CHAPTER XLI

CROYLAND

St. Guthlac—Abbot Joffrid—Boundary Crosses—The Triangular Bridge—Figure with Sceptre and Ball—Lincolnshire swan-marks.

As you pass in the train along the line from Peterborough to Spalding, and have got a mile or two north of Deeping St. James station, you can see to the east in a cluster of trees a broad tower with a short, thick spire standing out as the only feature in a wide, flat landscape. This, for all who know it, has a mysterious attraction, for it is the sorrowful ruin of a once magnificent building, a far-famed centre of light and learning from whence came the brains, the piety, and the wealth which, issuing over the fens of south-east Lincolnshire, not only supplied the first lecturers to Cambridge, but planted those splendid churches for which the “parts of Holland” are famous to this day. For this is the great Abbey of Crowland, or Croyland, the home of the good St. Guthlac, to whose memory this and many another church was dedicated, and to whose shrine pilgrimage was made for several centuries. It stands alone on a once desolate and still sparsely inhabited and seemingly endless fen, and past it the Welland flows down to the long serpentine lake beloved of skaters, which is spelt Cowbit, but called by all Lincolnshire folk “Cubbit Wash.”

Croyland is an older name than Crowland, and the fine church and monastery to which it owes its fame was set up in the eighth century, by King Æthelbald, in grateful memory of St. Guthlac. Now St. Guthlac is no legendary saint; he was a member of the Mercian royal house, who, tired of soldiering, sought a retirement from the world; and certainly few better places could be found than what was then a desolate, reedy waste of waters at the point where Cambridgeshire, Northamptonshire and Lincolnshire meet by the edge of Deeping Fen. No road led to it, and the fenmen’s boats were the only means of passage.

[Illustration: _Cowbit Church._]

[Sidenote: ST. GUTHLAC]

Guthlac was, we are told, the son of Penwald, a Mercian nobleman, and he was very likely born not far from Croyland. After nine years’ military service he entered the monastery of Hrypadon, or Repton, and after two years’ study resolved to take up the life of an Anchorite. So, in defiance of the evil spirits who were reputed to have their abode there, and who were probably nothing but the shrieking sea-gulls and the melancholy cries of the bittern and curlew, he landed on a bit of dry ground two miles to the north-east of Croyland, now called Anchor-Church-Hill, just east of the Spalding road. Here were some British or Saxon burial mounds, on one of which he set up his hut and chapel, while his sister Pega established herself a few miles to the south-west, at Peakirk. He had landed on his island on St. Bartholomew’s Day, August 24, 699, a young man of twenty-six, and here he was visited by Bishop Hædda, who ordained him in 705. In 709 Æthelbald being outlawed by his cousin King Coelred, took sanctuary with St. Guthlac, who prophesied to him that he would one day be king, and without bloodshed. St. Guthlac died in 713 or 714, but Æthelbald, who had vowed to build a monastery for Guthlac if ever he could, did become king in 716, and in gratitude built the first stone church and endowed a monastery for Benedictines at Croyland. Naturally St. Guthlac was the patron saint, and to him was joined St. Bartholomew, on whose day he had first come to Croyland.

[Sidenote: FOUNDATIONS OF THE ABBEY]

[Sidenote: ABBOTS OF CROYLAND]

_St. Guthlac_ is represented in his statue as bearing the scourge of St. Bartholomew, on whose feast day each year little knives were given away emblematic of his martyrdom by flaying. The custom was not abolished till 1476. Pictures of the scourge and knives are found in the stained glass of old windows; for instance, at Bag-Enderby, near Somersby. In 866 the Danes burnt the monastery. Eighty years later the chancellor of King Edred, whose name is variously given as Turketyl, or _Thurcytel_, restored the church and monastery, and became the first abbot in 946, about which time he founded the Croyland library. The first church was built on a peat bog; oak piles five and a half feet long being driven through the peat on to gravel, and above the piles recent digging has shown alternate layers of loose stone and quarry-dust, above which the stone foundations of the tower were found to go down fifteen inches below the surface, and to rest on a mixture of rubble and stiff soil which was brought in boats a distance of nine miles. Thurcytel’s church, which was cruciform and of considerable size and held one large bell, has almost, if not entirely, disappeared. The monastery was finished after his death by his successor, _Egelric_, who added six other bells in 976. The Danes, by cruel and repeated exactions, ruined the abbey which Thurcytel had left so richly endowed, in the time of Egelric’s successor, _Godric_, about 1010. This Egelric must not be confused with the Peterborough abbot of the same name, who became Bishop of Durham and made the great causeway from Deeping to Spalding in 1052, probably to give work to the peasantry in the year of the dreadful famine, 1051.

