Page:A tour through the northern counties of England, and the borders of Scotland - Volume I.djvu/262

 the friends of the levelling system, and to fall under the desolating hand of Lilburne, the Parliamentarian commander.

Returning over the old bridge, we visited the chapel of St. Robert, a hermit in Richard Ist's time, who, with an industry we cannot but admire, at the same time that we lament its wrong direction, excavated an apartment in the face of a high rock, nearly perpendicular, twelve feet long, nine wide, and eight high, adorning its roof with Gothic decorations, and its sides with an altar, recesses, and other sculptural representations. A knight- templar, carved in the rock, stands near the door of this little retreat, whose front shaded by ivy, sprinkled with lichens, and corroded with age, would be a very pretty object in a picture, if accompanied with a few fanciful appendages. Above this chapel, upon the same lofty rock which hangs over the margin of the river, is the hermitage; and further up the ascent Mon'agu fort, another excavation, the work of a poor man and his son, living chiefly by the precarious profits arising from the curiosity of travellers, who are led to survey this example of modern labour. The view from hence is rather extraordinary than beautiful, being a bird's-eye one over a scene of the most singular nature.