An exploration of Exmoor and the hill country of West Somerset with notes on its archæology ... With map and illustrations

Front matter

EXMOOR AND THE HILL COUNTRY OF WEST SOMERSET AN EXPLORATION OF EXMOOR AND THE HILL COUNTRY OF WEST SOMERSET WITH NOTES ON ITS ARCHÆOLOGY BY JOHN LLOYD WARDEN PAGE MEMBER OF THE SOMERSETSHIRE ARCHÆOLOGICAL AND NATURAL HISTORY SOCIETY ; AUTHOR OF ' AN EXPLORATION OF DARTMOOR AND ITS ANTIQUITIES With Map and Illustrations LONDON SEELEY AND CO., LIMITED ESSEX STREET, STRAND Of this edition on Large Paper, Two Hundred and Fifty Copies only are printed. This Copy is No.X'X.y PAGE CONTENTS

Preface

xiii

Chapter I General Features Of The Hill Country

View from Dunkery Beacon — Rivers and Streams — Exmoor — Roman Coins at Exe Head — Its Extent — Exmoor Forest — The Perambulation — Foresters — Sale of the Forest — Scenery — Elevation — Absence of Heather — Rivers of Exmoor — Fishing Records — The Barle — Pinkworthy Pond — The Chains — Moles Chamber and its Story — Roads — Climate — Minerals — The Brendon Hills — The Quantock Hills - i

Chapter II Cultivation

: GEOLOGY : FOLKLORE Sterility of the Hills — Sheep on Exmoor — Ponies — Farms — Wood-carving — Plaster Decoration — Geology — Minerals — Primeval Forests — Elephas primigenius — Peasantry — Signposts and Parsons — Betty Muxworthy's Prayer — Folklore — King's Evil — Charming Wens — Touching a Corpse — The Split Ash — Boneshave— Overlooking — A Divining Loaf — Customs on Midsummer and Christmas Eve — Ghosts: Master Lucott, and Mrs. Leakey 21

Chapter III The Wild Red Deer

The Red Deer— His principal Covers— Master Hugh Pollard — Mr. Fenwick Bisset— ' Brow, bay and trey'— Stags and Contents VI PAGE 83 Hinds— Hunting on the Quantocks— A Meet of the Devon and Somerset Staghounds— The 'Field ' — The Harbourer— Tufting— The Chase— Seeking a Substitute— Soiling— The Death — Famous Runs — Dangers to Hounds— John Boyse —Dr. Collins— Tom Webber— 'Jack' Russell— Keeping Harriers by Proxy .-------39

Chapter IV History And Antiquities

The Belgæ— The Britons— The Romans — Discovery of Coins and Mining Implements — The Saxons and Danes — Battle of Cynwit — Hubba's Grave — Invasion of the Lidwiccas — The Descent of 988— ' Knap Dane'— Battlegore— Harold's Descent upon Porlock — Githa and the Steep Holm — Stephen and Dunster Castle — Monrnouth's Rebellion — Barrows — A Story from Westcote — Trackways— Camps — Scarcity of Rude-stone Monuments — Inscribed Stone on Winsford Hill — A doubtful Avenue — Religious Houses — Churches -----57

Chapter V Dulverton To Withypoole, Simonsbath And Moles Chamber

Dulverton — Mouncey Castle — Brewers Castle — Hawkridge — Torr Steps — The Devil and the Parson — Winsford Hill — An Inscribed Stone — The Devil's Punch Bowl — Withypoole — Landacre Bridge — Cow Castle — Story of Burgess — Cloven Rocks — Simonsbath — Span Head — Moles Chamber

Chapter VI Exmoor In Devonshire

Challacombe — Edward Webber — Inns and Farmhouses — Cannon-balls — How Woodbarrow was opened — Pixy Rocks — The Longstone — Chapman Barrows — Paracombe — Sadler's Stone — Furzehill — A Camp — A precarious Clam — Ilford Bridges — Brendon Church — Millslade — Valley of the Lyn — Camp above Watersmeet — Lynmouth — Glen Lyn Contents VII PAGE again— The North Walk— The Valley of Rocks— Mother Meldrum — Jennifred's Leap ------ 102

