Newstead Abbey

“ In an old, time-worn, and mysterious looking mansion like Newstead Abbey, and one so haunted by monkish, and feudal, and poetical associations, it is a prize to meet with some ancient crone, who has passed a long life about the place, so as to have become a living chronicle of its fortunes and vicissitudes. ”

“ Below me extended the "living landscape," once contemplated by the loving pair; the gentle valley of Newstead, diversified by woods and corn-fields, and village spires, and gleams of water, and the distant towers and pinnacles of the venerable Abbey. The diadem of trees, however, was gone. The attention drawn to it by the poet, and the romantic manner in which he had associated it with his early passion for Mary Chaworth, had nettled the irritable feelings of her husband, who but ill brooked the poetic celebrity conferred on his wife by the enamored verses of another. ”

“ The sacred relic was sent to a brazier to be cleaned. As he was at work upon it, he discovered that the pedestal was hollow and composed of several pieces. Unscrewing these, he drew forth a number of parchment deeds and grants appertaining to the Abbey, and bearing the seals of Edward III. and Henry VIII., which had thus been concealed, and ultimately sunk in the lake by the friars, to substantiate their right and title to these domains at some future day.
One of the parchment scrolls thus discovered, throws rather an awkward light upon the kind of life led by the friars of Newstead. ”

“ When Colonel Wildman became proprietor of the Abbey he found Joe Murray flourishing in a green old age, though upward of fourscore, and continued him in his station as butler. The old man was rejoiced at the extensive repairs that were immediately commenced, and anticipated with pride the day when the Abbey should rise out of its ruins with renovated splendor, its gates be thronged with trains and equipages, and its halls once more echo to the sound of joyous hospitality. ”

“ For Newstead Abbey, see Beauties of England and Wales, 1813, xii. Part I. 401-405 (often reprinted without acknowledgment) ; Abbotsford and Newstead Abbey, by Washington Irving, 1835; Journal of the Archaeological Association (papers by T.J. Pettigrew, F.R.S., and Arthur Ashpitel, F.S.A.) , 1854, vol. ix. pp. 14-39; and A Souvenir of Newstead Abbey (illustrated by a series of admirable photographs) , by Richard Allen, Nottingham, 1874, etc., etc. ”

“ Around this quadrangle were low vaulted cloisters, with Gothic arches, once the secluded walks of the monks: the corridor along which we were passing was built above these cloisters, and their hollow arches seemed to reverberate every footfall. Everything thus far had a solemn monastic air; but, on arriving at an angle of the corridor, the eye, glancing along a shadowy gallery, caught a sight of two dark figures in plate armor, with closed visors, bucklers braced, and swords drawn, standing motionless against the wall. They seemed two phantoms of the chivalrous era of the Abbey. ”

“ The names of BYRON and AUGUSTA were still visible. They had been deeply cut in the bark, but the natural growth of the tree was gradually rendering them illegible, and a few years hence, strangers will seek in vain for this record of fraternal affection.
Leaving the grove, I continued my ramble along a spacious terrace, overlooking what had once been the kitchen garden of the Abbey. Below me lay the monks' stew, or fish pond, a dark pool, overhung by gloomy cypresses, with a solitary water-hen swimming about in it. ”

“ Annesley Hall At about three miles' distance from Newstead Abbey, and contiguous to its lands, is situated Annesley Hall, the old family mansion of the Chaworths. The families, like the estates, of the Byrons and Chaworths, were connected in former times, until the fatal duel between their two representatives. The feud, however, which prevailed for a time, promised to be cancelled by the attachment of two youthful hearts. While Lord Byron was yet a boy, he beheld Mary Ann Chaworth, a beautiful girl, and the sole heiress of Annesley. ”

“ But the characteristic feature of Newstead Abbey, so familiar that description seems unnecessary, and, yet, never quite accurately described, is the west front of the Priory Church, which is in line with the west front of the Abbey. "Half apart," the southern portion of this front, which abuts on the windows of the Prior's Parlour, and the room above, where Byron slept, flanks and conceals the west end of the north cloisters and library; but, with this exception, it is a screen, and nothing more. In the centre is the "mighty window" (stanza lxii. line 1) , shorn of glass and tracery ”

