The post-office is in one of the
oldest cottages. Its massive oak forks must have endured for many
centuries, and the framework of the doorway leading into the garden behind
must be of almost equal antiquity.
Between the years 1764 and 1766, John Wesley, on his northern circuit,
visited this unassuming little village and preached in the pulpit of the
parish church. A circular sun-dial bearing the motto "We stay not," and
the date 1782, appears above the porch, and the church is entered by a
fine old door of the Perpendicular period. A paddock on the west side of
the graveyard is known as the nun's field, but I have no knowledge of any
monastic institution having existed at Middleton. Aislaby, the next
village to the west, is so close that one seems hardly to have left
Middleton before one reaches the first cottage of the next hamlet. There
is no church here, and the only conspicuous object as one passes westwards
is the Hall, a large stone house standing close to the road on the south
side. Wrelton is only half a mile from Aislaby. It stands at the
cross-roads where the turning to Lastingham and Rosedale Abbey leaves the
Helmsley Road. The cottages are not particularly ancient, and there are no
striking features to impress themselves on the memory of the passer-by. At
Sinnington, however, we reach a village of marked individuality. The broad
green is ornamented with a bridge that spans the wide stony course of the
river Seven; but more noticeable than this is the very tall maypole that
stands on the green and appears in the distance as a tapering mast that
has been sloped out of perpendicular by the most prevailing winds.
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