There cannot be a question as to the first syllable in the name of this town being les, a court, or inclosure; and the second may probably be derived, as Mr. Tonkin conjectures, from kaer, a fortress; but in times when every thing was referred to the French language, les became changed into lis, and a flower-de-luce was adopted on the town seal.

The parish measures 7126 statute acres.

Annual value of the Real Property, as returned to Parliament in 1815:£.s.d.
  Borough707700
  Parish615300
Poor Rate in 1831:
  Borough100970
  Parish80140
Population,—
in 1801,in 1811,in 1821,in 1831,
Borough1860197524232853
Parish84890910961189
Together4042,

giving an increase on the borough of 53½ per cent.; on the parish of 42 per cent.; on both of 49 per cent. in 30 years.

Present Vicar, the Rev. T. Foote, instituted in 1821.

GEOLOGY, BY DR. BOASE.

The rocks of this parish are principally on the boundary of the porphyritic and calcareous series; partaking of the former in the northern part, and of the latter in the southern. The former sometimes nearly resemble hornblende schist; and, gradually leaving the hornblende, they pass into a coarse, lamellar, argillaceous rock, of a dirty yellowish brown colour, irregularly and indistinctly marked with blue spots. There are several large quarries in this rock round the town of Leskeard, where the stone is extensively used for building. It very nearly approaches in character to that of Bodmin, but is not quite similar.

The Editor. At a short distance from the town, on the road side leading towards Plymouth, occurs a soft micaceous schist, of a deep yellow tinge, which was most unfortunately mistaken for an ore of gold, about fifty years since, by a Mr. Hoskin, of Leskeard, and by his son, a clergyman, who, in utter ignorance of modern science, expended considerable sums of money in erecting machinery, for the prosecution of pursuits so vain as the raising of gold ore and extracting the metal.