Page:Medieval Military Architecture in England (volume 1).djvu/169

 Cast/cs of the Early English Period. 153 the tower by its only entrance, which is protected by a portcuUis, an interior meurtrikre^ and a stout door. From the entrance passage a staircase ascends in the wall, at first direct, and afterwards as a turnpike, and supplies each floor, reaching finally the ramparts. The basement was the store, and above are state and other chambers. The well, of large size, is in the basement, and each floor has its fireplace and garderobe. The roof was conical, and rested upon an internal wall, out- side of which was the rampart walk, protected by an unusually lofty parapet, surmounted by a heavy bold coping, and pierced by twenty-four doorways, intended to open into the timber bn'tasche, while between the doorways are twenty-four loops, intended to be used when the brctascJie was not fixed. A curious evidence remains of the manner in which this tower was scaffolded. A double row of putlog holes are seen to wind round the tower spirally, in two parallel lines, showing that as the wall rose it was surrounded by a sloping roadway of timber, of which the main beams were thrust into the wall, and supported by struts, the lower ends of which rested upon blocks in the lower holes. A similar arrangement may be seen in the north-west tower of Harlech Castle, commencing at the top of the curtain-wall So strong was Coucy keep that when, at the command of Mazarin, powder was exploded in its basement-chamber, and the vaultings throughout, thus lifted, fell, the cylinder, though cracked, was not thrown down. This noble example of a thirteenth-century tower has been successfully repaired by Viollet-le-Duc, who closed the fissure, and made the tower apparently as sound as ever. The vaulting, however, is gone. Nor does Coucy, though the chief of the towers of the thirteenth century, stand alone in its magnificence. Issoudun, known as La Blanche Tour, is remarkable for the position of its entrance-door, and for its well-stair contained in the pro- jecting spur; Tournebut, Cosson,Verneuil, Chinon,Villeneuve- le-Roi, Semur, AUuye, Bourbon-l'Archambault, and Chateau- dun, are a few only of the round towers or donjons scattered over France, and dating from the latter half of the twelfth and from the thirteenth century. There is a peculiarity in these French towers unknown in England. Where, as at Chateau-Gaillard, they are exposed on one side to be battered, they are constructed with a projection forming a right-angled salient from the cylinder, which thus becomes keel or boat-shaped in plain. This spur has a fine effect, and being usually solid, adds much to the strength of the tower. This projection, of which Roche- Guyon is a fine example, and which ascends the whole height