Clarence wanders in a wood, till at length he finds a beaten path, which leads him to a chatelet or little castle (et voit qu'il y a un castelet.)
5. A Castle, from MS Addit 10,293, f. 157, vo
"This castle was in appearance very strong, for there were good ditches round it full of water, and near the ditches were great 'roeillis' and wonderfully strong, and after there were walls wonderfully strong and thick and lofty, and they were as white as chalk[1]." The duke rides up to the outer gate, which he finds open and without guard—et c'estoit la bertesce desouz les fossés—he passes through it into the court, and rides up to the gate of the baille or body of the building, which was closed[2]. He knocks hard, and a 'valet' comes, of whom he asks a lodging. Our cut (fig. 5.) shews—Ensi que li due de Clarence parole au vallet à le porte du castel. We have here the ditch and fence, apparently of strong wooden palisades, surrounding the court, with the fortified tower (or bretesce) defending the bridge, and (within it) the castle or body of the building. We might be led by the words of the text to suppose that the walls of the castles were whitewashed, or painted; and in a translation of Grosteste's Chasteau d'Amour, in a MS. of the end of the fourteenth century (MS. Bibl. Egerton. in Mus. Brit. No. 928), the walls of a castle are spoken of as being painted of three colours:—
- ↑ Par samblant yeils castiaus estoit mult fors, quar il y avoit bons fossés entour et plains d'aigue, et près avoit grans roeillis et fort à grant merveille, et après sont li mur fort et espès et haut à grant mervelle, et estoient aussi blanc comme croie.
- ↑ Et puis envient à la porte del baille, qui fremes estoit.
- ↑ need.
