at Chester, as standing 2. Aug. 1725.
TAB. LXV.Riding under the gate where the Watling-street enters, I observed immediately two arches of Roman work. I was overjoyed at sight of so noble an antiquity, which has never been mentioned. It was a square of twenty foot within; for so far are they distant from each other, and of so much diameter: they are exactly of the same manner as those at Lincoln; the stones not quite so large, nor so good: the breadth is 2½ foot. On each side was a portal, of a lesser arch, and lower, for foot-passengers; for part of the arch is left, and people now alive remember them open quite through; though now both these, and part of the great arch, are taken up by little paltry shops: or, rather, the lesser ones are quite pulled down, and even the great ones are in the utmost danger of falling; for the occupants of those places cut away part of the bottom of the semicircle to enlarge their shops. The portals answered to the Rows (as they call them) so remarkable in this city, being portico’s quite through on both sides the streets, undoubtedly continued in a manner from the Roman times. It is admirable that these vast arches, made of stones of so large dimensions, and laid without mortar, can stand at all when their proper butment is destroyed: that which regards the city has a key-stone: in both, below the lowest stone of the arch, the two next courses downward project a little inward, in nature of imposts; and over the crown of the arches runs a course of projecting stones moulded a little, but coarsely: the stones are artfully, though rudely cut; to which it is owing that they are not fallen, as depending wholly on their own principles, and the manner of their masonry, or geometry. Here terminates the famous Watling-street, whose beginning in Dover valley I walked over in May last. The road is here preserved, going by the river side to Aldford.
The ancient subterraneous canals are perfect still; their outlets into the river under the city-walls are visible; and they say that they are so high, that a man may walk upright their whole length. Wherever they dig, they find subterraneous vaults and arches, and all manner of antiquities; many of which were collected by the late Mr. Prescot, prebend of the cathedral here, and now remain in the hands of his son.
The city is commodiously placed in an angle of the river, which washes and protects two sides of it. As I said, it is an oblong square, 600 paces one way, 400 the other; that is, 3000 feet by 2000. Two principal streets run its length at equal distances from the walls and each other: one may be called Principium, having the gates at each end; the other is Quintana: they are crossed in the middle by the via prætoria, where are the gates Decumana and Prætoria. Another principal street runs on each side it, equidistant from it, and the walls of the ends: these may be called strigæ. Other lesser streets, or hemistrigæ, subdivide some of the squares made by the principals. Thus must the original scheme be understood, when the military and civil citizens first founded and inhabited the place. The little difference now is caused by the cathedral and the castle: the castle, the seat of Hugh Lupus, count palatine, and his successors, is built, for the most part, beyond the limits of the Roman walls, in that angle next the flexure of the river; consisting of a great court, and keep, strongly walled, and fenced with a ditch: the city-wall carried still round without it. To the north of the castle is some small remnant of a nunnery. The meadow between the walls and the river here is called Rood-eye, from a cross there, the stump whereof remains: upon this they keep a horse-race. The city-walls are carefully repaired by the corporation, and make an agreeable walk quite round: they are founded intirely on the rock. The churches have every where, as in other places, deformed the streets, which are originally the most noble and spacious I have seen. The whole city has a descent every way from the centre. The castle is rendered strong as the nature of the place will allow of: here the earls called their courts of parliament, and administered all affairs of state and judicature with regality.
Last year, digging in the chapter-house, they found the bodies of some of the old earls palatine, wrapped up in leather sewed; but within that, they were laid in woolen, like what we call wadding: the bones are pretty perfect, but the flesh is gone. They showed us one, thought to be Randulf Demeschin, the last earl, laid in a stone coffin; a place left for his head: he lies on the right hand of Hugh Lupus, the first earl.
They have built a large handsome exchange over-against the front of the cathedral, with pillars of one stone. The city is not set precisely east and west, though pretty near it. The ancient Roman gate at the Watling-street was larger than the rest, because of the entrance of the Roman ways there from Condate, Bonium, and the greatest part of the kingdom; likewise for readier passage of the soldiers upon occasion, most requisite that way; two of the other gates being fenced by the river: therefore this extends in front to 80 foot. This city in Roman times must have appeared admirably beautiful, with such spacious streets: the tradesmens shops and houses I suppose then to have been next the piazza’s of the streets; the soldiers tenements backwards, with gardens into the squares, as it is at present. The river, which once washed the city-walls, is now thrown off to some considerable distance by salt-marshes: a dam too is made across it by the bridge, for the sake of the mill; and by other mismanagements it grows worse every day, so that ships cannot come up near the place; whence the only little trade they have accruing from the passage into Ireland, is in danger.
