Flemish clothiers, driven from their own homes by an inundation, in the reign of Henry I., who was glad enough to have such a solid and industrious race settled down here; but even before the arrival of these strangers, it was a flourishing fishing village, known as “Dyncych y Pyscoed,” or the Precipice of Fishes.
Tenby was at its greatest, however, in the time of Henry VII. and VIII., the former of whom deigned to make use of the castle as an asylum, while he was waiting to escape to Brittany, which he eventually did by the help of White, a wealthy merchant. The town was well garrisoned and fortified during the alarm of the Spanish Armada, and a considerable portion of the walls and ruined towers are still in good preservation, particularly on the south-west and north-west sides, which afford an agreeable walk. The lounge of Tenby, par excellence, is the Castle Hill, a rugged promontory almost surrounded by the sea, and crowned by the ruins of the keep.
A person must be hard to please, if he cannot enjoy a summer’s afternoon here at high-water, when he can lie on the grass and lazily watch the waves as they come rolling in, to break with impetuous disappointment on the water-worn cliffs below; when he can cast his eyes, almost without moving, over the wide sweep of Carmarthen Bay, with its graceful outlines of hills dotted here and there with white villages, and terminated by the fantastic point of Worm’s Head (up which I have many a time seen the breakers dashing, though at a distance of twenty miles), when the strains of the music (though not always of irreproachable tune), float pleasantly on the ear, mingled with the hum of voices and the deep boom of the breakers—Verily, I say, if a man cannot be happy under such circumstances, he does not deserve to live.
The ruins of the Castle are not extensive, and consist principally of the keep, a small round tower, with a square one attached to it, and commanding from the summit a view of the other watch-tower, which gave to the town the alarm of an approach by land. One of these is still remaining on a hill near Ivy Tower, above the road to Pater, and there is a second on the Burrows: a third and fourth on Windmill Hill and the Ridgeway have been destroyed. Besides the walls and the keep, the antiquarian may examine the church, which contains a singular west doorway, a beautiful flight of steps leading to the altar, and a curiously carved wooden roof, known by architects as a cradle roof. There are also some good monuments, amongst which is one in memory of the Whites, the wealthy merchants aforesaid, who helped Henry of Richmond out of the kingdom.
Tenby from the high ground.
But, perhaps, gentle reader, you turn up your nose at antiquities, and all such old-fashioned lore, and go in for the “ologies.” If you are a zoologist, then, explore the rugged cliffs and recesses of St. Catherine’s Island at low water, and do not get too much engrossed with your occupation; for I have known some people look up from their actiniæ, and make the pleasing discovery that the tide had risen, and cut them off from the shore, thus reducing them to spend several hours more than they liked on the island. The geologist will be struck with the foliated appearance of the limestone strata, which has been worn by the action of countless breakers into fantastic forms and caverns. In the rock basins left by the retreating tide, the admirers of zoophytes will find here employment for many a long day, as also at the Monkstone Rock (which stands out isolated on the North Sands), and on the cliffs round by Giltar and Lydstep.
To the south of Tenby, the coast dwindles down into sand burrows, but again rises to a considerable