Chapter VII From Moles Chamber By Pinkworthy Pond To The Doone Valley

; THENCE BY CHALK WATER TO OARE, GLENTHORNE AND PORLOCK The Chains— Pinkworthy Pond — Farley Water — Badgworthy Water—' Lorna's Bower'— Badgworthy Valley— Waterslide — Doone Valley— Doone Houses— The 'Warpath' — AFragment of an Avenue— Chalk Water — Oare Church — Moses and Aaron — View from above Glenthorne — Oldbarrow — Above the Fog — Glenthorne — Culbone Church — Ashley Combe — Porlock Weir — Porlock — The Coach Road — Whitestones — Porlock Hill - - - - - - 120

Chapter VIII From Porlock Over Dunkery

Porlock — Invasions of Ohter, and Rhoald, and Harold — Camp — Church — Horner Valley — Cloutsham — Dunkery — Curious Phenomenon — Dunkery Beacon — View from the Summit — Luccombe — Dr. Byam — Wootton Courtenay— Exford — Robert Baker — Winsford 141

Chapter IX From Porlock To Bossington, Lynch, And Selworthy, And Over The

NORTH HILL TO MINEHEAD Bossington — A Gigantic Walnut Tree — Lynch Chapel — Holnicote — Selworthy Green — Selworthy Church — Bury Castle — Bossington Beacon — Bratton Court — Henry de Bracton — Burgundy Chapel — Greenaleigh — View from Minehead Hill — History of Minehead - - - - 158

Chapter X More About Minehead

DUNSTER The Church — Curious Sculptures — A doubtful Tomb — Chained Books — Quay Town— The Hobby-Horse— Novel Contents VIII PAGE Marking-ink — Grabhurst — Vale of Avill— Dunster — The Yarn Market— The Luttrell Arms Hotel — Ruins of the Priory —The Priory Church— The Nunnery— The Castle- Its History 175

Chapter XI From Dunster, Over Croydon, And The Brendon Hills

Water Lane— Cæsar's Camp— British Camp — Croydon Hill — Another British Camp — Stone Enclosure at Dumbledeer — Withycombe Fire Beacon — Red Girts — Chargot Lodge — Monkham Circle — Slowly — Langridge Kistvaen — Treborough — Leigh Wood Cascade — Brendon Mines — The Dunstone and Naked Boy — Raleigh's Cross — Discovery of Roman Coins — Elworthy Barrows - - - - - 199

Chapter XII Between The Brendons And The Sea

Hartrow — Willet Tor — British Urns — Combe Sydenham — The Drake Cannon-ball — Stogumber — Monksilver — Nettlecombe — Knap Dane — Castle Hill — Huish Barton— Roadwater Valley — Cleeve Abbey — Chapel Cleeve - - - 219

Chapter XIII Along The Coast To Watchet

The Monks' Path— Old Cleeve— A Curious Epitaph— Blue Anchor — Marshwood Farm — Watchet — Dawes Castle — St. Decuman — Monuments and Epitaphs — A Resurrection — Williton — An Imitated Monument — Doniford - - - 236

Chapter XIV The

QUANTOCKS— THE LANDWARD SIDE Coleridge and Thelwall— St. Audries— Weacombe— Fire Beacon Hill — East Quantoxhead— Bicknoller— Trendle's Ring — Turk's Castle — Curdon Camp — Halsway Manor — Crowcombe — The Market Cross — Crowcombe Court — Church and Cross — Willsneck — Cockercombe — Bagborough— Mr. W. Fen wick Bisset - - - - - Contents IX

