August 25th.--On Thursday I went by invitation to Smithell's Hall in
Bolton le Moors to dine and spend the night. The Hall is two or three
miles from the town of Bolton, where I arrived by railway from Liverpool,
and which seems to be a pretty large town, though the houses are
generally modern, or with modernized fronts of brick or stucco. It is a
manufacturing town, and the tall brick chimneys rise numerously in the
neighborhood, and are so near Smithell's Hall that I suspect the
atmosphere is somewhat impregnated with their breath. Mr. ------ can
comfort himself with the rent which he receives from the factories
erected upon his own grounds; and I suppose the value of his estate has
greatly increased by the growth of manufactories; although, unless he
wish to sell it, I do not see what good this can do him.
Smithell's Hall is one of the oldest residences of England, and still
retains very much the aspect that it must have had several centuries ago.
The house formerly stood around all four sides of a quadrangle, enclosing
a court, and with an entrance through an archway. One side of this
quadrangle was removed in the time of the present Mr. ------'s father,
and the front is now formed by the remaining three sides. They look
exceedingly ancient and venerable, with their range of gables and lesser
peaks. The house is probably timber-framed throughout, and is overlaid
with plaster, and its generally light line is painted with a row of
trefoils in black, producing a very quaint effect. The wing, forming one
side of the quadrangle, is a chapel, and has been so from time
immemorial; and Mr. ------ told me that he had a clergyman, and even a
bishop, in his own diocese. The drawing-room is on the opposite side of
the quadrangle; and through an arched door, in the central portion, there
is a passage to the rear of the house. It is impossible to describe such
an old rambling edifice as this, or to get any clear idea of its plan,
even by going over it, without the aid of a map. Mr. ------ has added
some portions, and altered others, but with due regard to harmony with
the original structure, and the great body of it is still mediaeval.
The entrance-hall opens right upon the quadrangular court; and is a
large, low room, with a settle of carved old oak, and other old oaken
furniture,--a centre-table with periodicals and newspapers on it,--some
family pictures on the walls,--and a large, bright coal-fire in the
spacious grate. The fire is always kept up, throughout summer and
winter, and it seemed to me an excellent plan, and rich with cheerful
effects; insuring one comfortable place, and that the most central in the
house, whatever may be the inclemency of the weather. It was a cloudy,
moist, showery day, when I arrived; and this fire gave me the brightest
and most hospitable smile, and took away any shivery feeling by its mere
presence. The servant showed me thence into a low-studded dining-room,
where soon Mrs. ------ made her appearance, and, after some talk, brought
me into the billiard-room, opening from the hall, where Mr. ------ and a
young gentleman were playing billiards, and two ladies looking on. After
the game was finished, Mr. ------ took me round to see the house and
grounds.
The peculiarity of this house is what is called "The Bloody Footstep."
In the time of Bloody Mary, a Protestant clergyman--George Marsh by name
--was examined before the then proprietor of the Hall, Sir Roger Barton,
I think, and committed to prison for his heretical opinions, and was
ultimately burned at the stake. As his guards were conducting him from
the justice-room, through the stone-paved passage that leads from front
to rear of Smithell's Hall, he stamped his foot upon one of the
flagstones in earnest protestation against the wrong which he was
undergoing. The foot, as some say, left a bloody mark in the stone;
others have it, that the stone yielded like wax under his foot, and that
there has been a shallow cavity ever since. This miraculous footprint is
still extant; and Mrs. ------ showed it to me before her husband took me
round the estate. It is almost at the threshold of the door opening from
the rear of the house, a stone two or three feet square, set among
similar ones, that seem to have been worn by the tread of many
generations. The footprint is a dark brown stain in the smooth gray
surface of the flagstone; and, looking sidelong at it, there is a shallow
cavity perceptible, which Mrs. ------ accounted for as having been worn
by people setting their feet just on this place, so as to tread the very
spot, where the martyr wrought the miracle. The mark is longer than any
mortal foot, as if caused by sliding along the stone, rather than sinking
into it; and it might be supposed to have been made by a pointed shoe,
being blunt at the heel, and decreasing towards the toe. The
blood-stained version of the story is more consistent with the appearance
of the mark than the imprint would be; for if the martyr's blood oozed
out through his shoe and stocking, it might have made his foot slide
along the stone, and thus have lengthened the shape. Of course it is all
a humbug,--a darker vein cropping up through the gray flagstone; but, it
is probably a fact, and, for aught I know, may be found in Fox's Book of
Martyrs, that George Marsh underwent an examination in this house [There
is a full and pathetic account of the examination and martyrdom of George
Marsh in the eleventh section of Fox's Book of Martyrs, as I have just
found (June 9, 1867). He went to Smithell's hall, among other places, to
be questioned by Mr. Barton.--ED.]; and the tradition may have connected
itself with the stone within a short time after the martyrdom; or,
perhaps, when the old persecuting knight departed this life, and Bloody
Mary was also dead, people who had stood at a little distance from the
Hall door, and had seen George Marsh lift his hand and stamp his foot
just at this spot,--perhaps they remembered this action and gesture, and
really believed that Providence had thus made an indelible record of it
on the stone; although the very stone and the very mark might have lain
there at the threshold hundreds of years before. But, even if it had
been always there, the footprint might, after the fact, be looked upon as
a prophecy, from the time when the foundation of the old house was laid,
that a holy and persecuted man should one day set his foot here, on the
way that was to lead him to the stake. At any rate, the legend is a good
one.
