The learned writer, who now claims our attention, is well known to the public on several accounts, but especially as the historian of Whalley,' a respectable and important district in the counties of York and Lancaster. We were prepossessed in his favour by the remembrance of the following excellent remark in a sermon, which he preached, we believe, before the University of Cambridge. Alluding to an ancient discourse which he had quoted, he observed,

Happy would it be for the Church of Christ, if the works of these old masters of reason and patterns of piety were not now discarded, for a new divinity, which crawls from the modern press like the progeny of error, feeble and blind and innumerable.' Yet Dr. Whitaker's admiration, we conclude, is not devoted so much to what is old as to what is excellent; accordingly, he observes, in his preface, with regard to epitaphs, &c.; This work would indeed have had the countenance of its predecessors, had the author opened a correspondence with parish clerks and sextons for an entire assortment of those wares. But from such undistinguishing accumulation of sepulchral trash, indolence; œconomy and taste alike revolted. Many inscriptions therefore are omitted,

which, though neither rare

Nor ancient, will be so, preserved with care.'

The Deanery of Craven is introduced to our notice in the following terms.

"The district which I have now undertaken to describe is almost equally interesting to the Botanist, the Mineralogist, the Antiquary, and the Lover of Landscape. With the provinces of the two former I presume not to interfere.

Contiguous to the parish of Whalley on the South, this country assumes, from the very boundary a new character and complexion, of which the environs of Clitheroe alone partake in the former district. The Deanery of Craven extends about thirty miles Southward from the source of the Ribble and Wharf, and the interval between those rivers includes the first twenty miles in the course of the Are.

The basis of the country may be considered as one vast aggregate of calcareous matter, which, however generated, or wherever collected on the surface of the earth, seldom fails to produce a set of features in the face of nature, at once singular and beautiful." p. 1.

After assigning the continuous solidity of this kind of earth, in particular, as a reason for its being formed, by volcanic convulsions, into large abrupt masses and extensive caverns, author proceeds,

our

"It is enough for us however, that we know the result of these hidden operations, and profit by it: that we find in Craven a country fertile in pasturage, and rich in landscape, of which the complexion is equally

pleas

pleasing with the features. Tillage is almost universally exploded, and it would now be difficult to point out in Great Britain a tract of equal extent and of equal verdure.

The climate is cold and rainy, though greatly improved since the twelfth and thirteenth century, when common grain, if we believe the complaints of the monks, seldom arrived at maturity. Throughout the whole district there is some deficiency of native wood; but the ash, which from its general and spontaneous growth, and the various uses to which it is here applied, has often been called the Craven oak, by its pale and elegant foliage forms a charming accompaniment to the light verdure of the pastures; while the deep green of the indigenous yew, and the hoary leaves of the whitebeam, diversify the surfaces of the most inaccessible rocks." p, 2, 3.

The reader will already have observed that Dr. W. sees and delineates with the spirit of a painter. He continues by enumerating some scenes, which, he remarks, are

"So beautiful to the eye, or interesting to the imagination, or both, that I must take a consequence, which I am not unprepared for, if I linger over them with a fondness which cold tempers are incapable of feeling, and fastidious critics of enduring. Had these been wanting, the History of Craven would not have been written.

With respect to the villages of this country in general, they are in the highest degree neat, heathful, and pleasant.

Enclosures, however convenient for occupation, or conducive to improvement, have spoiled the face of the country as an object; the cornfields, which, by the variegated hues of tillage, relieved the uniformity of verdure about them, are now no more, and the fine swelling outlines of the pastures, formerly as extensive as large parks, and wanting little but the accompaniment of deer, to render them as beautiful, are now strapped over with ugly bandages of stone, and present nothing to the eye but right lined and angular deformity." p. 3.

After some brief remarks on the architecture of the Craven churches, and some ingenious observations in defence of the tithe system, Dr. W. informs us that the benefices of this deanery are all moderately well endowed, and that the churches are distributed with much prudence and judgement: it is impossible,' he continues,

"For a serious mind, contemplating (to contemplate) the venerable fabric of the church, the relative situation of the antient parsonage, and the collected population of the parish, or principal village of the parish, clustering around them both, without conceiving the idea of a numerous family of children gathered about their common parent, for the united purposes of comfort, instruction, and devotion.

