Rev. J. W. Dunn on Warkworth. 47 



they would tell of beneath the shadow of that archway, " in 

 piping times of peace," — whisperings of warm hearts now 

 cold and pulseless — of what deaths, dreary desolate deaths, 

 and groans and miseries they would tell, what time the Percy 

 rode forth, perforce, to slay and to subdue, instead of, as now, 

 to com.fort and to bless. 



The outside walls and towers, including the principal en- 

 trance, which you will not fail to examine in detail, noticing 

 among other things its peculiar buttresses, are for the most 

 part considered to be the earliest portions of this mass of 

 masonry — 



"this worm-eaten hold of ragged stone." 



Although built at a later period than the Keep, it will 

 answer our purpose best to consider next in order the Lion 

 Tower, whose mutilated blazonings of Percy and Lucy and 

 Herbert read us a mournful lesson of the short-lived en- 

 durance of man in his best estate. Casting your eyes upwards 

 from the fragment of the grim Lion, " verie workmanlie 

 wrought," which has given a name to this tower, under the 

 moulding, over the escutcheon to the right, you will observe a 

 curious emblem, which Mr. Longstaife, in his elaborate trea- 

 tise on the "old heraldry of the Percys," has been the first 

 to explain. The figure until lately was supposed to represent 

 a pilgrim's purse, and to be a clumsy pun perhaps upon the 

 family name. Mr. Longstaffe, amongst his other researches, 

 has ascertained it to be a " bascule" — a sort of swing used in 

 fortifications and the badge of the house of Herbert. This 

 discovery is the more valuable because it fixes this tower to 

 be the work of the 4th Earl of Northumberland, i. e., not 

 earlier than 1461, nor later than 1489. 



Before taking leave of the Lion tower, I may state, that 

 what is believed to have been the baptismal font of the castle 

 chapel is now placed within the ruin. Beneath its shadow 

 you will notice also a huge round blue stone, to which there 

 attaches a story which it may be as well to record. 



Years ago, it is said, the custodian of the Castle, dreamed 

 three times, on a certain night, the same dream ; which 

 was, that in a part of the enclosure, made known to him 

 in the dream, there lay buried beneath a blue stone, an 

 untold treasure. This miraculous revelation he had not 

 the wit to keep to himself, and in an unlucky hour he 

 told the whole to a neighbour, stating, at the same time, that 

 his faith was such, that he Avould take the first opportunity 



