Whalley Abbey

A place of black monks by Latham, which seems to be the Benedictine Priory at Up Holland, the ruins of which are also yet to be seen.

Priories of black canons at Cartmel and Conishead, Whalley Abbey and Furness Abbey up in the mountains, which is hardly a correct description of its position, and seems to indicate that he never actually visited Furness.

He may have been deterred by the difficult crossing of the sands, but we know that he afterwards examined the voucher book of the abbey when it had been forwarded to London.

He is particular in noting the parish churches as he passes each.

It grows in many rotten moorish grounds in the kingdom, says Gerard, who himself calls it the Lancashire asphodel, and is used in Lancashire by women to dye their hair of a yellowish colour.

Sitting here in the churchyard at Downham, we are reminded of one of the beautiful Pendle legends.

It is said that in the belfry behind us there are three bells that once hung in the conventual church at Whalley Abbey, and that as the shepherds crossing the Pendle on calm nights pass through Ashendene Clough or Ravenholme, they fancy they hear a soft low chime in the distance, and believe that the monks' bells at Downham are still ringing for midnight prayers as they did centuries ago.

Our progress will be slow, for we shall be halting continually to identify some flower in the hedgerow, or to search for a nest, or to watch the cuckoo relentlessly pursued by a tiny bird, or to listen to the indignant remonstrances that a lapwing is addressing to a lamb that has trespassed on her domain, or to note a fine example of contorted strata in a limestone quarry.