[Illustration:  RIPON MINSTER.]

Eugene Aram, we were informed, spent some years of his life in Ripon at a house in Bond-Gate.

St. Wilfrid was the patron saint of Ripon, where he was born.  Legend states that at his birth a strange supernatural light shone over the house, and when he died, those who were in the death chamber claimed that they could hear the rustling of the angels’ wings who had come to bear his spirit away.  As we saw some figures relating to him in the cathedral we presumed that he must have been its patron saint.  We found afterwards it was dedicated to St. Peter and St. Wilfrid.  St. Wilfrid was an enthusiast in support of the Church control of Rome.  One sympathises with the poor king, who had to decide between the claims of Rome and the Celtic Church, whether priests should have their hair cut this way or that, and if the date of Easter should be decided by the moon or by some other way.  He seems to have been a simple-minded fellow, and his decision was very practical.  “I am told that Christ gave Peter the keys of heaven to keep, and none can get in without his permission.  Is that so?” to which Wilfrid quickly answered “Yes.”  “Has your saint any power like that?” he asked Oswin, who could but say “No.”  “Then,” said the king, “I vote for the side with the greater power,” and decided in favour of Wilfrid.  Like other cathedrals, Ripon had suffered much in the wars, but there were many ancient things still to be seen there.  Near the font was a tomb covered with a slab of grey marble, on which were carved the figures of a man and a huge lion, both standing amongst some small trees.  It was supposed to have covered the body of an Irish prince who died at Ripon on his way home from the Holy War, in Palestine, and who brought back with him a lion that followed him about just like a dog.  In the cathedral yard there was an epitaph to a fisherman: 

Here lies poor but honest Bryan Tunstall.  He was a most expert angler
until Death, envious of his merit, threw out his line, and landed him
here
21st day of April, 1790.

[Illustration:  RIPON MINSTER, WEST FRONT]

We left Ripon by the Boroughbridge road, and when about a mile from the town we met one of the dignitaries of the cathedral, who from his dress might have been anything from an archdeacon upwards.  We asked him if he could tell us of any objects of interest on our farther way.  He told us of Aldborough, with its Roman remains and the Devil’s Arrows, of which we had never heard before; and he questioned us about our long tramp, the idea of which quite delighted him.  We told him that we had thrown our mackintoshes away, and why we had done so, and had bought umbrellas instead; and he said, “You are now standing before a man who would give fifty pounds if he had never worn a mackintosh, for they have given me the rheumatism!”

The church at Kirkby Hill had just been restored.  We saw an epitaph in the churchyard similar to one which we found in a graveyard later on, farther south: