BERRY POMEROY CASTLE. 135 



and thirty long. It bears the arms of Pomeroy cut in granite, 

 and is clothed in a rich vest of ivy ; the room above was probably 

 a chapel, A dilapidated staircase conducts us into the gloomy, 

 damp, and arched vaults, winding beneath the wall of the castle, 

 through whose massive masonry an occasional loop-hole admits 

 sufficient light to render " darkness visible. " This passage termi- 

 nates in circular chambers which are commonly called the dun- 

 geons, and many an idle tale is told of the ladies fair who have 

 pined away within their mealancholy walls. 



The remaining part of the building frequently attracts more 

 attention, as it occupies a conspicuous place in the quadrangle of 

 the ancient castle. It is a common error to confound these ruins, 

 and a person unacquainted with antiquities loses much of the 

 interest excited by Berry Pomeroy, in consequence of this mistake 

 It ough to be borne in mind that there is, at least a difference of 

 FIVE HUNDRED YEARS between the ages of the two buildings. The 

 modern portion, which may readily be distinguished by its tran- 

 som windows, was erected by the Seymours who bought the 

 property about the middle of the sixteenth century. Of this very 

 extensive mansion the northern and eastern sides only were com- 

 pleted, and that in a style of magnificence which cost twenty 

 thousand pounds. The apartments were truly splendid, and the 

 dining hall, (we learn from Prince who was vicar of the parish,) 

 was enriched with statues and figures carved in alabaster, and 

 with a chimney-piece of polished marble curiously engraven. The 

 marble mouldings and pannels of the other rooms were so bright, 

 that they answered the purpose of mirrors. A walk of consider- 

 able length led from the door of the great hall, arched over with 

 free stone, richly carved, and on the side away from the banquet- 

 ting house supported by free-stone pillars of the Corinthian order, 

 surmounted by highly-wrought friezes. The hand of man just 

 raised all this magnificence to live the brief period of half a cen- 

 tury ; for about that time from the erection of the building, it 

 was almost totally destroyed by lightning ; or at least so much 

 damaged that the family (principally in consequence of their 

 circumstances in the civil wars) did not feel equal to restore it. 

 Prince does not mention this fact, for we believe there existed at 

 the time some misunderstanding between him and the Seymours ; 

 but he alludes to it, when he says that " one and the same age saw 

 the rise and fall of this noble structure. " It has been idly con- 

 jectured that the Castle was dismantled in the civil wars, and it 

 has excited surprise that there are no vestiges of a siege ; it was 

 undoubtedly destroyed about that period in the manner we have 

 stated, but the tradition of any military operations is obviously in- 

 correct. 



The ruins of both these edifices are now seen in the last stage 

 of their splendour, crumbling side by side under the hand of time ; 

 the walls are enshrouded in flaunting ivy, and the fern-leaves nod 

 in the breeze on the broken turrets ; the song of the bird is now 



