The Dragon of Wantley.

"There is joy in the convent of Beverley,Now these saintly maidens are found,And to hear their story right wonderinglyThe nuns have gathered around;The long-lost maidens, to whom was givenTo live so long the life of heaven."

The Sisters further stated that the first spirit they met was the holy St. John, the founder of their convent, whom they immediately recognised, although he had cast off his earthly integuments, and appeared in a glorified form, but in semblance as when he performed the miracle at South Burton.

He welcomed them with affectionate warmth, and told them that their parents were now enjoying the reward of their virtuous and pious lives, but that they could not be permitted to see them until they themselves had finally passed away from earthly life. He further told them that he kept a watchful eye over his town and monastery in Inder-a-wood, with affectionate love, which should be seen in after ages, in the promotion of their prosperity.

The next day the festival of St. John was celebrated in the monastery and church, with more than usual interest and devotion. Towards the close of it—

"The maidens have risen, with noiseless treadThey glide o'er the marble floor;They seek the Abbess with bended head:'Thy blessing we would implore,Dear mother! for e'er the coming dayShall blush into light, we must hence away.'The Abbess hath lifted her gentle hands,And the words of peace hath said,'O vade in pacem;' aghast she stands,'Have their innocent spirits fled?'Yes, side by side lie these maidens fair,Like two wreaths of snow in the moonlight there."

At the same time the church became lighted up with a supernatural roseate hue, and sounds of celestial music ravished the ears of the assembly. The Sisters were laid side by side by tender and reverent hands in a tomb near the altar of the church, and now—

"Fifty summers have come and passed away,But their loveliness knoweth no decay;And many a chaplet of flowers is hung,And many a bead told there;And many a hymn of praise is sung,And many a low-breathed prayer;And many a pilgrim bends the kneeAt the shrine of the Sisters of Beverley."

The tomb of the Sisters was destroyed in the great fire of 1188, which destroyed not only St. John's Church and monastery, but the wholetown besides. They were afterwards rebuilt—the Minster in the superb style which it now presents—and it was in remembrance of these sainted Sisters that the uninscribed tomb was placed in the new church.

This legend has formed the subject of an exquisite poem, which appeared in the pages of theLiterary Gazette, and has been attributed to the pen of Alaric A. Watts, which, however, is open to doubt.

Dropcap-O

Onceon a time—as the old storytellers were wont to commence their tales of love, chivalry, and romance—there dwelt in the most wild and rugged part of Wharncliffe Chase, near Rotherham, a fearful dragon, with iron teeth and claws. How he came there no one knew, or where he came from; but he proved to be a most pestilent neighbour to the villagers of Wortley—blighting the crops by the poisonous stench of his breath, devouring the cattle of the fields, making no scruple of seizing upon a plump child or a tender young virgin to serve as abonne-bouchefor his breakfast table, and even crunching up houses and churches to satisfy his ravenous appetite.

Wortley, is situated in the parish of Penistone, and belongs now, as it has done for centuries, to the Wortley family. Before the dissolution of monasteries, the Rectory of Penistone belonged to the Abbey of St.Stephen, Westminster, and was granted, when the Abbey was dissolved, to Thomas Howard, third Duke of Norfolk, who out of the proceeds established in Sheffield a set of almshouses. The impropriation of the great tithes were let to the Wortley family, who, by measures of oppression and extortion, contrived to get a great deal more than they were entitled to, and Nicholas Wortley insisted on taking the tithes in kind, but was opposed by Francis Bosville, who obtained a decree (17th Elizabeth) against him; but Sir Francis Wortley, in the succeeding reign, again attempted to enforce payment in kind, with so much disregard to the suffering he inflicted upon the poor that they determined upon finding out some champion who would dare to attack this redoubtable dragon in his den at Wantley, so as to put an end, once and for all, to the destruction of their crops, the loss of their cattle, and the desolation of their ruined homes. Foremost in this movement was one Lyonel Rowlestone, who married the widow of Francis Bosville; and the parishioners entered into an agreement to unite in opposition to the claims of the Wortleys. The parchment on which it is written is dated 1st James I., and bristles withthe names and seals of the people of Penistone of that time, and is still extant.

In the neighbourhood, on a moor not far from Bradfield, stood a mansion called More or Moor Hall, and was inhabited by a family who had resided there from the time of Henry II., but of whom little is known, excepting the wonderful achievement of one member of the family, "More of More Hall," who slew the Dragon of Wantley.

The family had for their crest a green dragon, and there was formerly in Bradfield Church a stone dragon, five feet in length, which had some connection with the family. To this worthy, who, it is supposed, may have been an attorney or counsellor, the parishioners of Penistone, having decided upon appealing to the law courts, applied to undertake their case, and make battle on the terrible dragon in his den among the rocks of the forest of Wharncliffe. He readily complied with their wish, and with great boldness and valour prepared for the conflict by going to Sheffield and ordering a suit of armour, studded with spikes—that is, arming himself with the panoply of law, and then went forth and made the attack. The fight is said, in theballad narrative, to have lasted two days and nights, probably the duration of the lawsuit, and in the end he killed the dragon, or won his suit, thus relieving the people of Penistone from any further annoyance or unjust exaction from that quarter. Sir Francis Wortley persuaded his cousin Wordsworth, the freehold lord of the manor (ancestor, lineal or collateral, of the Poet Wordsworth), to stand aloof in the matter, and now the Wortley and the Wordsworth are the only estates in the parish that pay tithes.

