Part 15

The country immediately around Liverpool is deficient in old halls of the kind so abundant near Bolton and Manchester. This perhaps is in no degree surprising when we consider how thinly that part of Lancashire was inhabited when the manufacturing south-east corner was already populous. Speke is the only perfect example thereabouts of its particular class, the black-and-white; and of a first-class contemporaneous baronial mansion, the remains of the Hutte, near Hale, furnish an almost solitary memorial. The transom of the lower window, the upper smaller windows, the stack of kitchen chimneys, the antique mantelpiece, the moat, still untouched, with its drawbridge, combine to show how important this place must have been in the bygones, while the residence of the Irelands. It was quitted in 1674, when the comparatively new "Hale Hall" was erected, a solid and commodious building of the indefinite style. Liverpool as a district is correspondingly deficient in palatial modern residences, though there are many of considerable magnitude. Knowsley, the seat of the Earl of Derby, is eminently miscellaneous, a mixture of Gothic and classical, and of various periods, beginning with temp. Henry VI. The front was built in 1702, the back in 1805. Croxteth Hall, the Earl of Sefton's, is a stone building of the negative character indicative of the time of Queen Anne and George I. Childwall Abbey, a mansion belonging to the Marquis of Salisbury, is Gothic of the kind which is recommended neither by taste nor by fidelity to exact principles. Lathom, on the other hand, is consistent, though opinions vary as to the amount of genius displayed in the detail--the very part in which genius is always declared. Would that there existed, were it ever so tiny, a fragment of the original Lathom House, that noble first home of the Stanleys, which had no fewer than eighteen towers, without reckoning the lofty "Eagle" in the centre--its outer walls protected by a fosse of eight yards in width, and its gateway one that in nobleness would satisfy kings. Henry VII. came here in 1495, the occasion when "to the women that songe before the Kinge and the Quene," as appears in the entertaining Privy Purse Expenses of the royal progress that pleasant summer, there was given "in reward, 6s. 8d." So thorough was the demolition of the old place that now there is no certain knowledge even of the site. The present mansion was built during the ten years succeeding 1724. It has a rustic basement, with double flight of steps, above which are rows of Ionic columns. The length of the northern or principal front, including the wings, is 320 feet; the south front overlooks the garden, and an abundantly wooded park. An Italian architect, Giacomo Leoni, was entrusted with the decoration of the interior, which upon the whole is deservedly admired.

Ince Blundell is distinguished, not so much for its architecture, as for the collection of works of art contained in the entrance-hall, a model, one-third size, of the Pantheon. The sculptures, of various kinds, above 550 in number, are chiefly illustrative of the later period of Roman art, though including some gems of ancient Greek conception; the paintings include works of high repute in all the principal continental schools, as well as English, the former representing, among others, Paul Veronese, Andrea del Sarto, and Jan Van Eyck. The Ince Blundell collection is certainly without equal in Lancashire, and is pronounced by connoisseurs one of the finest of its kind in the country.

The neighbourhood of Blackburn is enviable in the possession of Hoghton Tower, five and a half miles to the W.S.W., a building surpassed in its various interest only by Lancaster Castle and the abbeys; in beauty of situation little inferior to Stirling Castle, and as a specimen of old baronial architecture well worthy of comparison with Haddon Hall. The estate was in the possession of the Hoghton family as early as temp. Henry II., when the original manor-house, superseded by the Tower, stood at the foot of the hill, by the river-side. The existing edifice dates from the reign of Elizabeth, having been erected by the Thomas Hoghton whose departure from "Merry England" is the theme of the pathetic old ballad, "The Blessed Conscience." He was one of the "obstinate" people who, having been educated in the Catholic faith, refused to conform to the requirements of the new Protestant powers, and was obliged in consequence to take refuge in a foreign country, dying an exile at Liege, 3d June 1580.

"Oh! Hoghton high, which is a bower Of sports and lordly pleasure, I wept, and left that lordly tower Which was my chiefest treasure. To save my soul, and lose the rest, It was my true pretence; Like frighted bird, I left my nest, To keep my consciènce.

