Cliff Castles and Cave Dwellings of Europe Part 14

The cave is in the range of cretaceous limestone that runs east and west to the north-east of Ma.r.s.eilles, and at La Beaume Sainte reaches the height of 3450 feet. The wild flowers, the fine forest, and the white rocks impart great interest to the visit without consideration of historical and legendary a.s.sociation. The botanist will find the globe flower, the anemone, the citisus, the man, the bee, the fly orchids, and the _Orchis militaris_ in considerable abundance; also banks of scented violets.

The grotto is at a considerable height above the valley. According to the legend, as already said, Mary Magdalen spent the close of her life here, and numerous anchorites settled in the caves around. In the fifth century Ca.s.sian placed monks in the grotto, but they were driven away by the barbarians, and La Sainte Beaume fell into complete oblivion till the thirteenth century.

The cave is lofty and s.p.a.cious, not a little damp, and water drips from the roof. To protect the altar a baldachin has been erected over it. At the extreme end is a raised dais of natural rock, on which the saint is supposed to have made her bed. Another cave is that of the Holy Sepulchre, which was formerly occupied by the monks of S. Ca.s.sian. From the Sainte Beaume a path leads upwards to the Saint Pilon, the highest pinnacle of the rock which here rises to a point, out of which grow wild pinks and aromatic shrubs, and where falcons make their nest.

According to the legend, Mary Magdalen was elevated by the hands of angels to this point seven times a day, there to say her prayers, which proceeding surely ent.i.tles her to a place as the patroness of aviation.

At Souge, on the Loir, a little below the troglodyte town of Troo already described, half-way up the cliff is the cave-chapel of S.

Amadou. It is 45 feet deep and 15 feet wide. The altar is at the end surmounted by a niche containing a statue of the saint, and to this formerly pilgrimages were made from all the valleys round. But this is a thing of the past, for it is now private property and converted into a cellar. What is peculiar about this chapel is that it is surrounded by a gallery also rock-hewn, and it was customary for the pilgrims to pa.s.s round the chapel through this gallery before entering it.

At Villiers, near Vendome, is the chapel of S. Andrew, that was formerly inhabited by a hermit. It is divided into two chambers. That on the left is the chapel proper, with its altar. Above the other opening is a bas-relief of the Crucifixion. When levelling the floor of this hermitage a few years ago, so as to convert it into a commodious private dwelling, a number of skeletons were found in graves sunk in the rock.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Plan of the Chapel of S. Amadou.]

Montserrat is famous throughout Spain on account of its statue of the Virgin, which is supposed to have been made by S. Luke, and brought to Barcelona in the year 50 by S. Peter, which, of course, is nonsense. S.

Luke never painted, and S. Peter never visited Spain. This extraordinary mountain derives its name from its saw-like appearance, _Mons serratus._ It consists of pudding-stone, "a strange solitary exiled peak, drifted away in the beginning of things from its brethren of the Pyrenees, and stranded in a different geological period." Mr.

Bayard Taylor thus describes the summit after a two hours' climb.

"Emerging from the thickets we burst suddenly upon one of the wildest and most wonderful pictures I ever beheld. A tremendous wall of rock arose in front, crowned by colossal turrets, pyramids, clubs, pillars, and ten-pin shaped ma.s.ses, which were drawn singly, or in groups of incredible distinction, against the deep blue of the sky. At the foot of the rock the buildings of the monastery and the narrow gardens completely filled and almost overhung a horizontal shelf of the mountain, under which it again fell sheer away down, down into misty depths, the bottom of which was hidden from sight. In all the galleries of memory I could find nothing resembling it." [Footnote: Taylor (B.), "Byways of Europe," Lond. 1869, i. p. 23.]

The spires of rock range about 3300 feet high, jumbled together by nature in a sportive mood. Here and there, perched like nests of the solitary eagle, are the ruins of former hermitages, burnt by the French under Suchet in July 1811, when they amused themselves with hunting the hermits like chamois in the cliffs, hung the monks of the monastery, plundered it of all its contents, stripped the Virgin of her jewellery, and burnt the fine library. Hitherto the monks, when periodically dressing the image, had done so with modestly averted eyes, but Suchet's soldiers had no such scruples. This image had been entrusted in the ninth century to a hermit, Jean Garin. Now Riguilda, daughter of the Count of Barcelona, was possessed by a devil, in another word, crazy, and was sent to be cured by the image or the hermit. A temptation similar to that of S. Anthony followed, but with exactly the opposite result. To conceal his crime, Jean Garin cut off Riguilda's head, buried her, and fled. Overtaken by remorse he went to Rome, and confessed his sin to the Pope, who bade him become a beast, never lifting his face towards heaven until the hour when G.o.d himself would signify his pardon.