TAB. LXVI.I saw at Mr. Prescot’s the Roman altar of Flavius Longus: it is very intire, and very prettily ornamented. On the top where the discus usually is, is cut the head of a Genius within a garland: on one side is a Genius with a cornucopia; on the other, a flower-pot with leaves of brank-ursin. It was found under a house by east-gate. He has more fragments of antiquity; Roman bricks, square for paving, a foot each side ; some marked LEG. XX. V. two inches and an eighth high; some hollow bricks with a double cavity for hypocausts. He has likewise a curious statue of the god Mithras with the Phrygian bonnet, and a torch in his hands, standing cross-legged: it was found under a niche of the wall, between east-gate and the river. Some of the bricks are thus marked, LEG. XX. V. V. which demonstrates they mean the legio vicesima valeria victrix. The altar has a square pedestal of one stone, which it stood on: the back of the altar is carved with drapery, and a festoon. Along with it was found a little earthen pot like a lamp; a brass winged Genius, small; two brass fibula’s; all in Mr. Prescot’s possession: he has likewise a brass camp-kettle, with two rings, 21 Roman inches high, found near here. The other inscription, which his father had, of PRAESENGVNTA, is sent to Oxford. He has also a very large collection of coins, brass, silver, and gold, most found at Chester. A golden British bracelet weighing 19 guineas, found lately in Wales, was melted down by a goldsmith here.
Walking beyond the river, I found the Roman way going to Bonium: it answers precisely to the great street of the city, which I call principia, and is extremely strait: it goes through Eccleston, Easton, &c. Examining where it passed down by the bridge on the west side, I was led to visit a rock hard by, over-against the castle: there I discovered a Roman carving of a goddess,TAB. LXVII. in a tabernacle, with an altar: it was not in the least difficult to see the traces of a Roman hand, through so many years, rubbing of cattle, and ill usage. There is a seat hollowed out close by it, and which has taken away part of a pillar, supporting the pediment. It is a figure of Pallas, with a shield on her left arm: a belt from her left shoulder holds a sword tied under her right arm, after the Roman mode: she has a spear supporting her right hand: her under garments reach down to her feet. The altar stands against one of the pillars, and has a little hole at top of it. I wonder it has escaped ruin so long, placed so near a great city, and so low that it is subject to all manner of injuries.
This city is of a most charming situation; the prospect around it every way is august. The walls were repaired by queen Edelfleda. They talk of king Egbert’s palace by St. John’s. Between Eastgate and the river the Roman wall is pretty perfect for 100 yards together, made of squarish-cut stones, the length inwards, with little mortar appearing on the outside: I suppose they run it in along the inside liquid. This was an admirable contrivance for strength: as the wall of the gate was but one stone in thickness throughout; so by this means the city-wall consisted of few stones in thickness. Mr. Prescot showed us some urns, great and small, many fragments of patera’s of fine red earth, found here; some with embossed work of flowers, animals, &c. some with the potters’ marks at the bottom, particularly MACRINV and CARAIED OFF. likewise many horns of little deer and other animals found by the altar.
The village beyond the bridge is called Henbury, denoting its antiquity. Many fragments, seemingly of pillars and capitals, set for sitting-stones before the doors about the city, particularly in Parson’s lane.
To the east of the cloisters is the building called the Chapter-house, from the use it was put to; but I suppose it a mausolæum of the earls of Chester: it is on the north side of the choir; it is of an odd and ancient kind of building: there is a vestibulum to it, of a very pretty model, which I have not seen elsewhere: the pillars are cabled, without capitals, so that they resemble palm-trees. In the gateway between this and the mausolæum they showed us a coffin of stone, or rather vault, of the length of a man, and proper depth (about six foot): at the head was cut a cross; in the bottom lay the skeleton; probably the first abbot made by the earls: they guess that to be Hugh Lupus’s remains, which are buried in the very middle of the place. There were found seven of these graves, correspondent to the number of earls. Bishop Ripley, who built the body of the church, lies under a brass in St. Mary’s chapel: behind the clock is a painting of him, with Christ, St. Peter, and other figures, and much writing in Latin verse, but defaced. St. Werburg’s shrine, foundress of the cathedral, was an elegant structure of stone carved: little niches with gilt statues of saints, men and women of the Saxon nobles, their names wrote upon each, some still legible, all defaced, their heads broke off, &c. the bishop’s throne is built upon it. There has been an ancient monastery at St. John’s, much ruins of which remain. The cloysters have been built since the mausolæum. They have a report that king Edgar’s palace was upon that rock, by the river side, where the image of Pallas is cut; but I think erroneously: it seems to have been a Roman villa and gardens of some learned commander. There are but two chief streets of the city wanting, as plotted by the founders; on one stands the cathedral: that answering it, on the opposite side of the city, at present is but a foot-path, and lane across gardens, which have encroached upon it on both sides. There are some Roman bricks in the wall of the Friery, as observed by Mr. Gale. In one quadrangle by the cloysters is a wall with Gothic arches, very much pointed, like that at Peterburgh, engraven by Mr. Sparkes, V. p. 130. Edesburg was the name of the Chamber in the Forest. At the great house over-against the shambles is a hypocaust of the Romans, made of bricks all marked with the twentieth legion. It is now the floor of the cellar.
