ance; for although the enclosure wall has been of a considerable height, and eight or nine feet in thickness; yet the interior part, instead of being filled with grout work, as in the walls of the Pile of Fouldrey, has been constructed with mud and small stones. The interior and exterior facings of the wall, being formed of limestone laid in lime mortar, have constituted its principal strength.

The rooms in those two towers, of which the walls are entire, have been very badly lighted; but several of them have had fire places; and for each apartment above the ground floor, there is a recess or closet in the side wall, connected with a long perpendicular vacuity. The staircases once leading to these rooms, and still to the top of the roofless towers, are included in the walls, and are entire; but the steps are so extremely small, and the ascent in some parts so vertical, that it requires much care to ascend and descend without falling. We ascended to the top of these towers, which are still topped by their ancient parapets, and covered with thorns and grass. The harmless hare has been known frequently to make her abode on these unfrequented heights, and has been there surprised, and hurried down to the destructive hounds. We congratulated ourselves that we got safe down.

At a little distance to the south-east of the castle, a copious running spring of excellent water issues from under the rocks on one side of the vale, and forms a small brook which glides through the meadows to the south, and falls into the bay of Morecambe.

We returned to Gleaston, and crossing the brook, entered a narrow incommodious road, which, about a mile and a half to the south-east of the village, making an abrupt ascent to the top of a hill, brought us in sight of the remains of an artificial, and once insulated, mount, called the Moot of Aldingham, where we soon arrived by travelling half a mile farther.

At a little distance from the present farm-house, anciently called Aldingham Hall, but now known by the

namė

name of Moat, is a small square plot surrounded by a ditch, upon which Aldingham Hall, the residence. of the Fleming's family, is supposed to have stood. It lies at the foot of a gentle sloop, which, rising to the south-east, terminates in a precipice formed by the waste of the sea. On the crest of the precipice, are the remains of an artificial mount of a considerable height, having apparently been somewhat oval at its base, and surrounded by a deep trench, between which and the insulated square plot at the foot of the hill, is a long streight ditch, erroneously called a fish-pond.

The intention and antiquity of these works are uncertain. No traces of foundations are perceptible upon the insulated square; but at some little distance from the south-east corner, the foundations of some kind of buildings were not long ago demolished. The ditch has been cut through a spring, and consequently could

never want water.

Mr. John Simpson, the farmer of the estate anciently called Aldingham hall, showed us much civility; and, upon our enquiring whether any antiquities had recently been discovered about the place, he informed us, that when the road which passes by the house, was first made in its present situation, two very thick earthen ware vessels, containing bones of infants, or of very small human subjects, were discovered, a little to the west of the adjoining house called Colt-park ; and that, in a field contiguous to the same place, a third pot was found in planting potatoes.

As these pots were never shown to any antiquarian, it is impossible to ascertain whether they were ancient urns, or only vessels of modern pottery, in which, as was supposed by those who found them, the bodies of murdered infants had been concealed by two women of abandoned characters, who, many years before, lived at a house, now totally demolished. It is much to be regreted, however, that the nature of these remains was not more clearly ascertained; if they were ancient, they might probably have thrown some light,

upon

upon the origin of the works which we have mentioned. The pots are said to have been extremely thick, and formed of very friable materials; they were short cylindrical vessels about one foot in diameter. The writer is inclined to believe they were more ancient than was supposed.

Mr. Simpson also informed us of a medicinal spring near the same place, and which he supposed had once been of some repute, but we had not time to search for the place.

As the sea after a short interval of repose, has resumed its destructive ravages upon this shore, and has already swept away a part of the mount, and may at some future period, annihilate the whole, we have thought proper to subjoin a sketch of the works, to perpetuate their form. The green part indicates a portion of land: the grey, a portion of the adjacent

shore.

The view from the top of the mount or Moot is pleasant, and extends across the spacious bay of Morecambe, on the opposite side of which, the town of Lancaster is one principal object. On a fine day the refraction of the atmosphere, makes the promontories of the distant shores to the west of Lancaster, appear like tufts of trees or groves suspended in the air.

Aldingham stands about half a mile from the Moat, close to the shore, at the foot of a gentle declivity, whose summit is covered with rocks. This ancient, and once extensive village, which probably received its name from its situation lying under a rocky eminence, (for Hald-hing-ham, Dr. Todd observes, signifies a habitation near hanging stones,) is now reduced to only two houses, and the church between them. The sea swept away the greater part of it, and the rest of the habitations, except the vicarage house, being purchased by the late learned rector of Aldingham, Dr. Roger Baldwin, were either pulled down, or applied to other uses.

Tradition says, another hamlet called Low-Scales, once laid to the south, or south-east, where there is

still