We reached Furness Abbey about twelve. There is a railway station close by the ruins; and a new hotel stands within the precincts of the abbey grounds; and continually there is the shriek10, the whiz, the rumble11, the bell-ringing, denoting the arrival of the trains; and passengers alight, and step at once (as their choice may be) into the refreshment-room, to get a glass of ale or a cigar,—or upon the gravelled paths of the lawn, leading to the old broken walls and arches of the abbey. The ruins are extensive, and the enclosure of the abbey is stated to have covered a space of sixty-five acres. It is impossible to describe them. The most interesting part is that which was formerly12 the church, and which, though now roofless, is still surrounded by walls, and retains the remnants of the pillars that formerly supported the intermingling curves of the arches. The floor is all overgrown with grass, strewn with fragments and capitals of pillars. It was a great and stately edifice13, the length of the nave14 and choir15 having been nearly three hundred feet, and that of the transept more than half as much. The pillars along the nave were alternately a round, solid one and a clustered one. Now, what remains16 of some of them is even with the ground; others present a stump17 just high enough to form a seat; and others are, perhaps, a man's height from the ground,—and all are mossy, and with grass and weeds rooted into their chinks, and here and there a tuft of flowers, giving its tender little beauty to their decay. The material of the edifice is a soft red stone, and it is now extensively overgrown with a lichen19 of a very light gray line, which, at a little distance, makes the walls look as if they had long ago been whitewashed20, and now had partially21 returned to their original color. The arches of the nave and transept were noble and immense; there were four of them together, supporting a tower which has long since disappeared,—arches loftier than I ever conceived to have been made by man. Very possibly, in some cathedral that I have seen, or am yet to see, there may be arches as stately as these; but I doubt whether they can ever show to such advantage in a perfect edifice as they do in this ruin,—most of them broken, only one, as far as I recollect22, still completing its sweep. In this state they suggest a greater majesty23 and beauty than any finished human work can show; the crumbling24 traces of the half-obliterated design producing somewhat of the effect of the first idea of anything admirable, when it dawns upon the mind of an artist or a poet,—an idea which, do what he may, he is sure to fall short of in his attempt to embody25 it.
In the middle of the choir is a much-dilapidated monument of a cross-legged knight26 (a crusader, of course) in armor, very rudely executed; and, against the wall, lie two or three more bruised27 and battered28 warriors29, with square helmets on their heads and visors down. Nothing can be uglier than these figures; the sculpture of those days seems to have been far behind the architecture. And yet they knew how to put a grotesque30 expression into the faces of their images, and we saw some fantastic shapes and heads at the lower points of arches which would do to copy into Punch. In the chancel, just at the point below where the high altar stands, was the burial-place of the old Barons31 of Kendal. The broken crusader, perhaps, represents one of them; and some of their stalwart bones might be found by digging down. Against the wall of the choir, near the vacant space where the altar was, are some stone seats with canopies32 richly carved in stone, all quite perfectly33 preserved, where the priests used to sit at intervals34, during the celebration of mass. Conceive all these shattered walls, with here and there an arched door, or the great arched vacancy35 of a window; these broken stones and monuments scattered36 about; these rows of pillars up and down the nave; these arches, through which a giant might have stepped, and not needed to bow his head, unless in reverence37 to the sanctity of the place,—conceive it all, with such verdure and embroidery38 of flowers as the gentle, kindly39 moisture of the English climate procreates on all old things, making them more beautiful than new,—conceive it with the grass for sole pavement of the long and spacious40 aisle41, and the sky above for the only roof. The sky, to be sure, is more majestic42 than the tallest of those arches; and yet these latter, perhaps, make the stronger impression of sublimity43, because they translate the sweep of the sky to our finite comprehension. It was a most beautiful, warm, sunny day, and the ruins had all the pictorial44 advantage of bright light and deep shadows. I must not forget that birds flew in and out among the recesses45, and chirped46 and warbled, and made themselves at home there. Doubtless, the birds of the present generation are the posterity47 of those who first settled in the ruins, after the Reformation; and perhaps the old monks48 of a still earlier day may have watched them building about the abbey, before it was a ruin at all.
We had an old description of the place with us, aided by which we traced out the principal part of the edifice, such as the church, as already mentioned, and, contiguous to this, the Chapter-house, which is better preserved than the church; also the kitchen, and the room where the monks met to talk; and the range of wall, where their cells probably were. I never before had given myself the trouble to form any distinct idea of what an abbey or monastery49 was,—a place where holy rites50 were daily and continually to be performed, with places to eat and sleep contiguous and convenient, in order that the monks might always be at hand to perform those rites. They lived only to worship, and therefore lived under the same roof with their place of worship, which, of course, was the principal object in the edifice, and hallowed the whole of it. We found, too, at one end of the ruins, what is supposed to have been a school-house for the children of the tenantry or villeins of the abbey. All round this room is a bench of stone against the wall, and the pedestal also of the master's seat. There are, likewise, the ruins of the mill; and the mill-stream, which is just as new as ever it was, still goes murmuring and babbling51, and passes under two or three old bridges, consisting of a low gray arch overgrown with grass and shrubbery. That stream was the most fleeting52 and vanishing thing about the ponderous53 and high-piled abbey; and yet it has outlasted55 everything else, and might still outlast54 another such edifice, and be none the worse for wear.
