g, one hand lightly gathering together the
folds of her white satin dress.

During the autumn and winter of 1645-46 Exeter was gradually hemmed in
by bodies of Parliamentary troops stationed at posts in the
neighbourhood, and with the new year the siege became a closer one. It
would seem, however, that there was no very acute distress from lack of
food; but Fuller, who was in the city at the time, mentions with
satisfaction the appearance of 'an incredible number of Larks ... for
multitude like Quails in the Wildernesse, and as fat as plentifull ...
which provided a feast for many poor people, who otherwise had been
pinched for provision.' As the spring advanced, the King's cause lapsed
into a condition too hopeless to be bettered by further resistance, and
on April 9 Sir John Berkeley, for over two years the faithful guardian
of the city, signed the articles of its surrender, on honourable terms,
to Sir Thomas Fairfax.

There is no space to speak of later dramatic incidents in Exeter--the
trial and execution of Mr Penruddocke and Mr Grove, leaders of a
Royalist rising of Wiltshire gentlemen, whose speeches on the scaffold
are given at length by Izacke; nor of the joy that greeted the
Restoration, when 'Tar-barrels and Bonefires capered aloft'; nor of
Charles II's visit, nor the entrance of the Duke of Monmouth in 1680
with five thousand horsemen, and nine hundred young men in white
uniforms marching before him. One may not even pause before the gorgeous
spectacle of William III's arrival, heralded by a procession in which
appeared two hundred negroes in white-plumed, embroidered turbans, and a
squadron of Swedish horsemen 'in bearskins taken from the beasts they
had slain, with black armour and broad flaming swords.'

It has been only possible to name the most outstanding points in the
history of a city--once more to quote Professor Freeman--'by the side of
which most of the capitals of Europe are things of yesterday.... The
city alike of Briton, Roman, and Englishman, the one great prize of the
Christian Saxon, the city where Jupiter gave way to Christ, but where
Christ never gave way to Woden--British Caerwisc, Roman Isca, West Saxon
Exeter, may well stand first on our roll-call of English cities. Others
can boast of a fuller share of modern greatness; none other can trace up
a life so unbroken to so remote a past.'

CHAPTER II

The Exe

'Goodly Ex, who from her full-fed spring
Her littl