Wanderings in Wessex · Chapter 7Introduction (5)
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During the de Montfort rebellion the castle was held against the king. Edward was kept here for a time by Isabella before his murder at Berkley. The castle then passed through several hands until the time of Elizabeth, when it was sold to Sir Christopher Hatton. During this long period, the fabric was added to and improved until little of the Norman structure remained. All the new buildings seem to have been constructed with but one purpose, that of making an impregnable fortress. The widow of Sir Christopher sold the castle to Attorney-General Sir John Banks, ancestor of the Bankes of Kingston Lacy, in whose occupation, or rather in that of his wife, it was to have its invincibility put to the test. Sir John was with the king's forces at York in 1643 when the army of the Parliament gathered upon the Knowle and East hills. During six weeks repeated attacks were made by the forces of Sir Walter Earle, but without success, and eventually the siege was raised. In 1646 treachery succeeded where honest warfare failed. Colonel Pitman, an officer of the royal garrison, admitted a number of Roundheads, who obtained possession of the King's and Queen's towers. The remainder of the building became untenable by the poorly armed defenders, who had parted with their ordnance long before as a matter of policy.
Months were spent by the victorious Parliamentary forces in mining the foundations and in the systematic destruction of the magnificent defences. As we see it to-day, the actual masonry is practically in the condition left by the explosions, so massive is the material and so indestructible the mortar.
The sketch which accompanies these brief notes will make the plan of the castle clear, but no description can give any adequate notion of the strange havoc wrought by the gunpowder. It speaks well for the good workmanship of the builders when one remembers that these leaning towers, that appear to be in immediate danger of collapse, have been in the same condition for nearly three centuries. The western tower has been carried down the hill nine feet from its original position, but is still erect and unshattered. Part of the curtain wall was completely reversed by the force of the explosive and now shows its inner face. Whoever superintended the work of demolition must have been one of the chagrined and disappointed attackers who was human enough to vent his feelings, at much expense and great risk of life and limb, on the stubborn old walls.
Corfe, small town or large village, is picturesque and pleasant enough in itself without the added interest of the castle and the beauty of the surrounding country. The church is dedicated to the martyred Edward. It was rebuilt in 1860, excepting the fourteenth century tower, with its quaint gargoyles, and the Norman south porch. From the tower, shot made from the organ pipes of the church was hurled at the castle during the siege. The clock was constructed while Elizabeth was queen and curfew is still rung daily from October to March at 8 p.m. Within the church may be seen the old altar frontal used prior to the Reformation, and the fifteenth-century font. Of much interest are the quotations from the churchwardens' accounts that are preserved in the church room.
The old market cross is gone. On its stump there was erected in 1897 a new Latin cross to commemorate the jubilee of Queen Victoria. "Dackhams," the Elizabethan manor standing back from the Swanage road, and now called Morton House, is a fine specimen of Tudor building. The architecture of Corfe, as in most of the inland villages of the "island," is most pleasing; a distinctive note being the pillared porch with a room above.
Corfe Castle retained a mayor and eight "barons" until 1883. The last to hold office (a Bankes) was also Lord High Admiral of Purbeck, a picturesque title over three hundred years old. It will come as a surprise to most readers to hear that Corfe was admitted to rank as a Cinque Port. The town returned the usual two members in pre-reform days.