There is not a great deal of ivy56 upon the walls, and though an ivied wall is a beautiful object, yet it is better not to have too much,—else it is but one wall of unbroken verdure, on which you can see none of the sculptural ornaments57, nor any of the hieroglyphics58 of Time. A sweep of ivy here and there, with the gray wall everywhere showing through, makes the better picture; and I think that nothing is so effective as the little bunches of flowers, a mere59 handful, that grow in spots where the seeds have been carried by the wind ages ago.
I have made a miserable60 botch of this description; it is no description, but merely an attempt to preserve something of the impression it made on me, and in this I do not seem to have succeeded at all. I liked the contrast between the sombreness of the old walls, and the sunshine falling through them, and gladdening the grass that floored the aisles61; also, I liked the effect of so many idle and cheerful people, strolling into the haunts of the dead monks, and going babbling about, and peering into the dark nooks; and listening to catch some idea of what the building was from a clerical-looking personage, who was explaining it to a party of his friends. I don't know how well acquainted this gentleman might be with the subject; but he seemed anxious not to impart his knowledge too extensively, and gave a pretty direct rebuff to an honest man who ventured an inquiry62 of him. I think that the railway, and the hotel within the abbey grounds, add to the charm of the place. A moonlight solitary63 visit might be very good, too, in its way; but I believe that one great charm and beauty of antiquity64 is, that we view it out of the midst of quite another mode of life; and the more perfectly this can be done, the better. It can never be done more perfectly than at Furness Abbey, which is in itself a very sombre scene, and stands, moreover, in the midst of a melancholy65 valley, the Saxon name of which means the Vale of the Deadly Nightshade.
The entrance to the stable-yard of the hotel is beneath a pointed66 arch of Saxon architecture, and on one side of this stands an old building, looking like a chapel67, but which may have been a porter's lodge68. The Abbot's residence was in this quarter; and the clerical personage, before alluded69 to, spoke70 of these as the oldest part of the ruins.
About half a mile on the hither side of the abbey stands the village of Dalton, in which is a castle built on a Roman foundation, and which was afterwards used by the abbots (in their capacity of feudal71 lords) as a prison. The abbey was founded about 1027 by King Stephen, before he came to the throne; and the faces of himself and of his queen are still to be seen on one of the walls.
We had a very agreeable drive home (our drive hither had been uncomfortably sunny and hot), and we stopped at Ulverton to buy a pair of shoes for J——- and some drawing-books and stationery72. As we passed through the little town in the morning, it was all alive with the bustle73 and throng74 of the weekly market; and though this had ceased on our return, the streets still looked animated75, because the heat of the day drew most of the population, I should imagine, out of doors. Old men look very antiquated76 here in their old-fashioned coats and breeches, sunning themselves by the wayside.
We reached home somewhere about eight o'clock,—home I see I have called it; and it seems as homelike a spot as any we have found in England,—the old inn, close by the bridge, beside the clear river, pleasantly overshadowed by trees. It is entirely77 English, and like nothing that one sees in America; and yet. I feel as if I might have lived here a long while ago, and had now come back because I retained pleasant recollections of it. The children, too, make themselves at home. J——- spends his time from morning to night fishing for minnows or trout78, and catching79 nothing at all, and U—— and R——- have been riding between fields and barn in a hay-cart. The roads give us beautiful walks along the river-side, or wind away among the gentle hills; and if we had nothing else to look at in these walks, the hedges and stone fences would afford interest enough, so many and pretty are the flowers, roses, honeysuckles, and other sweet things, and so abundantly does the moss18 and ivy grow among the old stones of the fences, which would never have a single shoot of vegetation on them in America till the very end of time. But here, no sooner is a stone fence built, than Nature sets to work to make it a part of herself. She adopts it and adorns80 it, as if it were her own child. A little sprig of ivy may be seen creeping up the side, and clinging fast with its many feet; a tuft of grass roots itself between two of the stones, where a little dust from the road has been moistened into soil for it: a small bunch of fern grows in another such crevice81; a deep, soft, green moss spreads itself over the top and all along the sides of the fence; and wherever nothing else will grow, lichens82 adhere to the stones and variegate their lines. Finally, a great deal of shrubbery is sure to cluster along its extent, and take away all hardness from the outline; and so the whole stone fence looks as if God had had at least as much to do with it as man. The trunks of the trees, too, exhibit a similar parasitical83 vegetation. Parasitical is an unkind phrase to bestow84 on this beautiful love and kindness which seems to exist here between one plant and another; the strong thing—being always ready to give support and sustenance85, and the weak thing to repay with beauty, so that both are the richer,—as in the case of ivy and woodbine, clustering up the trunk of a tall tree, and adding Corinthian grace to its lofty beauty.
