QUEEN ELEANOR'S CROSS AT GEDDINGTON _Frontispiece_
THE BELL, STILTON _Facing page_ 8
KIRBY HALL 18
WOTHORPE MANOR-HOUSE 18
DOORWAY, KIRBY HALL 20
GATEWAY, KIRBY HALL 20
ERWARTON HALL 36
WALSINGHAM 42
WALSINGHAM 42
EAST BARSHAM MANOR 44
FONT CANOPY, TRUNCH 44
WYMONDHAM 52
HAUTBOYS HALL 52
CHASTLETON 64
PIRTON COURT 80
THE WHITE HOUSE, PIXHAM 80
SEVERN END 82
SEVERN END 82
RIPPLE 86
STANTON 86
STANWAY HOUSE 90
STANWAY HOUSE 90
POSTLIP HALL 98
STOCKS, PAINSWICK 98
NAILSWORTH 100
BEVERSTONE CASTLE 100
GATE-HOUSE, SPYE PARK 104
LACOCK 104
LACOCK 106
BEWLEY COURT 106
LACOCK 108
LACOCK ABBY 108
CORSHAM ALMSHOUSE 112
CORSHAM ALMSHOUSE 112
CORSHAM ALMSHOUSE 114
CASTLE COMBE 114
YATTON KEYNELL MANOR 116
BULLICH MANOR-HOUSE 116
SHELDON MANOR 118
SHELDON MANOR 118
SOUTH WRAXALL MANOR-HOUSE 120
SOUTH WRAXALL MANOR-HOUSE 120
THE GEORGE, NORTON ST. PHILIP 124
THE GEORGE, NORTON ST. PHILIP 124
CHARTERHOUSE HINTON 128
WELLOW MANOR-HOUSE 128
OLD HOUSE NEAR CROSCOMBE 130
BECKINGTON CASTLE 130
CROSCOMBE CHURCH 132
CROSCOMBE 132
LYTES CARY MANOR-HOUSE 134
LYTES CARY MANOR-HOUSE 134
ANCIENT SCREEN, CURRY RIVEL CHURCH 136
FIREPLACE, LYTES CARY 136
BARRINGTON COURT 138
HINTON ST. GEORGE 140
SANDFORD ORCAS MANOR-HOUSE 140
MONTACUTE HOUSE 144
MONTACUTE PRIORY 144
CROWCOMBE 148
OLD HOUSE, CROWCOMBE 148
COMBE SYDENHAM 152
COMBE SYDENHAM 152
CROWCOMBE CHURCH 156
DUNSTER 156
BINDON 168
BINDON 168
WYLDE COURT 170
THE GOLDEN LION, BARNSTAPLE 170
MAPPERTON MANOR-HOUSE 172
MELPLASH COURT 172
WATERSTONE 174
ATHELHAMPTON 174
ATHELHAMPTON 176
ATHELHAMPTON 176
MONMOUTH'S TREE 178
SERVANTS' HALL, CHIRK CASTLE 182
SERVANTS' HALL, CHIRK CASTLE 184
MARKET DRAYTON 190
MARKET DRAYTON 190
BLACKLADIES 198
GREAT HALL, HADDON 202
GREAT HALL, HADDON 202
COURTYARD, HADDON 204
DRAWING-ROOM, HADDON 204
WITHDRAWING-ROOM, HADDON 206
WITHDRAWING-ROOM, HADDON 206
DOORWAY, HADDON 208
INTERIOR COURTYARD, HADDON 208
GREAT HALL, HADDON 212
HARDWICK HALL 212
GARLANDS, ASHFORD CHURCH 220
GATEWAY, KNOWSTHORPE HALL 240
TOMB, DARFIELD CHURCH 240
LEATHLEY STOCKS 244
STOCKS AT WESTON 244
MIDDLEHAM CASTLE 252
SWINSTY HALL 252
QUEEN'S GAP, LEYBURN "SHAWL" 254
BELLERBY OLD HALL 256
BOLTON CASTLE 256
ASKRIGG 260
NAPPA HALL 260
RICHMOND 266
EASBY ABBEY 266
NOOKS IN HUNTINGDONSHIRE
AND NORTH NORTHANTS
At Huntingdon we are on familiar ground with Samuel Pepys. When he
journeyed northwards to visit his parental house or to pay his respects
to Lord Sandwich's family at Hinchinbrooke, he usually found suitable
accommodation at "Goody Gorums" and "Mother" somebody else who lived
over against the "Crown." Neither the famous posting-house the "George"
nor the "Falcon" are mentioned in the _Diary_, but he speaks of the
"Chequers"; however, the change of names of ancient hostelries is
common, so in picturing the susceptible Clerk of the Admiralty chucking
a pretty chambermaid under the chin in the old galleried yard of the
"George," we may not be far out of our reckoning.
