jxii. TAUNTON AND DUNSTER. 



Taunton for 800 years, using it as a western residence down from 

 Saxon times. Now nothing was left to them but certain water 

 rights. After reading the inscriptions upon the gateway, " Vive 

 le Roi Henri" and " Laus tibi Xpe," the party entered the 

 ancient building now occupied by Mr. and Mrs. Gray and 

 decorated and furnished in admirable taste. The largest room 

 was a schoolroom, and amongst the old boys who had obtained 

 celebrity was Sir Robert Hart, of China, who spent a year and 

 a-half there. 



From his house he led the way to the supposed site of the Saxon and Norman 

 Castle. (The Saxon Castle was associated with the name of Ilia, King of the 

 West Saxons.) The great hall of the Castle, 120 feet long and 31 wide, is now 

 the principal part of the Museum. The assizes for the county were held in it up 

 to the year 1855 or 1856, and here in 1685 Judge Jeffreys sat to hold the Bloody 

 Assize. He pointed out one of the latest acquisitions of the Museum the state 

 coach in which the Sheriff of the county brought the judges of assize to the 

 court. The earliest part of the castle was of the date 1136, with typical Norman 

 buttresses, and walls of a thickness of no less than 13 feet. 



Entering the Museum and Library, the party proceeded to inspect its treasures, 

 all of which are arranged and described in a manner that reflects great credit on 

 the Curator. Mr. Gray mentioned that the society have a library of 20,000 

 books. Among the miscellaneous objects on view inside the door is a reliquary, 

 supposed to contain the blood of Thomas a'Becket, and an ancient jug with a 

 pewter lid, bearing, it is said, one of the only five signatures of William 

 Shakespere known to exist, with the date of 1602. In Roman tesselated floors 

 the Somerset Museum is not so rich as the Dorset ; but one fine specimen of 

 Roman mosaic depicts with wonderful life and modernity of feeling two hunters 

 bringing home a stag killed in the chase. The stag is slung by the legs on a pole 

 borne on their shoulders. Each hunter has a spear in his hand, and the 

 indispensable dog is also in the picture. As Mr. Gray observed, the designs of 

 these mosaics are usually geometrical patterns, and a scene of the chase like this 

 is of far greater interest. The party proceeded to inspect the implements of the 

 Bronze Age in which, Mr. Gray remarked, the Museum is rich, and which 

 includes fine bronze swords, six palstaves, or axes, and a broken spearhead found 

 in the laying of a drain between Wilton Church and Sherford, and the founder's 

 hoard of bronze implements discovered in Wick Park, near Stogursey, in 1870, 

 and deposited on loan by Sir Alexander Acland Hood. In the same case the 

 visitors had the good fortune to see the latest and perhaps the greatest treasure 

 of all the much-talked-of British gold tore, or torque, found recently at 

 Hendford Hill, near Yeovil. The tore, which looks as fresh and bright as if it 

 had just come straight from the hands of the goldsmith, weighs oozs. and 

 7'5 dwts., and its bullion value is 24. The party next looked at the good 



