asant walk. Near the centre of the wall is a curious
building generally known as the Lollards' Prison, although whether it
ever was used for this purpose is a matter of conjecture. One of the
finest views of the Cathedral is that obtained from a corner of the lawn
in the Palace Gardens.

THE EXE

After leaving the peaceful atmosphere of the Cathedral the noise and
distractions of the modern city grate upon us; the return to the
twentieth-century commonplace after the fourteenth-century refinement is
too sudden, there being no intermediate stage between the one and the
other, between the gloom of the great church and the glare and feverish
hurry of a prosperous city. This being so, we cannot do better than seek
a measure of quietude and repose along the banks of the Exe, a river
which, rising on Exmoor, gives name to Exeter, Exminster, and Exmouth.
Although rising in Somerset, the river may fittingly be claimed as a
Devonian one, as it enters the county a little below Dulverton, where
it receives the waters of the Barle. At the beginning of its career the
Exe flows through a country of great beauty and much romantic interest,
which has been immortalized by R. D. Blackmore in _Lorna Doone_.

[Illustration: THE EXE AT TOPSHAM]

This land of Exmoor is a heathery plateau that rivals in everything but
extent the sister moorland which gives birth to that prince of English
rivers, the Dart.

Dartmoor is larger, wilder, and grander in the bold contours of its
cloud-capped tors, but the wildness of Exmoor is blended with a sweet
and gentle charm which is all its own. It presents us with a panorama of
misty woods, gleaming water, and glowing heather; a combe-furrowed
moorland clothed with scrub oaks and feathery larches. After leaving
this forest shrine the Exe enters Devonshire, where, after flowing
through richly wooded and fertile valleys, it sweeps past the ancient
town of Tiverton, where it is swelled by the waters of the Loman. Three
miles from Tiverton it reaches Bickley Bridge, beyond which it is the
recipient of the Culm, the largest of all its tributaries. Along the
greater part of its course to this point its silver streams thread their
way between sloping hills crowned with hanging woods, and by scenery of
the true Devonian order. At Cowley Bridge, two miles above Exeter, the
river is joined by the Creedy, which, coming from the north-west, flows
through and gives name to _Creedy-ton_, or Crediton. The course of