But altogether the old George Inn is somewhat disappointing. Its
balustraded galleries are there sure enough, with the queer old
staircase leading up to them in one of the corners; but it has the same
burnished-up appearance of the courtyard of the Leicester Hospital at
Warwick. How much more pleasing both would strike the eye were there
less paint and varnish. The Inn has been refronted, and from the street
has quite a modern appearance.
Huntingdon recalls the sterner name of Cromwell. Strange that this
county, so proud of the Lord Protector (for has it not recently set up a
gorgeous statue at St. Ives to his memory?), should still harbour
red-hot Jacobites! According to _The Legitimist Calendar_, mysterious
but harmless meetings are still held hereabouts on Oak Apple Day: a day
elsewhere all but forgotten. Huntingdon was the headquarters of the
Royalist army certainly upon many occasions, and when evil days fell
upon the "Martyr King," some of his staunchest friends were here
secretly working for his welfare.[1] When Charles passed through the
town in 1644, the mayor, loyal to the back-bone, had prepared a speech
to outrival the flowery welcome of his fellow-magistrates: "Although
Rome's Hens," he said, "should daily hatch of its preposterous eggs,
chrocodilicall chickens, yet under the Shield of Faith, by you our most
Royal Sovereigne defended and by the King of Heavens as I stand and your
most medicable councell, would we not be fearful to withstand them."[2]
Though the sentence is somewhat involved, the worthy magnate doubtless
meant well.
It was the custom, by the way, so Evelyn tells us, when a monarch passed
through Huntingdon, to meet him with a hundred ploughs as a symbol of
the fruitful soil: the county indeed at one time was rich in vines and
hops, and has been described by old writers as the garden of England.
Still here as elsewhere the farmers' outlook is a poor one to-day,
although there are, of course, exceptions.
At historic Hinchinbrooke (on June 4, 1647), King Charles slept the
first night after he was removed from Holdenby House by Cornet Joyce:
the first stage of his _progress_ to the scaffold. In the grounds of the
old mansion, the monarch, when Prince of Wales, and little Oliver played
together, for the owner in those days of the ancient seat of the
Montagues and Cromwells was the future Protector's uncle and godfather.
Upon one occasion the boys had a stand-up fight, and the commoner, the
senior by only one year, made his royal adversary's nose bleed,--an
augury for fatal events to follow. The story is told how little Oliver
fell into the Ouse and was fished out by a Royalist piscatorial parson.
Years afterwards, when the Protector revisited the scenes of his youth
in the midst of his triumphant army, he encountered his rescuer, and
asked him whether he remembered the occurrence.
"Truly do I," was the prompt reply; "and the Lord forgive me, but I wish
I'd let thee drown."
The Montagues became possessed of the estate in 1627. Pepys speaks of
"the brave rooms and good pictures," which pleased him better than those
at Audley End. The Diarist's parental house remains at Brampton, a
little to the west of Huntingdon. In characteristic style he records a
visit there in October 1667: "So away for Huntingdon mightily pleased
all along the road to remember old stories, and come to Brampton at
about noon, and there found my father and sister and brother all well:
and here laid up our things, and up and down to see the gardens with my
father, and the house; and do altogether find it very pretty, especially
the little parlour and the summer-houses in the garden, only the wall do
want greens up it, and the house is too low roofed; but that is only
because of my coming from a house with higher ceilings."
