Delphi Complete Works of Ann Radcliffe (Illustrated) (328 page)

4.16. FURNESS ABBEY
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THE deep retirement of its situation, the venerable grandeur of its gothic arches and the luxuriant yet ancient trees, that shadow this forsaken spot, are circumstances of picturesque and, if the expression may be allowed, of sentimental beauty, which fill the mind with solemn yet delightful emotion. This glen is called the Vale of Nightshade, or, more literally from its ancient title Bekangsgill, the ‘“glen of deadly nightshade,”’ that plant being abundantly found in the neighbourhood. Its romantic gloom and sequestered privacy particularly adapted it to the austerities of monastic life; and in the most retired part of it King Stephen, while Earl of Mortaign and Bulloign, founded, in the year 1127, the magnificent monastery of Furness, and endowed it with princely wealth and almost princely authority, in which it was second only to Fontain’s-abbey in Yorkshire.

The windings of the glen conceal these venerable ruins, till they are closely approached, and the bye road, that conducted us, is margined with a few ancient oaks, which stretch their broad branches entirely across it, and are sinely preparatory objects to the scene beyond. A sudden bend in this road brought us within view of the northern gate of the Abbey, a beautiful gothic arch, one side of which is luxuriantly festooned with nightshade. A thick grove of plane-trees, with some oak and beech, overshadow it on the right, and lead the eye onward to the ruins of the Abbey, seen through this dark arch in remote perspective, over rough but verdant ground. The principal features are the great northern window and part of the eastern choir, with glimpses of shattered arches and stately walls beyond, caught between the gaping casements. On the left, the bank of the glen is broken into knolls capped with oaks, which in some places spread downwards to a stream that winds round the ruin, and darken it with their rich foliage. Through this gate is the entrance to the immediate precincts of the Abbey, an area said to contain sixty-five acres, now called the Deer-park. It is enclosed by a stone wall, on which the remains of many small buildings and the faint vestiges of others, still appear; such as the porter’s lodge, mills, granaries, ovens and kilns that once supplied the monastery, some of which, seen under the shade of the fine old trees, that on every side adorn the broken steeps of this glen, have a very interesting effect.

Just within the gate, a small manor house of modern date, with its stables and other offices, breaks discordantly upon the lonely grandeur of the scene. Except this, the character of the deserted ruin is scrupulously preserved in the surrounding area; no spade has dared to level the inequalities, which fallen fragments have occasioned in the ground, or shears to clip the wild fern and underwood, that overspread it; but every circumstance conspires to heighten the solitary grace of the principal object and to prolong the luxurious melancholy, which the view of it inspires. We made our way among the pathless fern and grass to the north end of the church, now, like every other part of the Abbey, entirely roofless, but shewing the lofty arch of the great window, where, instead of the painted glass that once enriched it, are now tufted plants and wreaths of nightshade. Below is the principal door of the church, bending into a deep round arch, which, retiring circle within circle, is rich and beautiful; the remains of a winding staircase are visible within the wall on its left side. Near this northern end of the edifice are seen one side of the eastern choir, with its two slender gothic window frames, and on the west a remnant of the nave of the Abbey and some lofty arches, which once belonged to the belfry, now detached from the main building.

To the south, but concealed from this point of view, are the chapter-house, some years ago exhibiting a roof of beautiful gothic sretwork, and which was almost the only part of the Abbey thus ornamented, its architecture having been characterised by an air of grand simplicity rather than by the elegance and richness of decoration, which in an after date distinguished the gothic style in England. Over the chapter-house were once the library and scriptorium, and beyond it are still the remains of cloisters, of the refectory, the locutorium, or conversation-room, and the calefactory. These, with the walls of some chapels, of the vestry, a hall, and of what is believed to have been a school-house, are all the features of this noble edifice that can easily be traced: winding staircases within the surprising thickness of the walls, and door-cases involved in darkness and mystery, the place abounds with.

