England, Picturesque and Descriptive Part 4

[Ill.u.s.tration: PEVERIL CASTLE, CASTLETON.]

BESS OF HARDWICKE.

[Ill.u.s.tration: HARDWICKE HALL.]

One of the great characters of the sixteenth century was Elizabeth, Countess of Shrewsbury, familiarly known as "Bess of Hardwicke," where she was born, and who managed to outlive four husbands, thus showing what success is in store for a woman of tact and business talent. She was a penniless bride at fourteen, when she married an opulent gentleman of Derbyshire named Barley, who left her at fifteen a wealthy widow. At the age of thirty she married another rich husband, Sir William Cavendish, the ancestor of the Dukes of Devonshire, who died in 1557, leaving her again a widow, but with large estates, for she had taken good care to look after the proper marriage settlements; and in fact, even in those early days, a pretty good fortune was necessary to provide for the family of eight children Sir William left her. She next married Sir William Loe, who also had large estates and was the captain of the king's guard, the lady's business tact procuring in advance of the wedding the settlement of these estates upon herself and her children--a hard condition, with which, the historian tells us, "the gallant captain, who had a family by a former marriage, felt himself constrained to comply or forego his bride." But in time the captain died, and his estates all went to the thrifty lady, to the exclusion of his own family; and to the blooming widow, thus made for the third time, there came a-courting the Earl of Shrewsbury; the earl had numerous offspring, and therefore could hardly give Bess all his possessions, like her other husbands, but she was clever enough to obtain her object in another way.

As a condition precedent to accepting the earl, she made him marry two of his children to two of hers, and after seeing these two weddings solemnized, the earl led her to the altar for the fourth time at the age of fifty; and we are told that all four of these weddings were actual "love-matches." But she did not get on well with the earl, whose correspondence shows she was a little shrewish, though in most quarrels she managed to come off ahead, having by that time acquired experience.

When the earl died in 1590, and Bess concluded not again to attempt matrimony, she was immensely rich and was seized with a mania for building, which has left to the present day three memorable houses: Hardwicke Hall, where she lived, Bolsover Castle, and the palace of Chatsworth, which she began, and on which she lavished the enormous sum, for that day, of $400,000. The legend runs that she was told that so long as she kept building her life would be spared--an architect's ruse possibly; and when finally she died it was during a period of hard frost, when the masons could not work.

[Ill.u.s.tration: ELIZABETHAN STAIRCASE, HARDWICKE HALL.]

Hardwicke Hall, near Mansfield, which the renowned Bess has left as one of her monuments, is about three hundred years old, and approached by a n.o.ble avenue through a s.p.a.cious park; it is still among the possessions of the Cavendish family and in the Duke of Devonshire's estates. The old hall where Bess was born almost touches the new one that she built, and which bears the initials of the proud and determined woman in many places outside and in. It was here that Mary Queen of Scots was held in captivity part of the time that she was placed by Queen Elizabeth in the custody of the Earl of Shrewsbury, and her statue stands in the hall.

There is an extensive picture-gallery containing many historical portraits, and also fine state-apartments. The mansion is a lofty oblong stone structure, with tall square towers at each corner, the architecture being one of the best specimens of the Elizabethan Period; on the side, as viewed from the park, the hall seems all windows, which accounts for the saying of that neighborhood:

"Hardwicke Hall, more gla.s.s than wall."

The ruins of the old hall, almost overgrown with ivy, are picturesque, but from everywhere on the ancient or on the modern hall there peer out the initials "E. S.," with which the prudent Bess was so careful to mark all her possessions.

BOLSOVER CASTLE.

[Ill.u.s.tration: BOLSOVER CASTLE.]

The noted Bolsover Castle, which Bess also built, though her son finished it after her death, stands in a magnificent position on a high plateau not far from Chesterfield, overlooking a wide expanse of Derbyshire. The present castle replaced an ancient structure that had fallen into ruin, and was supposed to have been built by "Peveril of the Peak;" it was fortified during King John's time, and traces of the fortifications still remain; it was repeatedly besieged and taken by a.s.sault. The present building is a square and lofty mansion of castellated appearance, with towers at the corners built of brown stone; in it the Earl of Newcastle, who subsequently inherited it, spent on one occasion $75,000 in entertaining King Charles I., the entire country round being invited to come and attend the king: Ben Jonson performed a play for his amus.e.m.e.nt. Lord Clarendon speaks of the occasion as "such an excess of feasting as had scarce ever been known in England before."

It now belongs to the Duke of Portland, and has fallen into partial decay, with trees growing in some of the deserted apartments and ivy creeping along the walls. Visitors describe it as a ghostly house, with long vaulted pa.s.sages, subterranean chambers, dungeon-like holes in the towers, and mysterious s.p.a.ces beneath the vaults whence come weird noises. When Mr. Jennings visited Bolsover recently he described it as like a haunted house, and after examining the apartments, in which most things seemed going to decay, he went down stairs, guided by an old woman, to the cellars and pa.s.sages that are said to be the remains of the original Norman castle. A chamber with a high vaulted roof was used as a kitchen, and an ancient stone pa.s.sage connected it with a crypt; beneath this, she told him, there was a church, never opened since the days of Peveril. Their voices had a hollow sound, and their footsteps awakened echoes as if from a large empty s.p.a.ce beneath: the servants, she said, were afraid to come down where they were, excepting by twos and threes, and she added: "Many people have seen things here besides me: something bad has been done here, sir, and when they open that church below they'll find it out. Just where you stand by that door I have several times seen a lady and gentleman--only for a moment or two, for they come like a flash; when I have been sitting in the kitchen, not thinking of any such thing, they stood there--the gentleman with ruffles on, the lady with a scarf round her waist; I never believed in ghosts, but I have seen _them_. I am used to it now, and don't mind it, but we do not like the noises, because they disturb us. Not long ago my husband, who comes here at night, and I could not sleep at all, and we thought at last that somebody had got shut up in the castle, for some children had been here that day; so we lit a candle and went all over it, but there was nothing, only the noises following us, and keeping on worse than ever after we left the rooms, though they stopped while we were in them." The old woman's tale shows the atmosphere there is about this sombre and ghostly castle of Bolsover.

THE WYE AND THE DERWENT.

[Ill.u.s.tration: THE CRESCENT, BUXTON.]

These two noted rivers take their rise in the Derbyshire hills, and, coming together at Rowsley near the pretty Peac.o.c.k Inn, flow down to the sea through the valleys of the Wye, the Trent, and the Humber. Rising in the limestone hills to the north of Buxton, the Wye flows past that celebrated bath, where the Romans first set the example of seeking its healing waters, both hot and cold springs gushing from the rocks in close proximity. It stands nine hundred feet above the sea, its nucleus, "The Crescent," having been built by the Duke of Devonshire; and the miraculous cures wrought by St. Mary's Well are noted by Charles Cotton among the _Wonders of the Peak_. From Buxton the Wye follows a romantic glen to Bakewell, the winding valley being availed of, by frequent tunnels, viaducts, and embankments, as a route for the Midland Railway.

In this romantic glen is the remarkable limestone crag known as Chee Tor, where the curving valley contracts into a narrow gorge. The gray limestone cliffs are in many places overgrown with ivy, while trees find rooting-places in their fissures. Tributary brooks fall into the Wye, all flowing through miniature dales that disclose successive beauties, and then at a point where the limestone hills recede from the river, expanding the valley, Bakewell is reached. Here are also mineral springs, but the most important place in the town is the parish church, parts of which are seven hundred years old. It is a picturesque building, cruciform, with a spire, and is rich in sepulchral remains, containing the ancestors of the Duke of Rutland--who owns the town--in the tombs of a long line of Vernons and Manners. In the churchyard are several curious epitaphs, among them that of John Dale and his two wives, the inscription concluding,

"A period's come to all their toylsome lives; The good man's quiet--still are both his wives."

In this churchyard is also the well-known epitaph often quoted:

"Beneath a sleeping infant lies, to earth whose body lent, More glorious shall hereafter rise, tho' not more innocent.

When the archangels trump shall blow, and souls to bodies join, Millions will wish their lives below had been as short as thine."

[Ill.u.s.tration: BAKEWELL CHURCH.]

HADDON HALL.

Three miles below Bakewell, near the Wye, is one of the most famous old mansions of England--Haddon Hall. This ancient baronial home, with its series of houses, its courtyards, towers, embattled walls, and gardens, stands on the side of a hill sloping down to the Wye, while the railway has pierced a tunnel through the hill almost underneath the structure.

The buildings surround two courtyards paved with large stones, and cover a s.p.a.ce of nearly three hundred feet square. Outside the arched entrance-gate to the first courtyard is a low thatched cottage used as a porter's lodge. Haddon is maintained, not as a residence, but to give as perfect an idea as possible of a baronial hall of the Middle Ages. To get to the entrance the visitor toils up a rather steep hill, and on the way pa.s.ses two remarkable yew trees, cut to represent the crests of the two families whose union by a romantic marriage is one of the traditions of this famous place. One yew represents the peac.o.c.k of Manners, the present ducal house of Rutland, and the other the boar's head of Vernon.

