CHAPTER IV.
A LANDSLIP
The chalk beds on sand – The subsidence of 1839 – The great chasm – Present conditions – The White Cliff – Beer quarries – Jack Rattenbury.
There are a good many more curious things to be seen in England than is generally supposed, if we will but go out of the highways to look for them. Certainly one of the most extraordinary and impressive is the great landslip between the mouth of the Axe and Lyme Regis; one which even extended further west beyond the estuary. On this bit of coast, where Devonshire passes into Dorset, the cliff scenery is very fine. The White Cliff is a magnificent headland that possesses the peculiarity of appearing to lean over preparing to slide into the waves, owing to the inclination of the varicoloured strata of which it is composed. To understand the phenomenon which occasioned the subsidence of a whole tract of coast with the alteration of the coastline, something must be said of the cause of the catastrophe. The chalk bed striped with lines of glistening black flints is superposed upon a bed of what is locally termed fox earth, a bed of gravel or sand that intervenes between it and the clay beneath. Now the rain that falls on the chalk downs infiltrates and, reaching the sand and unable to sink through the clay, breaks out in land springs.
But where the chalk cliffs start sheer out of the sea, there the springs ooze into the sea itself, and, dissolving the texture of the sandy bed, resolve it into a quicksand, liable at the time of great floods to be washed out from under the superincumbent chalk. Should this take place, there is no help for it, but down the chalk bed must go. If you were lying on a bed, and the mattress under your feather bed were pulled away, you would descend, sinking to a depth equivalent to the thickness of the subtracted mattress. That is plain enough.
Now all along the coast to the east of Lyme Regis there is an undercliff – evident tokens of a subsidence of this description which has taken place at some time. When this undercliff has been eaten up by the sea, and a fresh face of crag exposed, then again there will occur a displacement, a pulling out of the mattress, and down will go the chalk above with all the houses and fields upon it. But the sea has not as yet done more than nibble at this undercliff.
It was not quite so to the west of Lyme. There sheer cliffs of glistening white rose above the pebbly shore, so abruptly and with such slight undulations, that several miles ensued before it was possible for those on the height to descend to the beach. Naturally, where the rain-water percolated through the chalk it formed no valleys with streams.
Thus the cliffs stood – for no one knows how long – till the end of December, 1839.
Previous symptoms of the approaching convulsion were not altogether wanting. Cracks had been observed for more than a week opening along the brow of the Downs, but they were not sufficiently remarkable to attract much attention, as such fissures are by no means uncommon on this bit of coast. However, about midnight of December 24th, the labourers of Mr. Chappel, the farmer who occupied Dowlands (about a quarter of a mile inland from the brow of the cliff, and over half a mile from the nearest points of the approaching convulsion) were returning from a supper given them by their employer, whereat the ashen faggot had been burnt according to custom, and were making their way to their cottages, situated near the cliff. Then they noticed that a crack which crossed their path, and which they had observed on their way to the Christmas Eve supper, had widened, and that the land beyond had sunk slightly. Nevertheless they did not consider the matter of great importance, and they went to their homes and to bed. About four o'clock in the morning they were roused by their houses reeling, by the concrete floors bursting and gaping, and the walls being rent. They started from their beds in great alarm, and about six o'clock arrived at the farm to rouse their master; they had found their escape nearly cut off, as the crack had widened and the land on the sea side had sunk considerably, so that they had, with their wives and children, to scramble up – and that with difficulty, and, in the darkness, with no little danger.
Happily all escaped in time.
During Christmas Day there was no great change; parties of the coastguard were stationed on the Downs throughout the ensuing night to watch what would happen.
About midnight a great fissure began to form which ran in almost a direct line for three-quarters of a mile. This fissure rapidly widened to 300 feet, descending, as it seemed at first, into the very bowels of the earth, but as the sides fell in it finally was choked at a depth of 150 feet.
