Transcriber's Notes
###################
This e-text is based on the 1910 edition. The following errors have
been corrected.
# p. 68: "standstone" --> "sandstone"
# p. 71: bad print image; "south of": "of" restored
# p. 131: "exent" --> "extent"
Italic text in the original version has been placed between underscores
(_text_); bold passages have been symbolised by hash marks (#text#).
The caret symbol (^) indicates a superscript letter; the symbol [oe]
represents the respective ligature.
[Illustration: Physical Map of Devon]
CAMBRIDGE COUNTY GEOGRAPHIES
General Editor: F. H. H. GUILLEMARD, M.A., M.D.
DEVONSHIRE
CAMBRIDGE UNIVERSITY PRESS
London: FETTER LANE, E.C.
C. F. CLAY, Manager
[Illustration]
Edinburgh: 100, PRINCES STREET
Berlin: A. ASHER AND CO.
Leipzig: F. A. BROCKHAUS
New York: G. P. PUTNAM'S SONS
Bombay and Calcutta: MACMILLAN AND CO., LTD.
[_All rights reserved_]
_Cambridge County Geographies_
DEVONSHIRE
by
FRANCIS A. KNIGHT
AND
LOUIE M. (KNIGHT) DUTTON
With Maps, Diagrams and Illustrations
Cambridge:
at the University Press
1910
Cambridge:
PRINTED BY JOHN CLAY, M.A.
AT THE UNIVERSITY PRESS
PREFACE
In preparing this book much use has been made of the _Proceedings_ of
the Devonshire Association and of the first volume of the _Victoria
History of Devon_. The authors also desire to take this opportunity of
recording their grateful thanks to Her Gracious Majesty Queen Alexandra
for her kindness in providing one of the most interesting illustrations
in the volume--the beautiful photograph of the Armada trophy preserved
among the Royal plate in Windsor Castle, taken for the purpose of this
volume by her command.
F. A. K. AND L. M. D.
_March, 1910._
CONTENTS
PAGE
1. County and Shire. The Name Devonshire 1
2. General Characteristics 4
3. Size. Shape. Boundaries 8
4. Surface and General Features 11
5. Watershed. Rivers and the tracing of their courses.
Lakes 20
6. Geology 30
7. Natural History 41
8. A Peregrination of the Coast: 1, The Bristol Channel 55
9. A Peregrination of the Coast: 2, The English Channel 65
10. Coastal Gains and Losses. Sandbanks. Lighthouses 79
11. Climate and Rainfall 88
12. People--Race. Dialects. Settlements. Population 97
13. Agriculture--Main Cultivations. Woodlands. Stock 104
14. Industries and Manufactures 111
15. Mines and Minerals 119
16. Fisheries and Fishing Stations 124
17. Shipping and Trade 129
18. History of Devonshire 136
19. Antiquities 152
20. Architecture--(_a_) Ecclesiastical. Cathedral, Churches,
Abbeys and Monastic Houses 167
21. Architecture--(_b_) Military. Castles 185
22. Architecture--(_c_) Domestic. Famous Seats, Manor
Houses, Farms, Cottages 192
23. Communications: Past and Present--Roads, Railways,
Canals 202
24. Administration and Divisions--Ancient and Modern 208
25. The Roll of Honour of the County 213
26. The Chief Towns and Villages of Devonshire 225
ILLUSTRATIONS
PAGE
Devonshire in the Exeter Domesday Book. _Phot._ Worth
& Co 3
King Tor, near Tavistock. _Phot._ Frith 5
A Typical Devon Stream--Watersmeet, Lynmouth. _Phot._
Coates & Co. 6
A Devon Valley--Yawl Bottom, Uplyme. _Phot._ Frith 7
Glen Lyn, near Lynmouth. _Phot._ Coates & Co. 9
The Upper Dart, from the Moors. _Phot._ Frith 12
Tavy Cleave, showing disintegrated granite 14
On Lundy 17
The River Exe at Tiverton. _Phot._ Frith 21
On the Dart; Sharpham Woods. _Phot._ Frith 24
The Axe at Axminster Bridge. _Phot._ Frith 26
Bideford and the Torridge Estuary. _Phot._ Frith 28
Geological Section across England 32
Logan Stone, Dartmoor. Phot. Frith 34
A smoothly-weathered granite Tor, Dartmoor. _Phot._ Frith 36
Footprints of _Cheirotherium_. _Phot._ H. G. Herring 38
A Red Deer. _Phot._ H. G. Herring 43
Otters. _Phot._ H. G. Herring 44
Spurge Hawk Moth, with Pupa and Caterpillar. _Phot._
H. G. Herring 51
The Castle Rock, Lynton. _Phot._ Coates & Co. 56
Valley of Rocks, Lynton. _Phot._ Frith 57
Ilfracombe, from Hillsborough. _Phot._ Coates & Co. 59
Cliffs near Clovelly. _Phot._ Frith 63
Clovelly Harbour 64
Church Rock, Clovelly. _Phot._ Frith 65
Pinhay Landslip. _Phot._ Frith 67
White Cliff, Seaton. _Phot._ Barrett 68
Parson and Clerk Rocks, Dawlish. _Phot._ Frith 70
Anstis Cove, near Torquay. _Phot._ Frith 71
Torquay from Vane Hill. _Phot._ Frith 72
Brixham. _Phot._ Frith 74
"Britannia" and "Hindostan" in Dartmouth Harbour.
