Photo: Robinson & Thompson, Liverpool.
A QUIET NOOK ON THE VYRNWY.
The group of the Breiddens is gradually left behind, then rises the steep mass of Pontesbury Hill, backed by the long ridge of the Stiper Stones, with their broken crests of rugged and hard white rock, and behind them the broad backs of the Longmynds or the distant pyramid of Corndon. But, of course, to enjoy to perfection views of the land which feeds the upper waters of the Severn, it is necessary to quit the valley and obtain a Pisgah sight from some commanding hill. Thence we look over mile after mile of lowland, woodland, cornfield, and pasture, undulating downwards from bare rough hillsides on which the copses often are thickly clinging, to the margins of brooks and to the bed of the main river. To the west, line after line of hills recedes more dimly into the distance, till at last one shadow is pointed out as Plinlimmon, and another, yet fainter, as Cader Idris, and sometimes an apex of a far-off pyramid is said to be Snowdon. South of us, and yet more to the east, lie the nearer masses already mentioned, while in these directions the eye may detect, from some points of view, the peaked summits of the Caradoc Hills, or may rest upon the huge hog’s back of the Wrekin as it rises abruptly from the Shropshire lowland. There are few prettier districts in our country than the borderland between England and Wales; and that part of which we now speak can hold its own with most others. Here and there, perhaps, the hills are a little bare, and we seldom find much boldness of outline. In the Shelve district also, the lead mines with their white spoil-banks are distinctly an offence to the eye; but the wooded glens are often singularly beautiful, and the outlook from the heath-covered moorlands gives a sense of breadth and freedom, like the open sea.
As it nears Shrewsbury, the Severn quits for a time the hill-country, though it is only near the waterside that the land is distinctly a plain. The town itself is at the edge of a low plateau, and some of its streets are fairly steep, though the ascents are not long. The situation is fine, and in former days, when the town was restricted to narrower limits, must have been much more striking than it is at present. The river bends in sharp curves, like a reversed S, as though the hills had made a final struggle to hold it in bondage. Of these loops, that on the eastern side is the larger; and it forms a kind of horseshoe, almost enclosing a hilly headland of moderate elevation, which shelves down towards the neck of the isthmus, but falls steeply, sometimes almost precipitously, towards the river brink. Thus, with the Severn for a moat on more than three sides, and a comparatively narrow and defensible approach on the fourth, the position is almost a natural stronghold, and it was selected at a comparatively early date as the site of a fortified town.
If we could believe certain chroniclers, the history of Shrewsbury would begin more than four hundred years before the Christian era; but we can hardly doubt that the town existed in the days of the Romans. Towards the close of the sixth century English invaders came marauding up the valley of the Severn, and destroyed the old city of Wroxeter. For a time the fugitives found a refuge in the fortified palace of the Princes of Powis, which then stood on the headland now occupied by Shrewsbury; but before long that stronghold also became a prey to the plunderers, and the Britons were forced to seek safety among the fastnesses of Wales. Then Pengwern, as it had been called, became Scrobesbyrig—“the burgh of bushes”—from which obviously it has obtained its present name. Before very long its importance as a frontier town was fully recognised, but at first it remained small—probably because it was too near Wales for merchants or for men of peace—so that at the date of Domesday Book, though it had four churches, it contained only 252 houses. The castle was built a few years later by Roger de Montgomery, a Norman earl, and a gateway leading to the inner court is a relic of his work. The enclosing wall of the town was completed in the reign of Henry III. This follows, as far as possible, the line of the ancient river-cliff, which on the southward side is parted from the Severn by a strip of level land. Portions of this wall still remain, and it can be traced more or less perfectly along the southern and eastern sides.
The fortress resisted Stephen, who besieged it in 1138; on its fall, by way of reading a lesson to his enemies, he hanged ninety-four of the defenders. Later on, Shrewsbury was twice betrayed by the Welsh, and had one or two other “sensational” experiences, till the famous fight “for a long hour by Shrewsbury clock.” It was a race for the fortress between Hotspur and Henry IV., which was won by the king, who succeeded next day in forcing an action at a place since called Battlefield, about a league north of the town, and a mile from the Severn. The river figures more than once in the accounts of the marching and counter-marching connected with the battle, in which, as everyone knows, the king gained a complete victory, Hotspur falling on the field. Some of his principal associates felt the headsman’s axe a couple of days after the fight. In the Wars of the Roses the town was for the House of York, and two sons were born to the Duke within its walls: one died in infancy, and the other was the younger of the two lads murdered in the Tower. In the great Civil War the townsmen repaired their ruined walls and declared for King Charles, who spent a short time in Shrewsbury early in the struggle; but, later on, they were caught napping, for two parties of the Parliamentary Army effected an entrance during the night, one of them by scaling the steep slope below the old Council House. This daring band was headed by Captain Benbow, who afterwards took part with Prince Charles, was captured at Worcester, and was shot on the scene of his former exploit. He was buried in St. Chad’s Church, “October ye 16th, 1651,” as may still be read on his tombstone. Since then Shrewsbury has dwelt in peace, and during the last half-century has increased greatly and prospered proportionally. It is now a very important railway junction; the station, too small for its present needs, being on the lower ground on the eastern side of the neck of land already mentioned.
In former days the river was crossed by two bridges only, giving access to the headland—one from the eastern side, and so called the English bridge; the other, from the north-western, which, of course, bore the name of the Welsh bridge. Both were fortified in mediæval times, but they were rebuilt in more modern fashion during the eighteenth century. South of the Welsh bridge the plateau occupied by the old town slopes more gently down to the brink of the Severn. This part—a grassy space, planted with avenues of trees, which has long borne the name of the Quarries, from some old excavations—now forms a public park, which, as may be inferred from the illustration (p. [95]), adds greatly to the attractions of the town. Between the Welsh and English bridges is the Boathouse Ferry.
