“You see, sir, as how I’d been a clock-dressing at Gurston
[Grassington], and I’d staid rather lat, and may be gitten a lile sup o’
spirit, but I war far from being drunk, and knowed every thing that
passed. It war about 11 o’clock when I left, and it war at back end o’t’
year, and a most admīrable [beautiful] neet it war. The moon war varra
breet, and I nivvr seed Rylstone-fell plainer in a’ my life. Now, you
see, sir, I war passin down t’ mill loine, and I heerd summut come past
me--brush, brush, brush, wi’ chains rattling a’ the while; but I seed
nothing; and thowt I to mysel, now this is a most mortal queer thing.
And I then stuid still, and luik’d about me, but I seed nothing at aw,
nobbut the two stane wa’s on each side o’t’ mill loine. Then I heerd
again this brush, brush, brush, wi’ the chains; for you see, sir, when I
stuid still it stopped; and then, thowt I, this mun be a Bargest, that
sae much is said about: and I hurried on towards t’ wood brig, for they
say as how this Bargest cannot cross a watter; but lord, sir, when I gat
o’er t’ brig, I heerd this same thing again; so it mud either hev
crossed t’ watter, _or gone round by t’ spring heed!_ [About thirty
miles!] And then I becam a valliant man, for I war a bit freeten’d
afore; and thinks I, I’ll turn and hev a peep at this thing; so I went
up Greet Bank towards Linton, and heerd this brush, brush, brush, wi’
the chains a’ the way, but I seed nothing; then it ceased all of a
sudden. So I turned back to go hame, but I’d hardly reach’d t’ door,
when I heerd again this brush, brush, brush, and the chains going down
towards t’ Holin House, and I followed it, and the moon there shone
varra breet, and I _seed its tail_! Then, thowt I, thou owd thing! I can
say Ise seen thee now, so I’ll away hame. When I gat to t’ door, there
war a girt thing like a sheep, but it war larger, ligging across t’
threshold of t’ door, and it war woolly like; and says I, ‘git up,’ and
it wouldn’t git up--then says I, ‘stir thysel,’ and it wouldn’t stir
itsel! And I grew valliant, and I rais’d t’ stick to baste it wi’, and
then it luik’d at me, and sich oies! [eyes] they did glower, and war as
big as saucers, and like a cruelled ball; first there war a red ring,
then a blue one, then a white one; and these rings grew less and less
_till they cam to a dot_! Now I war nane feer’d on it, tho’ it girn’d at
me fearfully, and I kept on saying ‘git up,’ and ‘stir thysel,’ and t’
wife heerd as how I war at t’ door, and she cam to oppen it; and then
this thing gat up and walked off, _for it war mare feer’d o’ t’ wife
than it war o’ me_! and I told t’ wife, and she said it war Bargest; but
I nivver seed it since, and that’s a true story!”
In the glossary to the Rev. Mr. Carr’s “Horæ Momenta Cravenæ,” I find
the following--“_Bargest_, a sprite that haunts towns and populous
places. Belg. _birg_, and _geest_, a ghost.” I really am not a little
amused at Mr. Carr’s derivation, which is most erroneous. Bargest is not
a _town_ ghost, nor is it a haunter “of towns and populous places;” for,
on the contrary, it is said in general to frequent small villages and
_hills_. Hence the derivation may be _berg_, Germ., a _hill_, and
_geist_, a ghost; i.e. a hill ghost: but the real derivation appears to
me to be _bär_, Germ., a _bear_, and _geist_, a ghost; i.e. a bear
ghost, from its appearing in the form of a bear or large dog, as Billy
B----’s narrative shows.[475]
The appearance of the spectre hound is said to precede a death; which
tradition will be more fully illustrated in my next legend, “The Wise
Woman of Littondale.” Like most other spirits Bargest is supposed to be
unable to cross a water; and in case any of my Craven readers should
ever chance to meet with his ghostship, it may be as well to say, that
unless they give him the wall he will tear them to pieces, or otherwise
illtreat them, as he did one John Lambert, who, refusing to let him have
the wall, was so punished for his want of manners, that he died in a
few days.