_Phot._ Frith 75
A Rough Sea at Ilfracombe. _Phot._ Frith 81
The Eddystone Lighthouse. _Phot._ Frith 84
The Start Lighthouse. _Phot._ Frith 87
The Winter Garden at Torquay. _Phot._ Frith 90
Upcott Lane, Bideford. _Phot._ Frith 94
A Cockle Woman, River Exe. _Phot._ Frith 101
A Honiton Lace-Worker. _Phot._ Frith 102
Old Ford Farm, Bideford. _Phot._ Frith 105
Exmoor Ponies. _Phot._ Sport and General Illustrations Co. 106
Red Devon Cow 107
Gathering Cider Apples 109
A Water-mill at Uplyme. _Phot._ Frith 110
Devonshire Lace 113
Devonshire Pottery from the Watcombe Works 115
Cider-making in the 17th Century 116
A Modern Cider Press 117
Ship-building Yard, Brixham. _Phot._ Frith 118
Devon Great Consols Mine. _Phot._ Frith 121
Stone Quarry, Beer. _Phot._ Frith 123
Fish Market at Brixham. _Phot._ Lake 126
Brixham Trawlers. _Phot._ Frith 128
Teignmouth. Phot. Coates & Co., Bristol 133
Drake's Island from Mt. Edgcumbe. _Phot._ Frith 135
Penny of Ethelred II, struck at Exeter. _Phot._ Worth & Co. 139
Signatures of Drake and Hawkyns 143
Flagon taken by Drake from the "Capitana" of the Armada.
From a photograph taken by the Queen's command 144
Drake's Drum. From a photograph presented by Lady
Eliott Drake 145
The "Mayflower" Stone on Plymouth Quay. _Phot._ Frith 146
Palaeolithic Implement from Kent's Cavern 152
Dolmen near Drewsteignton. _Phot._ Mr John S. Amery 154
Palstave of the Bronze Age, from Exeter Museum. _Phot._
Worth & Co 155
Fernworthy Circle, near Chagford. _Phot._ Frith 156
Hurston Stone Alignment. _Phot._ Mr John S. Amery 157
Triple Stone Row and Circle near Headlands, Dartmoor.
_Phot._ Mr John S. Amery 158
Bronze Centaur forming the Head of a Roman Standard.
_Phot._ Worth & Co 162
Saxon Sword-hilt 164
Cyclopean Bridge, Dartmoor. _Phot._ Frith 166
Norman Doorway, Axminster Church. _Phot._ Miss E. K.
Prideaux 169
Ottery St Mary Church. _Phot._ Frith 170
Decorated Window, Exeter Cathedral. _Phot._ Worth & Co. 171
Rood Screen and Pulpit, Harberton Church. _Phot._ Crossley,
Knutsford 174
The Seymour Tomb, Berry Pomeroy Church. _Phot._ Frith. 177
Exeter Cathedral, West Front. _Phot._ Worth & Co. 179
The Nave, Exeter Cathedral. _Phot._ Worth & Co. 181
Buckland Abbey from a photograph presented by Lady
Eliott Drake 184
Compton Castle. _Phot._ E. Kelly 189
An Old Devon Farmhouse Chimney Corner. _Phot._ Miss
E. K. Prideaux 193
Hayes Barton: Sir Walter Ralegh's House. _Phot._ Miss
E. K. Prideaux 196
Mol's Coffee House, Exeter. _Phot._ S. A. Moore of Exeter 198
Sydenham House 199
Dartmouth: Old Houses in the High Street. _Phot._ Frith 201
Newton Village. _Phot._ Frith 202
Teignmouth: the Coast Line and Sea-wall. _Phot._ Frith 206
The Guildhall, Exeter. _Phot._ Frith 211
Sir Francis Drake 214
Sir Walter Ralegh. _Phot._ Emery Walker. Signature. _Phot._
Worth & Co 216
Charles Kingsley. _Phot._ Emery Walker 220
Blundell's School, Tiverton. _Phot._ Frith 222
Samuel Taylor Coleridge. _Phot._ Emery Walker 223
Clovelly. _Phot._ Frith 228
Dartmouth, from Warfleet. _Phot._ Frith 230
Cherry Bridge, near Lynmouth. _Phot._ Frith 234
Lynmouth Harbour. _Phot._ Coates & Co. 235
Ogwell Mill, Newton Abbot. _Phot._ Frith 237
Shute Manor House. _Phot._ Barrett 240
Tiverton Bridge. _Phot._ Frith 241
Diagrams 243
MAPS
Devonshire, Topographical _Front Cover_
Devonshire, Geological _Back Cover_
England and Wales, showing Annual Rainfall 92
The authors are indebted to Mr John S. Amery for leave to reproduce the
pictures on pp. 154, 157 and 158.
1. County and Shire. The Name Devonshire.
The word "shire," which is probably derived, like "shear" and "share,"
from an Anglo-Saxon root meaning "to cut," was at one time used in
a wider sense than it is at present, and was formerly applied to a
division of a county or even of a town. Thus, there were once six small
"shires" in Cornwall.
The word shire was in use at the time of King Ina, and occurs in the
code of laws which that monarch drew up about the year 709; but the
actual division of England into shires was a gradual process, and was
not complete at the Norman Conquest. Lancashire, for example, was not
constituted a shire until the twelfth century. Alterations in the extent
and limits of some of the counties are, indeed, still being made; and in
the case of Devonshire the boundaries have been changed several times
within the memory of persons still living.
The object of thus dividing up the country was partly military and
partly financial. Every shire was bound to provide a certain number of
armed men to fight the king's battles, and was also bound to contribute
a certain sum of money towards his income and the expenses of the state;
and in each district a "shire-reeve"--or sheriff, as we call the officer
now--was appointed by the Crown to see that the people did their duty
in both respects. The shire was a Saxon institution. County is a Norman
word, which came into use after the Conquest, when the government of
each shire was entrusted to some powerful noble, often a count, a title
which originally meant a companion of the King.
