CHAPTER XVII.
Locomotive, Number One—Barnard Castle—Buying a Calf on Sunday—Baliol’s Tower—From Canute to the Duke of Cleveland—Historic Scenery—A surprised Northumbrian—The bearded Hermit—Beauty of Teesdale—Egliston Abbey—The Artist and his Wife—Dotheboys Hall—Rokeby—Greta Bridge—Mortham Tower—Brignall Banks—A Pilgrimage to Wycliffe—Fate of the Inns—The Felon Sow—A Journey by Omnibus—Lartington—Cotherstone—Scandinavian Traces—Romaldkirk—Middleton-in-Teesdale—Wild Scenery—High Force Inn—The voice of the Fall.
Facing the entrance to the railway station, elevated on a pedestal of masonry, stands the first locomotive—Number One. With such machines as that did the Quakers begin in 1823 to transport coal from the mines near Darlington to Middlesborough along their newly-opened railway. Compared with the snorting giants of the Great Western, its form and dimensions are small and simple. No glittering brass or polished steel bedeck its strength; it is nothing but a black boiler, mounted on wheels, with three or four slender working-rods standing up near one end, and the chimney with its saw-toothed top at the other. Yet, common as it looks, it is one of George Stephenson’s early triumphs: one of the steps by which he, and others after him, established more and more the supremacy of mind over mere brute matter. It was a happy thought to preserve Number One on the spot where enlightened enterprise first developed its capabilities.
Tees is one of those streams—the “silly few”—which owe a divided allegiance, watering two counties at once. Rising high amidst the wildest hills of the north-west, it takes a course of eighty-three miles to the sea through many scenes of romantic beauty. Yesterday we looked down from Rosebury on the last two or three leagues of its outfall; to-day if all go well we shall see the summit from which it springs. It is a glorious morning; the earliest train arrives, interrupts our examination of the old locomotive, and away we go to breakfast at Barnard Castle, on the Durham side of the river.
There is so much of beautiful and interesting in the neighbourhood, scenes made classic by the pen of Scott, that I chose to pass the day in rambling, and journey farther in the evening. The town itself, old-fashioned in aspect, quiet enough for grass to grow here and there in the streets, was one of the ancient border-towns, and paid the penalty of its position. It has a curious market-cross, and touches of antiquity in the byeways; and owing to something in its former habits or history, is a butt for popular wit. “Barney-Cassel, the last place that God made,” is one way of mentioning the town by folk in other parts of the county; if you meet with a fellow more uncouth than usual, he is “Barney-Cassel bred;” any one who shoots with the long bow is silenced with “That wunna do, that’s Barney-Cassel;” and as Barney-Cassel farmers may be recognised by the holes in their sacks, so may the women by holes in their stockings.
One Sunday morning, a farmer, while on his way to chapel, noticed a fine calf in his neighbour’s field, and when seated in his pew, was overheard to ask the owner of the animal, “Tommy, supposin’ it was Monday, what wad ye tak’ for yer calf?” To which Tommy replied in an equally audible whisper, “Why, supposin’ it was Monday, aw’d tak’ two pun’ fifteen.” “Supposin’ it was Monday aw’ll gie two pun’ ten.” “Supposin’ it was Monday, then ye shall hev’t.” And the next day the calf was delivered to the scrupulous purchaser.
The pride of the town is the castle—ruined remains of the stronghold erected by Bernard Baliol to protect the lands bestowed on him by William the Red. Seen from the bridge, the rocky height, broken and craggy, and hung with wood, crowned by Baliol’s Tower, is remarkably picturesque. The Tees sweeps round the base, as if impatient to hide itself once more under green woods, to receive once more such intermingled shadows of rock and leafage as fell on it through Marwood Chase, and where Balder rushes in about a league above. A mile of sunlight, and then the brawling stream will play with the big stones and crowd its bed all through the woods of Rokeby.
Let us mount the hill and ascend the tower. The bearded hermit who inhabits therein points the way to the stone stair constructed within the massive wall, and presently we come to the top, where, although there is no parapet, the great thickness admits of your walking round in safety. The view is a feast for the eye—thick woods marking the course of the river, the trees thinning off as they meet the uplands, where fields and hedgerows diversify the landscape away to the hills; while in the distance the sight of dark, solemn moorlands serves but to heighten the nearer beauty. We can see lands once held by King Canute, now the property of the Duke of Cleveland: we passed his estate, the park and castle of Raby, about six miles distant on our way hither; and whichever way we look there is something for memory to linger on:
“Staindrop, who, from her sylvan bowers,
Salutes proud Raby’s battled towers;
The rural brook of Egliston,
And Balder, named from Odin’s son;
And Greta, to whose banks ere long
We lead the lovers of the song;
And silver Lune, from Stanmore wild,
And fairy Thorsgill’s murmuring child,
And last and least, but loveliest still,
Romantic Deepdale’s slender rill.”