ege when Hugh de Mortimer espoused the cause of Stephen,
and was attacked by Henry II., whose life was saved by the zeal of an
attendant, who received a well-aimed arrow intended for the king. It was
taken by the confederate barons, and retaken by Edward II., who
afterwards marched to Shrewsbury, where the proud Mortimers humbled
themselves and sued for mercy. It served not only as a garrison and a
prison, but, from its position on the frontier of Wales, very often as a
royal residence. King John came with a splendid retinue, of which the
bishops of Lincoln and Hereford, the earls of Essex, Pembroke, Chester,
Salisbury, Hereford, and Warwick formed part; upon which occasion the
entertainment is said to have cost, for the three days it lasted, a sum
equal to 2,000 pounds of modern currency. Prince Edward was a visitor
after the battle of Evesham; and the second Edward too--the first time at
the head of his army, the second, as a fugitive, crossing the Severn in a
small boat at nightfall. Henry IV. was here:

"On Wednesday next, Harry, thou shall set forward;
On Tuesday, we ourselves will march.
Our meeting is Bridgnorth; and, Harry, you
Shall march through Gloucester; by which account
Our general forces at Bridgnorth shall meet."

Charles I. arrived here from Shrewsbury, October, 1642, when he remained
three days and gave expression to the eulogium, which townsmen quote for
the benefit of strangers, respecting the beauty of the castle walk. It
was garrisoned for this unfortunate monarch, too, in the struggle which
cost him his head, upon which occasion the town was stormed by three
divisions of the Parliamentary army, March, 1646. The fight waxed
hottest near the north gate, and in the old churchyard, where the leader
of the loyalists fell. That the adherents of the king were not "all on
one side," would appear from the fact that the town's defenders were
pelted upon retiring to the castle by the inhabitants, treatment which
they seem to have deserved in setting fire to the town, bombarding St.
Leonard's, burning the adjoining buildings and driving the wretched
population in search of such shelter as the rocks and woods afforded.

The garrison capitulated on the 26th of April, 1646, in consequence of a
mine, by which the Parliamentary leader proposed to blow up the castle
and set fire to their magazine, then in St. Mary's Church, which stood
within the castle walls. Ecclesiastical dignitaries of