It has been suggested that the reason why the names of some counties end
or may end in "shire," while in other cases this syllable is never used,
is that the former were "shorn off" from some larger district, while the
latter represent entire ancient kingdoms or tribal divisions. According
to this theory, Yorkshire is a "shire" because it originally formed
part of the kingdom of Northumbria; and Kent is not a "shire" because
it practically represents the ancient kingdom of the Cantii. The form
"Kent-shire" is, however, found in a record of the time of Athelstan.
In the case of our own county both forms are in use, and we say
either "Devon" or "Devonshire," although the two names are not
exactly interchangeable. Thus, while we generally talk of "Red Devon"
cattle, we always speak of "Devonshire" cream. "Devon," which is the
older form, may be derived either from _Dumnonii_, the name given by
Ptolemy, an Alexandrian geographer of the second century, to the
inhabitants of the south-west of Britain, perhaps from a Celtic word
_Dumnos_, "people"--or it may come from the old Welsh word _Dyvnaint_
or _Dyfneint_, "the land of the deeps," that is to say, of deep valleys
or deep seas. To the Saxon settlers the people they found in possession
of the district were _Defn-saetan_ or "dwellers in Devon"; and in time
these settlers called themselves _Defenas_, or "men of Devon." In the
Exeter Domesday Book--the Norman survey of the five south-western
counties, completed probably before 1086--the name of the county is
given as _Devenesira_. It would appear, then, that the Britons called
their province "Devon," and that the Saxons called it "Devonshire." It
is characteristic of the peaceable nature of the Saxon occupation that
the two names, like the two nations, seem to have quietly settled down
side by side.
[Illustration: Devonshire in the Exeter Domesday Book]
It is believed that it was Alfred the Great who marked out the
border-line between Devon and Somerset; and it was undoubtedly Athelstan
who, after his victory over the West Welsh, made the Tamar the boundary
between Devon and Cornwall.
2. General Characteristics.
Devonshire is a county in the extreme south-west of England, occupying
the greater part of the peninsula between the English and Bristol
Channels, and having a coast-line both on the south and on the north.
Situated thus, on two seas, and possessing, especially on its southern
sea-board, a remarkable number of bays and estuaries, it has always been
noted as a maritime county. And although many of its harbours have, in
the lapse of ages, become silted up with sand or shingle, and are now of
comparatively slight importance, it has one great sea-port, which, while
only thirtieth in rank among British commercial ports, is the greatest
naval station in the Empire.
The county has in the past been famous for its cloth-weaving and for its
tin and copper-mining, but these industries are now greatly decayed, and
the main occupation of the people is agriculture, to which both the soil
and the climate are particularly favourable.
[Illustration: King Tor, near Tavistock]
A special characteristic of Devonshire is its scenery, which is so
striking that it is very generally considered the most beautiful
county in England; while there are probably very many who regard its
mild and genial, equable and health-giving climate as more noteworthy
still. It is a remarkably hilly country, and it also possesses not
only many rivers, but a great number of broad river estuaries. Another
characteristic with which every visitor to the district is struck is the
redness which distinguishes its soil, its southern cliffs, and its
famous breed of cattle, which is not less noticeable than the soft and
pleasant dialect, with its close sound of the letter "u" so typical both
of Devon and of West Somerset.
[Illustration: A Typical Devon Stream--Watersmeet, Lynmouth]
Another characteristic of the people has always been their loyalty
to their sovereign, to their county, and to each other. Devon is
proverbial, like Cornwall and Yorkshire, for the clannishness of its
inhabitants. It is a land, too, where superstition dies hard. Belief
in pixies--fairies, as they are called elsewhere--in witches and
witch-craft, in whisht-hounds and other weird and uncanny creatures, and
in portents and omens, still lingers, especially on Dartmoor.
[Illustration: A Devon Valley--Yawl Bottom, Uplyme]
Dartmoor itself, with its wild and picturesque scenery, its unrivalled
wealth of prehistoric antiquities, and its singular geological
structure, forms one of the most striking features of the county, and
one to which there is no parallel in England. The marine zoology of
Devonshire is more interesting than that of any other English county,
and nowhere else in the island has there been discovered clearer
evidence of the great antiquity of man than was found in Kent's Cavern
and other Devonshire caves.
Above all things, its position has made Devonshire a native land of
heroes. Very few other counties have produced so many men of mark, so
many men of enterprise and daring. Certainly no other has played a
greater part in the expansion of England. From Devonshire came not only
some of the most distinguished seamen of the Golden Age of Elizabeth,
some of the most skilful and daring of her naval captains, but some of
the earliest and most famous of our explorers; the founder of the first
English colony, the first Englishman to sail the polar sea, the first
Englishman to circumnavigate the globe.
3. Size. Shape. Boundaries.
Devonshire, which occupies rather more than one-twenty-second of the
whole area of England and Wales, is one of the largest counties in the
British Islands, being exceeded in size only by Yorkshire and Lincoln in
England, by Inverness and Argyll in Scotland, and by Cork in Ireland.
Its extreme length from east to west, measured along a horizontal line
drawn through the middle of the county, starting at the Dorsetshire
border half-way between Lyme Cobb and the Seven Rocks Point, passing
close to the city of Exeter, and reaching to the point where the river
Ottery enters the county, is 67 miles; exactly the same as that of the
county of Somerset. Its greatest breadth, from Countisbury Foreland on
the north coast to Prawle Point on the south, is 71 miles. It may be
added that a longer east and west line can be drawn only in Yorkshire
and Sussex, and a longer meridional line only in Yorkshire and Lincoln.
The area of the "Ancient" or "Geographical" county of Devonshire,
according to the revised return furnished by the Ordnance Department,
is 1,667,154 acres, or 2605 square miles. Compared with the counties
that adjoin it, it is two-and-a-half times the size of Dorset, it is
roughly twice as large as Cornwall, and it is more than half as large
again as Somerset. It is fifteen times as large as Rutland, it is
about half the size of Yorkshire, and its area is less than that of
Lincolnshire by only 48 square miles.
