We should like to record the romantic stories that have woven
themselves around each crumbling keep and bailey-court, to see them in
the days of their glory when warders kept the gate and watching
archers guarded the wall, and the lord and lady and their knights and
esquires dined in the great hall, and knights practised feats of arms
in the tilting-ground, and the banner of the lord waved over the
battlements, and everything was ready for war or sport, hunting or
hawking. But all the glories of most of the castles of England have
vanished, and naught is to be seen but ruined walls and deserted
halls. Some few have survived and become royal palaces or noblemen's
mansions. Such are Windsor, Warwick, Raby, Alnwick, and Arundel, but
the fate of most of them is very similar. The old fortress aimed at
being impregnable in the days of bows and arrows; but the progress of
guns and artillery somewhat changed the ideas with regard to their
security. In the struggle between Yorkists and Lancastrians many a
noble owner lost his castle and his head. Edward IV thinned down
castle-ownership, and many a fine fortress was left to die. When the
Spaniards threatened our shores those who possessed castles tried to
adapt them for the use of artillery, and when the Civil War began many
of them were strengthened and fortified and often made gallant
defences against their enemies, such as Donnington, Colchester,
Scarborough, and Pontefract. When the Civil War ended the last bugle
sounded the signal for their destruction. Orders were issued for their
destruction, lest they should ever again be thorns in the sides of the
Parliamentary army. Sometimes they were destroyed for revenge, or
because of their materials, which were sold for the benefit of the
Government or for the satisfaction of private greed. Lead was torn
from the roofs of chapels and banqueting-halls. The massive walls were
so strong that they resisted to the last and had to be demolished