There was no very exciting rivalry, I suppose, between the castle of Berry, even at its best, and the castle that stands only about two miles away on the “high rokky hille” of Totnes; for the stronghold of Judhael de Totnais and William de Braose, of Zouches and Edgecumbes, was the citadel of a walled town. If we climb the rocky hill in question—through the old east gate of the town, and past the fifteenth-century church and the hidden guildhall that was once a priory—we may see for ourselves how proudly the tower of Totnes once dominated the valley of the Dart. There is only a fragment of the keep standing now, and even in Henry VIII.’s time “the logginges of the castelle” were “clene in ruine.” The story of their decline and fall seems to be unknown, but I think the place must have been treated with some indifference by the Edgecumbes, who were, unless I am mistaken, rebuilding their beautiful house at Cothele when Totnes Castle came to them. If this were the case we could forgive them, and indeed be grateful for their absorption in the lovely treasure-house above the Tamar.
The various signs of age that make these steep streets so attractive must not make us forget that the antiquity claimed by Totnes is a far more venerable affair than any such thing of yesterday as a Norman castle. It was on a certain stone in Fore Street that Brutus of Troy, father of all Britons, first set his adventurous foot when he discovered this island. So at least says Geoffrey of Monmouth in his brave, imperturbable way. Brutus, we must suppose, sailed up the Dart; or perhaps at that early date Totnes was on the coast. In any case it was the charms of these woods and waters that attracted the voyagers to land in the new island, and “made Brutus and his companions very desirous to fix their habitation in it.” That is easily understood.
We too shall do well to come to Totnes by water. It is the best way, and can be done by steamer from Dartmouth. As this, however, probably means the neglect of Berry Pomeroy, which is far more serious than the missing of Brixham, I advise every motorist whose car can travel without him to drive from Paignton to Totnes, and to send the car by road to Dartmouth while he himself goes thither by water. For the banks of the winding Dart are, in their gentle way, incomparable, with their soft woods hanging over the stream, and their cornfields streaked with scarlet, and the little creeks where thatched cottages are clustered on the shore and white-sailed boats flutter beside the tiny quay. And among the trees of the left bank are Sandridge, the birthplace of John Davis, and Greenway, the home of the Gilberts, where Sir Humphrey lived before his widowed mother married Raleigh.
In the meantime those who drive their own cars must return to Paignton by road, and follow the railway to Brixham past Goodrington sands, where Charles Kingsley loved to spend the summer days searching for the orange-mouthed Actinia and dreaming of the Spanish Armada. There is not a spot upon this Devon coast but is the stuff that dreams are made of! Dreams of gallantry and war, of conquest and deliverance and wide adventure haunt us hour by hour as we pass from haven to haven, from Torquay to Brixham, and from Brixham to Dartmouth, and from Dartmouth to the climax of Plymouth Sound; with the great names of Drake and Gilbert and Hawkins, of Raleigh and Grenville ringing in our hearts as we spin across the soil that bred them, and, shining below us, the green sea that carried them to their renown.
The sea was not green, but grey and misty, on the day that “the Protestant wind” blew William the Deliverer into Torbay. The fleet, says a letter written “on the first day of this instant December, 1688,” had met with “horrid storms,” but “was not so damnified as was represented by the vulgar.” It was here, in this harbour of Brixham—now hemmed in by busy quays, and crowded with trawlers whose flaming sails might well be meant to commemorate Orange William—it was here where the statue stands that the prince first stepped ashore. On his flag, as on the statue, was the motto of his family: I will maintain. The statue is not flattering—or so, at least, we hope—but its presence, with its calm promise of liberty, is not without dignity amid all the bustle of the fishing-fleet. The scene was busy enough that day, when William stood here with Burnet, and the guns roared, and the drums and hautboys made music, and from every headland and housetop the people shouted their welcome; and, as the fog lifted, the fleet, lying out there beyond the breakwater, which was then unbuilt, “was a sight would have ravished the most curious eyes of Europe.”
William, and gradually all his regiments of horse and foot, climbed these narrow streets to the top of the hill. Though we take another road than theirs we by no means escape the climbing. Two slow miles, on gradients varying from one in twelve to one in ten, lead us to the point where we immediately begin to descend, on a rough steep road of sharp turns, which runs down to the shore of Dartmouth Harbour and the slip of Kingswear Ferry.
These are classic waters that lap upon the clumsy sides of the ferry-boat. We move slowly, and that is well, for there is much to see: much beauty of wooded headlands, of old streets drawing nearer, of boats and ships upon a blue-green sea. To the left are the two points that shelter the harbour, and on each its ruined tower, the guardians that did their work so long and well, and perished in the doing of it: to the right the river winds away into the land and the old Britannia lies at rest, and the great buildings of the Naval College crown the hill. It was from this harbour, more than three hundred years ago, that the Sunshine and Moonshine sailed away to the North West Passage with John Davis and his “company of goodlie seamen, not easily turned from any good purpose;” and it was between those two green headlands that Francie Drake came home from “singeing the King of Spain’s beard” at Cadiz, with the San Philip and all her spoils behind him. Historic fleets have ridden at anchor in the shelter of these hills: ships for Cœur-de-Lion’s crusade; and for Edward III.’s siege of Calais no fewer than thirty-one, all furnished by Dartmouth; and on one grim occasion, at least, an unwelcome fleet from France, which left the town a ruin. Many years later another French ship came sailing in unsuspiciously with letters from the Queen, a few days after Dartmouth Castle had surrendered to Fairfax. The captain, when he heard the news, flung the precious packet into the sea; “but God provided a Wave,” says the historian, “to bring it to the Boat that went out to seek it, and so it was brought unto His Excellency.”
BUTTERWALK, DARTMOUTH.
Round the quays on the Dartmouth side of the harbour the queer old houses are huddled into streets that climb and twist and turn in bewildering irregularity. Crooked gables and overhanging eaves nod at one another across the way: the carved beams and corbels of the wider streets rouse memories of departed merchant princes: rows of young trees are planted by the waterside: and always, behind the trees, behind the gables, is a glimpse of the turquoise sea. Everywhere are signs of the splendid past: in the fourteenth-century church, with its magnificent screen and pulpit, and the tomb of John Hawley, “a riche marchant and noble warrior again the French men”: in the houses of the Butterwalk, with their heraldic beasts and granite pillars and mullioned windows, their moulded ceilings and carved chimney-pieces. It is worth while to climb a rickety staircase, if only for the sake of hearing the Merry Monarch numbered among the saints.