[Illustration: Glen Lyn, near Lynmouth]
Although usually said to be irregular in form, the outline of the
county has a certain degree of symmetry, being roughly shaped like a
life-guardsman's cuirass, with nearly equal sides, with a small hollow
at the top or north coast, and a much larger one at the bottom or south
coast.
Devonshire, like Kent and Cornwall, is bounded on two sides by the sea,
having the Bristol Channel on the north and north-west, and the English
Channel on the south. On its western side the river Tamar, with its
tributary the Ottery, forms almost the whole of the frontier between it
and Cornwall. The eastern and north-eastern border is less definite,
but is roughly marked by Exmoor and the Blackdown Hills, which partly
separate Devonshire from Somerset. The short length of frontier between
Devonshire and Dorsetshire is marked by no natural feature.
No part of Devonshire is now, as was formerly the case, wholly
surrounded by any other county. Three of its parishes, however, are
partly in Dorset, one is partly in Cornwall, and one, a district of
Exmoor containing no houses or inhabitants, is partly in Somerset.
Culmstock, which before 1842 was considered to belong to Somerset,
although completely islanded in Devon, and Stockland and Dalwood, which
were reckoned with Dorset, although they were entirely inside the
Devonshire border, have now been formally transferred to this county. On
the other hand, Thornecombe and Ford Abbey, which belonged to Devonshire
although they were situate in the adjoining county, have been handed
over to Dorset. Still later alterations were the transfer of Hawkchurch
and Churchstanton from Dorset to Devon in 1896.
4. Surface and General Features.
Devonshire is characterised by such great irregularity and unevenness of
surface that practically the only level land in it is along the shores
of its estuaries; with the almost inevitable result that it is one of
the most picturesque and beautiful counties in England. Its scenery has
been very greatly affected by subterranean movements, which have not
only roughly shaped its hills and valleys, partly by upheaval and partly
by the shrinkage of the earth's crust, but have been the principal cause
of the breadth of the river estuaries which are so marked a feature of
its coasts, especially of the south. At many points along the shore of
Devonshire there is evidence, in raised sea-beaches, and, near Torquay,
in the borings of marine mollusca at a great height above the present
tide-line, of upheavals that must have raised the whole coast, even if
they did not materially change the contour of the country. On the other
hand, the existence of submerged forests at many places near the shore
proves that the land has sunk at least forty feet, thus allowing the sea
to flow further inland; thereby greatly widening the already existing
valleys, which had been formed in part by the shrinkage of the earth's
crust, and in part by the action of the rivers.
[Illustration: The Upper Dart, from the Moors]
The chief physical feature of Devonshire, a feature without parallel in
any other part of England, is the Forest of Dartmoor, the great upland,
some twenty miles long and eighteen miles broad, which occupies so
large a part of the southern half of the county. It is all granite,
the largest mass of granite in England, and forms part of a chain of
outcrops of that formation extending from Devonshire to the Scilly
Isles. The word "forest," it should be remembered, originally meant,
not a wood, but a hunting-ground. No part of the open moor is now covered
with trees, nor is it likely, considering the poorness of the soil,
that it ever was so covered, although roots and other remains of trees
have been found in various parts of it. In early days it was a royal
hunting-ground, and most of it is still Crown property, forming part
of the Duchy of Cornwall.
The most prominent feature of the moor, which contains the highest
ground in England south of Ingleborough in Yorkshire, are the isolated
rocky heights called tors, some 170 in number, many of which have been
weathered, not only into very rugged and highly picturesque, but even
into most strange and fantastic shapes; in many cases having their
steep slopes strewn with fallen fragments of rock, some of them tons in
weight, forming what are known on the moor as "clitters" or "clatters."
The highest points are High Willhays, 2039 feet; Yes Tor, 2029 feet,
only half a mile away from its rival, Newlake, 1983 feet; Cuthill, 1980
feet; and Great Lynx Tor, 1908 feet above sea-level; and among the most
striking and picturesque are Great Lynx Tor, Staple Tor, Mis Tor, and
Vixen Tor, although many others are remarkable for their strange and
time-worn outlines.
The moor is seamed by many valleys and ravines, not a few of which are,
in parts, well-wooded, each with its swiftly-flowing stream or river,
and many of them most picturesque and beautiful. Such, in particular,
are the Valley of the Dart, especially including Holne Chase and above;
of the Teign near Fingle Bridge; of the Tavy at Tavy Cleave; of the Lyd
at Lydford, and of the Plym at the Dewerstone.
[Illustration: Tavy Cleave, showing disintegrated granite]
Dartmoor is distinguished in being the coldest and rainiest part
of Devonshire, and to these two features of its climate are no doubt
largely due the fogs which so frequently envelope it. Its great extent
and its heavy rainfall make the moor the main watershed of the county.
Most of its rivers have their sources in the bogs, which are a well-known
and somewhat dangerous feature of the district, and of which the most
remarkable are Fox Tor Mire, Cranmere Bog, and Cuthill Bog.
Its varied and peculiar features, its vast expanses of wild and desolate
moorland, now aglow with golden gorse, and now still more splendid
with the magnificent purple of its broad sheets of heather or with the
warm hues of dying bracken, and beautiful, as the seasons change, with
the varying tints of grass and sedge, of ferns and rushes, of moss
and bog-myrtle and bilberry, of cotton-grass and asphodel; the almost
unrivalled beauty of its river-valleys, its multitudinous streams, its
wild life, its extraordinary wealth of prehistoric antiquities, its
lingering superstitions of pixies, of witch-craft, of night-flying
whisht-hounds and ghostly huntsmen, its very solitude and silence,
combine to make Dartmoor, to the antiquary and the artist, the
naturalist and the angler, one of the most attractive spots in England,
and one whose charm poets, painters, and authors have striven from
earliest days to immortalise.
