ST. WULFRAM’S CHURCH—GRANTHAM
Old Whitby appeals to our recollection as worth a second visit and we depart from our prearranged route at Doncaster, reaching York in the late afternoon. It has been a cold, rainy day and we cannot bring ourselves to pass the Station Hotel, though Whitby is but fifty miles farther and might be reached before nightfall.
We have previously visited York many times, but have given our time mainly to the show-places and we devote the following forenoon to the shops. There are many interesting book-stalls and no end of antique-stores with many costly curios, such as a Scotch claymore, accompanied by documents to prove that it once belonged to Prince Charlie. The shops, it seemed to us, were hardly up to standard for a city of nearly one hundred thousand. But York, while of first rank as an ecclesiastical seat and famous for its quaint corners and antiquity, is not of great commercial or manufacturing importance. It is a busy railroad center, with hundreds of trains daily, and next to Chester probably attracts a greater number of tourists than any other English provincial town. Leeds, Bradford, Sheffield, Hull, Middlesbrough, Halifax and Huddersfield are all Yorkshire cities with larger population and greater commercial activities. Of English churches we should be inclined to give York Cathedral first place, though viewpoints on such matters are so widely different that this may be disputed by good authorities. In size, striking architecture and beautiful windows, it is certainly not surpassed, though it has not the historical associations of many of its rivals.
Whitby is but fifty miles from York. An excellent road runs through a green, prosperous country as far as Pickering—about a score of miles—but beyond this we plunge into the forbidding hills of the bleakest, blackest of English moors. It is too early for the heather-bloom, which will brighten the dreary landscape a few weeks later, and a drizzling rain is falling from lowering clouds. The stony road, with steep grades and sharp turns, requires closest attention and, altogether, it is a run that is pleasant only in retrospect when reviewed from a cozy arm-chair by the evening fire.
I am going to write a chapter giving our impressions of Old Whitby which, I hope, will reflect a little of its charm and romance, so we may pass it here. We resume our journey after a pleasant pause in the old town and proceed by Guisborough, Stockton and Darlington to Bishop Auckland, where we again take up our northern route.
Bishop Auckland gets its ecclesiastical prefix from the fact that since the time of Edward I. it has been the site of one the palaces of the Bishops of Durham. The present building covers a space of no less than five acres and is surrounded by a park more than a square mile in extent. The palace is splendid and spacious, though very irregular, the result of additions made from time to time in varying architectural styles. It is easy to see how the maintenance of such an establishment—and others besides—keeps the good bishop poor, though his salary is about the same as that of the President of the United States. The town is pleasantly situated on an eminence near the confluence of the river Wear and a smaller stream. About a mile distant, at Escomb, is a church believed to date from the seventh century. It is quite small but very solidly built, the walls tapering upward from the ground, and some of the bricks incorporated in it are clearly of Roman origin, one of them bearing an old Latin inscription.
Bishop Auckland marks the western termination of Durham’s green fields and fine parks; we descend a steep, rough hill and soon find ourselves on a very bad road leading through a bleak mining country. Tow-Law is the first of several bald, angular villages with scarce a tree or shrub to relieve their nakedness; the streets are thronged with dirty, ragged urchins and slatternly women sit on the doorsteps along the road. The country is disfigured with unsightly buildings and piles of waste from the coal-mines; and the air is loaded with sooty vapors. It is a relief to pass into the picturesque hills of Northumberland, where, even though the road does not improve, there are many charming panoramas of wooded vales with here and there a church-tower, a ruin or a village. Towns on the road are few; we cross the Tyne at Corbridge, where a fine old bridge flings its high stone arches across the wide river. It is the oldest on the Tyne, having braved the floods for nearly two centuries and a half. In 1771 a great flood swept away every other bridge on the river, but this sturdy structure survived to see the era of the motor car. A bridge has existed at this point almost continuously since Roman times, and the Roman piers might have been seen until very recently. The vicinity is noted for Roman remains—sections of the Great Wall and the site of a fortified camp being near at hand. Many relics have been discovered near by and researches are still going on. The village by the bridge is small and unimportant, though it has an ancient church which shows traces of Roman building materials. Most remarkable is the Peel tower in the churchyard, where the parson is supposed to have taken refuge during the frequent Scotch incursions of the border wars.
Leaving the bridge we follow the Roman Watling Street, which proceeds in almost a straight line through the hills. It leads through a country famous in song and story; every hill and valley is reminiscent of traditions of the endless border wars in which Northumberland figured so largely and for so many years. Its people, too, were generally adherents of the Stuarts and it was near the village of Woodburn, through which we pass, that the Jacobites attacked the forces of George I., only to meet with crushing defeat, resulting in the ruin of many of the noblest families of the county. A little farther, in the vale of Otterburn, was the scene of the encounter of the retainers of Douglas and Percy, celebrated in many a quaint ballad. In the next few miles are Byrness and Catcleugh, two fine country-seats quite near the roadside, and there is a diminutive but very old church close to the former house. Byrness is the seat of a famous foxhunting squire who keeps a large pack of hounds and pursues the sport with great zeal. The wild, broken country and sparse population are especially favorable to hunting in the saddle. There is no lack of genuine sport, since the wild fox is a menace to lambs and must be relentlessly pursued to the death. Just opposite Catcleugh House a fine lake winds up the valley for nearly two miles. It seems prosaic when we learn that it is an artificial reservoir, affording a water supply for Newcastle-on-Tyne, but it is none the less a charming accessory to the scenery. Beyond this the road runs through almost unbroken solitude until it crosses the crest of the Cheviots and enters the hills of Scotland.