much farther, by following and defcribing the various Roman ftations that were all along contiguous to this ancient and ftupendous work. We fhall only obferve, from Bede, the venerable hiftorian of Jarrow, that, upon Severus' wall being broke down in feveral places by the barbarians, another was built, with turrets at intervening diftances, by the Romans, to defend the feeble and enervated inhabitants of their provinces. And as the empire was convulfed through the competition of feveral rivals at once for the fupreme power, the Roman troops took leave of the island, about four hundred and seventy-eight years from its being first invaded by Julius Cæfar. Twenty years afterwards, the Britons, finding the Scots and Picts too powerful for them, folicited the Romans to come to Britain to affift them; but they never returned. This laft wall is faid by Bede to have been eight feet broad, and twelve high, and was erected on the very fite of the walls of Adrian and of Severus. It had a great number of towers, or little caftles, a mile from each other, now called caftle-fteeds; and on the infide, fortified little towns or camps, called chefters. The inhabitants tell you, that there was also a brazen trumpet, or pipe, of which they now and then found pieces, fo artificially laid in the wall, between each caftle and tower, that upon the apprehenfion of danger, at any fingle place, by the founding of it, notice might be given to the next tower, and so on through the whole breadth of the illand.Vide Bede, as quoted by Camden. Mr. Brand, who, accompanied by the ingenious Mr. R. Beilby, in the year 1783, traced the whole extent of the Roman wall, has minutely recorded, in the appendix to his hiftory of Newcastle, his difcoveries of fragments of altars, urns, coins, &c. and fums up the whole of his obfervations with giving us the names of the various ftations along the wall, viz. Upon viewing the ruins of these once mighty efforts of human art, to fee the broken fragments of caftles, temples, palaces, and lofty ftructures, the mind is ftruck with strong emotions of a kind of melancholy fympathy; and it carries our reflections forward to the confummation of all things, as defcribed by the unrivalled Shakespeare. "The cloud-capt towers, the gorgeous palaces, But our fenfations are relieved, when we fee beautiful and fertile fields, covered with golden harvefts, where once ftood the rampart of huge stones cramped with iron; and where fierce warriors conflicted in mortal combat, now the fcenes of harmless bleating flocks, and of sportive lambs, gambolling in wanton play, along the venerable ruins of camps and entrenchments; as finely pictured by a great poet of nature. "And leads me to the mountain's brow, When difunited Britain ever bled, Loft in eternal broil: ere yet fhe grew To this deep laid indiffoluble state, Where wealth and commerce lift their golden head, Impartial watch; the wonder of a world!" THOMSON'S SPRING. SITUATION SITUATION AND EXTENT. This town, which has made, for ages, a confpicuous figure among the commercial marts for trade, manufactures, and bufinefs of various kinds, does not impress the ftranger, who approaches it from any direction, with ideas prepoffeffing in its favour. A very ingenious correfpondent of the editors of the Monthly Magazine, in his account of it, fays: "The fituation of modern Newcastle has probably been determined by its bridge, which, having been originally built by the Romans at this termination of their great north-eastern road, has been, from time to time, renewed upon the fame fite. This warlike people feem to have preferred paffing over the tops of hills, probably for the fake of ftations, from which to overlook and keep in devotion the furrounding country. But the objects to be anfwered by a military nation are very different from thofe of a commercial one, which are beft promoted by the ease and expedition with which goods and paffengers can be conveyed from one part of a country to another. The great obftruction to this free communication, and the enormous needlefs waste of the powers of that noble animal on whofe exertions we chiefly depend in these respects, occafioned by the fervility with which we still continue to follow the track of our predeceffors over the elevated barren ridge of Gateshead Fell, is a fource of daily mortification to the travellers upon this road. More especially when the view of that fingular edifice lately built for a patent-fhot tower at the white-lead works, a few hundred yards above the bridge, which prefents D 2 prefents itself to the paffenger about two miles north of Chester-le-ftreet, cannot fail to convince him of the ease with which a perfectly level road might be carried in a straight line from that point to the western extremity of the town. The noble prospect up the vale of Tyne, which regales the eye of the traveller as he defcends towards the town from the fummit of the ridge, may perhaps be pleaded as some compensation for the trouble of its ascent. "After the Romans had retired from Britain, it appears that the works which they had here conftructed were at leaft fo far maintained as to continue it a place of confiderable ftrength; and that many religious fraternities in the later Saxon times had found in it a fecure shelter. "But whatever caufes may have determined the fituation of Newcastle, and however well chofen it may once have been for the purposes of fecurity, it must be acknowledged to be fingularly ill adapted to anfwer thofe of neatness or convenience. To the ftranger who arrives from the fouth, after he has been astonished, and in fome degree terrified, by his rapid descent through Gateshead, (now indeed confiderably mitigated by the circuitous direction of the new street), immediately on his turning upon the bridge, a precipitous eminence prefents itself, which extends along the river weftward to the extremity of the town, leaving only room for a narrow street, very properly denominated The Clofe; but clustered all the way to the very fummit of its almoft perpendicular banks, with houfes built during the turbulent times which preceded the union of the crowns, when the inhabitants naturally crowded as close as poffible under the protection of the Caftle. Amidft these houfes |