[ 577 ] SUPPLEMENT TO VOLUME XCII. PART I. Embellished with a View of the CHURCHES of WILLINGEHALL-Dou and WILLINGEHALL-SPAIN, Essex; Also, A View of PRINCE RUPERT'S HEAD QUARTERS near Liverpool. Mr. URBAN, Myddelton House, Enfield, June 4. THE HE singularity of two Churches being situate very near each other in the same churchyard, induced me to request a view of them in your valuable pages (see vol. LXXXI. i. p. 157). As no engraving has appeared, I have now much pleasure in communicating a faithful representation, (see the Plate,) taken from the South-west corner of the churchyard, from which spot the South sides of both churches are seen at one and the same view. Yours, &c. WILLINGEHALL-DOU, AND WIL H. C. B. LINGEHALL-SPAIN, Two parishes so called, near the South end or extremity of the hundred of Dunmow, in the county of Essex, are distant from Chelmsford nine, from Ongar five, and from Dunmow twelve miles. The situation of these parishes is pleasant and healthy, the soil of various sorts, and well watered. From whence the name Wil lingehall is derived, is not quite certain; perhaps, from the Saxon word pillen, woolen, and hall, denoting the plenty and goodness of wool here. The parishes are distinguished from each other by the appellation of Dou and Spain, from their antient owners. At the time of the Conqueror's Survey, they seem to have been but one parish. The two churches stand in the same yard, the reason of which nothing now remaining shows. We find some rare instances of the like, particularly at St. Edmund's Bury in Suffolk; at Swaffham in Cambridge. shire, one of which churches, St. Mary's, is pulled down, except the See Gent. Mag. vol, LXXXV. i. p. 297. tower; and at Great Wigston, otherwise Wigston Two Steeples, in Leicestershire, though the latter are not so nearly adjoining. Willingehall-Dou: this Church is dedicated to St. Christopher, and consists of a body and chancel, tiled; at the West end is a square embattled tower, containing four bells. Willingehall-Spain: this Church is dedicated to St. Andrew and All Saints (on which account the parish is sometimes called Willingehall All Saints), is smaller than the other, and, as said before, stands in the same churchyard. The North side of this church is parallel with the South side of the other. It is neat, and of one pace with the chancel, with a handsome altar-piece. In a small wooden belfry are two hells. From the churchyard is a pleasant prospect over all the Rodings. Both churches contain armorial bearings, and monuments, the inscriptions on which are fully given, with further information, in County Histories, &c. to which we refer our readers. Mr. URBAN, June 10. AMONG the multitude of topogra phical notices which are to be found in the pages of the Gentleman's Magazine, I do not recollect that there has been any account of Wharncliffe, a romantic district in the West Riding of the county of York. Wharncliffe is a forest and deer-park on the banks of the Dow, about seven miles from the town of Sheffield. It is part of the antient domain of the house of Wortley. Within its circuit is found an inscription of the early part of the reign of Henry VIII. perfectly unique. It is connected with our popular song, as having been the haunt 578 Description of Wharncliffe Forest, Yorkshire. haunt of the fabled Dragon of Wantley. It was the birth-place of the eccentric and erratic Edward Wortley Montague; and for the first three years of her married life, the residence of his mother the lively Lady Mary, who was not insensible to the beauties of this singular and romantic spot, comparing it in after-life to the scenery in the neighbourhood of Avignon. Wharncliffe falls but one degree below, if it falls below, the parts of this island rich in picturesque beauty, which invite the visits of those who live in districts on which Nature has been less lavish of her favours. I shall not attempt to describe in detail the appearance which Nature assumes in this part of her work, because it has been done much better by another hand: but, with your permission, would borrow from a very interesting little work which has lately issued from the press *, a description not more beautiful in itself, than it is true to the singular and august original: "We took post horses, and set off at ten o'clock in the morning for Wharncliffe, seven miles distant from the town. After leaving its extended suburbs we continued to ascend during a drive of five miles; the two latter being through an umbrageous wood of oak, interspersed with birch, that closely bounded the carriage way on either side; not admitting a peep of the distant country. All was close, shadowy, and covert, excepting the various ridings on each hand, that branched off into the thickest part of the wood, alleys green,' that appeared to invite you into their bowery arcades. The ascending road, of excellent surface, continued to wind through the wood, admitting no terminating vista to the eye, till arrived at its extremity, and what a burst of landscape was then presented! Still the prospect wider spreads, And sinks the newly-risen hill. "The Life of a Boy; by the Author of The Panorama of Youth,' dedicated to the Countess of Besborough. 2 vols. 12mo. Whittakers. 1821." + Ecclesfield Church, once called, and not undeservedly, The Minster of the Moors.' appeared to repose beneath the distant woods and hills, and overlook the siniling plain beneath. "Turning from this amplitude of beauty, we entered, on the left, the inclosed ground cended a mile of high and level ground, that led to the object of our ride; and asskirted on one side by a thick plantation of Scots firs; and, on the other, open to wild, bare, and mountainous country. We then descended gently towards the house; the roof and chimneys of which were first perceptible. "The ground contiguous to it, on the left, spreading below the shelter of the firs that continued to skirt the hill, was a circular area, that must ever have bid defiance to cultivation, and which no picturesque eye could ever wish to be otherwise. Grotesque old oaks, presenting, amidst their dark green foliage, a black and leafless arm, or a bald and withered crown, starting from amidst the low grey rocks that seem thrown around in the most fantastic confusion; between whose interstices the fern grew in tufts of unusual size and height, forming a mimic wood beneath them; the whole intermingled with the shining hollies as old as the oaks, and groups of deer as wild as the roe bucks. "Over the house, the distant country had we proceeded no further, we should united its purple tint with the horizon; and, have supposed the heathy outline was all the view it commanded;-a house, humble as is its exterior appearance, exceeding in grandeur of situation the palaces of kings,— placed on the very verge of a line of perpendicular rocks, that sweep in circular pomp on either hand, and overhang a valley that lies many hundred fathoms below-the sides of its grand amphitheatre clothed with the richest mass of native woods that the kingdom presents, their unbroken surface then glowing with all the varieties of autumnal colouring. Below rolled the dark waters of the Don, inclosed by its rocky banks, too over-hanging woods, to be seen from the far beneath, and too much shadowed by the heights above. Compared even with those of the yeomanry of the present day, the house might be pronounced mean; but it must be remembered, it was built in the fifteenth century, when low ceilings and conthe warmth and comfort within; and the tracted windows were thought to promote the residence of a man of rank, it was only a lodge or appendage to his extensive do mains. "That its situation was selected by a strong feeling of the grand scenes and sweet grounds of Nature, is proved by an inscription within the house, and which its present owner, no doubt, highly values for its ancestorial testimony; the very stones proclaiming his hereditary local descent.-The inscription, in the old English letter, is as follows: • Pray PART 1.] Description of Wharncliffe Forest, Yorkshire. Pray for the soule of Sir Thomas Wortelay, Knight for the King's body to Edward the Fourth, Richarde the Thirde, Harry the Seventh and Eighth, hows saulis God pardon: which Thomas caused a house to be mad for this chase in midst of Wharncliffe, for his pleasor, and to hear the harte's bell, in the yere of our Lord, a thousand five hundred and ten.' "In sixteen hundred and seven, the stone on which this inscription is engraven, was at a little distance from the lodge, where seats were cut in the rock. Indeed, no sounds but those of nature and the elements could the voluntary recluse hear at Wharncliffe Chase; and so little alteration has the lapse of three hundred years made, that its present inhabitants can hear little more than the flow of unseen waters, the hush of bending woods, and the stag's bel low. "Very trifling additions appear to have been made in the original building... Turning the West end of the building, that stood a few yards behind the line of its front, the grandeur of Wharncliffe bursts upon our view. Woods and rocks, and sky, deep vallies and distant moors, in all the gorgeous display of a fine October day....... "Consideration for the horses induced us to proceed to Wortley, two miles further. We were there informed we might return by a different road, through the valley we had looked upon. Being desirous to see the same scenery in a different point of view, we acceded. Immediately on leaving Wortley, we descended a long and steep hill, and, turning to the left, entered upon the vale. The road continued by the side of the Don. On the left was the wooded amphitheatre; on the right, hanging copses, tufts of wood, interspersed with sloping pastures and nestling cottages beetled over the road. These we drove too closely beneath to see in their best effect; but all on the Wharncliffe side was in fine distance and perspective. "I never saw the actual pomp of woods before, sweeping down the steep declivity from its lofty summit to the river's brink, advancing and receding as we passed the windings of the vale, and presenting their varied beauty in processional array. The road was laid high above the river's bed. The carriage passed close to its steep and , rocky banks, and Lady Mary Wortley could not have been in more danger, when she awoke Mr. Wortley on their journey in Saxony, than we were in the domain of her descendant. Though the postillions were not nodding on their horses, or the Elbe rolling below, yet the banks were frequently as high, and the road as narrow, and the waters of the Don quite deep enough to have terminated our terrestrial career, if a horse had fallen, or a wheel come off on its slaty verge. We looked up to the circular rampart that crowned the summit for seve 579 ral miles; and when we were opposite the lodge, that, like an eagle's nest, appeared perched in the sky, we scarcely could believe that we had soared so high, or that the foot of man could have reached there. "Too clevated and too aërial to distinguish its architectural pretensions; its numerous chimnies that rose like small turrets, accorded well with the rocky line, of which it appeared to form a part; every object was in perfect keeping, but one; a newly-built coach-house, contiguous to the lodge, and there not unappropriate or obtrusive, when seen from the vale below, interrupted the feathery line of wood, and the fantastic one of rock, with its heavy, square, barn-like appearance. "The river now became more expansive and its surface smoother; the banks less rugged, yet still high; the woods drawing closer together, and their outline gradually declining to their termination, darkening all the vale, over which the mists of evening began to spread, that, just before we quitted, presented a new and striking object-a low and extensive building, apparently placed in the water, called, in the provincial language of the country, The Works.' From its very high cupola chimney, bright flashes of fire threw their lurid light upon the wood, which was again momentarily darkened by its emitting a heavy volume of coal-black smoke, the precursor of another illumination, Dark red the heaven above it glow'd, "Whilst, from the unglazed windows descending to the water's brim, the reflection of the fiery furnace was spread in. The dark figures at work within could only 'blood-red light' over its whole surface. be distinguished in contour; and as they passed and repassed, bearing red-hot iron bars with them, I thought of the abode of the Cyclops, preparing their fire-brands of destruction, and with thundering hammers frightening Silence from her sylvan haunts." It is proper to observe that some portions of this beautiful topographical fragment have been omitted, through an unwillingness to occupy too large a portion of your valuable pages. For them the reader may be referred to the work itself, where he will also find many very admirable precepts for the conduct of life, combined with the circumstances of a story pleasingly and ingeniously constructed. AN OCCASIONAL CORRESPONDENT. Mr. URBAN, Cambridge, May 3. Tied to the Senate by the ViceChancellor, whereby an Examination HE adoption of the Plan submit |