THE COURTYARD OF SKIPTON CASTLEThebuildings of this portion of the castle, although in such good preservation, are not occupied.
THE COURTYARD OF SKIPTON CASTLEThebuildings of this portion of the castle, although in such good preservation, are not occupied.
THE COURTYARD OF SKIPTON CASTLE
Thebuildings of this portion of the castle, although in such good preservation, are not occupied.
the level of the roofs without any branches or even twigs, but at that height it spreads out freely into a feathery canopy of dark green, covering almost the whole of the square of sky visible from the courtyard. The base of the trunk is surrounded by a massive stone seat, with plain shields on each side. The sunlight that comes through this green network is very much subdued when it falls upon walls and the pavement, which becomes strewn over with circular splashes of whiteness. The masonry of the walls on every side, where not showing the original red of the sandstone, has been weathered into beautiful emerald tints, and to a height of two or three feet there is a considerable growth of moss on the worn mouldings. The general appearance of the courtyard suggests more that of a manor-house than a castle, the windows and doorways being purely Tudor. The circular towers and other portions of the walls belong to the time of Edward II., and there is also a roundheaded door that cannot be later than the time of Robert de Romillé, one of the Conqueror’s followers. The rooms that overlook the shady quadrangle are very much decayed and entirely unoccupied. They include an old dining-hall of much picturesqueness, kitchens, pantries, andbutteries, some of them only lighted by narrow windows on the outer faces of the wall. There are many large bedrooms and other dark apartments in the towers. Only a little restoration would be required to put a great portion of these into habitable condition, for they are structurally in a good state of repair, as may be seen to some extent from the picture of the courtyard reproduced here. The destruction caused during the siege which took place during the Civil War might have brought Skipton Castle to much the same condition as Knaresborough but for the wealth and energy of that remarkable woman Lady Anne Clifford, who was born here in 1589. She was the only surviving child of George, the third Earl of Cumberland, and grew up under the care of her mother, Margaret, Countess of Cumberland, of whom Lady Anne used to speak as ‘my blessed mother.’ Her reverence for the memory of this admirable parent is also shown in the feeling which prompted her to put up a pillar by the roadside, between Penrith and Appleby, to commemorate their last meeting, and, besides this, the Lady Anne left a sum of money to be given to the poor at that spot on a certain day every year. After her first marriage with Richard Sackville,Earl of Dorset, Lady Anne married the profligate Philip, Earl of Pembroke and Montgomery. She was widowed a second time in 1649, and after that began the period of her munificence and usefulness. With immense enthusiasm, she undertook the work of repairing the castles that belonged to her family, Brougham, Appleby, Barden Tower, and Pendragon being restored as well as Skipton. We can see in the towers where the later work begins, and the custodian who shows us through the apartments points out many details which are invisible without the aid of his candle.
Besides attending to the decayed castles, the Countess repaired no less than seven churches, and to her we owe the careful restoration of the parish church of Skipton. She began the repairs to the sacred building even before she turned her attention to the wants of the castle. In her private memorials we read how, ‘In the summer of 1665 ... at her own charge, she caus’d the steeple of Skipton Church to be built up againe, which was pull’d down in the time of the late Warrs, and leaded it over, and then repaired some part of the Church and new glaz’d the Windows, in every of which Window she put quaries, stained with a yellow colour, these two letters—viz., A. P.,and under them the year 1655.... Besides, she raised up a noble Tomb of Black Marble in memory of her Warlike Father.’ This magnificent altar-tomb still stands within the Communion rails on the south side of the chancel. It is adorned with seventeen shields, and Whitaker doubted ‘whether so great an assemblage of noble bearings can be found on the tomb of any other Englishman.’ This third Earl was a notable figure in the reign of Elizabeth, and having for a time been a great favourite with the Queen, he received many of the posts of honour she loved to bestow. He was a skilful and daring sailor, helping to defeat the Spanish Armada, and building at his own expense one of the greatest fighting ships of his time, Elizabeth—who, like the present German Emperor, never lost an opportunity of fostering the growth of her navy—being present at the launching ceremony.