Could weight of character and due authority be recalled from their long extinction on one hand, and ancient reverence and submission on the other, every part of this now visionary theory might yet be realized.

In such a situation no character would need to be unknown, no piety unnoticed, no enormity unreproved. I allow that the present temper

of mankind is unfavourable to clerical exertions: yet a faithful discharge of duty, without eccentricity or imprudence, even under circunstanceS the most unpromising, will never be wholly lost; but it must not be dissembled that this district has never been distinguished for the piety or the labours of its clergy: and one fact is certain, let the cause be what it will, that no in part of England are the churches more negligently attended, in none does there appear a more general indifference to religious duties." p. 7.

We lament the facts which our historian thus faithfully records; yet we fear that the temper of mankind' has never been very favourable to clerical exertions,' and that the 'ancient reverence and submission,' so much regretted, were, too generally, mere modes of ignorance, fear, and superstition.

"One circumstance in the ecclesiastical History of Craven deserves to be remembered. There never was a period when the consciences of ecclesiastics were more harrassed by impositions of various kinds than in the civil wars of the last century; yet such was the flexibility of principle displayed by the incumbents of this deanery, under all their trials, that not a name in the whole number appears in the catalogue of sufferers exhibited on the two opposite sides by Calamy and Walker. The Surplice or the Gown, the Liturgy or Directory, Episcopal, Presbyterian, or Congregational Government; a King, a Commonwealth, or an Usurper; all these changes, and all the contradictory engage ments which they imposed, were deemed trifling inconveniences in comparison of the loss of a benefice." p. 7.

The deanery consists of the following parishes. Milton, Sladeburne, Gisburne, Bolton juxta Bowland, Long Preston, Giggleswick, Horton, Bracewell, Bernoldswick, Thornton, Marton, Bingley, Kighley, Kildwick, Skipton, Carlton, Broughton, Gargrave, Kirkby Malghdale, Ilkey, Addingham, Burnsal, Linton, Arncliffe, and Kettlewell. We have the description of each in order, comprehending a sketch of its external appearance, a history of its church or monastery, and a list of the incumbents; the antiquities of the place; the family history of the Lord of the manor, and the complicated transmission of property, from the conquest.

There are in this valuable volume, including a fine portrait of the author, forty-one plates, consisting of Abbeys, Mansions, Portraits, Landscapes, Tombs, Autographs, &c. There are also eighteen separate tables of Pedigrees, the Talbot's, the Percy's, the Clifford's, c-As usual in works of this kind, we have impressions of arms, seals, boots, gloves and spoons, with learned dissertations upon them. The boot of Henry the VI. we find to have measured two feet six inches, buttoning with two dozen of buttons, from the ankle to the knee; and his hairy glove was eighteen inches long.

The following is the history of an antient drinking Horn, in the possession of Lord Ribblesdale, of which Dr.W. has furnished a drawing.

"Here is also preserved the horn of a buffaloe, nearly twenty inches long, and containing about two quarts; it is supported on three silver feet resembling those of a man in armour. Round the middle is a filleting, inscribed, " Qui pugnet contra tres perdet duos ;" (Whoever challenges these three legs, will lose both his own.) a seasonable though rather inconsistent warning to those who were invited to drink out of it. I regret that no tradition remains to ascertain its antiquity. The characters afford no certain light, The O, however, is a lozenge, which was in use as early as the 12th century; but was revived, in a few instances, after the declension of the old black letter in the end of Henry VIII. Such horns were common among all the Northern tribes, as they were all addicted to deep potations. One of equal capacity was exhausted at a draught by the heir of an Highland chieftain before he could be admitted to the honours of manhood.-The Pusey-horn, once belonging to Canute, is another specimen of the same kind; but what most resembles this is the Wassel-horn of Robert de Eglesfield, still preserved in Queen's College, Oxford. The feet of the former are those of a dog; the latter, in allusion to the owner's name, the claws of an eagle. p. 35.