LEVERPOOL.
Leaving this famous seat, and the antique monuments of the renowned twentieth legion, we directed our course northward through the Chersonese, between the mouths of the Dee and the Mersey; a flat, sandy, clayey country, not much unlike the best part of the Lincolnshire levels. To the east of the old church of Bevington is added a spacious choir, and side-ailes. We ferried over the great bay to Leverpool. In the visto upward, the huge mountain whereon stands Beeston castle is very entertaining: it appears, though at the distance of above twenty miles, as a great rock emerging from the water. The novelty of Leverpool forbad us to hope for antiquities: it is a large, populous, busy town, placed upon the edge of the water, in a sandy soil, and open country, arisen from the commodiousness of its situation, with a spacious harbour. Quarry hill, a delf of stone of the red sort, and sandy, but not a brown red; so that in building it has a pleasant colour; and that fetched deep is lasting, and a good sort of stone: the new church is built of it; a neat building, by a good architect. I observed in this quarry, that the workmen make for themselves artificial springs at pleasure; for, though the strata here are very close together, and of a considerable breadth, yet there is a small dripping between some of them, especially those not far from the ground: here they cut a little bason, which is never empty. This confirms my former sentiments about springs.
Near the new church is a most magnificent charity-school. Here was a great castle, or tower, which they are pulling down; and a new church is building upon its ruins. The wet dock is a most capacious bason, with a broad street round it: the custom-house, a very neat building, fronts the dock. This town seems to be as big as Manchester; and they are building new streets every where. The process of the delf ware made here is very curious. There is a scarcity of good water here. From this place I first beheld the Irish sea.
We paid a visit to lord Derby at his seat at Knowsley, who may be truly said to be a person antiquæ fidei, grown old in wisdom: he has left the vanities of courts and cities for a retirement, which his lordship diversifies and makes still more agreeable with the greatest judgement. This is one of his seats: it stands on very high ground with a delicate prospect, and abounds with canals and fish-ponds: it has a park ten miles in circumference. The whole is newly refitted and adorned by my lord, and rendered very delightful. There is a great range of new building, with fine apartments full of admirable pictures, of antique marbles, and good furniture. The pictures are by the most celebrated masters, as M. Angelo, Caravagio, Veronese, Luca Jordano; a fine stag-hunting by Snyders, engraved by Sympson; sea-pieces by Vandeveld: many of Vandyke, Rubens, (one painted on paper, as Dr. Mead’s) and the story of Ulysses and Achilles; the Triumph of Industry, the original sketch of which I have: many of Salvator Rosa, and two great drawings of his upon boards; Titian, Carlo Maratti, and an infinity more. The bustoes are, young Geta; a coloss one of Faustina; a lesser one of the same, with one breast naked, very beautiful; Caligula; Gallienus; Alba Terentia, Otho’s mother; one that seems to be Pompey when young, or one of his sons: a brass head, said to be Michael Angelo; a lesser bust of Flora; a fine bust of Homer in Parian marble, of curious Greek work; another, a philosopher, of like work and materials; with several more. A statue of Hercules, two foot and a half high; two fine statues of Venus rising from the sea, somewhat less than life; a little statue of a Faunus; one of Bacchus; a lesser one of Ceres; another Venus with a dolphin, and a Mercury, both less than life.
Among the portraits, that of the famous countess of Richmond and Derby, foundress of St. John’s and Christ’s colleges in Cambridge; a full-length picture of a man born near here, called the Child of Hale, 11 foot high.
My lord has in his library a great collection of drawings, particularly the whole collection of the late Cheron, after Raphael; one of Hans Holbein, Henry VII. Henry VIII. &c. the original of the painting at Whitehall.
