Henry of Monmouth, Volume 1 | Page 9

requires another good in return, the King of his especial grace freely pardons the said John." Plac. Cor. in Cast. Oxon.]
[Footnote 10: Thus, in a warrant, dated 6th March 1381, an order is given by the Duke for payment to a Goldsmith in London, of 10l. 18s. for a present made by our dear daughter Philippa, to our very dear daughter Mary, Countess of Derby, on the day of her marriage; and also "40 shillings for as many pence put upon the book on the day of the espousals of our much beloved son, the Earl of Derby." Eight marks are ordered to be paid for "a ruby given by us to our very dear daughter Mary:" 13s. 4d. for the offering at the mass. Ten marks from us to the King's minstrels being there on the same day; and ten marks to four minstrels of our brother the Earl of Cambridge being there; and fifty marks to the officers of our cousin, the Countess of Hereford! On the 31st of January following, the Duke lays himself under a bond to pay to "Dame Bohun, Countess of Hereford, her mother, the sum of one hundred marks annually, for the charge and cost of his daughter-in-law, Mary, Countess of Derby, until the said Mary shall attain the full age of fourteen years."]
We shall probably not be in error, if we fix the period of the Countess of Derby leaving her mother's for her husband's roof somewhere in the year 1386, when he was twenty, and she sixteen years old; and we are not without reason for believing that they made Monmouth Castle their home.
Some modern writers affirm that this was the favourite residence of John of Gaunt's family: but it is very questionable whether from having themselves experienced the beauty and loveliness of the spot, they have not been unconsciously tempted to venture this assertion (p. 009) without historical evidence. Monmouth is indeed situated in one of the fairest and loveliest valleys within the four seas of Britain. Near its centre, on a rising ground between the river Monnow (from which the town derives its name) and the Wye and not far from their confluence, the ruins of the Castle are still visible. The poet Gray looked over it from the side of the Kymin Hill, when he described the scene before him as "the delight of his eyes, and the very seat of pleasure." With his testimony, unbiassed as it was by local attachment, it would be unwise to mingle the feelings of affection entertained by one whose earliest associations, "redolent of joy and youth," can scarcely rescue his judgment from the suspicion of partiality. At that time John of Gaunt's estates and princely mansions studded, at various distances, the whole land of England from its northern border to the southern coast. And whether he allowed Henry of Bolinbroke to select for himself from the ample pages of his rent-roll the spot to which he would take his bride, or whether he assigned it of his own choice to his son as the fairest of his possessions; or whether any other cause determined the place of Henry the Fifth's birth, we have no reasonable ground for doubting that he was born in the Castle of Monmouth, on the 9th of August 1387.
Of Monmouth Castle, the dwindling ruins are now very scanty, and in point of architecture present nothing worthy of an antiquary's (p. 010) research. They are washed by the streams of the Monnow, and are embosomed in gardens and orchards, clothing the knoll on which they stand; the aspect of the southern walls, and the rocky character of the soil admirably adapting them for the growth of the vine, and the ripening of its fruits. In the memory of some old inhabitants, who were not gathered to their fathers when the Author could first take an interest in such things, and who often amused his childhood with tales of former days, the remains of the Hall of Justice were still traceable within the narrowed pile; and the crumbling bench on which the Justices of the Circuit once sate, was often usurped by the boys in their mock trials of judge and jury. Somewhat more than half a century ago, a gentleman whose garden reached to one of the last remaining towers, had reason to be thankful for a marked interposition in his behalf of the protecting hand of Providence. He was enjoying himself on a summer's evening in an alcove built under the shelter and shade of the castle, when a gust of wind blew out the candle by his side, just at the time when he felt disposed to replenish and rekindle his pipe. He went consequently with the lantern in his hand towards his house, intending to