Alnwick is built on the summit of the southern bank of the Aln,
on a plateau of five acres of ground, walled round with strong
fortifications, defended by sixteen towers, and divided into two large
courtyards, with the Keep in the midst. The Keep is polygonal in form,
faced by nine towers, and is built round a third, or inner court. We
have the northern side of the second courtyard, with the Round (or
Record) Tower; next to that is the abutment, called the Ravine Tower,
in whose recess is the stone seat called “Hotspur’s Chair,” and between
which and the Record Tower is “the Bloody Gap,”--a name given to
that part of the curtain-wall from a breach being there made by the
Scots during some Border war, in a vain effort to capture the castle.
Three hundred Scots are said to have fallen there, and the extent of
“the Bloody Gap” is plainly to be discerned from the variations in
the masonry. We then come to the Constable’s Tower, and the Postern
Tower, or Sally Port, and then to the Keep itself, which was protected
by a low curtain-wall, carried in a semicircle to the Armourer’s
Tower and the Falconer’s Tower. These are the two towers lately swept
away (together with their curtain-wall) in order to accommodate the
arrangements consequent upon the erection of the Prudhoe Tower, for
which also the two north-western round towers of the Keep were also
destroyed. One of these towers contains the ancient banqueting-hall of
the Percies; and the successive sacrifice of these four towers with
their many interesting evidences of feudal times, in order that the
modern Italian interior of the castle might not be interfered with,
has raised a storm of discussion among such distinguished architects
as Scott, Cockerell, Donaldson, Godwin, Pocock, Ferguson, and Salvin,
under whom the recently completed works have been carried out, chiefly
from the designs of Commendatore Canina. These works have been hailed
with applause, and hailed upon with disapprobation. It is an example
of one of those Sir Roger de Coverley cases, where much may be said
on both sides. In the last six years these works have magically
transformed the interior of the feudal castle of the chivalrous Earls
of Northumberland (much debased, it is true, by Batty-Langley and
Strawberry-Hill Gothic) into a Roman palazzo, with the most gorgeous
and costly decorations of the Renaissance. For six years have two
hundred workmen been employed in these alterations; much has been done
at Rome, and much on the spot, especially by the twenty-seven native
wood-carvers. There are no shams in the decorations; the ceilings
and cornices are carved, and not cast or moulded: the walnut and
maple-woods are what they pretend to be; and, to such an extent has
this Ruskinism “conscientiousness of art” been carried that, in this
age of _papier-mâché_, _carton-pierre_, gutta-percha, and the
like, there are several _miles_ of the egg-ornament laboriously
carved by hand, while a door panel has occupied its carver four months,
and a shutter-panel, a twelvemonth. This modern sumptuousness of
decoration is a remarkable contrast to that peculiar species of economy
imposed upon the proud Percies of three centuries back, when Clarkson’s
report (in 1567) advised the taking out of the glass windows whenever
my lord and his friends were not there, and laying them up in safety
until their return, justifying this economical act by the “decaye and
waste” of the windows “throwe extreme winds.”
[Illustration: ALNWICK CASTLE, ENGLAND.]
Next to these now destroyed Armourer’s and Falconer’s Towers, comes the
Abbot’s Tower (the large corner one), where the abbot had apartments,
whenever choice or necessity caused him to leave his abbey, snugly
situated down in the wooded valley by the river-side. Beyond this is
seen the West Garret, and the outer of “Utter Ward,” with its square
and octagonal towers, and its advanced barbican, forming a picturesque
mass of great size and strength, and a noble entrance to a noble castle.
Walking along the parapets from the Round Tower, we pass East Garret.
Beginning at the left hand, we first come to the Guard House, and the
Auditor’s Tower, which flank the southern gate. The south wall is then
continued to the Middle Ward, which, as being the second great entrance
to the castle, is a building of great size and strength. Over it was
the chapel, approached from the library,--a noble room that occupied
the greater part of this block of building--but which has now been
converted into the private apartments of the Duke and Duchess. This
block of building divides the two courtyards, and is terminated in the
Keep, whose two semi-octagonal towers were added, in advance, to the
old square Norman tower, by the second Lord Percy, about the year 1350.
