family were seated at Millum, in the time of Henry the Third, when they acquired that estate, by the marriage of John de Hudleston with the Lady Joan, the heiress of the Boisville family." "Slavery continued to thrive on the soil of Northumberland long after the time of Edward the First; for in 1470, Sir Roger Widdrington manumitted his native, William Atkinson, for the purpose of making him his bailiff of Woodhorn." The inmates of Calder were probably neither better nor worse than other cowled fraternities. A certain Brother Beesley, a Benedictine Monk, of Pershore, in Worcestershire, speaks very boldly of certain shortcomings, in his own experience of "relygyus men." The following passage occurs in a petition addressed by him to the Vicar-General Cromwell, at the time of the visitation of the Monasteries:-- "Now y wyll ynstrux your grace sumwatt of relygyus men----. Monckes drynke an bowll after collatyon tyll ten or twelve of the clok, and cum to matyns as dronck as myss (mice)--and sum at cardys, sum at dyes, and at tabulles; sum cum to mattyns begenying at the mydes, and sum wen yt ys almost dun, and wold not cum there so only for boddly punyshment, nothyng for Goddes sayck." THE ARMBOTH BANQUET. To Calgarth Hall in the midnight cold Two headless skeletons cross'd the fold, Undid the bars, unlatched the door, And over the step pass'd down the floor Where the jolly round porter sat sleeping. With a patter their feet on the pavement fall; And they traverse the stairs to that window'd wall, Where out of a niche, at the witch-hour dark, Each lifts a skull all grinning and stark, And fits it on with a creaking. Then forth they go with a ghostly march; And bending low at the portal arch, Through Calgarth woods, o'er Rydal braes, And over the Pass by Dunmail-Raise The Two their course are keeping. Now Wytheburn's lowly pile in sight Gleams faintly beneath the new-moon's light; And farther along dim forms appear, All hurrying down to the darksome Mere, The drunken ferryman seeking. From old Helvellyn's domain they come, A spectral band demure and dumb; By twos, and threes, and fours, and more, They beckon the man to ferry them o'er, To where yon lights are breaking. And thither the twain are wending fast; For there from many a casement cast, The festal blaze is burning high In Armboth Hall; the hills thereby In uttermost darkness sleeping. In Wytheburn City there wakes not one To see those dim forms hastening on; But at Wytheburn Ferry may travellers wait, For busy with guests for Armboth gate, The boatman's sinews are aching.