On so treacherous a foundation the monks wisely built in wood rather than stone when possible, but they had no preservatives for wood in those days, hence, in 1061, Abbot _Ulfcytel_ had to rebuild the wooden erections which were attached to the monastery. He was greatly helped by the famous Waltheof, Earl of Northampton and Huntingdon, and when, on the false accusation of his infamous wife Judith, sister of William I., Waltheof was beheaded at Winchester, the monks got leave from the Conqueror to have his body buried at Croyland. In 1076 _Ingulphus_ became abbot, and, owing to the carelessness of some plumbers—an old and ever-recurring story—the whole of the buildings were again burnt down and the library of 700 MSS. destroyed. It is to the Chronicle of Ingulphus that we owe most of our knowledge of the early history of Croyland, and even if the Chronicle were written three centuries after his death, it still contains much sound and reliable information. Certainly after the fire his building was patched up for a generation, and the Abbot Joffrid, a man of extraordinary learning, zeal, and skill, built in 1109 what may well be called the third abbey. Most of Thurcytel’s work which had escaped the fire was taken down, and the foundations carried down to the gravel bed below the peat. Of this building, which was carried out by Arnold, a lay monk and a very skilful mason, the two western piers and arch of the central tower remain, but an earthquake in 1113 damaged the nave, and when in 1143 it was partly burnt down again, for the third time, Abbot Edward restored it. King Henry had sent for Joffrid (or Geoffrey) from Normandy. Among other remarkable deeds he sent four learned monks to give a course of lectures on grammar, logic, rhetoric and philosophy in a barn which they hired in Cambridge, or Grantbridge as it was then called. Sermons were also preached there in French and Latin, both by the monk Gilbert and by the abbot himself, of whom we are told that, though his numerous hearers understood neither language, the force of his subject and his comely person excited them to give amply towards his building fund. The account of the laying of the first stones of his new abbey is very remarkable. Five thousand persons were assembled and feasted on the spot, and many distinguished people took part, each laying one stone and placing on it a handsome offering of money, or titles to property, or patronage, or land, or possession of yearly tithes of sheep, gifts of corn or malt or stone, or the service for so many years of quarriers at the stone pits, with carriage of stone in boats.

Croyland lost a good friend by the death of Queen Maud, wife of Henry I., in 1118. She had been the especial patroness of the abbot Joffrid, and had founded the first Austin priory in England in 1108. Twenty years later King Stephen gave a fresh charter to the abbey, in the time of Abbot _Edward_, who commenced to re-build the abbey in 1145. The beautiful west front of the nave, some of which remains, was possibly planned by _Henry de Longchamp_ in 1190, but was not finished till the time of _Richard de Upton_, 1417-1427. His predecessor, _Thomas de Overton_, had rebuilt the nave in 1405, and it was during his abbacy that Croyland became a mitred abbey.

[Sidenote: THE MASTER MASON]

The architect and master mason under Richard de Upton was one William de Wernington, or William de Croyland, whose monument is in the tower now. The effigy wears a monk’s cowl and long robe, and holds a builder’s square and compasses and has this inscription: “ICI : GIST : MESTRE : WILLM : DE : WERMIGTON : LE : MASON : A : LALME : DE : KY : DEVY : P″SA : GRACE : DOVNEZ : ABSOLVTION.”