A pleasant route out of Corfe is to take a path between cottages on the left of the lane leading to West Orchard, and, crossing several meadows, to pass over the breezy Corfe common to the Kingston road. This gives the traveller a series of beautiful views and an especially fine retrospect of Corfe Castle. In a short two miles Kingston, climbing up its steep hill, is reached. The church, a landmark for many miles, was built by Lord Eldon in 1880. It was designed by Street in Early English. With its severe and lofty tower the exterior has a coldly conventional aspect not altogether pleasing. Inside, the large amount of Purbeck marble employed gives a touch of colour which, to a certain extent, relieves the austerity. Not far away is the older church built in Perpendicular style by Lord Chancellor Eldon. The seat of the Eldon family is at Encombe, a lovely cup-shaped hollow opening to the sea about a mile and a half away, and not far from the lonely Chapman's (or perhaps Shipman's) Pool, a deep and sheltered cove on the west of St. Aldhelm's Head. A path can be taken that crosses the fields until the open common, which extends to the edge of the great headland, is reached. On the summit, 450 feet above the waves, is a little Norman chapel dedicated to the first Bishop of Sherborne, whose name the headland bears and not that of St. Alban, as erroneously given in so many school geographies and in some tourist maps. This chantry served a double purpose, prayers being said by the priest within and a beacon lit upon the roof without, for the succour and guidance of sailors. A cross now takes the place of the ancient beacon bucket. It is said that the chapel was instituted by a sorrowing father who saw his daughter and her husband drowned in the terrible race off the headland in or about the year 1140. It was restored by the same Earl of Eldon who built the Kingston church, and is looked after by the neighbouring coast-guard. The interior is lit by one solitary window in the thick wall and in the centre is a single massive column. Some authorities have questioned its original use as a place of prayer, but tradition, and a good deal of direct evidence, point to the ecclesiastical nature of the building.
The tale of wreck and disaster off this wild coast reached such a dreadful total that in 1881 after much agitation a light was erected on Anvil Point and declared open by Joseph Chamberlain, then President of the Board of Trade. Between the two heads, which are about four miles apart, is the famous "Dancing Ledge," a sloping beach of solid rock upon which the surf plays at high tide with a curious effect, possibly suggesting the quaint name. This section of cliff, like the whole of the Dorset coast, is of great interest to the geologist and the veriest amateur must feel some curiosity on the subject when it is apparent to him that the beautiful scenery of this shore is caused mainly by its being the meeting place of so many differing strata. The Kimmeridge clay will be noticed at once by its sombre colour, almost quite black when wet, and in times of scarcity actually used as fuel. This clay rings Chapman's Pool and extends westwards to Kimmeridge Bay. St. Aldhelm's Head is built up of differing kinds of limestone, the fine bastions of the top being composed of the famous Portland stone itself, the finest of all the limestones from a commercial point of view.
To walk from St. Aldhelm's along the cliff to Anvil Point and so into Swanage is possible but fatiguing, and perhaps not worth the labour involved. Winspit Quarry and Seacombe Cliff would be passed on the way; between the two are some old guns marking the spot where the East Indiaman Halsewell went down in a fearful storm in January, 1786. This tragedy was immortalized by Charles Dickens in "The Long Voyage." Out of 250 souls only eighty-two were saved by men employed at Winspit Quarry. Some of the passengers are buried in the level plot between the two cliffs.
Worth Matravers, a mile and a half from the Head and four from Swanage, is a village at the end of a by-way that leaves the Kingston road near Gallows Gore(!) cottages, a mile west of Langton Matravers. The name of both these villages connects them with an old Norman family once of much importance in south-east Dorset. It is said that one of them was the tool of Queen Isabella and the actual murderer of Edward.
Worth is famous for its fine early Norman church, also restored by the Earl of Eldon. The tower, of three stories, the nave, south door and chancel arch, all belong to this period. The chancel itself is Early English. The carved grotesques under the eaves of the roof are worthy of notice. Not the least remarkable thing about Worth is the tombstone of Benjamin Jesty, who is claimed thereon to be the first person to inoculate for smallpox (1774). Langton Matravers need not keep the stranger; its church was rebuilt nearly fifty years ago and the village is unpicturesque.
We now approach Swanage, a delightful little town, well known and much appreciated by those of the minority who prefer a restful and modest resort to the glitter and crowds of Bournemouth. That it will never attain the dimensions of its great neighbour to the north is fairly certain. Swanage is in a comparatively inaccessible position. Barely eight miles from Bournemouth as the crow flies, it is twenty-four miles by rail and about the same by road. So that during the five years of war, when the steamer service was suspended, Swanage had no day trippers and the quietness of the town was accentuated, and the camp on the southern slopes of Ballard Down did not interfere to any great extent with this somnolence. But now the steamers pant across to Swanage pier again and unload the curious crowd who make straight for the Great Globe and Tilly Whim and pause to "rest and admire" as they breast the steep slopes of Durlston.