Jean Garin went forth from the Papal presence on his hands and knees, crawled back to Montserrat, and there lived seven years as a wild beast, eating gra.s.s and bark, and never looking up to heaven. At the end of this time his body was entirely covered with hair, and it so fell out that the hunters of the Count snared him as a wild animal, put a chain round his neck, and brought him to Barcelona. Here an infant of five months old, on beholding the strange beast, uttered a cry and exclaimed, "Rise up, Jean Garin, G.o.d has pardoned thee." Then, to the amazement of all, the beast arose and spoke in a human tongue. Happily the story is no more true than that the image was made by S. Luke. It is an old Greek story of S. James the Penitent, with the penance of Nebuchadnezzar tacked on to it.

Forbes says: "The traveller should visit the ruined hermitages of Sta.

Anna, San Benito, not forgetting La Roca Estrecha, a singular natural fissure; the highest and most interesting of all is the S. Jeronimo.

These retreats satisfied the Oriental and Spanish tendency to close a life of action by repose, and atone for past sensualism by mortification. The hermitages were once thirteen in number; each was separate, and with difficulty accessible. The anchorite who once entered one, never left it again. There he lived, like things bound within a cold rock alive, while all was stone around, and there he died, after a living death to the world, in solitude without love. Yet they were never vacant, being sought for as eagerly as apartments in Hampton Court are by retired dowagers. Risco says that there were always a dozen expectants waiting in the convent the happy release of an occupant. To be a hermit, and left to live after his own fashion, exactly suited the reserved, isolated Spaniard, who hates discipline and subjection to a superior." [Footnote: "Handbook of Spain," Lond.

1845, p.496. A visit to the image is heavily indulgenced. Pope Paul V.

granted remission of all his sins to any one who entered the confraternity of our Lady of Montserrat. Mr. B. Taylor says of the image: "I took no pains to get sight of the miraculous statue. I have already seen both the painting and the sculpture of S. Luke, and think him one of the worst artists that ever existed."]

Above Cordova, also in the Sierra, are rock hermitages serving in Andalusia the same purpose that did those of Montserrat in Catalonia.

These also never wanted a tenant, for in the Iberian temperament, _inedia et labor_, violent action alternating with repose is inherent.

In Italy, Subiaco must not be left without a notice. It was. .h.i.ther that S. Benedict fled when aged fourteen. He chose a cave as his abode, and none knew what was his hiding-place save a monk, Roma.n.u.s, who let down to him from the top of the rock the half of the daily loaf allotted to himself, giving him notice of its being ready for him by ringing a little bell. Here, once, troubled by the pa.s.sions of the flesh, Benedict cast himself into a thicket of thorns, and afterwards planted there two rose-trees which still flourish. This is now converted into a garden, and near by all the monks of Subiaco are buried.

Near La Vernia, a favourite retreat of S. Francis, is a deep cleft in the rocks, and a cave to which he was wont to retire at times. One friar only, Brother Leo, was permitted to visit him, and that once in the day with a little bread and water, and once at night; and when he reached the narrow path at the entrance, he was required to say _Domine l.a.b.i.a mea aperies;_ when, if an answer came, he might enter and say matins with his master. In a second cave the saint slept.

Outside this is the point of rock from which according to the _Fiorette:_ "Through all that Lent, a falcon, whose nest was hard by his cell, awakened S. Francis every night a little before the hour of matins by her cry and the flapping of her wings, and would not leave off till he had risen to say the office; and if at any time S. Francis was more sick than ordinary, or weak, or weary, that falcon, like a discreet and charitable Christian, would call him somewhat later than was her wont. And S. Francis took great delight in this clock of his, because the great carefulness of the falcon drove away all slothfulness, and summoned him to prayers; and moreover, during the daytime, she would often abide familiarly with him."

The Warkworth hermitage in Northumberland was made famous by Bishop Percy's ballad.