A series of escutcheons on the upper part of the towers helps us to
the date of their erection; and though we know not their architect,
we have full proof that he did his work well, for the towers have not
needed repairs up to this day, and even a rector’s legal adviser would
experience some difficulty in awarding dilapidations. The moat and
drawbridge that guarded the entrance to the Keep have long since passed
away; but, at the time of my visit, a field-piece, backed up by a
pyramidal pile of cannon balls, did harmless duty on either side of the
gateway, and playfully menaced the Auditor’s Tower and the Guard House
on the opposite side of the courtyard.
The ground-floor of the octagonal towers of the Keep is lighted by
long arrow slits that admit a thin wedge of light to the wine-cellar,
on the left hand, and to the chief dungeon, on the right. Each of the
lodges at the various gates was furnished with dungeons; but this was
the chief dungeon for the State offenders. Its size is eleven feet four
inches, by ten feet four inches. In the floor is an iron grating, over
a pit; and, a light being lowered into this for the depth of eleven
feet, discloses a horrible grave (worthy of Naples and the dark ages)
nine feet by eight, into which the wretched prisoner was lowered, or
shot like a sack of coals. Let us thank Heaven that such a place can
now only be shown as a curiosity. The breakfast-room was over the
gateway: we see one of its windows over the mound of the Keep. The
windows in the first round tower, and the windows in the flat wall to
the left, lighted the old dining-room. The next round tower contained
the old drawing-room whose interior shape was that of the ace of clubs.
A portion of the low curtain-wall is seen at the base of the Keep
mound; and then, immediately on the right is the postern tower, or
sally-port. In the lower part was a laboratory; in the upper part, a
collection of old armour, and a museum of miscellaneous antiquities;
Roman remains; small cannon, used at the first invention of gunpowder;
and the old standard bushel of Northumberland, and a chain of several
links, that could be bound around an arm, like an iron chain, and was
carved out of a solid block of stone.
Let us now pass between those two great octagonal towers, and up the
long dark tunnel that will lead us into the heart of the Keep, the
third, or inner court; the carriages rattle under that dark archway
with a peculiar dull sound, for its pavement is of wood, as is
also the pavement of the inner court. It is a polygon, having nine
sides of various dimensions, besides other little angles, and it is
about a hundred feet across from the one side to the other; and,
as it is walled in with high towers on every side, it has somewhat
of a well-like aspect. Its two great architectural and antiquarian
curiosities are the Saxon (or Norman, if you are a great stickler for
this point) mouldings on the inner face of the archway, presenting a
great diversity of enrichments--and the old draw-well, for the use of
the castle during a siege. This is built in the thickness of the wall,
with three pointed arches, surmounted by one large discharging arch, on
the point of which is a humorous-looking corbel, supporting the figure
of a priest, who is in the attitude of blessing the water. The old
axle, with its pegged hand-wheels, still remains, and this interesting
draw-well has not been interfered with in the recent alterations,
though the aspect of the Inner Court has been altered by the addition
of the covered drive.
The limits of this paper do not allow me to say more of Alnwick Castle,
or to touch upon the varied events that have befallen it and its
owners, from those early Percy days when--
“in the Conqueror’s fleet
Lord William shipp’d his powers,”
(as one of the family has told us in his ballad of the _Hermit of
Warkworth_) down to those later times of handsome Hugh Smithson,
the London apothecary, and his descendants, when, as the American
poet Halleck sings in that ballad, which is not so well known (in its
entirety) as it deserves to be:--
“The present representatives
Of Hotspur and his gentle Kate,
Are some half-dozen serving-men,
In the drab coats of William Penn--”
who will bow you
“From donjon vault, to turret wall,
For ten-and-sixpence sterling.”
