What to See in England Part 35

=Nearest Station.=--Bovey Tracey.

=Distance from London.=--215-1/2 miles.

=Average Time.=--Varies between 6 to 7 hours.

1st 2nd 3rd =Fares.=--Single 33s. 0d. 20s. 6d. 16s. 5-1/2d.

Return 57s. 9d. 36s. 0d. 32s. 11d.

=Accommodation Obtainable.=--At Bovey Tracey--"The Dolphin,"

"The Railway," "The Moorland" Hotels.

=Alternative Route.=--Train to Okehampton from Waterloo. L. and S.W. Railway. Okehampton is 5 miles from Sourton and 10 from Lydford.

While only two places are mentioned above as starting-places from which to get at Dartmoor, a dozen others, such as Tavistock and Ashburton, might be mentioned. Bovey Tracey, however, has many advantages, for the moment one alights from the train one sees only four miles distant two of the most rugged tors of the moor--Hey Tor and Rippon Tor--the last with its great logan stone balanced near the summit. A coach from the "Dolphin," which runs three days a week in the season, takes one through scenery which grows more and more desolate and grand as the summit of Hey Tor is approached. From Hey Tor the coach goes on to Buckland Beacon, whence a wide view is obtained, including the s.h.i.+ning roofs of Princetown right away in the distance. Princetown, with its convict prison, is considered by the people of the moor to be its most important town. Holne, which is included in some of the coach drives from Bovey Tracey, contains the birthplace of Charles Kingsley. Dartmoor is so huge that one must be born and spend a lifetime in or near it to really know it, and the visitor can merely endeavour to see typical examples of its granite tors, its peaty streams, its great stretches of boulder-strewn heather, and its strangely isolated villages.

Eight miles from Bovey Tracey is Widdecombe, the lonely little village possessing a church which is known as "the Cathedral of the Moor." The great tower of the church was struck by lightning one Sunday in October 1638, and a contemporary account can be seen on some panels in the tower.

Brent Tor, ill.u.s.trated opposite, is quite close to the station on the L.

and S.W. Railway of that name. The little battlemented church on the summit, which has nave, aisles, and chancel, has a legendary origin and is dedicated to St. Michael. The rock composing the tor is volcanic trap.

[Ill.u.s.tration: BRENT TOR, DARTMOOR.

The little church standing on Brent Tor is very prominently situated and can be seen for many miles across the moor.]

HAWORTH

THE HOME OF CHARLOTTE BRONTe

=How to get there.=--Train from St. Pancras. Change at Keighley.

Midland Railway.

=Nearest Station.=--Haworth.

=Distance from London.=--216 miles.

=Average Time.=--Varies between 5-1/2 to 6-1/2 hours.

1st 2nd 3rd =Fares.=--Single 28s. 7d. ... 16s. 6-1/2d.

Return 57s. 2d. ... 33s. 1d.

=Accommodation Obtainable.=--At Keighley--"Devons.h.i.+re Hotel."

Haworth is a long straggling village 4 miles from Keighley, a large manufacturing town in the West Riding of Yorks.h.i.+re. The road is very steep to the village--"four tough, scrambling miles." It consists of one street, so steep that the flagstones with which it is paved are placed end-ways that the horses may not stumble. Past the church and the lonely parsonage are the wide moors, high, wild, and desolate, up above the world, solitary and silent. This gray, sad-looking parsonage, so close to the still sadder churchyard, is a spot of more than ordinary interest, for it was the home of the Brontes--that wonderfully gifted and extraordinary family! Charlotte Bronte shared with her sisters their intense love for the wild, black, purple moors, rising and sweeping away yet higher than the church which is built at the summit of the one long narrow street. All round the horizon are wave-like hills. _Jane Eyre_, published in 1847, written with extraordinary power and wonderful genius, astonished the entire reading world. Little did any one imagine that the auth.o.r.ess lived far away from the busy haunts of men in a quiet northern parsonage, leading a gentle, sad life; for her two sisters, whom Charlotte loved as her own life, were very delicate, and their one brother, in whom they had placed great hopes, had given way to drink.

