Morpeth is little changed since coaching times, but the one very noticeable alteration shows by what utter barbarians the town was inhabited towards the close of that era. Entering it, the turbulent Wansbeck is crossed by a stone bridge, built in 1830, to provide better accommodation for the increased traffic than the ancient one, a few yards up stream, afforded. For some five years longer the old building was suffered to remain, and then, with the exception of its piers, it was demolished. No one benefited by its destruction, it stood in no one’s way, and its utility was such that a footbridge, a graceless thing of iron and scantling, has been erected across those ancient piers, to continue the access still required at this point from one bank to the other. It was to our old friends the monks that travellers were beholden for that ancient Gothic bridge, and their old toll-house still remains, after having passed through a varied career as a chapel, a school, and a fire-engine house. Turner’s view shows the road over the bridge, looking south; with the castle gate-house on the hill-top, a great deal nearer than it actually is. This, the sole relic of that old stronghold, has in later years been restored until it looks almost as new as the would-be Gothic of the gaol, which stands beside the modern bridge on entering the town and deludes the more ignorant into a belief of its genuine antiquity. At Morpeth, until the assizes were removed to Newcastle, justice was dispensed in this sham mediæval castle, built in 1821, and now, all too vast for present needs, used as a police-station. The old town gaol, at the other end of the town, facing the market-place, is much more interesting. Built in the likeness of a church tower, curfew is still rung from its belfry, beneath the queer little figures on the roof. Market-day brings crowds of drovers and endless droves of sheep and cattle to this spot, to say nothing of the pigs, singularly plentiful in these parts. “He’s driving his swine to Morpeth market,” is an expression still used of a snoring man in the neighbourhood. Always excepting market-day, Morpeth is now a curiously quiet and dreamy town. The stress of ancient times has left its few relics in the mouldering remains of strong and defensible walls, and in certain proverbs and sayings reflecting discreditably upon the Scottish people, but the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries are more evident in its streets than previous eras. To those centuries belong the many old inns with signs for the most part redolent of the coaching age: the “Nag’s Head,” the “Grey Nag’s Head,” the “Queen’s Head,” “Turk’s Head,” and “Black Bull”; this last with an odd semi-circular front and a beautiful coach-entrance displaying some fine Adam decoration. [Picture: Morpeth]