It recalled to my mind the
impressions of surprise, mixed with something approaching to awe, which
seized me, when the first object that met my eyes in the morning (for it
was late and dark when I reached Launceston) was the noble keep,
towering immediately above my chamber windows, and so near, that it
appeared as if I had only to open them and step into it. I do not mean
to draw a parallel between the castles of Launceston and Gisors, and
still less am I about to inquire into the relationship between the
Norman and the Cornish fortresses. The lapse of twenty years has
materially weakened my recollection of the latter, nor would this be a
seasonable opportunity for such a disquisition: but the subject deserves
investigation, the result of which may tend to establish the common
origin of both, and to dissipate the day-dreams of Borlase, who longed
to dignify the castellated ruins of the Cornish peninsula, by ascribing
them to the Roman conquerors of Britain.
Gisors itself existed before the tenth century; but its chief celebrity
was due to William Rufus, who, anxious to strengthen his frontiers
against the power of the kings of France, caused Robert of Belleme to
erect this castle, in 1097. Thus then we have a certain date; and there
is no reason to believe, but that the whole of what is left us is really
of the same aera, or of the following reign, in which it is known that
the works were greatly augmented; for Henry Ist was completely a
castle-builder.
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