Lancashire Sketches. Edwin Waugh
who became second Lord Byron, and died 4th October, 1679, aged 74. He was succeeded by his eldest son, William, who died 13th November, 1695, and was succeeded by his fourth son, William, who died August 8th, 1736, and was succeeded by a younger son, William, fifth Lord Byron, born in November, 1722, killed William Chaworth, Esq., in a duel, in January, 1765, and died 19th May, 1798. He was succeeded by his great nephew, George Gordon, the poet, sixth Lord Byron, who was born 22nd January, 1788, and died at Missolonghi, in April, 1824. In 1823, he sold Newstead Abbey to James Dearden, Esq., of Rochdale; and in the same year, he sold the manor and estate of Rochdale to the same gentleman, by whose son and heir they are now possessed. The manorial rights of Rochdale are reputed (says Baines) to extend over 32,000 statute acres of land, with the privileges of court baron and court leet in all the townships of the parish, including that portion of Saddleworth which lies within the parish of Rochdale; but excepting such districts as Robert de Lacy gave to the abbots of Whalley, with right to inclose the same.
The article goes on to say that the manor of Rochdale was anciently held by the Ellands of Elland, and the Savilles, and that on the death of Sir Henry Saville, it appears to have merged in the possession of the Duchy of Lancaster; and Queen Elizabeth, in right of her duchy possessions, demised that manor to Sir John Byron, by letters patent, dated May 12th, 27th year of her reign (1585), from Lady-day, 1585, to the end of thirty-one years.
The eye having now satisfied itself with what was notable in and about Milnrow, I took my way home, with a mind more at liberty to reflect on what I had seen. The history of Lancashire passed in review before me; especially its latest history. I saw the country that was once thick with trees that canopied herds of wild animals, and thinnest of people, now bare of trees, and thickest of population; the land which was of least account of any in the kingdom in the last century, now most sought after; and those rude elements which were looked upon as "the riddlings of creation," more productive of riches than all the Sacramento's gold, and ministers to a spirit which is destined to change the social aspect of Britain. I saw the spade sinking in old hunting grounds, and old parks now trampled by the fast-increasing press of new feet. The hard cold soil is now made to grow food for man and beast. Masses of stone and flag are shaken from their sleep in the beds of the hills, and dragged forth to build mills and houses with. Streams which have frolicked and sung in undisturbed limpidity thousands of years, are dammed up, and made to wash and scour, and generate steam. Fathoms below the feet of the traveller, the miner is painfully worming his way in labyrinthine tunnels; and the earth is belching coals at a thousand mouths. The region teems with coal, stone, and water, and a people able to subdue them all to their purposes. These elements quietly bide their time, century after century, till the grand plot is ripe, and the mysterious signal given. Anon, when a thoughtful barber sets certain wheels spinning, and a contemplative lad takes a fine hint from his mother's tea-kettle, these slumbering powers start into astonishing activity, like an army of warriors roused to battle by the trumpet. Cloth is woven for the world, and the world buys it, and wears it. Commerce shoots up from a poor pedlar with his pack on a mule, to a giant merchant, stepping from continent to continent, over the ocean, to make his bargains. Railways are invented, and the land is ribbed with iron, for iron messengers to run upon, through mountains and over valleys, on business commissions; the very lightning turns errand-boy. A great fusion of thought and sentiment springs up, and Old England is in hysterics about its ancient opinions. A new aristocracy rises from the prudent, persevering working-people of the district, and threatens to push the old one from its stool. What is to be the upshot of it all? The senses are stunned by the din of toil, and the view obscured by the dust of bargain-making. But, through an opening in the clouds, hope's stars are shining still in the blue heaven that over-spans us. Take heart, ye toiling millions! The spirits of your heroic forefathers are watching to see what sort of England you leave to your sons!
The Birthplace of Tim Bobbin
CHAPTER I
A merrier man,
Within the limits of becoming mirth,
I never spent an hour's talk withal:
His eye begets occasion for his wit:
For every object that the one doth catch,
The other turns to a mirth-moving jest:
Which his fair tongue (conceit's expositor)
Delivers in such apt and gracious words,
That aged ears play truant to his tales.
There is a quiet tract of country on the eastern border of Lancashire, lying in a corner, formed by the junction of the rivers Mersey and Irwell, and having but little intercourse with those great towns of the county which boil with the industry of these days, a few miles off, to the north and eastward. It is the green selvedge of our toilful district, in that direction; and the winding waters of the Mersey lace its meadows, lengthwise, until that river joins the more soiled and sullen Irwell, on the northern boundary of the parish. In all the landscape there are no hills to break the view; and, considering the extent of land, trees are but sparsely scattered over it. It is singular, also, that the oak will not flourish in this particular spot; although there are some fine specimens of the other trees common to the English soil. But the country is generally fertile, and prettily undulated in some places; and it is a pleasant scene in hay-time, "when leaves are large and long," and the birds are singing with full-throated gladness in the green shade, while the dewy swathe is falling to the mower's stroke, in the sunlight of a June morning. Looking eastward, across the Mersey, the park-like plains and rustling woods of Cheshire stretch away, in unbroken beauty, as far as the eye can see. Indeed, the whole of this secluded tract, upon the Lancashire side of the river, may be naturally reckoned part of that fruitful Cheshire district which has, not inappropriately, been called "the market-garden of Manchester." The parish of Flixton occupies nearly the whole of this border nook of Lancashire; and the scattered hamlet of Urmston, in this parish, lays claim to the honour of being the birthplace of our earliest and most popular native humourist, the celebrated John Collier, better known by his self-chosen name of "Tim Bobbin,"—
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