Part 27

Exeter is the famous _Isca Dumnoniorum_ of the Romans, the last station this way in Antoninus his Itinerary; _pen cair_ of the Britons, the capital: it is a large and populous city, built upon a pleasant eminence on the eastern bank of the river _Ex_, or _Isca_ when latinised. I suppose the original word signifies no more than waters, like the French _eaux_, a collection of them, or several rivers, or branches of rivers, running parallel; and that whether it be wrote _Ax_, _Ex_, _Ix_, _Ox_, or _Ux_; of which many instances all over England. This river is navigable up to the city, but the tide comes not quite so high. The walls take in a very great compass, being a parallelogram of 3000 Roman feet long, 2000 broad; having a gate on every side: it lies oblique to the cardinal points of the compass, and objects its main declivity to the south-west. What adds to its wholesomeness and cleanliness, is that the ground is higher in a ridge along the middle of its length, declining on both sides: further, on the south-west and north-west sides it is precipicious: so that, with the river, the walls, the declivity of ground and ditch without side, it was a place of very great strength, and well chose for a frontier against the ancient _Corinavii_: it was built with a good omen, and has been ever in a flourishing condition. The walls are in pretty good repair, having many lunettes and towers, and make a walk round the city, with the advantage and pleasure of seeing the fine country on the opposite hills, full of wood, rich ground, orchards, villages and gentlemen’s houses. The beauty of the place consists mainly of one long street, running the length of the parallelogram, called High-street, broad and strait: the houses are of a very old, but good model, spacious, commodious, and not inelegant: this street is full of shops well furnished, and all sorts of trades look brisk. The people are industrious and courteous: the fair sex are truly so, as well as numerous; their complexions, and generally their hair likewise, fair: they are genteel, disengaged, of easy carriage and good mien. At Mr. Cole’s the goldsmith I saw an old ground-plot of this city in queen Elizabeth’s time: there has been since a vast increase of buildings within and without the city: the situation renders it of necessity clean, dry and airy. The soil hither from Honiton was rather sandy than stony, whence it must needs be very healthful; and it is of a convenient distance from the sea. They drive a great trade here for woollen manufacture in cloths, serges, stuffs, &c. all along the water-side innumerable tenters or racks for stretching them. Here is a good face of learning too; many booksellers’ shops: I saw a printed catalogue of an auction of books to be sold there. I saw the coloss head of the empress Julia Domna dug up near Bath, in Dr. Musgrave’s garden, which his father calls _Andromache_: the head-dress is like that of her times, and her bust at Wilton; nor is the manner and carving despisable: the graver has not done it justice. It is the noblest relique of British antiquity of this sort that we know: it is twenty-one inches from the top of the attire to the chin, and belonged to a statue of twelve foot proportion, set upon some temple or palace originally. In the same place is the inscription of Camillus published by him: I saw his library, a very good collection of books, coins and other antiquarian _supellex_; likewise a treatise, ready for publication, of the original gout, which he wrote thirty years ago, before his other two. The doctor had made this distemper his particular view through his long practice; and this country remarkably abounds with patients of that sort, which he attributes in a great measure to the custom of marling the lands with lime, and the great use of poor, sweet cyder, especially among the meaner people.

In the northern angle of the city, and highest ground, is Rugemont castle, once the royal residence of the West-Saxon kings, then of the earls of Cornwall: it is of a squarish figure, not very large, environed with a high wall and deep ditch: there is a rampire of earth within, equal in height to the top of the wall at present, and makes a terrace-walk overlooking the city and country. In the morning, the air being perfectly serene, and the sun shining, I observed from this place all the country southward, between the sea and Exeter, covered with a very thick fog; the west side of the city and country beyond it very clear. In this place is the assize-house and a chapel. In the wall of this castle is a narrow cavity quite round, perhaps for conveyance of a sound from turret to turret. Dr. Holland supposes this to have been a Roman work originally; and it is not unlikely that it was their _prætorium_, or garrison. Beyond the ditch is a pleasant walk of trees, and a little intrenched hill, called Danes castle.

