and Somerset Archaeological Society, and is now most appropriately a
museum. Taunton has seen many strange sights. The town was owned by
the Bishop of Winchester, and the castle had its constable, an office
held by many great men. When Lord Daubeney of Barrington Court was
constable in 1497 Taunton saw thousands of gaunt Cornishmen marching
on to London to protest against the king's subsidy, and they aroused
the sympathy of the kind-hearted Somerset folk, who fed them, and were
afterwards fined for "aiding and comforting" them. Again, crowds of
Cornishmen here flocked to the standard of Perkin Warbeck. The gallant
defence of Taunton by Robert Blake, aided by the townsfolk, against
the whole force of the Royalists, is a matter of history, and also the
rebellion of Monmouth, who made Taunton his head-quarters. This
castle, like every other one in England, has much to tell us of the
chief events in our national annals.

[21] _Taunton and its Castle_, by D.P. Alford (Memorials of Old
Somerset), p. 149.

In the principality of Wales we find many noted strong holds--Conway,
Harlech, and many others. Carnarvon Castle, the repair of which is
being undertaken by Sir John Puleston, has no rival among our medieval
fortresses for the grandeur and extent of the ruins. It was commenced
about 1283 by Edward I, but took forty years to complete. In 1295 a
playful North Walian, named Madoc, who was an illegitimate son of
Prince David, took the rising stronghold by surprise upon a fair day,
massacred the entire garrison, and hanged the constable from his own
half-finished walls. Sir John Puleston, the present constable, though
he derives his patronymic from the "base, bloody, and brutal Saxon,"
is really a warmly patriotic Welshman, and is doing a good work in
preserving the ruins of the fortress of which he is the titular
governor.

We should like to record the romantic stories that have woven
themselves around each crumbling keep and bailey-court, to see them in
the days of their glory when warders kept the gate and watching
archers guarded the wall, and the lord and lady and their knights and
esquires dined in the great hall, and knights practised feats of arms
in the tilting-ground, and the banner of the lord waved over the
battlements, and everything was ready for war or sport, hunting or
hawking. But all the glories of most of the castles of England have
vanished, and naught is to be seen but ruined walls and deserted
halls.