admirable letter to the Queen he intercedes for 'Pedro Caro' and his
wife, and Sir Peter was eventually forgiven by Queen Mary, and honoured
by Queen Elizabeth.

Between Honiton and Sidmouth is an inn called The Hunter's Lodge (more
recently The Hare and Hounds), and opposite the house is a block of
stone, over which hovers a gruesome mystery. It is said that in the dead
of night the stone used to stir in its place, and roll heavily down into
the valley, to drink at the source of the Sid, and, some say, to try to
wash away its stain. Human blood has given it this power--the blood that
gushed upon it when the witches slew their victims, for it was once a
witches' stone of sacrifice.

Five miles to the south-west of Honiton is Ottery St Mary, a pretty
little town built on very steep slopes, and full of interesting
associations. It lies among 'fair meadows bathed in sunshine; with the
Otter river winding through them ... yonder are the red Devon steers
grazing up to their dewlaps in buttercups: beyond them dusky moors melt
into purple haze.' By making a slight detour one passes the pleasant
lawns and copses of Escot. Once the property of the Alfords, Escot was
bought in 1680 by Sir Walter Yonge (father of George II's unpopular
'Secretary-at-War'), who built a new and large house and lavishly
improved the grounds. But prodigality was the bane of the Yonges, and
not much more than one hundred years later it passed away from Sir
Walter's ruined grandson, and was bought by Sir John Kennaway.

The streets of Ottery are steep and sinuous, and both roadway and
footwalk are paved with pebbles and cobble-stones. The Manor of Ottery
was given by Edward the Confessor to the Dean and Chapter of Rouen, and
it continued in their possession during the reigns of nine Kings. Then
the Dean, finding that the task of collecting his rents and dues was
'chargeable, troublesome, and sometimes dangerous ... desired to sell
it, and met with a very fit chapman, John Grandisson, Lord Bishop of
Exon.'

Ottery's greatest treasure is the beautiful church, a miniature of
Exeter Cathedral, and it is to Bishop Grandisson that its great beauty
is due. He did not build the church; indeed, the shadow of a terrible
scandal had fallen upon it forty-five years before his rule began. For
in the year 1282 'that discreet man, Mr Walter de Lechelade,' the
Precentor of Ottery, was waylaid coming from Exeter Cathedral in his
canonical robes, and murdered by 'cer