Part 140

Then thrice did he turn where the streamers burn,[472] And thrice did he kiss the ground, And with solemn tone, in that gill so lone, He call’d on the Spectre Hound!

And a burning brand he clasp’d in his hand, And he nam’d a potent spell, That, for Christian ear it were sin to hear, And a sin for a bard to tell.[473]

And a whirlwind swept by, and stormy grew the sky, And the torrent louder roar’d, While a hellish flame, o’er the Troller’s stalwart frame From each cleft of the gill was pour’d.

And a dreadful thing from the cliff did spring, And its wild bark thrill’d around-- Its eyes had the glow of the fires below-- ’Twas the form of the Spectre Hound!

* * * * *

When on Rylstonne’s height glow’d the morning light, And, borne on the mountain air, The Priorie[474] bell did the peasants tell ’Twas the chanting of matin prayer,

By peasant men, where the horrid glen Doth its rugged jaws expand, A corse was found, where a dark yew frown’d, And marks were imprest on the dead man’s breast-- But they seem’d not by mortal hand.

* * * * *

In the evening calm a funeral psalm Slowly stole o’er the woodland scene-- The harebells wave on a new-made grave In “Burnsall’s church-yard green.”

That funeral psalm in the evening calm, Which echo’d the dell around, Was his, o’er whose grave blue harebells wave, Who call’d on the Spectre Hound!

* * * * *

The above ballad is founded on a tradition, very common amongst the mountains of Craven. The spectre hound is _Bargest_. Of this mysterious personage I am able to give a very particular account, having only a few days ago seen Billy B----y, who had once a full view of it. I give the narrative in his own words; it would detract from its merit to alter the language.

BILLY B----’S ADVENTURE.

“You see, sir, as how I’d been a clock-dressing at Gurston [Grassington], and I’d staid rather lat, and may be gitten a lile sup o’ spirit, but I war far from being drunk, and knowed every thing that passed. It war about 11 o’clock when I left, and it war at back end o’t’ year, and a most admīrable [beautiful] neet it war. The moon war varra breet, and I nivvr seed Rylstone-fell plainer in a’ my life. Now, you see, sir, I war passin down t’ mill loine, and I heerd summut come past me--brush, brush, brush, wi’ chains rattling a’ the while; but I seed nothing; and thowt I to mysel, now this is a most mortal queer thing. And I then stuid still, and luik’d about me, but I seed nothing at aw, nobbut the two stane wa’s on each side o’t’ mill loine. Then I heerd again this brush, brush, brush, wi’ the chains; for you see, sir, when I stuid still it stopped; and then, thowt I, this mun be a Bargest, that sae much is said about: and I hurried on towards t’ wood brig, for they say as how this Bargest cannot cross a watter; but lord, sir, when I gat o’er t’ brig, I heerd this same thing again; so it mud either hev crossed t’ watter, _or gone round by t’ spring heed!_ [About thirty miles!] And then I becam a valliant man, for I war a bit freeten’d afore; and thinks I, I’ll turn and hev a peep at this thing; so I went up Greet Bank towards Linton, and heerd this brush, brush, brush, wi’ the chains a’ the way, but I seed nothing; then it ceased all of a sudden. So I turned back to go hame, but I’d hardly reach’d t’ door, when I heerd again this brush, brush, brush, and the chains going down towards t’ Holin House, and I followed it, and the moon there shone varra breet, and I _seed its tail_! Then, thowt I, thou owd thing! I can say Ise seen thee now, so I’ll away hame. When I gat to t’ door, there war a girt thing like a sheep, but it war larger, ligging across t’ threshold of t’ door, and it war woolly like; and says I, ‘git up,’ and it wouldn’t git up--then says I, ‘stir thysel,’ and it wouldn’t stir itsel! And I grew valliant, and I rais’d t’ stick to baste it wi’, and then it luik’d at me, and sich oies! [eyes] they did glower, and war as big as saucers, and like a cruelled ball; first there war a red ring, then a blue one, then a white one; and these rings grew less and less _till they cam to a dot_! Now I war nane feer’d on it, tho’ it girn’d at me fearfully, and I kept on saying ‘git up,’ and ‘stir thysel,’ and t’ wife heerd as how I war at t’ door, and she cam to oppen it; and then this thing gat up and walked off, _for it war mare feer’d o’ t’ wife than it war o’ me_! and I told t’ wife, and she said it war Bargest; but I nivver seed it since, and that’s a true story!”

