Lays and Legends of the English Lake Country

NOTES TO "THE LUCK OF EDENHALL."

The curious ancient drinking glass, called the Luck of Edenhall, on the preservation of which, according to popular superstition, the prosperity of the Musgrave family depends, is well known from the humourous parody on the old ballad of Chevy Chase, commonly attributed to the Duke of Wharton, but in reality composed by Lloyd, one of his jovial companions, which begins,

"God prosper long from being brokeThe Luck of Edenhall."

The Duke, after taking a draught, had nearly terminated "the Luck of Edenhall;" but fortunately the butler caught the cup in a napkin as it dropped from his grace's hands. It is understood that it is no longer subjected to such risks. It is now generally shown with a damask cloth securely held by the four corners beneath it, which for this purpose is deposited along with the vessel in a safe place where important family documents are preserved.

Not without good reason do the Musgraves look with superstitious regard to its careful preservation amongst them. The present generation could, it is said, tell of disasters following swift and sure upon its fall, in fulfilment of the omen embodied in the legend attached to it.

The vessel is of a green coloured glass of Venice manufacture of the 10th century, ornamented with foliage of different colours in enamel and gold; it is about seven inches in height and about two in diameter at the base, from which it increases in width and terminates in a gradual curve at the brim where it measures about four inches. It is carefully preserved in a stamped leather case, ornamented with scrolls of vine leaves, and having on the top, in old English characters, the letters I. H. C.; from which it seems probable that this vessel was originally designed for sacred uses. The covering is said to be of the time of Henry VI. or Edward IV. The glass is probably one of the oldest in England.

The tradition respecting this vessel is connected with the still current belief, that he who has courage to rush upon a fairy festival, and snatch from them their drinking cup or horn, shall find it prove to him a cornucopia of good fortune or plenty, if he can bear it safely across a running stream. The goblet still carefully preserved in Edenhall is supposed to have been seized at a banquet of the elves, by one of the ancient family of Musgrave; or, as others say, the butler, going to fetch water from St. Cuthbert's Well, which is near the hall, surprised a company of fairies who were dancing on the green, near the spring, where they had left this vessel, which the butler seized, and on his refusal to restore it, they uttered the ominous words,—

"Whenever this cup shall break or fall,Farewell the luck of Edenhall."

The name of the goblet was taken from the prophecy. There is no writing to shew how it came into the family, nor any record concerning it. Its history rests solely on the tradition. Dr. Todd supposes it to have been a chalice, when it was unsafe to have those sacred vessels made of costlier metals, on account of the predatory habits which prevailed on the borders. He also says, that the bishops of this diocese permitted not only the parochial or secular, but also the monastic or regular clergy, to celebrate the eucharist in chalices of that clear and transparent metal. The following was one of the canons made in the reign of king Athelstan:—Sacer calix fusilis sit, non ligneus—Let the holy chalice be fusile, and not of wood, which might imbibe the consecrated wine.

William of Newbridge relates how one of these drinking-vessels, called elfin goblets, came into the possession of King Henry the First. A country-man belonging to a village near his own birthplace, returning home late at night, and tipsy, from a visit to a friend in a neighbouring village, heard a sound of merriment and singing within a hill; and peeping through an open door in the side of the hill, he saw a numerous company of both sexes feasting in a large and finely lighted hall. A cup being handed to him by one of the attendants, he took it, threw out the contents, and made off with his booty, pursued by the whole party of revellers, from whom he escaped by the speed of his mare, and reached his home in safety. The cup, which was of unknown material and of unusual form and colour was presented to the king.

At Muncaster Castle there is preserved an ancient glass vessel of the basin form, about seven inches in diameter, ornamented with some white enamelled mouldings; which, according to family tradition, was presented by King Henry VI. to Sir John Pennington, Knight, who was steadily attached to that unfortunate monarch, and whom he had the honour of entertaining at Muncaster Castle, in his flight from the Yorkists. In acknowledgment of the protection he had received, the King is said to have presented his host with this curious glass cup with a prayer that the family should ever prosper, and never want a male heir, so long as they preserved it unbroken: hence the cup was called "the luck of Muncaster." The Hall contains, among other family pictures, one representing "King Henry VI. giving to Sir John Pennington, on his leaving the Castle 1461, the luck of Muncaster."