I have not space to dwell upon these matters, although there is very
much to interest us in the records of the Castle and its owners,
and much for salient anecdote and gossip, not only as to the people
but also their manners and customs. As, for example, that curious
manuscript book, dated 1512, which tells us how the fifth Earl and his
family lived; they had fresh meat from Midsummer to Michaelmas, and
salt meat for all the rest of the year; how the servants rarely had
anything else than salt meat, with few or no vegetables (the roast beef
of Old England being a mere Jack-o’-Lantern to them); how my lord and
lady had no sheets to their bed, and only washed their tablecloths once
a month; how they rose at six, breakfasted at seven on a quart of beer,
a quart of wine, two pieces of salt fish, six red herrings, four white
herrings, and a dish of sprats--half a chyne of mutton and a chyne
of boiled beef being added on flesh days; how they dined at ten and
supped at four, and went to bed at nine; how there were only two cooks,
with two assistants to provide for a household of two hundred and
twenty-three, and how the head cook was so great a monarch that when
he gives an order for the making of mustard it bears this preamble:
“It seemeth good to us and our council;” how the players at Christmas
had twenty-pence for every play, and the rockers in the nursery had as
many shillings each year; how, in the winter, only a peck of coals were
allowed for each fire, and no fires after Lady-day, except half-fires
for my lord and lady, and the nursery. There is all this, and very
much more, that is both curious and interesting, but space, and not
material, fails me.
Nor can I speak of the out-of-door lions of Alnwick,--the park, the
gardens, the model farm, the Duchess’s dairy, the ruins of Alnwick
Abbey, down in the sequestered dell by the river, the ruins of Hulne
Abbey upon the slope of the hill over against the Castle--Brislee
Tower, a Strawberry-hill erection eighty feet high, called by Mr.
Walter White “an elegant structure”; but, in my humble opinion, a
very hideous affair, and a fit companion to Kew Pagoda; and more
useful than ornamental, for the summit commands a glorious view;--the
monument to commemorate the capture of William the Lion, and the cross
to commemorate the death of King Malcolm. It bears the following
inscriptions: “Malcolm III., King of Scotland, besieging Alnwick
Castle, was slain here, Nov. XIII., an. MXCIII.--K. Malcolm’s cross,
decayed by time, was restored by his descendant, Eliz. Dutchess of
Northumberland, MDCCLXXIV.” It is distant about three-quarters of a
mile from the castle, on the opposite side of the river; but, from
what the ancient chartulary of Alnwick Abbey says, the spot where
Malcolm died was two or three hundred yards nearer to the castle,
where Malcolm’s Well now is. Malcolm was ravaging Northumberland with
fire and sword, and, in due course, laid siege to Alnwick, which was
stoutly defended by Moroll of Bamburgh. When the garrison could hold
out no longer, a certain man rode forth to Malcolm, bearing the keys
of the castle tied to the end of his spear, and presented himself in a
suppliant posture, as being come to surrender up possession. Malcolm
advanced to receive the keys, when the soldier pierced him with a
mortal wound, and, dashing through the swollen river, escaped by the
fleetness of his horse. Malcolm dropped dead; a panic arose among the
Scots, and the desperate defenders of Alnwick made a successful sortie,
and put their enemy to the rout. Prince Edward, Malcolm’s eldest son,
received mortal wounds in this fight. The old Abbey chronicle says that
the soldier’s name was Hammond, and the place where he swam the river
was called “Hammond’s Ford.” But Hector Bœtius has improved the story
into a legend, and says the soldier’s name was Mowbray, and that he
pierced Malcolm through the eye, and from that circumstance acquired
the name of Pierce-eye, and became the founder of the proud family of
Percy, Earls of Northumberland. A very pretty legend, but somewhat
damaged by obtrusive facts, especially by that fact that the ancestor
of the family was that William de Percy, of the town of Percy in Lower
Normandy, who was one of the Norman chieftains who came over with the
Conqueror, and whose name is recorded in the rolls of Battle Abbey.