In the glossary to the Rev. Mr. Carr’s “Horæ Momenta Cravenæ,” I find the following--“_Bargest_, a sprite that haunts towns and populous places. Belg. _birg_, and _geest_, a ghost.” I really am not a little amused at Mr. Carr’s derivation, which is most erroneous. Bargest is not a _town_ ghost, nor is it a haunter “of towns and populous places;” for, on the contrary, it is said in general to frequent small villages and _hills_. Hence the derivation may be _berg_, Germ., a _hill_, and _geist_, a ghost; i.e. a hill ghost: but the real derivation appears to me to be _bär_, Germ., a _bear_, and _geist_, a ghost; i.e. a bear ghost, from its appearing in the form of a bear or large dog, as Billy B----’s narrative shows.[475]

The appearance of the spectre hound is said to precede a death; which tradition will be more fully illustrated in my next legend, “The Wise Woman of Littondale.” Like most other spirits Bargest is supposed to be unable to cross a water; and in case any of my Craven readers should ever chance to meet with his ghostship, it may be as well to say, that unless they give him the wall he will tear them to pieces, or otherwise illtreat them, as he did one John Lambert, who, refusing to let him have the wall, was so punished for his want of manners, that he died in a few days.

This superstition has in one instance been productive of good. A few years ago an inhabitant of Threshfield kept a huge he-goat, which the wags of the village would sometimes turn into the lanes, in the night-time, with a chain about his neck, to frighten the farmers on their return from Kettlewell market. They once determined to terrify a badger, or miller, as he returned from the market, by driving the animal with the chains, &c. into the lane through which the man of meal was to pass. About ten o’clock the miller, on entering Threshfield with his cart, espies the goat; and hearing the chains, overwhelmed with terror, he conjectures it to be Bargest, that was sent to take him away for his dishonest dealings; the miller stops his cart, and kneeling down in it, thus prayed, to the great amusement of the young rogues behind the wall:--“Good Lord, don’t let the devil take me this time, and I’ll never cheat any more; do let me get safe home, and I’ll never raise my meal again so extravagantly as I have done of late.” He _did_ get safe home, and was as good as his word till he discovered the trick, when he returned to his old malpractices; exemplifying the old epigram--

“The devil was sick, the devil a monk would be, The devil got well, the devil a monk was he.”

In the second verse of the legend of “The Troller’s Gill,” it is said,

And the elfin band from faërie land Was upon Elbōton hill.

Elboton is the largest of five or six very romantic green hills, that seem to have been formed by some tremendous convulsion of nature, at the foot of that fine chain of fells, which extends from Rylstone to Burnsall, and is said to have been, from “time whereof the memory of man runneth not to the contrary,” the haunt of faëries; numbers of these pretty little creatures having been seen there by several men of honour and veracity in this neighbourhood, one of whom _has had a faëry in his hand_! The elfin train has been visible in many parts of our district, but I know of no place they frequent more than Elboton. One of these diminutive beings, called Hob, is reputed to be a watchful preserver of the farmer’s property, and a most industrious workman. At Close-house, near Skipton in Craven, Hob used to do as much work in one night as twenty human workmen could in the same time; and, as I have been informed by an individual, who resided there about twenty years ago, Hob was accustomed to house the hay, stack the corn, and churn the butter, as well as perform several other offices, which tended materially to lessen the labour of the husbandman and the dairy maid. The occupier of Close-house at that time, thinking to make Hob some return for his kindness and assiduity, laid out a new red cloak for him, which so offended the good faëry, that he ceased his labours, and left the place. On the spot where the cloak was left, the following stanza was found,

Hob red coat, Hob red hood, Hob do you no harm, but no more good.[476]

Loupscar, alluded to in the third verse, is a place in the Wharfe near Burnsall, where the river is pent in with rocks, and boils along in a confined channel, and then discharges itself into a pool of tremendous depth, forming, as Dr. Whitaker says in his history, “a scene more dreadful than pleasing.” The channel of the Wharfe is in general craggy, and the river abounds with similar vortices to Loupscar; the two most celebrated of which are the Gastrills above Grassington, and the Strid, in Bolton woods. The latter will be recognised by the poetical reader, as the fatal gulf where the Boy of Egremond was drowned, whose story Rogers has versified with such exquisite pathos.