Before turning our steps northwards, let us glance at the mediaeval
bridge that spans the river Ouse, to Godmanchester, which is referred to
by the thirteenth-century historian _Henry of Huntingdon_ as "a noble
city." But its nobility has long since departed, and some modern
monstrosities in architecture make the old Tudor buildings which
remain, blush for such brazen-faced obtrusion. Its ancient water-mill
externally looks so dilapidated, that one would think the next
"well-formed depression" from America would blow it to atoms. Not a bit
of it. Its huge timber beams within, smile at such fears. It is a
veritable fortress of timber. But although this solid wooden structure
defies the worst of gales, there are rumours of coming electric
tramways, and then, alas! the old mill will bow a dignified departure,
and the curfew, which yet survives, will then also perhaps think it is
time to be gone.
At Little Stukeley, on the Great North Road some three miles above
Huntingdon, is a queer old inn, the "Swan and Salmon," bearing upon its
sign the date 1676. It is a good example of the brickwork of the latter
half of the seventeenth century. Like many another ancient hostelry on
the road to York, it is associated with Dick Turpin's exploits; and to
give colour to the tradition, mine host can point at a little masked
hiding-place situated somewhere at the back of the sign up in its gable
end. It certainly looks the sort of place that could relate stories of
highwaymen; a roomy old building, which no doubt in its day had
trap-doors and exits innumerable for the convenience of the gentlemen of
the road.
A little off the ancient "Ermine Street," to the north-west of Stukeley,
is the insignificant village of Coppingford, historically interesting
from the fact that when Charles I. fled from Oxford in disguise in 1646,
he stopped the night there at a little obscure cottage or alehouse, on
his way to seek protection of the Scots at Southwell. "This day one
hundred years ago," writes Dr. Stukeley in his _Memoirs_ on May 3, 1746,
"King Charles, Mr. John Ashburnham, and Dr. Hudson came from Coppingford
in Huntingdonshire and lay at Mr. Alderman Wolph's house, now mine, on
Barn Hill; all the day obscure." Hudson, from whom Sir Walter drew his
character of Dr. Rochecliffe in _Woodstock_, records the fact in the
following words: "We lay at Copingforde in Huntingdonshire one Sunday, 3
May; wente not to church, but I read prayers to the King; and at six at
night he went to Stamforde. I writte from Copingforde to Mr. Skipwith
for a horse, and he sente me one, which was brought to me at Stamforde.
---- at Copingforde the King and me, with my hoste and hostis and two
children, were by the fire in the hall. There was noe other chimney in
the house."[3] The village of Little Gidding, still farther to the
north-west, had often before been visited by Charles in connection with
a religious establishment that had been founded there by the Ferrar
family. A curious old silk coffer, which was given by Charles to the
nieces of the founder, Nicholas Ferrar, upon one of these occasions,
some years ago came into the possession of our late queen, and is still
preserved at Windsor.
A few miles to the north-east is Glatton, another remote village where
old May-day customs yet linger. There are some quaint superstitions in
the rural districts hereabouts. A favourite remedy for infectious
disease is to open the window of the sickroom not so much to let in the
fresh air as to admit the gnats, which are believed to fly away with the
malady and die. The beneficial result is never attributed to oxygen!
The Roman road (if, indeed, it is the same, for some authorities incline
to the opinion that it ran parallel at some little distance away) is
unpicturesque and dreary. Towering double telegraph poles recur at set
intervals with mathematical regularity, and the breeze playing upon the
wires aloft brings forth that long-drawn melancholy wail only to make
the monotony more depressing. Half a mile from the main road, almost due
east of Glatton, stands Connington Hall, where linger sad memories of
the fate of Mary Queen of Scots. When the castle of Fotheringay was
demolished in 1625, Sir Robert Cotton had the great Hall in which she
was beheaded removed here. The curious carved oak chair which was used
by the poor Queen at Fotheringay until the day of her death may now be
seen in Connington Church, where also is the Tomb of Sir Robert, the
founder of the famous Cottonian Library.
