[Illustration: SHREWSBURY CASTLE, FROM THE RAILWAY-STATION.]
[Illustration: HEAD-QUARTERS OF HENRY VII. ON HIS WAY TO BOSWORTH FIELD,
SHREWSBURY.]
[Illustration: ON BATTLEFIELD ROAD, SHREWSBURY.]
Westward of Stafford is the land of the "proud Salopians," Shropshire,
through which flows the Severn, on whose banks stands the ancient town
from which the Earls of Shrewsbury take their title. We are told that
the Britons founded this town, and that in Edward the Confessor's time
it had five churches and two hundred and thirty houses, fifty-one of
which were cleared away to make room for the castle erected by Roger de
Montgomery, a kinsman of William the Conqueror. The Norman king created
him Earl of Shrewsbury long before the present line of earls began with
John Talbot. Wars raged around the castle: it was besieged and battered,
for it stood an outpost in the borderland of Wales. It was here that
Henry IV. assembled an army to march against Glendower, and in the
following year fought the battle of Shrewsbury against Hotspur, then
marching to join Glendower. Hotspur's death decided the battle. The
Wars of the Roses were fought around the town, and here Henry VII., then
the Earl of Richmond, slept when going to Bosworth Field; and in the
Civil Wars King Charles had Shrewsbury's support, but Cromwell's forces
captured it. The town is on a fine peninsula almost encircled by the
Severn, and the castle stands at the entrance to the peninsula. Only the
square keep and part of the inner walls remain of the original castle,
but a fine turret has been added by modern hands. In the neighborhood of
Shrewsbury are the remains of the Roman city of Uriconium, said to have
been destroyed by the Saxons in the sixth century. Shrewsbury has always
been famous for pageants, its annual show being a grand display by the
trade societies. It is also famous for its cakes, of which Shenstone
says:
"And here each season do those cakes abide,
Whose honored names the inventive city own,
Rendering through Britain's isle Salopia's praises known."
The great Shrewsbury cake is the "simnel," made like a pie, the crust
colored with saffron and very thick. It is a confection said to be
unsafe when eaten to excess, for an old gentleman, writing from
melancholy experience in 1595, records that "sodden bread which bee
called simnels bee verie unwholesome." The Shropshire legend about its
origin is that a happy couple got into a dispute whether they should
have for dinner a boiled pudding or a baked pie. While they disputed
they got hungry, and came to a compromise by first boiling and then
baking the dish that was prepared. To the grand result of the double
process--his name being Simon and her's Nell--the combined name of
simnel was given. And thus from their happily-settled contention has
come Shrewsbury's great cake, of which all England acknowledges the
merit.