To commemorate the event an exceedingly humorous and cleverly satirical ballad was written, which, being also a lively burlesque on the ballad romances of chivalry, served the same purpose towards them that Cervantes' "Don Quixote" did for the prose fictions of the same character. Thus opens the ballad—

"Old stories tell how HerculesA dragon slew at Gerna,With seven heads and fourteen eyesTo see and well discerna;But he had a club, this dragon to drub,Or he had ne'er I warrant ye;But More of More Hall with nothing at all,He slew the dragon of Wantley.

"This dragon had two furious wings,Each one upon each shoulder;With a sting in his tail, as long as a flail,Which made him bolder and bolder.He had long claws, and in his jawsFour and forty teeth of iron;With a hide as tough as any buff,Which did him round environ."

It then goes on to describe how "he ate three children at one sup, as one would eat an apple." Also all sorts of cattle and trees, the forest beginning to diminish very perceptibly, and "houses and churches," which to him were geese and turkeys, "leaving none behind."

"But some stones, dear Jack, that he could not crack,Which on the hills you will finda."

These stones are supposed to be a reference to the Lyonel Rowlestone, who was the leader of the opposition. There are many local allusions of a similar character, which would no doubt add much to the keenness of the satire and the humour, but which are lost to us through our ignorance of the circumstances and persons alluded to.

"In Yorkshire, near fair Rotherham," was his den, and at Wantley a well from which he drank.

"Some say this dragon was a witch,Some say he was a devil;For from his nose a smoke aroseAnd with it burning snivel."

"Hard by a furious knight there dwelt," who could "wrestle, play at quarter-staff, kick, cuff, and huff; and with his hands twain could swing a horse till he was dead, and eat him all up but his head." To this wonderful athlete came "men, women, girls, and boys, sighing and sobbing, and made a hideous noise—O! save us all, More of More Hall, thou peerless knight of these woods; do but slay this dragon, who won't leave us a rag on, we'll give thee all our goods." The Knight replied—

"Tut, tut," quoth he, "no goods I want;But I want, I want, in sooth,A fair maid of sixteen, that's brisk and keen,With smiles about her mouth;Hair black as sloe, skin white as snow,With blushes her cheeks adorning;To anoint me o'er night, e'er I go to the fight,And to dress me in the morning."

This being agreed to, he hied to Sheffield, and had a suit of armour, covered with spikes five or six inches long, made, which, when he donned it, caused the people to take him for "an Egyptian porcupig," and the cattle for "some strange,outlandish hedgehog." When he rose in the morning,

"To make him strong and mightyHe drank, by the tale, six pots of aleAnd a quart ofaqua vitæ."

Thus equipped and with his valour braced up, he went to Wantley, concealing himself in the well, and when the dragon came to drink, he shouted "Boh," and struck the monster a blow on the mouth. The knight then came out of the well, and they commenced fighting, for some time without advantage on either side—without either receiving a wound. At length, however, after fighting two days and a night, the dragon gave him a blow which made him reel and the earth to quake. "But More of More Hall, like a valiant son of Mars," returned the compliment with such vigour that—

"Oh! quoth the dragon, with a deep sigh,And turned six times together;Sobbing and tearing, cursing and swearingOut of his throat of leather;More of More Hall! O, thou rascal!Would I had seen thee never;With the thing on thy foot, thou has pricked my gutAnd I'm quite undone for ever.

"Murder! murder! the dragon cry'd.Alack! alack! for grief;Had you but mist that place, you couldHave done me no mischief.Then his head he shaked, trembled and quaked,And down he laid and cry'd,First on one knee, then on back tumbled he:So groan'd, kick't, and dy'd."

Henry Carey, in 1738, brought out an opera on the subject, entitled "The Dragon of Wantley," abounding in humour, and a fine burlesque on the Italian operas of the period, then the rage of fashion. And in 1873, Poynter exhibited at the Royal Academy a picture of "More of More Hall and the Dragon."

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Ina sweetly sequestered spot, environed by patriarchal trees of luxuriant foliage, between the towns of Driffield and Beverley, nestles a Tudoresque building, which goes by the name of Watton Abbey, although it never was an abbey, but a Gilbertine Priory. It is now a private residence, and was occupied for many years as a school, the existing buildings apparently having been erected since the dissolution, and there are but few remains of the original convent, saving a portion of the nunnery, now converted into stables, a hollow square indicating the site of the kitchen and the moat which originally surrounded the entire enclosure. A couple of centuries ago there were extensive remains of the old priory, but they were removed for the purpose of repairing Beverley Minster. Moreover, the abbey has a haunted room, which, however, has no connection with the monastic times, although the ghost thathaunts it is usually designated "The Headless Nun of Watton," but belongs to the civil war period of the seventeenth century. The fact is that story tellers of the legend confound two altogether different narratives—the one of a trangressing nun of the twelfth century, and the other of a murdered lady of the seventeenth, combining their two histories into one story, as if their persons were identical.

