The church stands on the summit of the ridge, and its lofty tower was long an object of curiosity on account of

the signals displayed on it to indicate the arrival of ships or fleets. From ten to twenty arbitrary signals were made, by means of differently shaped and coloured flags, displayed from a perpendicular staff, and by balls suspended on two others, rising at an inclined angle from the opposite parapets.

The tardy adoption of a method, so simple and universal as that of conveying intelligence through the combination of signals, and of alphabetic writing, may be reckoned among the most curious anomalies of the human mind; when the common mode of what is called talking with the fingers actually does the thing itself, and Polybius, the friend of P. Cornelius Scipio Africanus, and his companion, at the destruction of Carthage, 145 years before our æra, gives a detailed description of a method by which this object may be attained, and dwells on its immense advantages. He admits indeed that difficulties must be expected in the execution; but adds, “In the present age the sciences are advanced to so great a perfection that almost every thing is capable of being taught by method.” See the General History of Polybius, book 10, extract 7, chapter 2. It was, however, reserved for the French, in their Revolutionary War, to practise this art, and for the first time in the spring of 1794, more than nineteen hundred years after the suggestion by Polybius, and notwithstanding repeated recurrences to nearly the same effect by various writers in modern times.

Mr. Hals states, that in the valuation of Pope Nicholas this parish was assessed, the Rectory at 100s. the Vicarage at 53s. 4d.

In the folio edition of the Taxatio Ecclesiastica Angliæ et Walliæ, auctoritate Papæ Nicholai IV. printed by command of King George III. 1802, the entries stand thus:

£.s.d.£.s.d.
Taxatio.Decima.
Eccl’a de Sacre5000100
Non ex’ {Vicar ejusdem2134——
Eccl’ia de Rame268——

The bracket may perhaps be wrongly placed, and Maker may be a corruption of the name here used.

Inceworth appears to have been the principal manor in this parish, and belongs to the family of Trefusis; it includes Milbrook, formerly a town of some consequence. Here were till very lately the brewhouses attached to the great naval establishment of this port; they are now removed to The Point on the Devonshire side, where one of the most extensive and most useful works ever constructed for such purposes has been recently completed. Walls have been laid in deep water, by the use of diving bells, so as to allow of the largest ships coming quite in contact with the wharfs, and there receiving, in the course of a few hours, all the supplies of meat, bread, beer, water, &c. that are requisite for their going to sea.

The object however which attracts the attention of strangers from all others in this parish, is the place formerly called Vaultershome, and afterwards West Stonehouse, but which Mr. Edgcumbe, who acquired it by a marriage with the heiress of the family of Durneford, its former possessors, chose to name Mount Edgcumbe, a proceeding now sanctioned by time, as are those of the change from Port Prior to Port Eliot, and some others. It would be useless to describe this most beautiful and superb place, considered by many as altogether the finest gentleman’s seat in the West of England. Nor can it be the least necessary to say any thing here of the distinguished family after whom it is called; who have possessed an hereditary seat in Parliament since the year 1741, and for two descents have been Lord Lieutenants of Cornwall.

By a strange absurdity this south-eastern extremity has been, notwithstanding that the whole river is attached to Cornwall, artificially considered as a part of Devonshire; but this and other similar anomalies are in some degree corrected by modern acts of the legislature, the authority of magistrates for any county having been extended over these insulated portions of another, and the right of voting