Chapter XV The Seaward Side Page

Holwell Cavern — Broomfield — Ruborough Camp — Quantock Lodge — Igneous Rocks — Nether Stowey — Coleridge and his Friends — The Court House — Castle Mount — Robert de Candos — The Audleys — The Trackway — Danesborough — Dodington Court — Sir Francis Doddington — Holford — Alfoxton ----- 277

Appendix

(A) PERAMBULATION OF EXMOOR FOREST - - - 297 (B) Superstition in West Somerset - 300 (C) Inscribed Stone on Winsford Hill - 309 Elevations of Principal Hills - - -* - - - 310 INDEX _ .... 311 ABBREVIATIONS The references to the Principal Works quoted in the following pages are abbreviated as follows : Hon. J. Fortescue's 'Records of Staghuntingon Exmoor' Stag-hunting. Murray's 'Handbook to Wilts, Dorset and Somerset' Murray. ' Proceedings of the Somersetshire Archæological Society ' Proc. Som. Arch. Soe. Savage's ' History of the Hundred of Carhampton' « ... Savage. LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS PAGE ExMOOR from THE Quantocks - - - Frontispiece Landacre Bridge - - - - - - 14 Red Deer - - - - - - - 40 Tarr Steps ------- 90 Lynmouth - - - - - - - 114 Valley of Rocks - - - - - - 118 Badgworthy Valley - - - - - 126 Badgworthy Waterslide - - - - - 128 Oare Church - - 130 Culbone Church - - - - - - 136 Porlock Weir - - - - - - 138 Porlock - - - - - - - 144 MlNEHEAD ------- 170 Grabhurst - - - - - - - 184 Dunster Castle - - - - - - 192 Leigh Cascade - - - - - - 210 St. Audries Church - - - - - 254 Crowcombe - - - - - - -

PREFACE.

So far as can be ascertained, no attempt has yet been made to describe in anything like detail the hill country of West Somerset. Now and again a book, generally a small one, has been given to the world, just sufficient to call the attention of the lover of scenery to the beautiful spots that exist between the Devonshire borders and the undulating line of Quantock ; but that no volume treating of the whole district between Lynton and Cothelstone has made its appearance seems certain. It has, therefore, occurred to me that an account of a region every day becoming better known may not be altogether unwelcome. As in a former work, for whose favourable reception I thank both critics and public, I have endeavoured to make my remarks on matters archæological in as popular a form as is consistent with what I fear many think a very dry subject.

Archæologists themselves, however, may be of opinion that they have cause for complaint in that there is not enough of that anti quarian leaven in which their souls take such delight. Preface XIV To them I would reply that this book is topical first and archæological afterwards : it is written not so much for those addicted to the study of the past as for the world at large ; and its pages are not, I would submit, suitable for the histories of manors, of feudal tenures and customs, for extracts from Domesday, and the thousand and one other matters that come within the purview of a work of purely archæological tendency. These may be found in the pages of Collinson the County Historian, in the proceedings of the Somersetshire Archæological Society, and in other works dealing with the records, facts, and traditions of earlier ages.

There being so few works upon the country described in the following pages, I have to acknowledge little assistance from brother authors. It would, however, be both ungrateful and ungenerous not to mention the Hon. John Fortescue's work upon Staghunting, whence I have drawn much interesting information on the chase of the red deer. In this connection, too, I would ac knowledge with thanks the services of Mr. Arthur Heal, the lately retired huntsman of the Devon and Somerset Staghounds, who not only perused the fourth chapter but added thereto certain observations which from a man of his great knowledge are of considerable value. I would also express my indebtedness to Mr. Thomas Andrew, F.G.S., for his revision of the pages relating to geology ; nor must I forget to thank Miss Alice King for contributing to the article on folklore in the appendix.