A nunnery was established here in a very early period of Anglo-Saxon Christianity, probably soon after its re-introduction into Northumbria by King Oswald, as we find St. John of Beverley performing a miracle there, which would be about the year 720, after he had resigned his Bishopric and retired to Beverley. It appears that he was an intimate friend of the Lady Prioress—Heribury—and made frequent visits to Watton to administer spiritual advice and ghostly consolation to the inmates under her charge. On one occasion when he went thither, he found the Prioress's daughter suffering great agony from a diseased and swollen arm, the result of unskilful bleeding, and was solicited to go to her chamber and give her his blessing, which might be the means of alleviating the pain.He inquired when she had been bled, and was told on the fourth day of the moon, which he said was a very inauspicious day, quoting Archbishop Theodore as his authority, and he feared his prayers would be of no avail. Nevertheless he went to her room, prayed for her restoration to health, gave her his blessing, and went down to dinner. They had, however, scarcely seated themselves when a servant came in, stating that all her pain had gone, her swollen arm had been reduced to its natural size, and that she was perfectly restored to health, and was dressing to come down and dine with them.

The nunnery was destroyed, it is presumed, by the Danes at the same time that the Monastery of Beverley perished at their hands, in the ninth century, and it lay waste and desolate until the twelfth century, although we find from the Domesday survey that there were then a church and priest in the village.

In 1148-9, Eustace Fitz John, Lord of Knaresborough, and a favourite of King Henry I., at the instance of Murdac, Archbishop of York, refounded the convent, in atonement for certain crimes he had committed. It was established for thirteen canons and thirty-sixnuns of the new Gilbertine order, who were to live in the same block of buildings, but with a party wall for the separation of the sexes; the canons "to serve the nuns perpetually in terrene as well as in divine matters." He endowed it with the Lordship of Watton, with all its appurtenances in pure and perpetual alms for the salvation of his soul, and those of his wife, his father and mother, brothers and sisters, friends and servants.

Archbishop Murdac was at the time resident at Beverley, the gates of York having been shut against him; and it may be that the fact of his predecessor, St. John, the patron-saint of the town where he dwelt, having performed a great miracle there, was what influenced him in his desire to see a resuscitation of the monastery. He was a remarkable man, and had led a somewhat adventurous life. Archbishop Thurstan was his patron, and gave him some preferments in the church of York, which he resigned at the pressing invitation of St. Bernard, founder of the Cistercians, to become a monk at Clervaux. Soon after he was sent by his superior to found a Cistercian house at Vauclair, of which he was appointed the first abbot, in 1131, where heremained until 1143, when, at the recommendation of St. Bernard, he was elected Abbot of Fountains. Under his judicious and able government the abbey prospered and threw off not less than seven offshoots—those of Kirkstall, Lix, Meaux, Vaudy, and Woburn.

On the death of Archbishop Thurstan, King Stephen desired the canons to elect William Fitzherbert, his nephew and their treasurer, in his place, which they were willing to do, but the Cistercians, headed by Murdac, suspecting that undue influence had been made use of, vehemently opposed his election, and Pope Eugenius, on the appeal of St. Bernard, suspended Fitzherbert.

Fitzherbert, out of revenge, went with his friends to Fountains, broke open the door, searched ineffectually for Murdac, then fired the abbey, and retired. This act caused a great sensation, and the Archbishop was deprived in 1147. The same year an assembly met at Richmond, and elected Murdac as Archbishop, who immediately went to Rome and obtained his pall from Pope Eugenius; but on his return found York barred against his entrance, upon which he retired to Beverley. Stephen, the King, refused to recognise him, sequestering thestalls of York, and fining the town of Beverley for harbouring him. It was at this time that he promoted the re-establishment of Watton, and placed within its walls a child of four years of age to be educated, with a view of taking the veil.

In retaliation, he excommunicated Puisnet, Treasurer of York, and laid the city under an interdict. Puisnet was afterwards elected Bishop of Durham, upon which Murdac excommunicated the Prior and Archdeacon, who came to Beverley to implore pardon, and could only obtain absolution on acknowledging their fault and submitting to scourging at the entrance to Beverley Minster. He died at Beverley in the same year (1153), and was buried in York Cathedral.

Elfleda, the child whom Murdac had placed in the convent, was a merry, vivacious little creature; and whilst but a child was a source of amusement to the sisterhood, who, although prim and demure in bearing, and some of them sour-tempered and acid in their tempers, were wont to smile at her youthful frolics and ringing laugh; but as she grew older, her outbursts of merriment, and the sallies of wit that began toanimate her conversation, were checked, as being inconsistent with the character of a young lady who was now enrolled as novice, preparatory to taking the veil. As she advanced towards womanhood her form gradually developed into a most symmetrical figure; and her features became the perfection of beauty, set off with a transparent delicacy of complexion, such as would have rendered her a centre of attraction even among the beauties of a Royal Court. This excited the jealousy of the sisters, who were chiefly elderly and middle-aged spinsters, whose homely and somewhat coarse features had proved detrimental to their hopes of obtaining husbands. They began to treat her with scornful looks, chilling neglect, and petty persecutions; but when she, later on, evinced a manifest repugnance to convent life, ridiculed the ways of the holy sisters, and even satirised them, they charged her with entertaining rebellious and ungodly sentiments, and subjected her to penances and other modes of wholesome correction, such as they considered would subdue her worldly spirit.

Sprightly and light-hearted as she was, Elfleda was not happy, immured as she was within these detested walls, and condemned to assist inwearisome services, such as she thought might perhaps be congenial to the souls of her elder sisters, whose hopes of worldly happiness and conjugal endearment had been blighted, but which were altogether unsuited for one so beautiful (for she knew that she was fair, and was vain of her looks) and so cheerful-minded as herself; and she longed with intense desire to make her escape, mingle with the outer world, and have free intercourse with the other sex.

