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Updated: May 17, 2025
During his last year at Coxwold, when his rollicking, boisterous spirits were much subdued, Sterne completed his 'Sentimental Journey. He also relished more than before the country delights of the village, describing it in one of his letters as 'a land of plenty. Every day he drove out in his chaise, drawn by two long-tailed horses, until one day his postilion met with an accident from one his master's pistols, which went off in his hand.
'He instantly fell on his knees, wrote Sterne, 'and said "Our Father, which art in Heaven, hallowed be Thy name" at which, like a good Christian, he stopped, not remembering any more of it. The beautiful Hambleton Hills begin to rise up steeply about two miles north of Coxwold, and there we come upon the ruins of Byland Abbey.
As was usual with him, however, he postponed commencing it until he should have returned to Coxwold; and, as was equally usual with him, he found it difficult to tear himself away from the delights of London.
Only a few weeks after his arrival in town he was presented by Lord Falconberg with the curacy of Coxwold, "a sweet retirement," as he describes it, "in comparison of Sutton," at which he was in future to pass most of the time spent by him in Yorkshire. What obtained him this piece of preferment is unknown.
And with one more longing, lingering look at the scenes which he had quitted for a lot like that of the Duke of Buckingham's dog, upon whom his master pronounced the maledictory wish that "he were married and lived in the country," this characteristic letter concludes: "Oh, Lord! now are you going to Ranelagh to-night, and I am sitting sorrowful as the prophet was when the voice cried out to him and said, 'What do'st thou here, Elijah? 'Tis well that the spirit does not make the same at Coxwold, for unless for the few sheep left me to take care of in the wilderness, I might as well, nay, better, be at Mecca.
Coxwold is a sleepy village undisturbed by modern progress, its thatched cottages straggling up the crooked street that leads to the hilltop, crowned by the hoary church whose tall, massive octagonal tower dominates the surrounding country.
The tenants were evidently used to visitors, and though they refused any gratuity, our attention was called to a box near the door which was labeled, "For the benefit of Wesleyan Missions." Two or three miles through the byways after leaving Coxwold brought us into the main road leading into York.
Unusually long as was the interval which had elapsed since the publication of the last instalment of Tristram Shandy, the new one was far from ready; and even in the "sweet retirement" of Coxwold he seems to have made but slow progress with it. Indeed, the "sweet retirement" itself became soon a little tedious to him.
Coxwold has that air of neatness and well-preserved antiquity which is so often to be found in England where the ancient owners of the land still spend a large proportion of their time in the great house of the village. There is a very wide street, with picturesque old houses on each side, which rises gently towards the church.
On reaching Coxwold his health appears to have temporarily mended, and in June we find him giving a far better account of himself to another of his friends. The fresh Yorkshire air seems to have temporarily revived him, and to his friend, Arthur Lee, a young American, he writes thus: "I am as happy as a prince at Coxwold, and I wish you could see in how princely a manner I live.
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