splendour and their power; while the people of almost every realm, after experiencing the vicissitudes of eventful Time, are again placed in a state of solid security.

Multa dies, variusque labor mutabilis Ævi
Retulit in melius; multos alterna revisens
Lusit, et in solido rursus Fortuna locavit.

VIRGIL.

This part of the subject may not improperly be closed with the following Lines, written some years since, by the author of the present work, amidst the scenery which they attempt to celebrate.

Grand Edifice! uplifted in the air,

As if surveying yonder golden skies,
Where Day's bright Orb in glory sinks to rest,
And proudly spurning from thy lordly foot

All sublunary things! how is my soul

Impress'd with solemn feeling, when thy courts
Silent I tread! and tho' the busy world,

Whence I have flown to solitude and peace,

Contain what I do value more than life,

Strewing my path with flowers-yet, here to muse
On coming Time,-Time, merging in the flood
Of vast Eternity-to ponder, too,

On Time gone by,-eventful various Time,
Checkered with joys and woes -'tis profitable.
Fabric of ancient days! elder than aught
That boasts resembling Form in Albion's isle,-
Dome of the Sire of kings! my willing feet
Thee visit, at this still congenial hour,

When Hesperus, bright herald of the night,
Prelusive to the hosts of lesser stars,

His solitary lamp o'er western climes

Hangs lovely.-Scene of holy Quietness!

Where nought is heard, save the cyclopean blows
Of ponderous hammers, thundering from afar
Falling, at slow and measured intervals

On fiery masses of ferruginous Ore;

Or the distinctless hum of many tongues,

As if all jubilant that Toil, no more

Demands accustomed Care: where nothing moves,

Save the quick-flitting bat, that wheels her course
(Now seen, now lost) around thy chinky walls,—
Thou Scene, which pensive meditation loves!
Receive me now, a lonely visitant,

To tread thy lofty heights, while yon fair plains,
Spread like a map beneath me, seem as friends
By separation left, at that calm hour,
When mounts the spirit to a brighter sphere.

Emblem of mortal man, bow'd down with age! How chang'd from what thou wert, ere, speeding on, O'er thee a thousand years began to roll!

Then, echoing through thy glades, the Warder's horn,
Sounded from yonder Tow'r, proclaim'd aloud
Approach of princely Guest, with liv'ried train
A shining band, and knights, for chivalrous deeds
Noted afar, emerging from yon arch ;-

Lo! these, methinks I see to Dudley's Chief,
Great Dodo, wending slow their gallant way.

Then, ancient Pile! when cent'ries yet were young,
Adorn'd in all the majesty of State,

Were seen thy spacious halls, while fairest dames,
And warrior-champions grac'd the festal board.

Departed Pomp! where are thy glories now?
Thy Grandeur all is gone! thy mouldering walls
Thy Monument,-themselves departing too,
Will need some chronicler to say they were!

But tho no Chieftain mid a vassal train
Here hold despotic sway, still, in my breast,
Dost thou, fam'd Castle! rev'rence high maintain.
What, tho' no minstrel sweep the sounding lyre,→
The wild winds' music round thy nodding towers
Delights me; and tho' now, on cedar floor,

No sprightly fair ones, pair'd with courtly youths,
Move in the mazy dance, I love to see

The ivy and the unmolested weed

Trailing along the moss-invested stones,

Fall'n-fall'n long since, half buried with their weight. There, mid the rudely-sculptur'd fragments, lo!

Atropa hangs her dark florescent bells,

Or (when comes autumn-tide) like rubies bright,

Berries seductive to the incautious eye

Of truant children,-berries drugg'd with death!

Fit product of a soil ensanguin'd oft

By martial strife; when, from these ramparts high,

The Baron-Despot look'd defiance bold

On the subjacent plains, tho' serried ranks

Sent, from unnumbered bows, "the arrowy show'r,"

* Atropa Belladonna, Deadly Nightshade.

P

Or tho' from yonder hills with verdure cloth'd,
Camc, thundering on his bastioned fastnesses,
Percussive balls, indenting the ribb'd towers
With angry vengeance; and, from many a heart,
Brave as what beat in thy disputed Pass,
Thermopola! bidding life's current flow.*

Alike have vanish'd now, thou hoary Pile!
Each circumstance of pomp, and acts like these.
Far better days are thine. What, tho' hurl'd down
Thy battlemented coronal of stones:-

It is not needed. For, no tyrant-king

Vexes, with iron sway, a groaning land;

But GEORGE THE GOOD rules with far mightier pow'r

The pow'r of Righteousness-a loyal realm:

While, Lord of thee, thou venerable Pile!
Ennobled by Desert and generous deeds,

More than by titled Honours, Dudley's Peer
Spreads thro' a wide and populous domain,
Beneficence. What, tho' yon Moon

Shoot her pale beams thro' crannied walls, once braced
With triple strength, Security, around,

Sleeps sweet as infant, pillow'd on the breast

Of its chaste mother, tranc'd in nuptial bliss.
Dwelling august! now, like some giant's frame,
Palsied by age—may Time, relenting, spare,
Till his own doom, thy reverend Relics grey;
When Castles, Kingdoms, and the mighty Globe,
Blended in one vast Ruin, shall dissolve!

*The Castle is supposed to have been cannonaded from a piece of ground on the eastern side of Cawney hill. Several balls (some of them 32 pounders) have been found among the ruins.

A LIST OF PLANTS, &c.

GROWING (MANY OF THEM INDIGENOUSLY) NEAR THE

Paris quadrifolia ............Four-leaved herb Paris Pimpinella saxifraga........Saxifrage Anise

Plantago media var.foliosa Plantain

Solanum Dulcamara........Sweet-bitter Nightshade

Thymum serpyllum

...

Ulmus campestris

Ulmus suberosa

Ulmus montana.

Ulmus Glabra

Wild Thyme, or running

TREES.

Betony

...Com. small-leaved Elm

..Com. cork-barked Elm

Broad-leaved Elm
Smooth-leaved or Wych
Elm

In Mr. Shaw's History of Staffordshire, the Dulcamara is erroneously stated to be synonymous with the Atropa Belladonna; whereas they are distinct Plants. They both grow abundantly upon the Castle Hill:-but the Atropa Belladonna alone is poisonous.

So large and numerous were, formerly, the Trees which surrounded the Castle, that it was called "the Castle in the woods." Of these ancient tenants very few now remain: nor are there more than three kinds of them on the hill, that are particularly distinguishable; namely, the Wych Elm, the Ash, and the Hawthorn. A remarkable variety, or Lusus Naturæ, in the former genus, is still standing in the Foxyard Colliery, about a mile beyond the Castle. The common people call it "the bow-down Tree," because every branch and every leaf of it incline towards the earth. Even the young shoots from its gnarled trunk, immediately on their first appearance, take that direction, as if the tree had been turned topsy-turvy. Its age probably is not less than three centuries: and,