SALTASH STATION.
Better is it to voyage across the Sound to the loveliness and fresh air and altogether sub-tropical domain of Mount Edgcumbe, whence this trinity of towns may be seen stretched out like a plan, with the Hamoaze, the many creeks and pools and inlets running in every direction.
The beauty of Plymouth’s site is, indeed, undeniable, whosoever may disparage it; nor may the splendour of its admirably centralised public buildings be gainsaid. Plymouth Guildhall is one of the most magnificent of modern buildings in the west—Gothic, good in design and execution; its windows, filled with stained glass, representing celebrated scenes in local history, from ancient days until that year in the ’70’s, when the Prince of Wales opened this building. This last event is duly shown in gorgeously tinted glass, but the Prince’s frock-coat is scarcely beautiful nor his silk hat an ideally fit subject for treatment in a stained-glass window. Let us laugh!
L.
This morning we rambled down to Antony Passage, on the Lynher River, and hailed the ferryman to put us across to Antony Park, on the opposite shore. The Norman keep of Trematon Castle looks down from the Saltash side on to a mud-creek spanned at its junction with the broad Lynher by one of Brunel’s old wooden railway viaducts, its sturdy timbers stalking across the ooze with curious effect.
Landed on the opposite shore, we walked through the beautifully wooded park, passing Antony House, the seat of the Carews since the fifteenth century. The house was rebuilt in 1721, but contains a fine collection of old masters, among them a portrait of Richard Carew, who died in 1620.
Richard Carew, of Antony, was the author of the well-known “Survey of Cornwall,” published in 1602. In the original edition the work is one of great charm of manner, and the interspersed songs by the author are instinct with grace and nicety of epithet. In a very much later edition the editor has taken upon himself to modernise Carew’s orthography with sorry results to his engaging style.
Not readily could one gather verses of such delightful conceits as these, upon the Lynher River:—