two o'clock
We got out at the gates , and wandered among the ruins that have been reverently excavated ; a gray and faded scene , like a kind of skeleton Pompeii with dead bones rattling ; entrance gateways ; ghost-haunted guard-houses ; stone rings which were towers ; many short , straight streets whose half-buried pavements once rang under soldiers ' heels ; the Forum ; all the camp-city plan ; a map with outlines roughly sketched in stone on faded grass . We had had our first sight of the Wall of which centurions in Britain bragged when they went back to Rome . Then it was a Living Wall ; but it is very wonderful still , where its skeleton lies in state . We had started so early from Keswick , that it was n't two o'clock when we left the Chesters ; and I was surprised when , instead of drawing up before some country inn for lunch , we skimmed through a gate only a mile or two away , and stopped under the shadowy frown of an imposing mediæval stronghold . It was Haughton Castle , whose towers and keep are crowded with stories of the past , and the visit was to be a surprise for us . Sir Lionel knew the owner , who had asked us all to lunch , for the `` dragon 's '' sake ; and it looked quite an appropriate resting-place for a dragon of elegant leisure . It was as interesting within as without ; and after luncheon they took us over the castle ; best of all , down in the deep dungeon where Archie Armstrong , a chief of moss-troopers , was forgotten and starved to death by his captor , Sir Thomas Swinburne , a stout knight of Henry the Eighth 's day .