This floor had two windows towards the north and south-west, the openings of which are about 18 inches broad, with plain equilateral heads. The former opens from a recess 7 feet 4 inches broad, having stone side-seats; between which, in the floor, is the trap descending into the dungeon. The other window has a recess 6 feet 10 inches broad, with a stone seat on its left side. In its right, or west jamb, is a door 2 feet 5 inches wide, square headed, beneath a drop relieving arch; from which rises a mural stair 2 feet 5 inches broad, lighted by two exterior loops, and with a flat covering, leading to the second floor. The window recesses are segmental, and are formed of excellent limestone tufa ashlar.
The second story had a timber floor resting on twelve corbels, and is cylindrical, like the first, and of the same diameter, but higher. It was the best room. Besides its entrance door on the west, it has on the south-west a fireplace under a flat segmental arch with plain chamfer, above which are two slender octagonal corbels, which evidently supported a hood, probably of timber. There are also two windows beneath drop-arch recesses, towards the south-east and north-east. The former has stone seats; and the latter a light 2 feet broad, with a cinquefoil head, of which the central foil is an ogee. The head is made of two stones only. The moulding is plain, having a shutter rebate inside; and outside, rounded jambs in place of the usual chamfer. This recess has a stone seat on the west side only. In the east jamb is a small square-headed door opening upon a mural stair of 2 feet 5 inches broad, of which nineteen steps remain, and which led to the third floor.
The stair is lighted by a small hole below, and above by a square-headed loop of 9 inches in a recess splayed to 3 feet 7 inches opening. The loop, though about 60 feet from the ground, was closed by one vertical and three horizontal bars. This floor may have been used as a prison.
The third stage has walls 8 feet thick, and had a wooden floor. The stair from below opened into it on the south-east side, but seems to have been continued in the south wall, so as to reach the battlement platform, now entirely gone. This floor has a small mural chamber, no doubt a garderobe, on its west side, the door into which is narrow, and has an arch of two stones, which seems to be four-centred, or of Tudor pattern. This door is placed between a window on the north-west, the recess of which has a flat drop arch; and another on the south-west, of which the recess is broken away. There is also a small fireplace on the north side, and another window to the north-east.
In the wall close south of the mural chamber are two small square shafts, one of which was no doubt a chimney and the other perhaps a garderobe vent from the battlements.
Bronllys Tower presents divers peculiarities. Though of rude masonry, its door and window dressings are excellent. In general design it resembles early English work; but its doors, recesses, fireplace, and corbels, seem of early Decorated, and perhaps, in parts, of Perpendicular work. It is altogether superior in detail to Penrice, which it resembles in dimensions, and it is inferior to Tre-Tower. The walls may be safely assigned to the first quarter of the thirteenth century; but it was no doubt inhabited as a place of defence, and afterwards as a dwelling, for two centuries and a half after this; and from time to time it received certain alterations, of which the present fireplace-front, the cinquefoiled and other windows, and the entrance to the mural chamber in the upper floor, may be cited as instances. The vault of the basement is possibly original, but may be an addition.
THE CASTLES OF BROUGH AND BROUGHAM, WESTMORELAND.
“ANNE Dorset, Pembroke, and Montgomery,” Baroness Clifford, Westmoreland, and Vesci, hereditary sheriff of Westmoreland, and Lady of the Honour of Skipton, in Craven, was in every way a remarkable woman: she was of high birth, held large estates, was the widow of two considerable peers, and had received and largely profited by an excellent education. To a strong and copious memory she added a sound judgment and a discerning spirit. She was a person of great firmness of character, and passed her life amidst events that exercised and strengthened that quality. Among the many subjects upon which she was informed, and which ranged, says Dr. Donne, from “predestination to slea silk,” was included a very close knowledge of the particulars of her own estates, and a very thorough determination to maintain her houses and castles in good repair. She found the castles of her Clifford and Vipont ancestors, Appleby, Brougham, and Brough, in ruins; she restored and made them habitable, and, though time and the hand of the spoiler have again brought two of them, Brougham and Brough, to decay, their walls still exhibit much of the amending hand of the great Countess, as well as of the original work of her remote ancestors.