Forest of Rossendale. 26 



J 



felt his hair rising on end at the sight of the two ghostly individuals 

 scraping music at the dead of night, and in such unwonted attire. 



The impression produced upon my mind by a visit paid some 

 years ago, in the month of June, to the oldest chapel at Lumb, on 

 the occasion of the anniversary services there, will not easily be 

 effaced from my memory. It was quite a " field day " among the 

 " Deighn Layrocks," and they mustered in strength, as though 

 bent on maintaining the reputation they had acquired for their 

 musical displays. The Singers' Gallery was thronged to excess. 

 In the fore-front was a dazzling row of buxom girls, with ruddy 

 faces and sparkling eyes, the picture of that rosy health which the 

 fresh and bracing air of the hill-side imparts ; and all were decked 

 out in bonnets newly trimmed with artificial flowers and ribbons of 

 the brightest hue, in every variety of colour and arrangement. 

 Neither in their other apparel was there any lack of neatness, many 

 of the girls displaying superior taste, and dressing in a manner 

 approaching to elegance. For weeks before the anniversary 

 Sundays of the various places of worship throughout Rossendale, 

 those who " ply the needle and thread " have a busy time of it ; 

 for it is the custom of the single lasses to appear at church or 

 chapel on those occasions in the finery which has to serve the 

 purpose of dazzling the eyes, and captivating the hearts, of the 

 rural swains during the intervening twelve months. But this is a 

 digression. Behind the girls were the males of every age, from 

 the youthful tyro to the hoary and spectacled patriarchs of the 

 valley ; and in the rear, with scarcely room to exert their powers, 

 were the Instrumentalists, amongst whom the Fiddlers, large and 

 small, predominated. The mellow flute and the clarionet had their 

 representatives ; and dotted here and there might be seen a brass 

 instrument, reflecting the bright sunshine that gleamed through the 

 windows of the humble edifice, {c) 



(c) It may indicate a want of taste on my part, but I confess to having 

 experienced a pang of regret on learning that the old-fashioned instruments 

 at Lumb Chapel had been supplanted by the more fashionable, but also more 

 formal, Organ — 



" Old times are changed, old manners gone ! " 



