NATIVE OF TOTNES
THE FIRST WITH BURKE TO CROSS THE
AUSTRALIAN CONTINENT
HE PERISHED IN RETURNING, 28 JUNE
1861
When the Australian Government offered a reward for an exploration of
that Continent from north to south, Wills, at that time an assistant in
the Observatory at Melbourne, volunteered his services along with Robert
O'Hara Burke, an Irish police inspector. Burke was appointed leader of
the expedition, consisting of thirteen persons, which started from
Melbourne on August 20th, 1860, and in four months' time reached the
River Barco, to the east of Lake Eyre. Here it became necessary to
divide the party: Burke took Wills with him, and two others, leaving the
remainder at Cooper's Creek to look after the stores and to wait there
until Burke and his companions returned.
They reached Flinders River in February of the following year, but they
found the country to be quite a desert, and provisions failed them. They
were obliged to return, reaching Cooper's Creek on April 21st, 1861.
They arrived emaciated and exhausted, only to find that the others had
given up all hope of seeing them again, and returned home. Burke and his
companions struggled on for two months, but one by one they succumbed,
until only one was left--a man named King. Fortunately he was found by
some friendly natives, who treated him kindly, and was handed over to
the search-party sent out to find the missing men. The bodies of Burke
and Wills were also recovered, and buried with all honours at Melbourne,
where a fine monument was erected to their memory.
Many of the early settlers in Australia were killed by the aborigines or
bushmen, and a friend of ours who emigrated there from our native
village many years ago was supposed to have been murdered by them. He
wrote letters to his parents regularly for some years, and in his last
letter told his friends that he was going farther into the bush in
search of gold. For years they waited for further news, which never
arrived; and he was never heard of again, to the great grief of his
father and mother and other members of the family. It was a hazardous
business exploring the wilds of Australia in those days, and it was
quite possible that it was only the numerical strength of Burke's party
and of the search-party itself that saved them from a similar fate.
But many people attributed the misfortunes of the expedition to the
number who took part in it, as there was a great prejudice against the
number thirteen both at home and abroad. We had often, indeed, heard it
said that if thirteen persons sat down to dinner together, one of their
number would die! Some people thought that the legend had some
connection with the Lord's Supper, the twelve Apostles bringing the
number up to thirteen, while others attributed it to a much earlier
period. In Norse mythology, thirteen was considered unlucky, because at
a banquet in Valhalla, the Scandinavian heaven, where twelve had sat
down, Loki intruded and made the number thirteen, and Baldur was killed.
The Italians and even the Turks had strong objections to the number
thirteen, and it never appeared on any of the doors on the streets of
Paris, where, to avoid thirteen people sitting down to dinner, persons
named Quatorziennes were invited to make a fourteenth:
_Jamais on ne devrait
Se mettre a table treize,
Mais douze c'est parfait_.
My brother thought the saying was only a catch, for it would be equally
true to say all would die as one. He was quite prepared to run the risk
of being the thirteenth to sit down to dinner, but that was when he felt
very hungry, and even hinted that there might be no necessity for the
others to sit down at all!
But we must return to Totnes and its bridge, and follow the long narrow
street immediately before us named Fore Street until we reach "the
Arch," or East Gate. The old-fashioned houses to the right and left were
a great attraction to my brother, who had strong antiquarian
predilections, and when he saw the old church and castle, he began to
talk of staying there for the rest of the day and I had some difficulty
in getting him along. Fortunately, close at hand there was a quaint
Elizabethan mansion doing duty as a refreshment house, with all manner
of good things in the windows and the word "Beds" on a window in an
upper storey. Here we called for refreshments, and got some coffee and
some good things to eat, with some of the best Devonshire cream we had
yet tasted. After an argument in which I pointed out the danger of
jeopardising our twenty-five-mile average walk by staying there, as it
was yet early in the forenoon, we settled matters in this way; we would
leave our luggage in Totnes, walk round the town to the objects of
greatest interest, then walk to Dartmouth and back, and stay the night
on our return, thus following to some extent the example of Brutus, the
earliest recorded visitor:
Here I stand and here I rest,
And this place shall be called Totnes.
[Illustration: TOTNES CHURCH WALK]
There was no doubt about the antiquity of Totnes, for Geoffrey of
Monmouth, the author of the famous old English Chronicle, a compilation
from older authors, in his _Historia Britonum_, 1147, began his notes on
Totnes not in the time of the Saxons nor even with the Roman Occupation,
but with the visit of Brutus, hundreds of years before the Christian
era. Brutus of Troy had a strange career. His mother died in giving him
birth, and he accidentally shot his father with an arrow when out
hunting. Banished from Italy, he took refuge in Greece, where it was
said he married a daughter of the King, afterwards sailing to discover a
new country. Arriving off our shores, he sailed up the River Dart until
he could get no farther, and then landed at the foot of the hill where
Totnes now stands. The stone on which he first set foot was ever
afterwards known as Brutus's stone, and was removed for safety near to
the centre of the town; where for ages the mayor or other official gave
out all royal proclamations from it, such as the accessions to the
throne--the last before our visit having been that of her most gracious
Majesty Queen Victoria.
The Charter of Totnes was dated 1205, the mayor claiming precedence over
the Lord Mayor of London, for Totnes, if not the oldest, was one of the
oldest boroughs in England. It was therefore not to be wondered at that
the Corporation possessed many curios: amongst them were the original
ring to which the bull was fastened when bull-baiting formed one of the
pastimes in England; a very ancient wooden chest; the staves used by the
constables in past generations; a curious arm-chair used by the town
clerk; a list of mayors from the year 1377 to the present time; two
original proclamations by Oliver Cromwell; many old placards of
important events; an exceptionally fine fourteenth-century frieze; a
water-pipe formed out of the trunk of an elm tree; the old stocks; and
an engraving representing the arrival of William of Orange at Brixham.
There was a church at Totnes in the time of the Conquest, for it was
mentioned in a charter by which "Judhel de Totnais," the Norman Baron to
whom the Conqueror gave the borough, granted the "Ecclesiam Sancte Marie
de Toteneo" to the Benedictine Abbey at Angers; but the present church
was built in 1432 by Bishop Lacy, who granted a forty-days' indulgence
for all who contributed to the work. His figure and coat-of-arms were
still to be seen on the church tower, which was 120 feet high, with the
words in raised stone letters, "I made the Tour." There was also a
figure of St. Loe, the patron Saint of artificers in brass and iron, who
was shown in the act of shoeing a horse. The corporation appeared to
have had control of the church, and in 1450 had erected the altar
screen, which was perhaps the most striking object there, for after the
restoration, which was in progress at the time of our visit, of nine
stone screens in Devon churches, excepting that in Exeter Cathedral, it
claimed to be the most beautiful.
In the church there was also an elaborate brass candelabrum for eighteen
lights with this suitable inscription:
Thy Word is a Lantern to my Feet
And a light unto my Path.
_Donum Dei et Deo_
17th May 1701.
The corporation has also some property in the church in the shape of
elaborately carved stalls erected in 1636; also an ancient Bible and
Prayer Book handsomely bound for the use of the mayor, and presented
April 12th, 1690, by the Honble. Lady Anne Seymour of Berry Pomeroy
Castle, whose autograph the books contain; and in the Parvise Chamber
attached to the church there were about 300 old books dating from 1518
to 1676, one a copy of Sir Walter Raleigh's _History of the World_,
published in 1634.
The carved stone pulpit, of the same date as the screen, had at one time
been divided into Gothic panels, on which were shields designed to
represent the twelve sons of Israel: Judah was represented by a lion
couchant, Zebulon by a ship under sail, Issachar as a laden ass resting,
and Dan as a serpent coiled with head erect, and so on according to the
description given of each of the sons in the forty-ninth chapter of
Genesis.
There were a number of monuments in the church, the principal being that
of Christopher Blacall, who died in 1635. He was represented as kneeling
down in the attitude of prayer, while below were shown his four wives,
also kneeling.
The conductor showed us the very fine organ, which before being placed
there had been exhibited at the Great Exhibition in London in 1851; and
we also saw the key of the church door, which, as well as the lock, had
been in use for quite four hundred years.
[Illustration: SEXTON'S COTTAGE, TOTNES.]
We then paid a hurried visit to the ruins of the old castle, which in
the time of Henry VIII was described by Leland the antiquary as "The
Castelle waul and the strong dungeon be maintained; but the logginges of
the Castelle be cleane in ruine"; but about thirty years before our
visit the Duke of Somerset, the representative of the Seymour family,
laid out the grounds and made of them quite a nice garden, with a flight
of steps of easy gradient leading to the top of the old Norman Keep,
from which we had a fine view of the country between Dartmoor and the
sea.