"Fair England! now ten times adieu! And friends that therein dwell; Farewell, my brother Richard true, Whom I did love so well-- Farewell, farewell, good people all, And learn experiènce; Love not too much the golden ball, But keep your consciènce."

The "Tower," so called, occupies the summit of a lofty ridge, on its eastern side bold and rugged, steep and difficult of access, though to the north and west sloping gently. Below the declivity meanders the Darwen, in parts smooth and noiseless; but in the "Orr," so named from the sound, tumbling over huge heaps of rock loosened from the opposite bank, where the wall of stone is almost vertical. In the time of its pride the hill was almost entirely clothed with trees, but now it is chiefly turf, and the extent of the prospect, which includes the village of Walton-le-Dale, down in the valley of the Ribble, is enjoyed perfectly. The ground-plan of the building presents two capacious courts, the wall with three square towers in front, the middle one protecting the gateway. The outer court is large enough for the easy movement of 600 men; the inner one is approached by a noble flight of steps. The portion designed for the abode of the family contains noble staircases, branching out into long galleries, which lead, in turn, to the many chambers. One of the rooms, called James the First's, is wainscoted. The stay of his Majesty at Hoghton for a few days in August, 1617, has already been referred to. It is this which has been so admirably commemorated in Cattermole's best painting. With a view to rendering his picture, containing some fifty figures, as historically correct as might be possible, the artist was assisted with all the records and portraits in existence, so that the imagination has little place in it beyond the marshalling. Regarded as a semi-ruin, Hoghton Tower is a national monument, a treasure which belongs not more to the distinguished baronet by whom it has lately been in some degree restored after the neglect of generations, than, as said above, like all others of its kind, to the people of England, who, in course of time, it is to be hoped, will rightly estimate the value of their heirlooms.

Stonyhurst, now the principal English Jesuit College, was originally the home of the Sherburne family, one of whom attended Queen Philippa at Calais, while upon another, two centuries later, Elizabeth looked so graciously that, although a Catholic, she allowed him to retain his private chapel and domestic priest. It was under the latter that the existing edifice took the place of one more ancient, though the builder did not live to complete his work. The completion, in truth, may be said to be yet barely effected, so many additions, all in thorough keeping, have been projected. Not that they interfere with the design of the stately original, its lofty and battlemented centre, and noble cupolas. The new is in perfect harmony with the old, and the general effect, we may be sure, is no less imposing to-day than it was three hundred years ago. The interior corresponds; the galleries and apartments leave nothing to be desired: they are stored, moreover, with works of art, and with archæological and historical curiosities; so richly, indeed, that whatever the value of the museums in some of the Lancashire large towns, in the entire county there is no collection of the kind that can take precedence of Stonyhurst. The house was converted to its present purpose in 1794, when the founders of the College, driven from Liege by the terrors of the French Revolution, obtained possession of it. They brought with them all they could that was specially valuable, and hence, in large measure, the varied interest of what it contains. In the philosophical apparatus room there is a _Descent from the Cross_, by Annibale Caracci. Elsewhere there are some carvings in ivory, and a _Crucifixion_, by Michel Angelo, with ancient missals, a copy of the Office of the Virgin which belonged to Mary, Queen of Scots, and antiques of miscellaneous character innumerable, those of the Christian ages supplemented by a Roman altar from Ribchester. A curious circumstance connected with Stonyhurst is, that the house and grounds occupy, as nearly as possible, the same area as that of the famous city which once adorned the banks of the Ribble.

