nly two female attendants were found, and these were
suffered, by Earl Talbot's orders, to go free.

"This is evidently the ladies' bower, when they happen to be here,"
Lord Grey said; as, an hour later, he entered a room in one of the
turrets, which had been already plundered by the soldiers. "'Tis a pity
that we did not find one or two of Glendower's daughters here. They
would have been invaluable as hostages.

"We were too hasty, Talbot. We should have closely questioned some of
the men, or those two women, and should have found means to learn
whether they were staying here. It may be that it was so, and that they
are, even now, concealed in some secret hiding place, hard by."

He at once called up several of his men, and set them to search every
room in the turret, for some sign of an entrance to a secret chamber;
but although the walls were all tapped, and the floors examined, stone
by stone, no clue was found to such an entrance, if it existed.

The house, which was built entirely of stone, offered no facilities for
destroying it by fire. The doors were all hewn down; the gates in the
wall taken off their hinges, and thrown into the moat, being too
massive to be destroyed by the arms of the soldiers. The outlying
buildings were all burned down, the vineyard rooted up, and the water
turned out of the fish pond. Then, greatly vexed at their failure to
seize Glendower himself, the two nobles rode back to Chirk; leaving a
hundred men, of whom the band from Ludlow formed part, under two of
Earl Talbot's knights, to retain possession of the house, until it
should be decided whether it should be levelled stone by stone; or left
standing, to go, with the estate, to whomsoever the king might assign
it.

By Lord Grey's advice, sentries were posted outside the walls, from
nightfall till daybreak, to prevent any risk of surprise by Glendower,
whose spies might take him word that the main body of the assailants
had left. One of the great halls had been left untouched, to serve for
the use of the garrison; and as an abundance of victuals were found in
the house, and the cellar was well stocked with wines, it was but a
short time before the garrison made themselves thoroughly comfortable.

As soon as it became dark, twenty men were placed on watch. Oswald,
with his party, were to take the third watch, at midnight; and
Mortimer's men-at-arms the second. The captain of each band was to
place the men, at such points as he mig