Many remains show that in Lancashire, in the time of Henry VIII., the spirit of church extension was again in full flow. Indications of it occur at Warrington, Burnley, Colne, and St. Michael-le-Wyre, near Garstang, also in the aisles of Middleton Church, and in the towers of Rochdale, Haslingden, Padiham, and Warton, near Lancaster. Here, however, we must pause; the history of the old Lancashire churches treated in full would be a theme as broad and various as that of the lives and writings of its men of letters. There is one, nevertheless, which justly claims the special privilege of an added word, the very interesting little edifice called Langho Chapel, four miles from Blackburn, the materials of which it was built consisting of part of the wreck of Whalley Abbey. Sculptured stones, with heraldic shields and other devices, though much battered and disfigured, declare the source from which they were derived; and in the heads of some of the windows, which resemble the relics of others at the Abbey, are fragments of coloured glass in all likelihood of similar origin. The date of the building would seem to have been about 1557, though the first mention of it does not occur until 1575. How curious and suggestive are the reminders one meets with in our own country (comparing the small with the great), of the quarrying of the Coliseum by the masons of mediæval Rome!
In old halls, mansions, and manor-houses, especially of sixteenth-century style, Lancashire abounds. A few are intact, held, like Widnes House, by a descendant of the original owners; or preserved through transfer to some wealthy merchant or manufacturer from the town, who takes an equal pride in maintaining the integrity of all he found—a circumstance to which we are indebted for some of the most beautiful archæological relics the county possesses. On the contrary, as would be expected, the half-ruined largely predominate, and these in many cases are now devoted to ignoble purposes. A considerable number of stronger substance have been modernised, often being converted into what are sometimes disrespectfully called "farmhouses," as if the home of the agriculturist were not one of the most honourable in the land;—now and then they have been divided into cottages. Still, they are there; attractive very generally to the artist in their quaintness, always dear to the antiquary and historian, and interesting, if no more, to all who appreciate the fond care which clings to memorials of the past, whether personal or outside, as treasures which once lost can never be recovered. They tell of a class of worthy and industrious men who were neither barons nor vassals, who had good taste, and were fairly well off in purse, and loved field-sports—for a kennel for harriers and otter hounds is not rare,—who were hospitable, and generous, and mindful of the poor.
The history of these old halls is, in truth very often, the history of the aboriginal county families. As wealth increased, and abreast of it a longing for the refinements of a more elevated civilisation, the proprietors usually deserted them for a new abode; the primitive one became the "old," then followed the changes indicated, with departure, alas! only too often, of the ancient dignity.
In the far north a few remains occur which point to a still earlier period, or when the disposition to render the manorial home a fortress was very natural. Moats, or the depressions they once occupied, are common in all parts, even where there was least danger of attack. In the neighbourhood of Morecambe Bay the building was often as strong as a castle, as in the case of the old home of the Harringtons at Gleaston, two miles east of Furness Abbey. These celebrated ruins, which lie in a hollow in one of the valleys running seawards, are apparently of the fourteenth century, the windows in the lower storey being acutely pointed single lights, very narrow outside, but widely splayed within. Portions of three square towers and part of the curtain-wall connecting them attest, with the extent of the enclosure (288 feet by 170 where widest), that the ancient lords of Aldingham were alike powerful and sagacious. On the way to Gleaston, starting from Grange, a little south of the village of Allithwaite, Wraysholme tells of similar times, though all that now remains is a massive tower, the walls 3-1/2 feet thick as they rise from the sod. It was near Wraysholme, it will be remembered, that according to tradition and the ballad, the last of the English wolves was killed. The fine old tower of Hornby Castle, the only remaining portion of a stronghold commenced soon after the Conquest, is of much later date, having been built in or about 1520. That without being originally designed to withstand the attack of a violent enemy, more than one of these substantial old Lancashire private houses held its own against besiegers in the time of the civil wars is matter of well-known history. Lathom House (the original, long since demolished) has already been mentioned as the scene of the memorable discomfiture of Fairfax by Charlotte, Countess of Derby, the illustrious lady in whom loyalty and conjugal love were interwoven.