Preface XV I cannot be blind to the fact that in a work of this character there must be sins both of omission and com mission. To my readers I would quote that dictum of Captain Cuttle, ' When found, make a note of.' In other words, I ask them to be kind enough to bring to my notice any omissions, any errors they may detect. There must be many an entertaining legend, for in stance, that has not reached my ear, and which would be gratefully welcomed should the time come, as I trust it may, for another edition. John Ll. Warden Page. Williton, Somerset. May, 1890. EXM OOR AND THE HILL COUNTRY OF WEST SOMERSET

Chapter I

general features of the hill country View from Dunkery Beacon— Rivers and Streams — Exmoor — Roman coins at Exe Head — Its extent — Exmoor Forest — The Perambulation — Foresters — Sale of the Forest — Scenery — Elevation — Absence of heather — Rivers of Exmoor — Fishing records —The Barle — Pinkworthy Pond — The Chains — Moles Chamber and its story — Roads — Climate — Minerals — The Brendon Hills — The Quantock Hills. The western portion of the county of Somerset consists of very broken and hilly ground, covering an area some thirty miles in length by fifteen in breadth. It is bounded on the north by the Bristol Channel, on the east by the Quantock Hills, and on the south and west by Devonshire. The largest and most mountainous tract is that occupying the extreme west — the wild expanse of Exmoor.

From its loftiest point, Dunkery Beacon, the whole country to be treated of in this work View from Dunkery Beacon 2 is spread out as on a map, and we will therefore imagine ourselves by the pile of stones which forms its summit, surveying the prospect beneath. To describe this panorama in detail is not our present intention; but merely to present to the eye of the reader — as far as may be — the configuration of the district which we are about to explore. Immediately around and far to the west are the rolling steppes of Exmoor, channelled by many a deep combe, each the bed of a torrent. Along the northern slopes spread the gray waters of the Channel, into which the moorlands sink with great abruptness. From here the grand escarpment is not visible : it is indeed only properly seen from the sea, and no one who has sailed along these seaward hills will ever forget that magnificent coastline.

Right out of the ' foam-laced margin' tower the great downs, here wooded nearly to their summits, eleven, twelve, thirteen hundred feet above; there bold and bare, the windshorn turf sprinkled with stony screes or sparsely shaded by storm bowed oak. And, with the single exception of the break caused by Porlock Bay, the rampart continues from the huge Foreland of Countisbury to Minehead. But it is not all Moor. Between Dunkery and Porlock are the deep, wooded glens of the Horner and its tributaries, while the vale dividing its steepes from the North Hill — as the short range running from Bossington to Minehead is called — is fertile and smiling, four miles across, and dotted with hamlet and homestead. From about the middle of this valley, another short range, that of Grabhurst, stretches nearly parallel with the View from Dunkery Beacon 3 North Hill to the ancient and picturesque town of Dunster.

A long valley winds southward from this town to Wheddon Cross, in Cutcombe, dividing the Moor proper from the outlying hills of Croydon and Rodhuish, and the straight, almost level, ridge of Brendon, reaching towards the Quantocks, which, separated from it by a wide depression, rise in quiet beauty against the eastern horizon, some fifteen miles away. Allusion has been made to the grandeur of the coastline from our western limits to Minehead. But from this quaint combination of ancient seaport and modern watering-place the scenery changes. As far as Blue Anchor, about three miles eastward, the shore is fla^ and sandy — at low tide, indeed, not without a suspicion of mud as well ; there is no cliff, the narrow strip of country between it and Dunster being flat as a fen, and, in winter, nearly as marshy.

From Blue Anchor the coast again rises in those alabaster-veined cliffs so familiar to the geologist. These trend away to Watchet, thence to become a low red or gray wall, ending alto gether where the Doniford brook spreads over the shingly beach at the foot of the Quantock Hills. Behind these cliffs the country undulates southward, now rising, now falling, to meet the Brendon Hills. It will thus be seen that this district has but little level ground ; in fact, with the exception of the plain fringing Blue Anchor Bay, I am not aware of half a dozen square miles without a hill between Glenthorne and Quantoxhead, between Minehead and Dulverton. With its purple moorlands, green valleys, undulating pastures and waving woods, it presents such a prospect I — Rivers and Streams 4 as may well have been in the mind of that poet who conjured the traveller setting out for foreign lands to tarry awhile, and first visit the scenes of his native isle.