Near Knowsley are coal-pits. From the summer-house on the top of the hill in the park may be seen six counties in England, three in Wales; the Wrekin. The tower at Liverpool, by the water-side, was built by Sir John Stanley, ancestor to my lord.
West-Derby, near here, is the place whence the title of the earldom. The trees here universally bend very much to the east, owing to the continual breezes from the Irish sea. This country is observed to have much rain all the year round, owing to the same cause; and were it not so, it would be very barren, as confiding wholly of sand upon solid rock, as all this western country is.
Ormskirk is said to be named from a church built by one Orme in former times: one of his name, still left, is wrote upon the font as churchwarden. This belongs to lord Derby; and here is the burial-place of the family, a deep vault filled up to the very church-floor with coffins: some old fragments of alabaster monuments of the family of Stanley; others of the Scaresbricks. The church consists of two buildings at different times; and two steeples, one a spire, the other a large square tower; and both are crowded together in an unseemly manner.
From thence we travelled toward Preston, over a boggy, flat and black level, called a Moss. On the right, at a distance, we saw Houghton castle upon a high hill; before us, the vast Lancashire mountains, on the tops of which the clouds hung like fleeces; till we forded the famous Belisama, now the Ribel; I suppose, Rhe bel, the river Bel. Vide Selden de diis Syris.
RIBLECHESTER.
I went to view this old station: it is prettily seated on a rising knoll upon the river; at some distance all round inclosed with higher ground, well clothed with wood and hedge-rows: beyond which the barren mountains, or Fells, as they generally call them here, from the Cimbric fala. The soil hereabouts is gravel with clay and sand by spots. The river Rible is very broad at this place, rapid and sonorous, running over the pebbles, and, what is much to be lamented, over innumerable Roman antiquities; for in this long tract of time it has eaten away a third part of the city. I traced out the old ground-plot, and where the wall and ditch went round it: it lay in length east and west along the north side of the river, upon its brink, 800 foot long, 500 broad: originally, I apprehend, two streets ran along its length, and three crossed them on its breadth. This place has been long famous for old monuments found therein; and some fragments still remaining I had a sight of. At the door of the Red-lion ale-house I saw the base of a pillar, and a most noble shaft, seven foot long, handsomely turned; which was fished out of the river: it is undoubtedly Roman originally, though the base has, I guess, been used as the stump of a later cross, in which this country abounds: there is a scotia and two torus’s at the bottom, though not very elegantly formed; perhaps it was never finished: the whole piece is 2½ foot high, 22 inches in diameter: the frustum of the column lay in the ale-house yard, where the weather, and other accidents, have obliterated an inscription consisting of three or four lines, towards the top: it is 17 inches diameter at top. One corner of this house is a Roman partition-wall, built of pebbles and hard mortar, as usual. This house now is by the brink of the river, leaving only a scanty road between; but within memory a great many houses opposite, and among them the chief inn of the town, were washed away. Farther on, down the river, a great part of an orchard fell down last year; and the apple-trees still grow in their own soil at bottom. Viewing the breach of the bank exposed thereby, I saw the joists and boards of a floor of oak, four foot under the present surface, with many bits of Roman bricks, potsherds, and the like; and such floors are to be seen along the whole bank, whence most antiquities are found in the river. The late minister of this place, Mr. Ogden, collected all the coins, intaglia’s, and other antiquities, found here in great quantities; but his widow, as far as I could learn, disposed of them to Mr. Prescot of Chester: I was shown the top of a great two-handled amphora, or wine-jar, taken out of the river, of whitish clay: I saw another like fragment; and among antiquities he took up a very large piece of corallium tubulatum, bigger than a man’s head; an admirable curiosity of nature. By symmetry I find the whole channel of the river, at present, lies within the precincts of the old city: the original channel on the other side being filled up with the city-walls, and rubbish; for it bends with a great elbow toward the city. The eastern limit of the city, or that upward of the river, lies against a brook there falling in; and the two streams playing against that angle, have carried it away, and still threaten them. At the western end of the city, or down the stream, a whole road, and some houses too, by a barn, are absorbed; and great quantity of ashler, the remains of the wall, has been carried off for building: much remains in the ground, and on the edge of the stream. Farther up the land, and all along the west side of the church-wall, the ditch is perfect, and the rampire where the wall stood pretty high, and the foundation of the wall a little apparent. They tell me the ashler stone still lies its whole length. They call this