MaʃTER : Iohn : Smyth : Gvner : to : his :
MaiestyE : HIghNES : WAS : A PRISNER IN THIS
PlACE : AND : lAy HERE frOM 1642 TEll th
William SidiaTE ROT This SAME
ANd if My Pin had Bin BETER fOR
HIs sake I wovlD HAVE MENdEd
EVERRi leTTER.
That was the last person known to have been confined in the dungeon. Besides this, there are crosses, crucifixes, cross-bows, and other objects and inscriptions traceable on the walls.
Guy’s Tower (to which we have alluded, and which forms our initial letter on page 206) contains several rooms appropriated to various purposes. Its summit is reached by a flight of 133 steps—a most fatiguing ascent, but amply repaid by the magnificent panoramic view obtained from the battlements. Hence “are seen the spires of the Coventry churches, the Castle of Kenilworth, Guy’s Cliff, and Blacklow Hill; Grove Park, the seat of Lord Dormer; Shuckburgh and the Shropshire Hills; the Saxon Tower on the Broadway Hills; the fashionable spa of Leamington, which appears almost lying underneath the feet, and the wide-extended park; while village churches, lifting up their venerable heads from amidst embowering trees, fill up a picture pleasing, grand, and interesting. In the various rooms will be noticed carvings and inscriptions which possess interest. From the Bear Court a portcullised doorway in the north wall opens to the moat, across which is a bridge leading to the pleasure-grounds and Conservatory. In this is placed one of the wonders of the “Stately Home”—the celebrated Warwick Vase, rescued from the bottom of a lake at Adrian’s Villa, near Tivoli, by Sir William Hamilton, from whom it was obtained by the late Earl of Warwick.
