the cellar. This is the more probable, because there was in this kitchen an ancient oven, in the thickness of the wall, part of which projected from the outside on a bold corbel; this corbel still remains; hence it is clear that the wooden kitchen was not a modern one, and it is not likely that this apartment and the cellar should be far from the hall.

A bold archway of freestone led to the drawbridge of the keep. The quadrant carefully executed in the stone work, in which the head of it traversed when raised and lowered, is still perfect, under the springing of the stone arch erected in 1822; previously to that time the two openings leading to the keep had only been boarded over, and the passage enclosed by side walls of lath and plaster. The drawbridge was not only of two arches (or rather openings) but also of two stories. It is called Pons Glorietta in the ministers' accounts of Edward III, as leading to the tower now containing the clock, etc., which seems to have been called the gloriette. In the lower story, the entrance is by a flat-trefoil or shouldered arch; above, the arch is part of the work of Henry VIII, who restored the whole of the upper story.

On the left of the entrance was the chapel. Three of the windows remain, and the arch which contained the rich tracery of a fourth. The entire windows that remain are of the period of Edward I, about 1280, as is also the outer arch of the richer one, but new tracery was put in about 1314-15, as it appears by the survey then taken that the original tracery had been destroyed by a hurricane. The interior subdivision of the keep is modern; but it is plain that the chapel, when used as such, was divided into two stories at the end opposite to the altar, a construction declared by Mr. Parker to be not uncommon at this period. The step to the raised altar is indicated by a difference in the level of the bases of the columns with which the jambs of the windows are embellished. A little beyond the chapel, Henry VIII seems to have pulled down a part of the outer wall, for the purpose of inserting two large windows; one of them, a bay window of octagonal character, in what was probably his banqueting room. It has been already observed that the principal hall was probably in the main part of the castle, in the inner bailey. Over the

banqueting room was a withdrawing room, and beyond it, where the larder is now situated, was probably a second kitchen, as there is an unusually large opening for a chimney, without any carving or hearth, and the flue divides itself into two in the upper story. On the eastern side there is a newel staircase, which leads to a postern opening on the moat; probably there was a wooden foot-bridge across the moat at this point, of which the portion next the building, at the least, was moveable. About half way across, when the moat was cleared out in 1822, there appeared to be a small island, the water being very shallow and the bottom hard. It is the part between the building and this island that is supposed to have been moveable. The staircase itself was probably constructed by Henry VIII, in a more peaceful age than that in which the fortress was first erected; however, there may have been some such arrangement from the first. From this staircase a door leads into a kind of cellar or store. In the corner, on the left of the entrance, was a spacious room, with a handsome chimney-piece, now destroyed, of the period of Henry VIII, with the arms of Guldeford quartered with those of Colepeper. A closet at the foot of the tower called the gloriette (to which we have now come back) was apparently a garderobe, and there is still another in the higher part of the tower. The principal floor of the keep contains three good fireplaces, with the arms of Henry VIII in the spandrils. The rose and pomegranate also occur in them, and the castle of Castille, by which it would seem that they were executed before Katharine of Arragon fell into disfavour.1 The interior wall, as left by Henry VIII, was of timber and plaster, and the oak or chesnut cornices were richly moulded. Several of the windows of the same material have been used again in the new wall erected in 1822.

In the gloriette, now called the clock-tower, is the bell on which the curfew has been rung for many centuries, the custom never having been abandoned, and the bell bearing the date 1432. There is also an ancient clock, which strikes on the same bell, but which has no dial or hands.

1 There was, in the upper story, a garderobe in its original state. It was constructed as such things still are in the south of France, and consisted of a low parapet, with a solid beam of oak, as a finish, on the top of it.

It is pronounced by Mr. Octavius Morgan to be of the same date with the bell (1432), with the exception of the pendulum, which has been substituted for the original balance, and some wheels, very recently added to facilitate the winding up. It probably contains one of the earliest remaining instances of the contrivance termed "the ratchet", which, in a much more perfect shape, is still used in watches, and by which the wheel on which the chain is coiled is prevented from recoiling as the winding up goes on. It only has one notch at the extremity of each diameter; this is in the striking part; in the other part there is another with four notches in each revolution. Old clocks in general have a still ruder device for this purpose, viz., a catch which lays hold of the spokes of the wheel.

