Traditions of Lancashire Volume II Part 3

"Who art thou? I fear me for the tempter!"

"And what boots it, lady? But, listen. These elves be my slaves; and yet I am not immortal. My term is nigh run out, though it may be renewed if, before the last hour be past, a maiden plight her hopes, her happiness to me! Ere that shadow creeps on the fairy pillar thou art irrevocably mine, or his whom thou dreadest."

Eleanor groaned aloud. She felt a cold hand creeping on her brow. She screamed involuntarily. On a sudden the boughs bent with a loud crash above her head, and a form, rushing down the height, stood before her.

This unexpected deliverer was Oliver Chadwyck. Alarmed by the cries of a female, as he was returning from the chase, he interposed at the very moment when his mistress was ensnared by the wiles of her seducer.

"Rash fool, thou hast earned thy doom. The blood be on thine own head.

Thou art the sacrifice!"

This was said in a voice of terrible and fiendish malignity. A loud tramp, as of a mighty host, was heard pa.s.sing away, and Oliver now beheld the form of his betrothed.

"Eleanor! Here! In this unholy place!" cried her lover. But the maiden was unable to answer.

"There's blood upon my hand!" said he, holding it up in the now clear and unclouded moonlight. "Art thou wounded, lady?"

"I know not," she replied; "I was alone. Yet I felt as though some living thing were nigh--some unseen form, of terrible and appalling attributes! Was it not a dream?"

"Nay," said Oliver, pensively; "methought another was beside thee!"

"I saw him not."

"How camest thou hither?"

"Let us be gone," said she, trembling; "I will tell thee all."

She laid her head on his shoulder. It throbbed heavily. "I am now free. The accursed links are broken. I feel as though newly wakened from some horrible dream! Thou hast saved me, Oliver. But if thine own life is the price!"

"Fear not; I defy their devilish subtilty--in their very den too: and thus, and thus, I renounce the devil and all his works!"

He spat thrice upon the ground, to show his loathing and contempt.

"Oh! say not so," cried Eleanor, looking round in great alarm.

Oliver bore her in his arms from that fearful spot. He accompanied her home; and it was near break of day when, exhausted and alone, she again retired to her chamber. By the way Oliver told her that he had found a mysterious tablet on the edge of the brook the same morning.

He had luckily hidden it in his bosom, and he felt as though a talisman or charm had protected him from the spells in the "Fairies'

Chapel."

Springtide was past, and great was the stir and bustle for the approaching nuptials between Oliver Chadwyck and the Lady Eleanor. All the yeomanry, inhabitants of the hamlets of Honorsfield, b.u.t.terworth, and Healey, were invited to the wedding. Dancers and mummers were provided; wrestlers and cudgel-players, with games and pastimes of all sorts, were appointed. The feasts were to be holden for three days, and masks, motions, and other rare devices, were expected to surpa.s.s and eclipse every preceding attempt of the like nature.

Eleanor sat in her lonely bower. It was the night before the bridal.

To-morrow would see her depart in pageantry and pomp--an envied bride!

Yet was her heart heavy, and she could not refrain from weeping.

She sought rest; but sleep was denied. The owl hooted at her window; the bat flapped his leathern wings; the taper burned red and heavily, and its rays were tinged as though with blood; the fire flung out its tiny coffin; the wind sobbed aloud at every cranny, and wailed piteously about the dwelling.

"Would that I might read my destiny," thought she. Her natural inclination to forbidden practices was too powerful to withstand.

Now there was formerly an ancient superst.i.tion, that if, on the night before marriage, a taper were burned, made from the fat of a young sow, and anointed with the blood of the inquirer, after sundry diabolical and cabalistical rites at midnight, a spirit would appear, and p.r.o.nounce the good or evil destiny of the querent.

Eleanor had prepared the incantation ere she laid her throbbing head on the pillow. Whether or not she slept, is more than we can divulge.

Such, in all probability, was the case; dreams being the echo only of our waking antic.i.p.ations.

She thought there came a rushing wind. The door flapped to and fro, the curtains shook, and the pictures glared horribly from the wall.