A pilgrimage to the neighbourhood of Stonyhurst is rewarded by the sight of old fashioned manor-houses scarcely inferior in manifold interest to those left behind in the southern part of the county. Little Mitton Hall (so named in order to distinguish it from Great Mitton, on the Yorkshire side of the stream) supplies an example of the architecture of the time of Henry VII. The basement is of stone, the upper storey of wood; the presence-chamber, with its embayed window-screen and gallery above, and the roof ceiled with oak in wrought compartments, are alike curious and interesting. Salesbury Hall, partly stone and partly wood, once possessed of a quadrangular court, now a farmhouse, was originally the seat of the Talbots, one of whom, in 1580, was Keeper of the Records in the Tower of London. Salmesbury, monographed by Mr. James Croston, dates from the close of the fourteenth century. This is a truly fascinating old place, the inner doors all without either panel or lock, and opened, like those of cottages, with a latch and a string. Townley Hall, near Burnley, one of the most ancient seats in the county, is rich in personal history. The banks of the Lune in turn supply examples of the ancient mansion such as befit a valley picturesque in every winding, Hornby Castle and Borwick Hall counting as chief among them.

The list of Lancashire remains of this character could be considerably enlarged. Scarisbrick and Rufford, near Ormskirk; Yealand Redmayne, nine miles north of Lancaster; Swarthmoor, Extwistle, and many others, present features of various interest, and in the aggregate supply materials for one of the most delightful chapters still to be written for the history not only of Lancashire but of England. But here we must desist.

XII

THE NATURAL HISTORY AND THE FOSSILS

An extended account of the flora of Lancashire, or of its fauna, or of the organic remains preserved in the rocks and the coal strata, is impossible in the space now at command: it is not demanded either by pages which profess to supply no more than general hints as to where to look for what is worthy or curious. A bird's-eye view of Lancashire, its contents and characteristics, would nevertheless be incomplete without some notice, however brief, of the indigenous trees and plants, the birds ordinarily met with, and the fossils. The zest with which natural history has been followed in Lancashire, for over a century, has resulted in so accurate a discrimination of all the principal forms of life, that the numbers, and the degree of diffusion of the various species, can now be spoken of without fear of error. In those departments alone which require the use of the microscope is there much remaining to be done, and these, in truth, are practically inexhaustible.

Being so varied in its geology, and possessed of a hundred miles of coast, Lancashire presents a very good average flora, though wanting many of the pretty plants which deck the meadows and waysides of most of the southern counties. The wild clematis which at Clifton festoons every old thorn is sought in vain. In Lancashire no cornfield is ever flooded as in Surrey with scarlet poppies; the sweet-briar and the scented violet are scarcely known, except, of course, in gardens; even the mallow is a curiosity. Many flowers, on the other hand, occur in plenty, which, though not confined to Lancashire, are in the south seldom seen, and which in beauty compare with the best. Mr. Bentham, in his _Handbook of the British Flora_, describes 1232 native flowering plants, and 53 of the cryptogamia--the ferns and their allies--or a total of 1285. Of these the present writer has personally observed in Lancashire more than 500. In the remoter corners another score or two, without doubt, await the finding. In any case, the proportion borne by the Lancashire flora to that of the entire island is, in reality, much higher than the figures seem to indicate, since quite a sixth part of the 1285 consists of plants confined to three or four localities, and thus not entitled to count with the general vegetation of the country. It is not, after all, the multitude or the variety of the species found in a given spot that renders it enviable. The excellent things of the world are not the rare and costly ones, but those which give joy to the largest number of intelligent human beings; and assuredly more delight has arisen to mankind from the primrose, the anemone, and the forget-me-not, than from all the botanist's prizes put together. Better, moreover, at any time, than the possession of mere quantity, the ceaseless pleasure that comes of watching manners and customs, or a life-history--such, for example, as that of the Parnassia. Not to mention all that precedes and follows, how beautiful the spectacle of the milk-white cups when newly open, the golden anthers kneeling round the lilac ovary; then, after a while, in succession rising up, bestowing a kiss, and retiring, so that at last they form a five-rayed star, the ovary now impurpled. In connection with the dethronement of the natural beauty of the streams in the cotton manufacturing districts, it is interesting to note that, while the primroses, the anemones, and the forget-me-nots, that once grew in profusion, here and there, along the margins, have disappeared, the "azured harebell"[45] holds its own. Even when the whitethorn stands dismayed, the harebell still sheets many a slope and shelving bank with its deep-dyed blue.