Parts of this house, like so many structures in the neighborhood, were built in the time of "Peveril of the Peak," and its great hall was the "Martindale Hall" of Scott's novel, thus coming down to us through eight centuries, and nearly all the buildings are at least four hundred years old.

[Ill.u.s.tration: HADDON HALL, FROM THE WYE.]

Entering the gateway, the porter's guard-room is seen on the right hand, with the ancient "peephole" through which he scanned visitors before admitting them. Mounting the steps to the first courtyard, which is on a lower level than the other, the chapel and the hall are seen on either hand, while in front are the steps leading to the state-apartments. The buildings are not lofty, but there are second-floor rooms in almost all parts, which were occupied by the household. There is an extensive ball-room, while the Eagle Tower rises at one corner of the court. Many relics of the olden time are preserved in these apartments. The ancient chapel is entered by an arched doorway from the court, and consists of a nave, chancel, and side aisle, with an antique Norman font and a large high-back pew used by the family. After pa.s.sing the court, the banquet-hall is entered, thirty-five by twenty-five feet, and rising to the full height of the building. In one of the doorways is a bracket to which an iron ring is attached, which was used, as we are told, "to enforce the laws of conviviality." When a guest failed to drink his allowance of wine he was suspended by the wrist to this ring, and the liquor he failed to pour down his throat was poured into his sleeve. A tall screen at the end of the room formed the front of a gallery, where on great occasions minstrels discoursed sweet music, while at the opposite end the lord and his honored guests sat on a raised dais. Here still stands the old table, while behind the dais a flight of stairs leads up to the state-apartments. Stags' heads and antlers of great age are on the walls. Another door opens out of the banquet-hall into the dining-room, the end of which is entirely taken up with a fine Gothic window displaying the Vernon arms and quarterings. This room is elaborately wainscoted. The royal arms are inscribed over the fireplace, and below them is the Vernon motto carved in Gothic letters:

"Drede G.o.d and Honour the Kyng."

An exquisite oriel window looks out from this room over the woods and grounds of Haddon, the recess bearing on one of its panels the head of Will Somers, who was Henry VIII.'s jester. The drawing-room, which is over the dining-room, is hung with old tapestry, above which is a frieze of ornamental mouldings. A pretty recessed window also gives from this room a delightful view over the grounds.

[Ill.u.s.tration: ENTRANCE TO THE BANQUET-HALL, HADDON HALL.]

The gem of Haddon is the long gallery or ball-room, which extends over one hundred feet along one side of the inner court: the semicircular wooden steps leading to this apartment are said to have been cut from a single tree that grew in the park. The gallery is wainscoted in oak in semicircular arched panels, alternately large and small, surmounted by a frieze and a turreted and battlemented cornice. The ceiling is elaborately carved in geometric patterns, and the tracery contains the alternating arms and crests of Vernon and Manners: the remains are still visible of the rich gilding and painting of this ceiling. In the anteroom paintings are hung, and from it a strongly-barred door opens upon a flight of stone steps leading down to the terrace and garden: this is "Dorothy Vernon's Door;" and across the garden another flight of steps leading to the terrace is known as "Dorothy Vernon's Steps." It was the gentle maiden's flight through this door and up these steps to elope with John Manners that carried the old house and all its broad lands into the possession of the family now owning it. The state bedroom is hung with Gobelin tapestry, ill.u.s.trating aesop's fables: the state bed is fourteen feet high, and furnished in green silk velvet and white satin, embroidered by needlework, and its last occupant was George IV.

The kitchen and range of domestic offices are extensive, and show the marvellous amount of cooking that was carried on in the hospitable days of Haddon; the kitchen has a ceiling supported by ma.s.sive beams and a solid oak column in the centre; there are two huge fireplaces, scores of stoves, spits, pothooks, and hangers, large chopping-blocks, dressers, and tables, with attendant bakehouses, ovens, pantries, and larders; among the relics is an enormous salting-trough hollowed out of one immense block of wood. Beyond the garden or lawn, one hundred and twenty feet square, extends the terrace, planted with ancient yews, whose gnarled roots intertwine with and displace the stones. This terrace extends the full width of the outer or upper garden, and gives a charming view of the southern front of the hall.

[Ill.u.s.tration: THE TERRACE, HADDON HALL.]

More romance hangs about Haddon than probably any other old baronial hall in England, and it has therefore been for years an endless source of inspiration for poets, artists, and novelists. Mrs. Radcliffe here laid some of the scenes of the _Mysteries of Udolpho_. Bennett's "King of the Peak" was Sir George Vernon, the hospitable owner of Haddon.

