About a mile outside Buckfastleigh, on the edge of Dartmoor, a little
stream, the Dean Burn, comes tumbling down from the hills through a
narrow valley of peculiar beauty. A short distance up this valley a
waterfall drops into a deep hollow known as the "Hound's Pool." How this
name arose is an old story.
According to the legend, hundreds of years ago, there was living in the
neighbouring hamlet of Dean Combe a wealthy weaver named Knowles. He was
famous throughout those parts of Devon for his skill and industry. But
in due course he died and was buried.
On the day after the funeral, hearing a strange noise, Knowles' son ran
to his father's work-room, where, to his alarm, he saw the dead man
seated at his loom working away just as he had done day after day, year
after year, in life. In terror the young man fled from the house, and
sought the parson of Dean Prior.
The good priest was at first sceptical, but he returned with the
frightened man to the house. As soon as the two had entered the door the
parson's doubts vanished, for sure enough, from an upper chamber, came
the familiar, unmistakable sound of the loom at work.
So the parson went to the foot of the staircase and shouted to the
ghostly weaver: "Knowles, come down! This is no place for thee."
"In a minute, parson," came the reply; "just wait till I've worked out
this shuttle."
"No," said the parson, "come thee at once; thou hast worked long enough
on this earth."
So the spirit came down, and the parson led it outside the house. Then
taking a handful of earth, which he had previously secured from the
churchyard, he flung it into the ghost's face, and instantly the weaver
turned into a black hound.
"Now, follow me," the parson commanded; the grim dog obediently came
to heel. The pair then proceeded into the woods, which, so they say, as
soon as the two entered, were shaken by a violent whirlwind. But at last
the priest led his charge to the edge of the pool below the waterfall,
then producing a walnut-shell with a hole in it, handed it to the hound
and addressed it.
"Knowles," he began, "this shows me plainly that in life thou tookest
more heed of worldly gain than of immortality, and thou didst bargain
with the powers of evil. There is but one hope of rest for thee. When
thou shalt have dipped out this pool with the shell I have given thee,
thou shalt find peace, but not before. Go, work out thy salvation."
With a mournful howl that was heard as far as Widdicombe in the Moor,
the hound leapt into the pool to begin its hopeless labour, and there,
exactly at midnight or midday, they say, you may still see it at its
task.
Buckfastleigh is on a branch line that runs up from Totnes, skirting
Dartmoor, to Ashburton. All around is some of the most glorious scenery
in Devon. Buckfast Abbey, founded in 1148 and for centuries a ruin, was
purchased by French Benedictines in 1882, and is now a live and busy
monastery once again.
Just beyond Dean Combe is Dean Prior, a place of the greatest literary
interest, for it was the home of the poet Herrick for many years.
The country all about abounds in objects of beauty and interest, yet is
all too often neglected by the holiday-maker at the neighbouring seaside
towns a few miles away, or the scurrying motorist speeding down along
the Plymouth road.
[Illustration: _Buckfast Abbey_]
[Illustration]