The abbey, which was formerly of such magnitude as nearly to fill up the breadth of the glen, is built of a palered stone, dug from the neighbouring rocks, now changed by time and weather to a tint of dusky brown, which accords well with the hues of plants and shrubs that every where emboss the mouldering arches.

The finest view of the ruin is on the east side, where, beyond the vast, shattered frame that once contained a richly-painted window, is seen a perspective of the choir and of distant arches, remains of the nave of the abbey, closed by the woods. This perspective of the ruin is
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said to be two hundred and eighty-seven feet in length; the choir part of it is in width only twenty-eight feet inside, but the nave is seventy: the walls, as they now stand, are fifty-four feet high and in thickness five. Southward from the choir extend the still beautiful, though broken, pillars and arcades of some chapels, now laid open to the day; the chapter-house, the cloisters, and beyond all, and detached from all, is the school-house, a large building, the only part of the monastery that still boasts a roof.

As, soothed by the venerable shades and the view of a more venerable ruin, we rested opposite to the eastern window of the choir, where once the high altar stood, and, with five other altars, assisted the religious pomp of the scene; the images and the manners of times, that were past, rose to reflection. The midnight procession of monks, clothed in white and bearing lighted tapers, appeared to the ‘“mind’s eye”’ issuing to the choir through the very door-case, by which such processions were wont to pass from the cloisters to perform the matin service, when, at the moment of their entering the church, the deep chanting of voices was heard, and the organ swelled a solemn peal. To fancy, the strain still echoed feebly along the arcades and died in the breeze among the woods, the rustling leaves mingling with the close. It was easy to image the abbot and the officiating priests seated beneath the richly-fretted canopy of the four stalls, that still remain entire in the southern wall, and high over which is now perched a solitary yew-tree, a black funereal memento to the living of those who once sat below.

Of a quadrangular court on the west side of the church, three hundred and thirty-four feet long and one hundred and two feet wide, little vestige now appears, except the foundation of a range of cloisters, that formed its western boundary, and under the shade of which the monks on days of high solemnity passed in their customary procession round the court. What was the belfry is now a huge mass of detached ruin, picturesque from the loftiness of its shattered arches and the high inequalities of the ground within them, where the tower, that once crowned this building, having fallen, lies in vast fragments, now covered with earth and grass, and no longer distinguishable but by the hillock they form.

The school-house, a heavy structure attached to the boundary wall on the south, is nearly entire, and the walls, particularly of the portal, are of enormous thickness, but, here and there, a chasm discloses the staircases, that wind within them to chambers above. The schoolroom below, shews only a stone bench, that extends round the walls, and a low stone pillar in the eastern corner, on which the teacher’s pulpit was formerly fixed. The lofty vaulted roof is scarcely distinguishable by the dusky light admitted through one or two narrow windows placed high from the ground, perhaps for the purpose of consining the scholar’s attention to his book.

These are the principal features, that remain of this once magnificent abbey. It was dedicated to St. Mary, and received a colony of monks from the monastery of Savigny in Normandy, who were called Gray Monks, from their dress of that colour, till they became Cistercians, and, with the severe rules of St. Bernard, adopted a white habit, which they retained till the dissolution of monastic orders in England. The original rules of St. Bernard partook in several instances of the austerities of those of La Trapp, and the society did not very readily relinquish the milder laws of St. Benedict for the new rigours imposed upon them by the parent monastery of Savigny. They were forbidden to taste flesh, except when ill, and even eggs, butter, cheese and milk, but on extraordinary occasions; and denied even the use of linen and fur. The monks were divided into two classes, to which separate departments belonged. Those, who attended the choir, slept upon straw in their usual habits, from which, at midnight, they rose and passed into the church, where they continued their holy hymns, during the short remainder of the night. After this first mass, having publicly confessed themselves, they retired to their cells, and the day was employed in spiritual exercises and in copying or illuminating manuscripts. An unbroken silence was observed, except when, after dinner, they withdrew into the locutorium, where for an hour, perhaps, they were permitted the common privilege of social beings. This class was consined to the boundary wall, except that, on some particular days, the members of it were allowed to walk in parties beyond it, for exercise and amusement; but they were very seldom permitted either to receive, or pay visits. Like the monks of La Trapp, however, they were distinguished for extensive charities and liberal hospitality; for travellers were so scrupulously entertained at the abbey, that it was not till the dissolution that an inn was thought necessary in this part of Furness, when one was opened for their accommodation, expressly because the monastery could no longer receive them.

