e tide serves, it is certainly worth while to go up to
Wadebridge, if only for the sake of the grand old bridge, originally
built of seventeen arches, in the year 1485, by Thomas Lovibond, Vicar
of Egloshayle. The bridge has been widened since its erection, but is
not otherwise much changed. There was a ferry here in the past, but it
was perilous, and Lovibond could not rest till, with the assistance of
his bishop, he had collected money for this beneficent work. There was
a great difficulty in sinking foundations for the bridge, owing to the
shifting sands, but, guided by a dream, Lovibond is said to have
resorted to packs of wool--the same method reported by tradition of
Bideford Bridge. The bridge is 320 feet long, and remains the best
specimen of its class in England, as it retains its protecting angles
for the use of pedestrians, which at Bideford have been removed.
Lovibond was not only a bridge-builder; he also erected the fine tower
of his church at Egloshayle (the mother-parish of Wadebridge).
Egloshayle probably means the "church by the river" (_eglos-hel_); its
church is particularly interesting for its western doorway, its Norman
font, and its Kestell monument, while there is some good carving in
the roof of the south aisle. The church of St. Breock is distant
nearly a mile from Wadebridge, on the western side of the river, and
is perhaps still more delightful in its position; it is noteworthy for
its monuments, which, however, have been much displaced. It is here
that the remains of Tregeagle lie entombed; his spirit, if we may
credit tradition, is otherwise engaged. St. Breock is supposed to have
arrived in Cornwall, from Wales, earlier than Petrock. He was an old
man, and, as Mr. Baring-Gould tells us, one day his companions "left
him to sing psalms in his cart whilst they were engaged at a distance
over some pressing business. When they returned they found a pack of
wolves round the old man, but whether his sanctity, or toughness, kept
them from eating him is left undecided." Surely it must have been his
sanctity. His name attaches to the Breock Downs, a high-lying moorland
rising to about 700 feet, thickly strewn with prehistoric remains.
Wadebridge has suffered by the opening of the railway to Padstow, but
it can boast that its rail to Bodmin was the second line to be opened
in England. Many jests were current in reference to the speed of this
early railway. Professor Shuttleworth, who was born at Eglosh