cleeve abbey—old cleeve—blue anchor

two miles inland from watchet lies the cistercian abbey of st. mary de cleeve, or clive; that is to say, st. mary of the cliff—the most notable ruin in these districts of somerset. the church, the abbey itself, has quite vanished, and its materials centuries ago passed into such commendably useful purposes as building-stones for neighbouring farmsteads, cow-bartons and linhays, while the many excellent roads of the neighbourhood doubtless owe their foundations to the same source. the very interesting and extensive remains of the establishment are those of the domestic buildings, which have scarce their equal elsewhere in england.

this once proud and beautiful abbey was founded in 1188 by one william de romare, of whom we know little else than that he was of the family of the earls of lincoln of that period. it stands, after the manner of all cistercian monasteries, in a pleasant fertile vale, watered by a never-failing stream; for the white monks were, next to their religious association, most remarkable for their agricultural and stock-breeding 190pursuits. they were not greatly distinguished for their learning, as were, for example, the benedictines; but as farmers they were pre-eminent, growing corn and breeding sheep and horses more scientifically than any secular agriculturists of their age.

the cistercians, who derived from citeaux, in france, were alternatively styled “bernadines.” they first established themselves in england in 1128: their first abbey that of waverley, near guildford. they stood, originally, for simplicity, in life and worship. “they spent their life,” says peter of blois, “on slender food, in rough vesture, in vigils, confession, discipline, and psalms; in humility, hospitality, obedience, and charity.” we have also the testimony of st. bernard’s words, that “in praying and fast, in study of holy writ, and hard manual labour” they occupied their time.

they were not so dour and solemn as some others of the monastic orders, and typified the spiritual joy that filled their hearts by the white habits they adopted; largely, however, as a protest against the penitential benedictines. for harmony never did exist between the monks of different rules, who were jealous of some and despiteful to others, according to circumstances. most orders, however, united in despising and ridiculing the cistercians, who were in this, as in the simplicity of their rule, and in the severe, unornamental character of their original abbeys, the plymouth brethren and the presbyterians of 191their age. the first type of cistercian house was almost as simple as a dissenting chapel of our own times. in the churches of other orders the rood was made as ornate, and of as costly materials, as possible: often glowing with gold and silver and precious stones. the cistercian monks, however, remembering that our lord died upon a cross of wood, placed a crucifix of plain wood in their churches, and throughout the whole of the establishment conducted themselves as the sanctified farmers they really were: not even scrupling to absent themselves from mass at harvest-time. if it be true—and it is a noble belief—that “to labour is to pray,” then the early cistercians prayed well; for with all their might they brought lands under cultivation, and tended and improved stock, and helped the world along toward the distant ideal.

but as time went on, and the order grew rich by dint of its own farming and wool-growing successes, and by a never-failing stream of benefactions, the abbots and monks by degrees became arrogant and lazy. they no longer worked in their fields; leaving the practical farming to the lay-brothers and the horde of dependents they had accumulated. as landowners they were even more grasping than secular landlords, and, in common with other orders, were extremely tenacious of their rights of market and other monopolies; thus earning for themselves a hatred which was in course of time to sweep them out of existence. the cistercians were not alone—nor 192perhaps even as prominent as others—in these worldly ways; but they shared in the growing arrogance and luxury of these bodies originally vowed to poverty and practising their vows because they did not own the wherewithal to do otherwise. their churches and domestic buildings were rebuilt elaborately and their abbots travelled en grand seigneur through the country; persons claiming great consideration.

entrance to cleeve abbey.

cleeve abbey derives its name from the swelling hills in the recesses of this valley of the stream, called the roadwater, i.e. the “roodwater.” “cleeve” indicates, in its old meaning, not only a cliff or cleft, but any bold hill. the word is found in the place-names of clevedon, 193near by, and at clieveden, on the thames. there are no cliffs in this gentle vale nearer than the not remarkably large cliffs at watchet. the valley is, indeed, more noted for its quiet pastoral beauty than for ruggedness, and was in olden times known as vallis florida, the “vale of flowers.”

although only the ground plan of the monastic church remains, showing it to have been a building 161 feet in length, and of the transitional period between the norman and the early english styles, the domestic buildings are in very fair preservation, considering their use by so many generations of farmers as hay, corn, and straw lofts. the cloister-garth, now a lawn-like expanse, was, until mr. luttrell cleared it out about 1865, a typical farm-yard, rich in muck. at the same period, the pigsties and various farming outbuildings that had been added in the course of over three hundred years, were cleared away, and the place made more accessible to those interested in these relics of the past. the luttrells, however, do not allow the place to be seen for nothing, and have indeed at least an adequate idea of its worth as a show; a notice confronting the pilgrim to the effect that cleeve abbey is shown on weekdays at one shilling a head: sixpence each for two or more: “special arrangements for parties.”

