FROM THE HEART OF THE WOLDS. 205 



distributed the patronage of these Lincolnshire churches be- 

 tween the recently created sees of Manchester and Ripon. 

 One little fact, though that a characteristic one, alone connects 

 at present these parishes on the beck with this long train of 

 history. Their rectors yet pay the same annual pensions of 

 six and eightpence and the like to the Ecclesiastical Commis- 

 sioners, which so long ago as 1380 they are recorded in the 

 Exchequer Rolls to have paid every year to the revenues of 

 Beau Port* 



A ghost story here lightens the graver matters of history. 

 The belated traveller may see in the winter nights a headless 

 man leave the ruin of the little Church of Ravendale, and walk 

 down into the valley. After a little he returns happy, with his 

 head under his arm, sits upon the ruined walls, and utters loud 

 cries of joy. On one occasion a labourer hard by held the gate 

 open for him to pass through, and nothing happened. The 

 moral of which is, always be civil, even to ghosts. 



In an old stained glass window of the Church of Barnoldby- 

 le-Beck, the next village, is some good leafage of oak-leaves and 

 acorns, recalling long-past years when the county was celebrated 

 for its oak trees, f Anthony Harwood, the parson of this parish, 

 was a zealous royalist in the civil wars, and was expelled from 

 his cure by the Earl of Manchester for absence in the King's 

 army to assert His Majesty's cause, for dissuading his parish- 

 ioners from rebellion, and for observing the ceremonies of the 

 Church. J Fifty years ago the " Feast " of this little village was 

 kept up with customs which at present seems relics of prehistoric 



* See Dugdale, Monasticon and a paper by the Precentor of Lincoln in 

 Ass. Architectural Report's, vol. xiv., p. 166. 



t See the ballad of Earl Douglas and the Fair Oliphant : 

 " He carried the match in his pocket 



That kindled to her the fire, 

 Well set about with oaken spails 

 That leaned o'er Lincolnshire." 

 J Walker's Sufferings of the Clergy. 