The cathedral is a good pile of building: two old towers stand on the north and south transept of the most ancient part: the organ is remarkably large; the diapason pipes fifteen inches diameter, and set against the pillars of the church: the west front of the church is full of old statues. Many religious foundations in the city are converted into streets and houses, full of numerous families and thriving inhabitants, instead of lazy monks and nuns. King Edward I. in the Saxon times founded the monastery of Exeter, anno 868: Athelstan enlarged it for the Benedictines in 932: Edward Confessor translated those monks to Westminster, and made this an episcopal see; not Edward III. as Mr. Camden says. Leofricus a Briton was the first bishop, and founder of the cathedral: he was chaplain to king Edward the Confessor, anno 1046: he gave his lands at Bampton in Oxfordshire to this church: he has a monument in the southern transept. Warewast, the third bishop, began to build the choir, 13 Henry I. Bishop Brewer created the dean and prebends in the time of Henry III. Bishop Quivel built the body of the church to the west end, 13 Edward I. he instituted the sub-dean and singing-men. Bishop Grandison lengthened the cathedral by two arches, and is buried in a little chapel in the west end: bishop Lacy began the chapter-house; bishop Nevil finished it: bishop Courtney built the north tower, or rather repaired it, and gave that large bell called _Peter_: the dean and chapter built the cloysters. St. Mary’s chapel, at the end of the choir, is now turned into a library: this, I suppose, is what bishop Leofric built. The bishop’s throne in the choir is a lofty Gothic work. Here are many monuments of bishops in the cathedral.

The present deanery, they say, was a nunnery. The monastery of St. Andrew at Cowic was founded by Thomas Courtney earl of Devon; a cell to Bec abbey in Normandy: it was dissolved in the time of Edward III. Roger Holland, I suppose duke of Exeter, lived in it in the time of Edward VI. St. Nicholas’ priory was a cell to Battle abbey: St. John’s was of Augustine friers: Polesloe, a mile off, dedicate to St. Catharine, a nunnery of the Benedictine order: Marsh was a cell to Plympton: Cleve was a monastery of Black canons; St. James’ priory, of Cluniac monks: Grey friers, without South-gate, were Franciscans; Gold-hays, without West-gate, Black friers: the Bear inn was the abbot of Tavistock’s house; the Blacklion too was a religious house; Lathbier another, near the new river below Radford mount. Thus had these holy locusts well nigh devoured the land.

In Corry lane, over-against St. Paul’s church, is a little old house called King Athelstan’s, said to have been his palace, built of large square stones, and circular arches over the doors: it seems indeed to have been originally a Roman building, though other later works have been added to the doors and windows: over the door in the street is a very small niche crouded into the wall, as if it had been converted into a religious house: in the yard a winding stone stair-case is added. One arch of South-gate seems to be Roman. No doubt the walls of the city are upon the Roman foundation for the most part, and great numbers of antiquities have been found here. In digging behind the guild-hall in Pancras-lane, they found a great Roman pavement of little white square stones eight foot deep. A pot of Roman coin of two pecks was dug up, two years ago, near St. Martin’s church: I saw some of them in Dr. Musgrave’s possession, of Gordian, Balbinus, Philippus, Julia Mæsa, Geta, Gallienus, and the like. Mr. Loudham, surgeon in this city, has many of them among his curious collection of antiquities, manuscripts, &c. Mr. Reynolds the schoolmaster is a great collector and preserver of such learned remains. St. Mary Arches church, and St. Stephen’s Bow, by their names seem to have been built out of Roman temples.

[Sidenote: TAB. LXXIV.]

The bridge over the _Isca_ is of great length, and has houses on both sides and both ends; a considerable void space in the middle: there is a church upon it with a tower-steeple. In the Guild-hall are the pictures of general Monk, and the princess Henrietta Maria, born at Bedford-house, a palace in this city, during the civil wars. The composition of the stone of this country is intirely made of little black pebbles, incrusted in a sandy matter of a red colour and mouldering nature.

[Sidenote: +Moridunum.+]

[Sidenote: TAB. LXXV.]

Leaving Exeter, my farthest western longitude at present, I steered my course back again along the sea-side, inwrapped in contemplation with the poet,

_Undæ quæ vestris pulsatis littora lymphis, Littora quæ dulces auras diffunditis agris!_ +Virg.+

[Sidenote: +Honey-Ditches.+ _a Camp_.

Nor could I think myself alone, when so much new entertainment was presented to me every minute. Much rock-samphire grows upon these cliffs. The Roman road seems to have crossed the Otter at Hertford. At Woodbury is a camp. I passed by Sidmouth, and came to Seaton, a little village upon the mouth of the river Ax. This Mr. Camden conjectures to have been the Roman _Moridunum_, and with reason: it has been a great haven and excellent port, of which they still keep up the memory: the river runs in a large valley, having high ground on each side: the shore is rocky, high and steep, consisting of the ends of hills which here run north and south: the ground at bottom under the rocks is marly; the waves wash it down perpetually, undermining the _strata_ of stone, which from time to time fall down in great parcels. At present this haven mouth, which is a good half-mile over, is filled up with beach, as they call it; that is, coggles, gravel, sand, shells, and such matter as is thrown up by the roll of the ocean: so that the river water has but a very narrow passage on the east side under the cliff. The beach was covered over with _papaver luteum corniculatum_, now in blossom: the people in the isle of Portland call it _squat maw_, i. e. bruise herb, and use it in that case, no doubt with good success, where both intentions are answered, of dissolving the coagulated blood, and easing pain. On the west side, near Seaton, upon a little eminence is a modern ruined square _Pharos_ built of brick; they remember it sixteen foot high; and two guns lie there. They say there were formerly many great foundations of houses visible nearer the sea than the present town, but now swallowed up; and in all likelihood there stood the Roman city. More inward toward the land, beyond the great bank of beach, is a marsh which the sea has made, landing itself up when its free flux was hindered: this is full of salt-pans, into which they take the sea-water at high tides. When they dig these places they find innumerable keels and pieces of vessels, with nails, pitch, anchors, &c. six or eight foot deep, because it was formerly part of the haven: anchors have been found as high as Axminster, and beyond it, though now there is no navigation at all: so great a change has Time produced in the face of Nature, upon these confines of the two great elements always opposing each other.