The tutelary genius of Swanage is of stone and the two high priests of the idol were Mowlein and Burt. Some undeserved fun has been poked at the shade of the junior partner, who conceived the enormous open-air kindergarten that has been formed out of the wild cliff at Durlston. For the writer's part, while venturing to deplore certain incongruities such as the startling inscription that faces the visitor as he turns to survey the Tilly Whim cavern from the platform of rock outside, a feeling of respect for the wholehearted enthusiasm and industry of the remarkable man who was responsible for these marvels is predominant. Every guide to Swanage enumerates in exhaustive detail the objects which make the town a sort of "marine store" of stony odds and ends. The best of these cast-offs is the entrance to the Town Hall, once in Cheapside as the Wren frontage to Mercer's Hall. The "gothic" tower at Peveril Point at one time graced the southern approach to London Bridge as a Wellington memorial. The clock at the Town Hall is said to be from a "scrapped" city church and the gilt vane on the turret of Purbeck House on the other side of the way is from Billingsgate. Not the least surprising of these relics are the lamp-and-corner-posts bearing the names of familiar London parishes.
When Swanage was Danish Swanic (it was called Swanwick in the early nineteenth century) it witnessed the defeat of its colonizers in a sea fight with Alfred. The irresponsible partners commemorated this by erecting a stone column surmounted by four cannon balls. A queer way of perpetuating a pre-conquest naval victory, but possibly the projectiles were less in the way here than at Millbank. Not far away, attached to the wall of the Moslem Institute, is a coloured geological map of the district, another effort at the higher education of "the man on the beach." It is certainly a good idea, and may lead many to a further study of a fascinating science, for nowhere may the practical study of scenery be made to greater advantage than near Swanage.
Perhaps the most graceful curve of coast line in Dorset is Swanage Bay, and to see it at its best one should stroll across the rising ground of Peveril Point. To the right are the dark cliffs of Purbeck marble that encircle Durlston Bay; to the left across the half-moon stretch of water is the white chalk of Ballard Point guarded by "Old Harry's daughter," the column of detached chalk in front. At one time this was one of a family, but "Old Harry" and his "wife" have sunk beneath the waves and the sole remaining member of the family may disappear during the next great storm. Beyond, indistinct and remote during fine weather but startlingly near when the glass is falling, are the cliffs of Alum Bay in the Isle of Wight, and the guardian "Needles."
The picturesque High Street should be followed past the Town Hall with its alien Carolean front, and the long wall of Purbeck House that is said to be made up from the "sweepings" of the Albert Memorial at Kensington. Down a lane at the side of the civic building is the old "Lock Up," with an inscription as quaint as it is direct, for it tells us that it was erected "for the prevention of Wickedness and Vice by the Friends of Religion and Good Order." Farther up High Street is a cottage, creeper-clad and picturesque, where Wesley stayed while preaching to the quarrymen. The best part of this stroll is towards the end, where a space opens out on the right to St. Mary's Church and the mill pond which is surrounded by as extraordinary a jumble of queer old roofs and gables as may be seen in Dorset. The church has been rebuilt and much altered and enlarged, but the tower is as old as it looks and has seen several churches come and go beneath it. There is no door lower than the second story and it must have been reached by a ladder. It was undoubtedly built for, and used as, a fortress in case of need.
Although there is little of beauty in the quarries that honeycomb the hills to the west of Swanage, the industry that is carried on is of much interest as a surviving guild or medieval trades union. One of the laws of the "company," unbroken from immemorial time, is that no work may be given to any but a freeman or his son who, after seven years' apprenticeship, becomes a senior worker upon presenting to the warden a fee of 6s. 8d., a loaf of bread and a bottle of beer. The guild meet every Shrove Tuesday at Corfe to transact the formal business of the year. Each quarryman and his partner, or partners, hold the little independent working allotted to them apart from the remainder of the quarry. This obviously prevents blasting and each block of stone is cut out by manual labour.