The noble west window, which has lost all its mullions and tracery, must have been one of the very finest in England.

In the days of Henry II. a dispute arose between the Abbot of Croyland and the Prior of Spalding, the prior going so far as to claim Croyland as a cell to Spalding. This quarrel continued through the reigns of Richard I. and John, when the Abbot of Peterborough joined the fray with a fresh dispute about the rights of common and pasture, and the payment of tolls at Croyland bridge. In these controversies Croyland generally was worsted.

[Illustration: _Croyland Abbey._]

[Sidenote: THE RUINS]

_John de Lytlyngton_ succeeded Abbot Upton and ruled for forty years. In his time Henry VI. and Edward IV. both visited Croyland, the latter being on his way to Fotheringay. A three months’ frost, followed by two years of famine, and later a great flood, followed by a pestilence and a fire which destroyed nearly all the village, but spared the abbey, are among the records of his abbacy. He vaulted the roofs of the aisles, glazed the windows, had the bells recast, and gave the choir an organ; also he built the great west tower for the bells and the porch with its parvise. He died in 1469. The short steeple was added to the tower later. The last abbot was _John Welles_, _alias_ Bridges. Another campanile had been built beyond the east end of the choir by Abbot _Ralph Marshe_, 1260, which gave the abbey two separate peals, as once at Lincoln. After these many vicissitudes the greater part of the beautiful building was destroyed at the dissolution in 1539, the nave, of nine bays, being preserved for a parish church. The north aisle had been used for the purpose before, and is so still. Besides this there is left now the west front, consisting of a tower with short spire and a very fine Perpendicular window, and all but the gable and window tracery of the beautiful ornate west end of the nave. This had originally no less than twenty-nine statues under canopies, in seven tiers, covering the wall on either side of the doorway and window, and also above the window. The handsome doorway is entered by a deeply moulded single arch enclosing two smaller ones, and in the tympanum is a large quatrefoil illustrating the life of St. Guthlac. The tower has a western porch under a six-light window. Much has been done by the rector, the Rev. T. H. Le Bœuf, to preserve this magnificent ruin, and since 1860, under Sir G. Scott and Mr. J. L. Pearson, sound restoration has been carried out. Besides the west front and the western tower and spire, one of the most remarkable parts of the abbey still existing is the stone screen which, contrary to usual custom, filled the west arch of the central tower, and is pierced by two doors, one on either side of the altar. Of this the side looking west is plain and probably had wooden panelling, but the eastern side is handsomely carved and panelled in stone. The north aisle has Lytlyngton’s groined roof, five large Perpendicular windows, and a rood-screen. Of St. Guthlac’s Shrine, which was destroyed in 870 and newly erected in 1136, and moved in 1196, nothing remains.

Of the old glass fragments have lately been found buried in the churchyard.

An epitaph on the north wall, dated 1715, has the following apt lines:—

Man’s life is like unto a winter’s day, Some brake their fast and so departs away; Others stay dinner then departs full fed, The longest age but supps and goes to bed.

[Illustration: _Croyland Bridge._]

[Sidenote: THE BOUNDARY CROSSES]

[Sidenote: TRIANGULAR BRIDGE]

