Lindisfarne

“ One excellent reign had lasted twenty-one years, the next eight reigns averaged four and a half years, and all ended in violence.
Higbald, the eleventh Bishop of Lindisfarne, 780-803, takes us back nearly to the best times of that specially Holy Isle. Ethelwold, 724-40, his next predecessor but one, was the bishop under whom King Ceolwulf, to whom Bede dedicated his famous work the Ecclesiastical History of the English Race, became a monk. It was this king-monk that taught the monks of Lindisfarne to drink wine and ale instead of the milk and water prescribed by their Scotic founder, Aidan. ”

“ Cuthbert of Lindisfarne, the great ascetic of the early English Church, distinguished above all others for the severity of his mortifications and his abhorrence of women. At his shrine, we are told, none of the gentler sex might worship; they were admitted to the church, but in the priory not even a queen could lodge. Queen Philippa was once admitted there as a guest, but a tumult arose, and she had to flee half dressed for safety to the castle. St. Cuthbert was a hermit to whom the sight of human beings was a weariness and the solitude of the desert a delight. ”

“ The diocese of Lindisfarne spread far to the west, much beyond Hexham. The Britons of Cumbria who had come to be tributaries of the Northumbrian kings, were thus included in it. King Egfrid's deed of gift, in which he gives the district of Cartmell, with all the Britons who dwell in it, to bishop Cuthbert, still exists. The Roman city of Carlisle, transformed into an Anglo-Saxon fortress, was also under his sway, with all the surrounding monasteries. ”

“ William Greenwell, M.A., D.C.L., F.R.S., F.S.A. IN the year 875 the great Scandinavian invasions were assuming large proportions, and among other parts of England where the Danes landed and harried the country was the coast of Northumbria. The monks fled from Lindisfarne, which had been selected by Aidan principally because of its resemblance to Iona. There was probably another reason for the choice: its neighbourhood to the stronghold of Bamborough, the seat of the Northumbrian Kings. Lindisfarne is very near to it, and naturally would be under the protection of the King who lived there. ”

“ His armies chased the Britons from the kingdom of Cumbria, and made the district of Carlisle English ground. A large part of the conquered country was bestowed upon the see of Lindisfarne, which was at this time filled by one whom we have seen before labouring as the Apostle of the Lowlands. Cuthbert had found a new mission-station in Holy Island, and preached among the moors of Northumberland as he had preached beside the banks of Tweed. ”

“ They took off the chasuble, which became a miracle-working relic, and put another in its place (Bæda; Reginald) . When Lindisfarne was laid waste by the Danes in 793, the body of the saint was left undisturbed. In 875 the see was again ravaged by another pagan invasion, and Bishop Eardulf determined to flee for safety. Mindful of the saint's charge to Henfrith, he and the monks took Cuthbert's body with them in their flight, carrying it in a wooden coffin. They went into Cumberland, and intending to migrate to Ireland put the body on board a ship at the mouth of the Derwent ”

“ In spite of the departure of Colman and his company, a strong party in favour of the usages of the Celtic church appears to have been left at Lindisfarne, and Cuthbert often met with rudeness in the discussions held in the chapterhouse. Gradually, however, his loving nature and patient temper overcame his enemies, and won them over to his views. Gentle with others, he was severe with himself, and was unsparing in his acts of mortification and devotion. ”

“ Stanza XIV. line 257. ‘St. Cuthbert was, in the choice of his sepulchre, one of the most mutable and unreasonable saints in the Calendar. He died A. D. 688, in a hermitage upon the Farne Islands, having resigned the bishopric of Lindisfarne, or Holy Island, about two years before. {1} His body was brought to Lindisfarne, where it remained until a descent of the Danes, about 793, when the monastery was nearly destroyed. The monks fled to Scotland, with what they deemed their chief treasure, the relics of St. Cuthbert. The Saint was, however, a most capricious fellow-traveller ”