Anchor hill; and, when digging by the house that stands upon part of it, they found anchors, and great quantities of iron pins, of all sizes, for ships or barges; for they say this river was navigable so high formerly, at least for smaller vessels. The north-west angle of the city is manifest, and where the northern wall turned round the north side of the church: a little way down a lane at that angle, a great bank runs westward, made of stone, like a Roman road. There is a lane goes down, north of the city, to the brook, called the Strand; which confirms their having some sort of navigation here. At the end of this lane is the street which is the Roman road, running directly northward up the fell, called Green gate: it passes over Langridge, a great mountain so named from it, so through Bowland forest: it appears green to the eye. In this street, over-against the Strand, is an old white house, where they say Oliver Cromwell lay, when going to Preston in pursuit of the Scots, after the battle of Marston-moor. The eastern wall over the brook stood likewise on a sort of precipice. I saw a large coin of Domitian, of yellow brass, very fair, found in the river, Imp. cæs. domit. aug. germ. cos. xvi. cens. per pp. reverse, Jupiter sitting in a curule chair, the hasta pura in his left, an eagle on his right hand, Jovi victori; exergue S. C. another pedestal of a pillar found in the river. Just under the Red-lion a subterraneous canal comes into the river, so high that one may walk upright in it, paved at the bottom. Many urns have been found hereabouts, but all lost and disregarded since Mr. Ogden died, who collected such things. They know the track of the Roman road all the way over the hills. In a garden by the Unicorn’s head a gold finger was found, and another brass finger as large as a man’s; two intaglia’s of Mercury with wings on his feet, the caduceus, &c. found near Anchor hill: much ashes and bones found about the city. Up the river, eight miles off, is Pendle hill, a vast black mountain, which is the morning weather-glass of the country people: upon it grows the cloud-berry plant. Digging in the church-yard, silver coins have been frequently turned up. The river hither is open and deep; but at Salesbury, a mile higher, rocks begin: therefore it is likely this place was chosen by the Romans because at the extent of navigation. Half of one longitudinal street, and of two latitudinals, are consumed. Horses and carriages frequently fall down the steep from the street, because it is narrow, and but factitious ground.
Panstones, up the hill, by the Green-moor lane, or Roman road, is a place much talked of; but they know not for what. I suppose it is either some Roman building, or a road eastward, or some terminus. They told me of an altar thereabouts with an inscription, axes, and the like, carved on it: it is on Duttonley, by Panstones. Haughton tower is within view; a great castle upon a precipicious hill.
Many are the inscriptions found here from time to time: Dr. Leigh has seen them all. Now they are removed, lost, or spoiled: one great altar they told me was carried to Dunkin hall, the seat of lady Petre, with an inscription, a ram, and a knife; many taken away by the family of Warrens, living lately at Salesbury hall. I saw the fragment of a stone, in the corner of a house by the mill, cut with very fair large letters: under the next house is the frustum of a pillar, 20 inches diameter, made into a horse-block: I saw another flat stone at the town’s end, laid over a gutter, with a monumental moulding upon it.
Above the town half a mile is a noble bridge of four very large arches, built lately by the country: over this I went to Salesbury; but all the inscriptions are carried away, probably to Mr. Warren’s other seat, near Stockport in Cheshire. I found a large stone in the corner of the house, which has been a Roman monumental stone, foolishly placed there for the sake of the carving: there are three large figures upon it, sweetly performed, and good drapery, though half worn way by time; a man and woman holding hands, both half naked; somewhat roundish in the woman’s hand: at the end is Apollo resting on his harp, his head leaning on his hand, as melancholy for the loss of a votary; for such we may guess the deceased, either a poet, physician, or musician: probably there was more carving on those sides within the wall. This has been a very large seat, with a park. They told me there were some carved stones at Dinkley, another seat of Mr. Warren’s, a mile farther; but I found they were all carried elsewhere, save two altars, both obliterated, but well cut: one stood in a grass-plot in the garden, covered over with moss and weeds; another used in the house as a cheese-press. This is a romantic place, hanging over the river purling across the rocky falls, and covered with wood. The late Mr. Warren was very careful of these learned remnants. They told me that Ribchester was destroyed by the Scots. These are all the memoirs I could pick up in about five hours I staid there, & antiquum tenuerunt flumina nomen. Ovid. Met.
Dr. Leigh, in Lancaster, says a Roman way goes from Manchester to Ribchester by strange ways towards Bury: he gives a cut of a ruby found here; on it a soldier with spear and shield. I take the two altars I saw at Salesbury to be those described in Dr. Leigh’s Lancaster.