Water has been laid on, from a spring in the hill about a quarter of a mile from the castle, from a very early time, by means of a leaden pipe. There is a charge for tin and solder, and the time for a plumber and his boy from Rochester to mend pipam aqueductus, et in castro et in parco, in the minister's accounts for 1367. At what precise time this luxury was first introduced there are no means of ascertaining; but, as it required repair, it was clearly not new at that time. As it appears from a passage cited in Mr. Hudson Turner's work On Mediaval Domestic Architure, "that there were baths at Ledes castle in Kent" in Edward the First's time, it may not be improbable that the conduit was made at the same time, i. e., about 1280. This is the date assigned to some of the chapel windows by Mr. Twopeny.

It

In the new building, erected in 1822, some of the old work has been introduced, especially a handsome oak chimney-piece in the dining-room, the work of the Smyths in the reign of James I, several of the oak spandrils carved by Henry VIII, and a curious chimney back, brought from an old manor house on the estate, which appears to have been cast at the termination of the wars of the roses. is divided into two compartments by a pattern in the shape of two arches; each arch contains a crown, of the period of Henry VII, with a rose beneath it, and the two panels are united by what seems intended for a cord. The dogs in the same fireplace were found in the room used as the withdrawing room, over the banqueting room of Henry

VIII, and have also the rose and crown and fleur de lis amongst their decorations. From this it is almost certain that they belonged to him. They are well cast and finished for the period.

Such are the principal remains of the original fabric at Leeds castle. From the time it has been in my possession it has been my constant care to preserve, as far as possible, all that remains of it from the unavoidable ravages of time. I have caused the whole of the external walls, from the top of the battlements to some distance below the water level, to be pointed afresh with strong mortar; and I hope it is in a fair way to continue for many years to come a tolerably perfect specimen of the military structures of our

ancestors.

THE DUTCH EXPEDITION TO THE MEDWAY, IN THE YEAR 1667.1

BY THE REV. BEALE POSTE.

THE British Archæological Association having assembled for the purpose of illustrating the history and antiquities of the county of Kent, it may seem to be in perfect unison with their views to endeavour to give a somewhat detailed, and, as far as it may be, an intelligible, account of the attack of the Hollanders on the naval establishments and defences of the river Medway; an event usually so briefly treated by our historians, and on the whole so imperfectly known. The transactions are not a little remarkable in their features; and in our days, from the altered circumstances of the two countries, almost seem like romance. However, Holland, now fallen, was then a formidable competing naval power; and incidentally this daring attempt, and the partial success which attended it, may be useful as a memento of the vulnerability of our

1 In the British Museum, among the Additional MSS. (5214, arts. 28, 29), are two tinted sketches representing the destruction of the English ships at Chatham, by the Dutch, in the year 1667; drawn by Wilhelm Van der Velde, They each measure 3 feet 6 ins. by 11 ins.

coasts; and, indeed, more especially so in the present times. In introducing the subject, a few words may be perhaps necessary as to the respective attitudes of the two countries at the commencement of these transactions, to make all matters well understood.

Scarcely any subject is more intricate in our national annals than the assigning the cause of the war with the Dutch, which began in February 1665. Our best historical writers, observing that a treaty for a league and alliance had been completed with them in the year 1662, and that no grievances remained but such as were prior to that date, have declared themselves much at a loss in assigning any sufficient motive for the hostilities; and have attributed them to the inimical feeling of the people, the unpatriotic views of the monarch then on the throne, and to the influence of the king's brother, the duke of York, who used all possible means to bring on a rupture between the two countries.

Hostilities began before an open declaration of war, by an English squadron being sent against the Dutch settlements on the coast of Africa to make reprisal for two ships taken before the treaty to which allusion has been made; which may serve to shew the somewhat unusual nature of the transaction. However, all this is historical fact: but the war once begun, both sides for two years fitted out very great armaments against each other; and in the seafights which occurred, the advantage chiefly remained on the side of our countrymen: though there was a considerable drawback to the successes, abroad, from the French and Danes joining the enemy, and at home, from a dreadful pestilence and the great fire of London. At last active negociations were in train at Breda for peace, in the month of May 1667. They had been begun, it seems, some time before at Paris, but had been transferred to the beforementioned place.

It will form some little illustration of the rather equivocal line of conduct which now began to be adopted by the Dutch, to observe that one of the last events of the preceding year, was a species of naval foray of the English in the Texel. According to the accounts of historical writers, they burnt one hundred and seventy valuable merchantmen at one swoop; destroyed the town of Ban