According to the charter of endowment, the lay brethren of the monastery were entrusted with the management of the secular affairs of the nunnery, which necessitated their admission within its portals on certain occasions for conference with the prioress. On these occasions Elfleda would cast furtive and very un-nunlike glances upon their persons. She was particularly attracted by one of them, a young man of prepossessing mien and seductive style of speech, and she felt her heart beat wildly whenever he came with the other visitors. He noticed her surreptitious glances, and saw that she was exceedingly beautiful, and his heart responded to the sentiment he felt that he had inspired in hers. They maintained this silent but eloquentlanguage of love for some time, and soon found means of having stolen interviews under the darkness of night, when vows of everlasting love were interchanged, and led, eventually, to consequences which at the outset were not dreamt of by the erring pair.

Suspicion having been excited by her altered form, she was summoned before her superiors on a charge of "transgressing the conventual rules and violating one of the most stringent laws of monastic life," and as concealment was impossible, she boldly confessed her fault, adding that she had no vocation for a convent life, and desired to be banished from the community. This request could not be listened to for a moment. The culprit had brought a scandal and indelible stain upon the fair fame of the house, which must, at any cost, be concealed from the world; and her open avowal of her guilt raised in the breasts of the pious sisterhood a perfect fury of indignation, and a determination to inflict immediate and condign punishment on her. It was variously suggested that she should be burnt to death, that she should be walled up alive, that she should be flayed, that her flesh should be torn from her bones with red-hot pincers, that she should beroasted to death before a fire, etc.; but the more prudent and aged averted these extreme measures, and suggested some milder forms of punishment, which were at once carried out. The miserable object of their vengeance was stripped of her clothing, stretched on the floor, and scourged with rods until the blood trickled down profusely from her lacerated back. She was then cast into a noisome dungeon, without light, fettered by iron chains to the floor, and supplied with only bread and water, "which was administered with bitter taunts and reproaches."

Meanwhile the young man, her paramour, had left the monastery, and as the nuns were desirous of inflicting some terrible punishment upon him for his horrible crime, they extorted from Elfleda, under promise that she should be released and given up to him, the confession that he was still in the neighbourhood in disguise, and that not knowing of the discovery that had been made, he would come to visit her, and make the usual signal of throwing a stone on the roof over her sleeping cell. The Prioress made this known to the brethren of the monastery, and arranged with them for his capture. The following night he came, looked cautiously round, and then threwthe stone, when the monks rushed out of ambush, cudgelled him soundly, and then took him a prisoner into the house. "The younger part of the nuns, inflamed with a pious zeal, demanded the custody of the prisoner, on pretence of gaining further information. Their request was granted, and taking him to an unfrequented part of the convent, they committed on his person such brutal atrocities as cannot be translated without polluting the page on which they are written; and, to increase the horror, the lady was brought forth to be witness of the abominable scene." Whilst lying in her dungeon, Elfleda became penitent, and conscious of having committed a gross crime, and one night whilst sleeping in her fetters, Archbishop Murdac appeared to her and charged her with having cursed him. She replied that she certainly had cursed him for having placed her in so uncongenial a sphere. "Rather curse yourself," said he, "for having given way to temptation." "So I do," she answered, "and I regret having imputed the blame to you." He then exhorted her to repentance and the daily repetition of certain psalms, and then vanished,—a vision which afforded her much consolation.

The holy sisters were now much troubled on the question of what should be done with the infant which was expected daily, and preparations were made for its reception; when Elfleda was again visited by the Archbishop, accompanied by two women who, "with the holy aid of the Archbishop, safely delivered her of the infant, which they bore away in their arms, covered with a fair linen cloth." When the nuns came the next morning they found her in perfect health and restored to her youthful appearance, without any signs of the accouchement, and charged her with murdering the infant,—a very improbable idea, seeing that she was still chained to the floor. She narrated what had occurred, but was not believed. The next night all her fetters were miraculously removed, and when her cell was entered the following morning she was found standing free, and the chains not to be found.

The Father Superior of the convent was then called in, and he invited Alured, Abbot of Rievaulx, to assist him in the investigation of the case, who decided that it was a miraculous intervention, and the Abbot departed, saying, "What God hath cleansed call not thou commonor unclean, and whom He hath loosed thou mayest not bind."

What afterwards became of Elfleda is not stated, but we may presume that after these miraculous events she would be admitted as a thrice holy member of the sisterhood, despite her little peccadillo.

Alured of Rievaulx, the monkish chronicler, narrates the substance of the above circumstances, and vouches for their truth. "Let no one," says he, "doubt the truth of this account, for I was an eye-witness to many of the facts, and the remainder were related to me by persons of such mature age and distinguished piety, that I cannot doubt the accuracy of the statement."

This is the story of the frail and unfortunate nun; the other, which is usually dovetailed on the former, is of much more recent date. In the present house there is a chamber wainscoted throughout with panelled oak, one of the panels forming a door, so accurately fitted that it cannot be distinguished from the other panels. It is opened by a secret spring, and communicates with a stone stair that goes down to the moat; it may be that the room was a hiding-place for the Jesuits or priests of the Catholic Churchwhen they were so ruthlessly hunted down and barbarously executed in the Elizabethan and Jacobean reigns. The room is reputed to be haunted by the ghost of a headless lady with an infant in her arms, who comes, or came thither formerly, to sleep nightly, the bed-clothes being found the following morning in a disordered state, as they would be after a person had been sleeping in them. If by chance any person had daring enough to occupy the room, the ghost would come, minus the head, dressed in blood-stained garments, with her infant in her arms, and would stand motionless at the foot of the bed for a while, and then vanish. A visitor on one occasion, who knew nothing of the legend, was put to sleep in the chamber, who in the morning stated that his slumbers had been disturbed by a spectral visitant, in the form of a lady with bloody raiment and an infant, and that her features bore a strange resemblance to those of a lady whose portrait hung in the room; from which it would appear that on that special occasion she had donned her head.

