And yet, about half a century before we made our appearance at the ruins, a visitor arrived who could see through them almost at a glance, and restored them in imagination to their former magnificence, as they appeared in the time of Queen Elizabeth.  He has described the preparations for the great feast given in her honour in 1575 by the Earl of Leicester, and resuscitated the chief actors in that memorable and magnificent scene.  He was described as “a tall gentleman who leaned rather heavily on his walking-stick,” and although little notice was taken of him at the time, was none other than the great Sir Walter Scott, whose novel Kenilworth attracted to the neighbourhood crowds of visitors who might never have heard of it otherwise.

We had begun to look upon Sir Walter in the light of an old acquaintance, once formed never to be forgotten, and admired his description of Kenilworth Castle: 

The outer wall of this splendid and gigantic structure inclosed seven acres, a part of which was occupied by extensive stables, and by a pleasure garden, with its trim arbours and parterres, and the rest formed a large base-court, or outer yard, of the noble Castle.  The Lordly structure itself, which rose near the centre of this spacious enclosure was composed of a huge pile of magnificent castellated buildings, apparently of different ages, surrounding an inner court, and bearing in the names of each portion attached to the magnificent mass, and in the armorial bearings which were there blazoned, the emblems of mighty chiefs who had long passed away, and whose history, could Ambition have lent ear to it, might have read a lesson to the haughty favourite who had now acquired and was augmenting the fair domain.  A large and massive Keep, which formed the Citadel of the Castle, was of uncertain, though great antiquity.  It bore the name of Caesar, perhaps from its resemblance to that in the Tower of London so called.  The external wall of this Royal Castle was on the south and west sides adorned and defended by a Lake, partly artificial, across which Leicester had constructed a stately bridge, that Elizabeth might enter the Castle by a path hitherto untrodden.  Beyond the Lake lay an extensive Chase, full of red deer, fallow deer, roes, and every species of game, and abounding with lofty trees, from amongst which the extended front and massive towers of the Castle were seen to rise in majesty and beauty.

The great feast provided by the Earl of Leicester in honour of the visit of Queen Elizabeth to Kenilworth Castle in 1575 was of a degree of magnificence rarely equalled either before or since, extending continuously over the seventeen days of the queen’s stay, beginning at two o’clock, at which time the great clock at the castle was stopped and stood at that hour until the Princess departed.  The cost of these ceremonies was enormous, the quantity of beer alone consumed being recorded as 320 hogsheads.