As "Awd Isaac " is too long for an anthology, I have
chosen "The Lucky Dream" as an illustration of Castillo's workmanship.
Apart from its narrative interest, this poem calls for attention as a
Yorkshire variant of an ancient and widely dispersed folk-tale, the
earliest known version of which is to be found in the works of the
thirteenth-century Persian poet Jalalu'd-Din. Castillo died at Pickering
in 1845, and five years later a complete edition of his poems was
published at Kirkby Moorside.
Less popular than "Awd Isaac," but often met with in collections of
dialect verse, is the poem entitled "The York Minster Screen." This was
the work of George Newton Brown, a lawyer by profession, who lived at
Nunnington in Ryedale. The poem, which is in the form of a dialogue
between two Yorkshire farmers, was first published at Malton in 1833.
The conversation, which is of the raciest description, is supposed to
take place in York Minster and turns on the repairs which were made in
1832 to the famous organ-screen which separates the nave and transepts
from the chancel. The question of altering the position of the screen is
debated with much humour and vivacity.
Before leaving the North Riding, reference must be made to Elizabeth
Tweddell, the gifted poetess of the Cleveland Hills.
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