Hotel," "Bradford Hotel," etc.

Ripon is situated on the little river Ure in a picturesque valley in the
west of Yorkshire. Its past history has been eventful enough, for it was
burnt by the Danes in the ninth century, destroyed by King Edred, and
laid waste by the Conqueror. It recovered quickly from all these
adversities, and is now a peaceful town given up to agricultural
pursuits. Besides possessing a small but interesting old cathedral and
some ancient houses in its town, many places of historic importance lie
in its immediate neighbourhood. Fountains Abbey is 3 miles distant (see
Index), and also Fountains Hall, a fifteenth-century building. An
interesting relic of old times is the blowing of the horn at nine in the
evening by a constable outside the mayor's house and at the
market-cross.

Ripon's minster became a cathedral in 1836. In the seventh century a
monastery was established here, and St. Wilfrid, the famous Archbishop
of York, built the minster. Of this building only the crypt remains,
consisting of a central chamber with niches in the walls, and a window
known as "St. Wilfrid's Needle" looking into the passage outside. It is
reached by steps and a long passage leading from the nave of the present
cathedral. Only the chapter-house and vestry remain of Archbishop
Thurstan's Norman church, erected in the place of the Anglo-Saxon one,
for Roger, Archbishop of York, pulled it down and began to erect the
present building in (_circa_) 1154. Being only a Collegiate Church in
those days, it was not built in a cathedral fashion, and it had no
aisles to its wide and low-roofed nave. The present aisles were added in
the sixteenth century, with the intention of giving a cathedral aspect
to the minster church. Much of Roger's work has been altered by
subsequent bishops, and the result is a strange succession of styles of
architecture. Ripon is the only cathedral that has glass in the
triforium of the choir.

The exterior, viewed from a distance, is a little squat, for it needs
the timber spires that formerly crowned the three towers.

[Illustration: _Photochrom Co., Ltd._

RIPON CATHEDRAL--THE MINSTER BRIDGE.]

DARTMOOR

=How to get there.=--Train from Paddington. Great Western Railway.
=Nearest Station.=--Bovey Tracey.
=Distance from London.=--215-1/2 miles.
=Average Time.=--Varies between 6 to 7 hours.

1st 2nd 3rd
=Fares.=--Single 33s. 0d. 20s. 6d. 16s. 5-1/2