278 Report of Meetings for 1880, by James Hardy. 



words " haec crux Scot facta," at its base. The cross in tbe 

 lawn in front of tbe vicarage is of similar workmanship, and is 

 said to mark the place where the buying and selling took place, 

 and where public preachings would be delivered. 



The various intricate passages to apartments in the monastery 

 were threaded, but there was nothing particularly gratifying to 

 be seen. It was inhabited by its latest owners — a branch of the 

 Dacres — who converted the dormitory into a hall ; and the strong 

 beam of wood which formed its mantel-piece bears the initials of 

 Christopher Dacre, 1586. 



An attempt was made to botanize the ruinous parts of the 

 structure. Jungermannia Hepatica, Cardamine Mrsuta, and Gera- 

 nium Rohertianum occupied the floor ; Linaria Cymhalaria was 

 pendent from the outer walls ; and Verhascum Tha/psus grew in 

 the vicarage garden ; which displayed also some shewy phloxes, 

 although of common sorts — white and crimson. There was much 

 yellow wall-flower on the ruins ; and a sprinkling of the feverfew, 

 Pyrethrum Parthenium. Briars, carrying hips, grew triumphant 

 on the top of the choir walls ; and a few plants of Hypericum 

 perforatum ; and young ash and elder trees had rooted themselves 

 in the chinks. In the headway of the clerestory in the south- 

 east angle of the choir is an altar to Jupiter erected by the first 

 cohort of the Dacians -styled the -^lian. Within the letters, 

 which are in the shade, the same white lichen was noticeable, to 

 which attention was drawn the day before at Coombe Crag. A 

 wide look out on the haugh in which the priory stands was ob- 

 tained from top of the turret stair. A pair of pied wagtails 

 were flitting about the roof in pursuit of flies, the latest seen for 

 the season. 



Lanercost priory, it is said, was. built by Eobert de Yallibus or 

 Vaux, the second Norman lord of Gilsland, in expiation for the 

 crime of having slain the dispossessed proprietor, Gilles Bueth, 

 who, after making many attempts to regain his inheritance, had 

 been invited to a friendly meeting for settlement of differences, 

 and then was treacherously murdered. It is somewhat remark- 

 able that when doubts of the verity of this story had begun to be 

 promulgated, it should have been corroborated by a discovery in 

 1864, of a Eunic inscription on a crag at Baronspike, lying 

 about two miles to the N.E. of Bewcastle Church. Dr Edward 

 Charlton reads the inscription thus ; " Baranr writes (these) to 



