[Illustration: OLD WEYMOUTH.]

Within the Guildhall is to be seen a chest from the captured Armada
galleon and an old chair from Melcombe Friary, of which some poor
remnants existed in Maiden Street almost within living memory. On the
other side of the harbour is Holy Trinity Church, built in 1836. This
has another fine altar painting of the Crucifixion, thought by some
authorities to be by Vandyck.

Certain portions of old Weymouth are very picturesque, with steep
streets and comfortable old bow-windowed lodging-houses patronized
almost exclusively by the better class of seafarer; merchant captains,
pilots and the like. A few of the lanes at the upper end of the
harbour may be termed "slums" by the more fastidious, but it is only
to their outward appearance that the word is applicable. Some of these
cottages are of great age and a number have been allowed to fall to
ruin. In Melcombe Regis at the corner of Edmund and Maiden Streets may
be seen, still embedded in the wall high above the pavement, a cannon
ball shot at the unfortunate town during the Civil War, in which
unhappy period much damage was done, the contending parties
successively occupying the wretched port to the great discomfort of
the burgesses.

Radipole Lake is the name given to the large sheet of water at the
back of Melcombe, formed by the mouth of the Wey before it becomes
Weymouth Harbour. The name is actually "Reedy Pool," so that "lake" is
a tautology reminding one of a similar blunder, often made by folks
who should know better, in speaking of "Lake" Winder_mere_. Radipole
is spoilt by an ugly railway bridge and some sidings belonging to the