The Rural Life of England

by William Howitt

But suddenly there was in the midst of all this noise and jollity, a cry of horror; and it was soon seen that one of the pointed stones that stand at intervals on the top of the high wall all round the court, had disappeared. It had given way with a man who clung to it, had fallen upon him, and killed him on the spot. There was a momentary pause in the festivity; a great running together to the spot of the catastrophe; but the body was soon conveyed away to an outbuilding, and the tide of riot rolled on. It was doomed, however, to receive a second check; for another man, in the wild excitement of the time, and of the strong ale, sprang at one bound over a wall that stood on the edge of a precipice, and fell a shattered corpse into the hollow below. These were awful events, and cast over some of the revellers a gloom that would not disperse; but far the greater part were now too highly charged with birth-day ale to be capable of reflection. All around was Bacchanalian chaos. Singing, shouting, attempts at dancing, reeling, and tumbling. Bodies lay thickly strewn through court and hall, and far around on the lawn. Some gay sparks were, with mock respect, carried with much struggling and laughter, and laid in sheds and stables and under trees, and one especial dandy was deposited in a heap of soot. For myself, perhaps the only sober person there, I hastened away, resolving to revisit that fairy mansion in the time of its restored quiet.

And in what a far different aspect did it present itself when I next saw it; and with what a far different company did I witness it! It was on one of the most glorious days of a splendid summer that we passed under the shadow of its oaks, as happy and attached a company as ever met on earth. Ah! they are all dispersed now! Out of a dozen glad hearts, not more than three are living now. But let me forget that. We were a joyful band of tried friends then. All, except myself and a young Yorkshire damsel, light as a sylph, and lovely and frolic as a fairy, were in carriages; we were on horseback; and scarcely had we entered the park, when, as if the sight of its fine wide level had filled her with an irresistible desire to scour across it, the madcap gave her horse the rein, and darted away. Under the boughs of the oaks she stooped, and flew along with arrowy swiftness. Every moment I expected to see her caught by one of them, and dashed to the ground; but she was too practised a horsewoman for that: she cleared the trees; the deer bounded away as she came galloping towards them, and turned and gazed at her from a distance; the rooks and daws, and lapwings feeding on the turf, soared up and raised wild cries; but she sped on, and there was nothing for me to do but to follow. I spurred forwards, but it was only to see her rush, at the same reckless speed, down a deep descent, where one trip of her horse—and nothing was more likely—and she would have flown far over his head to certain death. Yet down she went, and down I followed; but ere I reached the bottom, she was urging her horse up as steep an ascent, on whose summit, as I approached it, I found her seated on her panting steed, laughing at her exploit and my face of wonder.

When we reached the Hall, there were all our friends in the court, and the kind-hearted old gentleman, the head of the party, standing at the great hall door, laughing heartily at the attempts of each of the youngsters in succession to walk blindfold up a single row of the flags that lead from the court-gates to the house. Every one began full of confidence; but the laughter and cries of the rest soon proclaimed the failure of the enterprise. When it came to the turn of our merry madcap, up she walked with a bold step, and course as strait as if guided by a clue, from gate to door. All at once exclaimed that she could see, and busy hands were soon at work to fasten the handkerchief so artfully round her head, that she could not possibly get a glimpse of daylight. Again she was led to the gate, and again she marched up to the door as quickly and directly as before. The wonder was great; but still it was asserted that she must see;—it was that fine Grecian nose of hers that permitted a glance down beside it, enough for the guidance of the spirited damsel; so handkerchief was bound on handkerchief, aslant and athwart, to exclude every possibility of seeing; and again she was set at the gate; and again went gaily and confidently to the door without one erring footstep. There was a general murmur of applause and wonder. I see that light and buoyant figure still advancing up the line of flags; I see those golden locks dancing in the sunshine as she went; I see that lovely countenance, those blue and laughing eyes, full of a merry triumph, as her friends unbound her beautiful head. I see the same glad creature, all vivacity and happiness, now sitting on the warm turf, now bounding up long flights of stairs; now standing, to the terror of her companions, on the jutting edge of a ruinous tower;—and can it be true, that that fairy creature has long been dead! the light of those lovely eyes extinguished! those lovely locks soiled with the damp churchyard earth! Alas! we know too well how readily such things come to pass. But no black presage came before us then. All around was summer sunshine; we explored every nook in that old ivied ruin, the older house of Hardwick, in which the Queen of Scots was confined; paced the celebrated banqueting-room, adorned with the figures of Gog and Magog, with an angel flying between them with a drawn sword. We rambled over the leaden roof, and in the happy folly of youth, marked each other’s foot upon it, with duly inscribed names and date. We went all through the present house; through its tapestried rooms, along its gallery, into its ancient chapel, and up to its armoury, a tower on the roof; and finally adjourned to the neat little inn at Glapwell, to a merry tea, and thence home.