Although there are numerous streams, but two rivers, worthy of the name, water our district. These are the Exe and Barle, draining the southern half of Exmoor. The northern slopes supply streams of smaller size, which will be mentioned, more in detail, later. East ward of the Moor we have the Avill* flowing down the valley of the same name (the high land about Wheddon Cross being the watershed between it and the Exe) to the sandy flats beyond Dunster, and the brooks of Wash ford and Doniford ; the former rising in the Brendon Hills, entering the sea at Watchet ; the latter, which takes its source near Willet and drains the valley of Stogumber, joining the channel as mentioned above a little to the east of that port. All these streams are clear, all rapid. More than one is rocky, too : a circumstance that adds not a little to the charm of the mountain flood.

Not only is Dunkery the highest part of Exmoor, but Exmoor is head and shoulders above the hills adjacent. A wild open moorland it is, little cultivated, bleak and lonely. The central part is dreary enough : no tor, as upon Dartmoor, breaks its sombre lines ; no tree, save in some sheltered combe, softens its stern aspect. But on its borders will be found some of the finest scenery in England ; dark, narrow valleys crowded thick with trees, lit by the white flash of an impetuous torrent dashing headlong over mossy * Called at Dunster the Laun. Exmoor 5 boulders, at one moment caressing, at the next sub merging, the thickets of fern that fringe its course. As little of commercial value can be made out of Exmoor, there are neither towns nor villages really upon it. At one time there were mines; but they have long ceased working, a fact that no lover of scenery will deplore.

Not even chemical works or powder mills, those common accessories of waste land, disfigure the landscape. The villages — small, old-world, picturesque — stand at irregular distances about the skirts of the Moor, as if dreading its cold blasts and chilling mists ; and the traveller will find little beyond a shepherd's cot between Oare and Simonsbath. He will not be troubled greatly, either, by contact with his fellow-man ; for, though several roads have been cut across the waste, the population is too scanty to make much of a show upon them, and a human being about every four miles is as much as he can expect. If he be of tendency eremitical, or, like a poet of the Quantocks, one whc ' haunts lonely places,' we may commend him to the central district, where he will find no road at all, and may wander undisturbed over leagues of country the wildest of the wild, with no living object to disturb his meditations, unless it be a wild pony or wilder red deer.

For Exmoor and the neighbouring hills are the last habitat of this beautiful creature. Yet in spite of its barrenness it is not without beauty, a grim beauty perchance, and of a kind that in the heart of the Moor may, to some folk, become monotonous, but that still has its attractions. The great, round hills and dark, sullen ridges, in their very grandeur of desolation, Exmoor cannot fail to speak in tones very moving to him who loves the moorland. The wild heath beneath, the wild sky above — far up, but which seems at times so near — inspire a feeling of freedom to which the dweller in the lowlands is a stranger; while the keen mountain air, filling the lungs with the faint scent of the heather, the stronger perfume of the furze, or anon with the salt breath of the sea, induces an exhilaration of spirits of which even the most jaded is sensible.

And then the view. It may be questioned whether any highlands in England command the immensely varied prospect obtainable from this cradle of the Exe and Barle. Nearly the whole of the county of Somer set, quite half of Devon, a slice of Dorset, even a bit of Cornwall, lie beneath the eye; an expanse of salt water, from Avonmouth to Lundy, and far beyond into the wild Atlantic, stretches away right and left, while north wards the view is but blocked by the lofty mountains of central Wales. A panorama which is without equal south of the Scottish Border. Of its history little can be said. Of course it was a British fastness — the beacons on Dunkery and other hills, and the barrows which here and there break the long line of heath, speak to us of an early people ; but it seems to have been but sparsely inhabited, certainly not to the extent of its distant sister, Dart moor.

