Lancashire Sketches

Hoo's naut ogen th' king,But hoo likes a fair thing,An' hoo says hoo con tell when hoo's hurt.

I have heard them talk of kings, and statesmen, "wi' kindling fury i' their breasts;" and, in their "brews" and clubs, which meet for the spread of information, they discuss the merits of political men and measures, and "ferlie at the folk in Lunnon," in a shrewd, trenchant style, which would astonish some members of the collective wisdom of the nation, could they but conveniently overhear it. The people of Lancashire, generally, are industrious collectors of political information, from such sources as they can command. They possess great integrity of judgment, and independence of character, and cannot be long blinded to the difference between wise statesmen and political knaves. They are an honest and a decent people, and would be governed by such. They evince some sparks of perception of what is naturally due to themselves, as well as to their masters; and they only know how to be loyal to others who are loyal to themselves.

When the lame ostler had attended to his charge, he came into the house and sat down with the rest. Somehow, the conversation glided in the direction of Robert Burns, and we were exchanging quotations from his poems and songs, when one of us came to a halt in reciting a passage. To our surprise, the young limper who had rubbed down "Grey Bobby," took up the broken thread, and finished the lines correctly, with good discretion, and evident relish. I fancied that we were having it all to ourselves; but the kind-hearted poet who "mourned the daisy's fate," had been at the "Moor Cock" before us, and touched a respondent chord in the heart of our ostler. I forget who it is that says, "It is the heart which makes the life;" but it is true, and it is the heart which sings in Robert Burns, and the heart will stir to the sound all the world over. How many political essays, and lectures, and election struggles, would it take to produce the humanising effect which the song, "A man's a man for a' that," has awakened? It would sound well in the British houses of parliament, sung in chorus, occasionally, between the speeches.

After resting ourselves about three-quarters of an hour in the Moor Cock, we started up the hill-side, to a point of the road a little past the toll-bar and the old oil-mill in the hollow, at the right hand. Here we struck across the moor, now wading through the heather, now leaping over ruts and holes, where blocks of stone had been got out; then squashing through a patch of mossy swamp, and sinking into the wet turf at every step, till we reached the moss-covered pavement, which the ordnance surveyors have called a "Roman road." It is entirely out of any way of travel. A clearly-defined and regular line of road of about forty feet wide, and which we traced and walked upon up to the summit of the Edge, and down the Yorkshire side, a distance of nearly two miles from our starting place upon the track. We could distinguish it clearly more than a mile beyond the place we stopped at, to a point where it crossed the road at Ripponden, and over the moor beyond, in a north-westerly direction, preserving the same general features as it exhibited in those parts where it was naked to the eye. Here and there, we met with a hole in the road, where the stones of the pavement had been taken out and carried away. While we were resting on a bank at this old road-side, one of the keepers of the moor came up with his dogs, and begged that we would be careful not to use any lights whilst upon the moor, for fear of setting fire to the heath, which was inflammably-dry. I took occasion to ask him what was the name of the path we were upon. He said he did not know, but he had always heard it called "Th' Roman Road." At a commanding point, where this old pavement reaches the edge of "Blackstone," from the Lancashire side, the rocky borders of the road rise equally and abruptly, in two slight elevations, opposite each other, upon which we found certain weather-worn blocks of stone, half buried in the growth of the moor. There was a similarity in the general appearance, and a certain kind of order visible, in the arrangement of these remains, which looked not unlikely to be the relics of some heavy ancient masonry, once standing upon these elevations; and at the spot which is marked, is the line of the "Roman Road," in the ordnance maps, as an "Entrenchment."

The view along the summits of the vast moors, from any of the higher parts of this mountain barrier between the two counties of Lancaster and York, looks primevally-wild and grand, towards the north and south; where dark masses of solitude stretch away as far as the eye can see. In every other direction, the landscape takes in some cultivated land upon the hill-sides, and the bustle and beauty of many a green vale, lying low down among these sombre mountains; with many a picturesque and cultivated dingle, and green ravine, higher up in the hills, in spots where farm-houses have stood for centuries; sometimes with quaint groups of cottages gathered round them, and clumps of trees spreading about, shading the currents of moorland rivulets, as they leap down from the hills. In the valleys, the river winding through green meadows; mansions and mills, villages and churches, and scattered cottages, whose little windows wink cheerfully through their screen of leaves—

Old farms remote, and far apart, with intervening spaceOf black'ning rock, and barren down, and pasture's pleasant face:The white and winding road, that crept through village, glade, and glen,And o'er the dreary moorlands, far beyond the homes of men.

