Dr Ayshford used to say that he had three sources of income—his pension, his practice, and his property. On the strength of these resources he kept a pack of hounds. He was naturally very intimate with the Temples, and I have been told by a descendant that it was thanks to his generosity that the late Archbishop Temple was enabled to proceed to Oxford. Mutatis mutandis, it seems not improbable that by Frank Gilham, Blackmore may have intended his schoolmate. Think of it. Major Temple was not only an officer of the army, but a practical farmer, and the late primate could plough and thresh with the best. Gilham is described as no clodhopper: he “had been at a Latin school, founded by a great high priest of the Muses in the woollen line,” i.e., Blundell. Again, his farm adjoins the main turnpike road from London to Devonport, at the north-west end of the parish; and where is Axon, the Temples’ old place? The name “White Post” is perhaps adapted from “Whitehall,” a fine old-fashioned farmhouse between Culmstock and Hemyock.
Like Parson Penniloe (see Perlycross, chapter xxxiii.), Parson Blackmore kept pupils—a fact to which allusion is made in Tales from the Telling House. The Bude Light was the Rev. Goldsworthy Gurney. The existence of a wayside cross, from which and the fictitious description of the Culm was formed the name of both village and romance, is attributed to the public spirit of one Baker, who lived in the Commonwealth time, and usurped the manor; but whether it was anything more than a tradition in Blackmore’s youth, is perhaps doubtful. Priestwell is Prescott, Hagdon Hill Hackpen, and Susscott Northcott. Crang’s forge, had any such institution existed, would have been at Craddock.
The reader, however, may rest assured that Blackmore did not select these fanciful appellations without excellent reason. He desired for himself a large freedom, which, as we have seen, he used in transporting mansions, and other feats of imagination. One more illustration of this spiritual liberty may be cited. By the Foxes he evidently means the Wellington family. The dialogue between Mrs Fox of Foxden and Parson Penniloe, in chapter xliv., is sufficient to settle that. The name Foxdown, too, is evidently based on that of Mr Elworthy’s residence, Foxdene. Yet in chapter xii. Foxden is stated to be thirty miles from Perlycross by the nearest roads. On the other hand, Pumpington, as Wellington is called in Perlycross, is just where it should be (chapter xxiv.).
Turning to another matter, Blackmore has idealised the bells, inasmuch as he states that on the front of one of them—the passing bell—was engraven,
“Time is over for one more”;
and on the back,
“Soon shall thy own life be o’er.”
The Culmstock set is an interesting collection of bells, but not one of them is adorned with mottoes such as those. One bears the inscription “Ave Maria Gracia Plena,” and this was cast by Roger Semson, a West-country founder of repute, who was dwelling at Ash Priors, in Somerset, in 1549, and who stamped his initials on the bell. Another of his bells, at Luppitt, is at once more and less explicit on this point, since the inscription runs “nosmes regoremib.” To make sense, this must be read backwards. Two modern bells, placed in the Culmstock belfry in 1852 and 1853 respectively, awaken proud or painful memories. The former was cast in memory of the Duke of Wellington, the cost being defrayed by subscription, while the latter was “the free gift of James Collier, of Furzehayes, and John Collier, of Bowhayes.” John Collier, who was killed by lightning at Bowhayes, was the sporting yeoman with the otter hounds, to whom Blackmore alludes. The old house, by the way, was reputed to be haunted, and for years no one would live in it.
Blackmore’s description of the vicarage is literally correct, save that he calls it “the rectory.” A long and rambling house it certainly is, and the dark, narrow passage, like a tunnel, beneath the first-floor rooms, is a feature explained by the higher level of the front of the house “facing southwards upon a grass-plot and a flower-garden, and as pretty as the back was ugly” (Perlycross, chapter vi.).