Purbeck marble is famous all over southern England, and many historic buildings, from the Temple church in London to Salisbury and Exeter Cathedrals, are enriched by the beautifully polished columns of this dark-coloured limestone. The caves at Durlston, with their intriguing name, are simply abandoned quarries, although all sorts of fanciful legends have grown up about them. To any one familiar with the plan of the working of a quarry, the sloping tunnel that gives access to the cave will prove the origin to be artificial. Nevertheless, Tilly Whim is romantic enough to please the most fastidious of the steamer contingent and the scene from the platform of rock in front of the old workings is as wild and natural as could well be imagined. As for the open-air schoolroom above on Durlston Head a description is hardly necessary. That the pedagogic master mason was not without the saving grace of a sense of humour is proved by the once plain block of stone provided for those who would perpetuate their own greatness, now literally covered with names and initials. The staring red and white "castle" that crowns the cliff is a restaurant built to accommodate the day visitor, but if the evidence of discarded pastry bags and ginger-beer bottles that at times litter and disfigure the cliff and caves is to be regarded, the castle is not as well patronized as it should be. This unseemliness is kept under by what appears to be a daily clean up, though the writer has never met the public benefactor who makes all tidy in the early morning hours before the steamers have discharged their crowds. Possibly this is the same individual who keeps the tangle of blackberry and tamarisk pruned down so that while resting with "Sir Walter Scott" or "Shakespeare" we may duly admire the view across Swanage Bay.
No one should omit the glorious walk northwards across the fine expanse of Ballard Down to Studland. The coast road round the bay is taken to a path bearing to the right in the pleasant suburb of New Swanage. At the time of writing this leads through the before-mentioned, partly derelict, military camp and, after passing on the right the old Tudor farmhouse called Whitecliff, emerges on the open Down. The rearward views gain in beauty with every step, and when the summit is reached at the fence gate and the stone seat that seems to have strayed from Durlston, a magnificent and unforgettable view is obtained of Poole Harbour and the great heathland that stretches away to the New Forest. Every intricacy of the harbour can be seen as on a map, and its almost landlocked character is strikingly apparent as the eye follows the bright yellow arc of sand to the cliffs of Bournemouth. That town has most of its more glaring modernities decently hidden, and the pier and a few spires and chimneys seem to blend into the all-pervading golden brown of the Hampshire coast. In the near foreground Studland looks very alluring in its bowery foliage, but before descending the hillside the long and almost level Down should be followed to the right past the shooting range, provided the absence of a warning red flag gives permission. By a slight detour to the right as the ground slopes toward that extension of Ballard Down called Handfast Point, fearsome peeps may be had of the waves raging round Old Harry's daughter and the submerged ruins of her parents. Care must be taken here in misty weather, the cliffs are sheer, and unexpected gaps occur where nothing could save the unwary explorer in the event of an unlucky slip. Little is gained by following the cliff top all the way to the extreme edge of the Point, and a return may be made from hereabouts or a short cut made to the path leading to Studland.
Studland was until quite lately one of the most unspoilt of English villages. An unfortunate outbreak of red brick has slightly detracted from its former quiet beauty, but it is still a charming little place and claims as heretofore to be the "prettiest village in England," a claim as impossible of acceptance as some other of the challenges made by seaside towns. But it is unfair to class Studland with the usual run of such resorts; perhaps its best claims upon us are negative ones. It has no railway station, no pier, no bandstand, no parade, in fact the old village turns its back upon the sea in an unmistakable manner.
