e
presume neither to question nor emulate. We do not venture to trespass
on paths so much more ably trodden; what pleases or strikes the eye of
the simple observer, we may note, perhaps often deriving sensations of
pleasure from objects that may offend the cultivated taste of the
connoisseur, but as we plead ignorance, we trust to meet with indulgence.
Associations, rather than details of outline, cluster round our minds in
visiting these scenes, and on them we dwell.

The kitchens and dormitories were also on this floor, the former
accessible by a long narrow passage in the north wall, from the spiral
stairs in the north-east angle.

The next floor was occupied by the state apartments; and on the exterior
of the west side are four large windows with central columns, opposite to
corresponding openings in the inner wall for the admission of light into
the interior. The gallery on this side contains three little recesses,
or chambers, as they would have us call them, benched on either side, and
probably intended as waiting-rooms for the attendants. It communicated
with the south-west flight of stairs, but although these yet remain, they
are not safe to be explored.

The gallery on the north side has similar windows, and is reached by the
north-east staircase, with which the kitchen gallery communicates; the
passage is vaulted, and the tracings of large archways, in the inner
wall, filled in by masonry, have led to the idea that a large banqueting
chamber traversed this side of the building, the entrance to which would
be immediately connected with the grand entrance from the tower. Another
gallery, somewhat similar, runs along the south wall, not now accessible.
These three galleries are all that remain entire of the original
apartments, the various archways and outlines in the walls, rather
suggesting than deciding questions concerning the arrangement of the
interior filling up.

Having finished our explorings among these hollow portions of the walls,
the winding stairs lead on to the giddy heights of the ramparts, where a
scene awaits the adventurer's eye, that may well repay a steady effort to
conquer the propensity to walk over the unprotected side towards the
court within. And here we pause to take a survey of the picture as it
lies out before us; houses, slated, tiled, thatched and leaded, with
their forests of chimneypots, the growth and accumulations of centuries;
high pinnacles of brick, sending forth th