The Rural Life of England

by William Howitt

Besides these sledges, they have also that very ancient species of cart, the tumbrel; or, as they call it, the Tumble-Car. This is of so primitive a construction that the wheels do not revolve on a fixed axle, but the axle and wheels all revolve together. The wheels themselves are of a construction worthy of so pristine an axle; they are, in truth, wheels of the original idea; not things of the complex construction of nave, spokes, and fellies, but solid blocks of wood, into which the axle is firmly inserted; upon this axle the body of the vehicle is laid, and kept in its place by a couple of pegs. It is such a cart as you might imagine rumbling down these hills in the days of their Saxon ancestors. Since good roads have been opened through the dales, carts of modern construction have followed, and these tumbrels will in awhile be no longer seen. They have, however, this advantage; in descending the steep sides of the hills, their clumsy construction of axle and wheel prevents them from running down too fast, and this is the cause why they are still retained. And yet this difficulty of movement sometimes becomes the cause of awkward dilemmas. These tumbrels are apt to stick in the bogs as they come down the fells, and are not easily drawn out. We were assured that there was one then sticking in a bog on the hills, past all chance of recovery; and some wag of the dale had made this distich on the accident, denoting the peculiar pre-eminence of clumsiness in the unfortunate vehicle.

Willie O’Middlebrough’s tumble-car,
Many were better, and none waur.

With a carriage so antique, one is not surprised to find gears of corresponding character. Consequently, as in Cornwall, so here, collars of straw and a few ropes often serve to harness out the team.

As might be supposed, the inhabitants of one dale form a little community or clan where every one is known to the rest, and where a great degree of sociality and familiarity prevails; but the whole dale sub-divides itself again into neighbourhoods, where a stronger esprit du corps exists. The dales are singularly marked by lines of ravines and streams, which run down the sides of the fells from the bogs and springs on the heights. These lines are commonly fringed on the lower slopes by alders and other water-loving trees. The smaller streams are called sikes, the larger gills, and the largest, being generally those which run along the dale, becks. The space from gill to gill generally constitutes a neighbourhood, or if that space is small, it may include two or three gills. Within this boundary they feel it a duty, established by time and immemorial usage, to perform all offices of good neighbourhood, and especially that of associating together. For instance, when a birth is about to take place, they have what is called a Shout. The nearest neighbour undertakes the office of herald. She runs from house to house, through the neighbourhood, though it be dead of night, summoning all the wives with this cry—“Run, neighbour, run, for neighbour such-a-one wants thy help—and take thy warming-pan with thee!” The consequence is, that the house is speedily filled with women and warming-pans; a scene ludicrous, and, one would imagine, inconvenient enough too; but which the women of the dale all protest is a great comfort. When the child is born, there is a great ceremony of washing its head with brandy, which is performed by the father and his male friends, who are assembled for the occasion; and who then fall to, and make merry over their glasses.

The assembled women regale themselves with a feast of their own kind, being a particular species of bread made for the occasion, and sweet-butter; that is, butter mixed with rum and sugar, and having in truth no despicable flavour. Then comes the Wife-day, generally the second Sunday after the birth, when all the women of the neighbourhood who have attended at the Shout, go dressed in their best, to take tea, and hold a regular gossip, each carrying with her a shilling and the news of the neighbourhood. The highest possible offence that can be given, is to pass over a person within the understood limits of the neighbourhood—it is the dead-cut. Sometimes there occurs a false Shout, either through the wantonness or malice of some ne’er-do-weel. In the night, the mischievous wag runs from house to house, and calls all the good wives to the dwelling whence they are hourly expecting such a summons. When they get there, they find it a hoax, and come under the name of May-goslings,—the term applied to this species of dupe. The joke, however, is no venial one, for it is perhaps played off on a severe and tempestuous night, and the good dames muffled up in their cloaks, and lantern and warming-pan in hand, have to steer their way down the sides of hills, and across becks hidden by the drifts of snow. Similar assemblages take place at deaths, called Passings; and at Christmas, when they eat yule bread and yule cheese, made after a particular formula.

But perhaps the most characteristic custom of the Dales, is what is called their Sitting, or going-a-sitting. Knitting is a great practice in the dales. Men, women, and children, all knit. Formerly you might have met the wagoners knitting as they went along with their teams; but this is now rare; for the greater influx of visiters, and their wonder expressed at this and other practices, has made them rather ashamed of some of them, and shy of strangers observing them. But the men still knit a great deal in the houses; and the women knit incessantly. They have knitting schools, where the children are taught; and where they sing in chorus knitting songs, some of which appear as childish as the nursery stories of the last generation. Yet all of them bear some reference to their employment and mode of life; and the chorus, which maintains regularity of action and keeps up the attention, is of more importance than the words. Here is a specimen.

Bell-wether o’ Barking,[8] cries baa, baa,
How many sheep have we lost to-day?
Nineteen have we lost, one have we fun,
Run Rockie,[9] run Rockie, run, run, run.

This is sung while they knit one round of the stocking; when the second round commences they begin again—

Bell-wether o’ Barking, cries baa, baa,
How many sheep have we lost to-day?
Eighteen have we lost, two have we fun,
Run Rockie, run Rockie, run, run, run;

and so on till they have knit twenty rounds, decreasing the numbers on the one hand, and increasing them on the other. These songs are sung not only by the children in the schools, but also by the people at their sittings, which are social assemblies of the neighbourhood, not for eating and drinking, but merely for society. As soon as it becomes dark, and the usual business of the day is over, and the young children are put to bed, they rake or put out the fire; take their cloaks and lanterns, and set out with their knitting to the house of the neighbour where the sitting falls in rotation, for it is a regularly circulating assembly from house to house through the particular neighbourhood. The whole troop of neighbours being collected, they sit and knit, sing knitting-songs, and tell knitting-stories. Here all the old stories and traditions of the dale come up, and they often get so excited that they say, “Neighbours, we’ll not part to night,” that is, till after twelve o’clock. All this time their knitting goes on with unremitting speed. They sit rocking to and fro like so many weird wizards. They burn no candle, but knit by the light of the peat fire. And this rocking motion is connected with a mode of knitting peculiar to the place, called swaving, which is difficult to describe. Ordinary knitting is performed by a variety of little motions, but this is a single uniform tossing motion of both the hands at once, and the body often accompanying it with a sort of sympathetic action. The knitting produced is just the same as by the ordinary method. They knit with crooked pins called pricks; and use a knitting-sheath consisting commonly of a hollow piece of wood, as large as the sheath of a dagger, curved to the side, and fixed in a belt called the cowband. The women of the north, in fact, often sport very curious knitting sheaths. We have seen a wisp of straw tied up pretty tightly, into which they stick their needles; and sometimes a bunch of quills of at least half-a-hundred in number. These sheaths and cowbands are often presents from their lovers to the young women. Upon the band there is a hook, upon which the long end of the knitting is suspended that it may not dangle. In this manner they knit for the Kendal market, stockings, jackets, nightcaps, and a kind of caps worn by the negroes, called bump-caps. These are made of very coarse worsted, and knit a yard in length, one half of which is turned into the other, before it has the appearance of a cap.