(Vol. viii., p. 493.)
This place is not "an old out-of-the-way place," as described to F. M., but
stands in a paddock adjoining the churchyard, in the town of "Painswick, in
Gloucestershire." It is a respectable old stone-built house in the
Elizabethan style; and stands on an eminence commanding a view of one of
the pleasant valleys which abound in this parish. I do not know of, and do
not believe that there is, any "full description of it." Neither of the
county histories, of Atkyns (1712), Rudder (1779), Rudge (1803), or
Fosbrook (1807), mentions the court-house, though probably it is referred
to by Atkyns as "a handsome pleasant house adjoining the town, [then]
lately the seat of Mr. Wm. Rogers."
If either Charles I. or II. slept there, it was doubtless King Charles I.,
on the night of the 5th of September, 1643, on which day he raised the
siege of Gloucester, and
"Thousands of the royalist army marched in the rain up Painswick hill,
on the summit of which they encamped in the ancient entrenchment of the
part called Spoonbed hill. On this hill, tradition says, as Charles was
sitting on a stone near the camp, one of the princes, weary of their
present life, asked him 'When should they go home?' 'I have no home to
go to,' replied the disconsolate king. He went on to Painswick, and
passed the night there."--_Bibliotheca Gloucestriensis_ (Webb),
Introduction, p. 68., referring to Rudder (p. 592.) for the tradition
as to the colloquy.
The lodge, an old wooden house, in this parish more properly deserves the
character of an "old out-of-the-way house." I remember it many years ago,
when it contained a court, in which were galleries approached by stairs,
and leading to the sleeping-rooms of the mansion; such as were formerly in
the court-yard of the Bull and Mouth Inn, London, and are now in the yard
of the New Inn, Gloucester.