According to the legend, a lady of distinction who then occupied the house was a devoted Royalist in the great civil war which resulted inthe death of King Charles. It was after the battle of Marston Moor, which was a death-blow to the Royalists north of the Humber, and when the Parliamentarians dominated the broad lands of Yorkshire, that a party of fanatical Roundheads came into the neighbourhood of Watton, "breathing out threatenings and slaughter" against the "malignants," and especially against such as still clung to the "vile rags of the whore of Babylon," vowing to put all such to the sword. The Lady of Watton, who was a devout Catholic, heard of this band of Puritan soldiers, who were "rampaging" over the Wolds, and of the barbarous murders of which they had been guilty. Her husband was away fighting in the ranks of the King down Oxford way, and she was left without any protector excepting a handful of servants, male and female, who would be of no use against a band of armed soldiers, and it was with great fear and trembling that she heard of their arrival at Driffield, some three or four miles distant, where they had been plundering and maltreating "the Philistines;" fearing more for her infant than herself, as she believed the prevalent exaggerated rumour, that it was a favourite amusement with them to toss babies upin the air and catch them on the points of their pikes.

At length news was brought that the marauders were on the march to Watton, for the purpose of plundering it, as the home of a malignant, and the lady, for better security, shut herself, with her child and her jewels, in the wainscoted room, hoping in case of extremity to escape by means of a secret stair, and in the meanwhile committed herself and child to the care of the Virgin Mother. It was not long ere the band of soldiers arrived and hammered at the door, calling aloud for admittance, but met with no response. They were about breaking down the door, and went in search of implements for the purpose, when they caught sight of a low archway opening upon the moat, which they guessed to be a side entrance to the house, and crossing the moat, they found the stair, which they ascended and came to the panel, which they concluded was a disguised door. A few blows sufficed to dash it open, and they came into the presence of the lady, who was prostrate before a crucifix. Rising up, she demanded what they wanted, and wherefore this rude intrusion. They replied that they had come to despoil the"Egyptian" who owned the mansion, and if he had been present, to smite him to death as a worshipper of idols and an abomination in the eyes of God.

An angry altercation ensued, the lady, who possessed a high spirit, making a free use of her tongue in upbraidings and reproaches for their dastardly conduct on the Wolds, of which she had heard, to which they listened very impatiently, and replied in coarse language not fit for a lady's ears, at the same time demanding the plate and other valuables of the house. She scornfully refused to give them up, and told them that if they wanted them they must find them for themselves, and at length so provoked them by her taunts that they cried, "Hew down with the sword the woman of Belial and the spawn of the malignant," and suiting the action to the word, they caught her child from her arms, dashed its brains out against the wall, and then cut her down and "hewed" off her head, after which they plundered the house and departed with their spoil.

It must not be supposed that these ruffians were a fair specimen of the brave, God-fearing men who fought under Fairfax, and put Newcastleand Rupert to flight at Marston Moor, who fought with the sword in one hand and the Bible in the other, who laid the axe at the root of Royal abitrary prerogative, and were the real authors of the civil and religious liberty which we now enjoy. But, as in all times of civil commotion, there were evil-minded wretches who, for purpose of plunder, assumed the garb and adopted the phraseology of the noble-minded soldiers of Fairfax and Hampden, and the Ironsides of Cromwell, out-Puritaned them in their hypocritical cant, bringing disgrace and scandal upon the armies with which they associated themselves. And such were the villains who despoiled Watton, and slew so barbarously the poor lady and her infant; and from that time the ghost of the lady has haunted the room in which the deed was perpetrated.

In the year 1780, Mr. Bethell, the then occupier of the house, was giving a dinner-party in the dining-room, which adjoined the haunted apartment. When they were seated over their wine the host related the story of the ghost, and had scarcely finished it when an unearthly sound issued from the floor beneath their feet. Consternation seized on the party. They concludedthat it was the ghost, and to their imagination the candles began to emit a blue, ghostly light. It seemed to be a confirmation of the truth of the story; but they summoned up courage enough to make an examination, and although it was approaching the "witching hour of night," they sent for a carpenter, who took up some planks of the floor, and found—not the ghost, but the nest of an otter from the moat, who had made there a home for her progeny, whose cries had alarmed them; and thus was dissipated what might otherwise have been deemed a veritable supernatural visitation.