Standing upon these proud and rugged desolations, which look down upon the changeful life of man in the valleys at their feet, with such an air of strength and serenity, whilst the toiling swarms of Lancashire and Yorkshire are scattered over the landscape beyond, in populous hives—the contrast is peculiarly strong; and I have wondered whether these old hills, which have seen the painted Celt tracking his prey through the woods and marshes below, and worshipping "in the eye of light," among wild fanes of rock, upon these mountain wildernesses—which have heard the tread of the legions of old Rome; and have watched the brave Saxon, swinging his axe among the forest trees, and, with patient labour, slowly making these valleys into green and homely pasturages; and which still behold the iron horses of modern days, rushing along the valley every hour, snorting fire and steam: I have wondered whether the hills, at whose feet so many generations of brave men have come and gone, like swathes of grass, might not yet again see these native valleys of mine as desolate and stirless as themselves. These moorland hills, the bleak companions of mist, and cloud, and tempest, rise up one after another upon the scene, till they grow dim on the distant edge of the sky. Lying upon my back, among the heather, I looked along the surface of the moors; and I shall long remember the peculiar loneliness of the landscape seen in that way. Nothing was in sight but a wild infinity of moors and mountain tops, succeeding each other, like heaving waves, of varied form. Not a sign of life was visible over all the scene, except immediately around us, where, now and then, a black-faced sheep lifted its head above the heather, and stared, with a mingled expression of wonder and fear, at the new intruders upon its solitary pasturage. Occasionally, a predatory bird might be seen upon these hills, flitting across the lone expanse—an highwayman of the skies; and, here and there, the moorfowl sprang up from the cover, in whirring flight, and with that wild clucking cry, which, in the stillness of the scene, came upon the ears with a clearness that made the solitude more evident to the senses. A rude shepherd's hut, too, could be seen sheltering near a cluster of crags upon the hill-side, and hardly distinguishable from the heathery mounds, which lay scattered over the surface of the moor. But, in the distance, all seemed one wilderness of untrodden sterility—as silent as death. The sky was cloudless whilst we wandered upon those barren heights: and the blue dome looked down, grandly-calm, upon the landscape, which was covered with a glorious sunshine.

No stir of air was there;Not so much life as on a summer dayRobs not one light seed from the feathered grass,But where the dead leaf fell, there did it rest

Heaven and earth were two magnificent stillnesses, which appeared to gaze serenely and steadily at each other, with the calm dignity and perfect understanding of ancient friends, whose affinities can never be unsettled, except by the fiat of Him who first established them. Looking horizontally along the moors, in this manner, nothing was visible of those picturesque creases, which lie deep between these mountain ridges, and teem with the industrious multitudes of Lancashire and Yorkshire.

These hills form part of a continuous range, running across the island, in different elevations, and familiarly known as the "Backbone of England." Looking southward and south-east, in the direction of the rocky waste called "Stanedge,"—which is crossed by the high road from Manchester to Huddersfield—and "Buckstones," which, according to local tradition, was formerly an highwayman's haunt,—the whole country is one moorland wild; and the romantic hills of Saddleworth, with the dim summits of the Derbyshire mountains, bound the view. Northward, the landscape has the same general appearance. In this direction, Studley Pike lately occupied the summit of a lofty moorland, overlooking the valley between Hebden Bridge and the town of Todmorden; which is part of a district famous for its comely breed of people, and for the charms of its scenery. Studley Pike was a tall stone tower, erected to commemorate the restoration of peace, at the end of our wars with Napoleon. Singularly, it came thundering to the ground on the day of the declaration of war against Russia.

