They are rickety old things, and thickly coated with dust, but on certain days worshippers come and stick on strips of paper, bearing prayers. To turn these cylinders is apparently an act of homage to the whole saintly family, and enlists the good-will of the whole lot. Some Lama monasteries deal thus with their 128 sacred books and 220 volumes of commentary, placing them in a huge cylindrical bookcase, which they turn bodily, to save the trouble of turning individual pages—the understanding having apparently small play in either case.
It was nearly 6 A. M. ere we reached the Lama Temple, so that we were too late to see the grand morning service, as that commences at 4 A. M., when upwards of a hundred mats are spread in the temple, on each of which kneel ten of the subordinate Lamas, all wearing their yellow robes and a sort of classical helmet of yellow felt, with a very high crest like that worn by Britannia. They possess red felt boots, but can only enter the temple barefooted. The Great Lama wears a violet-coloured robe and a yellow mitre. He bears a sort of crozier, and occupies a gilded throne before the altar: a cushion is provided for him to kneel upon. The whole temple is in darkness or dim twilight save the altar, which is ablaze with many tapers.
When the copper gong sounds its summons to worship, they chant litanies in monotone, one of the priests reading prayers, from a silken scroll, and all joining in a low murmur, while clouds of incense fill the temple. A peculiarity of this chant is, that while a certain number of the brethren recite the words, the others sing a continuous deep bass accompaniment. Again the gong marks the change from prayer to sacred chants, and after these comes a terrible din of instrumental music—a clatter of gongs, bells, conch-shells, tambourines, and all manner of ear-splitting abominations. Then follows a silence which may be felt, so utter is the stillness and so intense the relief.
HADDON HALL
JOHN LEYLAND
When the Derbyshire Wye has pursued its winding way from its source in the millstone grit, and between the wooded steeps and precipitous limestone cliffs that curb and shape its course towards Bakewell, the hills on either bank recede, and the river flows through pleasant alluvial meadows, overlooked by occasional rocky scars, and by woods of fir, ash, beech, and oak, to its confluence with the Derwent at Rowsley. Some two miles below Bakewell, shortly before the stream of the Lathkil comes down from its enchanting valley on the right, with its narrow tributary, the Bradford, to swell the waters of the Wye, the limestone crops out as a platform on the opposite bank, and there, half-concealed by the umbrageous woodland, stand the time-worn towers and walls of Haddon. Whether we approach the spot from the direction of Rowsley or of Bakewell, the prospect can scarcely be surpassed in its kind, either for the wondrous grouping of the grey towers and battlements on the slope of the hill, or for the rich beauties of the varied foliage on the height beyond, and the flower-decked meads and pellucid stream below. These charms of a truly English landscape, and an old English mansion, have long had, and must continue to have, a spell of fascination for the artist and lover of the picturesque; but it is not only for them that visitors come in a ceaseless stream to Haddon. What other place can wake such impressions of old-time greatness touched by the witchery of bygone romance? It is here—better, perhaps, than any other spot in England—that we can grasp the conditions of life of the mediæval and Tudor gentlemen. The long line of the Vernons passes before us. We witness them, generation by generation adding to the majestic pile; the vacant chambers are peopled with stately ladies and mail-clad knights, the bowmen are ranged in the courtyard, and the sentinel keeps watch from the tower. We see the knight in anxious deliberation on questions of State and wonder what answer shall be returned to the King-maker’s letter. We partake of the bounteous hospitality of the Knight of the Peak, as many strangers have done before, bethinking ourselves anon of his daughter, fair Dorothy, and how that Manners is concealed in the woods, watching the light in her chamber. Then the sounds of revelry strike upon the ear, the door opens and she steals down the steps, and presently we hear the clang of hoofs upon the road. It is, indeed, such impressions as these that have given to the external beauties of Haddon Hall the additional charm of legend, poetry and romance, and have contributed to make it a place to which visitors from afar will always delight to come.
HADDON HALL. ENGLAND.
Although the various parts of the celebrated hall have been built at widely different periods, and upon a sloping and irregular rocky platform, its plan is very easy to understand, and it may be well, at the outset, to explain the disposition of the buildings as clearly as may be. They surround two courtyards—the lower one, to the west, on the river front, and the upper one, separated from the first by the great hall and domestic offices, rising up to the east on the hill-side behind it. The visitor enters the lower quadrangle at its north-western angle, placing his foot, as he passes the postern, in a hole which has been worn deeply by unnumbered strangers before him. He notices, on his right, beneath the archway, the porter’s room, with a bedstead that may well have kept that functionary wakeful; and beyond it, still on the right hand and western side, the so-called Chaplain’s Room—with its hunting-horn, old musket, Seventeenth Century boots, service of pewter platters, and other miscellaneous contents—as well as two other chambers, before the domestic chapel is reached. This edifice occupies the south-western angle, and extends about half-way up the southern side of the lower courtyard. Being not at right angles with the other portions of this quadrangle, it gives, with its picturesque bell-turret, a pleasing variety to the buildings within; and, externally, its east window and the angles of its chancel and southern aisle, with the heavy buttress at the western end, add materially to the picturesque effect of the hall. The chapel, moreover, contains, with some of the foundation walls, the oldest portions of the edifice, and the round column and chalice-like font are anterior, perhaps, to the coming of the Vernons to Haddon. The south side of the western quadrangle is completed by a range of constructions, including passages to the private apartments, and a turret stair to the battlemented wall; and leading up to the doorway is a flight of steps—added in the Sixteenth Century—which projects into the area of the courtyard. This space is further broken up by the three steps which extend across it from north to south, dividing it into an upper and a lower platform. Standing upon the slight elevation thus gained, the chapel, the buildings opposite on the western side, the entrance gateway, with the very curious corbelling and constructive ties over it in the angle, and the offices on the western side, with the turret, have a most pleasing and varied effect.