The greater part of Exmoor, and all its principal heights, are in
Somerset, but it extends into the north-eastern corner of Devon, and
detached portions of it, which appear to be really parts of the same
upland, reach to the hills above Combe Martin. Part of Span Head, whose
summit is 1619 feet above the sea, is in our county; and the outlying
spurs of Bratton Down, Kentisbury Down, and the Great Hangman are
all over 1000 feet high. There is very beautiful scenery on Exmoor,
especially on the Somerset side of the border, somewhat resembling that
on Dartmoor, although less wild and picturesque, and without any of the
tors which are so characteristic of the greater upland. Exmoor is the
only part of England where red deer still run wild; and the district
is visited every year by stag-hunters from all parts of the island and
especially from Ireland. Both it and Dartmoor are famous for a breed
of sturdy little ponies, originally, no doubt, of the same stock. In
the Badgeworthy Valley, which is in Somerset, although not far from
Lynton, may be seen what are said to be the ruined huts of the Doones, a
community of freebooters immortalised by Blackmore, who represents them
as having been the terror of the country-side towards the close of the
seventeenth century.
Other Devonshire hills are the Black Downs, along the border of
Somerset, in which the highest point is 860 feet above the sea; another
Black Down, six miles due south, reaching 930 feet; the Great Haldons,
south-west of Exeter, 817 feet high; and Dumpdon Hill, about two miles
north by east of Honiton, 856 feet above sea-level.
Devonshire is in parts extremely fertile, especially towards the south,
and it has been called (in common, it is true, with other counties) the
Garden of England. Two very large and specially productive areas are
the Vale of Exeter, and the South Hams,--the latter a name somewhat
indefinitely applied to the district south of Dartmoor and occupying
a large part of the region between the Teign and the Plym, with
Kingsbridge as its chief centre. The great fertility of this famous
district is due partly to the nature of the soil, partly to the mildness
of the climate and the shelter afforded by the heights of Dartmoor,
and partly to its nearness to the sea.
[Illustration: On Lundy]
A very remarkable and interesting feature of Devonshire is Lundy--an
island three miles long by one mile broad, lying out in the Bristol
Channel, opposite Barnstaple Bay, and twelve miles north-north-west of
Hartland Point. Its name, it is believed, is derived from two Norse
words meaning Puffin Isle.
Composed entirely of granite, except for its southern extremity,
which is millstone grit, its lofty cliffs are very wild and rugged
and picturesque, and for two miles along its eastern side there is a
remarkable series of chasms, from three to twenty feet wide and some
of them of great depth, known to the islanders as the Earthquakes. The
shingle beach at the south-eastern corner, in the shelter of Rat Island,
is the only landing-place, but many vessels find good anchorage on the
eastern side, well protected from westerly winds. Many ships, however,
have been wrecked among the terrible rocks round its base, including the
battleship _Montagu_, lost in 1906, and, according to tradition, one of
the galleons of the Spanish Armada. There is a lighthouse at each end of
the island, and the southern one is the most powerful in Devonshire.
Perhaps the greatest charm of Lundy lies, as will be shown in some
detail in a later chapter, in its natural history, especially in the
vast numbers of birds which visit it in the breeding season. Among
very rare stragglers that have been shot here is the Iceland falcon,
a species of which very few examples have been recorded for this
country. A few plants and insects are peculiar to the spot. There are
now few trees, except those planted not long ago near the owner's
house in a cleft at the south-eastern end, but some shrubs, such as
fuchsias, hydrangeas, and rhododendrons grow to a great size, and the
mesembryanthemums are particularly vigorous and beautiful.
Granite for the Thames Embankment was obtained here, but the quarries
have long been closed, and farming is the chief industry of the few
inhabitants.
There are evidences of very ancient occupation, in the shape of
kistvaens, tumuli, and the foundations of primitive dwellings; and in
times more recent the island has had a stirring history. In the reign
of Henry II it was held by the turbulent family of the Montmorencies or
Moriscos, and the shell of Morisco Castle, now converted into cottages,
still stands on the south-east corner of the island. During the Civil
War it was fortified for the king, and only surrendered in 1647. At
various times in the seventeenth century it was captured by French,
Spaniards, and Algerines; and it was, moreover, several times occupied
by pirates, some of whom were Englishmen, who found it a convenient
station from which to plunder ships sailing up the Bristol Channel.
5. Watershed. Rivers and the tracing of their courses. Lakes.
Devonshire is a well-watered county, a county of many rivers; and
although not one of its multitudinous streams is of real commercial
importance or of much value as a water-way, by their mere abundance and
by the beauty of their scenery, especially of the magnificent ravines
which many of them in the lapse of ages have worn deep in the rock, they
form one of its most striking features.
By far the most important watershed is the great upland of Dartmoor,
where, with few exceptions, rise all the principal rivers. The
headwaters of the Tamar and the Torridge--which rise close together,
but flow in very different directions and reach different seas--are in
the high ground in the north-west, on the very border of Cornwall, and
the sources of the Exe and of its great twin stream the Barle are on
the moor to which the former gives its name, just inside the county of
Somerset. But the tributaries of all these are drawn from the bogs of
Dartmoor, and especially from the morasses round the now insignificant
sheet of water known as Cranmere Pool. The whole eastern border of the
county, from Exmoor southward to the Blackdown Hills, is a source of
streams. Such are the Lyn, flowing into the Bristol Channel; the Bray,
the Yeo, and the Mole, tributaries of the Taw; the Loman, the Culm, and
the Clyst, tributaries of the Exe; the Otter, falling into the English
Channel; and the Yarty, a tributary of the Axe. It is remarkable that
of all the many streams of Devonshire, only two of any consequence reach
the estuary of the Severn. Almost all flow into the English Channel.