On the west, the valley of the Roch, with its towns and villages, stretches away out from this group of hills. Littleborough nestles immediately at the foot of the mountain; and the eye wanders along the vale, from hamlet to hamlet, till it reaches the towns of Rochdale, Bury, Heywood, Middleton, and the smoky canopy of Manchester in the distance. On a favourable day, many other large and more distant Lancashire towns may be seen. On the east, or Yorkshire side, looking towards Halifax, the hills appear to be endless. The valleys are smaller and more numerous, often lying in narrow gorges and woody ravines between the hills, hardly discernable from the distance. The mountain sides have a more cultivated look, and hovering halos of smoke, rising up from the mountain hollows, with, sometimes, the tops of factory chimneys peering out from the vales, show where villages like Ripponden and Sowerby are situated. On the distant edge of the horizon, a grey cloud hanging steadily beyond the green hill, called "King Cross" marks the locality of the town of Halifax. Green plots of cultivated land are creeping up the steep moors; and comfortable farm-houses, with folds of cottages, built of the stone of the district, are strewn about the lesser hills, giving life and beauty to the scene.

For native men, the moors of this neighbourhood, as well as the country seen from them, contain many objects of interest. The hills standing irregularly around; the rivers and streams; the lakes and pools below, and in the fissures of the mountains—we knew their names. The lakes, or reservoirs, about Blackstone Edge, form remarkable features in its scenery. One of these, "Blackstone Edge Reservoir," takes its name from the mountain upon whose summit it fills an extensive hollow. This lake is upwards of two miles, close by the water's edge. The scenery around it is a table-land, covered with heather, and rocks, and turfy swamps. The other two, "White Lees" and "Hollingworth," lie lower, about half way down the moors: "White Lees" in a retired little glen, about a mile north-west of the "White House," on the top of Blackstone Edge; and "Hollingworth," the largest and most picturesque of the three, is situated about two miles south-west of the same spot. Close by the side of the high road from Lancashire, over these hills into Yorkshire, this old hostelry, known as "Th' White House," is situated near the top of Blackstone Edge, looking towards Lancashire. The division-stone of the two counties stands by the road-side, and about half a mile eastward of this public-house. The northern bank of the road, upon which the division-stone stands, shuts out from view the lake called "Blackstone Edge Reservoir"—a scene which "skylark never warbles o'er." A solitary cart-road leads off the road, at the corner of the reservoir, and, crossing the moor in a north-easterly direction, goes down into a picturesque spot, called "Crag Valley," or "The Vale of Turvin," for it is known by both names. This valley winds through the heart of the moors, nearly four miles, emptying itself at Mytholmroyd, in the vale of Todmorden. Fifty years ago, "Crag Valley" was an unfrequented region, little known, and much feared. Now there are thriving clusters of population in it; and pretty homesteads, in isolated situations, about the sides of the clough. Manufacture has crept up the stream. "Turvin" is becoming a resort of ramblers from the border towns and villages of the two counties, on account of the picturesque wildness of its scenery. In some places the stream dashes through deep gorges of rock, overhung with wood; peeping through which, one might be startled by sight of a precipitous steep, shrouded with trees, and the foaming water rushing wildly below over its fantastic channel. There are several mills in the length of the valley now; and, in level holms, down in the hollow, the land is beautifully green. The vale is prettily wooded in many parts; but the barren hills overlook the whole length of Turvin. In former times, the clough was notable among the people of the surrounding districts, as a rendezvous of coiners and robbers; and the phrase "a Turvin shilling," grew out of the dexterity of these outlaws, who are said to have lurked a long time in the seclusion of this moorland glen.

Approaching Turvin by the rough road across the moor, from the top of Blackstone Edge, it leads into a deep corner of the valley, in which stands the church of "St. John's in the Wilderness," built a few years ago, for the behoof of the inhabitants of the neighbouring moors, and for a little community of factory people in this remote nook of the earth.

Upon the summit of one of the neighbouring mountains, there is a great platform of desolation, distinguished, even among this stony waste, as "The Wilderness;" and I think that whoever has visited the spot will be inclined to say that the roughest prophet that ever brooded over his visions in solitary places of the earth, could not well wish for a wilder Patmos than this moor-top. On the right hand of the public-house, near St. John's Church, several rough roads lead in different directions. The centre one goes up through a thick wood which clothes the mountain side, and on by winding routes to this "cloud-capped" wilderness. On a distant part of this bleak tract stand two remarkable Druidical remains, called "Th' Alder Stones," or the "Altar Stones,"—sombre masses of rock, upon which the Druid priests of our island performed their sacrificial rites, before the wild Celts of the district. The position and formation of these stones, which have each a sloping top, with a hollow in the middle, and a channel thence downward, seem to confirm the character attributed to them.