[Illustration: THE BELL, STILTON]
A couple of miles or so to the north is Stilton, which bears an air of
decayed importance. A time-mellowed red-brick Queen Anne house, whose
huge wooden supports, like cripples' crutches, keep it from toppling
over, comes first in sight. In striking contrast, with its formal style
of architecture, is the picturesque outline of the ancient inn beyond. A
complicated flourish of ornamental ironwork, that would exasperate the
most expert freehand draughtsman, supports the weather-beaten sign of
solid copper. Upon the right-hand gable stands the date 1642, bringing
with it visions of the coming struggle between King and Parliament. But
the date is misleading, as may be seen from the stone groining upon the
adjoining masonry. The main building was certainly erected quite a
century earlier. Here and there modern windows have been inserted in
place of the Tudor mullioned ones, as also have later doorways, for part
of the building is now occupied as tenements. The archway leading into
the courtyard has also been somewhat modernised, as may be judged from
the corresponding internal arch, with its original curved dripstone
above.
We came upon this inn, tramping northwards in a bitter day in March.
It looked homely and inviting, the waning sunlight tinting the stonework
and lighting up the window casements. Enthusiastic with pleasing
imaginings of panelled chambers and ghostly echoing corridors, we
entered only to have our dreams speedily dispersed. In vain we sought
for such a "best room" as greeted Mr. Chester at the "Maypole." There
were no rich rustling hangings here, nor oaken screens enriched with
grotesque carvings. Alas! not even a cheery fire of fagots. Nor, indeed,
was there a bed to rest our weary bones upon. Spring cleaning was
rampant, and the merciless east wind sweeping along the bare passages
made one shudder more than usual at the thought of that terrible annual
necessity (but the glory of energetic house-wives). But surely mine
hostess of the good old days would have scrupled to thrust the traveller
from her door: moreover to a house of refreshment, or rather
eating-house, a stone's-throw off, uncomfortably near that rickety
propped-up red-brick residence.
With visions of the smoking bowl and lavender-scented sheets dashed to
the ground, we turned away. But, lo! and behold a good _angel_ had come
to the rescue. So absorbed had we been with the possibilities of the
"Bell" that the "Angel" opposite had quite been overlooked. This rival
inn of Georgian date furnished us with cosy quarters. From our
flower-bedecked window the whole front of the old "Bell" could be
leisurely studied in all its varying stages of light and shade--an inn
with a past; an object-lesson for the philosopher to ruminate upon. Yes,
in its day one can picture scenes of lavish, shall we say Ainsworthian
hospitality. There is a smack of huge venison pasties, fatted capons,
and of roasted peacocks about this hoary hostel. And its stables; one
has but to stroll up an adjacent lane to get some idea of the once vast
extent of its outbuildings. The ground they covered must have occupied
nearly half the village. Here was stabling for over eighty horses, and
before the birth of trains, thirty-six coaches pulled up daily at the
portal for hungry passengers to refresh or rest.
The famous cheese, by the way, was first sold at this inn; but why it
was dubbed Stilton instead of Dalby in Leicestershire, where it was
first manufactured, is a mystery. Like its _vis-a-vis_, the "Angel" is
far different from what it was in its flourishing days. The main
building is now occupied for other purposes, and its dignity has long
since departed. To-day Stilton looks on its last legs. The goggled
motor-fiend sweeps by to Huntingdon or Peterborough while Stilton rubs
its sleepy eyes. But who can tell but that its fortunes may yet revive.
Was not Broadway dying a natural death when Jonathan, who invariably
tells us what treasures we possess, stepped in and made it popular? Some
enterprising landlord might do worse than take the old "Bell" in hand
and ring it to a profitable tune. But judging by appearances, visitors
to-day, at least in March, are few and far between.