Charlotte was known to the literary world as Currer Bell, her sisters as Acton and Ellis Bell. After _Jane Eyre_ came _s.h.i.+rley_, written in a period of great sorrow, for her two loved sisters died within a short s.p.a.ce of each other, not long after the death of their unhappy brother, and Charlotte was left alone in the quiet, sad parsonage with only her aged father. _Villette_ was well received. It was her last work.

Charlotte Bronte married, in 1854, the Rev. Arthur Nichols, and after a few brief months of happiness pa.s.sed away on March 31, 1855, at the early age of thirty-nine.

Haworth has been much influenced by the growth of Keighley.

[Ill.u.s.tration: _W.T. Stead, Heckmondwike._

THE PARSONAGE AT HAWORTH, FROM THE CHURCHYARD.

Where Charlotte Bronte and her family lived.]

RIEVAULX ABBEY

=How to get there.=--Train from King's Cross. Great Northern Rly.

=Nearest Station.=--Helmsley.

=Distance from London.=--219-1/4 miles.

=Average Time.=--Varies between 3-3/4 to 5 hours.

1st 2nd 3rd =Fares.=--Single 31s. 3d. ... 18s. 3-1/2d.

Return 62s. 6d. ... 36s. 7d.

=Accommodation Obtainable.=--"Black Swan" and "Crown" Hotels at Helmsley. There is no inn at Rievaulx.

=Alternative Route.=--Train from St. Pancras _via_ Sheffield. Midland.

The little village of Rievaulx--the name is Norman-French, but is p.r.o.nounced Rivers--is situated close to the river Rye, and 2-1/2 miles from Helmsley, on the Thirsk road. The great point of interest in connection with the village is the fact that close by are the ruins of the once magnificent abbey for monks of the Cistercian order, founded by Sir Walter D'Espec in 1131. The founder eventually became a monk at Rievaulx, and at his death was buried there. After the Dissolution the site was granted to the Villiers family, from whom it came to the Duncombes in 1695.

The most striking view of the abbey is obtained by leaving the main road and taking the footpath across Duncombe Park, where a sudden turn brings one in sight of a bend in the Rye, with the great roofless church rising on the left bank of the river. The princ.i.p.al remains of the fine old abbey, one of the most beautiful ruins in the kingdom, consist of the choir and transept of the church, and the refectory. The hospitium or guest house was formerly on the right of the lane leading to Helmsley.

The great nave of the church is now a shapeless ruin, but from certain indications it may be seen that it was Norman, and probably the work of D'Espec. The lower parts of the transept are Norman, and the remainder Early English.

The magnificent tower arch, 75 feet high, is still standing, and one of the most striking views of the ancient fabric is the crumbling nave as it appears framed in this lofty and wonderfully-proportioned opening, with a background of rich English foliage and landscape.

West of the nave were the cloisters, of which only a few arches now remain, and opening from their west wall is the fine Early English refectory, with the reading-desk still existing. Underneath the refectory there are the remains of the Norman dormitory.

Near the bridge, at the lower end of the village of Rievaulx, a place still called the "Forge," was possibly an ironworks under the superintendence of the monks.

[Ill.u.s.tration: _Photochrom Co., Ltd._

RIEVAULX ABBEY.]

BRIXHAM, DEVON

LANDING-PLACE OF WILLIAM III.

=How to get there.=--Train from Paddington. Great Western Railway.

=Nearest Station.=--Brixham.

=Distance from London.=--222-1/2 miles.

=Average Time.=--Varies between 5-1/4 to 6-3/4 hours.

1st 2nd 3rd =Fares.=--Single 34s. 0d. 21s. 4d. 17s. 0-1/2d.

Return 59s. 8d. 37s. 4d. ...

=Accommodation Obtainable.=--"The Queen's Hotel," "The Bolton,"

"The George Hotel," "The Globe," etc.