Читать книгу Memorials of Shrewsbury - Henry Pidgeon - Страница 9

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from which the last Norman Earl of Shrewsbury issued with the keys of the gates to make submission to Henry I. Although the masonry of the jambs of this noble gateway is singularly irregular, it has, through a period of nearly 800 years, retained its strength unshaken amid the ravages of time and war. It was formerly defended by a portcullis and towers.

The keep consists of two large round towers, embattled and pierced, connected by a square building of about 100 feet in length.

The interior is much altered from its original appearance, and now forms a handsome private residence, modern pointed windows having been placed therein when it was repaired by Sir William Pulteney, about the close of the last century. The drawing room is supposed to have been the guard chamber in the time of Charles I. The castle still retains one mark of its ancient dignity, for in the area of the inner court the knights of the shire are nominated, and when the result of the election is declared, are girt with their swords by the Sheriff. On the north-east side of this court is a postern, built in the time of Charles I.; and the battlements of the western wall have an interior platform, and are curiously pierced with narrow eyelets for the convenience of the cross-bowmen, around which time has wove its ivy mantling.

On the south side within the court is a mount, [16] rising upwards of 100 feet above the bed of the river. The summit is surrounded by a wall, and crowned by a watch tower, which forms a bold and beautiful object. The tower was rebuilt during the repair of the castle, from a design and under the superintendance of the late Thomas Telford, Esq. who was then residing with Sir William Pulteney. In this elevated tower Mr. Telford wrote the beautiful poem to his countryman Burns, and thus alludes to its site near the river Severn:—

No distant Swiss with warmer glow

E’er heard his native music flow,

Nor could his wishes stronger grow

Than still have mine;

When up this ancient mount I go

With songs of thine.

The sides of the mount are richly planted, and the summit commands a view of unrivalled beauty, with the most extensive amphitheatre of mountains of which perhaps the island can boast, inclosing within its wide sweep an eminently fertile, finely wooded, and beautifully diversified champagne country. ’Tis here that, after the eye has wandered from object to object, from the foreground to the most extreme distance with delight, that the words of Cowper naturally occur, as if written upon such as spot—

“Oh, scene surpassing fable, and yet true!”

It is now difficult to form an adequate idea of the original extent of this fortress; but it is certain that the castle formerly occupied a much larger space than is now marked out by its walls, the ballium (or outer court) extending within the town probably as far as the water-lane. The northern and north eastern sides were defended by a deep ditch or vallum encompassing the base of the bold and natural elevation on which the castle stands, having a communication with the river, but it is now filled up and forms a thoroughfare.

The remains of a duplicate rampart is distinguishable on the western side; and other outworks and towers might have stood near the front of the present county gaol, the Severn being a protection towards the east.

In auncient tyme our elders had desire,

To buyld their townes on steepe and stately hill;

To shewe that as their hearts did still aspyre,

So should their works declare their worthie will.

Churchyard.