Readers be at all times ready, for you
Know not what a day may bring forth.
Teignmouth was a strange-looking town, and the best description of it
was by the poet Winthrop Mackworth Praed, who described it as seen in
his time from the top of the Ness Rock:
A little town was there,
O'er which the morning's earliest beam
Was wandering fresh and fair.
No architect of classic school
Had pondered there with line and rule--
The buildings in strange order lay,
As if the streets had lost their way;
Fantastic, puzzling, narrow, muddy,
Excess of toil from lack of study.
Where Fashion's very latest fangles
Had no conception of right angles.
Possibly the irregular way in which the old portion of the town had been
built was due to the inroads of the French, who had invaded and
partially destroyed the town on two occasions; for in those days the
English coast between Portland and Plymouth was practically undefended.
By way perhaps of reprisal Teignmouth contributed seven ships and 120
mariners to Edward III's expedition to Calais in 1347.
[Illustration: "THE PARSON AND CLERK ROCK," DAWLISH.]
That unfortunate young poet John Keats visited Teignmouth in 1818.
Pages:
1001
1002
1003
1004
1005
1006
1007
1008
1009
1010
1011
1012
1013
1014
1015
1016
1017
1018
1019
1020
1021
1022
1023
1024
1025