There is no doubt but that this was a frontier post held by the Saxons; and many parts of the ruin still bear a Saxon or early Norman character. {349} During the reign of king John, and in several succeeding ages, it was in the hands of the earls of Pembroke, but afterwards deviated from that line. In Jacob’s Peerage, under the article of the earls of Shrewsbury, it is related, that the Hugh le Despencers forcibly seized Elizabeth Comyns at Kennington in Surry, and detained her in confinement above a year; concealing her in their different castles, until she was, by menaces of death, constrained to pass “her manor of Painswick in the county of Gloucester to the said earl, the elder Despencer, and the castle of Goodrich to Hugh the younger; to them and their heirs.”—Thus it was in feudal ages, when every potent baron dared violate the strongest bands of society; when the property and freedom of humble individuals, and the honour of females, were subjected to the will of contiguous power; and suffering innocence could only plead the wrongs that she suffered at the tribunal of the oppressor. But, alas! it is a principle of our being, it is a fact which ought to be treasured in the minds of Britons, that where power is without controul it seldom fails to act unjustly. In the civil wars of Charles the First this castle was in the hands of both parties successively; and upon the parliamentary cause proving triumphant, it was ordered to be dismantled: but a sufficient compensation was allowed to the countess of Kent, to whom it belonged. The farm-house appertaining to the meadows and corn-fields about the castle is situated a few hundred yards from the castle, to the right, and occupies the site of GOODRICH PRIORY: the chapel, converted into a barn, and some other Gothic remains, are still visible. In our way from Goodrich to Ross, for the first two miles traced in a bridle road that might with equal propriety be called a ditch, we had frequent views of the proud ruin towering above its incircling groves; which, variously combining with the surrounding landscape at each succeeding station, proved a new and delightful object. We crossed the Wye at Wilton bridge; a short distance above which, on the low western bank of the river, appear the mouldering towers of WILTON CASTLE, a Norman structure, once the baronial residence of the Greys. Several pleasure-boats with awnings, handsomely fitted up for the reception of company that would navigate the Wye, are moored by the bridge. {351}