It is probable that the king was here on two occasions; the first being after the battle of Towton, in 1461, when accompanied by his queen and their young son, with the dukes of Exeter and Somerset, he fled with great precipitation into Scotland: the second, after the battle of Hexham, which was fought on the 15th of May, 1463. On his defeat at Hexham, some friends of the fugitive king took him under their protection, and conveyed him into Lancashire. During the period that he remained in concealment, which was about twelve months, the king visited Muncaster. On this occasion the royal visit appears to have been attended with very little of regal pomp or ceremony. Henry, having made his way into Cumberland, with only one companion arrived at Irton Hall soon after midnight; but his quality being unknown, or the inmates afraid to receive him, he was denied admittance. He then passed over the mountains towards Muncaster, where he was accidentally met by some shepherds at three o'clock in the morning, and was conducted by them to Muncaster Castle. The spot where the meeting took place is still indicated by a tall steeple-like monument on an eminence at some distance from the castle.

The "luck of Burrell Green," at the house of Mr. Lamb, yeoman, in Great Salkeld, Cumberland, is less fragile in structure, is not less venerated for its traditional alliance with the fortunes of its possessors than the lordly cups of the Penningtons and Musgraves. It is an ancient brass dish resembling a shield, with an inscription round it, now nearly effaced. Like the celebrated glass of Edenhall, this too has its legend and couplet, the latter of which runs thus:—

"If this dish be sold or gi'en,Farewell the luck of Burrell Green."

When Ranulph de Meschines had received the grant of Cumberland from William the Conqueror, he made a survey of the whole county, and gave to his followers all the frontiers bordering on Scotland and Northumberland, retaining to himself the central part between the east and west mountains, "a goodly great forest, full of woods, red deer and fallow, wild swine, and all manner of wild beasts." This Forest of Inglewood comprehends all that large and now fertile tract of country, extending westward from Carlisle to Westward, thence in a direct line through Castle Sowerby and Penrith to the confluence of the Eamont and the Eden, which latter river then forms its eastern boundary all the way northward to Carlisle, forming a sort of triangle, each side of which is more than twenty miles in length. The Duke of Devonshire, as lord of the Honour of Penrith, has now paramount authority over the manors of Inglewood Forest.

The Forest, or Swainmote, court, for the seigniory, is held yearly, on the feast of St. Barnabas the apostle (June 11.) in the parish of Hesket-in-the-Forest, in the open air, on the great north road to Carlisle; and the place is marked by a stone placed before an ancient thorn, called Court-Thorn. The tenants of more than twenty mesne manors attend here, from whom a jury for the whole district is empanelled and sworn; and Dr. Todd says, that the chamberlain of Carlisle was anciently foreman. Here are paid the annual dues to the lord of the forest, compositions for improvements, purprestures, agistments, and puture of the foresters.

Until the year 1823, there was an old oak on Wragmire Moss, well known as the last tree of Inglewood Forest, which had survived the blasts of 700 or 800 winters. This "time-honored" oak was remarkable, not only for the beauty of the wood, which was marked in a similar manner to satin-wood, but as being a boundary mark between the manors of the Duke of Devonshire and the Dean and Chapter of Carlisle, as also between the parishes of Hesket and St. Cuthbert's, Carlisle; and was noticed as such for upwards of 600 years. This oak, which had weathered so many hundred stormy winters was become considerably decayed in its trunk. It fell not, however, by the tempest or the axe, but from sheer old age on the 13th of June, 1823. It was an object of great interest, being the veritable last tree of Inglewood Forest: under whose spreading branches may have reposed victorious Edward I., who is said to have killed 200 bucks in this ancient forest; and, perhaps at a later period, "John de Corbrig, the poor hermit of Wragmire," has counted his beads beneath its shade.

On the same day on which this tree fell, Mr. Robert Bowman, who was born at Hayton, in 1705, died at Irthington, at the extraordinary age of 117 years and 8 months, retaining his faculties till about three months before his death. He lived very abstemiously, was never intoxicated but once in his life, and at the age of 111, used occasionally to assist his family at their harvest work. The last forty years of his life were spent at Irthington, and in his 109th year he walked to and from Carlisle, being 14 miles, in one day.

The most remarkable instance of longevity in a native of Cumberland is that of John Taylor, born at Garragill in the parish of Aldston moor. He went underground to work in the lead mines at eleven years of age. He was fourteen or fifteen at the time of the great solar eclipse, called in the North mirk Monday, which happened 29th of March, 1652. From that time till 1752, except for two years, during which he was employed in the mint at Edinburgh, he wrought in the mines at Aldston, at Blackhall in the Bishoprick of Durham, and in various parts of Scotland. His death happened sometime in the year 1772, in the neighbourhood of Moffat, near the Leadhills mines, in which he had been employed several years. He worked in the mines till he was about 115. At the time of his decease he must have been 135 years of age.