In "Rambles in Northumberland and on the Scottish Border," 1835, it is thus described. "The hermitage of Warkworth is situated on the north bank of the Coquet, and about a mile from the castle. Leaving the castle yard and pa.s.sing round the exterior of the keep, a footpath leads down the declivity on the north side of the river. Entering a boat and rowing a short distance along the river, the visitor is landed at the foot of a pleasant walk which leads directly to the Hermitage.

This secluded retreat consists of three small apartments, hollowed out of the freestone cliff which overlooks the river. An ascent of seventeen steps leads to the entrance of the outer and princ.i.p.al apartment, which is about eighteen feet long, its width being seven feet and a half, and its height nearly the same. Above the doorway are the remains of some letters now illegible, but which are supposed when perfect to have expressed, from the Latin version of the Psalms, the words: Fuerint mihi lacrymae meae panes die ac nocte. The roof is chiselled in imitation of a groin, formed by two intersecting arches; and at the east end, where the floor is raised two steps, is an altar occupying the whole width of the apartment. In the centre, immediately above the altar, is a niche in which there has probably stood a figure either of Christ or of the Virgin.

"Near the altar, on the south side, there is carved in the wall a monumental figure of a rec.u.mbent female. In a niche near the foot of the monument is the figure of a man, conjectured to be that of the first hermit, on his knees, with his head resting on his right hand, and his left placed upon his breast. On the wall, on the same side, is cut a basin for the reception of holy water; and between the princ.i.p.al figure and the door are two small windows. At the west end is a third small window, in the form of a quatrefoil.

"From this apartment, which appears to have been the hermit's chapel, a doorway opens into the corner one, about five feet wide, and having also an altar at the east end, with a basin for holy water cut in the wall. In the north wall of this inner chamber an arched recess is cut, the base of which is of sufficient length and breadth to admit a middle-sized man reclining. An opening, cut slantwise through the wall dividing the chamber, allows a person lying in this recess to see the monument in the chapel. In the same wall there is rather an elegantly- formed window, which admits the light from the outer apartment. To the north of the inner chamber is a third excavation, much smaller than the other two, which led to an outer gallery to the west, commanding a view of the river. This gallery, which has been much injured by the fall of a part of the cliff, is said to have been arched like a cloister. After returning from these dimly-lighted cells to open day, and pa.s.sing through a stone archway, a flight of steps cut in the side of the rock leads to the hermit's garden at the top."

S. Robert of Knaresborough, who died 1218, was the son of one John Thorne of York, of which city his brother was mayor. Leland informs us that he forsook "the lands and goodes of his father to whom he was heire as eldest sonne." Leaving his home he came to Knaresborough, where he found a certain knight ensconced in a cave scooped out of the rock by the side of the Nidd, and dignified by the name of S. Giles's Chapel. But the knight had had enough of it, and _instante diabolo_ quitted his cave and made it over to Robert Thorne, and "returned like a dog to his vomit," which is a monastic way of putting the fact that he returned to his wife and family.

[ILl.u.s.tRATION: SCULPTURE IN ROYSTON CAVE. Representing S. Christopher and other saints, men in armour and ladies.]

Robert, however, did not spend an entire year in the cave, for certain _latrunculi_ having stolen _hys bred, hys chese,_ _hys sustenance_, he quitted the grotto--doubtless at the approach of winter--and estab- lished himself in much more comfortable quarters at Bramham. He was certainly a hermit who boiled his peas, for we are told that he maintained four men-servants; two were occupied in tilling his farm, one attended to his personal wants--was, in fact, his valet--and one went about with him on his begging expeditions.

The cave is 10 feet long, 9 feet wide, and 7 feet high. There is an image of a knight at the entrance, by some supposed to be more modern; it is, however, said that S. Robert did much himself to adorn and enlarge his chapel.

It was in this cave that Eugene Aram and Richard Housman murdered Daniel Clarke on 8th February 1745, for the sake of some jewellery and plate they had induced him to bring to S. Robert's Chapel with him.

It was not till fourteen years after that the body of Clarke was found, and Mrs. Aram declared that her husband and Housman had murdered him; Housman turned King's evidence, and Aram was hung on 16th August 1759.

Roche hermitage in Cornwall occupies a spire of rocks of schorl that shoots 100 feet above the surrounding moor. Built into the rocks is a little chapel, and beneath it is the hermit's cell. This seems to have been occupied continuously down to the Reformation, and various stories are told of the tenants.