Mr. W———, our landlord, has lent us a splendid work with engravings, illustrating86 the antiquities87 of Furness Abbey. I gather from it that the hotel must have been rebuilt or repaired from an old manor-house, which was itself erected88 by a family of Prestons, after the Reformation, and was a renewal89 from the Abbot's residence. Much of the edifice probably, as it exists now, may have been part of the original one; and there are bas-reliefs of Scripture90 subjects, sculptured in stone, and fixed91 in the wall of the dining-room, which have been there since the Abbot's time. This author thinks that what we had supposed to be the school-house (on the authority of an old book) was really the building for the reception of guests, with its chapel. He says that the tall arches in the church are sixty feet high. The Earl of Burlington, I believe, is the present proprietor92 of the abbey.
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1
crooked
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| adj.弯曲的；不诚实的，狡猾的，不正当的 | |
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metropolis
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| n.首府；大城市 | |
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rustic
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| adj.乡村的，有乡村特色的；n.乡下人，乡巴佬 | |
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adornment
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| n.装饰；装饰品 | |
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5
winding
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| n.绕，缠，绕组，线圈 | |
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arid
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| adj.干旱的；(土地)贫瘠的 | |
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wholesome
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| adj.适合；卫生的；有益健康的；显示身心健康的 | |
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8
specimens
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| n.样品( specimen的名词复数 )；范例；（化验的）抽样；某种类型的人 | |
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9
inclination
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| n.倾斜；点头；弯腰；斜坡；倾度；倾向；爱好 | |
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10
shriek
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| v./n.尖叫，叫喊 | |
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rumble
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| n.隆隆声；吵嚷；v.隆隆响；低沉地说 | |
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12
formerly
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| adv.从前，以前 | |
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13
edifice
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| n.宏伟的建筑物(如宫殿，教室) | |
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14
nave
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| n.教堂的中部；本堂 | |
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15
choir
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| n.唱诗班，唱诗班的席位，合唱团，舞蹈团；v.合唱 | |
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16
remains
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| n.剩余物，残留物；遗体，遗迹 | |
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stump
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| n.残株，烟蒂，讲演台；v.砍断，蹒跚而走 | |
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18
moss
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| n.苔，藓，地衣 | |
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19
lichen
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| n.地衣, 青苔 | |
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20
whitewashed
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| 粉饰，美化，掩饰( whitewash的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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partially
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| adv.部分地，从某些方面讲 | |
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22
recollect
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| v.回忆，想起，记起，忆起，记得 | |
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majesty
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| n.雄伟，壮丽，庄严，威严；最高权威，王权 | |
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24
crumbling
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| adj.摇摇欲坠的 | |
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25
embody
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| vt.具体表达，使具体化；包含，收录 | |
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knight
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| n.骑士，武士；爵士 | |
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bruised
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| [医]青肿的，瘀紫的 | |
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28
battered
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| adj.磨损的；v.连续猛击；磨损 | |
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29
warriors
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| 武士，勇士，战士( warrior的名词复数 ) | |
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30
grotesque
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| adj.怪诞的，丑陋的；n.怪诞的图案，怪人（物） | |
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barons
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| 男爵( baron的名词复数 )； 巨头； 大王； 大亨 | |
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32
canopies
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| （宝座或床等上面的）华盖( canopy的名词复数 )； （飞行器上的）座舱罩； 任何悬于上空的覆盖物； 森林中天棚似的树荫 | |
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33
perfectly
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| adv.完美地，无可非议地，彻底地 | |
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intervals
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| n.[军事]间隔( interval的名词复数 )；间隔时间；[数学]区间；（戏剧、电影或音乐会的）幕间休息 | |
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35
vacancy
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| n.（旅馆的）空位，空房，（职务的）空缺 | |
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36
scattered
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| adj.分散的，稀疏的；散步的；疏疏落落的 | |
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37
reverence
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| n.敬畏，尊敬，尊严；Reverence:对某些基督教神职人员的尊称；v.尊敬，敬畏，崇敬 | |
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38
embroidery
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| n.绣花，刺绣；绣制品 | |
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39
kindly
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| adj.和蔼的，温和的，爽快的；adv.温和地，亲切地 | |
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40
spacious
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| adj.广阔的，宽敞的 | |
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41
aisle
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| n.（教堂、教室、戏院等里的）过道，通道 | |
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42
majestic
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| adj.雄伟的，壮丽的，庄严的，威严的，崇高的 | |
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43
sublimity
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| 崇高，庄严，气质高尚 | |
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44
pictorial
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| adj.绘画的；图片的；n．画报 | |