There are few, if any, hut circles ; and none of those enclosures of ' standing stones ' that render so interesting the wild tract between Tavy and Teign. Roman coins have been found near Exe Head, not very far from their reputed camp of Showlsborough Its Extent 7 Castle; though what the conquerors of the world wanted in so desolate a spot is not apparent. Perhaps they utilized the old British trackway, which is said to have run from the Parret over the Quantocks and Brendons and up the Exe Valley to Barnstaple. Perhaps they ' prospected ' — as was certainly the case upon the Brendon Hills — for minerals ; or, peradventure, and this is equally probable, the coins belonged to some native, who may have received them from a legionary in the camp ; though, of course, there is no actual reason for assuming that the position of the camp had aught to do with the presence of these coins, Roman money, as is well known, being current in Britain for a considerable period.

Where this wild tract begins, and where it ends, is rather difficult to determine. According to Sir Henry de la Beche, ' it extends from the valley of Stogumber and Crowcombe, separating it from the Quantock Hills on the east, to the Hangman Hills on the Bristol Channel, near Combe Martin, on the west. Near the latter place this high land forms a point whence it sweeps to the south-east by a curved line, passing by Parracombe, Chapman Barrows, Span Head, and the North Molton Ridge. Its southern boundary ranges from thence by Molland Down, Dulverton Common and Haddon Down, to Heydon Down and Main Down near Wiveliscombe, whence the high land trends away to the Stogumber and Crowcombe Valley above mentioned.' So writes the eminent geologist, and, as far as geological formation and the natural ' lay ' of the land is concerned, he is doubtless right.

Perambulation of the Forest 8 Local opinion,' however, would bound Exmoor on the east by the valley dividing Dunkery from the heathery slopes of Croydon Hill. A portion of the waste, consisting of about 20,000 acres, has from time immemorial been termed the Forest. When it first became such is doubtful; but, in all probability, it was ' afforested ' soon after the Norman Conquest, together with Dartmoor, the New Forest and other wild tracts of country. Whatever acreage of woodland it may have borne in a former day, it is bare enough now. I do not think that the Forest, in its wooded sense, was ever of great extent. Doubtless what little timber it bore was cut down for fuel. As an open chase or hunting-ground it was used, and probably very few more trees than are at present to be found in its combes clothed the sheltered places of the wilderness.

To ascertain the limits of these forests, ' perambu lations ' were made, which were afterwards confirmed by Act of Parliament. The first and only recorded per ambulation of Exmoor took place by Royal Commis sion in the twenty-sixth year of the reign of Edward I.,* when the bounds were decided, and, done into modern English, were broadly as follows : Beginning at what is now known as County Gate, where the road from Porlock to Lynton passes through the wall dividing Somerset from Devon, the line ran to Fistones, ' where,' says Mr. Fortescue in ' Staghunting,' ' Deddycombe cot stood, and where Culbone parish crosses the main road at its junction with Oare,' and thence by the * Vide Appendix. The Foresters 9 head of Lillycombe to Wear Water. From Wear Water it continued over Middle Hill to Blackbarrow and Alderman's Barrow (which is, in the opinion of the writer above quoted, the same as the Osmundbergh of the perambulation), thence following a south-westerly line to Orchard Corner.

Near this it crossed the Exe, and ran to Redstone, on the road from Exford to Simonsbath, and from that point to a small stream running into Reddecombe, and on to Shutscombe. Deresmarke, the next point mentioned, ' is,' says Mr. Fortescue, ' apparently a thing of the past, but Stone chiste is doubtless the spot where Withypoole joins at one corner the parishes of Exmoor and Exford.' The next point was the Barle at Sheardon Hutch, whence the boundary ran to Willingford Water-crossing on the Dunn's Brook, thence following the existing county boundary to the starting-point. Besides the Foresters appointed by the Crown to preserve the King's rights, there was one chosen by the interested parties as guardians of the woods, commons, and pannage held by Barons, Knights and Freeholders within the forest.