There was once a steward under the Duchy named Tregeagle. He was a peculiarly nefarious agent, and very hard upon the tenants. His spirit is still supposed to roam over the moors, and not to be able to find peace till he has dipped the water out of Dozmare Pool with a nutsh.e.l.l.

Once, pursued by devils, he fled for sanctuary to Roche, and thrust his head through the east window of the chapel, but, being a broad- shouldered spirit, could force his way in no further. The devils were baffled and withdrew. But Tregeagle's position was not desirable. The wind, the rain, and the hail lashed that portion of his person that remained exposed, and he dared not withdraw his head from sanctuary lest the devils should be on him again. At every cutting blast he howled, and his howls so disturbed the hermit of Roche, that he found it impossible to sleep or to attend to his prayers on windy nights.

Unable to liberate Tregeagle himself, he sent for the monks of Bodmin, and they imposed on the wretched steward the task aforementioned, and a.s.sured him immunity from pursuit whilst engaged upon it.

"Robin Hood's Stable," in Nottinghamshire, at Pappewick, of which Throsby gives an ill.u.s.tration in his "History of the County," 1797, was in all probability a hermitage. Mr. W. Stevenson writes: "I am convinced, from its nearness to the great old road, its position due south, and its evidences of columns and arches, that it is an old cell or anchorite's cave of equal, if not superior age, to the neighbouring abbey. The interior would make a good picture, as the dampness of the rock is favourable to green vegetation in sportive lines and patches on the warm colours and the shadows of the rock. It is an artist's dream.

Time, during the lapse of centuries, has made sad havoc with the entrance. Originally it had a level cutting running into the hill until a face of rock was won in which to make a door and hew an underground apartment.

"The hollow of this cutting has been raised, the banks rounded down, the roof over the door has fallen; the hand of destruction has worked back into the cave, and all evidence of the door and its whereabouts has vanished. The floor is loaded with sand and blocks fallen from the roof. The floor being so buried renders it difficult perfectly to judge of the depth of the apartment." What a habitation for a rheumatic hermit! The "sportive lines and patches" of vegetation suggest sportive tweaks and twinges of the loins.

[ILl.u.s.tRATION: SCULPTURE IN ROYSTON CAVE]

Two miles from Repton is Anchor Church, where are the remains of a hermitage in a singular rocky bank, rising abruptly above the pastures on the verge of the Trent. "The summit is clothed with overhanging woods, forming only a portion of the high grounds, but the suddenness of the change which the scenery derives from the appearance of precipitous and broken rocks, occurring in the midst of a soft and beautiful region of pastoral luxuriance, is very striking. A curious series of chambers, communicating with each other, has been at some distant period beyond tradition excavated in that portion of the rock which is most naked and precipitous; and from this circ.u.mstance the site has been designated Anchor Church, signifying the residence of a hermit. At a distance it bears a very close resemblance to a Gothic ruin; the rude openings formed to admit light into the several cells, and the ruggedly fashioned doorway aiding, at first sight, the appearance of an artificial pile of grey antiquity. The rock is found princ.i.p.ally to consist of rough grit-stone, and of a congeries of sand and pebbles. The Trent, which now flows at a short distance, formerly ran close under the rock, as is indicated by a dead pool of water situate near its foot, and communicating with the channel of the river.

"A tall flight of steep steps rudely fashioned of large unshapen blocks of stone, conducted to the entrance of the hermitage, and the dim light within its h.o.a.ry, moss-grown, sloping walls is admitted through irregularly formed apertures, pierced through the dense body of the rock, and command magnificent views of the subjacent scenery."

[Footnote: Bigsby (R.), "Historical and Topographical Description of Repton in the County of Derby," Lond. 1854.]

In the month of August 1742, when occasion arose for setting a post in a "Mercat House" at Royston in Hertfordshire in order to place a bench on it for the convenience of the market women, the men in digging struck through the eye or central hole of a millstone, laid underground, and on raising this found that it occupied the crown of a cave sixteen feet deep, as appeared by letting down a plumb line. There was a descent into it of about two feet wide, with holes cut in the chalk at equal distances, and succeeding each other like the steps of a ladder. It was accurately circular. They let a boy down, and from his report of its pa.s.sing into another cavity, a slender man with a lighted candle descended, and he confirmed the report, and added that the second cave was filled with loose earth, which, however, did not quite touch the wall, which he could see to right and left.

