and the Kraken, which buries its vast bulk in the muddy ooze of ocean’s depths, only rising from time to time to engulf some unhappy ship beneath the waves.
That our entire country has been pervaded by a belief in such terrible creatures we learn from the names of Wormshead, Great Orme’s Head, Ormesleigh, Ormeskirk, Wormigill, Wormelow, and Wormeslea, with others of a similar character scattered over the land, but in the main we must look to the North of England for legends of any remarkable vigour or beauty respecting them.
Let us begin with the Worm of Sockburn, whose story is interesting from its extreme antiquity, and its connection with an old tenure of land. The manor of Sockburn was for generations held by the presentation of a falchion to the Bishop of Durham on his first entrance into his diocese. This service is said to date from the time of Bishop Pudsey, who purchased from Richard I. for himself and his successors the title of Earl of Sadberge. And from the time of this “jolye Bishop of Durham” (as Hugh Pudsey is called in an old record) to that of Van Mildert, the last of her Palatines, each bishop, as he entered his diocese, was met on Croft Bridge, or in the middle of the River Tees, by the lord of the manor of Sockburn, who, after hailing him Count Palatine and Earl of Sadberge, presented him with the falchion, and said these words:
“My Lord Bishop, I here present you with the falchion wherewith the champion Conyers slew the worm, dragon, or fiery flying serpent, which destroyed man, woman, and child; in memory of which the king then reigning gave him the manor of Sockburn, to hold by this tenure, that upon the first entrance of every bishop into the county this falchion should be presented.”
The Bishop then took the falchion into his hand, and immediately returning it, wished the lord of Sockburn health and a long enjoyment of the manor.
A fragment of verse, which I think we may safely ascribe to Mr. Surtees, the historian of the Palatinate, tells of—
Sockburn, where Conyers so trusty
A huge serpent did dish up
That had else ate the Bishop,
But now his old falchion’s grown rusty, grown rusty.
