OLD HOUSES IN THE CATHEDRAL CLOSE.
About eleven miles up the river Exe, before it has broadened out into the estuary, but where it flows through a well-marked valley and washes the bases of the cliffs, stands Exeter, a city set upon a hill. Here was an ancient "dun," or British hill-fort, succeeded by a Roman, and then by a Norman, castle, with the town descending upon the slope towards the river and spreading into the suburb of St. Thomas on the other side. The growing city now covers several neighboring hills and tributary valleys, one of the flourishing new suburbs being named Pennsylvania. Upon the ridge, where was located the old hill-fort, there still remain in a grove of trees some scanty ruins of the Norman castle, while well up the slope of the hill rise the bold and massive towers of Exeter Cathedral. Unique among English municipalities, this is essentially a hill-city, the ancient British name of Caerwise having been Latinized by the Romans into Isca, and then changed to Exanceaster, which was afterwards shortened into the modern Exeter. Nobody knows when it was founded: the Romans almost at the beginning of the Christian era found a flourishing British city alongside the Exe, and it is claimed to have been "a walled city before the incarnation of Christ." Isca makes its appearance in the Roman records without giving the date of its capture, while it is also uncertain when the Saxons superseded the Romans and developed its name into Exanceaster. They enclosed its hill of Rougemont, however, with a wall of masonry, and encircled the city with ramparts built of square stones and strengthened by towers. Here the Saxon king Æthelstan held a meeting of the Witan of the whole realm and proclaimed his laws, and in the first year of the eleventh century the Danes sailed up to the town and attacked it, being, however, beaten off after a desperate struggle. Two years later they made another attack, captured and despoiled it; but it rose from its ruins, and the townsmen afterwards defied the Norman as they had the Dane. William attacked and breached the walls, the city surrendered, and then he built Rougemont Castle, whose venerable ruins remain, to curb the stout-hearted city. It was repeatedly besieged—in the days of Stephen, Henry VII., and Henry VIII., the last siege during the quarrels preceding the Reformation lasting thirty four days, the defenders being reduced to eating horse-flesh. In the Civil War the Royalists captured it from the Parliamentarians, who held it, and it remained in the king's possession until after the defeat at Naseby, when Cromwell recaptured it. Charles II. was proclaimed at Exeter with special rejoicings. When William, Prince of Orange, first landed in England, he came to the valley of the Teign, near Newton Abbot, where the block of granite is still preserved from which his proclamation was read to the people. Three days later he entered Exeter, escorted by a great crowd of the townspeople. He went in military state to the cathedral and mounted the bishop's throne, with its lofty spire-like canopy, rich with the carving of the fifteenth century, while the choir sang the Te Deum, after which Bishop Burnet read his proclamation. He remained several days in Exeter, while events ripened elsewhere for his reception. Here many Englishmen of rank and influence joined him, and his quarters began to display the appearance of a court. The daily show of rich liveries and of coaches drawn by six horses among the old houses in the cathedral close, with their protruding bow-windows and balconies, gave the usually quiet place a palatial appearance, the king's audience-chamber being in the deanery. He remained here two weeks, and then left for London, the entire kingdom having risen in his favor and James having deserted the capital for Salisbury. This ended Exeter's stirring history. It afterwards grew in fame as a manufactory of woollens, but this has declined, and the chief industries now consist in the making of gloves and agricultural implements.
EXETER CATHEDRAL, FROM THE NORTH-WEST.
1. STUDLAND CHURCH. 2. RUINS OF OLD CROSS IN THE CHURCHYARD.
Exeter Cathedral is the most conspicuous feature in the view upon approaching the city, rising well above the surrounding houses, its two massive gray towers giving it something of the appearance of a fortress. This feature makes it unique among English cathedrals, especially as the towers form its transepts. The close is contracted, and around it are business edifices instead of ecclesiastical buildings. The exterior is plain and simple in outline, excepting the western front, which is a very rich example of fourteenth-century Gothic. A church is said to have been standing on its site and dedicated to the Benedictines as early as the seventh century, and it lasted until after the Norman Conquest. The Normans built a new church in the twelfth century, which contained the present towers, but the remainder of the structure was afterwards transformed as we now see it. The rich western façade consists of three stages, receding one behind the other; the lower is the porch, subdivided into three enriched arcades containing figures and pierced by three doorways. The second stage is formed above this by the ends of the nave and side-aisles, being terminated with a battlement flanked by small pinnacles about halfway up the nave gable. A fine window pierces this stage, and above it the remainder of the gable forms the third stage, also pierced by a window which opens over the battlement. The figures in the lower stage represent the kings of England, apostles, and saints. The interior of the nave discloses stone vaulting and Decorated architecture, with large clerestory windows, but a small triforium. The bosses of the roof, which presents an unbroken line, are seventy feet above the floor. One of the bays on the north side of the triforium is a beautiful minstrels' gallery, communicating with a chamber above the porch. The inner walls of the towers have been cut away, completely adapting them for transepts, the towers being supported on great pointed arches. In the large east window the stained glass commemorates St. Sidwell, a lady murdered in the eighth century at a well near Exeter by a blow from a scythe at the instigation of her stepmother, who coveted her property. The cathedral is rich in monumental relics, and it has recently been thoroughly restored. Little remains of the ancient convent-buildings beyond the chapter-house, which adjoins the south transept.
THE THRONE, EXETER CATHEDRAL.
The older parts of Exeter present a quaint and picturesque appearance, especially along the High Street, where is located the old Guild Hall, a ponderous stone building, with a curious front projecting over the footway and supported by columns; it was built in the sixteenth century. Sir Thomas Bodley, who founded the Bodleian Library of Oxford, was born in Exeter, and also Richard Hooker the theologian. Among its famous bishops was Trelawney (then the Bishop of Bristol), who was one of the seven bishops committed by King James to the Tower, and whose memory still lives in the West-Country refrain, the singing of which had so much to do with raising the English revolt in favor of the Prince of Orange: