Before the spinning-jenny and the steam-engine revolutionised our manner of living, there existed among the hills and dales of the Lake countries a little community which had its own peculiar manners, laws, and customs, and which was something unique in its way, for it seemed to be a kind of republic existing in the midst of a great empire. The people were what are now called peasant proprietors, but in Cumberland and Westmoreland they have always been named ‘statesmen.’ A few of these ancient land-owners still exist, and their tenure of the land which they possess is not feudal but allodial, in so far as that they acquired their estates at a very remote period, either by establishing themselves on unoccupied lands like the ‘settlers’ in Australia or America, or by conquering previous possessors. Several of these statesmen possess estates which have descended uninterruptedly in their families since the time of Richard II., and always as ‘customary freeholds;’ while one family, the Holmes of Mardale, have inherited their land in unbroken succession since the year 1060, when a certain John Holme came from Norway and settled in the district.

When James II. came to the throne he set up a claim to all those small estates, on the plea that the statesmen were merely tenants of the crown. But his claim was met by the sturdy Dalesfolk in a manner which he little expected. They met to the number of two thousand, at a place called Ratten Heath, and publicly declared that ‘they had won their lands by the sword, and by the sword they would keep them.’

Owing to the smallness of the estates, there was not sufficient employment in farm-work at all times for a statesman and his family, and carding, spinning, and weaving formed the employment for the winter months. The men carded, and the women spun the wool yielded by the previous clipping. Nearly every household had its weaving-shop, where one or two looms were kept, and many of the men were able to weave the cloth which served for their own wear and that of their families. The linsey-woolsey dresses worn by the women were homespun, and they also manufactured linen for domestic purposes.

The process of preparing the cloth was a curious one, and deserves mention. After a web of woollen cloth was turned out of the loom, it was taken to the ‘beck’ or stream and soaked in the water; then it was placed on a flat stone called the ‘battling-stone’ and well pounded with a wooden mallet. This primitive operation served instead of the elaborate processes through which woollen cloth now passes at the fuller’s mill.

The costume of the Dalesmen was rather picturesque, being composed of homespun fleeces of white or black, with occasionally a mixture of the two colours to save the expense of dyeing. This homely material, which is still made in some parts of Scotland and Ireland, has lately become fashionable, and is pronounced to be superior for country wear to the most finished products of our steam-looms. The coats were ornamented with brass buttons, as were also the waistcoats, which were made open in front to shew a frilled shirt-breast. Knee-breeches were the fashion for centuries, and these were worn without braces, which are quite a modern invention. Those used on Sundays or holidays had a knot of ribbon and four or five bright buttons at the knee, and those who could afford it had them made of buckskin. Their stockings, which were of course a conspicuous part of their dress, were also made from their own wool, the colour being either blue or gray. Clogs were their ordinary ‘shoon,’ but when dressed in holiday costume they had low shoes fastened with buckles, which were often of silver.

At the present day this picturesque costume is nearly obsolete, but some of the old Dalesmen still adhere to the fashion of their youth. About five or six years ago a few of them happened to meet at Grasmere Fair and stood chatting together for some time without noticing what many other persons were remarking, namely, that all of them were dressed in the old costume. When they did notice it they all agreed that it was a somewhat singular coincidence, and a proper occasion for a friendly glass in honour of ‘auld lang syne.’ They were the connecting link between the old times and the new, and would probably be the last of the Dalesfolk to wear the costume of the bygone age.

The dress of the Daleswomen was not less primitive than that of the men. They wore homespun linsey-woolsey petticoats and gowns, a blue linen apron completing their attire. The statesman’s daughter who first communicated to her native place a knowledge of the glories of printed calico is said to have created a great sensation, and was more than a nine days’ wonder. The clogs worn by the women were pointed at the toes and were clasped with brass instead of iron. Their bonnets were made of pasteboard covered with black silk, and in shape resembled a coal-scuttle, with the front projecting about a foot beyond the face of the wearer.

The houses of the Dalesfolk were not of the most comfortable kind, and were similar to those which exist at the present day in many of the southern counties of England. Badly constructed with rough-hewn stones, and joined with clay instead of mortar, they did not always shelter the inmates from the ‘cauld blast;’ while it was no uncommon thing for the roofs to be in such a state that when a snow-storm took place in the night, people in bed would often find several inches of snow on their bed-clothes the next morning. The wood used in the construction of the houses was oak; doors, floors, and window-frames being all of that sturdy material. The beams were made of whole trees roughly squared, while the smaller rafters and joists were split. Most of these old buildings had a porch before the outer door, the latter being of massive oak, two planks thick, and fastened together with wooden pegs (for the carpenters in those days used very few nails), which were put in parallel rows about three or four inches apart and left projecting about three-quarters of an inch on the outside. About six hundred of these pegs were used in its construction, and the making of them occupied as much time as it would take to make a dozen doors in our busier times. A degree of sanctity was, however, attached to a door by these simple folk, and certain charms to be used only at the threshold are remembered even now in the Dales.

In dwellings of the usual size there were not more than three rooms on the ground floor, namely the living-apartment, the dairy, and the parlour, the last being generally used as the bedroom of the master and mistress. In some cases there was an out-kitchen, but not in all.

Long after the use of coal and fire-grates became general throughout England these people still continued to burn peat and wood upon the open hearth, and it was not until half the present century had elapsed that, railway communication making coal cheaper, and the increased value of labour making peat dearer, coal finally triumphed and open fire-places gave place to grates. The old chimneys had no flues, and were very wide at the bottom, gradually contracting towards the top, and in these chimneys hams, legs of beef, flitches of bacon, and whole carcases of mutton were hung up to dry for winter consumption.

The food of the Dalesmen was confined almost wholly to the simple products of their own farms. They consumed a large portion of animal food, and as sheep and cattle were in the best condition for slaughtering in autumn, it was then that the Dalesfolk stocked their wide chimneys with a supply of meat for the winter and spring. Tea, coffee, and wheaten bread were very little known in the Dales; oatcake (AnglicÈ), or ‘haver-bread’ as it was termed, being used. The people brewed their own beer and drank it at nearly every meal. Such, with milk, butter, and cheese, was the food of these honest folk, and they seemed to have thriven well on it. When tea, coffee, and sugar came into general use, an old Dalesman remarked that he wondered ‘what t’ warl’ wod cum tew after a bit when fowk nooadays couldn’t git their breakfast without hevvin stuff fra baith East and West Indies.’

Until the middle of last century the roads of the two counties were in a wretched state; and instead of wheeled carriages, pack-horses and in some cases sledges were used for conveying things from one place to another. There is an old man now living in Grasmere whose grandmother could remember the present church bells being brought thither by sledges along the old road over the top of White Moss, then the main road between Ambleside and Grasmere. A man and his wife often rode to market together on the same horse, the woman sitting behind on what was called a pillion. But the Dalesfolk were not very particular as to their turn-out, for a piece of turf dried and cut into the proper shape often served them as a saddle. Other saddles were pads of straw; and on market-days, after business was over, such of the farmers as were convivially disposed stayed on at the public-house or inn, holding a ‘crack’ and drinking till a late hour; and while a spree of this kind was going on, it often happened that the poor hungry horses would break loose and eat up all the straw pads, thus leaving their owners to ride home bareback!

The Dalesfolk were rather superstitious; and there is an old story in the local records about the way in which the first lime was introduced to the district. It was carried on the back of a horse, and as they neared Borrowdale a thunder-storm came on, and the lime in the sack began to smoke. Thinking the sack was on fire, the man in charge went and filled his hat with water from a ditch, and threw it into the sack. As this made things worse, he grew terribly alarmed, and thinking the Evil One had something to do with it, he pitched the lime into the ditch, and leaping on to the horse, galloped home as fast as he could go.

Ploughing was attended with hard labour to those employed, and it required at least three men and three horses to work one plough. The horses were yoked one before another, and it was as much as one man could do to drive them. A second man held the plough-beam down, to prevent the plough from slipping out of the earth; while it was the work of a third to guide the whole concern, this part of the business requiring the most skill. Sometimes a fourth man was employed with pick and spade to turn up the places missed by the plough. Very little skill or labour was expended in the making of the implement, and it was nothing unusual for a tree growing in the morning to be cut down during the day, and made into a plough, with which a good stroke of work was done before night.

These good people worked much harder than their descendants of the present day. Their hours of labour were much longer, and much of what they did by hand is now done by machinery. Though ignorant and unrefined, they were honest and hospitable, and possessed a great deal of sound shrewd common-sense. In those days many of them followed several handicrafts, for the division of labour was not such as it is now; and a remarkable instance of this diversified ability is to be found in the life of the man who was the parish priest of Wordsworth’s poem, The Excursion. This worthy man—whose history we have slightly alluded to in an article in this Journal on the Lake Country—was the son of a poor statesman, and was the youngest of twelve. At the age of seventeen he became a village schoolmaster, and a little later both minister and schoolmaster. Before and after school-hours he laboured at manual occupation, rising between three and four in the summer, and working in the fields with the scythe or sickle. He ploughed, he planted, tended sheep, or clipped and salved, all for hire; wrote his own sermons, and did his duty at chapel twice on Sundays. In all these labours he excelled. In winter-time he occupied himself in reading, writing his own sermons, spinning, and making his own clothes and those of his family, knitting and mending his own stockings, and making his own shoes, the leather of which was of his own tanning. In his walks he never neglected to gather and bring home the wool from the hedges. He was also the physician and lawyer of his parishioners; drew up their wills, conveyances, bonds, &c., wrote all their letters, and settled their accounts, and often went to market with sheep or wool for the farmers.

He married a respectable maid-servant, who brought him forty pounds; and shortly afterwards he became curate of Seathwaite, where he lived and officiated for sixty-seven years. We are told that when his family wanted cloth, he often took the spinning-wheel into the school-room, where he also kept a cradle—of course of his own making. Not unfrequently the wheel, the cradle, and the scholars all claiming his attention at the same moment, taxed the ingenuity of this wonderful man to keep them all going. To all these attainments Mr Walker—or ‘Wonderful Walker,’ as he was called—also added a knowledge of fossils and plants, and a ‘habit’ of observing the stars and winds. In summer he also collected various insects, and by his entertaining descriptions of them amused and instructed his children. After a long and extremely useful, nay we might say heroic life, which extended over nearly the whole of the last century (he having been born in 1709), this remarkable Dalesman died on the 25th of June 1802, in the ninety-third year of his age. In the course of his life he had, besides bringing up and settling in life a family of twelve children, amassed the sum of two thousand pounds, the result of marvellous industry and self-denial.

The chapel where this celebrated man entered upon his sacred duties was the smallest in the Dales, the poet Wordsworth, Mr Walker’s biographer, describing it as scarcely larger than many of the fragments of rock lying near it. Most of these small chapelries were presided over by ‘readers,’ men who generally exercised the trades of clogger, tailor, and butter-print maker, in order to eke out their small stipend. The livings were not worth more than two or three pounds a year, and the ministers were dependent upon the voluntary contributions of their parishioners. Their stipends, beside the small money-payment mentioned above, comprised ‘clothes yearly and whittlegate.’ The former meant one suit of clothes, two pairs of shoes, and one pair of clogs; and the latter, two or three weeks’ victuals at each house according to the ability of the inhabitants, which was settled among themselves; so that the minister could ‘go his course’ as regularly as the sun, and complete it annually. Few houses having more than one or two knives, he was obliged to carry his own knife or ‘whittle.’ He marched from house to house, and as master of the flock, had the elbow-chair at the table-head. Some remarkable scenes were often the result of this droll arrangement, and many good stories are current with reference to it. A story is told in Whythburn of a minister who had but two sermons, which he preached in turn. The walls of the chapel were at that time unplastered, and the sermons were usually placed in a hole in the wall behind the pulpit. On Sunday, before the service began, some wag pushed the sermons so far into the hole that they could not be got out with the hand. When the time for the sermon had arrived, the minister tried in vain to get them out. He then turned to the congregation and said that he could touch them with his forefinger, but couldn’t get his thumb in to grasp them. ‘But however,’ said he, ‘I will read you a chapter of Job instead, and that’s worth both of them put together!’

There was a curious custom at one time in the Dales of holding market at the church. Meat and all kinds of things were displayed at the church doors, and it often happened that people would make their bargains first and hang their goods over the backs of their seats. Though such practices have long been discontinued, there are still people living who have heard the clerk give out in the churchyard the advertisements of the several sales which were to be held in the neighbourhood. One good custom there was, however, which might be often practised now with advantage in small towns and villages, namely, that of the churchwardens going round the village during divine service and driving all the loungers into church.

The Dalesfolk had their sports too, the chief of which was the one for which Cumberland and Westmoreland have ever been famous, namely wrestling. They were also keen hunters; and until quite a recent period a few couples of hounds were kept in every dale, and when the presence of a fox was betrayed by a missing lamb or a decimated hen-roost, all the dogs and nearly all the men in the parish entered in pursuit of the depredator, and were seldom balked by their victim.

Some songs that were in vogue in the Dales a hundred years ago are still sung, chiefly at fairs by itinerant ballad-mongers. Some of the tunes are very antique, as for instance, St Dunstan’s Hunt’s Up, mentioned by Sir Walter Scott as lost and forgotten, but which is still played on the fiddle every Christmas-eve. The festivals held from time to time in the Dales were such as were very common in all parts of ‘Merrie England’ when our forefathers worked hard, and money was much scarcer than it is now. That they worked harder on the whole is a thing which admits of two opinions; but one thing is certain, namely, that their work was of a steady, careful, easy-going kind, whilst now it is all bustle and drive, in the endeavour to cram into a few fleeting hours as much as they could do in a whole week. Such as we find the world, however, we must put up with it, content, like them, to keep pegging away, and meeting the storms and buffetings of life with the same courageous spirit which enabled them to add their mite towards the honour, glory, and welfare of our common country.