One James Robertson and a companion were at that hour crossing the fields which then extended over this tract, and stumbled across a slight ridge of gravel, which at first they thought must have been made by some boys, but one of them stepping on to it, down sank his leg, and his companion had to pull him out of a yawning chasm. Next moment they saw that the whole surface of turf was starred and splitting in all directions, and they fled for their lives. The sound of the rending of the rocks they described as being much like that of the tearing of cloth or flannel. Two other members of the coastguard, who were stationed on the beach, now saw something begin to rise out of the sea like the back of a gigantic whale; at the same time the shore of shingles on which they stood lifted and fell, like the heaving of a breast in sleep. The water was thrown into violent agitation, foaming and spouting, and great volumes of mud rushed up from below. The great back rose higher and ever higher, and extended further till at last it formed a huge reef at a little distance from the beach. This ridge was composed of the more solid matter, chert and other pebbles, that had been in the sand under the chalk, and which by the sinking of the chalk was squeezed out like so much dough. It remained as a reef for some years, but has now totally disappeared, having been carried away by the waves.
As the great chasm was formed, the masses from the sides falling in were, as it were, mumbled and chewed up in the depths, and to the eyes of the frightened spectators sent forth flashes of light; they also supposed that an intolerable stench was emitted from the abyss. But this was no more than the odours given out by the violent attrition of the cherty sandstone and chalk grinding against each other as they descended.
Throughout the 26th the subsided masses of the great chasm continued sinking, and the elevated reef gradually rising; but by the evening of that day everything had settled very nearly into the position in which it remains at present, although edges have since lost their sharpness and minor rents have been choked.
A writer whose reminiscences have been recently published describes briefly the aspect of the place after the sinkage.
"I rode over to see this huge landslip. The greater part of a farm had subsided a hundred feet or more. Hedges and fields, with their crops of turnips, etc., were undisturbed by the fall, and broken off sharply from the ground a hundred feet above. There was a rather dislocated ridge on the shore, which formed a sort of moraine to the slip. On this part were some cottages twisted about, but still holding together, and having their gardens and even their wells attached; yet the shock of the falling mass had been so great as to cause the upheaval of an island off shore."
The aspect of the landslip on the farms of Bindon, Dowlands, Rousdon, and Pinhay at present is full of interest and of picturesque beauty. Ivy has grown luxuriantly and mantles the crags, elder bushes have found the sunk masses of rock suitable to their requirements, and in early summer the air is strong with the scent of their trusses of flowers, and in autumn the whole subsidence is hung with thousands on ten thousands of shining black clusters of berries. Above a sea of foliage the white cliffs shoot out in the boldest fashion, and out of the gorge start horns, pinnacles of chalk of the most fantastic description. The whole is a labyrinth of chasms, not to be ventured into with good clothing, as the brambles grow in the wildest luxuriance and are clawed like the paws of a panther. But, oh! what blackberries may be gathered there – large, sweet, luscious as mulberries. Moreover, the whole sunk region is a paradise for birds of every description, and not a step can be taken that does not disturb jackdaws, magpies, warblers of every kind. One of the cottages that went down has been rebuilt with the old material. As already said, it descended at least a hundred feet with its well. The well still flows with water; that, however, is not now marvellous – how it was that it held water previously is the extraordinary fact.
At the extremity of the landslip the visitor will see that there is still movement going on, but on a small scale – cracks are still forming and extending through the turf. It may be safely said that the landslip between the mouth of the Axe and Lyme Regis is one of the most interesting and picturesque scenes to be found in England.
There is a good deal more in the neighbourhood to be seen than the landslip at Rousdon and Pinhay. If the cliffs be explored to the west of the mouth of the Axe, they will be found to well repay the visit. The splendid crag of the White Cliff towers above the sea, showing the slanting beds of the cherty matter below the dazzling white of the chalk, and from their inclination giving to the whole cliff an appearance of lurching into the waves. Beyond this is Beer, a narrow cleft in the hills, in which are fishermen's cottages, many of them very picturesque, and above them rises a really excellently designed modern church.
A walk up the valley leads to the famous Beer quarries that have been worked for centuries. This splendid building-stone lies below the chalk with flints. There are eight beds, forming a thickness of twelve feet four inches, resting on a hard, white, calcareous rock five or six feet thick, which reposes in turn on sandstones. There is very little waste from these quarries, which are carried on underground; and all that is seen of them are the yawning portals in a face of white cliff. But a shout at the entrance will summon a workman, who will conduct the visitor through the labyrinth underground. The roof is sustained by large square pillars formed by portions of the workable beds left standing.