The memorials of Lady Anne give a description of her appearance in the manner of that time: ‘The colour of her eyes was black like her Father’s,’ we are told, ‘with a peak of hair on her forehead, and a dimple in her chin, like her father. The hair of her head was brown and very thick, and so long that it reached to the calf of her legs whenshe stood upright; and when she caused these memorials of herself to be written (she had passed the year 63 of her age), she saidthe perfections of her mind were much above those of her body; she had a strong and copious memory, a sound judgment, and a discerning spirit, and so much of a strong imagination in her as that at many times even her dreams and apprehensions beforehand proved true.’ The Countess died at the great age of eighty-seven at Brougham Castle in Westmoreland, and was buried in the Church of St. Lawrence at Appleby.
We cannot leave these old towers of Skipton Castle without going back to the days of John, the ninth Lord Clifford, that ‘Bloody Clifford’ who was one of the leaders of the Lancastrians at Wakefield, where his merciless slaughter earned him the title of ‘the Butcher.’ He died by a chance arrow the night before the Battle of Towton, so fatal to the cause of Lancaster, and Lady Clifford and the children took refuge in her father’s castle at Brough. For greater safety Henry, the heir, was placed under the care of a shepherd whose wife had nursed the boy’s mother when a child. In this way the future baron grew up as an entirely uneducated shepherd lad, spendinghis days on the fells in the primitive fashion of the peasants of the fifteenth century. When he was about twelve years old Lady Clifford, hearing rumours that the whereabouts of her children had become known, sent the shepherd and his wife with the boy into an extremely inaccessible part of Cumberland. He remained there until his thirty-second year, when the Battle of Bosworth placed Henry VII. on the throne. Then the shepherd lord was brought to Londesborough, and when the family estates had been restored, he went back to Skipton Castle. The strangeness of his new life being irksome to him, Lord Clifford spent most of his time in Barden Forest at one of the keeper’s lodges, which he adapted for his own use. There he hunted and studied astronomy and astrology with the canons of Bolton.
At Flodden Field he led the men-at-arms from Craven, and showed that by his life of extreme simplicity he had in no way diminished the traditional valour of the Cliffords. When he died they buried him at Bolton Abbey, where many of his ancestors lay, and as his successor died after the dissolution of the monasteries, the ‘Shepherd Lord’ was the last to be buried in that secluded spot by the Wharfe.
Skipton has always been a central spot for the exploration of this southern portion of the dales, and since the Midland Railway has lately put out an arm to the north, there are lines going in five directions. The new branch that goes into Wharfedale stops just before it reaches Grassington, and has an intermediate station with a triple name in consideration of the fact that it is placed at almost exactly the same distance from the three villages of Hetton, Rylstone, and Cracoe. Whether we go by road or rail, we have good views of Flasby and Rylstone Fells as we pass along the course of Eller Beck to the romantically situated village made famous by Wordsworth’s ballad of ‘The White Doe of Rylstone.’ The site of the old manor-house where the Nortons lived may still be seen in a field to the east of the church. Owing to the part they took in the Rising of the North in 1569 the Nortons lost all their property in Yorkshire, and among the humble folk of Rylstone who shared in the rebellion there was Richard Kitchen, Mr. Norton’s butler, who lost much more, for he was executed at Ripon. From Hetton we follow a road to the west, and passing the hamlet of Winterburn, come to Airton, where there are some interesting old houses, one of them datingfrom the year of the Great Fire of London. Turning to the north, we come to Kirby Malham, less than two miles off. It is a pretty little village with green limestone hills rising on all sides; a rushing beck coming off Kirby Fell takes its way past the church, and there is an old vicarage as well as some picturesque cottages.