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45
recesses
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| n.壁凹( recess的名词复数 )；（工作或业务活动的）中止或暂停期间；学校的课间休息；某物内部的凹形空间v.把某物放在墙壁的凹处( recess的第三人称单数 )；将（墙）做成凹形，在（墙）上做壁龛；休息，休会，休庭 | |
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46
chirped
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| 鸟叫，虫鸣( chirp的过去式 ) | |
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47
posterity
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| n.后裔，子孙，后代 | |
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48
monks
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| n.修道士，僧侣( monk的名词复数 ) | |
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49
monastery
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| n.修道院，僧院，寺院 | |
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50
rites
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| 仪式，典礼( rite的名词复数 ) | |
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51
babbling
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| n.胡说，婴儿发出的咿哑声adj.胡说的v.喋喋不休( babble的现在分词 )；作潺潺声（如流水）；含糊不清地说话；泄漏秘密 | |
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52
fleeting
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| adj.短暂的，飞逝的 | |
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53
ponderous
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| adj.沉重的，笨重的，(文章)冗长的 | |
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54
outlast
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| v.较…耐久 | |
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55
outlasted
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| v.比…长久，比…活得长( outlast的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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56
ivy
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| n.常青藤，常春藤 | |
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57
ornaments
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| n.装饰( ornament的名词复数 )；点缀；装饰品；首饰v.装饰，点缀，美化( ornament的第三人称单数 ) | |
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58
hieroglyphics
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| n.pl.象形文字 | |
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59
mere
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| adj.纯粹的；仅仅，只不过 | |
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60
miserable
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| adj.悲惨的，痛苦的；可怜的，糟糕的 | |
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61
aisles
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| n. (席位间的)通道, 侧廊 | |
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62
inquiry
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| n.打听，询问，调查，查问 | |
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63
solitary
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| adj.孤独的，独立的，荒凉的；n.隐士 | |
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64
antiquity
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| n.古老；高龄；古物，古迹 | |
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65
melancholy
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| n.忧郁，愁思；adj.令人感伤（沮丧）的，忧郁的 | |
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66
pointed
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| adj.尖的，直截了当的 | |
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67
chapel
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| n.小教堂，殡仪馆 | |
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68
lodge
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| v.临时住宿，寄宿，寄存，容纳；n.传达室，小旅馆 | |
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69
alluded
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| 提及，暗指( allude的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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70
spoke
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| n.（车轮的）辐条；轮辐；破坏某人的计划；阻挠某人的行动 v.讲，谈（speak的过去式）；说；演说；从某种观点来说 | |
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71
feudal
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| adj.封建的，封地的，领地的 | |
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72
stationery
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| n.文具；(配套的)信笺信封 | |
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73
bustle
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| v.喧扰地忙乱，匆忙，奔忙；n.忙碌；喧闹 | |
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74
throng
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| n.人群，群众；v.拥挤，群集 | |
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75
animated
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| adj.生气勃勃的，活跃的，愉快的 | |
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antiquated
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| adj.陈旧的，过时的 | |
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77
entirely
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| ad.全部地，完整地；完全地，彻底地 | |
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78
trout
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| n.鳟鱼；鲑鱼(属) | |
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79
catching
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| adj.易传染的，有魅力的，迷人的，接住 | |
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80
adorns
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| 装饰，佩带( adorn的第三人称单数 ) | |
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81
crevice
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| n.(岩石、墙等)裂缝；缺口 | |
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82
lichens
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| n.地衣( lichen的名词复数 ) | |
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83
parasitical
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| adj. 寄生的(符加的) | |
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84
bestow
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| v.把…赠与，把…授予；花费 | |
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85
sustenance
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| n.食物，粮食；生活资料；生计 | |
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86
illustrating
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| 给…加插图( illustrate的现在分词 )； 说明； 表明； （用示例、图画等）说明 | |
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87
antiquities
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| n.古老( antiquity的名词复数 )；古迹；古人们；古代的风俗习惯 | |
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88
ERECTED
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| adj. 直立的，竖立的，笔直的 vt. 使 ... 直立，建立 | |
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renewal
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| adj.(契约)延期，续订，更新，复活，重来 | |
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90
scripture
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| n.经文，圣书，手稿；Scripture:(常用复数)《圣经》，《圣经》中的一段 | |
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91
fixed
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| adj.固定的，不变的，准备好的；(计算机)固定的 | |
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proprietor
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| n.所有人；业主；经营者 | |
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