Poems with a Mallerstang Connection

 

Wilfred Wilson Gibson (1878-1962)

In the early years of the 20th Century, Wilfred Gibson, who was born in Hexham, had a high reputation as a poet.  He wrote some war poetry (and was a friend of Rupert Brook), but his reputation was rather obscured by the much higher profile that the younger generation of "war poets", such as Wilfred Owen, achieved during the First World War. 

Some of Gibson's poetry can be found in The Oxford Book of Twentieth Century Verse, ed Philip Larkin, including The Mugger's Song, given below, and The Drove Road - from which an extract is given below. 

 

There is also an extract from a local poet, Fawcett Hunter, describing Pendragon Castle in 1797

The Mugger's Song

(In those days a Mugger just sold crockery)!

Set to music in 1919 by Herbert Howells, 1892-1983

(Recorded, with other Howells songs, on Chandos CHAN9185/6)

Driving up the Mallerstang
The mugger cracked his whip and sang
And all his crocks went rattle, rattle -
"The road runs fair and smooth and even
From Appleby to Kirkby Stephen
And womenfolk are kittle cattle.

And Kirkby Stephen's fair to see
And inns are good in Appleby,"
And all his crocks went rattle, rattle.
"But what care I for Kirkby Stephen,
Or whether roads are rough or even,
And womenfolk are kittle cattle?

And what care I for Appleby, 
Since Bess of the Blue Bell jilted me?"
And all his crocks went rattle, rattle -
"And wed today in Kirkby Stephen,
A sweep whose legs are odd and even?
And womenfolk are kittle cattle."

 

The Drove Road 

(an extract)

This is a reminder of hard past times, when cattle were moved long distances around the country on the hoof  along the old drovers' roads - including along the Old Highway through Mallerstang. 

The ancient "green road" through Mallerstang, which takes the hard way along the Tops,  still exists. It is also known as Lady Anne's Way, or the Roman Road.


...he'd been travelling hard on sixty year
The same old road, the same old giddy gait;
And he'd be walking, for a pint of beer,
Into his coffin one day, soon or late...

He'd met a sight of weather on the heath,
But this beat all.
'Twas worse than when he'd groped 
His way that evening down in Mallerstang-


Thon was a blizzard, thon, and he was done
And almost dropping, when he came a bang
Against a house - slap-bang, and like to stun!
Though that just saved his senses: and right there
He saw a lighted window he'd not seen,
Although he'd nearly staggered through its glare
Into a goodwife's kitchen, where she'd been
Baking hot griddle-cakes upon the peat.


And he could taste them now, and feel the glow
Of steady, aching, tingly, drowsy heat
As he sat there and let the caking snow
Melt off his boots, staining the sanded floor...

 

  Mallerstang Edge in winter 

 

- seen here from "Tommy Road"

 

 

- and from the valley bottom

 

Pendragon Castle

(an extract)

by Fawcett Hunter,  of Fell End, Ravenstonedale, 1797

 

I have seen the walls of Pendragon, but they were desolate...

The fox looked from the windows,

And the rank grass of the wall waved round his head.

Desolate is the dwelling of Pembroke;

Silence is in the house of her fathers.

Pendragon Castle in 1739, already becoming a ruin

 

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