ition which was to have executed a summary vengeance upon
the Scots; he journeyed forward by slow stages, but was taken ill at
Newbrough, where he stayed for some time, before continuing his journey
by Blenkinsopp, Thirlwall, and Lanercost to Carlisle.

On the opposite side of the stream from Stocksfield is the lovely
village of Bywell, a "haunt of ancient peace," "sleeping soft on the
banks of the murmuring Tyne." This little peaceful spot was at one time
a very busy centre of life and industry on a small scale; in the Middle
Ages the inhabitants drove a thriving trade in all the necessities for a
people who spent a great part of their lives upon horseback, especially
in the making of the ironwork required--"bits, stirrups, buckles, and
the like, wherein they are very expert and cunning." The Nevilles, lords
of Raby and earls of Westmoreland, held Bywell at this time; before that
it was in the hands of the Balliols, of Scottish fame, who, like the
Bruces, were Norman knights high in favour with their kings, Norman and
Plantagenet, though they afterwards became their most determined foes.

Long before the advent of the Normans, a church was built here by St.
Wilfrid, and in it--St. Andrew's or the "White" Church--Egbert, twelfth
bishop of Lindisfarne, was consecrated by Archbishop Eanbald in the year
803. More than a thousand years afterwards, in 1896, an Ordination
service was again held at Bywell, in St. Peter's church, when five
deacons were ordained by Bishop Jacob. And in times yet more remote
than Wilfrid's age, Roman legionaries crossed the Tyne at this point
over a bridge of their own construction, of which the piers might be
seen until our own day. Bywell, too, had its "find" of Roman silver; in
1760 a silver cup was found in the Tyne, bearing the inscription
"Desidere vivas" around the neck of the vessel.

When the Nevilles were lords of the manor of Bywell, they began to build
a castle here, which, however, was left unfinished; the ancient tower
still standing, with its picturesque draping of ivy, was the gate-house
of the intended fortress. On the rebellion of the northern earls in
1569, Westmoreland's forfeited lands passed to the crown, so that Bywell
was held by Queen Elizabeth for a year or two, until she sold the estate
to a branch of the Fenwick family.

Bywell is unique in Northumberland in possessing two churches side by
side yet in different parishes. The town of Bywell, we are told by the
same a