BEAMSLEY BEACON

129 itself, but in the solitudes of the great moors which lie between its confines and the line of the Wharfe running from Ilkley to Barden Bridge. A magnificent prospect of these moors and of much of the high ground surrounding the stretches of Upper Wharfedale may be obtained from the highest point of the highway between Blubberhouses and Bolton Bridge— which track of semi-solitude and sublime views the traveller who desires to regain the Wharfe at Bolton will follow. From here at an altitude of over 1000 feet the eye may sweep a tract of country of vast extent, wherein moorland and mountain, river and rock, combine to form a landscape of surpassing beauty.

Between this highroad-alongside which for some distance runs the old road now no longer used for serious traffic, but worth following for its associations—and the tributary of the Washburn known as Gill Beck, there is a still traceable piece of the Roman road which crossed the great moorlands lying between the valleys of the Nidd and the Wharfe, and gave direct communication between the camps of Aldborough (Isurium), and Ilkley (Olicana). This highway, which from the fact that it is not marked in the itinerary of Antonine, is supposed to have been constructed during the latter period of the Roman occupation, crossed the Nidd at Hampsthwaite, a few miles away, and the Washburn just below Blubberhouses, and climbing the hill at that point made straight for Ilkley over the south shoulde of Beamsley Moor. A pleasant excursion may be made over the moors from Blubberhouses to Ilkley by following the road for some little distance, and then turning off by the tracks in the heather which lead towards Denton and Middleton, and the pleasure of it becomes all the more heightened by the consciousness that it is almost impossible to find the proper way. Another excursion, wild, solitary, and productive of magnificent views, may be made along the moors to the summit of Beamsley Beacon, which rises to a height of about 1400 feet, and commands an unrivalled prospect of the valley of the Wharfe. To those who are not so fond of vast solitudes and great silences, however, the last stretches of the Washburn, between Blubberhouses and Greenhow Hill, will probably yield more attraction than the heath-clad moorlands, where little but the cry of the grouse is heard, and where the face of man is rarely set eyes on. But the last windings of the little river are also through a lonely land—in the whole of the county there is no river or stream which goes so deeply into the heart of the hills and moors as this, or conducts its followers through such quiet scenes to the murmur of its own music.

VOL. II.

R

CHAPTER XXXII

The Wharfe from Burley to Beamsley

BURLEY-THE BURLEY GREAT PUDDING-THE HERMIT OF ROMBALD'S MOOR-ASKWITH-DENTON: THE ANCESTRAL HOME OF THE FAIRFAXES-ILKLEY: THE OLICANA OF THE ROMANS-MODERN ILKLEY --ILKLEY PARISH CHURCH AND ITS CHURCHYARD CROSSES-ANTIQUITIES IN ILKLEY-THE CUP AND RING STONES-THE COW AND CALF ROCKS-VIEW FROM PANORAMA ROCKS THE STORY OF ROBERT COLLYER MIDDLETON-NESFIELD: A ROMAN FORTIFICATION-ADDINGHAM-ROMAN CAMP ON ADDINGHAM MOOR-BEAMSLEY AND KEX BECK-VIEW FROM BEAMSLEY BEACON.

I

HE highroad from Otley and Ilkley runs for the greater part of its course between the Wharfe and the railway line, and affords some striking views of the river scenery and of the hills and moors which close in the valley on both sides. Few highways have such charming surroundings as this, and few roadside villages are so bright and attractive as the only one through which it passes on its six miles' stretch between the two principal towns of this part of Wharfedale. Burley, which lies almost exactly half-way between Otley and Ilkley, is a striking example of the fact that it is never wise to prophesy, even in general terms. Whitaker, whose antipathies to manufacture and industries were only equalled by his love of natural beauty, considered Burley a delightful village, but contaminated, physically and morally, by the presence of a cotton mill, and hinted that the spread of industrialism in its midst would lead to its total degeneracy. Since his day and generation, Burley has increased considerably in size, and is the site of a very famous mill, but it is probably very much superior in physical and moral virtues to what it was a century ago or at any period of its existence. Although a place of considerable antiquity, and still possessing some ancient cottages strangely at variance with its newer buildings, Burley is to all intents and purposes a creation of the nineteenth century, and is essentially a manu

FEAST OF THE GREAT PUDDING

131 facturing village. Of that fact, however, the traveller is never inconveniently reminded. There are no dirty mills, no dirty people, and no dirty streets to be seen here, and though it is not held up to admiration as a model village, it is without doubt the cleanest and brightest industrial village in the county. With Greenholme Mills, the principal manufacturing concern in Burley, the late William Edward Forster, the author of the Education Acts of 1870, and the representative of Bradford in Parliament for many years, was closely connected, first as an active, and subsequently -during the late stages of his political career, in which he was a responsible member of various governments-as a sleeping partner. His old home, Wharfeside, is near the mills, and his grave is in the little burial-ground near Menston. Much of the brightness and attractiveness of Burley is due to the generosity of the firm with which Mr. Forster was associated, whose members have at various times provided schools, reading-rooms, concerthalls, and similar institutions for the benefit of their workpeople. The general aspect of the place is largely new. The church, which stands on the site of an ancient

chapel-of-ease that in its turn had replaced another of very early date, was rebuilt about thirty years ago, and its only object of in

terest is some old oak which was formerly part of the pew once occupied by Charles Fairfax of Menston, who was an attendant at the services here about the time of the Civil War. Until nearly the end of the last century there used to be a famous septennial gathering at Burley, known as the

Feast of the Great Pudding, which was attended by numbers of people from the adjacent parishes. About thirty stones of flour and the like weight of fruit was used in manufacturing a huge plum - pudding, which when duly boiled was distri

buted from a platform erected under the great Elm, or Alm, tree near the Malt Shovel Inn. It is said that though the pudding was boiled for nights and days it was never possible to cook it thoroughly, and that its recipients were usually plentifully bedaubed with paste as it was handed to them by the carvers.