The Rev. George Braithwaite, who died, curate of St. Mary's Carlisle, in 1753, at the age of 110, is said to have been a member of the Cathedral, upwards of one hundred years, having first become connected with the establishment as a chorister.

In Cumberland the prevalence of longevity seems to be confined to no particular district: the parishes which border on the fells on the east side of the county, are rather more remarkable for longevity than those on the Western coast: but there is little difference except in the large towns.

A list of remarkable instances of longevity, chiefly taken from the registers of burials in the several parishes in Cumberland, is given in Lyson's Magna Britannia. It embraces the period between 1664 and 1814 inclusive, and gives the date, name, parish, and age of each individual. In that space of 150 years, the list comprises 144 individuals ranging from 100 to 113 years of age. Seventy were males, seventy-four were females.

The number of persons in Cumberland who have reached from 90 to 99 years inclusive, since the ages have been noted in the parish registers is above 1120: of these about one fourth have attained or exceeded the age of 95 years.

HOB-THROSS

Millom's bold lords and knights of oldQuaff'd their mead from cups of gold.A lordly life was theirs, and free,With revel and joust and minstrelsy.Their fields were full, and their waters flow'd;On a hundred steeds their warriors rode:And glorious still as their line began,It broaden'd out as it onward ran.Millom's proud courts had page and groom,To serve in hall, to wait in room;Maid and squire in fair array:But better than these, at close of day—Better than groom or page in hall,Than maid and squire, that came at a call,Was the Goblin Fiend, that shunn'd their sight,And wrought for the lords of Millom by night.When sleepy maidens left their fires,Hob-Thross forth from barns and byresCame tumbling in, and stretching his formOut over the hearthstone bright and warm,He folded his stunted thumbs, to dreamFor an idle hour ere he sipp'd his cream;Or smoothed his wrinkled visage to gazeOn his hairy length at the kindly blaze.His snipp'd brown bowl of creamy storeSet nightly—nothing Hob wanted more.He scoured, and delved, and groom'd, and churned;But favour or hire he scorned and spurned.Leave him alone to will and to do,Never were hand and heart so true.Tempt him with gift, or lay out his hire—Farewell Hob to farm and fire.Blest the manor, and blest the lord,That had Hob to work by field and board!Blest the field, and blest the farm,That Hob would keep from waste and harm!Or ever a wish was fairly thought,Hob was ready, and all was wrought;Was grain to be cut, or housed the corn,All was finish'd 'twixt night and morn.Millom's great lords rode round their landWith courteous speech and bounteous hand.Hob-Thross too went forth to roam;Made every hearth in Millom his home.He thresh'd the oats, he churn'd the cream,He comb'd the manes of the stabled team,And fodder'd them well with corn and hay,When the lads were laggards at peep of day.Millom's good lord said—"Nights are cool;Weave Hob a coat of the finest wool.Service long he has tender'd free:Of the finest wool his hood shall be."—For his service good, in that ancient hold,To them and to theirs for ages told,They wove him a coat of the finest wool,And a hood to wrap him when nights were cool.It broke his peace, and he could not stay.Hob took the clothes and went his way.He wrapp'd him round and he felt him warm:But his life at Millom lost all its charm.Night and day there was heard a wailIn his ancient haunts, through wind and hail,—"Hob has got a new coat and new hood,And Hob no more will do any good."Blight and change pass'd over the place.Came to end that ancient race.Millom's great lords were found aloneStretch'd in chancels, carved in stone.Gone to dust was all their power;Spiders wove in my lady's bower.While Hob in his coat and hood of greenWent wooing by night the Elfin Queen.Call him to field, or wish him in stall,Hob-Thross answers no one's call.The snipp'd brown bowls of cream in vainOn the hearths he loved are placed again.The old and glorious days are flown.Hob is too proud or lazy grown;Or he goes in his coat and his hood of greenBy night a-wooing the Elfin Queen.

NOTES TO "HOB-THROSS."

