Page:Archaeological Journal, Volume 29.djvu/452

374 The gate-house has a portcullis chamber on the first floor, and a second floor above this. An open stair against the south side leads to the battlement, from which a door, an insertion, opens into the portcullis chamber. These upper rooms are plastered and papered, and nothing can be seen in them.

South of this gate the wall gradually sinks, and finally has been pulled own and removed. It may be traced as far as the site of a half-round tower, and some remains of an arch. Beyond this, also, the line of the wall may be traced as far as the site of Bugle tower, 180 yards from the West gate, and which caps the South-West angle of the town.

The South wall is almost wholly destroyed, and the foundation either removed or covered up by the broad and handsome quay which now intervenes between the base of the wall and the sea. This front was more or less convex, or rather polygonal, the angles being capped with drum towers. There are some traces of the South gate-house. In the rear of this part of the wall are the site of St. Mary Magdalene's Hospital, and in Porter-lane what was called Canute's Palace. A representation of the South gate before 1784 is preserved by Grose. It had a low, broad Edwardian arch, with bold machicolations above, and toward the East it was protected by a long flanking wall, parallel to its approach. It was removed 1830-40.

Forty yards from the South gate was another half-round tower, and thence the wall ran straight East for 83 yards, when it reached the South-East angle of the town. In the rear of this part of the wall, in Winkle-street, is "God's House," a Norman church, now restored very badly, and converted into a French Protestant place of worship.

At the South-East angle of the town, in the end of the East wall, is a gate, called God's House Gate, or South Gate, but which should be called Spur Gate, as it opens upon a work of that class. This gate-house is rectangular, quite plain, and without buttresses, having two upper floors. Its dimensions are 28 ft. broad by 23 ft. deep, and the South end projects as a low salient of two faces, upon the South wall, now removed. The passage is vaulted with a high pointed arch 12 ft. broad. Like the West gate, it had a central recessed doorway, now much cut away, and two portcullis grooves. The vault in front of the door is supported by two, and in rear of it by three, cross-ribs. Altogether in substance this gate-house resembles that of the West gate, and is of Early Decorated date. Its front may have been rebuilt when the Spur tower was added.

The spur-work projects from the Northern flank of the gate of the gate-house for about 80 ft. It is composed of a sort of lofty gallery, or curtain, terminating in a rectangular tower, about 22 ft. square, with buttresses capping the two East or outer angles diagonally. It is of three storeys, and is built across the Eastern ditch, no doubt to contain and protect its sluice communicating with the sea, which originally flowed up to the wall of the tower. There are seen largo arches in the North and East faces, which look as though there had been a passage for boats; but these seem really to have been arches of construction only, intended to throw the weight of the building upon the corners, which probably are more deeply founded than the curtain. In the North face is also a large modern arch, a relict of the canal which was to have been carried beneath the tower. The spur-work and the gate-house were long used as a Bridewell. All still bear marks of that degrading occupation. The