_Sic volvenda ætas commutat tempora rerum._ +Lucr. V.+

Half a mile off, upon higher ground, on the western side is a castle in a pasture, but formerly tilled, called Honey Ditches: it is moted about, and perhaps walled; for they dig up much square stone there. The place is an oblong square, containing about three acres: I guess it to have been the garrison of the port. Just by the present haven-mouth is a great and long pier or wall, jutting out into the sea, made of great rocks piled together to the breadth of six yards. They told me it was built many years ago by one Courd, once a poor sailor, who, being somewhere in the Mediterranean, was told by a certain Greek, that much treasure was hid upon Hogsdon hill near here, and that this memorial was transmitted to him by his ancestors: Courd, upon his return digging there, luckily found the golden mine, which enriched him prodigiously; so that at his own expence he built this wall, with an intent to restore the harbour. The people hereabouts firmly believe the story, and many have dug in the place with like hopes; and as an argument of its truth, they say some of his family are still remaining, that live upon their estate got by him.

A mile higher on the same western side of the river is Cullyford, where was the ancient road from London to Exeter passing over at Axbridge, which is now a stony ford, with two bridges that traverse the valley and the river, once a haven. Here have been many inns and houses, and a considerable town. They talk of great stone vaults being found; so that it probably arose from the destruction of _Moridunum_, as Culliton adjacent, from it. Further, it was a corporation, and they now keep up their claim by an annual choice of a mayor, who has a mace too, but I suppose not of great elegance.

[Sidenote: +Londinis.+]

[Sidenote: +Lyme.+]

[Sidenote: TAB. LXXVI.]

Lyme lies upon the sea-side, in the cavity between two mountains, the _Londinis_ of Ravennas according to Mr. Baxter. Here is a bold stony shore, the ridges of the hills jutting out into the sea; but broken off continually, and wasted away, by the waves as before: the ground too is clay and stone. Their method of opposing its violence is to throw out a wall of huge dry stones, which by time gathers the beech, and consolidates to a greater breadth. Besides, here is a great artificial pier, called the Cobb, extended to the length of 1000 foot with a bow into the ocean, where ships lie secure from the impetuous surges. Here are two little forts, one with five, another with three guns. A large sort of sea horse-tail grows plentifully upon these clayey cliffs; and many little springs issue thereout in the face of the briny deep, which loosen the earth, and hasten its continual downfall. I took notice that the declivity of the hills, with the veins of stone and different _strata_ of earth in these cliffs, is ever north-west, just as is the appearance of the Isle of Portland hence, and with the same angle. The town of Lyme has a pretty good appearance. A small river runs in a rocky _alveus_ through the middle of it into the sea. Most of their buildings are of a rag-stone, blue, not very durable. The duke of Monmouth landed at this place just by the pier with only twelve men: many of his party were executed on the spot afterwards, their limbs hung up in the town. Before that time the duke of Tuscany came here on shore in his visit to Britain. This is called Lime-Regis.

[Sidenote: +Icening-street.+]

[Sidenote: +Aggerdon.+]

Here entering Dorsetshire, I journeyed along the coast, in view of the ocean, and Portland isle growing more and more distinct, till I came to Bridport, a large town upon a little river. Ascending a high hill, I found myself upon the great downs of chalk like those at Salisbury, and, much to my surprize, infinitely fuller of Celtic barrows than your lordship’s celebrated plains. What matters of that sort I discovered shall be referred to another discourse. A little north of Bridport I found the great Icening-street of the Romans going to Dorchester, which I accompanied with no small pleasure. I imagine it goes a little farther up the country than I had travelled, and hereabouts may properly be said to begin, probably meeting the Foss at _Moridunum_. The road from _Moridunum_ westward through Exeter I think ought not to be denominated either from the one or the other, because of a different direction, which with reasonable allowance I esteem essential: but this road we are upon, which is the parallel and sister to the Foss, from Seaton to Yarmouth in Norfolk, extends to the like quantity of 250 Roman miles. In this place it is called the Ridge-way, both as it rises in an artificial ridge, and as it takes a high ridge all the way between here and Dorchester, having many valleys on both sides. The composition of the road is wholly of flints gathered off the lands, or taken from near the surface: these were laid in a fine bank, and so covered with turf. As I road along I found it frequently makes great curves to avoid passing over valleys, and industriously keeps on the highest ground, and commands the prospect of the country every where: it goes to Eggardon hill, as they tell me, north of Bridport; and here I suppose is a camp, whence the whole hundred is denominated: whether from this camp, or from this road, it is plain the old Latin word is retained, _agger_; therefore _aggerdon_, as it ought to be wrote, is the hill intrenched, or the down where the high road runs.