At Langho, Ardulf king of Northumberland gained a victory, anno 798.
LANCASTER.
Between Preston and this place we had the vast hills that part Yorkshire and Lancashire, all the way on our right. This is all sandy country to within three miles of Lancaster; then rock begins: the other has rock under it, but red and sandy; this is white. Where the castle and church stand is a high and steep hill, length east and west: this was the Roman castrum. I found a great piece of the wall at the north-east, in the garden of Clement Townsend; and so to Mr. Harrison’s summer-house, which stands upon it: it is made of the white stone of the country, and very hard mortar, and still very thick, though the facing on both sides is peeled off for the sake of the squared stone, which they used in building. A year or two ago a great parcel of it was destroyed with much labour. This reached quite to the bridge-lane, and hung over the street at the head of the precipice in a dreadful manner: from the summer-house it went round the verge of the close north of the church, and took in the whole circuit of the hill. The ditch on the outside of it is now to be seen. I suppose it originally inclosed the whole top of the hill where the church and castle stand, which is steep on all sides, and half inclosed by the river Lune; so that it was an excellent guard to this part of the sea-coast, and commands a very great prospect both by sea and land. Here was this great convenience too in the situation, that on the south side of the castle walls, under the tower, is a spring. All the space of ground north of the church is full of foundations of stone buildings, Roman, I believe; and much stone has been taken up there. To the west of the church is part of a partition wall left, of that time. This is a navigable river. The castle built since on this spot has been very strong; it suffered in the civil wars. The prospect hence takes in all the western sea, and sometimes reaches the isle of Man. The Cumberland and Westmorland hills are of such a nature as I never saw before: I took them for clouds at first, not only from their height, but figure; consisting not of long ridges, but pens, or sugar-loaves, suddenly breaking off. Eastward is Ingleborough, a very strange hill, having a flat place at top, like a table: they say there are some works upon it, and some stones placed like a bower: Camden takes notice of it as rising gradually eastward. Upon some of these hills it was that George Fox ascended to converse with the Holy Ghost, as he pretended; which he revealed to Nailor, and so began the sect of the Quakers, about sixty years ago.
There is a friery in the town, and the church of it was standing within memory. When they pulled down the Roman wall, they found many great toads alive in the thickness of it, and where in all appearance there could be no passage for them from without. The town of Lancaster lies upon the eastern declivity, before the castle.
CONCANGIOS. Water-crook.
Through a very hard road, but not an unpleasant country, we entered Westmorland. The river Can is very rapid, and full of cataracts, as running chiefly over the rock, and having a great descent. It is strange that the salmon coming up these rivers from the sea to lay their spawn, when obstructed by these places, leap over them with a surprizing force; and there they lie in wait to catch them with nets laid on the upper edge. A mile below Kendal this river takes a circling course, and makes a sort of peninsula, called Water-crook, where I found the old city: its name signifies the valley upon the water Can. It is a fine large valley, and very pleasant. Either with a cut, or by nature, the river ran quite round the city. Mr. Tho. Guy is the possessor of it. As soon as I came into the yard, I saw a large altar placed by some steps: I believe it dedicate to Bacchus, because of grapes and festoons on it: it is above three foot high: the festoons are on three sides; the back is plain. All the house and out-houses are built of Roman stone, dug up in the old city. The top of an altar is put into a corner of that stable where the altar stands. At the end of the house is a large statue or bas relief of Cupid: the gavel end fell down some time ago, and knocked off his head and arms; but it is well cut. In the garden, at the end of an out-house, is a very long inscription on a stone. He showed me a little portable altar, but 7-1/4 Roman inches high: the dedicatory inscription is obliterated by using it as a whet-stone; but it is prettily adorned, has two scrolls and the discus at top. Innumerable antiquities have been found here; great arches and ruins of buildings: they never plough but somewhat is found. The father of Mr. Guy saved many, which are since lost: this gentleman found many brass, silver, and gold coins here; but all are dispersed, except a large brass Faustina: he showed me an intaglia of Mercury set in gold for a ring: another with three faces to a head; the foremost, Mars with a helmet on; a woman’s face on each side: a paste of a light onyx colour, with a head: a sepulchral lamp. He told me of a large brass urn with bones in it found here: it had two ears to it, and was used forty years ago, in the family, as a kettle, and is now at his sister’s, Mrs. Herring, at Wall near Hexam.