The foundations and lower parts of the walls of the church are probably Saxon. The building as we see it is primitive Norman without later additions or any very apparent attempts at restoration, though a good deal of legitimate repairing has been carried out during the last few years. The solemn and venerable churchyard yews lend an added air of great age to the building. Close to the church door is the tombstone of one Sergeant Lawrence, whose epitaph is a stirring record of military service combined with a dash of real romance, though probably the sergeant's whole life did not have as much of the essence of dreadful war as one twelve months in the career of a present-day city clerk.
A long mile west, on the northern slopes of Studland Heath, is the famous Agglestone "that the Devil while sulking in the Isle of Wight threw at the builders of Corfe Castle" or, according to another account, from Portland. Probably the confusion arose through the original reporter using the term "the Island." Natives would know that the definite article could only refer to their own locality! The stone is an effect of denudation and is similar to other isolated sandstone rocks scattered about the south of England, e.g., the "Toad" Rock at Tunbridge Wells and "Great upon Little" near West Heathly in Sussex. A short distance away is a smaller mass called the "Puckstone." The derivation of the larger rock is probably Haligstane—Holy Stone. So difficult is it to contemplate the ages through which gradual weathering would bring these stones to their present shape that scientists, as recently as the middle of the last century, were at variance as to their natural or artificial origin.
A by-road, a little over five miles long, runs under the face of Nine Barrows Down and Brenscombe Hill to Corfe. It is a picturesque route and has some good views, but a much finer way, and but little longer, is along the top of the Downs themselves culminating at Challow Hill in a sudden sight of Corfe, backed by the imposing Knowle Hill. This walk is even surpassed by that along the hills westwards from Corfe. In this direction a similar by-road also runs under the long line of the Purbeck Hills, here so called, but on the south side of the range through Church Knowle which has an old cruciform church pulled about by "restorers" as far back as the early eighteenth century and several times since. The village is pleasant in itself and beautifully situated. A short distance farther is an ancient manor house dating from the fourteenth century. Its name—Barneston—is said to perpetuate a Saxon landholder, Berne, so that the foundations of the house are far older than this period. Over three miles from Corfe is the small church hamlet of Steeple; here a road bears upward to the right, and if the hill top has not been followed all the way from Corfe it should certainly be gained at this point. Not far away and nearer Church Knowle is Creech Barrow, a cone-shaped hill commanding a most extensive and beautiful view, especially north-westwards over the heathy flats of the Frome valley to the distant Dorset-Somerset borderlands. The narrow Purbeck range now makes obliquely for the coast, where it ends more than six miles from Corfe in the magnificent bluff of Flowers' Barrow, or Ring's Hill, above Worbarrow Bay. This is without doubt the finest portion of the Dorset coast, not only for the striking outline of the cliffs and hills themselves but for the beautiful colouring of the strata and the contrasting emerald of the dells that break down to the purple-blue of the water. Neither drawing nor photograph can give any idea of this exquisite blend of the stern and the beautiful.
Eastwards, Gad Cliff guards the remote little village of Tyneham from the sea; certain portions of this precipice seem in imminent danger of falling into the water, so much do they overhang the beach. At Kimmeridge Bay the cliff takes the sombre hue seen near Chapman's Pool and the beach and water are discoloured by the broken shale that has fallen from the low cliff. It is thought that a sort of jet jewellery was made here in Roman times; quantities of perforated discs have been found about the bay—termed "coal money" by the fishermen. The greasy nature of this curious form of clay is remarkable. Naphtha has been obtained from it and various commercial enterprises have been started at Kimmeridge in connexion with the local product but all seem to have failed miserably because of the unendurable smell that emanates when combustion takes place.
