hing trees rising in
masses of foliage to the height of several hundred feet. The stream
makes various sharp bends--a paradise for the artist--and finally it
broadens out into an estuary like an inland lake, with a view over the
intervening neck of land to Torbay, and beyond the coast-line at Exmouth
and towards Portland. Thus we come to Dartmouth, the old houses built
tier above tier on a steep hill running up from the harbor, while at the
extreme point of the promontory, guarding the entrance to the estuary,
is the little church of St. Petrox, with its armorial gallery and ruins
of an ancient manor house, and the castle, consisting of a square and a
round tower, coming down from Henry VII.'s reign, when it was built for
coast-defence. On the opposite point of the harbor-entrance are the
foundations of another castle, evidently built about the same time.
Dartmouth in early times was a port of great importance, and Edward III.
first gave it a charter under the name of Clifton-Dartmouth-Hardness.
Its merchants were then numerous and wealthy, and Coeur de Leon's
crusaders assembled their fleet in the harbor in 1190. The French
destroyed both it and Plymouth in 1377, and in 1403 the two towns,
combining, ravaged the French coasts and burned forty ships. The French
retaliated the next year, but Dartmouth was too much for them, killing
Du Chastel, the commander, and defeating his expedition. It suffered
severely in the Civil War, and there are still traces of the
land-fastenings of the iron chain stretched across the harbor to keep
out the French.

THE PLYM.

[Illustration: THE DEWERSTONE.]

[Illustration: IN BICKLEIGH VALE.]

[Illustration: OLD DOORWAY, AUGUSTINIAN PRIORY. PLYMPTON.]

Westward of the valley of the Dart is the valley of the Plym, also
flowing out of Dartmoor. Two streams known as the Cad and the Mew join
to form this river, and though they are of about equal importance, the
source of the Cad is generally regarded as the true Plym head, while a
crossing upon it is known as the Plym Steps. Both are rocky, dashing
mountain-streams, and such are also the characteristics of the Plym
after the junction until it enters its estuary. The Plym Head is within
the royal forest of Dartmoor, about twelve hundred feet above the sea,
and in the wild and lonely moorland. The stream flows by the flat summit
of Sheeps Tor, one of the chief peaks on the southern border of the
moor. Here in a hollow formed by overhanging