PAPCASTLE.
A mile off Cockermouth, on the north side of the river, lies this Roman station. The river water is very clear, according to its name, notwithstanding the floods here, owing to its running through rocky ground. The Roman castrum lies upon the top of the hill, above the village. I soon traced out its whole circumference, though the inhabitants had not the least notion of where it stood, supposing it to be lower down. I saw a bit of the Roman wall, which they wonder at, because it strikes fire when struck upon with a pick-axe, by reason of the hardness of the mortar: it lies by the road-side going to Wigton; and there the ditch is plainly visible, though half filled up with the rubbish of the wall. The whole town, and perhaps Cockermouth castle and town, are built out of it; likewise the walls of all the pastures and corn-fields adjoining. Free-stone cut is very common, which they say must have been fetched a good way off, because there is none such in the neighbourhood; and a great deal of ashler is still left in the ground. The field upon the top of the hill, the highest part of the castrum, is called the Boroughs. A man told me he found a hand mill-stone about the bulk of his hat, which he admired for its prettiness: he found a Roman coin too of Claudius, and others; but they are lost. Several other people told me they found coins upon the side of the hill; and the children pick them up after a shower of rain. Mr. Senhouse showed me a silver Geta, pont. reverse, princeps juventutis, among others found here. The famous font, now at Bridekirk, was taken up at this place, in the pasture south of the south-east angle of the city, by the lane called Moor-went. In the same place lately they found a subterraneous vault, floored with free-stone, of very large dimensions; the top of it made with the same sort of stone, all brought a distance off. The name of Boroughs includes both closes where the old city, or rather castrum, stood; for they find stones and slates with iron pins in them, coins, and all other matters of antiquity, upon the whole spot below the castrum, toward the water side. This was a beautiful and well-chosen place, a south-west side of a hill, a most noble river running under it, and a pretty good country about it, as one may judge by the churches; for that I find generally a good criterion of the goodness of a country, as Mr. Senhouse observed, who accompanied me hither. On the side of the hill are many pretty springs: at one of them we drank a bottle of wine, to the memory of the founders; then poured some of the red juice into the fountain-head, to the Nymph of the place. A person told us he had dug up, in the Boroughs, the foundation of a wall where the stones were laid slanting side by side, and liquid mortar poured upon them, as was often the Roman method; likewise several floors made of cement. The kind of slates dug up here, are brought too a good way off. Mr. Senhouse says he can trace the remains of the Roman road between this place and Elenborough in many places. This certainly was a town thoroughly peopled; and perhaps its name was Derventio, because standing upon this river Derwent. Fitz-house is on the south side of the river. Mr. Gilpin of Whitehaven has seen many Roman coins found at Papcastle, especially of Adrian.