“The Troller’s Gill” is in Skyram pastures, beyond Appletreewick. I visited it a few days ago, when the torrent was considerably swollen by the recent heavy rains amongst the mountains. The roar of the water, the terrific grandeur of the overhanging crags, and its loneliness, united to heighten the terrors of the place. To an inhabitant of London, the scene of the wolf’s glen, in the Drury version of “Der Freischütz,” may give some faint idea of it. Dr. Whitaker thought Troller’s Gill “wanted the deep horror of Gordale,” near Malham. There is certainly more sublimity and grandeur about Gordale; but as to horror, I think it nothing to “the Troller’s Gill.” This, however, is a matter of taste.

The last verses allude to the beautiful and ancient custom, still universally prevalent throughout our district, of chanting a solemn dirge at funerals, till the corpse reaches the church-yard gateway. I know of nothing more affecting to a stranger than to meet, at evening, a funeral train proceeding along one of our romantic vallies, while the neighbouring rocks are resonant with the loud dirge sung by the friends of the departed. Long may this custom continue! Too many of our old customs fall into misuse by the ridicule thrown on them by dissenters, as being popish, &c.; but I am happy to say, that in Craven the dissenters are great encouragers of funeral dirges. In Mrs. Heman’s sacred melody, “Last Rites,” this stanza alludes to the practice:--

By the chanted psalm that fills Reverently the ancient hills, Learn, that from his harvests done, Peasants bear a brother on To his last repose!

T. Q. M.

_Grassington in Craven,_

_Nov. 6, 1827._

[470] For No. I., see the “Banquet of the Dead.”

[471] A cave near Thorp.

[472] The Northern Lights. These beautiful meteors have been very vivid and frequent of late.

[473] These two lines are from a German ballad.

[474] Bolton Priorie.

[475] That bears were common in Craven in ancient times is evident from one of our villages being called Barden, i.e. the bear’s den. I consider this circumstance in favour of my derivation.--T. Q. M.

[476] Mr. Story, of Gargrave, has written a beautiful Craven faëry tale, called Fitz Harold.

* * * * *

THE SECOND SERIES OF

WHIMS AND ODDITIES,

WITH FORTY ORIGINAL DESIGNS,

BY THOMAS HOOD.

“What demon hath possessed thee, that thou wilt never forsake that impertinent custom of punning?”

_Scriblerus._

If I might be allowed to answer the question instead of Mr. Hood, I should say, that it is the same demon which provokes me to rush directly through his new volume in preference to half a dozen works, which order of time and propriety entitle to previous notice. This book detains me from my purposes, as a new print in a shop-window does a boy on his way to school; and, like him, at the risk of being found fault with for not minding my task, I would talk of the attractive novelty to wights of the same humour. It comes like good news, which nobody is ignorant of, and every body tells to every body, and sets business at a stand-still. It puts clean out of my head all thought of another engraving for the present sheet, though I know, good reader, that already “I _owe_ you one”--perhaps two:--never mind! you shall have “_all_ in good time;” if you don’t, I’ll give you leave to eat me. With such a tender, the most untender will, or ought to be, as content as “the blacks of Niger at its infant rill,” seated at their “_white-bait_,” the thirty-eighth _cut_--in Mr. Hood’s book, very near “the end,”--a very inviting one to Shylock-kind of people, who have not

“------seen, perchance, unhappy white folks cook’d, And then made free of negro corporations.”--p. 149.

