St. George's Gate. Tenby.
A stone's-throw farther on rises the broad bulk of the great St. George's Bastion, marking the entrance to one of the principal town gates, and pierced with five archways, in two of which the grooves for the portcullis may still be discerned. Overhead a gangway ran around the inner face of the wall, which is provided with lancet-holes for the use of archers, and is crowned with the usual corbelled battlements. Altogether this fine old structure presents a most picturesque appearance; its ancient archways being frequently enlivened by groups of market folk passing to and fro, while the rough gray stones of its venerable walls are wreathed with masses of flowering plants. A number of shabby dwellings which encumbered the approach have recently been swept away; one dilapidated old building with curious circular chimneys (said to have been used as a lazar-house) alone being spared.
Beyond St. George's Bastion rises another ivy-mantled tower, near which we espy a stone panel let into the wall, bearing the superscription 'Ao 1588, E. R.' Being interpreted, this inscription records that Tenby walls were repaired in the thirtieth year of good Queen Bess's reign.
Farther on the wall is pierced with a wide open archway, and terminates abruptly upon the precipitous edge of the cliff in a square, battlemented turret bearing a strong family likeness to the church towers of this locality. The walls seem to have been pierced with a double row of lancet-holes for the use of archers, the upper tier being commanded by a gangway carried upon pointed arches, while the lower row is accessible from the ground.
The day waxing warm and sunny, we now make for the harbour again, and charter one of the numerous well-found pleasure-boats which lie in wait for visitors. An hour's pleasant sail over a sea blue as the Mediterranean, and we land upon the shores of Caldey Island, like the Old Man of the Sea, pick-a-back fashion astride the boatman's back.
'This island,' says George Owen, 'is verie fertile and yeldeth plentie of corne; all their plowes goe with horses, for oxen the inhabitantes dare not keepe, fearing the purveyors of the pirattes as they themselves told me, whoe often make their provisions there by theire owne comission, and comonlie to the good contentment of the inhabitantes, when conscionable theefes arrive there.'
A grassy track, winding up the sloping bank amidst gorse and bracken, now leads across a stream and beside a few quarrymen's cottages to a dejected-looking chapel. In a neglected corner of the interior we discover the object of our visit—to wit, a recumbent oblong stone inscribed with certain archaic characters, which have been rendered as follows: 'In the Name both of the Cross itself and of Him who was fixed thereon, pray for the soul of Catuoconus.' Certain lines of the character known as Ogham may also be discerned upon the sides or edges of this hoary monolith.