The rarest of all bridges are, nowadays in England, those having houses on them, as was the fashion in the Middle Ages. The picturesque High Bridge at Lincoln, originally built in the 12th century, still preserves the lodgings built over it[60]; a solitary house remains on Elvet Bridge at Durham, and the only bridge of some length, with a complete row of houses, is a comparatively recent one, being the familiar Pulteney Bridge built at Bath by William Pulteney in the eighteenth century. {75} [Illustration 13. THE DEFENSIVE TOWER ON THE MONNOW BRIDGE, MONMOUTH.] {77} The more numerous of the mediæval bridges still in existence are those of one arch; there are many of them in Wales, some being most elegant and picturesque, such as the famous Devil’s Bridge over the Mynach, near Aberystwith. In England the largest is the one over the moat of Norwich Castle; and the most curious the three-branched one at Crowland, this last belonging in its actual state to the fourteenth century. It is no longer used, as no road passes over it and no water under.[61] Another of the finest, and one of the least known, crosses the Esk, near Danby Castle, Yorkshire. Its date is about 1385; the arms of Neville, Lord Latimer, who had it built, are yet to be seen at the top of the parapet. [Illustration 14. THE BRIDGE NEAR DANBY CASTLE, YORKSHIRE. (_Fourteenth Century._)] Lastly, a word may be said of the larger bridges, most {78} of which have unfortunately undergone great alterations and repairs. Besides the Wakefield Bridge above mentioned, there is one over the Dee, at Chester, part of which is as old as the thirteenth century, thoroughly repaired since Ormerod disrespectfully described it as “a long fabric of red stone extremely dangerous and unsightly.”[62] At Durham there are the Framwellgate and Elvet bridges, both originally built in the twelfth century. A six-arched bridge, rebuilt in the fifteenth century, exists at Hereford; another, repaired in 1449, with the help of indulgences, remains at Bidford.[63] A four-arched one, built in the fourteenth century, over the Dee is to be seen at Llangollen, being “one of the _Tri Thlws Cymru_, or three beauties of Wales;”[64] the arches are irregular in size, for the builder, in this and many other cases, minding more the solidity of the structure than its regularity, erected the piers at the places where the presence of rocks in the bed of the river made it most convenient. A very noteworthy one is the thirteenth-century bridge over the Nith, at Dumfries, in Scotland, which had formerly thirteen arches, seven of which only are now in use. It was long considered the finest after that of London. Other mediæval bridges of several arches remain at Huntingdon,[65] at St. Ives, at Norwich (Bishop’s Bridge), at Potter Heigham (a most picturesque one), at Tewkesbury, etc.[66] The Tewkesbury one, with the middle arch enlarged in modern times, but the {79} triangular recesses for foot passengers still in use, dates