The Elizabethan halls so termed, though some of them belong to the time of James I., are of two distinct kinds,—the half-timbered, black-and-white, or "magpie," and the purely stone, the latter occurring in districts where wood was less plentiful or more costly. Nothing in South Lancashire, and in the adjacent parts of Cheshire, sooner catches the eye of the stranger than the beautiful old patterned front of one of the former;—bars vertical and horizontal, angles and curves, mingling curiously but always elegantly, Indian ink upon snow, many gables breaking the sky-line, while the entrance is usually by a porch or ornamental gateway, the windows on either side low but wide, with many mullions, and usually casemented. The features in question rivet the mind so much the more because of the proof given in these old half-timbered houses of the enduring vitality of the idea of the Gothic cathedral, and its new expression when cathedral-building ceased, in the subdued and modified form appropriate to English homes—the things next best, when perfect, to the fanes themselves. The gables repeat the high-pitched roof; the cathedral window, as to the rectangular portion, or as far as the spring of the arch, is rendered absolutely; the filagree in black-and-white, ogee curves appearing not infrequently, is a varied utterance of the sculpture; the pinnacles and finials, the coloured glass, and the porch complete the likeness. Anything that can be associated with a Gothic cathedral is thereby ennobled;—upon this one simple basis, the architecture we are speaking of becomes artistic, while its lessons are pure and salutary.
Drawing near, at the sides of the porch, are found seats usually of stone. In front, closing the entrance to the house, there is a strong oaken door studded with heads of great iron nails. Inside are chambers and corridors, many and varied, an easy and antique staircase leading to the single upper storey, the walls everywhere hidden by oaken panels grooved and carved, and in the daintier parts divided by fluted pilasters; while across the ceilings, which are usually low, run the ancient beams which support the floor above. So lavish is the employment of oak, that, when this place was built, surely one thinks a forest must have been felled. But those were the days of giant trees, the equals of which in this country will probably never be seen again, though in the landscape they are not missed. Inside, again, how cheery the capacious and friendly hearth, spanned by a vast arch; above it, not uncommonly, a pair of huge antlers that talk of joy in the chase. Inside, again, one gets glimpses of heraldic imagery, commemorative of ancient family honours, rude perhaps in execution, but redeemed by that greatest of artists, the Sunshine, that streaming through shows the colours and casts the shadows. Halls such as these existed until quite lately even in the immediate suburbs of Manchester, in the original streets of which town there were many black-and-white fronts, as to the present moment in Chester, Ludlow, and Shrewsbury. Some of the finest of those still remaining in the rural parts of Lancashire will be noticed in the next chapter. Our illustrations give for the present an idea of them. When gone to decay and draped with ivy, like Coniston Hall, the ancient home of the le Flemings, whatever may be the architecture, they become keynotes to poems that float over the mind like the sound of the sea. In any case there is the sense, when dismemberment and modernising have not wrought their mischief, that while the structure is always peculiarly well fitted for its situation, the outlines are essentially English. It may be added that in these old Lancashire halls and mansions the occurrence of a secret chamber is not rare. Lancashire was always a stronghold of Catholicism, and although the hiding-places doubtless often gave shelter to cavaliers and other objects of purely political enmity, the popular appellation of "priest's room," or "priest's hole," points plainly to their more usual service. They were usually embedded in the chimney-stacks, communication with a private cabinet of the owner of the house being provided for by means of sliding shutters. Very curious and interesting refuges of this character exist to this day at Speke, Lydiate, Widnes, and Stonyhurst, and in an old house in Goosenargh, in the centre wall of which, four feet thick, there are two of the kind. In a similar "hole" at Mains Hall, in the parish of Kirkham, tradition says that Cardinal Allen was once concealed.