Returning from "St. John's in the Wilderness," towards Blackstone Edge, a quaint stone building, called "Crag Hall," occupies a shady situation upon the hill-side, at the right hand of the vale, and at the edge of the wild tract called "Erringdale Moor." This ancient hall contains many specimens of carved oak furniture, which have been preserved with the building, from the time of its old owners. A few years ago, the keeper of Erringdale moor dwelt in it, and kept the place in trim as a lodge, for the entertainment of the owners of the moor, and their sporting friends, in the grouse season.

Between the moor-side on which "Crag Hall" is situated, and the road up to the top of Blackstone Edge, a moorland stream runs along its rocky channel, in the deep gut of the hills. I remember that many years ago I wandered for hours, one summer day, up this lonely water, in company with a young friend of mine. In the course of our ramble upon the banks of the stream, little dreaming of any vestiges of human creation in that region, we came almost upon the roof of a cottage, rudely, but firmly built of stone. We descended the bank by a sloping path, leading to the door. There was no smoke, no stir nor sound, either inside or out; but, through the clean windows, we saw a pair of hand-looms, with an unfinished piece upon them. We knocked repeatedly, hoping to obtain some refreshment after our stroll; but there was no answer; and just as we were about to leave the lonely tenement, and take our way homewards—for the twilight was coming on, and we had nearly ten miles to go—we heard the sound of a pair of clogs in the inside of the cottage; and the door was opened by a tall, strong man, apparently about thirty-five years of age. His clear-complexioned face was full of frankness and simplicity. His head was large and well-formed, and covered with bristling brown hair, cut short. Yawning, and stretching his arms out, he accosted us at once—as if we were old friends, for whom he had been looking some time—with, "Well, heaw are yo, to-day?" We asked him for a drink of water. He invited us in, and set two chairs for us in a little kitchen, where the furniture was rudely-simple and sound, and everything in good order, and cleaned to its height. He brought forth pitchers full of buttermilk, plenty of thick oat-cakes, and the sweet butter for which these hills are famous; and we feasted. The cool of the evening was coming on, and there was no fire in his grate; so he fetched a great armful of dry heather from an inner room, and, cramming it into the fire-place, put a light to it. Up blazed the inflammable eilding, with a crackling sound, making the room look cheerful as himself. A few books lay upon the window-sill, which we asked leave to look at. He handed them to us, commenting on them, in a shrewd and simple way, as he did so. They were chiefly books on mathematics, a science which he began to discourse upon with considerable enthusiasm. Now, my young companion happened to have a passion for that science; and he no sooner discovered this affinity between himself and our host, than to it they went pell-mell, with books and chalk, upon the clean flags; and I was bowled out of the conversation at once. Leaving them to their problems, and circles, and triangles, I walked out upon the moor; and sitting upon a knoll above the house, wrote a little rhyme in my note-book, which some years after appeared in the corner of a Manchester newspaper. When I returned they were still at it, ding-dong, about something or another in differential calculus; and I had great difficulty in impressing upon the mind of my companion the important area lying between us and our homes. This lonely mathematician, it seemed, was a bachelor, and he got his living partly by weaving, and partly by watching the moor, for the owners; and as I looked upon him I almost envied the man his strong frame, his sound judgment, his happy unsophisticated mind, and his serene and simple way of life. He walked over the moor with us nearly two miles, without hat, conversing about his books, and the lonely manner of his life, with which he appeared to be perfectly contented. At our parting, he pressed us to come over the moors again the first opportunity, and spend a day with him at his cottage. I have hardly ever met with another man who seemed so strong and sound in body; and so frank, and sensible, and simple-hearted, as this mathematical eremite of the mountains. That enthusiastic attachment to science, which so strongly distinguishes him in my remembrance, is a common characteristic of the native working-people of Lancashire, among whom, in proportion to the population, there is an extraordinary number of well-read and practised mechanics, botanists, musicians, and mathematicians; and the booksellers in the towns of the county, know that any standard works upon these subjects, and some upon divinity, are sure to find a large and ready sale among the operative classes.

We wore the afternoon far away in rambling about the high and open part of Blackstone Edge, between the group of rocks called "Robin Hood's Bed," and the solitary inn called the "White House," upon the Yorkshire road. Wading through fern and heather, and turfy swamps; climbing rocks, and jumping over deep gutters and lodgments of peaty water, had made us so hungry and weary, that we made the best of our way to this inn, while the sun was yet up above the hills. Here, the appetite we had awakened was amply satisfied; and we refreshed, and rested ourselves a while, conversing about the country around us, and exchanging anecdotes of its remarkable local characters, and reminiscences of our past adventures in the neighbourhood. Many of these related to "Old Joe," the quaint gamekeeper, at Hollingworth, a kind of local "Leather Stocking," who has many a time rowed us about the lake in his fishing-boat.