The town of Kendal is very large, lying under a great hill to the west; the river to the east. Upon the rise of the hill is a place called Castle-low hill, which has been a castle raised in Saxon times, fortified with a ditch where not naturally steep, and a keep or artificial mount; a sorry way of encampment: the keep is narrow at top, and cannot contain above forty people: they are much too high to offend an enemy, and have no ground to defend. Above this are great scars, or mountains, of a hard kind of stone like porphyry, that will yield to no tool: they break it up in small shivers, for building, by the force of a heavy gaveloc and sledge-hammer. I saw several pretty springs running out of little hollows of the rock, especially toward the upper part; and most of the strata thereabouts drip continually: the workmen told me, that those cracks where the springs are go a great length into the mountain; and that the strata all round the hill lie declining with the side of the hill; that some strata are soft and porous, which lets the water strain through them; whilst others by their hardness stop it, and turn it all into the cracks and fissures; that these springs run very sparingly in dry weather: this shows that they are made only of the rain and dews falling upon the hill, and collected into these channels, which being generally perpetual, and in sufficient quantity one time with another, render the springs so. There is a spring on the top of Penigent hill, the highest in these parts. In this country vast stones like the grey weathers in Wiltshire, lie upon the surface, and by the sides of the hills, which are no part of the quarry, being of a different stone. On the other side of the town eastward, and over the river, is Kendal castle; a large stone building on a solitary apex, but not extraordinary high: it is fenced with a wall and ditch: they report that queen Catharine Parr was born here. This town has been built mostly with pent-houses and galleries over them all along the streets, somewhat like Chester. The carts or carriages of this country are small machines, with two wheels each, made of three pieces of timber, fastened to a cross axle-tree, which turns with the wheels: the cart is laid upon these wheels pro tempore, kept from slipping off the axle-tree by two pins underneath: they are drawn by one horse.[1] They say these carriages, of a light burthen and with one horse, answer better in this stony country than heavier, which are shook to pieces presently: hence Nature makes the horses of this country small in bulk. Here is an anchorite’s house with a very fine spring: near was a chapel of St. Mary, Abbot’s hall, and some other ruins of religious places. The church is a handsome and very large structure, consisting of five ailes: a good organ: several ancient chapels in it, with the tombs of the founders; one of Roos. The parishes of this country are generally of great extent, having several chapels of ease. This was, I believe, the county-town before Appleby, as rising immediately after the destruction of the Roman city. In the church is a monument of a judge, who died at the Assizes here in queen Elizabeth’s time.
The city of Concangios is much better situate than Kendal in several respects; because good land for a considerable way quite round it, as far as the valley reaches: the river, which may well be called spumosus, incompasses it like a horse-shoe: it is deeper, broader, and smoother, here than any where else: it is indeed a place incomparably well chosen for a small city: the ground is sufficiently high, even in floods; but floods render it an island, for it is low ground before the entrance, but not marshy. Across the entrance there are plain marks of a ditch north of the house; and Mr. Guy told me there was a wall all along, an apparent rampire on the inside of it; that his father dug up vast quantities of stone there: he showed me a place in the city, where a hypocaust was found, all arched with Roman brick, and paved with square bricks; that they covered it up again without demolishing it. I saw a brass Antoninus, found here; and a stone, somewhat like the capital of a small pillar, hexangular. Beyond the low ground which lies before the entrance of the city, is a Roman tumulus. Upon a slope of high ground, and in a pasture behind it, is another very large hill, partly natural, and partly artificial, by cutting away the roots of it, and rendering it more steep, as it appeared to me: there is an ash-tree planted on it: when it was ploughed, they discovered stones with mortar on them. I conjecture there was a building upon it; probably an outguard, or lodge, for the soldiers that stood upon the watch: for here was placed the numerus vigilum in the Notitia; and this place takes in a larger view than the city, as being higher. The city contains about 14 acres of ground, or more: it consists of two closes, one of twelve acres, another of four; but the fortified part took not in intirely the twelve acres: the ditch goes along the partition-fence visibly enough; the remainder was suburbs to the castle, which was 500 foot one way, 600 another. The inscription I spoke of at the end of the barn has not yet been described. Thus Mr. Gale read it.
Publius Ælius Publii filius Sergio Basso Decurioni legionis vicesimæ valeriæ Victricis vixit annos et privatus libertis et herm miles emeritus legionis sextæ victricis fecerunt. Si quis sepulchro alium mortuum intulerit mulctam ferat fisco Dominorum nostrorum, &c.
