TRELECH

CHURCH,

PRIORY,

AND

THE KYMIN

WON ASTOW

TREOWEN

TROY-HOUSE

PERTHIR

NEWCASTLE ·

SCENFRITH CASTLE-GROSSMONT CAS

TLE JOHN of kent.

MONMOUTH is delightfully situated in a gently undulating valley, chiefly in a high state of cultivation, surrounded by high hills: it occupies a sort of peninsula formed by the conflux of the Wye and the Monnow; so that it is nearly incircled by the two rivers. The town is extensive, and contains many good houses; particularly in a principal broad street, which extends from the market-place to an old British or Saxon bridge and gateway over the Monnow. The market-place, with

T 4

the

the town-hall over it, is a handsome building; but sadly disfigured by an awkward statue of Henry the Fifth, which, no doubt, was intended to ornament it.

From this part Mary's church,

a narrow street leads to St. which is also a handsome modern edifice, chiefly remarkable for its grand lofty spire rising 200 feet from the foundation; the tower of which affords an interesting view of the surrounding districts. This structure is engrafted upon a Gothic church that belonged to an Alien Benedictine priory of Black Monks, which was founded in the reign of Henry the First, and dedicated to the Holy Virgin. The priory-house forms a large family residence belonging to Adam Williams, Esq; and contains an apartment which the legend of the place declares to have been the library of the celebrated Geoffery of Monmouth; but the style of the building is by no means so ancient as the time of Geoffery, who, we find, was consecrated bishop of St. Asaph in 1152. mwot on?

"The chronicle of Briton's kings.esa Bo
"From Brute to Arthur's rayne,"

written by Geoffery, has long excited the attention and controversy of the learned: by

some

some it is implicitly believed; and rejected, as altogether fabulous, by others. The moderate opinion here, as in most other cases, is the best this views it as founded on au thentic documents, although distorted by monkish superstition and tricks, and a taste for, the marvellous.'

MONMOUTH CASTLE, situated on the banks of the Monnow in the northern part. of the town, exhibits few memorials of its former extent and magnificence in its present very dilapidated state; and the remaining fragments lose much of their characteristic dignity from the bricky appearance given by the red grit stone of which they are cons structed. Among these broken walls are shewn, with no small degree of exultation, traces of the chamber in which Henry the Fifth, the glory of Monmouth, was born! Adjoining to this is the ruin of a large apartment, sixty-three feet long by forty-six wide, which was probably the baronial hall, and in latter times formed the court of the Assizes. Other vestiges of the castle are evident among stables and out-houses: some vaults under the house of Mr. Cecil, of the Dyffrin, are of

"

the

the oldest character, and may be attributed to Saxon if not to Roman workmanship.

The general building of this castle (though of very remote foundation) may be considered as posterior to the Civil wars in the third Henry's reign; when, we learn, the castle of Monmouth was taken and rased to the ground by Simon Montford, Earl of Leicester. A large mansion on the site of the castle, built with its materials, and engrafted on its ruins, is now occupied as a ladies' boardingschool. Soon after the erection of this house, a Marchioness. of Worcester went thither to lie-in of her first child, at the instance of her grandfather, Henry, first Duke of Beaufort, who was anxious that his descendant should draw his first breath" near the same spot of ground and space of air, where our great hero Henry the Fifth was born." or

- Near the extremity of the town, by the side of the Monnow, is the county gaolera new massive stone building, which in its plan, regulations, and superintendance, does high credit to the public spirit of the county Without the town, at the foot of the Monnow-bridge,is St. Thomas's church, acud

rious old structure which is supposed to have been built by the Saxons.

Monmouth is supposed by Mr. Horsley to have been a Roman station, the Blestium of Antoninus. It is a borough and corporate town, governed by a mayor, and contains about six hundred houses, and two thousand six hundred inhabitants. Woollen Woollen caps were the staple manufacture of Monmouth when that article was in general use; and Shakspeare's Fluellen alludes to this fashion: " If your

Majesty is remembered of it, the Welch"men did goot service in a garden where "leeks did grow, wearing leeks in their "Monmouth caps." But the town has now no manufacture, although there are some iron and tin works in the neighbourhood: its commerce depends on the navigation of the Wye, in the distribution of goods between Bristol, Hereford, and adjoining districts. Yet no small part of its thriving appearance may be attributed to the numerous gentry, that are induced to fix their residence here from the pleasantness of the situation.

Chippenham meadow, an agreeable plain, inclosed by the town, the Wye, and the Monnow, is the general rendezvous of Gwentonian