The Icening-street derives its name not from beginning, but ending, at the Iceni, _via ad Icenos_. They say hereabouts it was cast up in a night’s time by the devil, referring to a supernatural agent the effect of Roman wisdom and industry. It enters the city of Dorchester by the north of Winterburn at West-gate. In divers places they have mended it where wore out, by a small slip of chalk and flints, with a shameful and degenerate carelessness; so that we may well pronounce the Romans worked with shovels, the moderns with tea-spoons: besides, it is mostly inclosed and obstructed with perpetual gates across it, to the great hindrance of travellers, to whom public ways ought to be laid open and free; and the authors of such nusances may well be declared sacrilegious. An endless fund of Celtic as well as Roman inquiries hereabouts, and no where less regarded.

[Sidenote: +Durnovaria.+]

[Sidenote: TAB. LXXVII.]

[Sidenote: TAB. LXXVIII.]

Dorchester, the Roman _Durnovaria_, meaning the passage over the river, is a good regular town, standing conformable to the four cardinal points, with the river on its north side: it had four gates in the middle of each side, was encompassed with a strong wall and ditch, if not two; for so it seems, though now levelled into arable, to which the inhabitants hereabout are extremely prone. On the west side great part of the old Roman wall is standing, twelve foot thick, made of rag-stone, laid side by side and obliquely, then covered over with very strong mortar: the next course generally leans the contrary way: now and then three horizontal ones for binding, for much flint is used withal. I saw the foundation of it in a saw-pit laid upon the solid chalk: it is yet twelve foot high, broke through and battered every where, as if the sight of it was obnoxious: this is a strong manner of building, and very expeditious. Much more of this wall remained within memory. It would surprise one to think why the very ruins of it should be pulled down, which must be done with great labour, and frequently a mud wall erected in its place. The foundations appear quite round the town; but eastward a street is built upon it, and the ditch filled up: it is still called The Walls; for that way the town is swelled out into a considerable village, with a church and handsome tower, called Fordington, corruptly Farington. Here are three churches in the town beside it. On the south and west side, without the walls, a handsome walk of trees is planted, looking pleasantly into the fields; but the sort of them being common sycamores, are incommodious by harbouring flies. The winding of the river on the north spoils the square of the town that way; and there is an _area_ of a castle, out of the ruins of which the grey friers built their convent: but now all the works are wholly obliterated, religious and military. The banks of the river here are steep, for the town stands on high ground. Beyond the river are meadows and warm sandy lands; on this side, the fine chalky downs, pleasant for riding, and profitable in excellent grain. The air must needs be wholesome and pure, the climate warm, and a sufficient distance from the sea; so that we need not wonder if the Romans were fond of this place. The level of the old city was much lower than the present; for antiquities, which are found in great number, always lie deep. Some farmers were levelling another great barrow; but the people of Fordington rose in arms and prevented them with a laudable animosity. All this land is of the prince’s fee. I took notice of a particularity in the stone they use here: it is fetched from a quarry southward in the way to Weymouth; a flag-stone, rising in large dimensions, but not very thick: the superfice of it is curiously and regularly indented or waved, like a mat made of cables, and that very regularly: it much resembles the face of the sands upon the sea shore, just after the tide is gone off: it is very convenient for paving, and those natural undulations prevent slipperiness, being nevertheless level enough: they make fences for their grounds with it in many places, setting them up edgewise in a pretty method. The Roman money dug up here are called _dorn-pennies_, or king Dor’s money: the reverend Mr. Place, living here, showed me a great collection of them. Much _opus tessellatum_ has been found. As this town, so Wareham below from its ford derives its name. In Lincolnshire we call them still _warths_.

From Dorchester many Roman roads disperse themselves, beside the Icening-street, passing directly over the meadows to Walton: one goes by the amphitheatre southward to Weymouth; another by Poundbury, Stretton, to Yeovil and Ischalis; another probably to Wareham.

[Sidenote: +Poundbury+ _a_ Ro. _Camp_.]