sidenote: MISTRESS AND MAID.]
of Conistone, at the period of the giant’s location at the The
particular Knight, who was chief of the Flemings Tarns, was far
advanced in the vale of years, and, in addition to some six or eight
gallant and stately sons, had
“One fair daughter, and no more,
The which he loved passing well.”
And Eva le Fleming, called by the country people “the Lady Eva,” was
famed throughout the broad north for her beauty and gentleness, her
high-bred dignity and her humble virtues; but it is not with her that
my story has to do. She, like the mother of “the gentle lady married
to the Moor,” had a maid called Barbara, an especial favourite with
her mistress, and, in her own sphere, deemed quite as beautiful. In
fact, it was hinted that, when she happened to be in attendance upon
her lady on festive or devotional occasions, the eyes of even knights
and well-born squires were as often directed to the maid as to the
mistress, and seemed to express as much admiration in one direction as
the other. And when mounted on the Lady Eva’s own palfrey, bedecked
in its gayest trappings, she rode, as she oftentimes did, to visit
her parents at Skelwith, old and young were struck with her beauty,
and would turn, as she ambled past, to gaze after her, and to wonder
at the elegance of her figure, the ease of her deportment, and the
all-surpassing loveliness of her features. Her lady, notwithstanding
the disparity of their rank, loved her as a sister, and it was
whispered amongst her envious fellow-servants, that her mistress’s
fondness made her assume airs unbecoming her station. True enough it
was that she seemed sufficiently haughty and scornful in her reception
of the homage paid to her charms by the young men of her own rank,
and by many above it. The only one to whom she showed the slightest
courtesy on these occasions was wild Dick Hawksley, the Knight’s
falconer, and he was also the only one who appeared to care no more for
her favours than for her frowns.
[Sidenote: AN ABDUCTION.]
The Lady Eva, as well befits high-born dames, was somewhat romantic in
her tastes, and would often row for hours upon the lake, and wander for
miles through the woods, or even upon the mountains, unattended, save
by her favourite bower-maiden. And one evening in autumn, after having
been confined for two whole days to the hall by heavy and incessant
rain, tired of playing chess with her father and battledore with her
younger brothers, or superintending the needlework of her maids, and
tempted by the brilliant moonlight and now unobscured skies, she
summoned Barbara, and set out upon a stroll by the lake side.
The pair were sauntering along a path cut through the dense coppice,
the lady leaning in condescending affection upon the shoulder of her
maiden, and listening to a recital of how, on her return from some
of her visits to her parents, she had been waylaid by Great Will of
the Tarns, and how, on a recent evening, he had attempted to seize
her rein, and would have stopped her, had she not whipt the palfrey,
and bounded past him. The lady was expressing her indignation at
this insolence, when a gigantic figure sprang upon the pathway, and
snatching up the screaming Barbara with the same ease with which she
herself would have lifted an infant, vanished on the instant amongst
the thick hazels.
[Sidenote: A CHASE BUT NO RESCUE.]
The Lady Eva stood for a minute struck powerless with terror and
astonishment at this audacious outrage; but the sound of the monster
crashing his headlong course through the coppice, and the half-stifled
screams of his captive, soon recalled her suspended faculties, and then
“Fair” _Eva_ “through the hazel grove
Flew, like a startled cushat-dove,”
back to the hall, where, breathless with terror and exertion, she gave
the alarm that Barbara had been carried off by the Giant. There was
noisy and instantaneous commotion amongst the carousing gentles at the
upper, and the loitering lackeys at the lower end of the hall. Dick
Hawksley, and a few more, darted off in immediate pursuit on foot,
while several rushed to the stables, in obedience to the calls of their
young masters, who were, one and all, loudly vociferating for their
horses. Scarce a minute passed, ere half a dozen le Flemings, attended
by as many mounted followers, were spurring like lightning through the
wood in the direction of Yewdale. They came in sight of the Giant and
his burthen as he neared Cauldron Dub, with the light-heeled falconer
close behind, calling loudly upon him to stay his flight; but he held
on with tremendous strides, till he reached the brow over the pool,
when, finding that the horsemen were close upon him, and that it was
hopeless to try to carry his prize farther, he stopped—uttered one
terrible shout of rage and disappointment—and whirled his shrieking
victim into the flooded beck, resuming his now unincumbered flight with
increased speed. Dick Hawksley rushed over the bank a little lower
down, and the horsemen, abandoning the chase, galloped to the brink of
the stream, which was high with the recent rains. They saw the falconer
plunge into the torrent, as the bower maiden, yet buoyant with her
light garments, was borne rapidly down. They saw him seize her with one
hand, and strike out gallantly for the bank with the other, but the
current was too strong for him, encumbered as he was with the girl in
his grasp. The devoted pair were swept down the stream, at a rate that
made the spectators put their horses to a gallop to keep them in sight,
even while the exertions of the brave falconer sufficed to sustain
their heads above water, which was only till they came under the
bridge, where the water, pent in by the narrow arch, acquired four-fold
force, and there they heard him utter a hoarse cry of despair, and the
gallant Hawksley and the Lady Eva’s beauteous favourite were seen no
more, till their bodies were found, days after, on the shore far down
the lake. One or two of the horsemen continued to gallop down the side
of the beck, in the bootless hope of being able even yet to render
them some aid, but the most of them turned their horses’ heads, and
went off once more at their utmost speed in pursuit of the murderous
Giant. He, considering the chase at an end, had slackened his pace, and
they were not long in overtaking him. Great Will struck out manfully
with his club (time out of mind the giant’s favourite weapon) as they
rushed upon him, but they speedily surrounded him, and, amid a storm
of vengeful yells and bitter execrations, the Giant of the Tarns
was stretched upon the sward, “with the blood running like a little
brook” from a hundred wounds, for he was so frightfully slashed and
mangled by their swords, that—as my informant näively averred—there was
not so much whole skin left upon his huge body as would have made a
tobacco-pouch.
