THE COMBES 181 



with old silver thatch and gleaming whitewashed walls. 

 Here a little bridge leaps the stream, and steep roads 

 climb up the tremendous acclivities on either side. 

 The stream glitters beneath and peeps here and there 

 from overhanging bowers of trees. To its song is 

 added the deep murmur of the sea beneath. 



This combe, typical of the North coast, on both 

 sides of those invisible boundaries that divide Devon 

 and Cornwall between Bude Bay and Hartland, may 

 thus be dwelt on, because it is for ever famous. Here, 

 at the mill, dwelt Kingsley's hapless heroine of West- 

 ward Ho / 



The southern combes that open on the Channel are 

 narrower and less searched by the sun. They lie 

 deep hid in ferns and shade-loving things ; they hide 

 the lovely bee-orchis, the purple gromwell, the lesser 

 meadow-rue, the seaside carrot, the crow-garlic, the 

 wood-vetch, the Bithynian vetch, and other treasures. 

 Their sides are draped with the wild clematis, their 

 red cliff-faces furnish a home for jackdaws and hawks. 



And inland lie those deep resting-places that abound 

 in this county of many hills. Here are valleys like 

 cups, into which one must sink by great declivities ; 

 here lovely hamlets twinkle their white walls beside 

 the orchards, while grass lands and red earth and a 

 medley of field and forest rise round about ; here 

 farms extend in the midst of their harvests, where 

 each hollow is a busy centre of human activity ; and 

 here, callous to their environment and its significance, 

 men pursue the business of living, and are seldom 