[45] Usually miscalled "blue bell," _vide_ "The Shakspere Flora."

On the great hills along the eastern side of the county, and especially in the moorland parts, the flora is meagre in the extreme. Acres innumerable produce little besides heather and whortle-berry. When the latter decreases, it is to make room for the empetrum, or the Vitis Idæa, "the grape of Mount Ida"--a name enough in itself to fling poetry over the solitude. Harsh and wiry grasses and obdurate rushes fill the interspaces, except where green with the hard-fern. Occasionally, as upon Foledge, the parsley-fern and the club-moss tell of the altitude, as upon Pendle the pinguicula and the cloud-berry. The hills behind Grange are in part densely covered with juniper, and the characteristic grass is the beautiful blue sesleria, the colour contrasting singularly with that of the hay-field grasses. The choicest of the English green-flowered plants, the trulove, _Paris quadrifolia_, is plentiful in the woods close by, and extends to those upon the banks of the Duddon. Everywhere north of Morecambe Bay, as these names go far to indicate, the flora is more diversified than to the south; here, too, particular kinds of flowers occur in far greater plenty. At Grange the meadows teem with cowslips, in many parts of Lancashire almost unknown. Crimson orchises--Ophelia's "long-purples," the tway-blade, the fly-orchis, the Lady's tresses, the butterfly-orchis, that smells only after twilight, add their charms to this beautiful neighbourhood, which, save for Birkdale, would seem the Lancashire orchids' patrimony. The total number of orchideous plants occurring wild in the county is fourteen; and of these Birkdale lays very special claim to two--the marsh epipactis and the _Orchis latifolia_. In the moist hollows among the sand-hills, called the "slacks," they grow in profusion, occurring also in similar habitats beyond the Ribble. The abundance is easily accounted for; the seeds of the orchids, of every kind, are innumerable as the motes that glisten i' the sunbeam, and when discharged, the wind scatters them in all directions. The orchids' Birkdale home is that also of the parnassia, which springs up less frequently alone than in clusters of from six or eight to twenty or thirty. Here, too, grows that particular form of the pyrola, hitherto unnoticed elsewhere, which counts as the Lancashire botanical specialty, looking when in bloom like the lily of the valley, though different in leaf, and emulating not only the fashion but the odour. It would much better deserve the epithet of "Lancashire" than the asphodel so called, for the latter is found in bogs wherever they occur. Never mind; it is more than enough that there is whisper in it of the "yellow meads," and that in high summer it shows its bright gold, arriving just when the cotton-grass is beginning to waft away, and the sundews are displaying their diamonds, albeit so treacherously, for in another week or two every leaf will be dotted with corpses. No little creature of tender wing ever touches a sundew except under penalty of death. Only two other English counties--York and Cornwall--lend their name to a wild-flower, so that Lancashire may still be proud of its classic asphodel.

No single kind of wild-flower occurs in Lancashire so abundantly as to give character to the county, nor is it marked by any particular kind of fern. The most general, perhaps, is the broad-leaved sylvan shield-fern (_Lastrea dilatata_), though in some parts superseded by the amber-spangled polypody. Neither is any one kind of tree more conspicuous than another, unless it be the sycamore. Fair dimensions are attained by the wych-elm, which in Lancashire holds the place given south of Birmingham to that princely exotic, the _campestris_--the "ancestral elm" of the poet, and chief home of the sable rook--a tree of comparative rarity, and in Lancashire never majestic. The wild cherry is often remarkable also for its fine development, especially north of the sands. The abele, on the other hand, the maple, and the silver willow, are seldom seen; and of the spindle-tree, the wayfaring-tree, and the dogwood, there is scarcely an example. They do not blend in Lancashire, as in the south, with the crimson pea and the pencilled wood-vetch. When a climber of the summer, after the bindweed, ascends the hedge, it is the Tamus, that charming plant which never seems so much to have risen out of the earth as to be a cataract of foliage tumbling from some hidden fount above. Wood-nuts are plentiful in the northern parts of the county; and in the southern wild raspberries, these equal in flavour and fragrance to those of garden growth, wanting only in size. Bistort makes pink islands amid hay grass that waits the scythe. Foxgloves as tall as a man adorn all dry and shady groves. The golden-rod, the water septfoil, and the Lady's mantle, require no searching for. At Blackpool the sea-rocket blooms again towards Christmas. On the extremest verge of the county, where a leap across the streamlet would plant the feet in Westmoreland, the banks are dotted for many miles with the bird's-eye primula.