Suddenly--starting from the panel, with eyes lighted up like bale-fires, and a malignant scowl on her visage--stalked down one of the family portraits. It was that of a female--a maiden aunt of the house of Byron, painted by one of the court artists, whom the king had brought from France, and patronised at a heavy cost. This venerable dame appeared to gaze at the spectator from whatsoever situation she was beholden. The eyes even seemed to follow you when pa.s.sing across the chamber. A natural consequence though, and only marvelled at by the ignorant and illiterate.

This ancient personage now advanced from her hanging-place, and standing at the foot of the bed, opened out a fiery scroll with these ominous words:--

"Maid, wife, and widow, in one day, This shall be thy destiny."

Eleanor struggled hard, but was unable to move. She laboured for utterance, but could not speak. At length, with one desperate effort, a loud cry escaped her, and the vision disappeared. She slept no more, but morning disclosed her haggard cheek and sunken eye, intimating that neither hope nor enjoyment could have been the companion of her slumbers.

It was a bright morning in June. The sun rode high and clear in the blue heavens. The birds had "sung their matins blythe" ere the bridegroom arrived with his attendants. Merrily did the village choristers acquit themselves in their vocation, while those that were appointed strewed flowers in the way. The bells of St Chad trolled out their merry notes when the ceremony was over, and the bride, on her snow-white palfrey, pa.s.sed on, escorted by her husband, at the head of the procession. Gay cavaliers on horseback, and maidens prancing by their side, made the welkin ring with loud and mirthful discourse. The elder Byron rode on his charger by the side of Jordan Chadwyck and his eldest son, with whom rode the vicar, Richard Salley, nothing loath to contribute his folly to the festival.

As the procession drew nigh to the hall, a messenger rode forward in great haste, whispering to Byron, who, with angry and disordered looks, shouted aloud to Oliver--

"Away--away! The cowardly Traffords are at our threshold. They have skulked out, like traitors as they be, knowing our absence at the feast. 'Tis an old feud, and a b.l.o.o.d.y one. Who is for Byron? Down with the Traffords!"

The old man here put spurs to his horse, and galloped off with his attendants.

"A Byron--a Byron!" shouted Oliver, as he followed in full cry, first leaving his wife under a suitable and safe escort. Soon they routed the enemy, but the prediction was complete; for Eleanor became

"Maid, wife, and widow, in one day!"

her husband being slain during the battle.

The blood of man was held of little account in those days, if we may judge by the following award on the occasion:--

"In virtue of a writ of appeal of death, sued out against Sir John Trafford, Knight, his tenants and servants, the sum of sixty pounds was deemed to be paid by Trafford to Biroun, to be distributed amongst the cousins and friends of the late Oliver C., in the parish church of Manchester, on the award of Sir Thomas Stanley, Knight, _Lord Stanley_--viz. ten marks at the nativity of John the Baptist, and ten marks at St Martyn, yearly, until the whole was paid, and all parties to be fully friends. Dated London, 24th March, 20 Edward IV. 4018."

[1] Whitaker's _Hist. Whalley_, p. 441.

[2] Corry's _Lancashire_.

[3] _Mag. Britan._ York, p. 391.

[4] Here vulgarly called the Tearn Barn (t.i.the-barn) in Wales; distinctly seen in showery weather, but invisible in a settled season.

[5] On a bleak moor, called Monstone Edge, in this hamlet, is a huge moor-stone or outlier, which (though part of it was broken off and removed some years ago) still retains the name of Monstone. It is said to have been quoited thither by Robin Hood, from his bed on the top of Blackstone Edge, about six miles off. After striking the mote or mark aimed at, the stone bounced off a few hundred yards and settled there. These stones, however, in all probability, if not Druidical, were landmarks, the ancient boundary of the hamlet of Healey; and, as was once customary, the marvellous story of this ancient outlaw might be told to the urchins who accompanied the perambulators, with the addition, probably, of a few kicks and cuffs, to make them remember the spot.

[Ill.u.s.tration: THE LUCK OF MUNCASTER.]

THE LUCK OF MUNCASTER.

_K. Hen._--"From Scotland am I stolen, even of pure love, To greet mine own land with my wishful sight."