[Illustration: The River Exe at Tiverton]
The longest of the Devonshire rivers is the Exe, after which are
named Exford and Exton in Somerset, and Exeter and Exmouth in our own
county--a strong and beautiful stream which rises near Simonsbath on
Exmoor, flowing for the first twenty miles through Somerset and crossing
the Devonshire border near Dulverton station, where it is met, on the
left bank, by its great tributary the Barle. It then runs nearly due
south, through well-wooded and fertile country, being joined on its
left bank, at Tiverton, "the town of the two fords," by the Loman; and
farther down on the same side by the Culm, which gives its name to
Culmstock. Near Exeter it receives on the right bank the Creedy, a
pretty and winding stream that lends its name to Crediton, and along
whose shores in some of the richest land in Devonshire. A little below
Exeter, close to the once famous port of Topsham, it is joined on the
left bank by the Clyst, a small and unimportant stream, flowing through
most fertile country, and giving its name to no fewer than seven
villages. Below Topsham the Exe widens out to nearly a mile, forming,
at high tide, from this point to the sea, a noble estuary five miles
long, with the popular watering-place of Exmouth on the slope of the
eastern side of its entrance, which is almost closed by a long sandbank
called the Warren, divided into two parts by a stream. Until late in the
thirteenth century the Exe was navigable from the sea to Exeter. But in
1290 Isabella de Fortibus, Countess of Devon, having quarrelled with the
citizens, blocked the river-bed with stones, at a place still called
the Countess Weir, leaving, however, sufficient room for ships to pass.
At a later period this space was closed by the Earl of Devon, and the
navigation of the river entirely stopped. Vessels now reach Exeter by a
canal.
The second river in point of length is the Tamar, after which are
named North Tamerton in Cornwall and Tamerton Foliott in our own
county. Rising in the extreme north-west, in the high ground that parts
Devonshire from Cornwall, it forms almost the whole of the dividing line
between the two counties, and is characterised throughout the lower
portion of its course by some very beautiful scenery. It is joined by
many streams, some rising in Devonshire and some in Cornwall; some of
which--the Lyd, for example--are renowned for their wildness and beauty.
The largest of the western tributaries is the Lynher, entirely a Cornish
river, whose estuary joins the Hamoaze. The most important of those on
the left bank is the Tavy, a Dartmoor-drawn stream, giving its name to
the town of Tavistock and to the villages of Peter Tavy and Mary Tavy,
and flowing through some of the most fruitful land in Devonshire. A
particularly fertile district is that lying between the Tavy and the
Tamar.
Although it is a much shorter river than the Exe or the Tamar, the Dart
is better known than either, and is perhaps the most familiar by name
of all the Devonshire streams. Along its banks, especially near Holne
and Buckland-in-the-Moor, and along the wooded shores of its magnificent
estuary, is some of the most beautiful river-scenery, not in this county
only but in all England. The most important of its many tributaries are
the East and the West Dart--both of which rise in the great bog round
Cranmere Pool, and join at a picturesque spot called Dartmeet--and the
Webburns, East and West. Below Totnes the Dart widens out into a long
and most beautiful estuary, winding among finely-wooded hills. On the
west side of its entrance is the old port of Dartmouth, named, like
Dartington, after the river, and on the opposite shore is the smaller
but equally picturesque little town of Kingswear.
[Illustration: On the Dart; Sharpham Woods]
Famous as the Dart is for the wildness and beauty of its scenery, and
for the excellence of its trout and salmon fishing, it has an evil name
for the dangerous nature of its swiftly-flowing waters, which, after
heavy rain on the moor, rise with extraordinary rapidity, changing it
in a few hours from a peaceful and easily-forded stream into a raging
and resistless torrent. At Hexworthy, in November, 1894, the river rose
ten and a half feet above the level of the previous day. Characteristic
of this as the other of the moorland streams, is the strange sound it
sometimes makes, especially towards nightfall, known as its "cry," and
believed by the superstitious to be ominous of flood and danger. To
"hear the Broadstones crying"--masses of granite lying in the bed of the
stream--is considered by the moor-folk a sure sign of coming rain.
The Dartmoor rivers, in the upper part of their courses, are naturally
all swift, and are all more or less tinged by the peat of their
moorland birth-place--lightly, when the stream is low, and deepening in
flood-time into the colour of a rich cairngorm.
The Teign, another of the streams that rise in the Cranmere bog, is
famous both for the beauty of the scenery along its winding shores and
for the many prehistoric antiquities--stone circles and alignments,
menhirs and tumuli--which stand near them. Its two main branches, the
North and the South Teign, meet about a mile to the west of Chagford. To
the east of that moorland village the river flows through beautifully
wooded valleys, and is joined on its right bank, below Chudleigh, by
another Dartmoor tributary, the Bovey, on which stand Bovey Tracy,
famous for its beds of lignite and clay and for its potteries, and North
Bovey, near which are the remains of the very remarkable Bronze Age
village of Grimspound. Below Newton Abbot the Teign becomes a broad
estuary, on or near whose shores are five of the townships that are
named after the river, the most important of which is the little port
and well-known watering-place of Teignmouth. The river mouth is almost
blocked by a low promontory, which, although now built over, was once a
mere sand-bank or dune, from which latter word, no doubt, it takes its
name of the Den.
