Julia Griffiths to Frederick Douglass, November 14, 1856

FOR FREDERICK DOUGLASS' PAPER.

LETTERS FROM THE OLD WORLD.

Number XXXIV.

SHERWOOD HALL, Nottinghamshire,

November 14th, 1856.

MY DEAR FRIEND:—I am spending a few days in the legendary neighborhood of the ancient forest of Sherwood, famous, in olden times, for the feats of Robin Hood, and his outlaw band of "merrie men."

As I came hither from Nottingham, the other day, I was startled by the sudden exclamation of a friend, "Over there lies Newstead, and here are the hills of Armesley."^{*Bryon's poem "Hills of Annesley" suggests that Griffiths intended this name to read Annesley not Armesley. This is likely a printer's error.} For a moment, imagination was in the ascendancy, and a vision of the "Land of Armesley," with the noble poet by her side, arose before me,

"Standing upon a hill, a gentle hill,

There two, a maiden and a youth were there gazing"

But the scene faded before my eyes as rapidly as it came.

I looked again—the hills of Armesley were bleak, barren, and desolate, and the dark, sombre woods of Newstead seemed to look sorrowfully towards them, as if sympathizing in their desolation.

It is difficult to realize that nearly fifty years have tolled away since Lord Byron crossed, for the last time, the threshold of Armesley Hall, and "mounting on his steed," rushed, he knew not whither.

* * * * * Saturday Evening—I devoted to-day to visiting Newstead, and viewed, with deep and painful interest, the beautiful localities so associated with the history of that gifted man, the [illegible] of whose fitful genius stilll irradiate poetical minds, but whose life may be termed a romantic tragedy. Commencing when, as a little boy, Byron fled from the scoldings of an injudicious and passionate mother—continuing, as the fatal truth burnt upon the still young, and impassioned school-boy, that she, who "knew she was by him beloved," and "that his heart was darkened with her shadow," lived not for him—still going forward, as rushing away from his native land, he vainly sought to find, on foreign shores, a balm for his lacerated and wounded heart—and closing, "ere it was yet noon," as Missoloughi, in Western Greece, where he, who was the melancholy hero, fell, while "engaged in the glorious attempt to restore that country to her ancient freedom and renown—who does not sigh, "poor Byron!" as he thinks over his sad history?

* * * * *

The drive from the town of Mansfield to

Newstead is five miles in length, and bounded by grand old woods, and heathery glades, which, decked (as they are now) in the sombre hues of Autumn, add a peculiar charm to the aspect of the country. Just in from of the Park gates stands, in solidarity grandeur, a lordly oak, a source of admiration to all passers by from the vast extent of its widely spreading branches, and its prominent situation. We entered the gates, drove for about a mile through a wild and picturesque portion of the Park, when lo! on the right hand a fine sheet of water appeared in view, and on the left stood the venerable Abbey in solemn grandeur; the graceful ivy clinging fondly to the richly embellished ruins of former Ecclesiastical splendor and greatness. It has been said that the religious remains of this old Abbey, are equalled by no architecture in the Kingdom, save that of Yorkminster.—Specimen of the Norman, the early English, and the Gothic architecture are all here, richly blended together. King Henry II is said to have endowed the Abbey of Newstead, as an expiator for the part he took in the murder of Thomas Abecket. King John, and the following monarchs greatly enlarged the territories and privileged of the monks; but, in 1539, the whole was surrendered into the hands of Henry VIII, who closed the doors that had long been open for the reception of the widow and fatherless, and, in the following year, by letters patested the King granted Newstead, &c., &c., to Sir John Byron, Knight, and his heirs. This "little Sir John with the great heard," (as he was called,) converted, at considerable expense, the old Abbey into a Castellated dwelling, and it became his favorite residence.

"Years roll on years; to ages, ages yield;

Abbots to Abbots, in a line succeed;

Religions charter their protecting shield.

'Till royal sacrilege their doom decreed;

One Holy Henry rear'd the Gothic walls,

and bade the pious inmates rest in peace:

Another Henry the kind gift recalls,

And bids devotion's hallowed echoes cease."

It is said that few families in the Kingdom boast more of the "pride of ancestry," than that of Byron; nevertheless it was not until the reign of Charles I that the Byrons obtained a peerage. Faithful and devoted was "Sir John Biron, afterwards Lord Biron," to the fortunes of the King; and his princely residence of Newstead was besieged by the Parliamentarians, and bravely sustained the siege. The Byron estates were, for a time, after the death of King Charles, sequestered by the Parliament, but restored to their owner on the restoration of Charles II.

In 1736, William, fifth Lord Byron, succeeded to the title and estates, and appears to have enjoyed the most uneventful title of the "wicked Lord." Reminiscences of this evil man

abound in that neighborhood of which he seems to have been the terror. He manifested towards his son and heir, the most relentless hatred, which he carried to such an extent that he destroyed all the majestic timber of the estate, and as noble a heard of Deer as ever graced the sylvan forest of Sherwood. Two thousand seven hundred head of deer were slaughtered in the shortest possible time.

The Abbey and once beautiful grounds were alike suffered to fall into decay; but the intended victims of his malice (his son and grandson) died before him, and on the decease of this unhappy man, George Gordon Byron, (then a little boy of six years,) succeeded to the tittle and the dilapidated estates.

Nothing whatever seems to have been done towards restoring this dreary place, during the minority of Byron, and a cheerless reception must have met him, when, in 1808, the youthful poet took to it as his residence.

His spirit seems at once, to have imbibed the melancholy tone that pervaded all things around him and to have poured forth its grief in the following touching lines:

" Through thy battlements, Newstead, the hallow winds whistle,

Thou, the hall of my fathers, art gone to decay;

In thy once smiling garden, the hemlock and thistle

Have choked up the rose which late bloom’d in the way."

