[Picture: Newark Castle] There was a certain Dame Eleanor Disney, who, to do honour to this strange kind of king, came, splendidly dressed, with her husband, Sir Henry, to one of the receptions. James’s eye lighted upon all this finery, and his frugal mind was shocked. “Wha,” he asked, “be that lady wi’ a lairdship to her bock?” But the most stirring of Newark’s historic days were yet to come. Newark to the last was loyal to Charles the First. Three times was the town besieged by the Parliament, and never taken. All the inhabitants armed and did excellent service, making sorties and capturing troops of Parliamentary horse; and had not the royal cause failed elsewhere, Newark must have emerged, triumphant, at the end. But at last all that remained were some few outlying garrisons throughout the country. Newark was especially commanded by the king to discontinue a hopeless resistance, and accordingly the town laid down its arms in 1646. It was then that the castle was ruined. It is a highly picturesque ruin to-day, and lacking nothing in itself of grandeur, only needs a more effective site. As it stands, only slightly elevated above the river and the surrounding levels, this historic castle has not the advantages that belong to fortresses like Ludlow and Harlech, perched on their rocky heights. But it has done its duty and still serves to give a note of dignity to Newark town, as one approaches it by the long straight levels of the road from the north. It looks much the same to-day as when Rowlandson made his sketch of it, with the coach dashing over the bridge, more than a hundred years ago; the projecting Tudor oriel windows still looking forth upon the sullen tide from the more ancient walls, their crumbling stones scarce more decayed than then. The old wooden bridge, however, that formerly spanned the Devon, was pulled down and rebuilt in 1775. The great glory of Newark is its beautiful church, with that soaring spire which is visible for miles away, before the town itself is glimpsed. Not so tall as Grantham spire, it is as beautiful in its simpler style, and the church is better placed in the town than that of Grantham. Especially striking is the view across the great market-place, the grey Early English and Decorated spire, with its numerous belfry-lights, and the fine windows and bold arcading of the tower forming a splendidly effective contrast with the seventeenth and eighteenth century red-brick houses facing the square. Newark and Grantham spires are really the products of an old-time rivalry between the two towns. Either town is satisfied that it possesses the best, and so the peace is kept throughout the ages.