In Unfamiliar England

It runs almost straight from Exeter to Prince Town-the prison town of the moor-and on either side for many miles lies a waste country, apparently quite devoid of villages

iles between Exeter and Moreton Hampstead trying and almost terrifying in places. The hills offered little impediment to our motor, b

iquity, for it has a sixteenth century building, called the Arcade, whose Moorish touches are decidedly picturesque. It is like a bit of Spain in the hills of Dartmoor

ellow of the gorse and the metallic green of the whortle, all intensified by golden sunshine, have marvelously transformed the somber tone of the moorland of scarce an hour before. But where is the "forest"? Only stunted trees appear here and there, or a fringe of woods along the clear streams; we learn that "forest" once meant a waste, uncultivated tract of land, and in later days has been applied to woodlands alone. We run for miles with no human habitation in sight save an occasional cottage in a small, barren field surrounded by stone walls. We come upon a large, attractive-looking inn unexpectedly-though it ought not to be unexpected to find an inn anywhere in England-the Two Bridg

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m the upland road. Original Painting

r French soldiers, and a few Americans were confined here in 1812. It then fell into disuse until 1850, but for the half

typical examples of its granite tors, its peaty streams, its great stretches of boulder-strewn heather, and its isolated villages." Evidently he must mean that

e something less romantic to think of, for in attempting a short cut to Tintagel without going to Camelford, we run into a series of the crookedest, roughest lanes we found in all England. These appear to have been quite abandoned; in places mere ravines with myriads of sharp loose stones and many long steep hills. But we push on and almost ere we are aware, find ourselves in Tintagel village, which with its long rows of boarding-houses hardly accords with one's preconceived romantic notions. Then we catch a glimpse of the ocean out beyond the headland, upon which is perched a huge, square-towered building-King

n such a masterly manner in the painting by Mr. Moran, the towering cliffs crowned by the fragmentary ruins looming far above us. A path cut in the edge of the cliff leads to a precarious-looking foot-bridge across the chasm and a still narrower and steeper path hugs the face of the precipice on the

STLE, OFF TINTAG

Painting by Th

ght hour! Here, legend declares-and I care not if it be dim indeed and questioned by the wiseacres-was once the court of the wise and faultless Arthur, who gathered to himself the flower of knighthood of Christendom and was invincible to all attacks from without, but whose dominion crumbled away before the faithlessness and dishonor of his own followers. Here, perchance, the faithless Guinevere pined and sighed for her forsworn lover and gazed on the sea, c

red but grim and massive in decay. There must have been a connection between the castles on either side of the great ravine, though it is hardly apparent how this could have been. Perh

very clouds floating in it like fairy ships. Suddenly the sun dropped from behind the cloud, which had obscured his full splendor, into the resplendent zone beneath, flooding the sea, into which he slowly sank, with a marvelous though evanescent glory. Then followed a

lines of the headlands were softened by a clinging blue haze. We lingered on the legend-haunted ground until nearly noon and it was with keen regret that we glided away from the pleasant hostelry b

ance of twenty-five miles, for we did not turn aside for Bude or for Stratton, just opposite on each side of the road. The latter is said to be one of the most unspoiled and genuinely ancient of the smaller Cornish villages. At times we were within a mile or

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ainting by A. J

n a chronicle that seeks rather the untrodden ways. It is not possible for a motor or any other vehicle to descend the steep, stone-paved streets, and about a

ors. Coaching parties come from Tintagel (round trip eighty miles) and one is sure to find Clovelly crowded in season, especially if the day is fine. And so we found it, literally thronged, a huge excursion steamer lying at anchor in the harbor. There was a little disarray and confusion at the pleasant New Inn-new in name only-evidently due to more patronage than could easily be taken care of. As we waited for luncheon we looked about at the collection of antique brass, copper, china and pottery that almost covered

ons of these ancient fanes, often quite peculiar in each case? Just before we entered Barnstaple we turned into a byroad, and dropping down a hill of appalling steepness and length, came to Tawstock Church, famed as the finest country church in Devon-the "Westminster of the West Country," some enthusiast has styled it. Though hardly deserving such a dignified characterization as this, Tawstock Church is well worth a visit. Besides some remarkable tombs and fi

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d comfort, and still retains much of the gorgeous decorations done by its former occupant. The poet Shelley had an odd association with Barnstaple. When living at Lynton, after his marriage with Harriet Westbrook, he came to Barnstaple and spent some time in bringing out a p

ul grounds facing the sea, which murmured almost directly beneath our open windows. It was a beautiful evening; the tide was just receding from the jutting rocks scattered along the coast, whereon the sea, even in its mildest moods, chafes into foam; and one can easily imagine a most awe-inspiring s

s positively depressing under such conditions. And though we recall Dunster Church with associations not unpleasing in perspective, the surroundings were not altogether pleasing at the time. We found the caretaker, a bent old woman, in the church, but she informed us that there were really two churches and that she had jurisdiction over only one of them. However, she conducted us

ncient Mariner" was conceived. A few months before, while in a lonely farmhouse between Porlock and Lynton, he had the dream which he started to record in "Kubla Khan." This poem he had composed in his dream, but while writing it down on awakening, a "person from Porlock" interrupted, and when the poet essayed to write, not only the words but the images of the vision had faded away, and the fragment of "Kubla Khan" remains like a shattered gem. Wordsworth and his sister Dorothy came a little later to Alfoxden House, standing in a pleasant park in the parish of Halford, and here the literary association between Coleridge and Wordsworth became intimate and the little volume of "

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ainting by A. J

r abbeys of Britain. In the majority of cases the abbey proper had been destroyed, but the church escaped, often through purchase by the citizens.

even the archway through which their bodies went out to the grave. The church suffered from despoilers more than any other part of the abbey, and great is the loss to architecture. Otherwise we get a community of the Middle Ages preserved in all its es

the wind and rain and where under foot the grass grows lush and green as it grows only in England

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med up to us as we were about to leave and opened his heart about the ruin in which he dwelt and which he seemed to love. He told us its

ty, which we drink in as we skim swiftly along the smooth, wet road. We catch a final gleam of the ocean at Weston-