“ Cuthbert, most austere of Western ascetics, and of Grace Darling, whose heroism puts so strange a gloss upon the holy man’s abhorrence of womankind. The remnants of the ancient Abbey of Lindisfarne are among the very few examples of Saxon architecture which the destructiveness of the Danes has left to us; and that even these ruins remain, is due to no negligence of theirs. When they descended upon the island in the seventh century, not for the first time, they made a brave attempt to leave a desert behind them ”

“ Notwithstanding, everything goes to prove that the new abbot and prior of Lindisfarne adopted without reserve the decisions of the assembly of Whitby, and took serious pains to introduce them into the great Keltic community. Cuthbert, in whom the physical energy of a robust organization was united to an unconquerable gentleness, employed in this task all the resources of his mind and heart. All the rebels had not left with bishop Colman; some monks still remained, who held obstinately by their ancient customs. ”

“ Lindsay quickly turned round.
“Aha! Dalzell,” cried he, “so it was thou, wicked wag that thou art?”
“’Tis indeed Sir William de Dalzell,” said Lady de Lindsay, laughing; “he is always at his mad tricks. There now, do but see what he is about; he is actually applying the tip of a long feather from a peacock’s tail to tickle the cheek of my sister Jane’s husband, the grave Sir Thomas Hay of Errol.”
“How doth he dare to attack the august cheek of the High Constable of Scotland?” said the Earl of Moray, with a smile. ”

“ Lindsay replied, "when I should have spoken to you in a more gentle voice, and bending the knee, although it is not in the nature of us old Scotch to model ourselves on your French courtiers; but for some time, thanks to your changing loves, you have kept us so often in the field, in harness, that our voices are hoarse from the cold night air, and our stiff knees can no longer bend in our armour: you must then take me just as I am, madam; since to-day, for the welfare of Scotland, you are no longer at liberty to choose your favourites." ”

“ He was in the act of springing into the saddle as Lindsay approached; but the Scottish warrior believing, from the richness of his armour, that he was some one of noble blood, pushed after him so hard, and gained so much upon him, that he was nearly within reach of him with his lance-point.
“Turn, Sir Knight,” cried Lindsay. “It is a shame thus to flee. I am Sir David Lindsay. By St. Andrew, an thou turn not, I must strike thee through with my lance.” ”

“ Lord Patrick Lindsay represented, by a parable, the inequality of the stakes—the life and fortunes of the King of Scotland against those of an inferior man. James threatened that, if he lived to return, he would hang up Lindsay before his own castle. The Earl of Angus, the well-known Bell-the-Cat, supported Lindsay, and repeated that the English army consisted for the most part of men of mean rank, the Scottish one of the flower of the nobility and gentlemen of the kingdom. ”

“ And so it is, all the world over. I should think myself very hardly used by fortune, if I had to live alone in a grimy city for six months on five-and-thirty pounds, and had to get up every day before dawn to grind away at Latin and Greek; yet here is young Lindsay with his blue eyes ready to leap out of his head with excitement and delight at the bare prospect of it! It is a curious world. But I must look after my packing; for in order to reach Glasgow to-morrow, we must be stirring long before daylight. Till we meet, then,
Your affectionate cousin ”

“ John's figure and air, in his utter coolness, that insensibly restored her spirits. Triumphant confidence in him overcame the fear of Mr. Lindsay; and when he appeared, Ellen, with tolerable composure, met him, her hand upon John's arm, and said, "Father, this is Mr. Humphreys," my brother she dared not add.
"I hope Mr. Lindsay will pardon my giving him this trouble," said the latter; "we have one thing in common which should forbid our being strangers to each other. I, at least, was unwilling to leave Scotland without making myself known to Mr. Lindsay." ”

“ Lindsay died some time before 22 April 1396 (Exchequer Rolls, iii. 386) . Lindsay in 1392 founded a convent of Trinity Friars, Dundee, which subsequently became a hospital for decayed burgesses.
By his wife, Margaret Keith, daughter of Sir William Keith [q. v.] , great marischal of Scotland, he left two daughters, Margaret, married to Sir Thomas Colville, and Euphemia, to Sir John Herries of Terregles. As he had no male issue, the barony of Crawford passed to his cousin-german, Sir David Lindsay of Glenesk, first earl of Crawford [q. v.] ”