Totnes was supposed to have been the Roman "Ad Darium," at the end of
the Fosse Way, and was also the famous harbour of the Celts where the
great Vortigern was overthrown by Ambrosius. As the seas were infested
with pirates, ports were chosen well up the estuaries of rivers, often
at the limit of the tides; and Totnes, to which point the Dart is still
navigated, remained of importance from Saxon times, through the
struggles with the Danes until the arrival of the Normans; after this it
was gradually superseded by Dartmouth.
At Totnes, when we asked the way to Dartmouth, the people jocularly told
us that the only direct way was by boat down the river; but our rules
and regulations would not permit of our going that way, so we decided to
keep as near to the river as we could on the outward journey and find an
alternative route on our return. This was a good idea, but we found it
very difficult to carry out in the former case, owing to the streams
which the River Dart receives on both sides on its way towards the sea.
Relieved of the weight of our luggage, we set off at a good speed across
fields and through woods, travelling along lanes the banks of which
were in places covered with ferns. In Cheshire we had plenty of bracken,
but very few ferns, but here they flourished in many varieties. A
gentleman whom we met rambling along the river bank told us there were
about forty different kinds of ferns and what he called "fern allies" to
be found in the lanes and meadows in Devonshire. He said it was also
noted for fungi, in which he appeared to be more interested than in the
ferns, telling us there were six or seven hundred varieties, some of
them being very beautiful both in colour and form; but we never cared
very much for these, as we thought them too much akin to poisonous
toadstools. We asked him why the lanes in Devonshire were so much below
the surface of the land, and he said they had been constructed in that
way in very ancient times to hide the passage of cattle and produce
belonging to the British from the sight of their Saxon oppressors. He
complained strongly of the destruction of ferns by visitors from
populous places, who thought they would grow in their gardens or
back-yards, and carried the roots away with them to be planted in
positions where they were sure to die. In later years, it was said,
young ladies and curates advertised hampers of Devonshire ferns for sale
to eke out their small incomes; and when this proved successful, regular
dealers did the same, and devastated woods and lanes by rooting up the
ferns and almost exterminating some of the rarer kinds; but when the
County Councils were formed, this wholesale destruction was forbidden.
[Illustration: SHARPHAM ON THE DART.]
We had a fairly straight course along the river for two or three miles,
and on our way called to see an enormous wych-elm tree in Sharpham Park,
the branches of which were said to cover a quarter of an acre of ground.
It was certainly an enormous tree, much the largest we had seen of that
variety, for the stem was about sixteen feet in girth and the leading
branches about eighty feet long and nine feet in circumference. The Hall
stood on an eminence overlooking the river, with great woods surrounding
it, and the windings of the river from this point looked like a number
of meres or lakes, while the gardens and woods of Sharpham were second
to none in the County of Devon. Near the woods we passed a small
cottage, which seemed to be at the end of everywhere, and was known
locally as the "World's End." The first watery obstruction we came to
was where the River Harbourne entered the River Dart, and here we turned
aside along what was known as the Bow Creek, walking in a
go-as-you-please way through lovely wooded and rocky scenery until we
reached a water-mill. We had seen several herons on our way, a rather
scarce bird, and we were told there was a breeding-place for them at
Sharpham, together with a very large rookery. We passed Cornworthy,
where there was an old church and a prehistoric camp, and some ruins of
a priory of Augustinian nuns which existed there in the fourteenth
century; but we had no time to explore them, and hastened on to
Dittisham, where we regained the bank of the River Dart. This was
another of the places we had arrived at either too late or too early,
for it was famous for its plums, which grew in abundance at both Higher
and Lower Dittisham, the bloom on the trees there forming a lovely sight
in spring. A great many plums known as damsons were grown in Cheshire,
and in olden times were allowed to remain on the trees until the light
frosts came in late September or early October, as it was considered
that they had not attained their full flavour until then; but in later
times as soon as they were black they were hurried off to market, for
they would crush in packing if left until thoroughly ripe.
Dittisham was also noted for its cockles and shrimps. The river here
widened until it assumed the appearance of a lake about two miles wide,
and the steamboat which plied between Totnes and Dartmouth landed
passengers at Dittisham. As it lay about half way between the two
places, it formed a favourite resort for visitors coming either way, and
tea and cockles or tea and shrimps or, at the right time, tea and
damsons--might be obtained at almost any of the pleasant little cottages
which bordered the river. These luxuries could be combined with a walk
through lovely scenery or a climb up the Fire Beacon Hill, about 600
feet above sea-level; or rowing-boats could be had if required, and we
were informed that many visitors stayed about there in the season.
Across the river were several notable places: Sandbridge to the left and
Greenway to the right. At Sandbridge was born the famous navigator John
Davis, who was the first to explore the Arctic regions. On June 7th,
1575, he left Dartmouth with two small barques--the _Sunshine_, 50 tons,
carrying 23 men, and the _Moonshine_, 35 tons, and 19 men--and after
many difficulties reached a passage between Greenland and North
America, which was so narrowed between the ice that it was named Davis'
Straits. He made other voyages to the Arctic regions, and was said to
have discovered Hudson's Straits. Afterwards he sailed several times to
the East Indies; but whilst returning from one of these expeditions was
killed on December 27th, 1605, in a fight with some Malay pirates on the
coast of Malacca.
Greenway House, on the other hand, was at one time the residence of
those two remarkable half-brothers Sir Humphrey Gilbert and Sir Walter
Raleigh, and it was there that Sir Walter planted the first potato ever
grown in England, which he had brought from abroad. As he was the first
to introduce tobacco, it was probably at Greenway that his servant
coming in with a jug of beer, and seeing his master as he thought
burning, threw it in his face--"to put his master out," as he afterwards
explained.
Sir Humphrey Gilbert appeared to have been a missionary as well as an
explorer, for it was recorded that he "set out to discover the remote
countries of America and to bring off those savages from their
diabolical superstitions to the embracing of the Gospel," which would
probably account for his having a Bible in his hand when he went down
with his ship--an event which in later years was immortalised by
Longfellow:
Eastward from Campobello
Sir Humphrey Gilbert sailed;
Three days or more seaward he bore.
Then, alas! the land wind failed.
* * * * *
He sat upon the deck,
The Book was in his hand;
"Do not fear, Heaven is as near,"
He said, "by water as by land!"
Beyond Dittisham the river turned towards Dartmouth through a very
narrow passage, with a dangerous rock near the centre, now called the
Anchor Stone, which was covered at high water. It appeared, however, to
have been used in former times to serve the purpose of the
ducking-stool, for the men of Dartmouth and Dittisham brought scolds
there and placed them on the rock at low water for immersion with the
rising tide, whence it became known-as the "Scold's Stone." One hour on
the stone was generally sufficient for a scolding woman, for she could
see the approach of the water that would presently rise well above her
waist, and very few chose to remain on the stone rather than repent,
although of course it was open to them to do so.
After negotiating the intricacies of one other small creek, we entered
the ancient town of Dartmouth highly delighted with our lovely tramp
along the River Dart.
We were now in a nautical area, and could imagine the excitement that
would be caused amongst the natives when the beacon fires warned them of
the approach of the Spanish Armada, for Dartmouth was then regarded as a
creek of Plymouth Harbour.
The great fleet invincible against us bore in vain
The richest spoils of Mexico, the stoutest hearts of Spain.
[Illustration: THE MOUTH OF THE DART FROM MOUNT BOONE.]
Dartmouth is one of the most picturesquely situated towns in England,
and the two castles, one on either side of the narrow and deep mouth of
the Dart, added to the beauty of the scene and reminded us of the times
when we were continually at war with our neighbours across the Channel.
The castles were only small, but so were the ships that crossed the seas
in those days, and they would no doubt be considered formidable
fortresses then. At low tide the Dart at that point was never less than
five yards deep, and in the dark it was an easy matter for a ship to
pass through unobserved. To provide against this contingency, according
to a document in the possession of the Corporation dating from the
twenty-first year of the reign of King Edward IV, a grant of £30 per
annum out of the Customs was made to the "Mayor, Bailiffs, and Burgesses
of Dartmouth, who had begonne to make a strong and myghte Toure of lyme
and stone adjoining the Castelle there," and who were also to "fynde a
cheyne sufficient in length and strength to streche and be laide
over-thwarte or a travers the mouth of the haven of Dartmouth" from
Dartmouth Castle to Kingswear Castle on the opposite bank to keep out
all intruders. This "myghte cheyne" was raised across the entrance every
night so that no ships could get through, and the groove through which
it passed was still to be seen.