The first of these Foresters was one William de Wrotham, in whose representatives, the De Peches, the office remained till 1337, when Matthew de Peche sold it to Sir Richard D'Amori, Knight, who twenty-one years later is supposed to have parted with it to Roger Mortimer, Earl of March. It is said to have continued in the possession of his descendants and of the Dukes of York until it came to the Crown in the reign of Edward IV.* * Phelps' ' History of Somerset,' p. 40. Physical Features 10 In 1815 the Forest was put up for auction, and sold to Mr. John Knight, a Worcestershire gentleman, who constructed round the whole a ring fence, enclosing, I am told, an area fifty-two miles in circumference. Such part of his purchase as was then represented by the Forest — for he bought up the interests of divers other holders — was, in 1856, made the present parish of Exmoor.

So much for the history — and very scant history it is — of Exmoor Forest. Now for the physical features of the land. Dunkery, being the highest part of the Moor, would, it may well be supposed, afford the best panorama of its surface. But this is not so. As a general outlook for the whole of the district hereafter to be described, it is indeed facile princeps, but, standing as it does almost on the western edge of the Moor, the person who views Exmoor from the Beacon, will, while acquiring a good idea of border scenery, scarcely obtain the best picture of the interior of the waste — the old Forest. To see Exmoor in its native wildness, he should take his stand on the high ground about Pinkworthy Pond, or midway between it and Hoar Oak Hill. From either of these points he will gain a very fair view of the Forest, and this is what he will see : A bare, rolling waste of moorland stretching away into the eastern distance, like the ocean ' heaving in long swells.' Here and there a larger wave rises to wards the sky, the sloping wall of some combe deeper than its fellows.

There is one of these combes at his very feet ; and a fine mountain glen it is. On either Physical Features 11 hand the bald downs tower to a height of a couple of hundred feet or more, scored here and there by little ' goyals ' or gullies, down which sparkle tiny runnels, each lending its volume to swell the transparent torrent hurrying through the bottom to join a larger stream in the valley beyond. He will hear the voice of the waters, but nothing beside, unless, indeed, he move ; when perchance a black cock will start up with loud whirr from the coarse grass, or a curlew vanish across the ravine, uttering its melancholy cry. No dwelling is within sight, though the knowledge that a shepherd's hut \\&s perdu in one of the folds, a mile or two away, will prevent that feeling of utter loneliness inspired by the desolation of the granite moorland five and-thirty miles away to the southward.

Peaks, whether rocky or grass-grown, there are none; neither is there a hill of any considerable elevation with truly mountainous outline, unless we except Dun kery, rising purple a dozen miles ahead. But for all that the tableland is lofty : yon coach-road to Porlock runs at a level from 1,200 to 1,400 feet above the sea ; those five tumuli that give name to a hill southward* are 1,619 *feet high, and Chapman Barrows, to the west, reach an elevation but a few feet less. But there is little heather; outside the ring fence there is plenty, but within ' Sir Frederick's ' domain coarse grass flourishes, intruded upon by few clumps of the dark wiry shrub with its graceful waxen flower. Yet the Forest wants not for colouring ; there is plenty * Span Head or Five Barrows. For elevations, vide infra, p. 310.

Physical Features 12 of tall bracken, its vivid green in spring, its golden brown in autumn, lighting up the dingy grass almost as much as the occasional scarlet of the whortleberry, which may be found in greater or less quantity on every hillside. There are, too, the usual emerald, and brown, and red patches of bog, fringed with nodding cotton grass ; so that the Forest, though heatherless, is not colourless. And if there be any who think that the absence of heath must perforce render a moorland region devoid of colour, let him look across this wild expanse on a day of sun and wind, when the cloud shadows are marching from hill to hill, from valley to valley, and he will confess that the presence of purple bloom is very far from being a sine, qua non in the matter of artistic requirement.