“ Those simple country souls never dreamt in their hearts of suspecting their old comrade, Franz Lindner the jäger, who had come back unexpectedly, like Andreas and Linnet, of being the Karl von Forstemann of Vienna referred to in the announcement. But Franz knew it couldn’t be long before the police were on his track; and he turned and fled upwards to his old home at St Valentin, like a fox to its lair, or a rabbit to its burrow.
All the way up the hill his soul seethed within him. He would sell his life dear, if the worst came to the worst ”

“ He seemed delighted to find himself understood and appreciated by Clarence, and every moment of Linden’s visit served to ripen their acquaintance into intimacy. At length they talked upon Copperas Bower and its inmates.
“You will find your host and hostess,” said the gentleman, “certainly of a different order from the persons with whom it is easy to see you have associated; but, at your happy age, a year or two may be very well thrown away upon observing the manners and customs of those whom, in later life, you may often be called upon to conciliate or perhaps to control. ”

“ A phaen’s body contains the whole of life, a man’s body contains only the half of life—the other half is in woman. Faceny may be too strong a draught for your body to endure.... Do you not feel this?”
“I am dull with my different feelings. I must take what precautions I can, and chance the rest.” He bent down, and, taking hold of the phaen’s thin and ragged robe, tore off a broad strip, which he proceeded to swathe in folds around his forehead. “I’m not forgetting your advice, Leehallfae. I would not like to start the walk as Maskull and finish it as Digrung.” ”

“ As soon as ever he learned from Franz Lindner how things were going on between Linnet and her Engländer, and had ascertained by private inquiry from the Herr Oberkellner at the Erzherzog Johann that Herr Will was going away for a few days’ tour among the Botzen Dolomites,⁠—⁠why, taking opportunity by the forelock, he telegraphed at once to the Herr Vicar at St Valentin to come on by the first train, all expenses paid, over the Brenner to Meran, on purpose to save the soul of an erring member of his flock, in imminent danger of faith and morals, from a heretic Englishman. ”

“ After the banishment of those concerned in the Ruthven raid, Lindsay endeavoured to obtain the co-operation of Bowes, the English ambassador, to bring about a reconciliation between the two factions, but his endeavours were unsuccessful. He had gradually won considerable influence with the king, and acquired the reputation of being 'the minister whom the court liked best.' On this account he was in May 1584 selected by the ministers in and around Edinburgh to induce the king to delay his assent, until a meeting of the assembly, to certain acts circumscribing the authority of the kirk ”

“ Linden's unworthiness, the suit of the latter is of course at rest forever: if not, and Mr. Linden be indeed all that he asserts, my daughter's choice cannot be an election of reproach; Lord Ulswater promises peaceably to withdraw his pretensions; and though Mr. Linden may not possess his rank or fortune, he is certainly one with whom, if of ancient blood, any family would be proud of an alliance."
Blending with these reflections a considerable share of curiosity and interest in a secret which partook so strongly of romance, Lady Westborough despatched her note to Clarence. ”

“ Did you ever see a perfectly beautiful woman, Sophy? I doubt it. I never did till I saw Margaret Lindsay. I was so astonished to see a lady at the Castle Farm that I positively stared at the girl for a moment, but she came forward and shook hands with the utmost self-possession.
‘I’m afraid you have had a cold drive, Mr. Blake,’ she said; and though she spoke in a very decidedly Scotch accent, the words did not sound so harshly from her lips as they had done when spoken by her father. For the first time I thought that the Doric might have an agreeable sound. ”

“ Everybody says there is not the slightest opening at the Scotch bar; but I know so little of the world!’
‘You do indeed, poor fellow!’ was the reader’s inward comment. But Hubert was deceiving himself when he ascribed his sudden resolution to set off for Scotland to a desire to see Alec Lindsay through his difficulties; or rather, he refused to listen to the whisper in which his heart told him that if he went to the Castle Farm he would in all probability find Margaret there. He had forced himself to stay away from Scotland for two years ”