Dartmouth Castle stood low down on a point of land on the seashore, and
had two towers, the circular one having been built in the time of Henry
VIII. Immediately adjoining it was a very small church of a much earlier
date than the castle, dedicated to St. Petrox, a British saint of the
sixth century. Behind the castle and the church was a hill called
Gallants' Bower, formerly used as a beacon station, the hollow on the
summit having been formed to protect the fire from the wind. This rock
partly overhung the water and served to protect both the church and the
castle. Kingswear Castle, on the opposite side of the water, was built
in the fourteenth century, and had only one tower, the space between the
two castles being known as the "Narrows." They were intended to protect
the entrance to the magnificent harbour inland; but there were other
defences, as an Italian spy in 1599, soon after the time of the Spanish
Armada, reported as follows:
Dartmouth is not walled--the mountains are its walls. Deep water is
everywhere, and at the entrance five yards deep at low water. Bastion
of earth at entrance with six or eight pieces of artillery; farther
in is a castle with 24 pieces and 50 men, and then another earth
bastion with six pieces.
The harbour was at one time large enough to hold the whole British navy,
and was considered very safe, as the entrance could be so easily
defended, but its only representative now appeared to be an enormous
three-decker wooden ship, named the _Britannia_, used as a training-ship
for naval officers. It seemed almost out of place there, and quite
dwarfed the smaller boats in the harbour, one deck rising above another,
and all painted black and white. We heard afterwards that the real
_Britannia_, which carried the Admiral's flag in the Black Sea early in
the Crimean War, had been broken up in 1870, the year before our visit,
having done duty at Dartmouth as a training-ship since 1863. The ship we
now saw was in reality the _Prince of Wales_, also a three-decker, and
the largest and last built of "England's wooden walls," carrying 128
guns. She had been brought round to Dartmouth in 1869 and rechristened
_Britannia_, forming the fifth ship of that name in the British navy.
[Illustration: H.M.S. _BRITANNIA_ AND _HINDUSTANI_ AT THE MOUTH OF THE
DART.]
It was in that harbour that the ships were assembled in 1190 during the
Crusades, to join Richard Coeur-de-Lion at Messina. In his absence
Dartmouth was stormed by the French, and for two centuries alternate
warlike visits were made to the sea-coasts of England and France.
In 1338 the Dartmouth sailors captured five French ships, and murdered
all their crews except nine men; and in 1347, when the large armament
sailed under Edward III to the siege of Calais, the people of Dartmouth,
who in turn had suffered much from the French, contributed the large
number of 31 ships and 757 mariners to the King's Fleet, the largest
number from any port, except Fowey and London.
In 1377 the town was partly burnt by the French, and in 1403 Dartmouth
combined with Plymouth, and their ships ravaged the coasts of France,
where, falling in with the French fleet, they destroyed and captured
forty-one of the enemy.
In the following year, 1404, the French attempted to avenge themselves,
and landed near Stoke Fleming, about three miles outside Dartmouth, with
a view to attacking the town in the rear; but owing to the loquacity of
one of the men connected with the enterprise the inhabitants were
forewarned and prepared accordingly. Du Chatel, a Breton Knight, was the
leader of the Expedition, and came over, as he said, "to exterminate the
vipers"; but when he landed, matters turned out "otherwise than he had
hoped," for the Dartmouth men had dug a deep ditch near the seacoast,
and 600 of them were strongly entrenched behind it, many with their
wives, "who fought like wild cats." They were armed with slings, with
which they made such good practice that scores of the Bretons fell in
the ditch, where the men finished them off, and the rest of the force
retreated, leaving 400 dead and 200 prisoners in the hands of the
English.
[Illustration: OLD HOUSES IN HIGHER STREET, DARTMOUTH]
In 1620 the Pilgrim Fathers called at Dartmouth with their ships
_Speedwell_ and _Mayflower_, as the captain of the _Speedwell_ (who it
was afterwards thought did not want to cross the Atlantic) complained
that his ship needed repairs, but on examination she was pronounced
seaworthy. The same difficulty occurred when they reached Plymouth, with
the result that the _Mayflower_ sailed alone from that port, carrying
the Fathers to form a new empire of Englishmen in the New World.
We were delighted with the old towns on the south coast--so different
from those we had seen on the west; they seemed to have borrowed some of
their quaint semi-foreign architecture from those across the Channel.
The town of Dartmouth was a quaint old place and one of the oldest
boroughs in England. It contained, both in its main street and the
narrow passages leading out of it, many old houses with projecting
wooden beams ornamented with grotesque gargoyles and many other
exquisite carvings in a good state of preservation. Like Totnes, the
town possessed a "Butter Walk," built early in the seventeenth century,
where houses supported by granite pillars overhung the pavement. In one
house there was a plaster ceiling designed to represent the Scriptural
genealogy of our Saviour from Jesse to the Virgin Mary, and at each of
the four corners appeared one of the Apostles: St. Matthew with the bull
or ox, St. Luke with the eagle, St. Mark with the lion, and St. John
with the attendant angel---probably a copy of the Jesse stained-glass
windows, in which Jesse is represented in a recumbent posture with a
vine or tree rising out of his loins as described by Isaiah, xi. I: "And
there shall come forth a Rod out of the stem of Jesse, and a Branch
shall grow out of his roots."
The churches in Dartmouth were well worth a visit. St. Saviour's, built
in 1372, contained an elaborately carved oak screen, one of the finest
in the county and of singular beauty, erected in the fifteenth century.
It was in perfect condition, and spread above the chancel in the form of
a canopy supporting the rood-loft, with beautiful carving and painted
figures in panels. The pulpit was of stone, richly carved and gilt, and
showed the Tudor rose and portcullis, with the thistle, harp, and
fleur-de-lys; there were also some seat-ends nicely carved and some old
chandeliers dated 1701--the same date as the fine one we saw in the
church at Totnes.
[Illustration: ST. SAVIOUR'S CHURCH, DARTMOUTH.]
The chancel contained the tomb, dated 1394, of John Hawley, who died in
1408, and his two wives--Joan who died in 1394, and Alice who died in
1403. Hawley was a rich merchant, and in the war against France equipped
at his own expense a fleet, which seemed to have been of good service to
him, for in 1389 he captured thirty-four vessels from Rochelle, laden
with 1,500 tons of wine. John Stow, a famous antiquary of the sixteenth
century, mentioned this man in his _Annals_ as "the merchant of
Dartmouth who in 1390 waged war with the navies and ships of the ports
of our own shores," and "took 34 shippes laden with wyne to the sum of
fifteen hundred tunnes," so we considered Hawley must have been a pirate
of the first degree.
There was a brass in the chancel with this inscription, the moral of
which we had seen expressed in so many different forms elsewhere:
Behold thyselfe by me,
I was as thou art now:
And them in time shalt be
Even dust as I am now;
So doth this figure point to thee
The form and state of each degree.
[Illustration: ANCIENT DOOR IN ST. SAVIOUR'S CHURCH]
The gallery at the west end was built in 1631, and there was a door in
the church of the same date, but the ironwork on this was said to be two
hundred years older, having probably been transferred to it from a
former door. It was one of the most curious we had ever seen. Two
animals which we took to be lions were impaled on a tree with roots,
branches, and leaves. One lion was across the tree just under the top
branches, and the other lion was across it at the bottom just above the
roots, both standing with their heads to the right and facing the
beholder; but the trunk of the tree seemed to have grown through each of
their bodies, giving the impression that they were impaled upon it. The
date of the woodwork (1631) was carved underneath the body of the lion
at the top, the first figure in the date appearing to the left and the
remaining three to the right, while the leaves on the tree resembled
those of the oak. Whether the lions were connected in any way with those
on the borough coat-of-arms we did not know, but this bore a lion on
either side of it, the hinder portion of their bodies hanging over each
side of an ancient boat and their faces being turned towards the
spectator, while a crowned king, evidently meant for Richard
Coeur-de-Lion, was sitting between them--the lions being intended to
represent the Lions of Judah. The King was crowned, but above him,
suspended over the boat, was a much larger crown, and underneath that
and in the air to the left, but slightly above the King's crown, was the
Turkish Crescent, while in a similar position to the right was
represented the Star of Jerusalem.
The original parish church of Dartmouth, on the outskirts of the town,
contained two rather remarkable epitaphs:
Here lyeth buried the Bodie of Robert Holland who
Departed this life 1611 beinge of
The age of 54 years 5 months and odd dayes.
Here lies a breathless body and doth showe
What man is, when God claims, what man doth owe.