Many attribute Byron's well known tendency to superstition to the fact of his passing much of his time in wandering about the empty halls and lonely cloisters of the Abbey, and brooding over the skulls and effigies of the former inhabitants.

As I walked up and down the cloisters, which are precisely in the same state (except four ordinary dilapidations) as in the days of the monks, with the dead beneath my feet, and the ancient Gothic Fountain, murmuring in the centre of this cloister court, I did not wonder that "a monk arrayed in cowl and beads and dusky garb," is said sometimes to appear—

"Now in the moonlight and now lapsed in shade."

for, in truth, it seemed to me the very place for a ghostly visitation.

We drew night to the Entrance Hall, with its Gothic porch, its ancient looking door, its low groined ceiling, and passed to the monk's parlor, or reception room, in which lies the book for recording visitor's names.

But before I take you with me to the beautiful Library, I ought to state, that Newstead is not the property of Colonel Wildman, who was a school-fellow of Byron at Harrow, and whose name I saw but a few months since, carved in wood, beneath that of the Poet, on the walls of the celebrated old school-room of

Harrow. In 1818 Col. Wildman made the purchase and much as Byron regretted to part with his inheritance, he expressed his great satisfaction that his "old school-fellow, fellow [monitor?] and friend" had come into possession of it, and that it had fallen into hands likely to raise the romantic pile to something of its former splendor. "I trust that Newstead will, being yours, remain so, (said Byron,) and that it may see you as happy, as I am very sure that you will make your dependants."

The noble owner has done full justice to the confidence reported to him by the Poet; while he has laid out large sums of money in the restoration and adornment of the fine old Abbey, in the enlargement of the pleasure grounds, and the rebuilding of the farms, he has also preserved, with the greatest veneration, every memorial of Byron, and of his family; and the Poet's bed-room is still carefully kept in the same state as when occupied by his Lordship, altho' forty-two years have passed since he crossed its door way. The bed, the chair, the writing table are all there, and stand just as they used to do. Still does the bay window look out upon as glorious a prospect as they eye could desire; and over the far reaching woods of Newstead, rise the hills of Armesley.

It was in 1814 that Byron last visited the Abbey. It became the property of Col. Wildman six years before the death of his Lordship, and the Colonel scarcedly kept unchanged the former bed-rooms and sitting-room of Byron, in the hope that sometime he might return, not as a visitor to Newstead, but to his old apartments in the old home of his ancestors. It was a beautiful idea of his friend. Extremely simple and unpretending as is the furniture of these rooms, the Colonel's extreme consideration for the keen and sensitive feelings of Byron made him know that, dearer to the Poet would be the faded drapery, in the old chamber, than the richest hangings of more modern times. I found it difficult to quit the Bay window. Imagination took possession of me for a season. I seemed to see the Poet looking out upon the then surrounding desolation, as he gave utterance to his melancholy feeling thus:

"Newstead, what saddening change of scene is thine.

They yawning arch betokens sure decay;

The last and youngest of a noble line.

Now holds thy mouldering turrets in his sway

"Deserted now, he scans thy grey worn towers;

Thy vaults, where dead of feudal ages sleep;

Thy cloisters, pervious to the wintry showers;

These, these he views, and views them but to weep."

Day after day the sun rise upon the fine buttresses, pinnacles and cloisters of the noble pile. Day after day does the sunlight stream in at the Bay window, and send its rays upon

the faded drapery and gilt coronets that surmount it—upon the writing table and chair and ink stand, that seem as if in waiting. Daylight lingers for a time, but soon the shadows lengthen—"the evening shades prevail"—the sun sets, and that solitary chamber remains, night after night, unoccupied and desolate.

We next passed to what is called "the haunted chamber," a dismal looking room where a restless monk is said to intrude his ghostly presence. In Byron's time his page used this apartment; and in the olden time it is thought to have been one of the abbot's rooms.

And next, we passed to the Library, to which I have already referred. This is a noble apartment, comfortably filled up, and containing a valuable collection of ancient and modern literature. Fine paintings adorn the walls, which are covered with light and dark oak pannelling. Three stained glass windows look from the Library into the cloisters; these belonged to the old Abbey. Time fails; I must not go into details, nor tell you of the beautiful carving in wood and the many interesting curiosities in the noble library—nor must I enlarge on the grandeur of the Eastern Corridor—nor on the magnificence of the several apartments, respectively known as King Edward the Third`s Room, King Henry the Seventh`s Room, King Charles the Second`s Room, and supposed to have been once occupied by those monarchs.

Each room is appropriately and splendidly furnished in the style of the age of each of those monarchs. Rich tapestry, antique carving, and fine pannelling abound; and yet an air of comfort pervades each apartment, and they all look as if the guests had left them that morning. The Duke of Sussex`s Room is also a fine apartment.

We next came to the grand Drawing-Room, which was once the Dormitory of the monks, and in later days the shooting gallery of Byron and his companions. Now it is a truly regal apartment, magnificently fitted up; but I dare not begin to particularlize. The celebrated portrait of Byron, by Phillips, is over the chimney piece, in the Drawing Room. It is the finest portrait of the finest head I ever saw. It made me think of Moore's beautiful comparison, when he likened the original to an alabaster vase lighted within.

But I mist pass hurriedly to the Grand Dining Hall, which was once the Refectory of the Abbey. This apartment is magnificently filled up. The painted windows, the oaken ceiling, the chimney piece, the Gothic screen, and music gallery are all fine. Suits of armor and curiasses from Waterloo, are here. After.