Half the charm of Stilton lies in the fact that there is no hurry. It is
quite refreshing in these days of rush. For instance, you want to catch
a train at Peterborough,--at least we did, for that was the handiest way
of reaching Oundle, some seven miles to the west of Stilton as the crow
flies. Sitting on thorns, we awaited the convenience of the horse as to
whether his accustomed jog-trot would enable us to catch our train. We
_did_ catch it truly, but the anxiety was a terrible experience.
Oundle is full of old inns. The "Turk's Head," facing the church, is a
fine and compact specimen of Jacobean architecture. It was a brilliant
morning when we stood in the churchyard looking up at the
ball-surmounted gables standing out in bold relief against the clear
blue sky, while the caw of a colony of rooks sailing overhead seemed
quite in harmony with the old-world surroundings.
More important and flourishing is the "Talbot," which looks
self-conscious of the fact that in its walls are incorporated some of
the remains of no less historic a building than Fotheringay Castle,
whose moat and fragmentary walls are to be seen some three and a half
miles to the north of the town. The fortress, with its sad and tragic
memories of Mary Queen of Scots, was demolished after James came to the
throne, and its fine oak staircase, by repute the same by which she
descended to the scaffold, was re-erected in the "Talbot." The courtyard
is picturesque. The old windows which light the staircase, which also
are said to have come from Fotheringay, are angular at the base, and
have an odd and pleasing appearance.
Two ancient almshouses, with imposing entrance gates, are well worth
inspection. There is a graceful little pinnacle surmounting one of the
gable ends, at which we were curiously gazing when one of the aged
inmates came out in alarm to see if the chimney was on fire.
Fotheringay church, with its lantern tower and flying buttresses, is
picturesquely situated close to the river Nene, and with the bridge
makes a charming picture. The older bridge of Queen Mary's time was
angular, with square arches, as may be seen from a print of the early
part of the eighteenth century. In this is shown the same scanty remains
of the historic Castle: a wall with a couple of Gothic doorways, all
that survived of the formidable fortress that was the unfortunate
queen's last prison-house. As at Cumnor, where poor Amy Robsart was
done to death in a manner which certainly Elizabeth hinted at regarding
her troublesome cousin, there is little beyond the foundations from
which to form an idea of the building. It was divided by a double moat,
which is still to be seen, as well as the natural earthwork upon which
the keep stood. The queen's apartments, that towards the end were
stripped of all emblems of royalty, were situated above and to the south
of the great hall, into which she had to descend by a staircase to the
scaffold. Some ancient thorn trees now flourish upon the spot. The
historian Fuller, who visited the castle prior to its demolition, found
the following lines from an old ballad scratched with a diamond upon a
window-pane of Mary's prison-chamber:
"From the top of all my trust
Mishap hath laid me in the dust."
Though Mary's mock trial took place at Fotheringay in the "Presence
Chamber," she was actually condemned in the Star Chamber at Westminster;
and it may here be stated that that fine old room may yet be seen not
very many miles away, at Wormleighton, near the Northamptonshire border
of south-east Warwickshire. A farmhouse near Fotheringay is still
pointed out where the executioner lodged the night before the deed; and
some claim this distinction for the ancient inn in which are
incorporated some remains of the castle.
As is known, the Queen of Scots' body was buried first in Peterborough
Cathedral, whence it was removed to Westminster Abbey. There is a
superstition in Northamptonshire that if a body after interment be
removed, it bodes misfortune to the surviving members of the family.
This was pointed out at the time to James I.; but superstitious as he
was, he did not alter his plans, and the death of Prince Henry shortly
afterwards seemed to confirm this belief.[4]
But there are other memories of famous names in history, for the head of
the White Rose family, Richard of York, was buried in the church, and
his duchess, Cecilia Neville, as well as Edward of York, whose death at
Agincourt is immortalised by Shakespeare. When the older church was
dismantled and the bodies removed to their present destination, a silver
ribbon was discovered round the Duchess Cecilia's neck upon which a
pardon from Rome was clearly written. The windows of the church once
were rich in painted glass; and at the fine fifteenth-century font it is
conjectured Richard III. was baptized, for he was born at the Castle.