We find our way to a decayed lych-gate, whose stones are very black and moss-grown, and then get a close view of the Perpendicular church. The interior is full of interest, not only on account of the Norman font and the canopied niches in the pillars of the nave, but also for the old pews. The Malham people seemingly found great delight in recording their names on the woodwork of the pews, for carefully carved initials and dates appear very frequently. All the pews have been cut down to the accepted height of the present day with the exception of some on the north side which were occupied by the more important families, and these still retain their squareness and the high balustrades above the panelled lower portions. One of the parish registers has the rare distinction of containing Oliver Cromwell’s signature to a marriage. There is also the entry of the baptism on November 7, 1619, of John Lambert, whobecame famous as Major-General in the Roundhead army.
Just under the moorland heights surrounding Malham Tarn is the other village of Malham. It is a charming spot, even in the gloom of a wintry afternoon. The houses look on to a strip of uneven green, cut in two, lengthways, by the Aire. We go across the clear and sparkling waters by a rough stone footbridge, and, making our way past a farm, find ourselves in a few minutes at Gordale Bridge. Here we abandon the switchback lane, and, climbing a wall, begin to make our way along the side of the beck. The fells drop down fairly sharply on each side, and in the failing light there seems no object in following the stream any further, when quite suddenly the green slope on the right stands out from a scarred wall of rock beyond, and when we are abreast of the opening we find ourselves before a vast fissure that leads right into the heart of the fell. The great split is S-shaped in plan, so that when we advance into its yawning mouth we are surrounded by limestone cliffs more than 300 feet high. If one visits Gordale Scar for the first time alone on a gloomy evening, as I have done, I can promise the most thrilling sensations to those who have yet to see this astonishing sight.It almost appeared to me as though I were dreaming, and that I was Aladin approaching the magician’s palace. I had read some of the eighteenth-century writers’ descriptions of the place, and imagined that their vivid accounts of the terror inspired by the overhanging rocks were mere exaggerations, but now I sympathize with every word. The scars overhang so much on the east side that there is not much space to get out of reach of the water that drips from every portion. Great masses of stone were lying upon the bright strip of turf, and among them I noticed some that could not have been there long; this made me keep close under the cliff in justifiable fear of another fall. I stared with apprehension at one rock that would not only kill, but completely bury, anyone upon whom it fell, and I thought those old writers had underrated the horrors of the place. Through a natural arch in the rocks that faced me came a foaming torrent broken up below into a series of cascades, and the roar of the waters in the confined space added much to the fear that was taking possession of me. It was owing to the curious habit that waterfalls have of seeming to become suddenly louder that I must own to that sense of fearfulness, for at one moment the noise
GORDALE SCARThisis one of the most astonishing sights in Yorkshire. The gorge is a result of the Craven Fault—a geological dislocation that has also made the huge cliffs of Malham Cove. The stream is the Aire. It can be seen coming through a natural arch high up among the rocks.
GORDALE SCARThisis one of the most astonishing sights in Yorkshire. The gorge is a result of the Craven Fault—a geological dislocation that has also made the huge cliffs of Malham Cove. The stream is the Aire. It can be seen coming through a natural arch high up among the rocks.
GORDALE SCAR
Thisis one of the most astonishing sights in Yorkshire. The gorge is a result of the Craven Fault—a geological dislocation that has also made the huge cliffs of Malham Cove. The stream is the Aire. It can be seen coming through a natural arch high up among the rocks.
sounded so suddenly different that I was convinced that a considerable fall of stones had commenced among the crags overhead, and that in a moment they would crash into the narrow cleft. Common-sense seemed to urge an immediate retreat, for there was too much water coming down the falls to allow me to climb out that way, as I could otherwise have done. The desire to carry away some sort of picture of the fearsome place was, however, triumphant, and the result is given in this chapter.
Wordsworth writes of
‘Gordale chasm, terrific as the lairWhere the young lions couch,’
‘Gordale chasm, terrific as the lairWhere the young lions couch,’
‘Gordale chasm, terrific as the lairWhere the young lions couch,’
and he also describes it as one of the grandest objects in nature.