cleeve abbey is not shown on sundays and that traveller who from force of circumstances comes to it on the sabbath must be content 194with a view of its entrance-gateway only. if he cannot contain his artistic or antiquarian enthusiasm, but must needs peer and quest about on the edge of the precincts, then the fury of the people who occupy the farm, and are at the same time caretakers of and guides to the abbey ruins, and without whose unwelcome company you may not see the place at all, at any time, is let loose over him. whether this be a respect for the sabbath, or for the merely secular rules imposed by the luttrells, or whether it is not more likely to be the rage aroused by the prospect of a stranger seeing for nothing that for which a fee is charged, i will not pretend to declare. you may come at any time over the ancient two-arched gothic bridge from the road, and so through the gatehouse, and through that into the outer court, which is now a meadow, without being challenged: arriving at the further end at the farmhouse, beside which is a wicket-gate admitting into the cloister-garth. “ring the bell,” curtly says a notice-board, with a small “please” added, in hesitating manner, for politeness’ sake; probably by some satirical visitor, wishful of imparting a lesson in manners.

the present explorer was one of those whom circumstances conspire to bring hither on sunday, without the prospect of a return in the near future. he left a bicycle in the gatehouse and came across the meadow, where the base of the old abbot’s market-cross stands with a sycamore growing in the empty socket of its shaft, to the wicket-gate. 195it being sunday, he did not ring, but entered and sat down there in an ancient archway, in would-be peaceful and holy contemplation. what more christian and sabbath-like spirit than this would you have? better, i take it, than the occupation of most of the villagers at that same moment, reading the sunday newspapers, filled (after the manner of the sunday newspaper) with the raked-together garbage of the last seven days.

but this holy calm was not to continue. it was entirely owing to that bicycle. a strategist would have concealed it. its presence under the archway of the gatehouse brought the peaceful interlude to an abrupt conclusion, as shall presently appear.

within the space of an all too short minute or two there appeared two little girls through the wicket-gate, coming home to the farmhouse from a walk, or from sunday school, evidently excited by the sight of that machine, and by the very obvious deduction that the owner of it must be somewhere near. “and very pretty it was,” as pepys might have put it, to see them questing about everywhere except in the right place, and not finding him, sitting there in the grateful shade quite close to them, and really easily to be seen, you know. and after all, it was the intruder himself who revealed his own presence, with the remark, “i suppose you are looking for the owner of that bicycle?” whereupon they ran away and there presently entered upon the scene an angry woman, with inflamed visage and furious 196words; with offensive epithets about “trippers,” and the like. outrageous!

now, to beat a leisurely and dignified retreat under such circumstances is difficult. you owe it to yourself not to be ignominiously routed in disorder, but to draw off your forces from the stricken field calmly and collectedly, inflicting losses upon the enemy, if possible. and then, you know, to be styled a “tripper,” and by a fat farmer-woman! does that not demand retribution?

therefore, “do you presume, woman, to call me a tripper?” seemed the best retort: effective and injurious, and at the same time restrained and dignified.

“woman!” what a deadly offence, what a god-addressing-a-blackbeetle effect this has! it produces rage of the foaming, abusive, incoherent order, in midst of which, with a cold-drawn, blighting smile, you retire, with the consciousness that the thing will rankle for days. but the incident renders a comparison of old times with new in somerset unfavourable to the present age. in the olden days, before every historic spot or architectural rarity had become a show-place, resorted to by a constant stream of visitors, the farmer whose farm happened to be on the site of some ruined abbey would, as a rule, make the visitor courteously welcome at all times, in his homely fashion, and would indeed be pleased to see the rare strangers who came his way; but in these times, now that excursionists are everywhere, 197and in great numbers, ruins have acquired a certain commercial value, and must be hedged about with restrictions.

the refectory, cleeve abbey.

but here we are in the twentieth century, and it were hopeless and foolish to wish ourselves back in the early years of the nineteenth; for not the most perfect examples of that old-time courtesy could recompense for other incidental discomforts.

here, then, facing the road, across the little gothic bridge spanning the roodwater, stands the gatehouse. let us enter—it being weekday—beneath the ample arch of that mingled decorated and late perpendicular building. the upper storey, the work of william dovell, 198the last abbot, bears the hospitable latin welcome:

porta patens esto

nulli claudaris honesto,

metrically rendered:

gate, open be;

to honest men all free.