When we came out of the inn, the sun had gone down upon the opposite side of the scene. Night's shadows were climbing the broad steeps; but the summit-lines of the hills still showed in clear relief, against the western sky, where the sunset's glory lingered. In every other direction, the skirts of the landscape were fading from view. Rochdale town, with its church tower and stacks of tall chimneys, had disappeared in the distance. The mountainous wastes stretching away on the north, south, and east, were melting into indistinct masses; and, below the hills, quiet evening's dreamy shades were falling softly down, and folding away for the night the hamleted valleys between Blackstone Edge and the boundary of the scene. Day's curtains were closing to; the watchers of night were beginning their golden vigil; and all the air seemed thick with dreams. We descended from the moor-top by a steep path, which diverges, on the right-hand side of the highway, a little below the "White House," and cuts off a mile of the distance between that point and the "Moor Cock," where we had left "Grey Bobby" and the "Whitechapel." Far down, from scattered cots and folds, little lights were beginning to glimmer. That frontlet jewel of mild evening's forehead—"the star that bids the shepherd fold"—was glowing above us, and, here and there, twinklings of golden fire were stealing out from the blue expanse. As we picked our way down the moor, the stillness of the tract around us seemed to deepen as the light declined; and there was no distinguishable sound in the neighbourhood of our path, except the silvery tricklings of indiscernable rills. From the farms below, the far-off bark of dogs and lowing of cattle came floating up, mingled with the subdued rush and rattle of railway trains, rushing along the valley. Half an hour's walk down the hill brought us back to the "Moor Cock." Limper, the ostler, got "Grey Bobby" from the stable, and put him into the harness. Out came the folk of the house, to see us off. Our frisky tit treated us to another romp; after which we drove down the road, in the gloaming, and on through Littleborough and Smallbridge, to Rochdale, by the light of the stars.

The Town of Heywood and its Neighbourhood

Nature never did betrayThe heart that loved her; 'tis her privilege,Through all the years of this our life, to leadFrom joy to joy.Wordsworth

One Saturday afternoon, about midsummer, I was invited by a friend to spend a day at his house, in the green outskirts of Heywood. The town has a monotonous, cotton-spinning look; yet, it is surrounded by a pleasant country, and has some scenery of a picturesque description in its immediate neighbourhood. Several weeks previous to this invitation had been spent by me wholly amongst the bustle of our "cotton metropolis," and, during that time, I had often thought how sweetly summer was murmuring with its "leafy lips" beyond the town, almost unseen by me except when I took a ride to a certain suburb, and wandered an hour or two in a scene upon which the season seemed to smile almost in vain, and where the unsatisfactory verdure was broken up by daub-holes and rows of half-built cottages, and the air mixed with the aroma of brick-kilns and melting lime. Sometimes, too, I stole down into the market-place, on a Saturday morning, to smell at the flowers and buy a "posy" for my button-hole. It reminded me of the time when I used to forage about my native hedges, for bunches of the wild rose and branches of white-blossomed thorn. But now, as the rosy time of the year grew towards its height, I began to hanker after those moors and noiseless glens of Lancashire, where, even yet, nature seems to have it all her own way. I longed for the quiet valleys and their murmuring waters; the rustling trees; and the cloudless summer sky seen through fringed openings in the wildwood's leafy screen. Somebody says, that "we always find better men in action than in repose;" and though there are contemplative spirits who instinctively shun the din of towns, and, turning to the tranquil seclusions of nature, read a lofty significance in its infinite forms and moods of beauty, yet, the grand battle of life lies where men are clustered. Great men can live greatly anywhere; but ordinary people must be content to snatch at any means likely to improve or relieve their lot; and it will do any care-worn citizen good to "consider the lilies of the field" a little, now and then. Country folk come to town to relieve the monotony of their lives; and town's folk go to the country for refreshment and repose. To each the change may be beneficial—at least I thought so; and, as light as leaf upon tree, I hailed my journey; for none of Robin Hood's men ever went to the greenwood with more pleasure than I.