A further result of the Craven fault that produced Gordale Scar can be seen at Malham Cove, about a mile away. There the cliff forms a curved front 285 feet high, facing the open meadows down below. The limestone is formed in layers of great thickness, dividing the face of the cliff into three fairly equal sections, the ledges formed at the commencement of each stratum allowing of the growth of bushes and small trees. A hard-pressed fox issaid to have taken refuge on one of these precarious ledges, and finding his way stopped in front, he tried to turn, and in doing so fell and was killed.
At the base of the perpendicular face of the cliff the Aire flows from a very slightly arched recess in the rock. It is a really remarkable stream in making its début without the slightest fuss, for it is large enough at its very birth to be called a small river. Its modesty is a great loss to Yorkshire, for if, instead of gathering strength in the hidden places in the limestone fells, it were to keep to more rational methods, it would flow to the edge of the Cove, and there precipitate itself in majestic fashion into a great pool below. There is some reason for believing that on certain occasions in the past the stream has taken the more showy course, and if sufficient cement could be introduced into some of the larger fissures above, a fall might be induced to occur after every period of heavy rain. All the romance would perhaps disappear if we knew that the effect was artificial, and therefore we would no doubt be wiser to remain content with the Cove as it is.
Thetrack across the moor from Malham Cove to Settle cannot be recommended to anyone at night, owing to the extreme difficulty of keeping to the path without a very great familiarity with every yard of the way, so that when I merely suggested taking that route one wintry night the villagers protested vigorously. I therefore took the road that goes up from Kirby Malham, having borrowed a large hurricane lamp from the ‘Buck’ Inn at Malham. Long before I reached the open moor I was enveloped in a mist that would have made the track quite invisible even where it was most plainly marked, and I blessed the good folk at Malham who had advised me to take the road rather than run the risks of the pot-holes that are a feature of the limestone fells. This moor is on the range of watersheds of Northern England, for it sends streams east and west that find their way into the Irish Sea and German Ocean.
With the swinging lantern throwing vast shadows of my own figure upon the mist, and the stony road under my feet, I at length dropped down the steep descent into Settle, having seen no human being on the road since I left Kirby Malham. Even Settle was almost as lonely, for I had nearly reached a building called The Folly, which is near the middle of the town, before I met the first inhabitant.
In the morning I discovered that The Folly was the most notable house in the town, for its long stone front dates from the time of Charles II., and it is a very fine example of the most elaborate treatment of a house of that size and period to be found in the Craven district. Settle has a most distinctive feature in the possession of Castleberg, a steep limestone hill, densely wooded except at the very top, that rises sharply just behind the market-place. Before the trees were planted there seems to have been a sundial on the side of the hill, the precipitous scar on the top forming the gnomon. No one remembers this curious feature, although a print showing the numbers fixed upon the slope was published in 1778. The market-place has lost its curious old tollbooth, and in its place stands a town hall of good Tudor design. Departed also is much of the charm of the old Shambles that occupy a
SETTLEThisgrey old town in Ribblesdale is one of the quaintest in this part of Yorkshire.
SETTLEThisgrey old town in Ribblesdale is one of the quaintest in this part of Yorkshire.
SETTLE
Thisgrey old town in Ribblesdale is one of the quaintest in this part of Yorkshire.
central position in the square. The lower story, with big arches forming a sort of piazza in front of the butcher’s and other shops, still remains in its old state, but the upper portion has been restored in the fullest sense of that comprehensive term.
In the steep street that we came down on entering the town there may still be seen a curious old tower, which seems to have forgotten its original purpose. Some of the houses have carved stone lintels to their doorways and seventeenth-century dates, while the stone figure on ‘The Naked Man’ Inn, although bearing the date 1663, must be very much older, the year of rebuilding being probably indicated rather than the date of the figure.