The people now conceived the notion that a great treasure was concealed here, and some workmen were employed to enlarge the pa.s.sage of descent.

Then with buckets and a well-kerb, they set to work to clear it, and drew up the earth and rubbish that filled the cave. When they came to the floor of the descending pa.s.sage they ran a long spit downwards and found that the earth was still loose. The vast concourse of people now became troublesome, and the workmen were obliged to postpone further operations till night.

After much time and labour had been expended, the cave was cleared, but no really scientific examination of it was made till 1852, when Mr.

Beldam drew up a report concerning it, which he presented to the Royal Society of Antiquaries. The cave is bell-shaped, and from the floor to the top of the dome measures 25-1/2 feet. The bottom is not quite circular, but nearly so, and in diameter is from 17 feet to 17 feet 6 inches. A broad step surrounds it, 8 inches wide and 3 feet from the floor. About 8 feet above the floor a cornice runs round the walls cut in a reticulated or diamond pattern two feet wide. Almost all the s.p.a.ce between the step and this cornice is occupied with sculpture, crucifixes, saints, martyrs, and subjects not easy to explain. Vestiges of red, blue, and yellow are visible in various places, and the relief of the figures has been a.s.sisted by a dark pigment. In various parts of the cave, above and below the cornice, are deep cavities or recesses of various forms and sizes, some of them oblong, and others oven-shaped, of much the same character as those found in the French caves. High up are two dates cut in the chalk, in Arabic numerals, that have been erroneously read 1347 and "Martin 1350 February 18," but these should be respectively 1547 and 1550, as Arabic numerals were not in use in England in the fourteenth century, and the name of Martin and the February are distinctly sixteenth century in character. The figure carving was not done by the same hand throughout.

Apparently the cave was originally a shaft for burial or for rubbish, and a hole in the side and floor that Dr. Stukeley took for a grave was nothing but a continuation downwards of the ancient shaft, as is proved by what has been found in it. But in mediaeval times the puticolus was enlarged and converted into a hermitage, and a hermit is known to have occupied it till the eve of the Reformation, for in the Churchwarden's book of the parish of Ba.s.singborne, under the date 1506, is the entry, _"Gyft of 20d. recd, off a Hermytt depting at Roiston in ys pysh"_ It is true that this entry does not absolutely fix the residence of the hermit at the cave, but it is hardly probable that there were two hermitages in so small a town.

The cave was probably filled in with earth in 1547 and 1550, when the inscribed dates were affixed. After which its existence was forgotten, and the Mercat House was erected over it before 1610. The carvings have been supposed to belong to the period of Henry II. and Richard C?ur-de- Lion, but it is not possible to put them earlier than the beginning of the sixteenth century, at all events such as represent the Crucifixion.

It is possible, however, that some of the kingly or knightly figures may be somewhat earlier.

Stukeley was quite convinced that the Royston cave was the oratory of the Lady Rohesia, daughter of Aubrey de Vere, who succeeded his father in 1088, but there exists no evidence that she ever lived at Royston.

The place takes its name from Rohesia, daughter of Eudo Dapifer.

In 1537, says Froude, while the harbours, piers, and fortresses were rising in Dover, "an ancient hermit tottered night after night from his cell to a chapel on the cliff, and the tapers on the altars before which he knelt in his lonely orisons made a familiar beacon far over the rolling waters. The men of the rising world cared little for the sentiment of the past. The anchorite was told sternly by the workmen that his light was a signal to the King's enemies" (a Spanish invasion from Flanders was expected), "and must burn no more; and when it was next seen, three of them waylaid the old man on his way home, threw him down, and beat him cruelly." [Footnote: "History of England," vol. iii.

p. 256.]

The following notice appeared in the _Daily Express_ of 9th June 1910. "A subterranean chamber with a spiral staircase at one end and a Gothic roof has been discovered at Greenhithe. It is believed to have been a hermit's cell."

The hermit left a pleasant memory behind him when he disappeared from England, perhaps just in time before complete degeneration set in as in France and Germany, Italy and Spain. Shakespeare, whenever he introduces him, does so in a kindly spirit, and represents him as a consoler of the afflicted and a refuge to the troubled spirit. By Spenser also he is treated with affection.