His soule a guest his body a trouble
His tyme an instant, and his breath a bubble.
Come Lord Jesus, come quickly.
The other was worded:
William Koope, of Little
Dartmouth dyed in Bilbao
January the 30th, 1666, in the 6
yeare of his abode there beinge
embalmed and put into a Leaden
Coffin, was, after Tenn Weekes
Tossinge on the seas, here
Below interred May ye 23
AO. DOM. 1667 Ætates svæ 35.
Thomas Newcomen, born at Dartmouth in 1663, was the first man to employ
steam power in Cornish mines, and the real inventor of the steam engine.
The first steamboat on the River Dart was named after him.
In the time of the Civil War Dartmouth was taken by the Royalists, who
held it for a time, but later it was attacked from both land and sea by
Fairfax, and surrendered to the Parliament. Immediately afterwards a
rather strange event happened, as a French ship conveying despatches for
the Royalists from the Queen, Lord Goring, and others, who were in
France, entered the port, the captain being ignorant of the change that
had just taken place. On hearing that the Parliament was in possession,
he threw his despatches overboard. These were afterwards recovered and
sent up to Parliament, where they were found to be of a very important
nature--in fact, the discoveries made in them were said to have had some
effect in deciding the fate of King Charles himself.
We had now to face our return journey to Totnes, so we fortified
ourselves with a substantial tea, and then began our dark and lonely
walk of twelve miles by the alternative route, as it was useless to
attempt to find the other on a dark night. We had, however, become quite
accustomed to this kind of thing, and though we went astray on one
occasion and found ourselves in a deep and narrow road, we soon regained
the hard road we had left. The thought of the lovely country we had seen
that day, and the pretty places we had visited, cheered us on our way,
and my brother said he should visit that neighbourhood again before
long. I did not treat his remark seriously at the time, thinking it
equivalent to the remarks in hotel books where visitors express their
unfulfilled intention of coming again. But when on May 29th, 1873, a
lovely day of sunshine, my brother departed with one of the handsomest
girls in the village for what the newspapers described as "London and
the South," and when we received a letter informing us that they were
both very well and very happy, and amusing themselves by watching the
salmon shooting up the deep weir on the River Dart, and sailing in a
small boat with a sail that could easily be worked with one hand, and
had sailed along the river to Dartmouth and back, I was not surprised
when I found that the postmark on the envelope was TOTNES.
In his letter to me on that occasion, he said he had received from his
mother his "marching orders" for his next long journey; and although her
letter is now old and the ink faded, the "orders" are still firmly fixed
where that good old writer intended them to be, and, as my brother said,
they deserved to be written in letters of gold:
=_My earnest desire is that you may both be happy, and that whatever
you do may be to the glory of God and the good of your
fellow-creatures, and that at the last you may be found with your
lamps burning and your lights shining, waiting for the coming of the
Lord!_=
(_Distance walked thirty-one-miles_.)
_Tuesday, November 14th._
We had made good progress yesterday in consequence of not having to
carry any luggage, but we had now to carry our belongings again as
usual.
Totnes, we learned, was a walled town in the time of the Domesday
Survey, and was again walled in 1265 by permission of Henry III. Of the
four gates then existing, only two now remained, the North and the East;
they were represented by archways, the gates themselves having long
since disappeared. We passed under the Eastgate Archway, which supported
a room in which were two carved heads said to represent King Henry VIII
and his unfortunate wife Anne Boleyn; and with a parting glance at the
ancient Butter Cross and piazzas, which reminded us somewhat of the
ancient Rows in Chester, we passed out into the country wondering what
our day's walk would have in store for us.
We had thought of crossing over the centre of Dartmoor, but found it a
much larger and wilder place than we had imagined, embracing over
100,000 acres of land and covering an area of about twenty-five square
miles, while in the centre were many swamps or bogs, very dangerous,
especially in wet or stormy weather. There were also many hills, or
"tors," rising to a considerable elevation above sea-level, and ranging
from Haytor Rocks at 1,491 feet to High Willheys at 2,039 feet. Mists
and clouds from the Atlantic were apt to sweep suddenly over the Moor
and trap unwary travellers, so that many persons had perished in the
bogs from time to time; and the clouds striking against the rocky tors
caused the rainfall to be so heavy that the Moor had been named the
"Land of Streams." One of the bogs near the centre of the Moor was never
dry, and formed a kind of shallow lake out of which rose five rivers,
the Ockment or Okement, the Taw, the Tavy, the Teign, and the Dart, the
last named and most important having given its name to the Moor. Besides
these, the Avon, Erme, Meavy, Plym, and Yealm, with many tributary
brooks, all rise in Dartmoor.
Devonshire was peculiar in having no forests except that of Dartmoor,
which was devoid of trees except a small portion called Wistman's Wood
in the centre, but the trees in this looked so old and stunted as to
make people suppose they had existed there since the time of the
Conquest, while others thought they had originally formed one of the
sacred groves connected with Druidical worship, since legend stated that
living men had been nailed to them and their bodies left there to decay.
The trees were stunted and only about double the height of an
average-sized man, but with wide arms spread out at the top twisted and
twined in all directions. Their roots were amongst great boulders, where
adders' nests abounded, so that it behoved visitors to be doubly careful
in very hot weather. We could imagine the feelings of a solitary
traveller in days gone by, with perhaps no living being but himself for
miles, crossing this dismal moor and coming suddenly on the remains of
one of these crucified sacrificial victims.
Not far from Wistman's Wood was Crockern Tor, on the summit of which,
according to the terms of an ancient charter, the Parliament dealing
with the Stannary Courts was bound to assemble, the tables and seats of
the members being hewn out of the solid rock or cut from great blocks of
stone. The meetings at this particular spot of the Devon and Cornwall
Stannary men continued until the middle of the eighteenth century. After
the jury had been sworn and other preliminaries arranged, the Parliament
adjourned to the Stannary towns, where its courts of record were opened
for the administration of Justice among the "tinners," the word Stannary
being derived from the Latin "Stannum," meaning tin.
Some of the tors still retained their Druidical names, such as Bel-Tor,
Ham-Tor, Mis-Tor; and there were many remains of altars, logans, and
cromlechs scattered over the moors, proving their great antiquity and
pointing to the time when the priests of the Britons burned incense and
offered human victims as sacrifices to Bel and Baal and to the Heavenly
bodies.
There was another contingency to be considered in crossing Dartmoor in
the direction we had intended--especially in the case of a solitary
traveller journeying haphazard--and that was the huge prison built by
the Government in the year 1808 on the opposite fringe of the Moor to
accommodate prisoners taken during the French wars, and since converted
into an ordinary convict settlement. It was seldom that a convict
escaped, for it was very difficult to cross the Moor, and the prison
dress was so well known all over the district; but such cases had
occurred, and one of these runaways, to whom a little money and a change
of raiment would have been acceptable, might have been a source of
inconvenience, if not of danger, to any unprotected traveller, whom he
could have compelled to change clothing.
We therefore decided to go round the Moor instead of over it, and visit
the town of Plymouth, which otherwise we should not have seen.
The whole of Dartmoor was given by Edward III to his son the Black
Prince, when he gave him the title of Duke of Cornwall after his
victorious return from France, and it still belonged to the Duchy of
Cornwall, and was the property of the Crown; but all the Moor was open
and free to visitors, who could follow their own route in crossing it,
though in places it was gradually being brought into cultivation,
especially in the neighbourhood of the many valleys which in the course
of ages had been formed by the rivers on their passage towards the sea.
As our road for some miles passed along the fringe of the great Moor,
and as the streams crossed it in a transverse direction, on our way to
Plymouth we passed over six rivers, besides several considerable brooks,
after leaving the River Dart at Totnes. These rivers were named the
Harbourne, Avon, Lud, Erme, Yealm, and Plym, all flowing from Dartmoor;
and although there was such a heavy rainfall on the uplands, it was said
that no one born and bred thereon ever died of pulmonary consumption.
The beauty of Dartmoor lay chiefly along its fringes, where ancient
villages stood securely sheltered along the banks of these streams; but
in their higher reaches were the remains of "hut circles" and
prehistoric antiquities of the earliest settlers, and relics of
Neolithic man were supposed to be more numerous than elsewhere in
England.
There was no doubt in our minds that the earliest settlers were those
who landed on the south coast, and in occupying the country they
naturally chose positions where a good supply of water was available,
both for themselves and their cattle. The greater the number of running
streams, the greater would be the number of the settlers. Some of the
wildest districts in these southern countries, where solitude now
prevailed, bore evidence of having, at one time, been thickly populated.