[Sidenote: SPEEDY RETRIBUTION.]
It will be apparent enough to the most obtuse intellect, that, after
such events as these, the localities where they occurred must, of
necessity, be haunted, and, as the ghosts of murderers, as well as of
murder_ees_, if they be right orthodox apparitions, always appear to be
re-enacting the closing scene of their earthly career, it is scarcely
required of me to dilate farther upon the manner of their appearance.
Of course I do not expect, and certainly do not wish to be called upon
to prove the even down truth of every particular of the story, with
which I have been doing my little best to amuse you; but the assured
fact of the Dub and the Bridge being haunted, and that by sundry most
pertinacious spirits, I am ready to maintain against all comers.
But here you are approaching the lovely secluded farm and cottage of
Holme Ground, and whenever I am sick of this world and its vanities,
which as yet, I am happy to say, maintain _some_ hold upon my
affections, it is here that I should be satisfied to take up my rest.
[Sidenote: ROAD AND ROAD-SIDE.]
You may remember that it was hereabouts you crossed the vale of
Tilberthwaite,
“Paled in with many a mountain high,”
on a former ramble. On the present occasion, you hold the road to your
right, and a precious steep, rugged sample of a road it is; but as you
gradually surmount the ascent, you may take a retrospective glance,
now and then, at the beautiful vale, or rather dell, of Tilberthwaite,
and the mountains with which it is “paled in,” all of these being
surmounted by the massive Weatherlam, which is seen to much advantage,
and shews itself to be a magnificent hill from this road.
Travel onwards, with belts of plantations occupying all conceivable,
and some inconceivable inequalities of ground on your left, and
“mountains and moorlands, bleak, barren, and bare,” on your
right, till, as you approach Hodgeclose, you pass one or two very
awful-looking chasms, yawning in close proximity to the road. These
are slate-quarries, which have, for many years, been placed upon the
superannuated list. At Hodgeclose, you must turn from the road, pass
through the farm-yard and a wood-girdled field or two, to inspect an
adjacent slate-quarry, in which inspection you will find the proprietor
an intelligent and obliging cicerone. He will first conduct you by a
subterranean passage two hundred yards long, to the principal quarry,
where the men are busy boring and blasting, and loading the carts with
masses of slate metal, technically called clogs. It is in truth a
strange looking spot this same quarry, being about eighty yards long
and twenty wide, with perpendicular walls of living rock rising to
a height of, at least, fifty yards, fringed at the top by low trees
and bushes, the circumscribed portion of white clouds and blue sky
appearing, from below, to rest upon the tree tops. The only exit is
by the level through which you entered, though there is another level
branching off to the right, and leading to an enormous dark cavern,
“Where, far within the darksome rift,
The wedge and lever ply their thrift.”
[Sidenote: MOUNTAIN HANDICRAFT.]
Its great extent is shewn by the candles of the workmen at its farther
extremity—its height, by a chink in the roof, where a few stray rays of
daylight faintly and feebly struggle through.
Having explored the slate beds, you may proceed to the slate sheds,
where the men are engaged in riving and dressing the slate, and, from
the expertness of the workmen, a very interesting process it is. The
clogs, you perceive, are thrown down in heaps at the open side of the
shed, and are of various shapes and sizes, the average size being
that of a well-grown folio volume. One of these the splitter seizes,
and holding it adroitly on edge with his left hand, taps one side of
it with a hammer like a small pickaxe, with its points flattened and
sharpened, until he establishes a decided crack, which he follows up,
and repeating this process, divides the clog into smooth slates, quite
as rapidly as you could divide the leaves of any gigantic folio. When
riven to a proper degree of thinness, the slates are laid alongside
of a man who sits very commodiously upon a prostrate beam of wood,
into the upper side of which a long flat-topped staple is fastened. On
this staple he holds the undressed slates, and chips them into shape
as quickly as any young lady of your acquaintance could clip muslin
with her best scissors. They are then laid aside, and classified
according to their fineness, the finest being called London—the second
Country—the coarsest Tom—and a very small quality for slating the walls
of houses is called Peg.
[Sidenote: A NOBLE EXCAVATION.]
Having thanked Mr Parker for his courtesy, and, if you can afford it,
left a small gratuity for the men, you may proceed upon your way, which
is a very pleasant one, as ways go, winding through woods and fields
into the valley you traversed on your way to Wrynose. Then cross this
same valley to examine another slate-quarry belonging to Mr Marshall,
in which you will find a magnificent cavern, not dark, but quite as
light as any part of the world without, having an ample window near its
roof; it is nearly circular, about forty-five yards in diameter, and
the same in height, forming a grander dome than is possessed by any
artificial edifice I have yet beheld.