A great woollen manufactory at Kendal, especially of such stuffs as are proper for hangings. Winander meer, near here, is ten miles long, remarkable for a fish called char, which they pot, and send all over the kingdom. This country is exceedingly obnoxious to rain, and some of the hill-tops on one side or other are perpetually covered with clouds: I imagine the vast solidity of the stone that composed them attracts the clouds big with water at some considerable distance, and then the winds break and dash them into rain. This is another furtherance of hills being supplied with fountains.
The city of Concangios is placed on the highest plot of the Chersonese: the four acres westward are more meadow-like, but far from low. A great ridge of hills runs north and south-eastward of this place, called Hag-fell, of a fine downy nature, and good riding on the southern point of it. About a mile and half off the city was the castrum exploratorum, or watch-tower: it is a mere tip of very high ground, like a narrow tongue, and very steep, especially side ways: it is called Castle-steed: it is sixty foot broad, 120 long: the sides being thus steep needed no ditch; but on the south end are two ditches, on the north three: I suppose it was walled about: it is of the common cliff of the country; and in one place the ditch has been cut through the rock. At the bottom of this hill is a large spring, which immediately falls into a cavity of the earth again, and so I suppose rises lower in another place. From hence is a fine prospect to the mouths of the rivers Can and Lune, and all over this coast. The Westmorland hills raise themselves into a new and more romantic appearance than before, and the place well answered the purpose of an espial.
About a mile north of Kendal is a cave in the rock near a wood, called Hells-fell Nab, or the Fairy-hole: they talk of organs, pillars, flitches of bacon, and the like matters here, as at Poole’s Hole in Derbyshire.
SHAP.
On the south side of the town of Shap, six miles south of Penrith, we saw the beginning of a great Celtic avenue, on a green common. This is just beyond the horrid and rocky fells, where a good country begins. This avenue is seventy foot broad, composed of very large stones, set at equal intervals: it seems to be closed at this end, which is on an eminence, and near a long flattish barrow, with stone works upon it: hence it proceeds northward to the town, which intercepts the continuation of it, and was the occasion of its ruin; for many of the stones are put under the foundations of houses and walls, being pushed by machines they call a betty, or blown up with gunpowder. Though its journey be northward, yet it makes a very large curve, or arc of a circle, as those at Abury, and passes over a brook too. A spring likewise arises in it, near the Greyhound inn. By the brook is a little round sacellum, composed of twelve stones, but lesser ones, set by one great stone belonging to the side of the avenue: the interval of the stones is thirty-five foot, half the breadth of the avenue: the stones, no doubt, did all stand upright, because three or four still do; but they were not much higher then, than now as fallen, because of their figure, which is thick and short: they are very large, and prodigiously hard, being nothing else but a congeries of crystals of very large sizes, of a flakey nature. Houses and fields lie across the track of this avenue, and some of the houses lie in the inclosure: it ascends the hill, crosses the common road to Penrith, and so goes into the corn-fields on the other side of the way westward, where some stones are left standing; one particularly remarkable, called Guggleby stone. The people say these were set up by enchantment: and the better sort of folks, as absurdly affirm, they are made by art. I doubt not but they are gathered somewhere off the surface, among the fells, and that here was a great temple of the old Britons, such as that at Abury, which it resembles very much, as far as I can judge at present; for the rainy weather, which in this country is almost perpetual, hindered me from making at this time a thorough disquisition into it. The ground it runs over consists of gentle risings and fallings, but in general declines toward the west: it is here, and for a great way further north, east and west, a very fine downy turf, and pleasant hills; or at least they seemed so after the rugged and barren views and roads we had just passed: but the country under this turf is a lime-stone, quite different from the stones of the avenue. In our journey hither the country is far worse than the peaks of Derbyshire, and nothing to entertain the eye but the numerous and rare cataracts; whole rivers, and the whole continuance of them, being nothing else; the water every where running among the rocks with great violence and rapidity: even the springs burst out of the ground, and rise into the air with a surprising push: therefore the Britons erected this laborious work very conveniently, beyond that uncultivated frontier, and in a country where they might range about in their chariots at pleasure. I guess, by the crebrity and number of the stones remaining, there must have been two hundred on a side: near them in several places are remains of circles to be seen, of stones set on end; but there are no quantity of barrows about the place, which I wonder at. Though these stones are not of such a flat form as those at Abury, nor so big as some there; yet they are very large, and as heavy as any of those in the avenues there. The site of the place is pretty much bounded eastward by the hill that way adjacent; but there is a large prospect west ward, and the country descends that way to a great distance. At a place called in the maps Stone-heaps, we saw a cairn or barrow made of stones: all the tops of the fells, I am told, abound with these crystallised stones.