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CHAPTER IX.

"MINSTREL-BARDS1 were of very early-even of Celtic-origin; and the destruction of the Welsh bards by Edward I. evidences the importance and influence of the fraternity. As the Celtic races had their bards, so the Teutonic races had their minstrels. In process of time, these ballad-harmonies, which had originally been chiefly warsongs, became a sort of rude political engine, and a kind of record of passing events, occupying somewhat, though very imperfectly, the place of a newspaper, and certainly having a considerable tendency to civilize the people. A shrewd saying is recorded by Andrew Fletcher, of Saltoun-I knew a wise man who believed that if a man were permitted to make all the ballads, he need not care who should make the laws of a nation.' In the Christian Church, also, the good influence of hymns and spiritual songs was not unfelt; for, though in earlier times these compositions were in Latin, and, therefore, not fully understood by the people, nevertheless their ears became thereby accustomed to metrical sounds, and the soothing strains of these solemn melodies entered with hallowing power into many a peasant-heart. The sacred songs of the early Christians were never silenced; the voices of holy

1 This passage is borrowed from a lecture on "Ballad Poetry," by the Rev. G. J. Brown, Chaplain to his Grace the Duke of Marlborough.

men in religious houses, uttering songs of adoration, were wafted over hill and plain; and it was impossible such thrilling strains could float throughout the air, and across lone village homesteads, without awaking pure and gentle emotions. When Canute, with his Danish soldiers, was approaching the Abbey of Ely, the voices of the monks were heard ascending in a solemn chant; and the soldiers hushed their martial clang, and the King sheathed his sword, for the saintly music sank into the depths of his human heart, and he remembered the living lesson taught him by the Atlantic waves, That the titles of Lord and Master belong only to Him whom earth and seas are ready to obey.' Nor did the influence of the Church's voice of melody die away in a later period; for when the noble Christian hymns of Germany arose, what emotions they awoke; and we, in this our land, can still acknowledge their power; for where is the heart that does not feel the grand harmony of such airs as the 'Old Hundredth' and 'Luther's Hymn ?' The ancient bards were called originally Scalds (which means smoothers and polishers of language,') and were held by the people in that rude admiration ever shown by the uneducated towards those excelling themselves in literary accomplishments; and their persons were safe from harm, and respected even in hostile quarters. We all know the story of King Alfred entering with impunity the precincts of the Danish camp, disguised as a Saxon minstrel; and who does not remember the pretty tale of Richard I. being discovered in his Austrian captivity by his faithful minstrel, who had wandered from castle to castle singing the King's favourite song, until his zeal was recompensed by at last hearing the royal voice respond, in the same strain, from the depths of the donjon keep ?-In aftertimes, however, when printing had begun to make

knowledge more generally diffused, the art of minstrelsy declined, till at length, in Queen Elizabeth's reign, wandering minstrels (who had erst been wont to roam with their harps from hall to hall, singing at the castles of the Barons) were positively pronounced a nuisance, and an Act was actually passed in which they were classed among 'rogues, vagabonds, and sturdy beggars !'"

Sir W. Scott, in his Lay of the Last Minstrel, pathetically describes the changed fortunes of the minstrel race :

"The way was long, the wind was cold,

The Minstrel was infirm and old;

His withered cheek and tresses grey,
Seemed to have known a better day;
The harp, his sole remaining joy,
Was carried by an orphan boy.
The last of all the bards was he,
Who sung of Border chivalry;
For, well-a-day! their date was fled,
His tuneful brethren all were dead;
And he, neglected and oppressed,
Wished to be with them, and at rest.
No more, on prancing palfrey borne,
He carolled, light as lark at morn;
No longer courted and caressed,
High placed in hall, a welcome guest,
He poured, to lord and lady gay,

The unpremeditated lay;

Old times were changed, old manners gone,

A stranger filled the Stuarts' throne;

The bigots of the iron time,

Had called his harmless art a crime.

A wandering harper, scorned and poor,
He begged his bread from door to door;
And tuned to please a peasant's ear,

The harp a King had loved to hear.'"'

Yet, as the truest poetry is that which most stirs the mortal frame, the hold which ballads have ever maintained upon the popular mind, proves

1 Lay of the Last Minstrel, Canto I., Stanza I.

that this style of composition ought neither to be despised nor overlooked. And "much of history has been handed down to us by ballad poetry; for the events celebrated in ballads were sure to have been such as were most prominent in the public mind at the time they took place. Homer, amongst the early Greeks, and Tyrtæus, in ancient Sparta, were in reality ballad-minstrels, who recounted in their verses the events of times yet more remote." Leaving

"Red Penrith's table round,

For feats of chivalry renown'd,"

we proceeded across Lowther Bridge, and along the Kendal and Shap road, till we reached the carriage-way which leads through verdant pastures into the noble park of eight hundred acres, well stocked with forest-deer, and studded with royal oaks, surrounding Lowther Castle. The original mansion, Lowther Hall, was burnt down in 1720; and the first stone of the existing castle was laid by the late Earl in 1808. In former times the village of Lowther, then consisting of a church and seventeen tenements, stood opposite the north front of the hall; but in 1682 Sir John Lowther (afterwards first Lord Lonsdale) caused these rustic homesteads to be removed, erecting, in lieu thereof, near the margin of the river Lowther, a group of neat dwellings, called "Lowther New Town," a church with dome and lantern, a commodious rectory-house, and a large seminary (or college) intended for the benefit of the northern counties: this last was, by James, Earl of Lonsdale, converted into a manufactory for beautiful stockings, and carpets little inferior to those of Persia, chiefly for his own use, or for presents to his friends.1

Vide "Pringle's Survey."

The family of Lowther has been seated at Lowther from time immemorial, and has long taken a leading and honourable part in the county affairs of Westmoreland and Cumberland. Some antiquarians suppose the name to be derived from Lothaire, or Lother, (signifying "fortunate honour,") a frequent name amongst the ancient kings of Denmark; others, with more probability, refer it to the family residence in the parish of Lowther, which unquestionably takes its name from the Lowther river. It appears William de Lowther was at the head of the gentry of Westmoreland in the reign of Henry II.; and in the reign of Edward I. Sir Hugh de Lowther was Attorney-General, and sat in the House of Commons as Knight of the Shire for the county of Westmoreland. This honour, the representation of Westmoreland or Cumberland in Parliament, may be said, with occasional intermissions, to have descended as a heirloom in the Lowther family down to the present time. To his son, the second Sir Hugh, Lowther Park owes its foundation, he having received "grant of free warren and licence to make a park in the manor of Lowther" in 1336. A third Sir Hugh (son of Sir Robert, and Margaret, daughter of Bishop Strickland) was at the battle of Agincourt, 1415; a fourth Sir Hugh was M.P. for Cumberland in 1448; and his son, the fifth Sir Hugh was K.B. at the marriage of Arthur, Prince of Wales, (who, by the way, was named after Arthur of the Round Table, from whom Henry, through his grandfather, Owen Tudor, claimed to be descended,) with Catharine of Arragon, in the reign of Henry VII. His grandson, Sir Richard, (son of a sixth Sir Hugh,) was the Sheriff of Cumberland who received into his custody the beautiful and unfortunate Mary, Queen of Scots, when she fled across the border, to claim the hospitality and