This superstition has in one instance been productive of good. A few
years ago an inhabitant of Threshfield kept a huge he-goat, which the
wags of the village would sometimes turn into the lanes, in the
night-time, with a chain about his neck, to frighten the farmers on
their return from Kettlewell market. They once determined to terrify a
badger, or miller, as he returned from the market, by driving the animal
with the chains, &c. into the lane through which the man of meal was to
pass. About ten o’clock the miller, on entering Threshfield with his
cart, espies the goat; and hearing the chains, overwhelmed with terror,
he conjectures it to be Bargest, that was sent to take him away for his
dishonest dealings; the miller stops his cart, and kneeling down in it,
thus prayed, to the great amusement of the young rogues behind the
wall:--“Good Lord, don’t let the devil take me this time, and I’ll never
cheat any more; do let me get safe home, and I’ll never raise my meal
again so extravagantly as I have done of late.” He _did_ get safe home,
and was as good as his word till he discovered the trick, when he
returned to his old malpractices; exemplifying the old epigram--
“The devil was sick, the devil a monk would be,
The devil got well, the devil a monk was he.”
In the second verse of the legend of “The Troller’s Gill,” it is said,
And the elfin band from faërie land
Was upon Elbōton hill.
Elboton is the largest of five or six very romantic green hills, that
seem to have been formed by some tremendous convulsion of nature, at the
foot of that fine chain of fells, which extends from Rylstone to
Burnsall, and is said to have been, from “time whereof the memory of man
runneth not to the contrary,” the haunt of faëries; numbers of these
pretty little creatures having been seen there by several men of honour
and veracity in this neighbourhood, one of whom _has had a faëry in his
hand_! The elfin train has been visible in many parts of our district,
but I know of no place they frequent more than Elboton. One of these
diminutive beings, called Hob, is reputed to be a watchful preserver of
the farmer’s property, and a most industrious workman. At Close-house,
near Skipton in Craven, Hob used to do as much work in one night as
twenty human workmen could in the same time; and, as I have been
informed by an individual, who resided there about twenty years ago,
Hob was accustomed to house the hay, stack the corn, and churn the
butter, as well as perform several other offices, which tended
materially to lessen the labour of the husbandman and the dairy maid.
The occupier of Close-house at that time, thinking to make Hob some
return for his kindness and assiduity, laid out a new red cloak for him,
which so offended the good faëry, that he ceased his labours, and left
the place. On the spot where the cloak was left, the following stanza
was found,
Hob red coat, Hob red hood,
Hob do you no harm, but no more good.[476]
Loupscar, alluded to in the third verse, is a place in the Wharfe near
Burnsall, where the river is pent in with rocks, and boils along in a
confined channel, and then discharges itself into a pool of tremendous
depth, forming, as Dr. Whitaker says in his history, “a scene more
dreadful than pleasing.” The channel of the Wharfe is in general craggy,
and the river abounds with similar vortices to Loupscar; the two most
celebrated of which are the Gastrills above Grassington, and the Strid,
in Bolton woods. The latter will be recognised by the poetical reader,
as the fatal gulf where the Boy of Egremond was drowned, whose story
Rogers has versified with such exquisite pathos.
“The Troller’s Gill” is in Skyram pastures, beyond Appletreewick. I
visited it a few days ago, when the torrent was considerably swollen by
the recent heavy rains amongst the mountains. The roar of the water, the
terrific grandeur of the overhanging crags, and its loneliness, united
to heighten the terrors of the place. To an inhabitant of London, the
scene of the wolf’s glen, in the Drury version of “Der Freischütz,” may
give some faint idea of it. Dr. Whitaker thought Troller’s Gill “wanted
the deep horror of Gordale,” near Malham. There is certainly more
sublimity and grandeur about Gordale; but as to horror, I think it
nothing to “the Troller’s Gill.” This, however, is a matter of taste.
The last verses allude to the beautiful and ancient custom, still
universally prevalent throughout our district, of chanting a solemn
dirge at funerals, till the corpse reaches the church-yard gateway. I
know of nothing more affecting to a stranger than to meet, at evening, a
funeral train proceeding along one of our romantic vallies, while the
neighbouring rocks are resonant with the loud dirge sung by the friends
of the departed. Long may this custom continue! Too many of our old
customs fall into misuse by the ridicule thrown on them by dissenters,
as being popish, &c.; but I am happy to say, that in Craven the
dissenters are great encouragers of funeral dirges. In Mrs. Heman’s
sacred melody, “Last Rites,” this stanza alludes to the practice:--
By the chanted psalm that fills
Reverently the ancient hills,
Learn, that from his harvests done,
Peasants bear a brother on
To his last repose!