The Castle of Dunster is of high antiquity, and for many centuries was a place of great military consideration in the western counties. It was the _caput_ of an extensive Honour, and the chief seat of a line of very powerful barons. The hill upon which it stands is the north-eastern, or seaward extremity of a considerable ridge, from which it is cut off by a natural depression, and thus forms what is known in West-Saxon nomenclature as a tor. The tor covers above ten acres of ground, and is about 200 feet high, with a table top in area about a quarter of an acre. It stands upon the western edge of a deep and broad valley, which contains the park, and below the castle expands into a tract of meadow about a mile in breadth, skirting the sea from Minehead to below Carhampton. The park is traversed by a considerable stream, the Avill, one head of which springs from Croydon Hill, and the other, flowing past Wootton-Courtenay, rises about six miles distant under Dunkery Beacon. The home view, one of exceeding richness, is limited and sheltered on the south and west by the Brendon Hills and the high ground rising towards Exmoor. To the east it includes the vales of Cleeve and Williton, bounded by the Quantocks. Seaward on to the north the eye ranges over Bridgwater Bay to the headland of Brean Down and Worle, and commands the west or opposite coast from Penarth Point to Aberavan and Swansea. West, and at the foot of the castle hill, and under the immediate control and protection of the old fortress, is the town of Dunster, a small and compact cluster of old-fashioned houses, many with timber fronts, in the midst of which is the parish church, once connected with the priory, the foundation of one of the early Norman lords. The eastern or monastic part of the building now forms the private chapel of the Luttrells, and contains several of their tombs. [Illustration: DUNSTER CASTLE. Wyman & Sons, Gᵗ. Queen Sᵗ. London.]