Mr. Hood begins--to be modest--with pleading guilty to what he calls “some verbal misdemeanours,” and then, leaving “his defence to Dean Swift, and the other great European and oriental _pun_dits,” puts himself upon his country. But by whom is he arraigned, save a few highwaymen in the “march of intellect,” who sagely affirm, that “a man who would make a pun would pick a pocket!”--a saying devised by some wag, to the use and behoof of these doldrums, who never hear a good thing, but they button up their pockets and features, and walk off with nothing about them of likeness to humanity but the biforked form. For capital likenesses of such persons, turn to the story of “Tim Turpin,” and look first, to pay due honour, at the engravings of “the Judges of a-size,” and then at “Jurors--not con-jurors.” Portraits of this order could not have been drawn by any other than a close and accurate observer of character. Indeed, that Mr. Hood is eminently qualified in this respect, he has before abundantly testified; especially by “The Progress of Cant,” a print that must occupy a distinguished place in a history of Character and Caricature, whenever such a work shall be written.[477] In this new series of “Whims and Oddities,” he presents a sketch, called “Infant Genius;”--a little boy delighted with having rudely traced an uncouth figure; such a “drawing” as excites a good mistaken mother to declare, “the little fellow has quite a genius, and will be very clever if he only has encouragement:”--and thus many a child’s talent for fine-drawing--which, at the tailoring trade, might have secured the means of living--has been misencouraged to the making up of fifth-rate artists with a starvation income. The engraving of the “Infant Genius” illustrates the following poem.

THE PROGRESS OF ART.

O happy time!--Art’s early days! When o’er each deed, with sweet self-praise, Narcissus-like I hung! When great Rembrandt but little seem’d, And such old masters all were deem’d As nothing to the young!

Some scratchy strokes--abrupt and few So easily and swift I drew, Suffic’d for my design; My sketchy, superficial hand, Drew solids at a dash--and spann’d A surface with a line.

Not long my eye was thus content. But grew more critical--my bent Essay’d a higher walk; I copied leaden eyes in lead-- Rheumatic hands in white and red, And gouty feet--in chalk.

Anon my studious art for days Kept making faces--happy phrase, For faces such as mine! Accomplish’d in the details then I left the minor parts of men, And drew the form divine.

Old gods and heroes--Trojan--Greek, Figures--long after the antique, Great Ajax justly fear’d; Hectors of whom at night I dreamt, And Nestor, fringed enough to tempt Bird-nesters to his beard.

A Bacchus, leering on a bowl, A Pallas, that outstar’d her owl, A Vulcan--very lame; A Dian stuck about with stars, With my right hand I murder’d Mars-- (One Williams did the same.)

But tir’d of this dry work at last, Crayon and chalk aside I cast, And gave my brush a drink! Dipping--“as when a painter dips In gloom of earthquake and eclipse”-- That is--in Indian ink.

Oh then, what black Mont Blancs arose. Crested with soot, and not with snows; What clouds of dingy hue! In spite of what the bard has penn’d, I fear the distance did not “lend Enchantment to the view.”

Not Radcliffe’s brush did e’er design Black Forests, half so black as mine, Or lakes so like a pall; The Chinese cake dispers’d a ray Of darkness, like the light of Day And Martin over all.

Yet urchin pride sustain’d me still, I gaz’d on all with right good-will, And spread the dingy tint; “No holy Luke helped me to paint. The Devil surely, not a saint. Had any finger in’t”.

But colours came!--like morning light, With gorgeous hues displacing night, Or spring’s enliven’d scene: At once the sable shades withdrew; My skies got very, very blue; My trees extremely green.

And wash’d by my cosmetic brush, How beauty’s cheek began to blush; With locks of auburn stain-- (Not Goldsmith’s Auburn)--nut-brown hair, That made her loveliest of the fair; Not “loveliest of the plain!”

Her lips were of vermilion hue; Love in her eyes, and Prussian blue, Set all my heart in flame!-- A young Pygmalion, I adored The maids I made--but time was stor’d With evil--and it came!

Perspective dawn’d--and soon I saw My houses stand against its law; And “keeping” all unkept! My beauties were no longer things For love and fond imaginings; But horrors to be wept!

Ah! why did knowledge ope my eyes? Why did I get more artist-wise? It only serves to hint, What grave defects and wants are mine; That I’m no Hilton in design-- In nature no Dewint!

Thrice happy time!--Art’s early days! When o’er each deed with sweet self-praise, Narcissus-like I hung! When great Rembrandt but little seem’d, And such old masters all were deem’d As nothing to the young!

In verification of the old saying, “Once a man, twice a child,” Mr. Hood tells of “A School for Adults,”--and gives a picture of aged men, baldheaded and wigged, whose education had been neglected, studying their A, B, C. A letter from one of them at a preparatory school is exceedingly amusing. The article is preceded by a dramatic scene.

_Servant._ How well you saw Your father to school to-day, knowing how apt He is to play the truant. _Son._ But is he not yet gone to school? _Servant._ Stand by, and you shall see.