Crookback's badge, the boar, may still be seen in the church, and the
Yorkist falcon and fetterlock are displayed on the summit of the vane
upon the tower. Also some carved stalls, which came from here, in the
churches of Tansor and Hemington to the south of Fotheringay, bear the
regal badges and crest. The falcon and the fetterlock also occur in the
monuments to the Dukes of York, which were rebuilt by Queen Elizabeth
when the older tombs had fallen to decay. The allegiance to the
fascinating Queen of Scots is far from dead, for in February 1902, and
doubtless more recently, a gentleman journeyed specially from Edinburgh
to Fotheringay to place a tribute to her martyrdom in the form of a
large cross of immortelles bearing the Scots crown and Mary's monogram,
and a black bordered white silk sash attached.
A few miles to the west of this historic spot are the fine Tudor houses
Deene and Kirby: the former still a palatial residence; the latter,
alas! a ruin fast falling to decay. Deene, with its battlemented towers
and turrets and buttressed walls, is a noble-looking structure, with
numerous shields of arms and heraldic devices carved upon the masonry.
These are of the great families, Brudenel, Montagu, Bruce, Bulstrode,
etc., whose intermarriages are emblazoned in painted glass in the top of
the mullioned windows of the hall. Sir Thomas Brudenel, the first Earl
of Cardigan, who died three years after the Restoration, was a typical
old cavalier after the style of Sir Henry Lee in _Woodstock_; and in
the manor are preserved many of his manuscripts written during his
twenty years' confinement in the Tower. In the great hall there is a
blocked-up entrance to a subterranean passage running towards Kirby, and
through this secret despatches are said to have been carried in the time
of the Civil War; and at the back of a fireplace in the same apartment
is a hiding-place sufficiently large to contain a score of people
standing up. One of the rooms is called Henry VII.'s room, as that
monarch when Earl of Richmond is said to have ridden from Bosworth Field
to seek refuge at Deene, then a monastery.
[Illustration: WOTHORPE MANOR-HOUSE.]
Among the numerous portraits are the Earl of Shrewsbury, who was slain
by the second Duke of Buckingham in the notorious duel, and his wife
Lady Anne Brudenel, who was daughter of the second Earl of Cardigan.
Some time before the poor plain little duchess suspected that she had a
formidable rival in the beautiful countess, she was returning from a
visit to Deene to her house near Stamford, where her reckless husband
just then found it convenient to hide himself, as a warrant for high
treason was out against him, when she noticed a suspicious little
cavalcade travelling in the same direction. Ordering the horses to be
whipped up, she arrived in time to give the alarm. The duke had just set
out for Burleigh House with some ladies in his company, and, says
Clarendon, the sergeant "made so good haste that he was in view of the
coach, and saw the duke alight out of the coach and lead a lady into the
house, upon which the door of the court was shut before he could get to
it. He knocked loudly at that and other doors that were all shut, so
that he could not get into the house though it were some hours before
sunset in the month of May."[5] Pepys was strolling in the park and met
Sergeant Bearcroft "who was sent for the Duke of Buckingham, to have
brought his prisoner to the Tower. He come to towne this day and brings
word that being overtaken and outrid by the Duchesse of Buckingham
within a few miles of the duke's house of Westhorp, he believes she got
thither about a quarter of an hour before him, and so had time to
consider; so that when he came, the doors were kept shut against him.