The Ribble divides Settle from its former parish church at Giggleswick, and until 1838 the townsfolk had to go over the bridge and along a short lane to the village which held its church. Settle having been formed into a separate parish, the parish clerk of the ancient village no longer has the fees for funerals and marriages. Although able to share the church, the two places had stocks of their own for a great many years. At Settle they have been taken from the market square and placed in the court-house, and at Giggleswick one of the first things we see on entering the village is one ofthe stone posts of the stocks standing by the steps of the market cross. This cross has a very well preserved head, and it makes the foreground of a very pretty picture as we look at the battlemented tower of the church through the stone-roofed lichgate grown over with ivy. The history of this fine old church, dedicated, like that of Middleham, to St. Alkelda, has been written by Mr. Thomas Brayshaw, who knows every detail of the old building from the chalice inscribed ‘✠THE · COMMVNION · CVPP · BELONGINGE · TO · THE · PARISHE · OF · IYGGELSWICKE · MADE · IN · ANO · 1585.’ to the inverted Norman capitals now forming the bases of the pillars. The tower and the arcades date from about 1400, and the rest of the structure is about 100 years older.
‘The Black Horse’ Inn has still two niches for small figures of saints, that proclaim its ecclesiastical connections in early times. It is said that in the days when it was one of the duties of the churchwardens to see that no one was drinking there during the hours of service the inspection used to last up to just the end of the sermon, and that when the custom was abolished the church officials regretted it exceedingly. Giggleswick is also the proud possessor of a school founded in1512. It has grown from a very small beginning to a considerable establishment, and it possesses one of the most remarkable school chapels that can be seen anywhere in the country. It was built between 1897 and 1901, as a memorial of Queen Victoria’s ‘Diamond Jubilee,’ by Mr. Walter Morrison, who spared no expense in clothing it with elaborate decoration, executed by some of the most renowned artists of the present day. The design of the building is by Mr. T. G. Jackson, R.A.
The museum is of more than ordinary interest on account of the very fine collection of prehistoric remains discovered in the Victoria Cave two miles to the north-east of Settle. Besides bones of such animals as the cave bear, bison, elephant, and grisly bear, fragments of pottery were discovered, together with bronze and silver coins dating from the Roman period.
An ebbing and flowing well, which has excited the admiration of all the earlier writers on this part of Yorkshire, can be seen at about the distance of a mile to the north of Giggleswick. The old prints show this as a most spectacular natural phenomenon; but whatever it may have been a century or more ago, it appears at the present day as little more than an ordinary roadside well,so common in this neighbourhood. In very dry or very wet weather the well remains inactive, but when there is a medium supply of water the level of the water is constantly changing. Giggleswick Tarn is no longer in existence, for it has been drained, and the site is occupied by pastures. The very fine British canoe, discovered when the drainage operations were in progress, is now preserved in the Leeds Museum.
The road that goes northward from Settle keeps close to the Midland Railway, which here forces its way right through the Dale Country, under the very shoulders of Pen-y-ghent, and within sight of the flat top of Ingleborough. The greater part of this country is composed of limestone, forming bare hillsides honeycombed with underground waters and pot-holes, which often lead down into the most astonishing caverns. In Ingleborough itself there is Gaping Gill Hole, a vast fissure nearly 350 feet deep. It was only partially explored by M. Martel in 1895. Ingleborough Cave penetrates into the mountain to a distance of nearly 1,000 feet, and is one of the best of these limestone caverns for its stalactite formations. Guides take visitors from the village of Clapham to the inmost recesses and chambersthat branch out of the small portion discovered in 1837.
The fells contain so many fissures and curious waterfalls that drop into abysses of blackness, that it would take an infinite time to adequately describe even a portion of them. The scenery is wild and gaunt, and is much the same as the moors at the head of Swaledale, described in an earlier chapter. In every direction there are opportunities for splendid mountain walks, and if the tracks are followed the danger of hidden pot-holes is comparatively small. From the summit of Ingleborough, and, indeed, from most of the fells that reach 2,000 feet, there are magnificent views across the brown fells, broken up with horizontal lines formed by the bare rocky scars. Bowfell, Whernside, Great Shunnor Fell, High Seat, and a dozen other heights, dominate the lower and greener country, and to the west, where the mountains drop down towards Morecambe Bay, one looks all over the country watered by the Lune and the Kent, the two rivers that flow from the seaward side of these lofty watersheds.
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