Sandown castle is composed of four lunettes of very thick arched work of stone, with many port-holes for great guns: in the middle is a great round tower, with a cistern at top; underneath an arched cavern, bomb-proof: a foss incompasses the whole, to which there is a passage over a draw-bridge. Deal castle and Walmer castle are of the same nature, all built by Harry VIII. to guard this naked level coast: moreover, lines are drawn along between castle and castle, and at proper intervals round bastions with a ditch and parapet of earth, where cannon may be planted, as in the infancy of fortification. These are what Camden calls _Rome’s works_, and fancies to be remnants of Cæsar’s ship-camp: the neighbours with as little truth affirm they were thrown up by Oliver Cromwell, for reduction of these castles: one is close by the north side of Deal, and two between Deal castle and Walmer castle. At Walmer castle the cliff begins for about half a mile southward with a gentle rise to a hill, whereon is a _tumulus_: then the shore is plain again in a valley till you come to Kings-wold, which is half a mile’s space. Between Walmer castle and Deal I take to be the spot where Cæsar landed in his first expedition, because it is the first place where the shore can be ascended north of Dover, and exactly answers his assigned distance of eight miles: probably in his second expedition, when he came with many more ships, and had a perfect knowledge of the country, he went a little farther in the downs, whereabouts now is Deal, a town lately sprung up from the mariners. As for his sea-camps, it is vain to expect a sight of them; they are many ages since absorpt by the ocean, which has so long been exercising its power, and wasting the land away. Even since Harry the VIIIth’s time it has carried off the sea-ward _esplanades_ of the three castles, and one half of two of the three circular forts. Indeed, of late years, the providential ejectment of those pebbles has put a stop to it in some measure; and it is amazing to see how it by degrees fills up these fosses and trenches, and sometimes flies over the banks a good way up into the land, with a power well expressed by the poet, _Aut vaga cum Tethys Rutupinaque littora fervent._ +Lucan.+ vi. But of this affair of Cæsar’s I reserve to myself another opportunity of speaking, when I shall expresly treat of his expedition hither. At Deal castle is a very good well, though close by the sea. [Illustration: 37·2ᵈ. _A Prospect towards Deal from yᵉ Barrow South of Walmer Castle._ _Stukeley delin._ _Toms. Sculp._] [Illustration: 38·2ᵈ. _The Appeareance of the Roman_ DVBRIS _Stukeley delin._ _Toms Sculp._]