Adventure and adventurers > Black's guide to the counties of Dorset, Devon, & Cornwall

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BRANCH ROUTE BODMIN TO BOSSINEY. Bx>Ute 1.
The ruins, yet extant, are placed on the very brink of a tre¬
mendous precipice (300 feet above the sea), which forms the
extremity of a bold headland or promontory, called by the
peasants “the Island,” because the rush of waters has nearly
separated it from the main land. The castle originally occupied
the promontory and the opposite hill—the two portions being
connected by a noble bridge, whose massive foundations are yet
visible. “ Arches and flights of steps cut in the native rock
remain ; and walls, based on the crags, as they protrude them¬
selves from the ground, some at one elevation and some at
another, and enclosing wide areas, which once were royal rooms,
but are now carpeted with the softest turf; where the goat or
the mountain sheep grazes, or seeks shelter from the noon sun
and the ocean wind, and where the children from the neighbour¬
ing mill come up and pursue their solitary sports, build mimic
castles with the fallen stones of the dwelling of ancient kings,
and enclose paddocks and gardens with rows of them. Other
battlemented walls, which constituted the outworks and fortifica¬
tions, run winding .here and there up the steeps, and along the
strips of green turf, apparently natural terraces, on the heights
of the promontory.”