keeping the
castle in view the whole time, got good quarters for the mare at the
first hostel we encountered, and proceeded up a country lane to spend
an hour or two among the ruins. The entrance is very fine, and might
give rise to grand historic emotions in people fond of the feudal and
sublime; but in our instance such a train of thought would have been
impossible, for just inside of the majestic portal sat an old harper
thrumming away at the pathetic melody of Jenny Jones. He might as well
have played Jim Crow at once, for romance was put to flight, and we
speedily got as far as we could from the descendant of Talessin. The
Duke of Beaufort has fitted up the ruins in a way that would have
gratified the heart of Mrs Radcliffe. Winding stairs lead, in the
thickness of the walls, from tower to tower, and the dim corridors and
dizzying bartizans are made safe to the most timid of Cockneys by
stout wooden banisters, that enable you to stand as securely on a
crumbling battlement as on the top of Salisbury plain. We saw the
courts and quadrangles, admired the splendid windows, and only
wondered at the lowness of the ceilings of some of the principal
rooms, as from floor to floor could not have been more than seven feet
and a half. There were fountain courts without a fountain; and
chapel-yards with no chapel; why should we speak of kitchens,
conjuring up visions of roasted oxen, and butteries suggestive of
hogsheads of home-brewed ale, when fire-places are now choked up, and
nothing is left of the buttery but a pile of broken stones? At first,
on going in, we dilated on the grand things we should do in the way of
restoration if we were the lord of the castle. First, we would fit it
up exactly as it was in the brave days of old: we should have new
floors put in the audience-chamber; a roof on the great dining-hall; a
stately dais at the upper end, and get it from the hands of Pugin--the
identical castle of the days of Elizabeth. But, on closer inspection,
we came to the conclusion that the natural condition of such buildings
is that of interesting remains. The rooms are low, the passages are
dark, the bed-rooms dog-kennels, the stairs ladders, the court-yards
damp, the windows all turned the wrong way, and, in short, the
sixteenth century an excellent trimmer of popes and conqueror of
armadas, but a very bad architect.

In one of the court-yards was a flock of sheep nibbling at the grass
that had been trodden by the great