[Illustration: The Axe at Axminster Bridge]
Other south-coast rivers are the Axe--one of whose two main branches
rises in Somerset and the other in Dorset--which gives its name to
Axminster and Axmouth; the Otter, which rises in the Blackdown
Hills, and flowing past Honiton, Ottery St Mary, and Otterton, reaches
the sea at Budleigh Salterton; the Aune or Avon, especially famous
for its salmon, the Erme, and the slopes Yealm, small but beautiful
streams rising on the southern slopes of Dartmoor, widening into estuaries
as they near the English Channel, and giving names to Aveton, Ermington,
and Yealmpton, respectively. The Plym, after which are named Plympton,
Plymouth, and Plymstock, is another Dartmoor river, flowing through some
very beautiful country, especially in the neighbourhood of Bickleigh,
and at length forming a broad and important estuary known first as
the Laira, and lower down as the Catwater or Cattewater, which joins
Plymouth Sound.
The chief rivers on the north coast are the Torridge and the Taw, the
former of which, rising in the extreme north-west, on the Cornish
border, near the source of the Tamar, flows south-west for nearly half
its course, and then sweeps round to run in the opposite direction,
giving its name to three several Torringtons, and having as its chief
tributaries the Walden, the Lew, and the Okement, all on its right bank.
The last-named stream is formed of the East and the West Okements, which
meet at Okehampton, their namesake. The lower waters of the Torridge
form a long and narrow estuary--its shore only ten miles distant from
the original source of the river--half-way down which is the once
important port of Bideford, built on both sides of the stream, which
is here spanned by a very ancient bridge. Near the entrance of the
estuary, but neither of them on the open sea, are Appledore, the port of
Barnstaple, and Instow, a small but growing watering-place.
The Taw is a Dartmoor-drawn river, rising, like so many streams, in the
Cranmere bog, giving its name to Tawstock and to three several Tawtons,
and receiving on its right bank the Yeo, the Little Dart, and the Mole.
The most considerable town on it is Barnstaple, beyond which it becomes
a broad tidal estuary, joining that of the Torridge, and flowing out
into what is known both as Barnstaple and Bideford Bay.
[Illustration: Bideford and the Torridge Estuary]
Many small streams fall into the Bristol Channel, among which is the
Lyn, renowned for its beautiful scenery and its good trout-fishing.
A large proportion of the Celtic words in our language are found in
the names of natural features, especially of hills and rivers. This is
particularly well seen in Devonshire, where, as has been pointed out,
the Saxons came as settlers rather than conquerors, adopting many of
the names which they found already in use, and where an unusually large
number of towns and villages have been called after the streams on which
they stand.
The names Exe, Axe, and Okement, from the Celtic _uisge_; Avon, Aune,
and Auney, from _afon_; Dart, from _dwr_; and Teign, from _tain_, are
all derived from roots meaning "water." Other names are taken from
descriptive adjectives, such as Wrey, from _rea_, rapid; Lyn, from
_lleven_, smooth; and Tamar, Taw, and Tavy, from _tam_, spreading or
still.
The lakes of Devonshire, as is the case in the majority of English
counties, are little more than ponds. Cranmere Pool, in the great morass
where many Devonshire rivers rise, lying in a dreary spot, as befits
the reputed place of punishment of evil spirits, has shrunk of late
years in consequence of much peat-cutting in its neighbourhood, and
is now an insignificant pond, rarely more than seventy yards across,
and in hot summers sometimes quite dry. Bradmere Pool and Classenwell
Pool, the sites of old mine-workings, are beautiful little lakes, but
they are only a few acres in extent. Burrator Reservoir has been made
in order to supply water to Plymouth. The largest of these miniature
lakes is Slapton Ley, or Lea, a long and narrow sheet of water, two and
a quarter miles in length and measuring about 200 acres, separated from
the sea, with which it was no doubt once connected, by a bank of fine
shingle. The reeds of its north-eastern end, which are cut and sold for
thatching, are the haunt of many water-birds; and the Ley is visited in
winter by immense numbers of migratory ducks and waders.
6. Geology.
Three main points characterise the geological features of Devonshire;
the simplicity of the system in the west, north-centre and south-west of
the county; the comparative complexity and variety of the strata in the
east and south; and, most remarkable of all, the extraordinary number of
outcrops of igneous rock, from the great mass of Dartmoor granite, which
has no parallel in England, to the hundreds of small dykes or elvans
that are scattered chiefly over the southern region, although some occur
to the north and east of Dartmoor.
The oldest rocks in Devonshire are probably not, as was once thought,
the granites, but the highly altered or metamorphic formations in the
extreme south; that is to say, the mica and quartz schists and the
hornblende epidote schists which extend from near Start Point to Bolt
Tail, a district which, owing in great measure to distortion by volcanic
upheaval, includes some of the most picturesque scenery in Devon.
Next in order of age is the series called Devonian, after the name of
the county, in which they were first distinguished from the Old Red
Sandstone. They are, however, by no means confined to Devonshire, but
are very widely distributed, covering a large part of Cornwall, and
occurring on the continent of Europe, especially in Russia, and in Asia
and North and South America. The Devonian beds--which are found both in
the north and south, occupying two distinct areas separated by widespread
deposits of culm or carboniferous measures--were, it is thought,
formed in open water, and probably at the same time that the Old Red
Sandstone of the adjoining county of Somerset and elsewhere, which is
not found in this county at all, was being deposited in estuaries and
land-locked seas.
