projecting crags, which fling additional gloom over the
melancholy tarns that repose in dismal grandeur at their feet,--its
hamlets, and towns, and ivy-mantled churches, which remind the visiter of
their antiquity by the rudeness, and convince him of their durability by
the massiveness of their construction,--these are all features in the
landscape which require to be seen only once, to be impressed upon the
recollection for ever. But it is not merely for the lovers of the wild,
and beautiful, and picturesque, that the localities of Craven possess a
powerful charm. The antiquarian, the novelist, and the poet, may all find
rich store of employment in the traditions which are handed down from
father to son respecting the ancient lords and inhabitants of the
district. It is indeed the region of romance, and I have often felt
surprise, that the interesting materials with which it abounds have so
seldom been incorporated into the works of fiction which are now issuing
with such thoughtless haste from the press of the metropolis. In Dr.
Whitaker's History of Craven--which in spite of his extravagant
prejudices in favour of gentle blood, and in derogation of commercial
opulence, is still an excellent model for all future writers of local
history--there is a ground-work laid for at least a dozen ordinary novels.
To say nothing of the legendary tales, which the peasantry relate of the
minor families of the district, of the Bracewells, the Tempests, the
Lysters, the Romilies, and the Nortons,--whose White Doe, however, has
been immortalized by the poetry of Wordsworth,--can any thing be more
pregnant with romantic adventure than the fortunes of the successive
chieftains of the lordly line of Clifford? Their first introduction to
the North, owing to a love-match made by a poor knight of Herefordshire
with the wealthy heiress of the Viponts and the Vesys! Their rising
greatness, to the merited disgrace and death of Piers de Gavestone and
his profligate minions! and their final exaltation to the highest honours
of the British peerage, which they have now enjoyed for five hundred
years, to the strong hand and unblenching heart with which they have
always welcomed the assaults of their most powerful enemies! Of the first
ten lords of Skipton castle, four died in the field and one upon the
scaffold! The "black-faced Clifford," who sullied the glory which he
acquired by his gallantry at the battle of Sandal, by murdering his
youthful pri