THE PARSON AND CLERK ROCKS.
There is, however, a delightful variant of this road journey that cannot too greatly be praised. This is found when coming to the cross-lanes in the hollow at Holcombe, one mile from Lea Mount, by turning to the left down a tree-shaded way known as “Smugglers’ Lane.” A short distance brings the explorer to a sight of the sea again, glimpsed between the stone arches of a railway-bridge spanning a tiny cove or inlet. A walk through the arches on to the sands, if the tide be out, or the ascent of a dozen steps up to the sea-wall, if it be in, brings the stranger into the best and easiest, and certainly, into the most beautiful, approach to Teignmouth, by the sea the whole way and under the shadow of the tremendous red cliffs, at whose foot the railway, by the daring of Brunel, is made to run along the most massive of sea-walls. The engineer here wrought more picturesquely than he knew, and performed an inestimable service to the public by providing a ten-foot wide masonry pathway nearly two miles and a half long, where the contemplative visitor has the trains on one side and the sea on the other; and where he may, when it blows great guns off the sea, witness such a spouting and a buffeting of furious waves against the wall as scarce to be equalled around the coast.
The railway has here, at any rate, left the shore more picturesque than it found it, and the trains themselves give a last touch of romance. You see them, in summer, coming down from London, a wondering and expectant face thrust from every window: the faces of holiday-makers enraptured with the scene. You see the holiday-makers again, a little later, with a deep tan colour, but with expressions wistful and melancholy; returning home, and taking a long lingering glance before the Parson Tunnel finally occults the view.
There is an added majesty to the sea-wall and the railway when night is come. The red cliffs become black and minatory, the trees and shrubs against the skyline assuming weird shapes; and stillness reigns; for mankind is gregarious and congregates in the town, leaving the sea-wall to shy lovers; and the contemplative crickets chirp in the ballast and on the sleepers, and the wash of the waves sounds in a restful undertone until a red eye in the darkness along the line changes to green and, with a rush and a scream, the express thunders by.
TEIGNMOUTH: THE SEA WALL.