The next day, coming with officers of the neighbour market-town
[Stamford] to force open the doors, they were open for him, but the duke
gone, so he took horse presently and heard upon the road that the Duke
of Buckingham was gone before him for London. So that he believes he is
this day also come to towne before him; but no newes is yet heard of
him."[6] Many blunders have been made in reference to the duke's house
of "Westhorp." Some have called it "Owthorp" and others "Westhorpe" in
Suffolk, the demolished mansion of Charles Brandon, Duke of Suffolk. The
place referred to is really Wothorpe manor-house, the remains of which
stand some two miles to the south of Stamford and ten to the north of
Deene. The existing portion consists of four towers, the lower part of
which is square and the upper octagonal, presumably having been at one
time surmounted by cupolas. The windows are long and narrow, having only
one mullion running parallel across. Beneath the moulding of the summit
of each tower are circular loopholes. It is evidently of Elizabethan
date, but much of the ornamental detail is lost in the heavy mantle of
ivy and the trees which encircle it.
[Illustration: KIRBY HALL.]
That that stately Elizabethan mansion, Kirby Hall (which is close to
Deene), should ever have been allowed to fall to ruin is most
regrettable and deplorable. It was one of John Thorpe's masterpieces,
the architect of palatial Burleigh, of Holland House and Audley End, and
other famous historic houses. He laid the foundation-stone in 1570, and
that other great master Inigo Jones made additions in the reign of
Charles I. The founder of Kirby was Sir Christopher Hatton, who is said
to have first danced into the virgin queen's favour at a masque at
Court. The Earl of Leicester probably first was famous in this way, if
we may judge from the quaint painting at Penshurst, where he is bounding
her several feet into the air; but was not so accomplished as Sir
Christopher, who in his official robes of Lord Chancellor danced in the
Hall of the Inner Temple with the seals and mace of his office before
him, an undignified proceeding, reminding one of the scene in one of the
Gilbert and Sullivan operas.
[Illustration: DOORWAY, KIRBY HALL.]
[Illustration: GATEWAY, KIRBY HALL.]
Kirby must have been magnificent in its day; and when we consider that
it was in occupation by the Chancellor's descendant, the Earl of
Winchelsea, in 1830 or even later, one may judge by seeing it how
rapidly a neglected building can fall into decay. Even in our own memory
a matter of twenty years has played considerable havoc, and cleared off
half the roof. Standing in the deserted weed-grown courtyard, one cannot
but grieve to see the widespread destruction of such beautiful
workmanship. The graceful fluted Ionic pilasters that intersect the
lofty mullioned windows are falling to pieces bit by bit, and the
fantastic stone pinnacles above and on the carved gable ends are
disappearing one by one. But much of the glass is still in the windows,
and some of the rooms are not all yet open to the weather, and the great
hall and music gallery and the "Library" with fine bay window are both
in a fair state of preservation. Is it yet too much to hope that pity
may be taken upon what is undoubtedly one of the finest Elizabethan
houses in England? The north part of the Inner Court is represented in
S. E. Waller's pathetic picture "The Day of Reckoning," which has been
engraved.
Some three miles to the south of Kirby is the village of Corby, famous
for its surrounding woods, and a curious custom called the "Poll Fair,"
which takes place every twenty years. Should a stranger happen to be
passing through the village when the date falls due, he is liable to be
captured and carried on a pole to the stocks, which ancient instrument
of punishment is there, and put to use on these occasions. He may
purchase his liberty by handing over any coin he happens to have. It
certainly is a rather eccentric way of commemorating the charter granted
by Elizabeth and confirmed by Charles II. by which the residents (all of
whom are subjected to similar treatment) are exempt from market tolls
and jury service.
A pair of stocks stood formerly at the foot of the steps of the graceful
Eleanor Cross at Geddington to the south of Corby. Of the three
remaining memorials said to have been erected by Edward I. at every
place where the coffin of his queen rested on its way from Hardeby in
Lincolnshire to Westminster Abbey, Geddington Cross is by far the most
graceful and in the best condition. The other two are at Waltham and
Northampton. Originally there were fifteen Eleanor crosses, including
Hardeby, Lincoln, Stony Stratford, Woburn, Dunstable, St. Albans,
Cheapside, and Charing Cross. The last two, the most elaborate of all,
as is known, were destroyed by order of Lord Mayor Pennington in 1643
and 1647, accompanied by the blast of trumpets.