The lords of Millom are connected with an ancient legend of Egremont Castle, which is given elsewhere, and which especially alludes to the horn and hatterell which they bore on their helmets. This crest is said to have been assumed in the time of Henry I., on the occasion of the grant of this seignory by the Lord of Egremont to Godard de Boyvill or Boisville, whose descendants retained possession of the greater part of it for about one hundred years when it became vested by marriage in Sir John Hudleston, whose pedigree is alleged to be traceable for five generations before the Conquest. In this family it remained for about five hundred years, when, for failure of male issue it was sold to Sir James Lowther, nearly a century ago. The names of the first possessors are now almost forgotten in their own lands. The castle is of great antiquity. It is uncertain at what date it was originally built; but it was fortified and embattled by Sir John Hudleston, in 1335. In ancient times it was surrounded by a fine park, of which there are some scanty remains on a ridge to the north. The great square tower is still habitable, though its old battlements are gone. The castle was invested during the parliamentary war, and the old vicarage house was pulled down at the same time, "lest the rebels should take refuge there." There are traces of the ancient moat still visible. Between the broken pillars of an old gateway, an avenue leads to the front of the ruin, which, though not of great extent, presents a fine specimen of the decayed pomp of early times. The walls of the court yard are all weather-stained and worn; and, here and there, delicate beds of moss have crept over them, year after year, so long, that the moist old stones are now matted with hues of great beauty. The front of the castle is roofless, and some parts of the massive walls are thickly clothed with ivy. A fine flight of worn steps leads up through the archway, to the great tower, in the inner court. Above the archway a stone shield bears the decayed heraldries of the Hudleston family; and these arms appear, also, on a slab in the garden wall, and in other parts of the buildings. The front entrance of the great tower, from the inner court, when open, shews within a fine old carved staircase, which leads one to suppose that the interior may retain many of its ancient characteristics.

The church is a venerable building, with its quaint little turret, containing two bells. The edifice consists of a nave and chancel, a south aisle, and a modern porch on the same side. The aisle was the burial place of the Hudlestons. Here is an altar-tomb, ornamented with Gothic tracery and figures bearing shields of arms, on which recline the figures of a knight and his lady, in alabaster, very much mutilated. The knight is in plate armour, his head resting on a helmet, and having a collar of S.S.; the lady is dressed in a long gown and mantle, with a veil. They appear to have originally been painted and gilt, but the greater part of the colouring has been rubbed off. Near the altar-tomb are the very mutilated remains of a knight, carved in wood, apparently of the fourteenth century. A few years ago there was a lion at his feet. A mural marble tablet to the memory of the Hudleston family is on the wall of the aisle.

The lordship of Millom is the largest seignory within the barony of Egremont; its ancient boundaries being described as the river Duddon on the east, the islands of Walney and Piel de Foudray on the south, the Irish Sea on the west, and the river Esk and the mountains Hardknot and Wrynose on the north. It anciently enjoyed great privileges: it was a special jurisdiction into which the sheriff of the county could not enter: its lords had the power of life and death, and enjoyed jura regalia in the six parishes forming their seignory, namely, Millom, Bootle, Whicham, Whitbeck, Corney, and Waberthwaite. Mr. Denton, writing in 1688, says that the gallows stood on a hill near the Castle, on which criminals had been executed within the memory of persons then living. To commemorate the power anciently possessed by the lords of this seignory, a stone has recently been erected with this inscription—"Here the Lords of Millom exercised Jura Regalia."

This lordship still retains its own coroner.

A small nunnery of Benedictines formerly existed within this seignory, at Lekely in Seaton, which lies westward from Bootle, near the sea. The precise date of its foundation cannot be ascertained: but it appears to have taken place on or before the time of Henry Boyvill, the fourth lord of Millom, who lived about the commencement of the thirteenth century; and who "gave lands in Leakley, now called Seaton, to the nuns;" and who in the deed of feofment of the manor of Leakley made by the said Henry to Goynhild, his daughter, on her marriage with Henry Fitz-William, excepts "the land in Leakley which I gave to the holy nuns serving God and Saint Mary in Leakley."

The nunnery was dedicated to St. Leonard; and was so poor that it could not sufficiently maintain the prioress and nuns. Wherefore the Duke of Lancaster, afterwards Henry IV., by his charter, in 1357, granted to them in aid the hospital of St. Leonard, at Lancaster, with power to appoint the chantry priest to officiate in the said hospital. At the dissolution the possessions of the priory were only of the annual value of £12 12s. 6d. according to Dugdale, or £13 17s. 4d. by Speed's valuation.

When at the suppression of Abbeys it came to the crown, Henry VIII. gave the site and lands at Seaton to his servant Sir Hugh Askew, and his heirs. This Knight was descended from Thurston de Bosco, who lived in the days of King John at a place then called the Aikskeugh, or Oakwood, near Millom, and afterwards at Graymains, near Muncaster; and from a poor estate was raised to great honour and preferment, by his service to King Henry VIII. in his house and in the field. Anne Askew, whose name stands so eminent in the annals of martyrology, was one of his descendants.

