Leyburn stands high among the hills, and must have been a picturesque old market-place before the ancient town-hall, market-cross, and two stately elms were removed. The great wide street has now a bare and by no means attractive appearance, and were it not for the lovely surroundings it would not form so popular a centre for exploring. The "Shawl," the huge natural terrace, on a rocky base high up above the tree-tops of the woods below, is, of course, its great feature, and a more delightful walk could not be found in England, with the softest turf to walk upon and the glorious panorama in front. Conspicuous among the heights is flat-topped Penhill, standing boldly out against the wide expanse of dale, upon whose crest are the ruins of a chapel of the old Knights Templars. A gap in the rock, with a path running westwards through the woods, is known as "Queen's Gap," for Mary Queen of Scots when she fled from Bolton Castle got thus far when she was overtaken in attempting to urge her horse through the narrow ravine. In consequence of this, the "Shawl" locally is said to derive its name from the shawl the prisoner dropped upon the way, giving her pursuers a clue; which on the face of it is ridiculous, as the name is derived either from the Saxon Sholl or Scandinavian Schall. Bolton is some five miles away to the west, and the poor captive was to have gone northwards to Richmond and thence to her native land; and at Bellerby, between Richmond and Leyburn, a halt was to have been made at the Hall, the seat of the Royalist family of Scott, where a company of Scots guards was stationed ready to receive her. The old Hall still stands on the left-hand side of the village green as you enter, and looks as if it had a history.
BELLERBY OLD HALL.
At Bolton the window may be seen from which she was lowered to the ground, and one can trace the way she took in a north-easterly direction across the rocky bed of the rushing stream into the woods below the "Shawl." The window from which she escaped is the upper one of the three running horizontally with the south-western tower. There is another window to the prison-room which looks into the inner courtyard. The apartment is grim and bare, with a small fireplace, and steps leading down into a larger bare apartment, once the "drawing-room." Though externally the castle is not so picturesque as Middleham, it is much more perfect and interesting. The hooded stone fireplaces remain in the walls, and various rooms can be located, from the hall and chapel to the vault-like stables in the basement. The well, too, is perfect, with scooped-out wall to the upper chambers, not forgetting the awful dungeon in the solid rock. A large apartment with wide Tudor fireplace has been converted into a museum, and the curiosities are of a varied nature, from cocking spurs and boxing-gloves from the sporting centres of Leyburn and Middleham to the bull-fight banderillos of Spain. There is quite an assortment of weird-looking instruments of torture, which, after all, are only toasting-dogs, huge cumbrous things like antediluvian insects or much magnified microbes. How is it these appurtenances of domestic comfort have entirely died out like the now extinct warming-pan? But this museum can no way be compared with Mr. Home's wonderful collections at Leyburn. Here you can learn something about everything, for the kindly proprietor of the museum takes a pride in describing his curios. Those who have been to Middleham and seen the castle immortalised by Shakespere, may here study Edward IV.'s fair hair. As rare a curiosity is a valentine of the time of William III. From the treasures of Egyptian tombs you skip to the first invented matches; from Babylonian inscriptions to early-Victorian samplers. And the learned antiquarian relates how he was educated in the old Yore mill at Aysgarth by old John Drummond, the grandson of the Jacobite Earl of Perth, who had to hide himself in a farm in Bishopdale (How Rig) for his hand in the '45, when the Scotch estates were confiscated for aiding the cause of the Bonnie Prince. Were it not for Mr. Home's interest in old-time customs, the bull-ring in the market-place would have disappeared, for the socket was nearly worn through when he had it repaired. He relates how at the last bull-baiting the infuriated beast got away and sent the whole sportsmen flying, and at length was shot in Wensley village.
Wensley nestles in the valley, surrounded by hills. The interior of the church is rich in carvings from the ruinous abbey of Easby, near Richmond. The stalls from Easby have at the ends exceptionally bold and elaborate carvings with heraldic shields and arms, dating from the days of Edward IV. A nearly life-size brass, of the third Edward's time, is of its kind one of the finest in England,—an ecclesiastic in robes, with crossed hands pointing downwards. By the entrance door is a quaint old poor-box; but what first strikes the eye as you enter, is the parclose screen from Easby Abbey, which, ill fitting its confined space, partially blocks the windows; but the effect of the elaborate carving against the tracery is very striking. It is early-Tudor in date, and belonged to the Scrope chantry, whose arms appear upon it, with those of Fitz-Hugh, Marmion, and other noble families. Within this screen, evidently a good many years later, a manorial pew was made, the side of which is within the parclose. To amalgamate the two, the latter has been somewhat mangled, doors having been added, with a pendant aloft to balance other large hollow pendants in the various arches. Unfortunately the whole has been painted with a dull grey and grained, a feeble attempt to represent marble, and parts of it are also gilt. A fixed settle has been added to the interior, so unless carefully examined it is difficult to detect how the parclose and pew were made into one. The two-decker pulpit and the wide old-fashioned pews lined with faded green baize and pink rep, bring us back to more modern times; but one would be loath to see them removed if restoration funds were lavish. Beneath the great manorial pew lie at rest the remains of the daughter of the thirteenth Lord Scrope, who by marriage with the first Duke of Bolton brought the castle into the Poulett family: until then the Scropes had held possession through marriage with an heiress of the Nevills. The third wife of Charles Poulett, second Duke of Bolton, was Henrietta Crofts, the daughter of the Duke of Monmouth and Eleanor Needham.[34]
The Scrope who had charge of the Scots queen at Bolton Castle was Henry, the eleventh lord, whose wife was sister to the captive's plotting lover, the Duke of Norfolk, who also lost his head through these ambitious schemes; and doubtless it was the duke who contrived the queen's escape. She had been brought from the castle of Carlisle in July 1568, but after her attempt to escape was promptly removed (on January 26) to Tutbury Castle under charge of the Earl of Shrewsbury. The furniture of her private altar at Bolton, the altar-cloth, part of a rosary, a small bronze crucifix, and an alms-bag, are now preserved at Low Hall, Yeadon, mentioned earlier in this chapter. Her hawking gloves also: these are said to have been given to Lord Scrope upon her leaving.
Some miles to the west of Bolton is Nappa Hall (where the ancient family of Metcalfe lived since the reign of Henry VI., and where Metcalfes live to-day), a fortified manor-house with square towers (suggestive of Haddon), which also claims association with the unfortunate queen. By some accounts she slept here one night, by others two or more; and the tradition in the Metcalfe family says nine, in the highest chamber of the tallest tower. The date is not known, but probably she was brought here on her way from Carlisle Castle. The bed on which she slept, the top of which was very low, is now at Newby Hall, near Ripon. Our sanitary views being very distinct from those enlightened times, the pillars of these sixteenth-century beds are frequently raised (in some cases unnecessarily high), and unless one wished to be half-smothered, this is a natural thing to do if the bed is to be put to practical use; but nowadays the collectors of ancient furniture are again reducing the height, and bringing them down to their original proportions.