To the second class were assigned the cultivation of the lands and the performance of domestic affairs in the monastery.

This was the second house in England, that received the Bernardine rules, the most rigorous of which were, however, dispensed with in 1485 by Sixtus the Fourth, when, among other indulgences, the whole order was allowed to taste meat on three days of the week. With the rules of St. Benedict, the monks had exchanged their gray habit for a white cassock with a white caul and scapulary. But their choir dress was either white or gray, with caul and scapulary of the same, and a girdle of black wool; over that a mozet, or hood, and a rochet
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. When they went abroad they wore a caul and full black hood.

The privileges and immunities, granted to the Cistercian order in general, were very abundant; and those to the Abbey of Furness were proportioned to its vast endowments. The abbot, it has been mentioned, held his secular court in the neighbouring castle of Dalton, where he presided with the power of administering not only justice but injustice, since the lives and property of the villain tenants of the lordship of Furness were consigned by a grant of King Stephen to the disposal of my lord abbot! The monks also could be arraigned, for whatever crime, only by him. ‘“The military establishment of Furness likewise depended on the abbot. Every mesne lord and free homager, as well as the customary tenants, took an oath of fealty to the abbot, to be true to him against all men, excepting the king. Every mesne lord obeyed the summons of the abbot, or his steward, in raising his quota of armed men, and every tenant of a whole tenement furnished a man and horse of war for guarding the coast, for the border-service, or any expedition against the common enemy of the king and kingdom. The habiliments of war were a steel coat, or coat of mail, a falce, or falchion, a jack, the bow, the bill, the cross-bow and spear. The Furness legion consisted of four divisions: — one of bowmen horsed and harnessed; bylmen horsed and harnessed; bowmen without horse and harness; bylmen without horse and harness
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.”’

The deep forests, that once surrounded the Abbey, and overspread all Furness, contributed with its insulated situation, on a neck of land running out into the sea, to secure it from the depredations of the Scots, who were continually committing hostilities on the borders. On a summit over the Abbey are the remains of a beacon, or watchtower, raised by the society for their further security. It commands extensive views over Low Furness and the bay of the sea immediately beneath; looking forward to the town and castle of Lancaster, appearing faintly on the opposite coast; on the south, to the isles of Wanley, Foulney, and their numerous islets, on one of which stands Peel-castle; and, on the north, to the mountains of High Furness and Coniston, rising in grand amphitheatre round this inlet of the Irish Channel. Description can scarcely suggest the full magnificence of such a prospect, to which the monks, emerging from their concealed cells below, occasionally resorted to sooth the asperities, which the severe discipline of superstition inflicted on the temper; or, freed from the observance of jealous eyes, to indulge, perhaps, the sigh of regret, which a consideration of the world they had renounced, thus gloriously given back to their sight, would sometimes awaken.

From Hawcoat, a few miles to the west of Furness, the view is still more extensive, whence, in a clear day, the whole length of the Isle of Man may be seen, with part of Anglesey and the mountains of Caernarvon, Merionethshire, Denbighshire and Flintshire, shadowing the opposite horizon of the channel.

The sum total of all rents belonging to the Abbey immediately before the dissolution was 946l. 2s. 10d. collected from Lancashire, Cumberland, and even from the Isle of Man; a sum, which considering the value of money at that period; and the woods, meadows, pastures, and sisheries, retained by the society in their own hands; the quantity of provisions for domestic use brought by the tenants instead of rent, and the shares of mines, mills, and saltworks, which belonged to the Abbey, swells its former riches to an enormous amount.