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Gentleman's Magazine 1802 p.635
the stile of business is amazing, and is enough to ruin Bristol and eclipse London." (p.122.) - At Heysham,
"Upon the crown of a rock, joining the church-yard, is a flat, thirty yards diameter, which precipitates into the sea, where stand the remains of a chapel. In this repository of the dead was taken up a stone coffin, which now lies above ground, and seems to fit a corpse five feet ten, and to have stood the test of a thousand years. A hollow is cut in the hard grit, for the head, neck, shoulders, &c. Upon this bare rock is a level part, six yards by three and a half, in which have been cut six hollows, or coffins, in a row, in the form of a human body, about twelve inches deep, with a groove round each, to admit a lid. This was probably the depositary of one family, who, instead of sinking, may be said to rise into the grave. The West side of this rock is washed by the waves, and elevated about fifty feet above them. These receptacles of the dead look like half a dozen mummies, in rank. (pp.130,131.)
Receptacles must be like catacombs, and the bodies in them like mummies.
The passage 8 miles over the Kent sands (p.132-139.) is truly interesting; also, the description of Windermere (p.141-146.)
At Penrith the father and daughter parted, he for the Wall, she for the Lakes. Antiquaries as we are, we wish they had kept together.
A mile from Shewenshields is the famous Busy gap, about 29 miles from Newcastle, so called from the frequency of the Picts and Scots breaking through this gap, and suprising the Romans and Britons, and afterwards of the Moss troopers; "a break in the mountain over which the Wall ran, now filled up by a common field-gate, two yards and an half wide." The feats of the Moss troopers have been greatly exaggerated; but "a more dreary country than this can scarcely be conceived. I do not wonder it shocked Camden. The country itself would frighten him, without the troopers." (p.229.)
"The station Borcovicus, now House Steads, is much elevated; declines to the South; the ramparts are plain. A very large Suburb seems to have been added to this populous City, now reduced to one solitary house; the whole about fifteen acres. The curious observer, I believe, may count twenty streets. The population, perhaps, could not be less than two or three thousand souls. From the melancholy relicks on the spot, it must have been graced with some elegant buildings. A Temple, no doubt, was one. I saw the square base of a large pillar, with a circular shaft proceeding from it, fourteen inches in diameter, curiously moulded. Another, of a different form, with a square shaft eighteen inches diameter; noble remains of fifteen hundred years! which loudly declare the days of ancient splendour. The castle stood at the corner, North-west, within the Station; was itself moated round, as were also the Station and the Suburbs, separately. Joining the Wall, within, are the remains of a Court of Justice, about twelve yards long and six wide. In the West corner was the judge's seat, six feet in diameter, and quoined with stone, ten courses of which remain. It is not easy to survey these important ruins without a sigh; a place once of the greatest activity, but now a solitary desert; instead of the human voice, is heard nothing but the winds. In the farm-house, down in the valley, the jamb which supports the mantle-tree is one solid stone, four feet high, two broad, and one thick, complete as in the day the workmen left it, as in the plate annexed; which may also be found in Warburton's History of the Wall, plate III. p.60; and in Gough's improved edition of Camden's Britannia, vol.III. plate xvii. p.245. There are also many curious figures, all Roman, in this Station." (pp.235-237.)
"At Bradley-hall, a single farm-house, I consider myself in the middle of the kingdom, between the German Ocean and the Irish Sea; consequently, upon the most elevated ground between both, and distant, in a strait line, by land, about fifty miles from each. We must allow, from the convexity of the globe, a rise of one hundred and fifty yards; and the mountain on which I stand will perhaps give a rise of forty more. It follows, I am elevated one hundred and ninety yards above the sea. The prospects are not grand, but extensive, and rather aweful." (p.240.)
"The works at Cambeck, the ancient Petriana, are wholly gone; for a gentleman, who, like other 'wise men from the East,' had acquired a fortune in India, recently purchased the estate on which this castle stood for 130,000l. stocked up the foundations, and erected a noble house on the spot. Other Stations preserve the ruins, but this only the name, and is the first which has been sacrificed to modern taste." (p.271.)
"Upon the spot of Edward the Third's departure at Burgh, Henry Howard, Duke of Norfolk, proprietor of the land, erected a monument 28 feet high, 1685, declaring the event in Latin. Time and the weather have reduced this monument, and the fragments now lie round the spot. Lord Lonsdale is proprietor of the estate by exchange of property with the Duke, and, I was
informed,
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