DARTMOOR. XIX 



The Eastern Boundary between Devon and Somerset is formed 

 by the wild moorlands of Exmoor, on which the Exe and its tribu- 

 tary the Barle take their rise^ and after crossing the valley of the 

 Tone, to the eastern escarpment of the Blackdown Hills, which 

 it skirtSj to Yarcombe, there meets the boundary line between 

 Somerset and Dorset. From thence to Lyme Regis the county 

 boundary between Devon and Dorset runs over a broken hilly 

 country, becoming more open as it approaches the sea. 



The County may be conveniently divided into five well-marked, 

 and more or less natural, districts, as follows : — I, Dartmoor ; 

 II. The South Hams ; III. East Devon ; IV. North Devon (each 

 of the last three abutting on the first) ; and V. Lundy Island off 

 the north coast. 



I. DARTMOOR. 



Dartmoor ^, the Mother of Streams, occupies a considerable 

 part of the south-west area of Devonshire. From Belstone, near 

 Okehampton, in the north, to the Plymouth road between the 

 rivers Erme and Avon in the south, it extends nearly 22 miles ; 

 and from Blackdown to Ilsington it stretches 17 miles from east 

 to west. Its average breadth is about ten or twelve miles, and it 

 altogether covers an area of about 275 square miles, or 176,000 

 statute acres ; but a large part of this is taken up by private 

 estates, common ground belonging to various villages, warrens, 

 and " New Takes,^^ where small pieces of the moor have been 

 drained and enclosed, and the balance representing the property 

 of the Duchy of Cornwall is put down at 53,614 acres, which is 

 mostly on the granite and in a state of nature. Viewed from the 

 north, Dartmoor rises like a vast fortress, its numerous ' tors ' 

 jjresent the ajipearance of fortifications ; but once its steep sides 

 have been surmounted all resemblance to a mountainous district 

 is lost, — one finds one's self on a great granitic jjlateau some 1400 

 feet above the sea-level, where rounded hills of no great height 

 succeed one another like rolling billows; bogs and streams are in 

 their peaty hollows ; there are no lofty precipices to suggest to the 

 eye of the lover of birds that he is wandering where once the Eagle 



• The name is said to he derived frmn the British dicr, Avater, and mor, a 

 reservoir— as wo learn f'roiii thi- Introduction to Cnvrini'ton's Pocni. 