Among other monastic records, a letter from the Abbot of Kirkstall to his brethren in the 13th century is introduced, with the charitable intention of shewing, as Dr. W. says, that these men have not always had justice done them: it displays forcibly the humble, pious, and affectionate feelings of the writer, but is too long for insertion here.

Those who are the advocates of humanity in what may be called the cottage-system, will see in a curious letter (page 69) what an ancient grievance they are endeavouring to remedy. It is addressed to the Earl of Northumberland, by his minor tenants, complaining of the oppressions of their overgrown neighbours; and was written in the middle of the sixteenth century.

RYGHT NOBLE EARLE,

"We your poore suppliants and daylye orators thinhabitants of bothe Martons, infalliblie sheweth, and suppliantly complainthe, unto y'r greatest and most noble Honor, the lamentable ruine and decaye of ourselves and others, for wante of corne, and other good order which hathe bene heretofore amongst us, as well as in plowinge and sowinge, as pasturinge, namely, of p'ce of grounde linge above the towne, one p't of the same beinge called Thrambale, which most profitablie was kepte for the pasturinge and grassinge of oxen and kye comminge to our doores; and another p'cel, called Tranawe, was orderly used for the grassynge of sheepe; the other p'cel called the Scarfeelde, beinge most profitable for gettinge of corne, was used in plowinge and sowing, to our great comforte and com'odite.-Yet, through Mr. Redmayne tenant of the manor-house of the one sydé, and Mr. Hayber of the other, so manye

strange

strange cattle were into the same grounde taken, yea that they were almost infinite, w'h thinge, as God knoweth, was almoste to the utter undowinge of us youre poore suppliants and orators; which, if it be not by your most noble Honor and gracious good wille now amended, even as it hath been heartofore, so shall it now be, yea that we shall not be able to serve our Prince, nor yet your most honorable person, as our dutie requireth; for by this means your poore orators losst our cattell, being so starved in the Somer that they wholly died in Winter. Whearfore, most noble Earle, we entreat your most noble Honor, that for the Lord Jesus Christ his sake, it would please your noble Honor, through your most gracious good will, to find a remedy." p. 69.

Dr. W. is not less aware of the evils which attended the feudal system, than of those which arise from the levelling genius of the present day.' The cottage system promises to afford a suitable remedy for the present state of the peasantry, without incurring the inconveniences of the past. That spirit of independence, which, together with all generous and delicate feeling is rapidly dying away, in brutality and vassalage, would soon revive on such a soil as ours, and advance, not only the happiness and worth of individuals, but the strength and prosperity of the state.

At page 81, Dr. W. introduces a letter written by one of the Tempest family in 1731, describing his journey on an Eastern mission; from this we extract the following idea, which, says Dr. W. is equally new and ingenious.'

"Before I leave Thrace I must not forget, that in this part of the country there are now and then little low hillocks, upon which a strait, thorn grows, like so many pikes stuck in the ground. This shrub gathers the flying dust and sand, and forms a rising; and these being opposite to Troy, made me imagine that they gave the hint to Virgil for the fable of Polydorus hic me confixum ferrea texit telorum seges, et jaculis increvit acutis,' and a reddish earth at the root makes the hint clear. p. 82.

،

The catalogue of incumbents at Long Preston, gives us some pleasing proofs of professional zeal, especially in one who formed the duty of the church, memoriter et extempore, after he became blind; and, in another who expired in the pulpit.

In the parish of Giggleswick we meet with

'An ebbing and flowing well, which issues from the face of a long ridge of rock skirting the road from Settle to Clapham.-The habits of this singular spring are extremely irregular: within the last four or five years it has been observed to rise and fall nineteen inches in the space of five minutes. The times of its flux and reflux are apparently unconnected with rain or drought, or any other external cause.

Almost overhanging the town of Settle, is Castleberg, a conical rock, backed by a cluster of rugged and protuberant craggs, and once undoubtedly crowned with a fortification.

The