In the churchyard of Burley there lies one of the most notable of the eccentric characters for which Yorkshire is famous, in the person of Job Senior, known to fame as the Hermit of Rombald's Moor. From an account of his strange career, published by Harrison, a bookseller of Bingley, after his death, it appears that Senior was born near Ilkley, and was the illegitimate son of a man who left him a small fortune. In his youth he was strong and good-looking and somewhat smart in his dress. He was employed as a labourer in the Ilkley district, and was noted for his great strength in lifting the heavy stones of which the fences in Wharfedale are principally built. He was afterwards employed as a wool-comber, and then as an hostler at Ilkley, and later in life he gave way to habits of dissipation and intemperance, and was principally supported by the charity of neighbours. When he was about sixty years of age he made the acquaintance of an ancient widow named Mary Barret, who resided in a cottage on the edge of Rombald's Moor. Behind the cottage was a garden and paddock which had been redeemed by Mary Barret's first husband from the common land, and it occurred to Senior that if he could only persuade the old woman —who was then in her eightieth year-to marry him, the house and land would become his own property. He accordingly waited upon Mary, and suggested that as they were both lone folk they would do well to wed. To this the old woman demurred, but on Senior assuring her that he was in love with her bonny looks, she consented, and they were duly married. Soon after the wedding his wife fell ill, and the exact manner of her death was as follows:-She complained one night that she was cold, and Senior accordingly took up the hearthstone, dug a pit in the earth, and laid her in it, in close proximity to the fire. Later on she felt hungry, so he purchased a pound of fat bacon, placed it on the fire, and catching the almost blazing fat which ran from it in an iron spoon, poured the contents of the latter down the old woman's throat, with the result that she died almost instantly. Senior was very disconsolate at her death, but was somewhat consoled by the thought that he would now enter into entire possession of the house and land. In this, however, he was disappointed, as his wife's children by her first marriage appeared on the scene and successfully laid claim to the property. Senior for a time kept possession of the cottage, but happening to leave it one day he found on his return at night that it had been dismantled, and that a hoard of money which he had concealed in the walls had been lost or stolen. This loss affected his reason, and from that time he lived in a rude hut which he constructed out of the ruins of the cottage. This was about the size of a dog-kennel, and could only be entered in a

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133

creeping position. All around his hut Senior planted potatoes, and lived on them, with the addition of oatmeal and buttermilk. He kept a peat-fire burning close by, and used to sit with one leg on each side of it, poking roasted potatoes from its depths with his stick, and rolling them in his oatmeal bag ere he ate them. He drank his water and buttermilk warm, heating them in stone bottles, which were kept amongst the embers. He had a curious trick of singing in four voices-treble, alto, tenor, and bassand in winter used to travel about the country exhibiting his skill, and sleeping in any outhouse offered him. His personal habits were of an extreme filthiness: he never washed himself or used a comb, and his clothes were unchanged for years. He wore clogs stuffed with hay on his feet, and his legs were encased in straw. His coat was a thing of many colours and mere patches, and his breeches were of a like nature, supported by a girth of hemp tied tightly about his body. On his back he carried a bag, and on his head was a brimless hat, the ruins of which were kept together by hemp-string. From it dangled a tobacco-pipe, and in each hand, as he walked, he carried a rough staff. Senior was very fond of giving practical advice to people who visited him out of curiosity, and his favourite maxim was to the effect that land was better than a wife, and potatoes than children. On the north bank of the Wharfe, almost opposite Burley, lies the village of Askwith, a quaint, old-world place, wherein several inhabitants are living on the very spots, if not in the same houses, occupied by their ancestors six centuries ago. Askwith is one of the prettiest and quietest of the Wharfeside villages, and the charm of its gardens and orchards is deepened by the presence of the two brooks which run through it from the moors beyond to join the Wharfe near Burley. A short distance to its west lies Denton Park, the ancestral home of the famous family of Fairfax. Originally the property of the Thwaites family, whose ancestors were Clerks of the Kitchen to William the Conqueror, it passed into the possession of the Fairfaxes in 1518 by the romantic marriage of Sir William Fairfax to Isabel Thwaites, the heiress whom he forcibly removed from the keeping of the sisters at Nun Appleton, and espoused at the adjacent church of Bolton Percy. Denton is most closely connected with the life and doings of Thomas, the first Lord Fairfax, who spent the greater part of his time here, died here, and was buried in the church of Otley, a few miles away. In his youth he had many employments as a diplomatist. Elizabeth despatched him to the court of Scotland on five occasions as the bearer of important communications for James I., who formed a great admiration for the young envoy's qualities. He was knighted on the field after the battle of Rouen by the Earl of Essex on account of his great bravery, and was subsequently raised to the peerage. It is a curious thing that he formed. an impression that his eldest son, the famous Sir Ferdinando, possessed no military talent, and there are two legends in connection with the old man. which show that he had some strange notions of the powers of his own