We did not attempt to investigate any of these pretty valleys, as we
were anxious to reach Plymouth early in order to explore that town, so
the only divergence we made from the beaten track was when we came to
Ivybridge, on the River Erme. The ivy of course flourished everywhere,
but it was particularly prolific in some parts of Devon, and here it had
not only covered the bridge, over which we crossed, but seemed inclined
to invade the town, to which it had given its name. The townspeople had
not then objected to its intrusion, perhaps because, being always green,
it was considered to be an emblem of everlasting life--or was it because
in Roman mythology it was sacred to Bacchus, the God of Wine? In
Egyptian mythology the ivy was sacred to Osiris, the Judge of the Dead
and potentate of the kingdom of ghosts; but in our minds it was
associated with our old friend Charles Dickens, who had died in the
previous year, and whom we had once heard reading selections from his
own writings in his own inimitable way. His description of the ivy is
well worth recording--not that he was a poet, but he once wrote a song
for Charles Russell to sing, entitled "The Ivy Green ":
Oh! a dainty plant is the ivy green.
That creepeth o'er ruins old!
Of right choice food are its meals, I ween;
In its cell so lone and cold.
The wall must be crumbled, the stone decayed,
To pleasure his dainty whim,
And the mouldering dust that years have made
Is a dainty meal for him.
Creeping where no life is seen,
A rare old plant is the ivy green.
Fast he stealeth on, though he wears no wings.
And a staunch old heart hath he:
How closely he twineth, how tight he clings.
To his friend the huge oak tree;
And slyly he traileth along the ground,
And his leaves he gently waves
As he joyously hugs and crawleth around
The rich mould of dead men's graves.
Creeping where no life is seen,
A rare old plant is the ivy green.
Whole ages have fled, and their works decayed,
And nations have scattered been;
But the stout old ivy shall never fade
From its hale and hearty green;
The brave old plant in its lonely days
Shall fatten upon the past,
For the stateliest building man can raise
Is the ivy's food at last.
Creeping where no life is seen,
A rare old plant is the ivy green.
It is remarkable that the ivy never clings to a poisonous tree, but the
trees to which it so "closely twineth and tightly clings" it very often
kills, even "its friend the huge oak tree."
Near the bridge we stayed at a refreshment house to replenish the inner
man, and the people there persuaded us to ramble along the track of the
River Erme to a spot which "every visitor went to see"; so leaving our
luggage, we went as directed. We followed the footpath under the trees
that lined the banks of the river, which rushed down from the moor above
as if in a great hurry to meet us, and the miniature waterfalls formed
in dashing over the rocks and boulders that impeded its progress looked
very pretty. Occasionally it paused a little in its progress to form
small pools in which were mirrored the luxuriant growth of moss and
ferns sheltering beneath the branches of the trees; but it was soon away
again to form similar pretty pictures on its way down the valley. We
were pleased indeed that we had not missed this charming bit of scenery.
Emerging from the dell, we returned by a different route, and saw in the
distance the village of Harford, where in the church a brass had been
placed to the Prideaux family by a former Bishop of Worcester. This
bishop was a native of that village, and was in a humble position when
he applied for the post of parish clerk of a neighbouring village, where
his application was declined. He afterwards went to work at Oxford, and
while he was there made the acquaintance of a gentleman who recognised
his great talents, and obtained admission for him to one of the
colleges. He rose from one position to another until he became Bishop
of Worcester, and in after life often remarked that if he had been
appointed parish clerk he would never have become a bishop.
We recovered our luggage and walked quickly to Plymouth, where we
arrived in good time, after an easy day's walk. We had decided to stop
there for the night and, after securing suitable apartments, went out
into the town. The sight of so many people moving backwards and forwards
had quite a bewildering effect upon us after walking through moors and
rather sleepy towns for such a long period; but after being amongst the
crowds for a time, we soon became accustomed to our altered
surroundings. As a matter of course, our first visit was to the Plymouth
Hoe, and our first thoughts were of the great Spanish Armada.
[Illustration: SIR FRANCIS DRAKE. _From the picture in the possession of
Sir T.F. Elliot Drake._]
The position of England as the leading Protestant country, with the fact
of the refusal of Queen Elizabeth when the King of Spain proposed
marriage, made war between the two countries almost certain. Drake had
also provoked hostilities, for he had sailed to the West Indies in 1587,
and after defeating the Spaniards there had entered the Bay of Cadiz
with thirty ships and destroyed 10,000 tons of shipping--an achievement
which he described as "singeing the whiskers of the King of Spain." In
consequence of this Philip, King of Spain, declared war on Elizabeth,
Queen of England, and raised a great army of ships to overwhelm the
English.
It was on Friday, July 19, 1588, that Captain Thomas Fleming, in charge
of the pinnace _Golden Hind_, ran into Plymouth Sound with the news that
the Spanish Armada was off the Lizard. The English captains were playing
bowls on Plymouth Hoe when Captain Fleming arrived in hot haste to
inform them that when his ship was off the French coast they had seen
the Spanish fleet approaching in the distance, and had put on all sail
to bring the news. This was the more startling because the English still
believed it to be refitting in its own ports and unlikely to come out
that year. Great excitement prevailed among the captains; but Drake, who
knew all that could be known of the Spanish ships, and their way of
fighting, had no fear of the enemy, and looked upon them with contempt,
coolly remarking that they had plenty of time to finish the game and
thrash the Spaniards afterwards. The beacon fires were lighted during
the night, and--
Swift to east and swift to west
The ghastly war-flame spread;
High on St. Michael's Mount it shone,
It shone on Beachy Head.
Far on the deep the Spaniards saw
Along each southern shire
Cape beyond cape, in endless range
Those twinkling points of fire.
The Armada consisted of 131 large ships accompanied by galleys armed
with heavy guns, and many smaller vessels, carrying 27,345 men, of whom
8,050 were seamen and 19,295 soldiers. The twelve largest ships were
named after the twelve Apostles, and a hundred priests were distributed
through the fleet, for King Philip was a very pious man, and the Armada
had been blessed by the Pope. They were under the command of the Duke of
Medina Sidonia, and the Spaniards, who were proverbially cruel, were so
sure of victory that they had brought with them many strange instruments
of torture, some of which we had seen in the Tower of London on our
visit there the previous year.
The Lord High Admiral of England was Lord Charles Howard, a grandson of
the Duke of Norfolk and a cousin to Queen Elizabeth, besides being a
leader of the Court circle. He had, however, been trained as a sailor,
and the advice and assistance of such brave and experienced sailors as
Drake, Hawkins, and Frobisher were sufficient to carry him through any
crisis.
Drake had inspired his people so that none had any dread of the
Spaniards or of their big ships, which were constructed for fighting at
close quarters only; while Drake pinned his faith on light ships, easily
managed and capable of quick manoeuvring, but armed with big cannon, so
that he could pound away at a safe distance. Compared with the small
English ships, the big ships of the Spaniards, with their huge
superstructures, looked like castles floating on the sea, and the ocean
seemed to groan beneath its heavy burden. But how astonished the English
must have been, both at the vast number and size of the ships composing
the Armada, proudly floating up the Channel in a formation resembling an
arc or segment of a circle extending nearly seven miles.
When the battle commenced, Lord Howard had only got together a fleet of
about a hundred ships, but it soon became evident that the light and
well-handled ships of the English, with their more rapid sailing and
clever manoeuvring, were more than a match for the much larger ships of
the Spaniards. Sir Francis Drake followed the Armada closely during the
night, and came up with a large galleon commanded by Don Pedro de Valdez
that had been damaged in the fight, and this he captured with all on
board. The weather now began to grow stormy, and the strong gale which
sprang up during the night caused some of the Spanish ships to foul each
other, and the English captured several of them the next day. The wind
now began to blow in all directions, and some of the Spanish ships
becoming unmanageable, their formation was broken, so that there was no
fixed order of battle. Meantime the shots from the English, whose boats
were lower in the water, had played havoc with the lofty hulls of the
Spanish ships, whose shot often passed over the English and damaged
their own vessels.
The following day Howard was unable, for want of ammunition, to carry on
the fight, so he took the opportunity to divide his fleet into four
parts: the first he commanded himself, in the _Ark Royal_; the second he
placed under Sir Francis Drake in the _Revenge_; the third under Sir
John Hawkins in the _Victory_; and the fourth under Captain Frobisher in
the _Triumph_.
