And verdant valleys, greet our eyes.
Here, ancient castles (once so grand)
Show marks of Time’s defacing hand;
Some, shatter’d by war’s hissing shot,
Leave only stones to tell the spot;
Whilst others, towers still abide
To mourn, alas! their former pride:
And thine, O Knaresboro’, shares the fall—
Now little but a crumbling wall.
[89] These lines were composed to accompany the nest, which the author purchased at the little museum of petrified curiosities in “Mother Shipton’s” Inn, situated about a quarter of a mile from the Dropping Wells at Knaresborough, and which he presented to his much respected friend and benefactor, J. Cutcliffe, Esq., then residing at Newcastle-under-Lyme, Staffordshire, August, 1865.