There are few remains of the convent now left: some part of the priory-chapel is still standing, particularly a fine window with lancets, in the style of the thirteenth century. Seton-Hall, formerly a part of the conventual buildings, and subsequently the residence of Sir Hugh Askew, is now occupied as a farm house.

Of Seton and Sir Hugh Askew, we have the following quaint story in Sandford's M.S. account of Cumberland:—

"Ffour miles southward stands Seaton, an estate of £500 per annum, sometimes a religious house, got by one Sir Hugo Askew, yeoman of the sellar to Queen Catherine in Henry Eight's time, and born in this contry. And when that Queen was divorced from her husband, this yeoman was destitute. And he applied for help to (the) Lo. Chamberlain for some place or other in the King's service. The Lord Steward knew him well, because he had helpt to a cup (of) wine ther before, but told him he had no place for him but a charcoal carrier. 'Well' quoth this monsir Askew, 'help me in with one foot, and let me gett in the other as I can.' And upon a great holiday, the king looking out at some sports, Askew got a courtier, a friend of his, to stand before the king; and Askew gott on his velvet cassock and his gold chine, and basket of chercole on his back, and marched in the king's sight with it. 'O,' saith the king, 'now I like yonder fellow well, that disdains not to do his dirty office in his dainty clothes: what is he?' Says his friend that stood by on purpose, 'It is Mr Askew, that was yeoman of the sellar to the late Queen's Mtie, and now glad of this poor place to keep him in your matie's service, which he will not forsake for all the world.' The king says, 'I had the best wine when he was i'th cellar. He is a gallant wine-taster: let him have his place againe;' and after knighted him; and he sold his place, and married the daughter of Sir John Hudleston; (and purchased6 this religious place of Seaton, nye wher he was borne, of an ancient freehold family,) and settled this Seaton upon her, and she afterwards married monsir Penengton, Lo: of Muncaster, and had Mr. Joseph and a younger son with Penington, and gave him this Seaton."

A brass plate on the south wall of the chancel of Bootle Church, bears the effigies of a knight in armour, with the following inscription in old English characters, indicating his tomb. "Here lieth Sir Hughe Askew, knyght. late of the seller to Kynge Edward the VI. which Sir Hughe was made knyght, at Musselborough felde, in ye yeare of our Lord, 1547, and died the second day of Marche, in the yere of our Lord God, 1562."

Among the local spirits of Cumberland, whose existence is believed in by the vulgar, is one named Hob-Thross, whom the old gossips report to have been frequently seen in the shape of a "Body aw ower rough," lying by the fire side at midnight. He was one of the class of creatures called Brownies, and according to popular superstition, had especially attached himself to the family at Millom Castle. He was a solitary being, meagre, flat-nosed, shaggy and wild in his appearance, and resembled the "lubbar fiend," so admirably described by Milton in L'Allegro. Gervase of Tilbury speaks of him as one of the "dæmones, senile vultu, facie corrugata, statura pusilli, dimidium pollicis non habentes." In the day time he lurked in remote recesses of the old houses which he delighted to haunt; and, in the night, sedulously employed himself in discharging any laborious task which he thought might be acceptable to the family, to whose service he had devoted himself. He loved to stretch himself by the kitchen fire when the menials had taken their departure. Before the glimpse of morn he would execute more work than could be done by a man in ten days. He did not drudge from the hope of recompense: on the contrary, so delicate was his attachment, that the offer of reward, but particularly of food, infallibly would occasion his disappearance for ever. He would receive, however, if placed for him in a snipped pot, a quart of cream, or a mess of milk-porridge. He had his regular range of farm houses; and seems to have been a kind spirit, and willing to do any thing he was required to do. The servant girls would frequently put the cream in the churn, and say, "I wish Hob would churn that," and they always found it done. Hob's readiness to fulfil the wishes of his friends was sometimes productive of ludicrous incidents. One evening there was every prospect of rain next day, and a farmer had all his grain out. "I wish," said he, "I had that grain housed." Next morning Hob had housed every sheaf, but a fine stag which had helped him was lying dead at the barn door. The day however became extremely fine, and the farmer thought his grain would have been better in the field: "I wish," said he, "that Hob-Thross was in the mill-dam;" next morning all the farmer's grain was in the mill-dam. Such were the tales which were constantly told of the Millom Brownie, and as constantly believed. He left the country at last, through the mistaken kindness of some one, who made him a coat and hood to keep him warm during the winter. He was heard at night singing at his favourite haunts for a while about his apparel, and "occupation gone," and at length left the country.