Tales and Legends of the English Lakes by Wilson Armistead

Author:Wilson Armistead [Armistead, Wilson]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781355588337
Google: rFbZjwEACAAJ
Publisher: Bibliolife DBA of Bibilio Bazaar II LLC
Published: 2016-05-05T05:40:07+00:00

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LADY EVA AND THE GIANT.

A LEGEND OF YEWDALE.

A

S you enter the romantic vale of Yewdale, about a quarter of a mile above the saw-mills, by looking over the hedge to your right, you may perceive, near to the verge of the precipitous bank of Yewdale Beck, and a few yards from the roadside, a long narrow mound which seems to be formed of solid stone covered with moss, but which a nearer inspection would show to be composed of several blocks fitted so closely together as to prove the mound to have had an artificial, and not a natural origin. You observe it is somewhere between three and four yards long. That singular accumulation of lichen-clad rock has been known for centuries amongst the natives of Yewdale and the adjacent valleys, by the romance-suggesting designation of Girt Will's Grave. How it came by that name, and how Cauldron Dub and Yewdale Bridge came to be haunted, my task is now to tell.

Some few hundred years ago, the inhabitants of these contiguous dales were startled from their propriety, if they had any, by a report that one of the Troutbeck giants had built himself a hut, and taken up his abode in the lonely dell of the Tarns, above Yewdale Head. Of course you have read the history and exploits of the famous Tom Hickathrift, and remembering that he was raised at Troutbeck, you will not be much surprised when I tell you that it was always famous for a race of extraordinary size and strength; for even in these our own puny days, the biggest man in Westmoreland is to be found in that beautiful vale.

The excitement consequent upon the settlement of one of that gigantic race in this vicinity soon died away, and the object of it, who stood somewhere about nine feet six out of his clogs, if they were in fashion then, and was broad in fair proportion, became known to the neighbours as a capital labourer, ready for any such work as was required in the rude and limited agricultural operations of the period and locality—answered to the cognomen of "Girt (great) Will o' t' Tarns," and, once or twice, did good service as a billman under the Knight of Conistone, when he was called upon to muster his powers to assist in repelling certain roving bands of Scots or Irish, who were wont, now and again, to invade the wealthy plains of low Furness.

The particular Knight who was chief of the Flemings of Conistone, at the period of the giant's location at the Tarns, was far advanced in years, and, in addition to some six or eight gallant and stately sons, had

"One fair daughter, and no more,

The which he loved passing well."

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