[Illustration: SIR JOHN HAWKINS _Portrait from the "Horologia" published
in 1620_]
When they came opposite the Isle of Wight the storm ceased and there was
a calm; but Sir John Hawkins contrived to get his ship the _Victory_
alongside a large Portuguese galleon, the _Santa Aña_, and a single
combat ensued. Both fleets watched the progress of the fight, the
Spaniards being quite certain of their comrades' victory, while the
English placed their confidence in the bravery of their champion. It was
a stiff fight, in which many were killed and wounded, but at last the
English were seen swarming like ants up the sides of their opponents'
great ship, and in a few moments her brave captain was seen handing his
sword to Sir John Hawkins. The flag of Spain on the mast of the _Santa
Aña_ descended, and the white flag and red cross of St. George soon
floated in its place. Then arose a mighty cheer, and the triumphant
hurrahs of the English proclaimed the victory to the anxious watchers on
shore. But three huge Spanish galleons were rowed to the scene to
recover the Portuguese ship, and Howard towed the _Ark Royal_ and the
_Golden Lion_ to fight them. It was a desperately unequal fight, and the
boats were for a time hidden from view by the smoke, but in the end the
cheers of the English announced that the galleons had been driven off
and the _Santa Aña_ lost to Spain.
The Armada continued its progress towards the Straits of Dover, with the
English hanging on, and anchored off Calais; but by this time the
English fleet had been reinforced by many ships raised by private
gentlemen and others, which brought the number to about 140. Howard now
decided to draw the Spanish fleet from its anchorage, and Drake, turning
eight of his oldest ships into fire-ships, distributed them in the night
amongst the enemy, ordering the crews to set them on fire and then
return in their small boats. The ships were piled up with inflammable
material, with their guns loaded, and when these exploded, the Spaniards
were so terrified that they unfurled their sails, cut their cables, and
so lost their anchors. They fled in confusion, many being seriously
damaged in collision, but only to encounter the English ships _Revenge,
Victory, Mary Rose_, and _Dreadnought_, which immediately attacked. Some
of the Spanish vessels were captured and some were lost on the shores of
France and Holland; but the main body, much battered and with their
crews badly out of spirits, sailed on into the North Sea. Howard was
close up to them east of the Firth of Forth, but shortage of water and
provisions, as well as of munitions, kept him from attacking, and with
bad weather threatening he made for the Channel ports, and on August
7th, 1588, the Lord High Admiral returned to England with his victorious
fleet.
The remaining ships of the Armada encountered furious storms off the
coast of Ireland, where ten were sunk; and it was not until the end of
September that the battered remnants of the once great fleet reached the
coast of Spain.
Queen Elizabeth went in state to St. Paul's Cathedral to offer up thanks
to the Almighty for the safety of her Kingdom and herself, and caused a
medal to be struck bearing on it a fleet scattered by a tempest and the
words:
He blew with His winds and they were scattered.
Plymouth Hoe is an elevation between that town and the sea, and its
history dates back to legendary ages, when Brutus and Corineus came to
Albion with their Trojan warriors, and found the land inhabited by great
giants, who terrified their men with their enormous size and horrid
noises. Still they were enabled to drive them away by hurling darts and
spears into their bodies. The leader of the giant race of Albion was
Gogmagog, who was the biggest of them all, but they wounded him badly in
the leg, as the story goes, and dragged him to Plymouth Hoe, where they
treated him kindly and healed his wounds. But the question arose who
should be king, and it was decided to settle the matter by a wrestling
match, the winner to be king. The giants selected Gogmagog as their
champion and the Trojans chose Corineus, brute strength and size on the
one hand being matched by trained skill on the other. On the day fixed
for the combat the giants lined one side of the Hoe and the Trojans the
other. At length Corineus succeeded in forcing Gogmagog to the ground.
He fell on his back, the earth shaking with his weight and the air
echoing with the noise of his mighty groan as the breath was forced
from his body. Then, after breathing a minute, Corineus rushed upon his
fallen foe, dragged him with a great effort to the edge of the cliff,
and pushed him over. The giant fell on the rocks below, and his body was
broken in pieces.
Michael Drayton, whose birthplace we had passed in the Midlands, wrote
in his _Polyolbion_ that there was a deadly combat between two giants
"upon that lofty place the Hoe," which took place after the arrival of
the Trojans under Brutus of Troy, and that the figures of the two
wrestlers, one bigger than the other, with clubs in their hands, were
cut out in the turf on Plymouth Hoe, being renewed as time went on. They
vanished when the citadel was built by King Charles II, though in the
digging of the foundations the great jaws and teeth of Gogmagog were
found.
It was supposed that the last of the giants were named Gog and Magog,
and were brought to London and chained in the palace of Bruté, which
stood on the site of the Guildhall there; their effigies were standing
in the Guildhall in the reign of Henry V, but were destroyed in the
Great Fire of London. The present Gog and Magog in the Guildhall, 14
feet high, were carved by Richard Saunders in 1708, and are known as the
"City Giants."
[Illustration: CITADEL GATE, PLYMOUTH.]
We had often heard and read about Brutus, one of those mysterious men
whose history we could not fathom, for as far north as York we read in a
book there that "Brutus settled in this country when the Prophet Eli
governed Israel and the Ark was taken from the Philistines, about 1140
B.C., or a century and a half later than when David was singing Psalms
in Jerusalem"; then the writer went on to say that a direct descendant
of Brutus, King Ebrancus, anxious to find occupation for his twenty sons
and thirty daughters, built two cities, one of which was York; so
possibly the other city might have been London.
Plymouth Hoe in the time of Drake was a piece of hilly common land with
a gallows standing at one corner, and nearer the sea a water tower and a
beacon to signal the approach of enemies. But it was also a place of
recreation, and used for drilling soldiers and sailors. There were
archery butts, and there must also have been a bowling green, on which
the captains of the fleet were playing bowls when the news reached them
of the approach of the Spanish Armada. Amongst the English captains were
one from Cheshire, George de Beeston, of Beeston, and a near relative of
his, Roger Townshend. Both had charge of leading ships, and were
knighted on board the _Ark_ by Lord Howard for their services.
When we visited Plymouth Hoe we found it laid out with broad walks and
large plots of grass, where sailors and soldiers were much in evidence.
In later years the greater portion of the old Eddystone Lighthouse was
re-erected there, from the cage on the top of which was a very fine view
over Plymouth Sound, one of the most beautiful in England. Besides the
town and the famous Hoe there could be seen, seawards, Drake's or St.
Nicholas' Island, the famous Breakwater, and the still more famous
Eddystone Lighthouse, while on the Cornish side were the beautiful woods
of Mount Edgcumbe reaching down to the water's edge. Then there was the
estuary of the River Tamar, called the Hamoaze, with the huge railway
bridge crossing it to Saltash, the frame of the general picture being
formed by the hills which surrounded Plymouth, including those of
Dartmoor in the background.
O the fair Town of Plymouth is by the sea-side,
The Sound is so blue and so still and so wide,
Encircled with hills, and with forests all green,
As a crown of fresh leaves on the head of a queen.
O dear Plymouth town, and O blue Plymouth Sound!
O where is your equal on earth to be found?
Eddystone Lighthouse, the top of which could just be seen from the Hoe,
stood on a group of rocks nine miles from the Cornish Coast and fourteen
miles from Plymouth. These rocks were covered at high water by the sea,
and were so dangerous to ships moving in and out of Plymouth or along
the coast, that a lighthouse of wood was built on them in the year 1700,
which was washed away by a great storm three years afterwards, when the
lighthouse people perished as well as the unfortunate architect,
Winstanley, who happened to be there on a visit at the time. In 1709 a
second and a stronger wooden lighthouse was built by Rudyard, but the
progress of the work was delayed owing to the workmen being carried on
to France by a French ship and lodged in a prison there. King Louis XIV,
when he heard of this, chivalrously ordered the Englishmen to be
liberated and their captors to be put in the prison in their places,
remarking that "though he was at war with England, he was not at war
with mankind." So the lighthouse was completed, and remained until 1755,
when it was destroyed by fire. It was the work of years to construct and
build a lighthouse on a rock in the midst of the stormy seas, but a
third was built by Smeaton in 1759, this time made of granite and
Portland stone, and modelled after the shape of the trunk of an old oak
tree. The stones had been prepared on land, and were sent to the rock as
required for the various positions, and so the lighthouse was raised in
about four months.
This one was strongly built, and braved the storms for more than a
hundred years, and was still in position when we visited Plymouth; but
a portion of the rock on which it was built was causing some anxiety, as
it showed signs of giving way. A fourth lighthouse was therefore
prepared during the years 1879-82, being built wholly of granite, the
old lighthouse doing duty meanwhile. This was designed and carried out
by Sir James Douglas, at a cost of about £80,000. It was a substantial
structure, and built on a different foundation 133 feet high, being 50
feet taller than its predecessor, and containing a number of rooms. It
had two 2-ton bells at the top to sound in foggy weather, and the
flash-lights could be seen from a distance of many miles.
