Volume Eleven - Pre-Victorian to the Present Day - some more aspects - Picturesque Penarth —an Ideal Seaside Residential Centre - 1907.

Penarth - a view from Windsor Gardens.

Modern Penarth is to the Cardiff of to-day what Kingstown has long been to Dublin. For a time the name was principally associated with one of the great docks, but of late years the small and unimportant village of half a century ago has been gradually replaced by terraces of well-built houses and groups of handsome detached mansions standing in smiling gardens and embracing the three ecclesiastical parishes of Penarth (" the bear's head "), Cogan and Llandough.

Penarth, like Cardiff, has a history. Possibly the most important event in its annals was the matrimonial alliance of two centuries ago which made the ancestors of the Earl of Plymouth its ground-landlord, for both the present prosperity and future possibilities of Penarth must be largely attributed to the energy and enterprise of the actual holder of that title (better known as Lord Windsor) and his mother, under whose auspices many of the earlier local improvements were originated and carried out.

The view obtainable from the Windsor Gardens at Penarth is one not soon to be forgotten. Roughly speaking, you stand midway between the bold headlands known as Penarth and Lavernock — the former giving the name of " the bear's head " to the whole district. Immediately around and below you is a wealth of vegetation rarely to be met with. The drives and walks are lined with shady trees, while ferns and wild flowers (three shades of Valerian amongst them) grow luxuriantly in the rich grey marl of the cliff-side.

Close to the Yacht Club is the pier from which, during the season, steamers are constantly starting for the quite visible coasts of Somerset and Devon. From this particular coign of 'vantage in the " Country of Castles " a glimpse may be obtained not only of " Wonderful Wessex" but of the "Shire of the Sea Kings." On an exceptionally clear day even the dim outline of the "Cornish Riviera " may possibly be discernible. Weston and Clevedon are only some ten miles away, Penarth, on the opposite coast being equidistant between the two.