_Enter three old men, with satchels, singing._

_All three._ Domine, domine, duster, Three knaves in a cluster. _Son._ O this is gallant pastime. Nay, come on Is this your school? was that your lesson, ha? _1st Old Man._ Pray, now, good son, indeed, indeed-- _Son._ Indeed You shall to school. Away with him; and take Their wagships with him, the whole cluster of them. _2d Old Man._ You shan’t send us, now, so you shan’t-- _3d Old Man._ We be none of your father, so we be’nt.-- _Son._ Away with ’em, I say; and tell their school-mistress What truants they are, and bid her pay ’em soundly. _All three._ Oh! oh! oh! _Lady._ Alas! will nobody beg pardon for The poor old boys? _Traveller._ Do men of such fair years here go to school? _Native._ They would die dunces else These were great scholars in their youth; but when Age grows upon men here, their learning wastes, And so decays, that, if they live until Threescore, their sons send ’em to school again; They’d die as speechless else as new-born children. _Traveller._ ’Tis a wise nation, and the piety Of the young men most rare and commendable: Yet give me, as a stranger, leave to beg Their liberty this day. _Son._ ’Tis granted. Hold up your heads; and thank the gentleman, Like scholars, with your heels now. _All three._ Gratias! gratias! gratias!

[_Exit, singing._]

“THE ANTIPODES,” _by R. Brome_.

No reader of the first series of the “Whims and Oddities” can have forgotten “The Spoiled Child” of “My Aunt Shakerly,” or the unhappy lady herself; and now we are informed that “towards the close of her life, my aunt Shakerly increased rapidly in bulk: she kept adding growth unto her growth,

“Giving a sum of more to that which had too much,”

till the result was worthy of a Smithfield premium. It was not the triumph, however, of any systematic diet for the promotion of fat,--(except oyster-eating there is no human system of _stall_-feeding,)--on the contrary, she lived abstemiously, diluting her food with pickle-acids, and keeping frequent fasts in order to reduce her compass; but they failed of this desirable effect. Nature had planned an original tendency in her organization that was not to be overcome:--she would have fattened on sour krout.

“My uncle, on the other hand, decreased daily; originally a little man, he became lean, shrunken, wizened. There was a predisposition in his constitution that made him spare, and kept him so:--he would have fallen off even on brewer’s grains.

“It was the common joke of the neighbourhood to designate my aunt, my uncle, and the infant Shakerly, as ‘WHOLESALE, RETAIL, and FOR EXPORTATION;’ and, in truth, they were not inapt impersonations of that popular inscription,--my aunt a giantess, my uncle a pigmy, and the child being ‘carried abroad.’”--This is the commencement of an article entitled “The _Decline_ of Mrs. Shakerly.”

A story of “the Absentee,” and of the “absent tea,” on a friend’s visit to him, is painfully whimsical. Akin to it is an engraving of a person who had retired to rest coming down stairs in his shirt, and shorts, and great alarm, with a chamber-light in his hand, and the top of his nightcap in a smothering blaze, exclaiming

“_Don’t you smell Fire?_”

Run!--run for St. Clement’s engine! For the pawnbroker’s all in a blaze, And the pledges are frying and singing-- Oh! how the poor pawners will craze! Now where can the turncock be drinking? Was there ever so thirsty an elf?-- But he still may tope on, for I’m thinking That the plugs are as dry as himself.

The engines!--I hear them come rumbling: There’s the Phœnix! the Globe! and the Sun! What a row there will be, and a grumbling, When the water don’t start for a run! See! there they come racing and tearing, All the street with loud voices is fill’d; Oh! it’s only the firemen a-swearing At a man they’ve run over and kill’d!

How sweetly the sparks fly away now, And twinkle like stars in the sky; It’s a wonder the engines don’t play now But I never saw water so shy! Why there isn’t enough for a snipe, And the fire it is fiercer, alas! Oh! instead of the New River pipe, They have gone--that they have--to the gas!

Only look at the poor little P----’s On the roof--is there any thing sadder? My dears, keep fast hold, if you please, And they won’t be an hour with the ladder! But if any one’s hot in their feet, And in very great haste to be sav’d, Here’s a nice easy bit in the street, That M‘Adam has lately unpav’d!