The greater portion of the old lighthouse built by Smeaton was carefully
taken down and removed to Plymouth, where it was re-erected on the Hoe
as a lasting memorial to the man whose wonderful genius had conferred
such a benefit on the sailors of all nations--for it was impossible to
calculate how many lives had been saved during the 120 years his
lighthouse had been protecting the ships of all nations from the
dangerous reef on which it stood. The old lighthouse now forms a
conspicuous object on the Hoe, and contains some interesting relics, and
in the lantern are the candlesticks in which the lights were placed that
guided the mariners across the stormy ocean in past ages. Over the
lantern are the words "24 August 1759" and "Laus Deo" (Praise to God),
for the goodness of the Almighty was always acknowledged in those days
both in construction of great works and otherwise, and another
inscription also appears which seems very appropriate:
Except the Lord build the house, they labour in vain that build it.
Plymouth at first sight had the appearance of a new town, with so many
new buildings to attract the eye of a stranger. Elihu Burritt, however,
when he, like ourselves, was journeying to Land's End, described it as
"the Mother Plymouth sitting by the Sea." The new buildings have
replaced or swamped the older erections; but a market has existed there
since 1253, and members have been returned to Parliament since 1292,
while its list of mayors is continuous from the year 1439. It was to
Plymouth that the Black Prince returned with his fleet after his great
victories in France in the reign of Edward III.
In the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries Plymouth was the port from
which expeditions were sent out to explore and form colonies in hitherto
unknown places abroad, and in these some of the most daring sailors the
world has ever known took part.
Sir Martin Frobisher, the first navigator to attempt to find the
north-west passage to India, and from whom comes the name Frobisher's
Strait, to the south of Baffin Land, was knighted, along with Townshend
and Beeston, for his services in the defeat of the Spanish Armada.
Sir Francis Drake, the great Admiral of Queen Elizabeth's time, made
many adventurous voyages, partly for discovery and partly for plunder,
and was the first Englishman to sail round the world. He brought news of
the existence of gold in some places where he had been, and when he
returned his well-filled ship stimulated others to emulate the Spaniards
in that direction.
Sir Walter Raleigh, who was described as a scholar, courtier, soldier,
sailor, and statesman, discovered Virginia in 1584. He was in great
favour at Court, but he quarrelled with Queen Elizabeth, who had granted
him a Patent for the discovery and settlement of unknown countries in
the West. When James I ascended the throne he was suspected of being a
conspirator and was sentenced to death, but the sentence was altered to
imprisonment in the Tower of London, where during his twelve years'
confinement he wrote his _History of the World_. In 1615 James set him
at liberty, and put him at the head of an expedition to Guinea to find
gold, but, being unsuccessful, on his return he was beheaded in Old
Palace Yard in 1618--a sad ending to a great career. It was at Virginia
that he discovered tobacco, and possibly the potato, for he introduced
both these plants into England; and "Virginia Leaf" tobacco is still the
finest produced in America. Sir Walter explored the place when it was
named Pamlico Sound, but it was afterwards named "Virginia" by Queen
Elizabeth herself, and to Sir Walter Raleigh's efforts to colonise this
and other places we owe many of our possessions to-day. In the struggle
for independence Virginia took the lead, and the first Representative
Assembly in America was held there, while in the war between the North
and South it was the scene of the last battle and the final surrender.
Captain James Cook, whose book _Voyages round the World_ is now a
classic, made many discoveries for Great Britain, including that of the
Sandwich Islands; and he sailed from Plymouth on two occasions, 1768 and
1772. He made three voyages round the world, but on the third was
murdered by natives at Hawaii. He discovered Botany Bay in New South
Wales in 1770, which was afterwards made a penal colony, whither early
in the year 1787 eleven ships sailed from Plymouth, with 800 criminals,
over 200 officials, and many free settlers.
But the most important departure from the port was in 1620, when the
_Mayflower_ sailed for America with the "Pilgrim Fathers" on board. She
was only a little barque of 180 tons, and was sadly tossed about by the
big waves in the Atlantic. But after enduring many hardships, the
emigrants landed on the barren shores of Massachusetts Bay, and named
the spot where they landed "New Plymouth," that being no doubt what
Elihu Burritt had in his mind when he described Plymouth as "the Mother
Plymouth sitting by the Sea," for so many emigrants had gone from there
to America and other places that there were now quite forty places named
Plymouth in different parts of the world. The place whence the "Fathers"
left the port on their perilous journey was afterwards marked with a
stone. This we went to see, but we were driven off the Hoe by a heavy
shower of rain.
[Illustration: THE "MAYFLOWER STONE," PLYMOUTH HARBOUR.]
Plymouth was also the last port of call in Europe of the ship
_Northumberland_ bound for St. Helena, with Napoleon Bonaparte on board;
and we thought it a strange incident of travel that the list of
distinguished visitors here in 1871 should have included (in addition to
ourselves of course!) the names of the unfortunate Emperor Napoleon III,
and his still more unfortunate son, who had been there about a fortnight
before we arrived. During that year the French agreed to pay the great
indemnity which the Germans demanded, and which it was said laid the
foundation of the prosperity of the German Empire.
(_Distance walked twenty-three and a half miles_.)
_Wednesday, November 15th._
We left our hotel at daylight this morning, having made special
arrangements last night for a good breakfast to be served in time for an
early start, for we had a heavy day's walk, before us. We were now in
sight of Cornwall, the last county we should have to cross before
reaching Land's End. We had already traversed thirteen counties in
Scotland and fourteen in England since leaving John O' Groat's. But an
arm of the sea named the Hamoaze separated us from Cornwall, and as our
rules prevented us from crossing it either by boat or train, the
question arose how we were to get across the water, which was one of the
greatest naval anchorages in the world, and near the great dockyards in
which the Government employed some thousands of men. We had come that
way in the hope of seeing some of the big warships near Devonport, and
at length we came to the great railway bridge at Saltash. The thought
occurred to us that we might reach the Cornish coast by walking over the
bridge to the other side. We had walked across a railway bridge on one
occasion in Scotland to enable us to reach Abbotsford, the former
residence of the great Sir Walter Scott, so why not adopt a similar plan
here? We were some time before we could find a place where we could
scale the embankment, but ultimately we got on the railway and walked to
the entrance of the bridge; but when we reached the path at the side of
the bridge it looked such a huge affair, and such a long way across the
water, that we decided not to venture without asking some advice. We
waited until we saw coming along the railway track a workman, to whom we
confided our intention. He strongly advised us not to make the attempt,
since we should run great bodily risk, as well as make ourselves liable
to the heavy fine the railway company had power to inflict. We rather
reluctantly returned to the road we had left, but not before seeing some
of the big ships from the bridge--the finest and last of the iron
tubular bridges built by the famous engineer Brunel, the total length,
including approaches, being 2,200 feet. It had been opened by H.R.H. the
Prince Consort in 1859, and was named after him the "Royal Albert"
Bridge. We had now to leave the main road and find our way across
country, chiefly by means of by-lanes, until we reached Tavistock, where
there was a bridge by which we could cross the River Tavy. We had become
quite accustomed to this kind of experience, and looked upon it as a
matter of course, for repeatedly in Scotland we had been forced to make
a circuit to find the "head of the loch" because we objected to cross
the loch itself by a ferry.
[Illustration: THE "ROYAL ALBERT" BRIDGE, SALTASH]
We had only proceeded a mile or two beyond the great bridge at Saltash,
when we came in sight of the village of St. Budeaux, at the entrance of
which we came upon a large number of fine-looking soldiers, who, we were
informed, were the 42nd Highlanders, commonly known as the Black Watch.
They were crossing a grass-covered space of land, probably the village
green, and moving in the same direction as ourselves, not marching in
any regular order, but walking leisurely in groups. We were surprised to
see the band marching quietly in the rear, and wondered why they were
not marching in front playing their instruments. The soldiers, however,
were carrying firearms, which quite alarmed my brother, who never would
walk near a man who carried a gun--for if there was one thing in the
world that he was afraid of more than of being drowned, it was of being
shot with a gun, the very sight of which always made him feel most
uncomfortable. He had only used a gun once in all his life, when quite a
boy, and was so terrified on that occasion that nothing could ever
induce him to shoot again. He was staying at a farm in the country with
a cousin, who undertook to show him how to shoot a bird that was sitting
on its nest. It was a very cruel thing to do, but he loaded the gun and
placed it in my brother's hand in the correct position, telling him to
look along the barrel of the gun until he could see the bird, and then
pull the trigger. He did so, and immediately he was on the ground, with
the gun on top of him. His cousin had some difficulty in persuading him
that the gun had not gone off at the wrong end and that he was not shot
instead of the bird. It was one of the old-fashioned shot-guns known as
"kickers," and the recoil had sent him flying backwards at the moment of
the noise of the discharge--a combination which so frightened him that
he avoided guns ever afterwards.