The "Tout" forms the eastern extremity of Worbarrow Bay; this boldly placed and precipitous little hill forms a sort of miniature Gibraltar and is one of the outstanding features of this bewilderingly intricate shore. On the farther or western side of the bay is the exquisite Arish Mel Gap,[1] that, taking all points into consideration, particularly that of colouring, is probably the finest scene of its kind on the English coast. Picturesquely placed at the head of the miniature valley is Lulworth Castle, grey and stern, and making an ideal finish to the unforgettable picture. A spring in the recesses of the dell sends a small and sparkling stream down to the gap, the sides of which in spring and early summer are a blaze of white and gold, challenging the cliffs in their display of colour. A path climbs gradually by an old wind-torn wood up the landward side of Bindon Hill, with gorgeous rearward views across the fields of Monastery Farm to the northern escarpment of the Purbeck Hills. The path very soon reaches the top of Bindon that seems to drop directly to Mupe Bay and its jagged surf-covered rocks. In two miles from Arish Mel the path ends directly above the delectable Lulworth Cove, and of all ways of reaching that unique and lovely little place this is the most charming. Care must be taken on the steep side of Bindon. Several accidents have taken place here. One of them is perpetuated by an inscription on a board placed upon the hillside. The path must be followed until it drops into the road leading to the landward village.
[1] Correctly—Arish Mel. "Gap" and "Mel" are synonyms in Dorset.
Lulworth bids fair, or ill, to become a "resort" apart from the descents from Bournemouth or Weymouth, which are only of a few hours' duration. Before the Great War there was an extension of West Lulworth round the foot of Bindon Hill, but the railway at Wool is still a good five miles away and the great majority of seaside visitors seem to fight shy of any place that has not a station on the beach.
Lulworth has been described and photographed so many times that a description seems needless. It would want an inspired pen to do any portion of this coast full justice. Suffice it to say that the cove is almost circular, 500 yards across, and that the entrance is so narrow as to make it almost invisible from the open sea. The contortions of the cliff face within the cove would alone render the place famous.
More often sketched than Lulworth; perhaps because it is easier to draw, is Durdle Door or Barn Door, the romantic natural arch that juts out at the end of Barndoor Cove. The outline has all the appearance of stage scenery of the goblin cavern sort. So lofty is the opening that a sailing boat can pass through with ease. Behind it is the soaring Swyre Head, 670 feet high, and the third of that name in Dorset. Between this point and Nelson Fort on the west of Lulworth Cove is Stair Hole, a gloomy roofless cavern into which the tide pours with a terrifying sound, especially when a strong sou-wester is blowing.
East Lulworth is a charming old village, three miles from the cove and two from West Lulworth. Close to it is the castle that completes the picture at Arish Mel. The church, much altered and rebuilt, is Perpendicular, and in it are interesting memorials of the Welds to whom the castle has belonged since 1641. This family are members of the Roman church, and a fine chapel for adherents of that communion was built in the park at the end of the eighteenth century. It is said to be the first erected in England since the Reformation. The ex-king Charles X of France sought and found sanctuary at Lulworth Castle in August, 1830, as Duke of Milan. He was accompanied by his heir, the Duke of Angoulême, and the Duke of Bordeaux.
CHAPTER IV
DORCHESTER AND ITS SURROUNDINGS
The railway from Wareham to Dorchester runs through the heart of that great wild tract that under the general name of Egdon Heath forms a picturesque and often gloomy background to many of Mr. Hardy's romances. These heath-lands are a marked characteristic of the scenery of this part of the county. Repellent at first, their dark beauty, more often than not, will capture the interest and perhaps awe of the stranger. Much more than a mere relic of the great forest that stretched for many miles west of Southampton Water and that in its stubborn wildness bade fair to break up the Saxon advance, the heaths of Dorset extend over a quarter of the area of the county.
Wool is five miles from Wareham and is the station for Bindon Abbey, half a mile to the east. The pleasant site of the abbey buildings on the banks of the Frome is now a resort of holiday-makers, adventurers from Bournemouth and Swanage, who may have al-fresco teas through the goodwill of the gatekeeper, though it would appear that they must bring all but the cups and hot water with them. The outline of the walls and a few interesting relics may be seen, but there is nothing apart from the natural surroundings to detain us. The old red brick Manor House, close to the station, and in plain view from the train, was a residence of the Turbervilles, immortalized by Hardy. Of much interest also is the old Tudor bridge that here crosses the Frome.