Mrs. ------ tells me that the miraculous stone was once taken up from the
pavement, and flung out of doors, where it remained many years; and in
proof of this, it is cracked quite across at one end. This is a pity,
and rather interferes with the authenticity, if not of the stone itself,
yet of its position in the pavement. It is not far from the foot of the
staircase, leading up to Sir Roger Barton's examination-room, whither we
ascended, after examining the footprint. This room now opens sideways on
the Chapel, into which it looks down, and which is spacious enough to
accommodate a pretty large congregation. On one of the walls of the
Chapel there is a marble tablet to the memory of one of the present
family,--Mr.------'s father, I suppose; he being the first of the name
who possessed the estate. The present owners, however, seem to feel
pretty much the same pride in the antiquity and legends of the house as
if it had come down to them in an unbroken succession of their own
forefathers. It has, in reality, passed several times from one family to
another, since the Conquest.
Mr. ------ led me through a spacious old room, which was formerly
panelled with carved oak, but which is converted into a brew-house, up a
pair of stairs, into the garret of one of the gables, in order to show me
the ancient framework of the house. It is of oak, and preposterously
ponderous,--immense beams and rafters, which no modern walls could
support,--a gigantic old skeleton, which architects say must have stood a
thousand years; and, indeed, it is impossible to ascertain the date of
the original foundation, though it is known to have been repaired and
restored between five and six centuries ago. Of course, in the lapse of
ages, it must continually have been undergoing minor changes, but without
at all losing its identity. Mr. ------ says that this old oak wood,
though it looks as strong and as solid as ever, has really lost its
strength, and that it would snap short off, on application of any force.
After this we took our walk through the grounds, which are well wooded,
though the trees will bear no comparison with those which I have seen in
the midland parts of England. It takes, I suspect, a much longer time
for trees to attain a good size here than in America; and these trees, I
think Mr. ------ told me, were principally set out by himself. He is
upwards of sixty,--a good specimen of the old English country-gentleman,
sensible, loving his land and his trees and his dogs and his game, doing
a little justice-business, and showing a fitness for his position; so
that you feel satisfied to have him keep it. He was formerly a member of
Parliament. I had met him before at dinner at Mrs. H------'s. . . . . He
took pleasure in showing me his grounds, through which he has laid out a
walk, winding up and down through dells and over hillocks, and now and
then crossing a rustic bridge; so that you have an idea of quite an
extensive domain.
Beneath the trees there is a thick growth of ferns, serving as cover for
the game. A little terrier-dog, who had hitherto kept us company, all at
once disappeared; and soon afterwards we heard the squeak of some poor
victim in the cover, whereupon Mr. ------ set out with agility, and ran
to the rescue.--By and by the terrier came back with a very guilty look.
From the wood we passed into the open park, whence we had a distant view
of the house; and, returning thither, we viewed it in other aspects, and
on all sides. One portion of it is occupied by Mr. ------'s gardener,
and seems not to have been repaired, at least as to its exterior, for a
great many years,--showing the old wooden frame, painted black, with
plaster in the interstices; and broad windows, extending across the whole
breadth of the rooms, with hundreds of little diamond-shaped panes of
glass. Before dinner I was shown to my room, which opens from an ancient
gallery, lined with oak, and lighted by a row of windows along one side
of the quadrangle. Along this gallery are the doors of several
sleeping-chambers, one of which--I think it is here--is called "The Dead
Man's Chamber." It is supposed to have been the room where the corpses
of persons connected with the household used to be laid out. My own room
was called "The Beam Chamber," from am immense cross-beam that projects
from the ceiling, and seems to be an entire tree, laid across, and left
rough-hewn, though at present it is whitewashed. The but of the tree
(for it diminishes from one end of the chamber to the other) is nearly
two feet square, in its visible part.