Scott has written of it, a host of artists have painted its most attractive features, and many a poet has sung of the

"Hall of wa.s.sail which has rung To the unquestioned baron's jest: Dim old chapel, where were hung Offerings of the o'erfraught breast; Moss-clad terrace, strangely still, Broken shaft and crumbling frieze---- Still as lips that used to fill With bugle-blasts the morning breeze."

But, unlike most baronial strongholds, the history of Haddon tells only the romance of peace, love, and hospitality. It came by marriage into the possession of the Vernons soon after the Conquest; one of them, Sir Henry Vernon of Haddon, was appointed governor of Prince Arthur by Henry VII. His grandson, Sir George Vernon, lived in such princely magnificence at Haddon that he was known as the "King of the Peak;" his initials, "G. V.," are carved in the banquet-hall. Around his youngest daughter, Dorothy, gathers the chief halo of romance. The story in brief is, that her elder sister, being the affianced bride of the son of the Earl of Derby, was petted and made much of, while Dorothy, at sweet sixteen, was kept in the background. She formed an attachment for John Manners, son of the Earl of Rutland, but this her family violently opposed, keeping her almost a prisoner: her lover, disguised as a forester, lurked for weeks in the woods around Haddon, obtaining occasionally a stolen interview. At length on a festal night, when the ball-room was filled with guests summoned to celebrate the approaching nuptials of the elder sister, and every one was so wrapped up in enjoyment that there was no time to watch Dorothy, the maiden, un.o.bserved, stole out of the ball-room into the anteroom, and through the door, across the garden, and up the steps to the terrace, where her lover had made a signal that he was waiting. In a moment she was in his arms, and rode away with him in the moonlight all night, across the hills of Derbyshire, and into Leicestershire, where they were married next morning. It was the old story--an elopement, a grand row, and then all was forgiven. Sir George Vernon had no sons, and his daughters divided his estate, Haddon going to Dorothy, who thus by her elopement carried the famous hall over to the family of Manners. Dorothy died in 1584, leaving four children, the oldest, Sir George Manners, living at Haddon and maintaining its hospitable reputation. Dying in 1679, his son John Manners, who was the ninth Earl of Rutland, became the master of Haddon, and "kept up the good old mansion at a bountiful rate," as the chronicler tells us. He kept one hundred and forty servants, and had so many retainers and guests that every day the tables in the old banquet-hall were spread as at a Christmas feast. The earl was raised to the rank of duke, and his son John, Duke of Rutland, known as the "Old Man of the Hill," died in 1779, since which time the family have not used the hall as a place of residence, having gone to Belvoir in Leicestershire. Its present owner is the sixth Duke of Rutland, Charles Cecil Manners, and the descendant of the famous Dorothy. There are few places, even in England, that have the fame of Haddon, and it is one of the chief spots sought out by the tourist. The duke maintains it just as it existed centuries ago, with the old furniture and utensils, so as to reproduce as faithfully as possible the English baronial hall of his ancestors.

CHATSWORTH.

[Ill.u.s.tration: THE "PEAc.o.c.k," FROM THE ROAD.]

[Ill.u.s.tration: CHATSWORTH HOUSE, FROM THE SOUTH-WEST.]

[Ill.u.s.tration: MARBLE DOORWAY TO STATE DRAWING-ROOM.]

[Ill.u.s.tration: STATE DRAWING-ROOM, CHATSWORTH.]

Below Haddon Hall the valley of the Wye broadens, with yet richer scenery, as it approaches the confluence of the Wye and Derwent at Rowsley, where the quaint old Peac.o.c.k Inn, which was the manor-house of Haddon, bears over the door the date 1653, and the crest of the ducal House of Rutland, a peac.o.c.k with tail displayed. Ascending for a short distance the valley of the Derwent, which washes the bases of the steep limestone hills, we come to Chatsworth. In sharp contrast with the ancient glories of Haddon is this modern ducal palace, for whose magnificence Bess of Hardwicke laid the foundation. This "Palace of the Peak" stands in a park covering over two thousand acres; the Derwent flows in front, over which the road to the palace is carried by a fine bridge. From the river a lawn gently slopes upward to the buildings, and the wooded hill which rises sharply behind them is surmounted by a hunting-tower, embosomed in trees. A herd of at least a thousand deer roam at will over the park, and have become very tame. Chatsworth is a brownish-yellow building, square and flat-topped, with a modern and more ornamental wing. Its front extends fully six hundred feet, and in parts it is of that depth. The estate was bought in the sixteenth century by Sir William Cavendish, who built the original house, a quadrangular building with turrets, which was greatly extended by his wife. It was used as a fortress in the Civil Wars, and was considerably battered. The first Duke of Devonshire about the year 1700 rebuilt the mansion, employing the chief architects, artists, designers, and wood-carvers of his time, among them Sir Christopher Wren. In the grounds, not far from the bridge over the Derwent, is the "Bower of Mary Queen of Scots."