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SirRichard de Veron was a distinguished knight of the North Riding, who held a considerable estate by knight's service of the De Brus family in Cleveland. He was one of the heroes of the Battle of the Standard, in 1138, who went forth at the behest of Archbishop Thurstan to oppose the invasion of David of Scotland, and who signally defeated that monarch. A few years after, he joined the forces of the Empress Maud, whose pretensions to the throne of England he considered to be more legitimate than those of Stephen, and fought on her side at Lincoln, in 1141, when the King was defeated and taken prisoner, continuing to uphold her cause until she was compelled to retire from England. The war being thus brought to an end, and the adherents of the Empress generally declining to take service under a King whom they deemed a usurper, and by whom they were looked upon with suspicion, DeVeron sheathed his sword and retired to his family and home in Cleveland. He had a wife, whom he dearly loved, and two children, a boy—his heir, and a sweet little daughter for whom he entertained the most tender affection; indeed, although he delighted in the clash of arms and the exciting revelry of war, he was never so truly happy as when in the midst of his family, teaching his young son to ride, practice at the target, and follow his hounds in pursuit of the wild animals of the chase; or listening to the prattle of his little daughter, when taking lessons from her mother in reading, music, or embroidery work. Thus happily passed a few months after his return from his martial pursuits, when one morning, news was brought that a case of plague had occurred in the village, causing, as it always did, great consternation not only amongst the villagers, but in the knight's mansion, which stood half a mile away from the village. It was hoped that it might be an isolated case, and such rude remedial measures as were then known were adopted to prevent the spread of the infection, but within a week another case was reported, and another and another in rapid succession, after which it spread with fearful speed, until half thepopulation succumbed to it, and were hastily buried without the usual funeral rites. In a month the disease appeared to be dying out, the deaths were fewer and fewer day by day, and it was fondly hoped that the terrible infliction was passing away, but it was not until three-fourths of the people had fallen victims to its pestilential fury.

Although Sir Richard hesitated not to go down to the village and employ himself in administering food, medicine, and consolation to the afflicted, he took every known precaution against coming into too close contact with the infected; he kept his family closely shut up at home, and occupied a separate set of apartments himself, not allowing them to come into his presence; but notwithstanding all his preventive measures he was at last stricken down. He gave positive orders that he should be left alone, and if it was God's will that he should die, he declared his resolution that he would die alone, and with affectionate earnestness sent a message to his wife, entreating her to remain apart from him, and not imperil her dear life by coming to his bedside. But she, true wife as she was, heeded not the risk to her own life, so long as she couldafford comfort and spiritual consolation to him, in what might very probably be his last few moments on earth, and regardless of the injunction, hastened, on receiving the message, to the room where he lay. He reproached her gently for exposing herself to the risk of infection, but was met by assurances that it was not possible for her to remain away whilst he was lying there requiring careful tendence, with all the servants standing aloof panic-stricken, or flying from the house. He implored her to retire, but she replied that she might or might not take the infection; that was as God pleased, and if she did she might or might not fall a victim, but most assuredly if she left him alone and shut herself up away from him she would die of anxiety, or, in case of his death, of a broken heart. Finding remonstrance useless, he was fain to submit to her nursing, and happily during the night the malady passed its crisis, his strong, healthy constitution enabling him to battle successfully with the disease, and he gradually became convalescent.

Happiness again seemed to be dawning over the household, but it was not destined to last long. The faithful wife, who had watched sotenderly over his sick bed, regardless of the risk she ran, maintained her health so long as her services were needed, but in her ministrations she had imbibed the seed of the fatal malady, and now, when her husband was restored to health, the terrible plague spot made its appearance, and so rapidly did the disease develop itself that, within twenty-four hours, she fell a victim to its remorseless energy. It was a fearful blow to Sir Richard, but this was not all the suffering he had to undergo. Scarcely had he returned from the obsequies of his wife, when his two children caught the infection, and in another four-and-twenty hours they were both carried off, leaving him bereft of all the best-beloved of his soul, and sunk in the depths of desolation and despair.

For some months he remained in his silent and cheerless home in a state of profound apathy, taking no interest in the avocations devolving on him as the lord of an extensive estate. It is true he befriended, pecuniarily, the numerous widows and orphans left in the village by the ruthless pestilence that had swept over it, and he contributed large sums of money to the Church for prayers and masses for the souls of the departed, not only of his own family, but of hisvassals and dependants. Nothing seemed capable of rousing him from the despondency into which he had fallen; the sports of the field were altogether neglected; the cheerful companionship of friends presented no attractions for him, and he sat at home hour after hour through the live-long day, plunged in moody melancholy and repining meditation on his irreparable loss, and the utter extinction of all that was worth living for. And thus passed week after week and month after month, Time, the great mollifier of grief, seeming to impart no balm to his sorrow-stricken soul.

The only person whom he admitted as a visitor, besides those who came on imperative business matters, was Father Anselm, a pious and devout man, the priest of the village church. It was in his company only, and in listening to his spiritual converse, that he felt any relief from the grief that oppressed him, and gradually, after many interviews, he began to look upon his affliction as a providential dispensation, intended for some wise purpose. Gradually also he became more weaned from earthly and secular things, and his soul to become more spiritualised, and he began to experience a feeling of attraction to the cloister. One day he mentioned this to his spiritualadviser, and Father Anselm, rejoicing thereat, warmly applauded the feeling, urging that such self-devotion would be most acceptable to God, and that it was only in religious meditation and prayer that he would be vouchsafed that true consolation which religion alone could give. The holy father perhaps was not altogether single-minded in thus fostering the idea of assuming the cowl, for he was a true Churchman, considering that the promotion of the temporal aggrandisement of the Church was an essential part of the duty of a Christian, a sentiment then universally prevalent, and not unusual now. He knew that Sir Richard was the owner of broad acres, and that now he had no heir to inherit them, and he often made delicate and incidental allusions to the fact, which seemed to produce an impression on the mind of the knight. At last an opportunity offered itself of speaking out more openly. With a profound sigh, Sir Richard one day said, when the conversation had turned upon his estates and possessions, "Alas! why should I trouble or concern myself about these lands and the improvements that might be made on them? I shall never more be able to derive pleasure from the possession of them, and I have no heir tobequeath them to. What is the good of riches if they do not afford happiness? A crust and water from the wayside brook with happiness is better than untold wealth accompanied with sorrow and anguish of heart."

