I took his body on my back,
And whiles I gaed, and whiles I sat,
I digged a grave and laid him in,
And happed him with the sod sae green.
But think na ye my heart was sair,
When I laid the mould on his yellow hair!
O think na ye my heart was wae
When I turned about away to gae!
Nae living man I'll love again,
Since that my lovely knight is slain;
Wi' ae lock of his yellow hair
I'll bind my heart for evermair.
The devoted wife was buried with her husband. In a deserted burial place, which once surrounded the keep of Henderland, the monument was lately, and perhaps is still, to be seen. It is a large stone, broken into three parts, but some armorial bearings are traceable, and the following inscription—legible though much defaced, "Here lyes Perys of Cokburne and his wyfe, Marjory."
During the civil wars with the "Roses," Carlisle suffered severely; sometimes from the one party and sometimes from the other—a calamity which it shared, however, with all the other principal towns of the kingdom. In the formidable rising against Henry the Eighth, led originally by Sir Robert Aske, and known as the Pilgrimage of Grace, the city was besieged by 8000 men. They were under the command of Nicholas Musgrave, Thomas Gilley, and others, who appeared as leaders of the movement, after it had been abandoned by Aske and its other originators. The citizens, knowing that the Duke of Norfolk was marching to their relief, sallied out upon their besiegers, and put them to flight. Seventy of the leaders were captured by the Duke; but Musgrave, the prime mover, escaped. The others were hanged and beheaded, and their heads placed upon the gates of the city. This happened in the year 1537.
Little more than a century afterwards, Carlisle suffered a severer siege by the Scotch and Parliamentary forces, under General Lesley. It was defended for the Royalists by Sir Thomas Glenham; and surrendered on the 28th of June, 1645, after having held out for more than six months. During the siege, the distress of the garrison and the inhabitants was so severe, that the flesh of horses, dogs, rats, and other vermin was eaten. Bread was exhausted and hemp-seed substituted; which in its turn became so dear as to be unpurchasable by all except the most wealthy. A coinage of silver pieces, of three shillings value, was instituted in the castle during the siege, from the plate of the inhabitants, which was sent in for the purpose. The diary of Isaac Tullie, a resident in the city during the siege, preserved among the Harleian MSS. in the British Museum, states that "the citizens were so shrunk from starvation, that they could not choose but laugh at one another, to see their clothes hang upon them as upon men on gibbets, for one might put one's head and fists between the doublets and shirts of many of them."
[THE DRUIDS' SACRIFICE.]
A LEGEND OF KESWICK.
Mark yon altar
... See this wide circus
Skirted with unhewn stone; they awe my soul,
As if the very Genius of the place
Himself appeared, and with terrific tread
Stalked through his drear domain....
Know that thou stand'st on consecrated ground—
The mighty pile of magic-planted rocks,
Thus ranged in mystic order, marks the place
Where but at times of holiest festival
The Druid led his train.