The main block of buildings, lying between the two quadrangles, is now entered by the porch, which leads into a lobby or passage separating the great hall on the right from the kitchen and its offices on the left. This arrangement was general in mediæval dwelling-places, and may be seen in many of the timber manor-houses of Lancashire and Cheshire, where, as we see it at Haddon, the Minstrel’s Gallery is usually over the entrance passage, at the end of the hall opposite to the daïs. At Haddon, the table at the upper end still remains, supported on its three pedestal legs, and we think of the time when the King of the Peak held festival there, as we look upon its time-worn board. It is to be observed that the constructional conditions of the hall rendered it impossible to add the great bay, which was a chief feature of mediæval banqueting-rooms—one that may be seen in its perfection in the magnificent, but roofless hall of Wingfield, a few miles away. In the manor-houses of Lancashire and Cheshire, to which allusion has been made, the withdrawing-room lies in general immediately behind the great hall, and adjacent to the daïs, but at Haddon we find, in that position, a private dining-room, with a fine recessed window; and the drawing-room, which is above it, is approached by a flight of stone steps. The drawing-room at Haddon is a beautiful tapestried chamber, with fine views from its bay window over the gardens and down the valley of the Wye; and from it access is had to the Earl’s Bedroom and the Page’s Room. On the other side of the lobby from which the hall is entered is a sloping passage leading down to the kitchen, with its huge fireplace and curious culinary appliances, and other doors from the same passage open into the buttery, wine-cellar, add sundry offices. The great hall, and the domestic offices described, complete the enclosure of the first courtyard and form the western side of the second. The northern side of this upper quadrangle is formed of a series of small chambers; and a staircase from the hall-passage leads up to the quaint tapestried rooms above them, which, if tradition may be believed, were the nursery and the rooms of Dorothy Vernon, of Lady Cranborne, daughter of John Manners, eighth Earl of Rutland, and of Roger Manners. By the same staircase from the passage, access is had to the Minstrel’s Gallery, as well as to the gallery on the eastern side of the hall (a later addition), which brings the visitor to the top of the stone steps by which the drawing-room is reached. At that place are the segmental steps of solid oak, whereby the magnificent Long Gallery or Bedroom is entered. This great chamber, which is a chief glory of Haddon, will be alluded to later. It occupies the whole length of the southern side of the upper courtyard, and projects picturesquely at its eastern end upon the terrace, where a window affords a view of the winter garden towards Dorothy Vernon’s Walk. From the Long Gallery a door leads into the range of buildings enclosing the second quadrangle on its eastern side. These are the anteroom, with Dorothy Vernon’s Steps leading down to the Terrace; the State Bedroom, with its Gobelin tapestry, its strange bas-relief of Orpheus taming the Beasts; its huge bed and ancient hangings, and its mirror called “Queen Elizabeth’s Looking-glass;” the Ancient Stateroom, a chamber coeval with the angle tower; and the little passage-room over the gateway—the original entrance to the castle—whence the winding-stair is reached, leading up to the Peveril Tower, which dominates the whole range of buildings. From this elevation the visitor sees the two courtyards below him, with the woods and terraces, and the upper and lower gardens on the south side, as well as the way leading down to the footbridge over the Wye, and a fine prospect of the winding vale of that river, and of many a distant hill.
Having thus before us the general plan of the buildings of Haddon Hall, we may proceed to consider the historical, legendary, and other considerations to which the venerable edifice very naturally leads us. There have been those who have chosen to see, in the lower parts of its construction, the evidences of Saxon work, and, indeed, very likely Haddon was a location in Saxon times. However, that may be, we find it mentioned in Domesday Book as a berewick of the Manor of Bakewell, and the first possessor of whom we have authentic knowledge was that same William Peveril, a natural son of the Conqueror, to whom he granted “Peveril’s Place in the Peke,” and who also had custody of the Manor of Chatsworth. Thus, at this very early period, we find Haddon associated in ownership with two of the most interesting places in the Peak district. The Peverils did not long enjoy their possessions, for William Peveril, probably a grandson of the first possessor, having, it was alleged, poisoned Ranulph, Earl of Chester, who supported Matilda, took to ignominious flight in order to avoid punishment, and his possessions fell to Henry II. It is possible that some parts of the foundations of Haddon belong to the time of the Peverils, but, at any rate, the memory of their association with it is preserved in the name of the north-eastern tower. At the date of their fall, Haddon—or, to speak more precisely, Nether Haddon, for Over Haddon lies some two miles away on the hills—was held by William de Avenell in knight’s-service, and the King thus became direct lord of his fee. Towards the close of the Twelfth Century, Haddon came to the Vernons by the marriage of Richard de Vernon with Avicia, a daughter and one of the co-heiresses of William de Avenell, the other being married to Sir Simon Bassett. This Richard de Vernon was descended from the Barons of Shipbroke, the first of whom, William de Vernon, came over with the Conqueror, and received his barony at the hands of Hugh Lupus, Earl of Chester. The Vernon name is derived from the Lordship which the family held in what is now the Department of the Eure and Arrondissement of Evreux.