65 
In his lecture (which was choicely illustrated) Mr. Mellor 
frequently drew attention to the manners, dress and occupation 
of the Loire population, but his chief object was to re-people, as 
it were, their ancient castles and palaces with the principal 
figures of those stirring times in French and English History, 
and 
“For a short space 
We saw revealed the double threads that bind 
This little speck of time we call ‘ to-day,’ 
To the great cycle of unending life 
That has been and shall be evermore.” 
LOCAL GLIMPSES: RHYMES AND DREAMS.* 
By HENRY HOULDING. December 21st, 1892. 
My first purpose in preparing these “Local Glimpses,” was 
that I would give some reminiscences of old Burnley as it first 
appeared to me in the thirties, and of the old Burnley people 
whom I knew, and then piece these out with some tags of my 
own, whose only interest to this society or to any body else is 
that they are associated, in the mind of the writer at least, with 
its streets, garrets and workshops, and some of its queer old 
folk, ‘‘men and women weird,” and whose first well-spring of 
inspiration bubbled up in Blucher Street, whose name indicates 
that the tall, gaunt, ugly houses which composed that classic 
precinct, were built shortly after the battle of Waterloo. But I 
soon found that this was a task beyond my power, that I knew 
very little of ancient Burnley, very little of the rambling village 
that began with the Cross Keys of St. Peter at one end, and 
finished with the fatal bird that exulted over his (the saint’s) 
downfall, now turned into a weather-cock, at the other 
extremity. ‘In the dark street where I was born,” there was a 
motley gathering of ancient folk, who must have assembled here 
from all points of the outer wilderness, for whose wandering 
tribes Burnley was then and has been since a place of refuge, if 
not of rest. There was the Yorkshire butcher, the Irish tailor, 
Bernard or “ Barnad” Ennis, who retired from business about 
sixty years ago, and built the “ Turf Tavern ” in close proximity 
to the daisies and hedgerows ; Tom Rickard, the printer, 
whose whole plant was comprehended in the back bedroom. 
Tom was one of the old Trafalgar heroes, and was supposed to 
carry some French bullets in his body, as he shuffled about 
* Asit has been proposed to publish the “Rhymes” in another form, they are 
not given here. 
