BINDON.
More interesting are the remains of old Shute House, which lies inland some six or seven miles. This was a far more extensive mansion, as will be seen by the imposing embattled gateway and a remaining wing, which rather remind one of a bit of Haddon. Here during the Monmouth Rebellion the Royalist commander Christopher, second Duke of Albemarle, encamped on June 18, 1685, the same day that the other duke, the boon companion of his wilder days, entered Taunton. The house belonged then, as it does still, to the De la Poles.
Most of the old houses hereabouts are associated in some sort of way with the rebellion. Close upon the county border to the north-east stands Coaxden, a much modernised old farm, where stories are told of fugitives from Sedgemoor. How its occupant, Richard Cogan, being suspected as a Monmouth adherent, fled from his house to Axminster, where in the "Old Green Dragon Inn" the landlord's daughter secreted him between a feather-bed and the sacking of a bedstead. Kirke's "lambs" traced him to the house, but failed to hit upon his hiding-place. The story ends as all such stories should, the girl who preserved his life became his wife. The house is further interesting as the birthplace in 1602 of Sir Symonds D'Ewes the historian.
WYLDE COURT.
A couple of miles or so to the west is Wylde Court, another interesting old farmhouse, much less restored, dating from Elizabeth's reign, with numerous pinnacled gable ends and characteristic entrance porch and oak panelled rooms. This and Pilsdon, another Tudor house a few miles to the west, at the foot of Pilsdon Pen, belonged to the Royalist Wyndhams, and in the troublous times they were looked upon with suspicion, and searched on one or two occasions by the Parliamentary soldiers. "Hellyer's Close," near Wylde Court, is so named because a Royalist commander, Colonel Hellyer, was taken prisoner and executed here by Cromwell's soldiers. At the time that Charles II., in 1651, attempted to get away to France from the coast of Dorset, Pilsdon was visited by a party of Cromwellian soldiers, and Sir Hugh Wyndham and his family secured in the hall while the house was thoroughly searched, suspicion even falling upon one of the ladies that she was the king in disguise.[26] Sir Hugh's monument may be seen at Silton in the extreme north corner of the county.
Chideock is a charming old-world village in the valley between Charmouth and Bridport, snugly perched between the cone-shaped eminence Colmer's Hill and Golden Cap, the gorse-covered headland, said to be the highest point between Dover and the Land's End. The castle of the De Chideocks and Arundells, a famous stronghold built in Richard II.'s reign, long since has disappeared, but its moat can be traced. The fine old church exteriorly is one of the most picturesque in Dorsetshire, but the inside has been much restored and modernised. A handsome tomb of Sir John Arundell in armour is in the south aisle.