Father Anselm saw his opportunity, and pertinently asked, "Since you have no heir, why not make the holy Church of Christ your heir? By doing so you would garner up for yourself riches in heaven—an eternity of inconceivable happiness compared with which in duration your present suffering is but as the pang of a moment."

Sir Richard sat musing for the space of a quarter of an hour, and then said, "Holy Father, what you say seems good, fitting, and worthy of consideration. Give me a week to think it over, and at the expiration of that period I will commune with you further on the subject," and Father Anselm took his departure.

At the week's end, when they met again, Sir Richard opened the subject by saying, "Venerable Father, I have since our last meeting given deep consideration to your counsels, and have come to the resolution of doing as you advise me. I have determined on assuming the monkish habit;spending the remainder of my life in pious communion with some holy brotherhood; and on resigning my possessions into the hands of the Church of God."

"It is good," replied Father Anselm. "Have you thought of any specific house on which to bestow your donation?"

"It occurred to me," continued Sir Richard, "to become a canon of the Augustinian house recently founded by my feudal Lord, Robert de Brus, at Guisborough, and to add my lands to its further endowment."

"Permit me to counsel you otherwise," said the Father, "Guisborough, as an Augustinian house, is not so strict in its discipline as other monastic houses, and is already very fairly endowed. But there is another, of the Benedictine order, where you would have an opportunity of cultivating a more strictly religious and less secular frame of mind—I mean Whitby, a holy spot, once sanctified by the presence of the blessed St. Hilda. It was founded by King Oswy in 687, was laid in ruins by the sacrilegious Danes in 867, and so remained for another couple of hundred years, when God moved the heart of Will de Percy to refound it as a Priory. Withinthe last few years it has again been converted into an Abbey; but it lacks endowment for the due maintenance of its superior dignity. Let me advise you, therefore, to cast in your lot with these Benedictines, and win the approval of God by bestowing your wealth in his service, where it is much needed."

Sir Richard assented to this suggestion, caused a deed of gift to be drawn, in which he conveyed his lands to the Abbot and convent of Whitby, and entered the house as a novice; and in due time, at the expiration of his novitiate, was admitted as a monk.

Brother Jerome (to use his monastic appellation) soon attracted notice by the fervour of his piety, his asceticism, and a strict and sincere observance of the conventual rules; as well as by his humility and obedience to the ordinances of his superiors. It chanced that after he had been in the house a few years, the Prior, whose position was that of sub-Abbot in the house, sickened and died; and, at a meeting of the chapter to elect his successor, Brother Jerome was suggested as the most fitting, by his manifest piety and abilities, for the office; but he resolutely declined taking it upon himself, preferring, as hesaid, to be rather a hewer of wood or drawer of water—the servant of the brotherhood—than to hold any superior office.

In the course of his meditations he was wont to cast a retrospective glance on his past life, and to grieve over his career as a soldier and a shedder of blood; especially did he mourn over the excesses of barbarous cruelty into which he had been drawn in emulation of the ferocity of his fellow-soldiers, when marching under the banner of the Empress, remembering with tears of bitter remorse, the burning villages, the homeless people, the corpse-strewn fields, and the widows and orphans they left in their rear. The more he thought of these past phases of his life, the more intense became his self-reproaches and the compunction excited by a sense of guilt and sin. He sought by mortification and maceration of the flesh to make atonement for these blood-stained deeds, but despite these self-inflicted punishments, he was not able to find rest for his soul. For ever, when prostrate in prayer, would they rise up before him, and the enemy of mankind would whisper in his ear, "Thou fool! what is the good of praying and fasting and weeping? Thy sins are too heinous for pardon;thou hast given up thy possessions to secure a heritage in heaven, but thy guilt is so damning that thou wilt assuredly find its gate shut against thee. Instead of leading a miserable and wretched life here in the cloister, return to the world and enjoy life while it lasts, for in either case there is nothing to hope for in the future."

Jerome took counsel of the Abbot, an old, wise, and experienced Christian, who at once detected the cloven hoof in the temptation, and was successful in convincing the tempted one of the fact, advising him to go on in the course he was pursuing, assuring him that there was mercy for the vilest of sinners if penitent, which afforded him great consolation.

Nevertheless the remorse-stricken sinner considered that his misdeeds had been such that he could scarcely do sufficient in the way of mortification to obliterate the guilt of the past, and he determined upon withdrawing himself entirely from communion with his fellow-creatures, even from the Holy Brotherhood of Whitby, and devote the remainder of his life to meditation and prayer altogether apart from the world.

Connected with the Abbey there was, in asolitary place of the forest which fringed the banks of the Esk, a chapel where the monks were wont to retire at certain seasons for the purpose of devotion, away from the bustle and distraction inevitable in a large community; and in close proximity to this chapel, Jerome built for himself a wooden hut in which to pass his remaining years as a hermit, secluded from society, living on wild fruit and roots, quenching his thirst from the streamlet which trickled past, and spending his days and nights in prayer, flagellation, and abstinence.

Resident in the neighbourhood of Whitby were two landed proprietors—Ralph de Perci, Lord of Sneton, and William de Brus, Lord of Ugglebarnby, who were great lovers of hunting and other field sports, and near them lived one Allatson, a gentleman and freeholder. The three were boon companions, and constantly meeting in the pursuance of country sports, and at each other's houses for the purpose of carousing together. One night when they were thus assembled together they arranged to go boar-hunting on the following day, which was the 16th of October, 5th Henry II., in the forest of Eskdale; and soon after dinner they met, attiredin their hunting garbs, with boar-staves in their hands, and accompanied by a pack of boar-hounds, yelping and barking, and as eager for the sport as their masters.