“ One of his gay companions gives a picture of Newstead when thus repaired, and the picture is sufficiently desolate.
“There are two tiers of cloisters, with a variety of cells and rooms about them, which, though not inhabited, nor in an inhabitable state, might easily be made so; and many of the original rooms, among which is a fine stone hall, are still in use. Of the Abbey church, one end only remains; and the old kitchen, with a long range of apartments, is reduced to a heap of rubbish. ”

“ It is remarked at the Abbey, that the rooks, though they sally forth on forays throughout the week, yet keep about the venerable edifice on Sundays, as if they had inherited a reverence for the day, from their ancient confreres, the monks. Indeed, a believer in the metempsychosis might easily imagine these Gothic-looking birds to be the embodied souls of the ancient friars still hovering about their sanctified abode. ”

“ The Abbey and its monastic environs being haunted ground, it was natural that a mysterious visitant of the kind, and one supposed to be under the influence of mental hallucination, should inspire awe in a person unaccustomed to the place. As Colonel Wildman's sister was one day walking along abroad terrace of the garden, she suddenly beheld the Little White Lady coming toward her, and, in the surprise and agitation of the moment, turned and ran into the house. ”

“ The Abbey was by no means benefited by these roystering inmates, who sometimes played off monkish mummeries about the cloisters, at other times turned the state chambers into schools for boxing and single-stick, and shot pistols in the great hall. The country people of the neighborhood were as much puzzled by these madcap vagaries of the new incumbent, as by the gloomier habits of the “old lord,” and began to think that madness was inherent in the Byron race, or that some wayward star ruled over the Abbey. ”

“ It is not my intention to lay open the scenes of domestic life at the Abbey, nor to describe the festivities of which I was a partaker during my sojourn within its hospitable walls. I wish merely to present a picture of the edifice itself, and of those personages and circumstances about it, connected with the memory of Byron. ”

“ The Abbey Church, though in ruins, is a very good example of Early English work. The abbey itself is full of interesting and historic rooms, one being the bedroom where Charles II. slept, retaining still the state bed, whose coverlet was embroidered by Mary Queen of Scots. Edward I. is known to have stayed in the abbey, and the room which he occupied contains some splendid oak carving. Lord Byron's bedroom is just as he left it, with his college pictures on the walls and the writing-table that he used. Newstead is open to the public on Tuesday and Friday when the family are not in residence. ”

“ Over the west door there is the mutilated figure of (?) the Saviour, but of twelve saints or twelve niches there is no trace. The "grand arch" is an ivy-clad screen, and nothing more. Behind and beyond, in place of vanished nave, of aisle and transept, is the smooth green turf; and at the east end, on the site of the high altar, stands the urn-crowned masonry of Boatswain's tomb.
Newstead Abbey was sold by Lord Byron to his old schoolfellow, Colonel Thomas Wildman, in November, 1817. ”

“ And pray who is the Little White Lady?"
"Why, sir, that nobody knows; she lives in the Weir Mill farmhouse, down in the skirts of the wood. She comes to the Abbey every morning, keeps about it all day, and goes away at night. She speaks to nobody, and we are rather shy of her, for we don't know what to make of her."
Colonel Wildman now concluded that it was some artist or amateur employed in making sketches of the Abbey, and thought no more about the matter. ”

“ There is no evidence of any abbey having ever existed on the site; but surrounded as the district is with Newstead and New and Old Melrose, the seats of ancient ecclesiastical establishments, the discovery of the brick foundations of extensive buildings would very naturally suggest the local name of the Red Abbey. It was in the immediate neighbourhood of this Roman site that one of those curious subterranean structures was discovered, which has been referred to in an earlier chapter. ”

