A HOLIDAY IX DEVONSHIRE. 79 



had herself looked much upon the place ; but these Ihies are 

 most appropriate : — 



" "Wild Dartmoor ! thou that, midst thy inountains rude, 

 Hast robed thyself with haughty solitude. 

 As a dark cloud on summer's clear blue sky, 

 A mourner circled witli festivity ! 

 For all beyond is life ! — the rolling sea, 

 Hie rush, the swell, whose echoes reach not thee." 



Near Dartmeet, woods begin to diversify the landscape. 

 They cover the steep declivities that rise precipitately froni 

 one or both banks. Below the bridge there are numbers 

 of the most tempting pools; but the local fishermen, ad- 

 mitting the superior scenery, give the sportsman's palm to 

 the West Dart, which for a mile or two above the bridge is- 

 the beau-ideal of a lovely highland stream. Its bed is 

 strewn with boulders that in drought, as in flood, irritate 

 the impetuous current into ebullitions of boil, bubble, foam, 

 and headlong plunges very beautiful to watch, and pre- 

 sently, when the torrent moderates into a less violent flow,, 

 most serviceable to the dexterous handler of the fly-rod. 

 The Dart on its downward course to Buckfastleigh, more 

 especially in its windings tlirough Holne Chase, is the 

 paradise of painters. 



Time and space would fail me to recount the legends to 

 which Dartmoor Forest has given rise. It was my privi- 

 lege on one of my rambles to fall in with a gentleman 

 renewing an old- acquaintance with the moors. For years 

 he had been doomed to frizzle in the West Indies, and 

 returning to the mother country for a year's holida}', re- 

 paired at once to Dartmoor to fish familiar streams and 

 be braced by the invigorating atmosphere. Of course lie 