A boar was soon started, which plunged into the recesses of the forest, followed by the hounds in full cry, and by the hunters, shouting to encourage them. Onward they rushed, through brake and briar, the huge animal clearing a pathway through the tangled underwood, which enabled his pursuers to follow without much impediment. Onward they went in hot speed, the hounds sometimes overtaking the boar, and tearing him with their fangs, and the hunters beating him with their staves, maddening him with rage, and causing him to turn upon his pursuers, and rend the dogs with his fangs, as he would also the hunters, could he have escaped the environment of the dogs; and then he would dash onward again, evidently becoming more and more exhausted from wounds and bruises and loss of blood, until at length they came in sight of the chapel and hermitage; from which point we cannot do better than continue the narrative in the words of Burton, as given in his "Monasticon Ebor."

"The boar," says he, "being very sore and very hotly pursued, and dead run, took in at the chapel door and there died, whereof the hermit shut the hounds out of the chapel and kept himself within at his meditations, the hounds standing at bay without.

"The gentlemen called to the hermit (Brother Jerome), who opened the door. They found the boar dead, for which they, in very great fury (because their hounds were put from their game) did, most violently and cruelly, run at the hermit with their boar staves, whereby he died soon after."

Fearful of the consequences of their crime, they fled to Scarborough, and took sanctuary in the church; but the Abbot of Whitby, who was a friend of the King, was authorised to take them out, "whereby they came in danger of the law, and not to be privileged, but likely to have the severity of the law, which was death."

The hermit, who had been brought to Whitby Abbey, lay at the point of death when the prisoners were brought thither; and hearing of their arrival, he besought the Abbot that they might be brought into his presence; and when they made their appearance said to them, "I amsure to die of these wounds you gave me." "Aye," quoth the Abbot, "and they shall surely die for the same." "Not so," continued the dying man, "for I will freely forgive them my death if they will be contented to be enjoined this penance for the safeguard of their souls." "Enjoin what penance you will," replied the culprits, "so that you save our lives." Then Brother Jerome explained the nature of the penance:—"You and yours shall hold your lands of the Abbot of Whitby and his successors in this manner. That upon Ascension Eve, you, or some of you, shall come to the woods of Strayheads, which is in Eskdale, the same day at sunrising, and there shall the abbot's officer blow his horn, to the intent that you may know how to find him; and he shall deliver unto you, William de Brus, ten stakes, eleven strutstowers, and eleven yethers, to be cut by you, or some of you, with a knife of one penny price; and you, Ralph de Perci, shall take twenty and one of each sort, to be cut in the same manner; and you, Allatson, shall take nine of each sort to be cut as aforesaid, and to be taken on your backs and carried to the town of Whitby, and to be there before nine of the clock the same daybefore mentioned. If at the same hour of nine of the clock it be full sea, your labour or service shall cease; but if it be not full sea, each of you shall set your stakes at the brim and so yether them, on each side of your yethers, and so stake on each side with your strowers, that they may stand three tides, without removing by the force thereof. Each of you shall make and execute the said service at that very hour, every year, except it shall be full sea at that hour; but when it shall so fall out, this service shall cease.... You shall faithfully do this, in remembrance that you did most cruelly slay me; and that you may the better call to God for mercy, repent unfeignedly for your sins, and do good works. The officer of Eskdale side shall blow—'Out on you! out on you! out on you!' for this heinous crime. If you, or your successors, shall refuse this service, so long as it shall not be full sea, at the aforesaid hour, you, or yours, shall forfeit your lands to the Abbot of Whitby, or his successors. This I entreat, and earnestly beg that you may have lives and goods preserved for this service; and I request of you to promise, by your parts in Heaven, that it shall be done by you and your successors as it is aforesaid requested, and I willconfirm it by the faith of an honest man." Then the hermit said, "My soul longeth for the Lord; and I do freely forgive these men my death, as Christ forgave the thief upon the cross," and in the presence of the Abbot and the rest, he said, moreover, these words, "In manas tuas, domine, commendo spiritum, meum, avinculis enim mortis redemisti me Domine veritatis. Amen." So he yielded up the ghost the 8th day of December,A.D.1160, upon whose soul God have mercy. Amen.

In 1753, the service was rendered by the last of the Allatsons, the Lords of Sneton and Ugglebarnby having, it is supposed, bought off their share of the penance. He held a piece of land, of £10 a year, at Fylingdales, for which he brought five stakes, eight yethers, and six strutstowers, and whilst Mr. Cholmley's bailiff, on an antique bugle horn, blew "out on you," he made a slight edge of them a little way into the shallow of the river.

Burton, writing in 1757, adds, "This little farm is now out of the Allatson family, but the present owner performed the service last Ascension Eve,A.D.1756."

The horn garth or yether hedge, as the fencewas called, was constructed yearly on the east side of the Esk for the purpose of keeping cattle from the landing places.

Charlton, in his history of Whitby, discredits this tradition, saying that there were no such persons as those mentioned, and no chapel, only a hermitage in the forest; that the making of the horn garth is of much older date than that indicated, and that there is no record in the annals of the abbey of its ever having been made by way of penance; concluding that it is altogether a monkish invention.

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