THE BIRDS[46]

[46] Condensed in part from the chapter on Lancashire Birds in _Manchester Walks and Wild-flowers_, 1858, long since out of print.

With the Lancashire birds, as with the botany, it is not the exhaustive catalogue that possesses the prime interest. This lies in the habits, the odd and pretty ways, the instincts, the songs, the migrations, that lift birds, in their endless variety, so near to our own personal human nature.

Adding to the list of birds known to be permanent residents in Great Britain, the names of those which visit our islands periodically, either in summer or winter, the total approaches 250. Besides the regular immigrants, about a hundred others come occasionally; some, perchance, by force of accident, as when, after heavy weather at sea, the Stormy Petrel is blown ashore. In Lancashire there appear to be, of the first-class, about seventy: the summer visitors average about thirty; and of winter visitors there have been noticed about a score, the aggregate being thus, as nearly as possible, one-half of the proper ornithology of the country. The parts of the county richest in species are naturally those which abound in woods and well-cultivated land, as near Windermere, and where there are orchards and plenty of market-gardens, as on the broad plain south-west of Manchester, which is inviting also in the pleasant character of the climate. Here, with the first dawn of spring, when the catkins hang on the hazels, the song-thrush begins to pipe. The missel-thrush in the same district is also very early, and is often, like the chief musician, remarkable for size, plumage, and power of song. Upon the seaside sand-hills it is interesting to observe how ingeniously the throstle deals with the snails. Every here and there in the sand a large pebble is lodged, and against this the bird breaks the shells, so that at last the stone becomes the centre of a heap of fragments that recall the tales of the giants and their bone-strewed caverns. This, too, where the peacefulness is so profound, and where never a thought of slaughter and rapine, save for the deeds of the thrushes, would enter the mind. The snails are persecuted also by the blackbirds--in gardens more inveterately even than on the sand-hills--in the former to such a degree that none can refuse forgiveness of the havoc wrought among the strawberries and ripening cherries. Both thrush and blackbird have their own cruel enemy--the cunning and inexorable sparrow-hawk. When captured, the unfortunate minstrel is conveyed to an eminence, sometimes an old nest, if one can be near, and there devoured. In almost all parts of Lancashire where there are gardens, that cheerful little creature, the hedge-sparrow or dunnock, lifts up its voice. Birds commence their song at very various hours. The dunnock usually begins towards sunset, first mounting to the loftiest twig it can discover that will bear its weight. The sweet and simple note, if one would hear it to perfection, must be caught just at that moment. The song is one of those that seem to be a varied utterance of the words of men. Listen attentively, and the lay is as nearly as may be--"Home, home, sweet, sweet home; my work's done, so's yours; good night, all's well." Heard in mild seasons as early as January, the little dunnock sings as late as August. It rears a second brood while the summer is in progress, building a nest of moss, lining it with hair, and depositing five immaculate blue eggs. The robin, plentiful everywhere in the rural districts, and always equal to the production of a delightful song, never hesitates to visit the suburbs even of large and noisy towns, singing throughout the year, though not so much noticed in spring and summer, because of the chorus of other birds. The country lads still call it by the old Shaksperean name:

... "The ruddock would, With charitable bill (O bill, sore-shaming Those rich-left heirs that let their fathers lie Without a monument!) bring thee all this; Yea, and furr'd moss besides."--_Cymbeline_, iv. 2.