The ancient oak stands on a steep slope above the beck. It’s been growing here for centuries. When William Wordsworth spent his brief honeymoon close by, he might have found the same tree – if he’d known where to look. And during Henry VIII’s dissolution of the local monasteries, this steadfast oak would have been looking down over its rushing beck, as it had done on the day Robert the Bruce defeated the English at the nearby Battle of Byland in 1322.