There is a small, clear lake almost concealed by foliage, in the centre of which is a tower, and on the top a gra.s.s-grown garden, where are also several fine trees. Here, under guard, the captive was permitted to take the air. In those days she looked out upon a broad expanse of woods and moorland: now all around has been converted into gardens and a park.

Entering the house through a magnificent gateway, the visitor is taken into the entrance-hall, where the frescoes represent the life and death of Julius Caesar; then up the grand staircase of amethyst and variegated alabaster guarded by richly-gilded bal.u.s.trades. The gorgeously-embellished chapel is wainscoted with cedar, and has a sculptured altar made of Derbyshire marbles. The beautiful drawing-room opens into a series of state-apartments lined with choice woods and hung with Gobelin tapestries representing the cartoons of Raphael.

Magnificent carvings and rare paintings adorn the walls, while the richest decorations are everywhere displayed. Over the door of the antechamber is a quill pen so finely carved that it almost reproduces the real feather. In the Scarlet Room are the bed on which George II.

died and the chairs and footstools used at the coronation of George III.

On the north side of the house is another stairway of oak, also richly gilded. In the apartments replacing those where Mary Queen of Scots lived are her bed-hangings and tapestries. There is an extensive library with many rare books and ma.n.u.scripts, and a sculpture-gallery, lined with Devonshire marble, containing many statues and busts, and also two rec.u.mbent lions, each nine feet long and four feet high and weighing four tons, and carved out of a solid block of marble. The final enlargement of Chatsworth was completed about forty years ago, when Queen Victoria made a state visit and was given a magnificent reception by the Duke of Devonshire.

[Ill.u.s.tration: STATE BEDROOM, CHATSWORTH.]

[Ill.u.s.tration: THE SCULPTURE-GALLERY, CHATSWORTH.]

The gardens at Chatsworth are as noted as the house, and are to many minds the gem of the estate. They cover about one hundred and twenty-two acres, and are so arranged as to make a beautiful view out of every window of the palace. All things are provided that can add to rural beauty--fountains, cascades, running streams, lakes, rockeries, orange-groves, hothouses, woods, sylvan dells--and no labor or expense is spared to enhance the attractions of trees, flowers, and shrubbery.

From a stone temple, which it completely covers, the great cascade flows down among dolphins, sea-lions, and nymphs, until it disappears among the rocks and seeks an underground outlet into the Derwent. Enormous stones weighing several tons are nicely balanced, so as to rock at the touch or swing open for gates. Others overhang the paths as if a gust of wind might blow them down. In honor of the visit of the Czar Nicholas in 1844 the great "Emperor Fountain" was constructed, which throws a column of water to an immense height. The grounds are filled with trees planted by kings, queens, and great people on their visits to the palace. The finest of all the trees is a n.o.ble Spanish chestnut of sixteen feet girth. Weeping willows do not grow at Chatsworth, but they have provided one in the form of a metal tree, contrived so as to discharge a deluge of raindrops from its metallic leaves and boughs when a secret spring is touched. The glory of the Chatsworth gardens, however, is the conservatory, a beautiful structure of gla.s.s and iron covering nearly an acre, the arched roof in the centre rising to a height of sixty-seven feet. In this famous hot-house are the rarest palms and tropical plants.

It was designed by Joseph Paxton, the duke's head-gardener, and, enlarging the design, Paxton constructed in the same way the London Crystal Palace for the Exhibition of 1851, for which service he was knighted. Besides this rare collection of hot-house plants, the famous Victoria Regia is in a special house at Chatsworth, growing in a tank thirty-four feet in diameter, the water being maintained at the proper temperature and kept constantly in motion as a running stream. The seed for this celebrated plant was brought from Guiana, and it first bloomed here in 1849. Some fifty persons are employed in the gardens and grounds, besides the servants in the buildings, showing the retinue necessary to maintain this great show-palace, for that is its chief present use, the Duke of Devonshire seldom using it as a residence, as he prefers the less pretentious but more comfortable seat he possesses at Bolton in Yorkshire. North of Chatsworth Park, near Baslow, on top of a hill, is the strange ma.s.s of limestone which can be seen from afar, and is known as the Eagle Rock.