The Infirmary was founded for the eradication of one species of evils; but here is a building for the suppression of evils of another description. The City Gaol, for such is the gloomy-looking structure before us, is an erection of the present century, having supplanted the old and ruinous prison which formerly stood upon the site of the present North Gate. Over the handsome Doric entrance is an iron railing, within which the last sentence of the law is occasionally executed on condemned criminals. Surely the day is not far distant when “death by the hangman” will be a punishment unknown to the criminal code of England! What adds to the evil, so far as Chester is concerned, is that the authorities of the City are compelled, by some antediluvian charter, to see execution done on every condemned criminal within the County, though for what reason this especial honour was first conferred on the citizens, is an enigma susceptible of no clear solution.
A short distance hence is Stanley Place, a double row of genteel residences; at the head of which, within that ponderous gateway, is the old Linen Hall, once the great mart for Irish linens, but of late, owing to the decay of that branch of trade, consecrated to the sale of the famed Cheshire cheese. What! have you never yet tasted a bit of “prime old Cheshire?” Let us recommend you then to do so, on your return to the Inn; and if your fancy does not gloat over it for a month or two to come, our belief in your good taste will be considerably modified.
“Onward!” is again the word, and ascending a short incline, we find ourselves on the top of another of the four great Gates of the city. We are now exactly opposite to where we set out, and have, therefore, at least half completed our circuit of the city. The West, or as it is more usually termed, the Water Gate (from the Dee having originally flowed up to its portals), is like the East and North Gates, a modern structure, having replaced the old and unsightly archway in 1789, as appears by an inscription on the west side. The custody of Chester Gates was at one time a privilege much courted by the high and mighty in the land. Thus the sergeantship of the East Gate has belonged since the time of Edward I. to the ancestors of the present Lord Crewe, of Crewe; the North Gate during that period has been in charge of the citizens; the Water Gate, on which we are now standing, in custody of the Stanleys, Earls of Derby; while the Bridge Gate, to which we shall presently come, belonged to the Earls of Shrewsbury, inheriting from their ancestors, the Troutbecks and Rabys, sergeants thereof in the fourteenth century. Below us lies a plain of sweetest verdure and most inviting beauty; and by way of diversifying our subject, we will now step down from the Gate and Walls, and find ourselves, in another chapter, treading the green sward of the old Roodeye.
CHAPTER IV.
The Walls, continued.—The Roodeye.—Chester Races.—The Castle of the Olden Time, and the Castle of To-day.—The Grosvenor Bridge.—Cæsar’s Tower.—Handbridge and Edgar’s Cave.—Bridgegate.—Dee Mills and Bridge.—Causeway.—Queen’s Park and Wishing Steps.—The Newgate and its Traditions.—The East Gate.
Well, here we are, on a beautiful meadow, eighty-four acres in extent, clad in Nature’s own mantle of brightest green, and bearing the euphonious name of the Roodeye. This splendid pasture, now so cheerful to look upon, has not always worn the same gay aspect. In ages past and gone—when the Saxon and the Norman held sway over the land—when colossal Liverpool was but a simple fishing-hamlet—the infant commerce of England was borne along the surging billows of the Dee, up to the very Walls of Chester. In those days the spacious lawn before us was covered with water at every tide, save only a bank or eye of land near the centre, which being surmounted by a plain substantial stone cross, acquired the name of the Roodeye, or the Island of the Cross. Are you fond of legends?—Here then is one that may gratify your taste.
Once upon a time (you must not ask when) the Christians of Hawarden, a few miles down the river, were in a sad strait for lack of rain. Now it so happened that in the church of that place there stood an image of the Virgin Mary, called Holy Rood. To her shrine then repaired the faithful and fearful of all classes to pray for rain. Among the rest, Lady Trawst, the wife of the governor of Hawarden, prayed so heartily and so long, that the image, grown desperate we suppose, fell down upon the lady and killed her. Mad with rage at this “answer to their prayers,” a jury of the inhabitants was summoned, and the Holy Rood summarily convicted of wilful murder and other heinous sins. Fearful, however, of the consequences if they executed the offender, the jury determined to lay her upon the beach at low water; whence the next tide carried her away to the spot where she was found, under the Walls of Chester. The citizens held a post-mortem examination, and seeing that she was Holy Rood, decided on burying her where she was found, and erected over her a simple stone Cross, which, tradition says, once bore an inscription to the following effect:
The Jews their God did crucify,
The Hardeners theirs did drown:
Because their wants she’d not supply,—
And she lies under this cold stone.
Another version affirms she was carried to St. John’s Church, and there set up in great pomp, and that this Cross was erected on the spot where she was found.
So much for the legend: yonder is the remnant of the Cross under which her holiness was laid; and as