IN DEVON AND SOMERSET 217 



ference between stag- hunting on Exmoor a hundred 

 years ago and now, except that the hounds were slower, 

 and the country wilder and more open. 



The boundaries of the latter are not quite as 

 wide as they were, but they have not changed much. 

 They may now be said to be the coast on the north, 

 and the Devon and Somerset Railway on the south, 

 while the roads from Watchet to Wiveliscombe, and 

 from Lynton to Barnstaple, enclose it approximately 

 on the east and west ; roughly, a parallelogram 

 twenty-five miles by fifteen. 



There are few parishes within this area through 

 which hounds do not run every year, and the whole 

 of it can be, and is, hunted from the kennels at 

 Exford. There are besides two outlying districts 

 frequented by the deer, the Quantock Hills between 

 Taunton and the sea, and the Stoodleigh country 

 between Dulverton station and Tiverton. 



There are deep woods on the cliffs that overhang 

 the Bristol Channel, and in most of the valleys that 

 run down to it. Behind these there is in most places 

 a strip of cultivation, and beyond that a belt of moor- 

 land, varying in width from three to ten miles, run- 

 ning without a check from the westward boundary 

 to Dunkerry Beacon, and on from the latter with some 

 intervals of enclosed land to Treborough. South of 