“ Various visitors have either fancied, or pretended to have seen him, and a cousin of Lord Byron, Miss Sally Parkins, is even said to have made a sketch of him from memory. As to the servants at the Abbey, they have become possessed with all kinds of superstitious fancies. The long corridors and Gothic halls, with their ancient portraits and dark figures in armor, are all haunted regions to them; they even fear to sleep alone, and will scarce venture at night on any distant errand about the Abbey unless they go in couples. ”

“ About the middle of the last century, the Abbey came into the possession of another noted character, who makes no less figure in its shadowy traditions than Sir John the Little with the great Beard. This was the grand-uncle of the poet, familiarly known among the gossiping chroniclers of the Abbey as "the Wicked Lord Byron." He is represented as a man of irritable passions and vindictive temper, in the indulgence of which an incident occurred which gave a turn to his whole character and life, and in some measure affected the fortunes of the Abbey. ”

“ She communicated her wishes to Colonel Wildman, and they met with an immediate response in his generous bosom. It was settled on the spot, that an apartment should be fitted up for the Little White Lady in one of the new farmhouses, and every arrangement made for her comfortable and permanent maintenance on the estate. With a woman's prompt benevolence, Mrs. Wildman, before she laid her head upon her pillow, wrote the following letter to the destitute stranger:
"NEWSTEAD ABBEY,
"Tuesday night, September 20, 1825. ”

“ This was a great double tallow candle stuck upon the end of a pole, with which he could conduct his visitors about the ruins on dark nights, so much to their satisfaction that, at length, he began to think it even preferable to the moon itself. “It does na light up a’ the Abbey at since, to be sure,” he would say, “but then you can shift it about and show the auld ruin bit by bit, whiles the moon only shines on one side.”
Honest Johnny Bower! so many years have elapsed since the time I treat of, that it is more than probable his simple head lies beneath the walls of his favorite Abbey. ”

“ Here, too, we encountered a memento of Lord Byron, a great black and white Newfoundland dog, that had accompanied his remains from Greece. He was descended from the famous Boatswain, and inherited his generous qualities. He was a cherished inmate of the Abbey, and honored and caressed by every visitor. Conducted by the chamberlain, and followed by the dog, who assisted in doing the honors of the house, we passed through a long low vaulted hall, supported by massive Gothic arches, and not a little resembling the crypt of a cathedral, being the basement story of the Abbey. ”

“ Eight years had gone by since he had looked his last on "venerable arch" and "lucid lake" (see "Epistle to Augusta," stanza viii. lines 7, 8) , but he had not forgotten, he could not forget, that enchanted and enchanting scene.
Newstead Abbey or Priory was founded by Henry II., by way of deodand or expiation for the murder of Thomas Becket. Lands which bordered the valley of the Leen, and which had formed part of Sherwood Forest, were assigned for the use and endowment of a chapter of "black canons regular of the order of St. ”

“ It is a famous place for antiquarian plunder; there are such rich bits of old time sculpture for the architect, and old time story for the poet. There is as rare picking in it as a Stilton cheese, and in the same taste—the mouldier the better.”
He went on to mention circumstances of “mighty import” connected with the Abbey, which had never been touched, and which had even escaped the researches of Johnny Bower. The heart of Robert Bruce, the hero of Scotland, had been buried in it. ”

“ The most curious relic of old times, however, in this quaint but richly dight apartment, was a great chimney-piece of panel-work, carved in high relief, with niches or compartments, each containing a human bust, that protruded almost entirely from the wall. Some of the figures were in ancient Gothic garb; the most striking among them was a female, who was earnestly regarded by a fierce Saracen from an adjoining niche.
This panel-work is among the mysteries of the Abbey, and causes as much wide speculation as the Egyptian hieroglyphics. ”

“ Rising amidst green, folding meadows, on the right bank of the Severn, the ruined Abbey forms the central feature in a beautiful, tranquil scene; and, set amidst rich, dark foliage, with the river rolling by, and cattle standing knee-deep in the shallows, has exercised the brush of many a landscape artist.
Founded by Roger de Clinton, Bishop of Chester, early in King [Pg 142] Stephen's reign, Buildwas Abbey is built in a plain, severe style, offering a striking contrast to its more elegant rival at Much Wenlock. ”