My next visit to Hardwick was in the autumn of 1834. My companions now were, my true associate for the last seventeen years, and one little boy and girl, who, as we advanced up the park, rambled on before us in eager delight. Twenty years had passed since that youthful party I have just mentioned was there;—twenty years to me of many sober experiences; of naturally extended knowledge; of observation of our old English houses in various parts of the kingdom: but as I once more approached Hardwick, I felt that it had lost none of its effect,—nay, that that effect was actually increased: it was more unworldly, more unlike any thing else, or any thing belonging to common life; more poetical, more crowned and overshadowed with beautiful and solemn associations, than it was when I first beheld it in my youth. The distance you have to advance, from the moment you emerge from amongst the trees of the park into a full view of the Hall, until you reach it, tends greatly to heighten its effect. There it stands, bold and alone, on a wide unobstructed plain.

No trees crowd upon it, or break, for a moment, the view; it lifts itself up in all its solemn and unique grandeur to the blue heavens, like a fairy palace, in the days of old romance. It is a thing expressly of by-gone times—darkened indeed by age, but not injured. Unlike modern mansions, you see no bustle of human life about it; no gardens and shrubberies; but wings of grey, and not very high walls, extending to a considerable distance over the plain, from each end of the house, inclosing what gardens there are, and paddocks. You see no offices appended,—it seems a place freed from all mortal necessities,—inhabited by beings above them. All offices, in fact, that are not included within the regular walls of the house, are removed to a considerable distance with the farm-yard. As you draw near, its grave aspect strikes you more strongly; you become more sensible of its loftiness, of the vast size of its windows, and of that singular parapet which surmounts it. It is an oblong building, with three square towers at each end, both projecting from, and rising much higher than, the body of the building. The parapet surmounting these towers is a singular piece of open-work of sweeping lines of stone, displaying the initials of the builder, E. S.—Elizabeth Shrewsbury,—surmounted with the coronet of an earl. On all sides of the house these letters and crown strike your eye, and the whole parapet appears so unlike what is usually wrought in stone, that you cannot help thinking that its singular builder, old Bess of Hardwick, must have cut out the pattern in paper with her scissars. It is difficult to say, whether this remarkable woman had a greater genius for architecture or matrimony. She was the daughter of John Hardwick of Hardwick, and sole heiress of this estate. She married four times, always contriving to get the power over her husband’s estates, by direct demise, or by intermarrying the children of their former marriages with those of former husbands, so that she brought into the family immense estates, and laid the foundation of four dukedoms. Her genius for architecture is sufficiently conspicuous in this unique pile, and in the engraving of Worksop Manor in Thoroton’s Nottinghamshire, as erected by her, though since destroyed by fire,—a building full of the same peculiar character. It is said that it having been foretold her by some astrologer, that the moment she ceased to build would be the moment of her death, she was perpetually engaged in building. At length, as she was raising a set of almshouses at Derby, a severe frost set in. All measures were resorted to necessary to enable the men to continue their work: their mortar was dissolved with hot water, and when that failed, with hot ale; but the frost triumphed—the work ceased, and Bess of Hardwick expired! This noble building I trust will long continue to perpetuate her memory, lifting aloft on its parapet her conspicuous E. S.

