Page:A tour through the northern counties of England, and the borders of Scotland - Volume II.djvu/81

 pilasters; over this an admirably sculptured figure of the Virgin Mary appears in a recess surmounted by a Gothic canopy. Within all is neatness and good repair as far as the transept and Lady's chapel, which have been suffered shamefully to dila- pidate; and the noble monuments of the Howards and Dacres, richly decorated with the grandest ornaments of the sculpture of the fifteenth and six- teenth centuries, to be defaced and ruined. But such is the lot of human grandeur! it makes a little stir for a few years, then sinks into the grave, and together with its memorial, perishes and is for- gotten. " Be not thou afraid, therefore, though " one be made rich, or if the glory of his house be kC increased; for lie shall carry nothing away with ir - him when he dieth, neither shall his pomp follow ' him. Man, though in honour, hath no undcr- " standing, but may be compared to the bea I t; that perish."

Quitting this mortifying scene, we directed our course to Na worth-Castle, the baronial mansion oi the Lords of Gilsland; a piece not calculated, however, to inspire a more cheerful tram oi ideas than the church of Lanecost; since every thing within and without the ca tie suggests the dire- purposes to which it was formerly applied- the op- pressions of feudal tyranny in more early da;> ,

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