The boundaries of Croyland, which in Æthelbald’s Charter were rivers, were staked out more definitely when disputes between this abbey and Peterborough arose, by stone crosses; and though these are in part destroyed or broken down, six crosses, or parts of them, are still standing in fields or hedges, which are all mentioned by name, in later charters. One of them, “Turketyls or Thurcytels Cross,” is placed at the junction of Lincolnshire and Cambridgeshire. In this, as in all the others, the cross is missing. The shaft is of obelisk form, on a shapely base, and has been restored. Parts of other crosses are “Guthlac’s Stone,” near the Assendyke, four miles from Croyland; “Finestone,” or “Fynset,” “Greynes,” “Folwardstaking,” and “Kenulph’s Stone.” One of the boundaries mentioned as early as the charter of Edred, A.D. 943, is “The Triangular Bridge.” The present is an extremely curious thirteenth- or fourteenth-century structure, doubtless replacing an earlier one. Like the triangular lodge near Rothwell, in Northamptonshire, it was probably intended to be emblematic of the Trinity. It has three pointed arches, with a way for a stream to flow under each, and three roadways over the arches, but the arches are too low, and the roadways too narrow for vehicles and too steep for any convenient traffic. Hence it may have been the basement of a large cross approached by three flights of steps, where now we have the steep inclines. The parapet walls are perhaps a later addition. Still it served as a bridge too. Roads from Stamford, Peterborough and Spalding meet at the bridge, and tributaries of the Welland and Nene, now covered in, flow under it. The height of the arches is nine feet, and their span sixteen and a half. It would not require that span now, but the streams were bigger when this bridge was built, for we are told that Henry VI. came to Croyland by water in 1460, and that Edward IV. embarked at the wharf just below the bridge, in 1468, for Fotheringay Castle, which is on the banks of the Nene, a distance of some two and twenty miles by water.

[Sidenote: FIGURE ON THE BRIDGE]

There is a stone bench along the left side of the bridge parapet, as you approach from Peterborough, and on this you find an ancient stone figure seated: it is often called Æthelbald holding a globe in his hand or a loaf of bread; but it is far more likely that it is the figure of our Lord, from the centre of the gable above the great west window of the nave, holding in his hands what Shakespeare in the lines below calls “the sceptre and the ball.” The shallowness of the statue and its height—six feet when seated but even the knees only projecting ten inches—make it certain that it was only meant to be seen from the front and at a good height. Moreover, the workmanship of the statue corresponds with that of the other statues on the west front of the abbey.

The rector states as a fact that the west gable of this west front was taken down in 1720, and the statue placed on the bridge, where it must be admitted that it looks very much out of place and uncomfortable. The bridge is said to be in three counties—Lincolnshire, Cambridgeshire and Northamptonshire—so, though the abbey is entirely in Lincolnshire, we can in a few steps leave the county of which Croyland is the last place we have to describe.

The “ball,” or orb, is carried by the monarch at the coronation service in one hand and the sceptre in the other as symbols of imperial power. There is no finer passage in English literature than the soliloquy of King Henry V. on the eve of the battle of Agincourt, the last part of which runs thus:—

’Tis not the balm, the sceptre and the ball, The sword, the mace, the crown imperial, The intertissued robe of gold and pearl, The farced title running ’fore the king, The throne he sits on, nor the tide of pomp That beats upon the high shore of this world, No, not all these, thrice-gorgeous ceremony, Not all these, laid in bed majestical, Can sleep so soundly as the wretched slave, Who with a body fill’d and vacant mind Gets him to rest, cramm’d with distressful bread; Never sees horrid night, the child of hell, But, like a lackey, from the rise to set Sweats in the eye of Phœbus, and all night Sleeps in Elysium; next day after dawn, Doth rise and help Hyperion to his horse, And follows so the ever-running year, With profitable labour, to his grave: And, but for ceremony, such a wretch, Winding up days with toil and nights with sleep, Had the fore-hand and vantage of a king. The slave, a member of the country’s peace, Enjoys it; but in gross brain little wots What watch the king keeps to maintain the peace, Whose hours the peasant best advantages.

_Henry V._, Act IV. Scene 1.

[Sidenote: LINCOLNSHIRE SWAN-MARKS]

In the Museum of the Record-office is a long brown-paper roll with a double column of swans’ heads, the bills painted red and showing in black the marks of the different owners in two counties, of which Lincolnshire is one. These marks were in use in the years 1497-1504, a few being added for the year 1515.

One of the plainest to read is the name of Carolus Stanefeld de Bolyngbroke; among others are the marks of the parsons of Leek and Leverton, the vicars of Waynflete, Frekeney and Sybsa, the Bayly of Croft, the abbot of Revysbye and Philip abbas de Croyland.

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