282 Beport of Meetings for 1880, by James Hardy. 



Tke antique garden appears to grow little more tlian vegetables 

 for the bousebold. Tbe apple-trees were old and decayed at the 

 top. By way of ornament there were a few old yews clipped 

 into pyramidal shapes ; there were few flowers, and these be- 

 longed to a past age of gardening. There were some bright 

 looking phloxes ; Solomon's seal ; and the single CheUdonium 

 maj'us ; and there was a little rockery with wild ferns at the en- 

 trance. " On the walk outside the eastern wall of the Castle, 

 and near ' Lord William's Tower,' a noble old yew-tree stands 

 on the edge of the declivity — a venerable contemporary of the 

 founders of Naworth Castle." So says Mr Gibson, but from in- 

 adequate information, none of us saw it. 



To give the history of Naworth would be altogether superflu- 

 ous. Eather let me quote from Canon Ornsby's Introduction to 

 Lord William Howard's Household Books, published by the 

 Surtees Society, a few paragraphs that will be new to most mem- 

 bers of the Club, in vindication of Lord William from misrepre- 

 sentations of his history, that are constantly being repeated, and 

 which Sir Walter Scott by giving them the sanction of his 

 authority, has rendered still more widely credited. 



" The year in which Lord William actually made Naworth 

 Castle his residence cannot be fixed with absolute precision. 

 Here, at all events, he was certainly living in 1607. From that 

 time until his death it was his chief residence, and the place 

 around which there has been such* an outgrowth of traditions 

 respecting him." — "By the name of Belted Will, he is now popu- 

 larly known, and by the title of Lord Warden he is still tradition- 

 ally designated. Tradition tells us also, and the statement finds 

 a place even in the sober pages of the historian, that he main- 

 tained a garrison of 140 men at Naworth; whilst stories based 

 upon the rough and ready chastisement which he is supposed to 

 have meted out to the banditti who infested that wild country, 

 still meet with unhesitating acceptance and undoubting belief." 



"It is a somewhat ungrateful task to throw the light of his- 

 torical evidence upon wild and picturesque legends which, in 

 successive generations, have charmed the ear of eager childhood, 

 when told by some hoary grand-sire or some ancient grand-dame, 

 to a listening group around the winter hearth. But legends 

 these really are, so far, at least, as Lord William is concerned. 

 The popular idea which prevails concerning him, even amongst 



