"Hic jacet in tumba Rosa Mundi, non Rosa munda: Non redolet, sed olet, quæ redolere solet." The railway has not improved the situation of this old castle:-- "Clifford has fallen--howe'er sublime, Mere fragments wrestle still with time; Yet as they perish, sure and slow, And, rolling, dash the stream below, They raise tradition's glowing scene,-- The clue of silk, the wrathful queen; And link in memory's firmest bond The love-lorn tale of Rosamond." Passing between wooded eminences, broad fields, and peaceful farms, the Wye at length reaches the suburbs, and then the ancient city of Hereford. [Illustration: ROSS CHURCH (_p. 136_).] Hereford was a town of importance even at the dawn of English history. Outside its walls stood the palace of Offa, the greatest of all the Mercian princes; and during the reign of the Mercian kings it was the principal town of Mercia. Ethelfleda, sister of Edward the Elder, governed the place with great skill, and she it was who constructed the castle that guarded the town, and constructed it so well that it proved to be one of the strongest in all England. Leland has this to say of the keep: "High, and very strong, having in the outer wall ten semicircular towers, and one great tower within"; and adds that "it hath been one of the largest, fayrest, and strongest castles in England." Here, again, the wily Llewelyn comes upon the scene, for he led his men from the fastness of the Upper Wye, pillaged and burnt the place, murdered the bishop and his assistants, set the cathedral ablaze, and left what had been a fair town a mass of smouldering ruins. A visitor to this ancient city will find it hard to realise that anything but peace and goodwill ever reigned in all the district, for in these days of bustle and worry it would be difficult to discover in all Great Britain a more placid, steady-going, self-satisfied city than Hereford. Well laid out, clean, at least reasonably well-to-do--although it does not lay claim to be a place of great industry, relying more upon the church and the market than upon the manufactory--there seems to be a perpetual air of Sunday hovering over the town. The very visitors--and they are many--move soberly about the streets, and appear to have become imbued with the spirit of the place. No one can be many minutes in Hereford without detecting that not only the people but the very buildings take their key from the grand cathedral that, calmly gazing into the face of Time, has seen of men and houses generations come and generations go.