but more literally translated, “gate, be open; and be closed to no honest man.” it was a favourite threshold invitation with the cistercians; but the later corruption, avarice, and sloth that marked them, in common with other orders, led to a double meaning being fastened upon it, both in england and in france. the latin construction easily admits of a cynical interpretation, figured for us by the still-surviving french punning proverb: “faute d’un point martin perdit son ane; i.e. by the mistake of a full-stop, martin lost his ass;” the original martin of this cryptic saw being the abbot of alne, who was so unscholarly that in setting up the honoured motto, he placed a full-stop after the word “nulli”; thus making the phrase read scandalously,

gate opened be to none.

closed to the honest man.

that unfortunate abbot’s lack of learning caused the enraged people of the district, headed by rival churchmen, to demolish his abbey.

but to return to the sea, at blue anchor, by way of old cleeve.

199past washford—i.e. “watchet-ford”—railway station, and down a leafy lane to the right hand, we come in a mile to the village of old cleeve; its pleasant rustic, vine-grown cottages commanding views of the beautiful bay between blue anchor and the bold promontory of north hill, minehead, from their bedroom windows in the heavily thatched roofs.

there is not much of old cleeve, but what there is, bears the impress of simplicity and innocence, not at all in unison with the scandalous rhyme:

there was a young fellow of cleeve

who said, “it is pleasant to thieve!”

so he spent all his time

in commission of crime—

now he’s out on a ticket-of-leave.

the church of old cleeve is of the usual fine perpendicular character to which we grow accustomed in these parts; with the curious individual feature of a floor gradually, but most distinctly, ascending from the west end of the nave to the chancel. here is an alms-box, dated 1634, and inscribed “tob. 4. pro. 19. remember ye poore. bee mercifvll after thy power. he that hath pitie vpon ye poore lendeth vnto the lord.”

in a recess contrived in the wall of the nave and surmounted by a boldly moulded ogee arch, finished off with a finial in the shape of a human face wearing a somewhat satanic expression of 200countenance, is a recumbent effigy of a civilian of the fifteenth century. this, although blunted and damaged by time and ill-usage, was evidently a fine work in the days of its prime. the effigy has not been identified, and whether it be that of a merchant-prince, or some great local landowner, cannot be said; but the original was, at all events, if we may judge from the care evidently taken by the sculptor with the effigy, a person of importance. a peculiarly charming and dainty—almost a feminine—effect is given by the decorated fillet that encircles the long hair, and by the girdle around the waist; but what will most keenly arouse the interest and the speculation of those who examine the figure is the very striking little sculptured group, of a cat with one paw resting on a mouse, on which the feet of the effigy rest. although the head of the cat is somewhat worn down, the group is still tolerably perfect, and the cat is seen to be looking up at the figure, as though seeking her master’s approval.

the question visitors will naturally ask, “has this representation of sculptured cat and mouse any particular meaning here?” at once arises; but no facts, or legends even, are available. it is curious to note, however, that sir richard whittington—the famous “dick whittington,” the hero of the “dick whittington and his cat” story—was contemporary, or very nearly contemporary, with the unknown man represented here. it is not suggested that the 201fact is more than a coincidence: but it is a curious one.

mysterious effigy at old cleeve.

in the porch is an ancient, greatly timeworn 202chest, with three locks and a slit in the lid, for the reception of “peter’s pence” and other contributions. as the chest is about six feet in length and proportionably deep, it is evident that the expectations were not modest. let us trust the faithful took the hint and contributed accordingly.

and so by delightful lanes to blue anchor, where the railway runs along the shore and has a station of that name. blue anchor station must in its time have misled many strangers, for where a railway station is, there one expects a town, or village, also. but here is a void, an emptiness, a vacuum. only a solitary bay is disclosed before the astounded stranger’s gaze. it is a noble bay, it is true, and commands lovely views of the great north hill at minehead, with dunster nestling midway; and the sunsets are magnificent. but railway companies don’t build railway stations merely for the convenience of those few people who would take a journey especially for sake of a view or a sunset; and it certainly seems as though the great western expected building developments here, long ago, and was still awaiting them. in short, all there is of blue anchor is an old inn of that name, not remotely suggesting a past intimately connected with smuggling, together with a cottage or two.

blue anchor.

unfortunately for the lover of an unspoiled seashore, a formal sea-wall has recently been built, to protect the marshes that here fringe 205the bay from being drowned. the somerset county council built it, at a cost of some ￡30,000. let us hope the luttrells are properly grateful for this public work that so efficiently protects their lands.