unded them. The rear of the farm presented an almost
blank surface, save for one small door, which was open, a sudden black
oblong of shadow in the mellow whiteness. A cat sat cleaning itself in
the mild sunshine; otherwise there was no life nor movement. It looked
an enchanted place.

Farther on I came to a fork of the road, where a little stream ran
swiftly past the thatched and whitewashed cottages, their tiny gardens
profusely bright with flowers--hyacinths, daffodils, forget-me-nots, and
the deep red of climbing japonica. In one of them an old woman in a pink
sunbonnet was leaning on a stick gossiping with a neighbour, while two or
three sunburned children with yellow hair were dabbling in a brook. It
was idyllically and typically English, that ideal England of artists
which is dreamed of and loved by the sons and daughters of the Colonies,
who, thinking of "home" which they have never seen, think of such a scene
of verdant and homely peace.

Just beyond was a great barrow, a steep green mound perhaps twenty feet
high, with a little cottage beside it, and the small garden encroaching
on its green sides. I asked a child what she knew about it, wondering if
some local legend still lingered round the spot; but she told me "they
had dug a pond, beyond there, and this was the earth they had thrown up."
I did not explain to her the unlikeliness of such a heavy undertaking,
with a clear stream running by, but went on, wondering what British
chieftain or maraudering Dane lay buried under that great mound, awaiting
the last trump.

Bishop's Tawton is said to have been the seat of the Saxon Bishops of
Devon, established here in the tenth century; a farm now occupies the
site of the old episcopal palace, but the church is Perpendicular, and
the only Saxon remains I could discover was the base of a stone Saxon
cross in the churchyard. On the opposite bank of the river is Tawstock
church, standing in the grounds of Sir Bourchier Wrey, and close to his
house. The church is built on rising ground, and set round by trees in
which rooks have built; clamorous and noisy, they fly round and round the
old grey tower morning and evening. When the October gales are tossing
the trees, and the rain-clouds are gathering on the hills their cawing
has a sound of ill-omen, which makes them seem the unresting and
malignant spirits of those fierce lords of the Dark Ages, evil-doers and
unrepentant.

From Barnstaple to Lynton there a