Wallingford was in after-centuries frequently a royal residence; chiefly, it is true, for royal widows and other such extinct volcanoes, Have Beens, and back-numbers; but by the sixteenth century the castle appears to have become dilapidated. Leland, for example, declared it in his time “sore yn ruine”; but Camden, coming after him, said its size and magnificence were amazing to him, as a young man. “My fer-ends, what is ter-ewth?” as Chadband despairingly asked. Perhaps Leland’s capacity for amazement was less than that owned by Camden. After Leland’s time, it must surely have been repaired; or how else could the sixty-five days’ siege have been withstood by the gallant Royalist governor, Blagge, in 1646? I pause for a reply, without, however, in the least expecting one. Six years later, the cautious Parliament caused this stronghold to be blown up, and now all we can see are some rude fragments of walls in the large and beautiful grounds of a private residence, courteously opened on summer afternoons.
Its curious privileges also mark the antiquity of Wallingford. Among them is the nine o’clock curfew, instead of at eight o’clock: said to have been granted as a special favour by William the Conqueror, in recognition of his friendly reception here. The curfew-bell still sounds from the tower of St. Mary-le-More every evening at nine o’clock.
The native-born burghers of Wallingford had the immemorial right (perhaps they have it now, for what it may be worth) of claiming, when tried for a first offence against the criminal law, that, instead of being put to death, they should have their eyes put out and be otherwise mutilated. Those lenient, soft-hearted, sentimental ways of dealing with crime have ever been the curse of the country! At Wallingford, Thomas Tusser, author of Five Hundred Points of Good Husbandry, who was born about 1524 and died 1580, began his career as a chorister in the castle chapel, and appears to have had a sorry time of it here, according to his reminiscent verses,
“What robes, how bare, what college fare!
What bread, how stale, what penny ale!
Then, Wallingford, how wert thou abhor’d
Of seely boys!”
Reason sufficient, it would seem, by those eloquent lines!