[Illustration: THE HAMOAZE, SEPARATING DEVON AND CORNWALL]
We were obliged to walk quickly, for we knew we had a long walk before
us that day and must get past the Highlanders, who fortunately were in
no hurry. We passed one group after another until we reached the narrow
road along which we had been directed to turn. Here we saw the soldiers
going the same way, now walking in twos and threes, and presently the
road developed into one of the deep, narrow lanes so common in
Devonshire. We continued to pass the soldiers, but there was now a
greater distance between the small groups. Presently we were accosted by
a sergeant, one of the most finely proportioned men we had ever seen--a
giant, as we thought, amongst giants, for all the soldiers were very big
men--who said to us, "Now, my lads! if you see any of the enemy, tell
them we are two or three miles away, will you?" We wondered what he
meant, but as he smiled, we considered it a joke, and replied, "All
right!" as we moved on. We had passed all the soldiers except the first
two, who were about fifty yards ahead. They had climbed up the high bank
on the left-hand side of the lane, and were apparently looking over the
country and shading their eyes with their hands so as to get a better
view, when we saw a number of others belonging to the same regiment file
quietly down-the opposite side. Crossing the lane, they ran up the bank
where the two soldiers were still standing, and almost before they
realised what was happening their bonnets had been taken off their heads
and they found themselves prisoners. It was a clever capture, and as it
took place immediately before our eyes, we remained standing there
looking on with astonishment, for we had no idea what was about to
happen.
But immediately the scene changed, and soldiers appeared in front, both
in the lane and high up above the road. But the worst feature was that
they began firing their guns; so here we were in a deep lane from which
there was no escape, and, as we afterwards ascertained, between the two
halves of one of the most famous regiments in the British army, one
ambuscaded by the other! We were taken completely by surprise, as we had
never seen or heard of a sham fight before, and it appeared a terrible
thing to us, as the fiery eyes and fierce countenances of the soldiers
were fearful to see, and we became greatly alarmed, expecting every
minute to be taken prisoners. I consoled my brother by telling him the
guns were only loaded with blank cartridges, but his only remark was,
"But suppose one of them isn't, and we get shot," and he began to walk
onwards more quickly than I had ever seen him walk before. Keeping as
near one side the road as possible, and dodging between the soldiers,
with myself following closely behind his heels, perspiring profusely
with fear and exertion until there was scarcely a dry thread upon us, we
managed at last to escape, and were profoundly thankful when we got
clear of the Black Watch and so ended one of the most exciting
adventures we ever had. It reminded my brother of the Charge of the
Light Brigade, a story he was very familiar with, an Irish friend of his
named Donoghue being one of the trumpeters who sounded it, and of
Tennyson's words:
Cannon to right of them.
Cannon to left of them,
Cannon in front of them,
Volley'd and thundered.
In our case, he said, we had guns at our back in addition.
We did not know at that time that the 42nd Highlanders were so famous,
but a friend of ours, an officer in the army, has since handed us a
description of that regiment, bringing its history down to a later
period.
The 42nd Highlanders were originally formed from the independent
companies raised in the year 1729 to keep the King's peace among the
Highland Hills; the Black Watch, so called from the dark hue of its
tartan, was first paraded as a regiment of the British army in 1740.
They had distinguished themselves in all parts of the world: America,
India, Flanders, Egypt, Corunna, Waterloo, Sevastopol, Indian Mutiny,
Ashantee, Egypt, Nile, and South Africa, and lost heavily at
Ticonderago, Toulouse, Waterloo, and afterwards in the Boer War. They
were amongst our bravest soldiers, and were famous as being one of
the four regiments named for distinction by Wellington at Waterloo;
twice they had been specially called upon, once at the Battle of
Alexandria, when the Commander-in-Chief, Sir Ralph Abercromby, called
for a special effort at a critical period in the fight, saying, "My
brave Highlanders! Remember your forefathers! Remember your country!"
and victory immediately ensued; and again at the Battle of Corunna,
when Sir John Moore in the thick of the fight, before being mortally
wounded, exclaimed, "Highlanders! Remember Egypt!" and the foe was
scattered in all directions. In Egypt, after storming Tel-el-Kebir
and taking part in the battles that followed, such was the conduct of
the Black Watch that Lord Wolseley sent the following telegram:
"Well done, old comrades of the Black Watch."
Such we may venture to say were the men among whom we found ourselves on
that occasion. In after life we always took a deep interest in the
doings of that famous regiment, and we noticed that when any hard
fighting had to be done, the Black Watch nearly always assisted to do
it--so much so that sometimes we regretted that we had not had the
honour of having been taken prisoner by them on that ever-memorable
occasion!
The next village we came to was Tamerton Foliot, in a lovely situation,
standing at the end of a creek which fills with the tide. At that point
the waters of the Tavy join those of the larger River Tamar, and
eventually assist to form the Hamoaze. Tamerton was a very old
settlement, as Gilbert Foliot, who was Bishop of London from 1163 to
1188, and one of the most prominent opponents of Thomas a Becket,
Archbishop of Canterbury, was a native of that village. There was a
recumbent effigy in the church dating from the year 1346; but beyond
that the great object of interest in the village was an old oak tree
named the Coppleston Oak, because of a very sorrowful incident which
occurred near the church one Sunday morning many centuries ago. It
appeared that a local squire named Coppleston, a man of bad temper and
vile disposition, when at dinner made some gross remarks which were
repeated in the village by his son. He was so enraged when he heard of
it, on the Sunday, that as they were leaving the church he threw his
dagger at the lad, wounding him in the loins so that he fell down and
died. An oak tree was planted near the spot, and was still pointed out
as the Coppleston Oak. The father meanwhile fled to France, and his
friends obtained a conditional pardon for him; but to escape being
hanged he had to forfeit thirteen manors in Cornwall.
[Illustration: TAMERTON CHURCH AND THE FATAL OAK]
We were now fairly off the beaten track, but by devious ways, with
lovely wooded and river scenery to the left and the wild scenery of
Dartmoor to the right, we managed to reach Buckland Abbey. This abbey
was founded in 1278 by the Countess of Baldwin-de Redvers, Earl of
Devon, and we expected to find it in ruins, as usual. But when Henry
VIII dissolved the monasteries, he gave Buckland to Sir Richard
Grenville, who converted it into a magnificent mansion, although some
few of the monastic buildings still remained. He formed the great hall
so as to be under the great central tower of the old abbey, and the
dining-room he formed out of a portion of the nave, while the
drawing-room was at the end of a long gallery upstairs; so that
altogether it formed a unique structure. In 1581, however, it was sold
to Sir Francis Drake, and the mansion contained some relics of his,
amongst which were two drums; there were also a chair and a table made
out of one of his old ships, the _Pelican_, and a fine portrait of Sir
Francis by Jansen, dated 1594. The gardens were very beautiful, as the
trees in this sheltered position grew almost without let or hindrance;
there were some of the finest tulip trees there that we had ever seen.
We were informed that when Sir Francis Drake began to make some
alteration in his new possessions, the stones that were built up in the
daytime were removed during the night or taken down in some mysterious
manner. So one moonlight night he put on a white sheet, and climbed a
tree overlooking the building, with the object of frightening any one
who might come to pull down the stones. When the great clock which
formerly belonged to the old abbey struck the hour of twelve, he saw the
earth open below, and about twenty little black devils came out and
started to pull down the wall. Sir Francis began to move his arms about
and flap them as if they were wings, and then crowed like a cock. The
devils, when they heard the white bird crowing, looked up, and, thinking
the morning must be close at hand, immediately disappeared to the
regions below. We could not learn if or how often these performances
were repeated, but it seemed a very unlikely thing for Sir Francis Drake
to do, and the story sounded as if it belonged to a far remoter period
than that of the Spanish Armada.
[Illustration: DRAKE'S STATUE, TAVISTOCK.]
Drake was idolised in Plymouth and the surrounding country, where his
name was held in everlasting remembrance, and his warlike spirit
pervaded the British navy. At a much later period than that of our visit
even his drum was not forgotten. Whether it was one of those that were
preserved in the old abbey or not we did not know, but it is the subject
of a stirring poem by Sir Henry Newbolt.