NAMES OF SUBDIVISIONS CHARACTERS OF ROCKS
SYSTEMS
{Metal Age Deposits }
{Recent {Neolithic " } Superficial
{Pleistocene {Palaeolithic " } Deposits
{ {Glacial " }
T{
E{ {Cromer Series }
R{ {Weybourne Crag }
T{Pliocene {Chillesford and Norwich Crags } Sands chiefly
I{ {Red and Walton Crags }
A{ {Coralline Crag }
R{
Y{Miocene Absent from Britain
{
{ {Fluviomarine Beds of Hampshire }
{ {Bagshot Beds }
{Eocene {London Clay } Clays and Sands
{ {Oldhaven Beds, Woolwich and Reading} chiefly
{ {Thanet Sands Groups }
{ {Chalk }
{ {Upper Greensand and Gault } Chalk at top
{Cretaceous {Lower Greensand } Sandstones, Mud
S{ {Weald Clay } and Clays below
E{ {Hastings Sands }
C{
O{ {Purbeck Beds }
N{ {Portland Beds }
D{ {Kimmeridge Clay }
A{ {Corallian Beds }
R{Jurassic {Oxford Clay and Kellaways Rock } Shales, Sandstones
Y{ {Cornbrash } and Oolitic
{ {Forest Marble } Limestones
{ {Great Oolite with Stonesfield Slate}
{ {Inferior Oolite }
{ {Lias--Upper, Middle, and Lower }
{
{ {Rhaetic }
{ {Keuper Marls }
{Triassic {Keuper Sandstone } Red Sandstones and
{ {Upper Bunter Sandstone } Marls, Gypsum and
{ {Bunter Pebble Beds } Salt
{ {Lower Bunter Sandstone }
{ {Magnesian Limestone and Sandstone } Red Sandstones
{Permian {Marl Slate } and Magnesian
{ {Lower Permian Sandstone } Limestone
P{
R{ {Coal Measures } Sandstones, Shales
I{Carboniferous {Millstone Grit } and Coals at top
M{ {Mountain Limestone } Sandstones in
A{ {Basal Carboniferous Rocks } middle Limestone
R{ } and Shales below
Y{
{ {Upper } Devonian and old Red } Red Sandstones,
{Devonian {Mid } Sandstone } Shales, Slates and
{ {Lower } } Limestones
{
{ {Ludlow Beds } Sandstones, Shales
{Silurian {Wenlock Beds } and Thin
{ {Llandovery Beds } Limestones
{
{ {Caradoc Beds } Shales, Slates,
{Ordovician {Llandeilo Beds }Sandstones and
{ {Arenig Beds } Thin Limestones
{
{ {Tremadoc Slates }
{Cambrian {Lingula Flags } Slates and
{ {Menevian Beds } Sandstones
{ {Harlech Grits and Llanberis Slates }
{
{ {Sandstones,
{Pre-Cambrian No definite classification yet made {Slates and
{Volcanic Rocks
[Illustration: DIAGRAM SECTION FROM SNOWDON TO HARWICH, ABOUT 200 MILES.
This cross section shows what would be seen in a deep cutting nearly E.
and W. across England and Wales. It shows also how, in consequence of
the folding of the strata and the cutting off of the uplifted parts,
old rocks which should be tens of thousands of feet down are found in
borings in East Anglia only 1000 feet or so below the surface.]
The North Devonian beds, which extend from the coast as far south as
the latitude of Barnstaple, consist of slates, grits, and sandstones
which, it is believed, judging from the organic remains in them,
were formed in shallow water and near shore. Their lower strata, the
Foreland grits, Lynton beds, and Hangman grits, contain some fossils
and various kinds of coral. But the Middle beds, the Ilfracombe and
Morte slates, are much richer in animal remains; of which perhaps the
most remarkable are primitive palaeozoic fish, such as the very curious
armoured _pteraspis_; while corals and bivalve shells are abundant and
characteristic. The Upper Devonian is less fossiliferous, but contains
some large trilobites, various marine shells, and some land-plants.
The South Devonian, which covers nearly all South Devon and a large part
of Cornwall, is somewhat different in character, consisting chiefly
of slates, with coralline limestones, varied by volcanic outcrops or
elvans--a word said to be of Cornish origin, and meaning "white rock."
To judge from its fossils, it was deposited in deeper water than the
contemporary beds in the north of the county. The Lower and Middle
beds are also far richer in animal remains; and the Middle Devonian of
the south, which is the most typical of the series and includes the
limestones of Plymouth and Torbay, is crowded with shells, trilobites,
and corals. Among the shells, bivalves--such as _Stringocephalus_, which
occurs only in the Devonian formations--spiral univalves, and corals
are very abundant. There are also many crinoids, distinct from those
of the carboniferous limestone, while perhaps the most characteristic
form is the rare and curious _Caleola sandalina_, differing from all
other corals in having an operculum. There are not many varieties of
trilobite, but the large _Brontes flabellifer_ is not uncommon.
[Illustration: Logan Stone, Dartmoor]
The Lower beds of this series contain fewer organic remains, although a
good many fossils are found, including fragmentary remains of various
fishes which have not yet been identified. The Upper Devonian is, on
the whole, very poor in fossils.
Between the two Devonian areas, and occupying a large part of the
centre of the county, are the carboniferous or coal-bearing measures,
containing, however, not true coal but anthracite, which has more carbon
in it than is found in ordinary coal; and these beds are perhaps more
often known as Culm, from the Welsh _cwlwm_, a knot, in allusion to
the fragmentary condition in which the mineral is frequently found.
Anthracite, which elsewhere and especially in South Wales is a most
valuable fuel, is here clayey and impure, and in thin seams. It is
worked to a small extent, to be ground and made into a paint called
Bideford Black. The Culm measures consist of grits, shales, and
sandstones, with beds of chert and limestone containing fossil plants
and other forms of marine life. Fish are few, only two species having
been identified. The anthracite occurs in the middle Culm, and there are
other remains of plants in both the middle and upper beds. The upper
Culm is well seen on the coast near Clovelly and by the river Torridge,
where it has been bent by volcanic upheaval into curious and beautiful
curves. These measures, in general, are characterised by many outcrops
of volcanic rock, some of which were probably contemporary, that is to
say, they were poured out while the culm was in process of formation;
while others are intrusive, or were forced up through the strata after
these had been solidified into rock. These igneous rocks are found in
great variety.
[Illustration: A smoothly-weathered granite Tor, Dartmoor]