All the lower walls surrounding the courts and paddocks, are finished with similar open-work of bands of curved and knotted stone. A colonnade runs along each side of the house between the projecting towers, and the entrance-front is enclosed by that court of which I have already spoken; having its walls mounted, at intervals, with quaint pyramidal stones. On this side of the house a fine valley opens itself, filled with noble woods, a large water, and displaying beyond a hilly and pleasant country.

At about a hundred yards from the Hall stand the remains of the old one. The progress of dilapidation upon this building, since my last visit, was striking. Then you could ascend to the leaden roof; but now means were adopted to prevent that, on account of its unsafe state; in fact, the stairs themselves have partly fallen in; many of the floors of the rooms have fallen through; the ceiling of the celebrated banqueting-room itself has given way by places, and in others is propped up by stout pieces of timber. The glory of Gog and Magog will soon be annihilated, or they will be left on the walls, exposed to the astonished gaze of the passer-by, as are some stucco alto-relievoes of stags under forest trees on the chamber walls, with ivy drooping over them from the top of the walls above, and tall trees that have sprung on the hearths of destroyed rooms below, waving before them. This is the outward aspect of those old halls where Mary Stuart, and the almost equally unfortunate Arabella Stuart, once dwelt. Within, the present hall is as perfect a specimen of an Elizabethan house, as can be wished. “The state apartments are lofty and spacious, with numerous transom windows admitting a profusion of light. The hall is hung with very curious tapestry, which appears to be as ancient as the fifteenth century. On one part of it, is a representation of boar-hunting, and on another of otter-hunting. In the chapel, which is on the first floor, is a very rich and curious altar-cloth, thirty feet long, hung round the rails of the altar, with figures of saints under canopies wrought in needlework. The great dining-room is on the same floor, over the chimney-piece of which are the arms of the Countess of Shrewsbury, with the date of 1597. The most remarkable apartments in this interesting edifice are the state room, or room of audience, as it is called, and the gallery. The former is sixty-four feet nine inches, by thirty-three feet, and twenty-six feet four inches high. At one end of it is a canopy of state, and in another part a bed, the hangings of which are very ancient. This room is hung with tapestry, in which is represented the story of Ulysses; over this are figures, rudely executed in plaster, in bas-relief, amongst which is a representation of Diana and her nymphs. The gallery is about 170 feet long and 26 wide, extending the whole length of the eastern side of the house; and hung with tapestry, on a part of which is the date of 1478.”[11] The house has not only been kept in repair, but exactly in the state in which its builder left it, as to furniture and fitting up, with a very few exceptions, and these in the most accordant taste. For instance, the Duke of Devonshire has brought hither his family pictures from Chatsworth, so as to make this fine gallery the family picture gallery. Not another painting has been suffered to enter. He has also now added a most appropriate feature to the entrance hall, a statue of the Queen of Scots, of the size of life, by Westmacott. It stands on a pedestal of the same stone, bearing an armorial escutcheon.

[11] Lyson’s Magna Britannia.

Mrs. Jameson expresses strongly the effect of the huge escutcheons, the carved arms thrust out from the wall, intended to hold lights, and the great antlers, as she first entered this hall by night; but what would have been the effect of seeing Mary Stuart herself standing full opposite, as if to receive her to this place of her former captivity.[12] To her, and to every imaginative person, the effect must have been powerful, and solemnly impressive. Gray the poet, instead of thinking that the Queen of Scots had but just walked down into the park for half an hour, would have seen her visibly here. I have seen the portraits of Queen Mary, both here and in Holyrood, but none of them give me a thousandth part of the idea of what she must have been, compared with this statue.

[12] I do not mean literally that this house was the place of her captivity, it was the old one.