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Passage Illustrated

"I cannot help suspecting that the keeper we beheld with the demon hunter was Morgan Fenwolf," remarked the earl. "Suppose we make inquiry whether he was at home last night. We can readily find out his dwelling from Bryan Bowntance, the host of the Garter."

Richmond acquiesced in the proposal, and they accordingly proceeded to the cloisters of Saint George's Chapel, and threading some tortuous passages contrived among the canons' houses, passed through a small porch, guarded by a sentinel, and opening upon a precipitous and somewhat dangerous flight of steps, hewn out of the rock and leading to the town.

None except the more important members of the royal household were allowed to use this means of exit from the castle, but, of course, the privilege extended to Richmond and Surrey. Here in later times, and when the castle was not so strictly guarded, a more convenient approach was built, and designated, from the number of its stairs, "The Hundred Steps."

Having accomplished the descent in safety, and given the password to the​ ​ sentinel at the foot of the steps, the two young nobles emerged into the street, and the first object they beheld was the body of the miserable​butcher swinging from the summit of the Curfew Tower, where it was left​by order of the king. [Chapter VI. "How the Fair Geraldine bestowed a Relic upon her Lover; How​Surrey and Richmond rode in the Forest at Midnight; And​where they found the Body of Mark Fytton, the Butcher," p. 52]​

Other Views and Related Material on Windsor Castle

• Windsor Castle from the Long Walk, Victorian additions and alterations by Sir Jeffry Wyattville
• Early twentieth-century view of the castle from the river
• The Frogmore Mausoleum, adjacent to the Long Walk
• Statue of Queen Victoria at the foot of Castle Hill, Windsor

References

Ainsworth, William Harrison. Windsor Castle. An Historical Romance. Illustrated by George Cruikshank and Tony Johannot. With designs on wood by W. Alfred Delamotte. London: Routledge, 1880. Based on the Henry Colburn edition of 1844.

Patten, Robert L. Chapter 30, "The 'Hoc' Goes Down." George Cruikshank's Life, Times, and Art, vol. 2: 1835-1878. Rutgers, NJ: Rutgers U. P., 1991; London: The Lutterworth Press, 1996. Pp. 153-186.

Worth, George J. William Harrison Ainsworth. New York: Twayne, 1972.

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