Leaving the antient town of Colyton by its south-western approach, the
broad turnpike-road that leads over the hill to Sidmouth, at about
half-a-mile's distance up its ascent, a turn to the right takes us
into the trackway of a winding and somewhat narrow Devonshire lane. A
pleasant prospect opens across the valley below, through which the
Coly sparkles along with sinuous course, and immediately in the
mid-distance appears the old ruinous cradle of the Courtenay family,
Colcombe Castle, grey-walled, ivy-clad, and orchard environed. Beyond
and just under the further fir-topped hill-line, another grey dot
strugglingly emerges from among the dense garnishing of foliage that
surrounds it, and shews us what remains of old Shute House, while to
its left, across the far valley, rises the beautiful tree-crested
acclivity of Shute Park; localities of special importance pertinent to
the interests of our little narrative, to be referred to by and by. In
front a delightful and typical Devonian landscape extends itself.
Sprinkled over with the deserted homes of the olden lesser
squirearchy, the antient lords of the vale, and picturesquely varied
alternate with copse, plantations, and well-timbered hedgerow, the two
valleys of the Coly and the Brinkly bifurcate just at this point,
meeting under the shadow of the remarkable pyramid-shaped hill, Waddon
Pen, and then stretch away, variously broken into lesser knoll and
vale, until lost in the misty outline of the high, far-distant curtain
of the Farway hills, with their tiny clumps of trees that just break
the even contour, and stand like sentinels on the rampart-appearanced
outline against the grey sky. They recall also for the moment to the
historic memory, the burthen of a pleasant story, connected with its
breezy, and comparatively unfrequented altitude, one of the numberless
traditions that throng the hills and vales of the olden region of the
Danmonii.
A rest for awhile on the parapet of the bridge spanning the little
Morganhayes brook, hastening to join the Coly a few fields' distance
below; a rivulet whose banks at Spring time are almost fairy-land with
abundance of some of our finest wild flowers, broad stretches of
daffodils, myriads of white-starred anemones, gleams of pale primroses
and bleached lady-smocks, and sheen of golden-cups in their
succession, but specially, when uncertain April brings her tears and
sunshine, the haunt of the most gorgeous of them all