We dined, at seven o'clock, in a room some thirty-five or forty feet
long, and proportionably broad, all panelled with the old carved oak
which Mr. ------ took from the room which he had converted into a
brew-house. The oak is now of a very dark brown hue, and, being highly
polished, it produces a sombre but rich effect. It is supposed to be of
the era of Henry the Seventh, and when I examined it the next morning, I
found it very delicately and curiously wrought. There are carved
profiles of persons in the costume of the times, done with great skill;
also foliage, intricate puzzles of intersecting lines, sacred devices,
anagrams, and, among others, the device of a bar across a tun, indicating
the name of Barton. Most of the carving, however, is less elaborate and
intricate than these specimens, being in a perpendicular style, and on
one pattern. Before the wood grew so very dark, the beauty of the work
must have been much more easily seen than now, as to particulars, though
I hardly think that the general effect could have been better; at least,
the sombre richness that overspreads the entire square of the room is
suitable to such an antique house. An elaborate Gothic cornice runs
round the whole apartment. The sideboard and other furniture are of
Gothic patterns, and, very likely, of genuine antiquity; but the
fireplace is perhaps rather out of keeping, being of white marble with
the arms of this family sculptured on it.
Though hardly sunset when we sat down to dinner, yet, it being an
overcast day, and the oaken room so sombre, we had candles burning on
the table; and, long before dinner was over, the candle-light was all the
light we had. It is always pleasanter to dine by artificial light.
Mrs. ------'s dinner was a good one, and Mr. ------'s wines were very
good. I had Mrs. ------ on one side, and another lady on the other
side. . . . .
After dinner there were two card-parties formed in the dining-room, at
one of which there was a game of Vingt-et-un, and at the other a game of
whist, at which Mrs. ------ and I lost several shillings to a Mrs. Halton
and Mr. Gaskell. . . . . After finishing our games at cards, Mrs. Halton
drove off in a pony-chaise to her own house; the other ladies retired,
and the gentlemen sat down to chat awhile over the hall fire,
occasionally sipping a glass of wine-and-water, and finally we all went
off to our rooms. It was past twelve o'clock when I composed myself to
sleep, and I could not have slept long, when a tremendous clap of thunder
woke me just in time to see a vivid flash of lightning. I saw no ghosts,
though Mrs. ------ tells me there is one, which makes a disturbance,
unless religious services are regularly kept up in the Chapel.
In the morning, before breakfast, we had prayers, read by Mr. ------, in
the oak dining-room, all the servants coming in, and everybody kneeling
down. I should like to know how much true religious feeling is indicated
by this regular observance of religious rites in English families. In
America, if people kneel down to pray, it is pretty certain that they
feel a genuine interest in the matter, and their daily life is supposed
to be in accordance with their devotions. If an American is an infidel,
he knows it; but an Englishman is often so without suspecting it,--being
kept from that knowledge by this formality of family prayer, and his
other regularities of external worship. . . . .
There was a parrot in a corner of the dining-room, and, when prayers were
over, Mrs. ------ praised it very highly for having been so silent; it
being Poll's habit, probably, to break in upon the sacred exercises with
unseemly interjections and remarks. While we were at breakfast, Poll
began to whistle and talk very vociferously, and in a tone and with
expressions that surprised me, till I learned that the bird is usually
kept in the kitchen and servants' hall, and is only brought into the
dining-room at prayer-time and breakfast. Thus its mouth is full of
kitchen talk, which flows out before the gentlefolks with the queerest
effect.
After breakfast I examined the carvings of the room. Mr. ------ has
added to its decorations the coats of arms of all the successive
possessors of the house, with those of the families into which they
married, including the Ratcliffes, Stanleys, and others. From the
dining-room I passed into the library, which contains books enough to
make a rainy day pass pleasantly. I remember nothing else that I need to
record; and as I sat by the hall fire, talking with Mr. Gaskell, at about
eleven o'clock, the butler brought me word that a fly, which I had
bespoken, was ready to convey me to the railway. I took leave of
Mrs. ------, her last request being that I would write a ghost-story
for her house,--and drove off.