The stone is nearly white, and chiefly composed of carbonate of lime, with the addition of some argillaceous and silicious matter, and a few scattered particles of green silicate of iron. When first quarried this stone is somewhat soft, and is easily worked, but it rapidly hardens on exposure.
Opposite the new quarry are the mounds that mark the site of the old quarry, from which the stone was extracted for Exeter Cathedral. The subterranean passages there are now blocked, but during the time of the European war they were much used by smugglers, who abounded in Beer. The Memoirs of Jack Rattenbury, the most notorious of these, were published at Sidmouth in 1837, but are not of conspicuous interest. Beer Head has suffered from landslips, and is broken into spires of rock in consequence.
Books on the Landslip, and on Seaton: —
Conybeare and Dawson, Memoir and Views of Landslips on the Coast of East Devon, 1840. A very scarce work.
Hutchinson (P. O.), Guide to the Landslip near Axmouth. Sidmouth, 1840.
Davidson (J. B.), "Seaton before the Conquest," in Transactions of Devonshire Association, 1885.
Mumford (G. F.), Seaton, Beer, and Neighbourhood. Yeovil, n. d.
CHAPTER V.
EXETER
The river Exe – Roman roads – The Saxons in Devon and Exeter – Saxon and British Exeter – The Battle of Gavulford – S. Boniface at Exeter – His persecution of Celtic missionaries – S. Sidwell – Bishop's seat transferred to Exeter – S. Olave's Church – The Cathedral – Its merits and demerits – Ottery S. Mary – Excursions from Exeter – Fingle Bridge – Fulford – Ecclesiological excursions.
Exeter, the Isca Dumnoniorum of the Romans, was the Celtic Caer Wisc; that is to say, the caer or fortress on the Usk. The river-name has become Exe; it derives from the Celtic word which signifies water, and which we have in whiskey and Usquebaugh, i. e. fire-water.
The same word has become also Ock. Thus the Ockment River at Okehampton, a few miles down, becomes the Exe, at Exbourne; and a tributary of the Exe is the Oke, that flows into it near Bampton.
There have been but few Roman remains found in Exeter, and it can never have been an important settlement. Several Roman roads converge on it and radiate from it.
The great Fosseway, that ran from Lincoln through Leicester, reached it. It struck from Honiton, by Rockbeare and Clyst Honiton, and shows its antiquity by being the bounds of Broadclyst and Rockbeare, Sowton and Pinhoe parishes. It entered Exeter by Heavitree. Another Roman road from Lyme Regis enters Exeter by Wonford, where it joins the Fosseway. This road also proclaims its high antiquity by being a parish boundary. From Exeter an ancient road ran direct for Launceston: it is called in places the Old Street. It branched at Okehampton, and a road ran thence to Stratton, in Cornwall.
The Fosseway continued to Moreton Hampstead, and crossed Dartmoor, where it has served as the equator of that desolate region; all above it is esteemed the northern half, all below the southern half of Dartmoor. Further it has not been traced.
Another road, the Ridgeway, ran from Exeter to Totnes, and thence has been followed to Plympton Castle.
Whether these roads proceeded far in Cornwall cannot now be determined.
That these ways were possibly pre-Roman, but improved by the conquerors of the world, is probable. Hard by the roadside at Okehampton, in 1898, was found a hoard of the smallest Roman coins, all of the reign of Constantine the Great. It had probably formed the store of a beggar who "sat by the wayside begging." He hid it under a rock, and probably died without having removed it. About 200 coins were found, all dating from between A.D. 320 and 330.
The Saxons must have crept in without violent invasion, across the Axe, rather than through the gaps in the Black Down and Exmoor – for to the north, as already said, the vast morasses were a hindrance – and have established themselves without violent opposition by the riversides. Their manner of life was unlike that of the Britons. The latter clung to the open highlands, their Gwents as they called them, clear of trees, breezy downs; whereas the Saxons, accustomed to forests, made their stockades in the flat hams and ings by the rivers, in worths and on hangers.
Very probably the Dumnonii suffered their intrusion with reluctance, but they did not venture on forcible resistance, lest they should bring down on themselves the vengeance of Wessex.
When, however, the Saxons had established themselves in sufficient numbers, they had their headquarters in Exeter; but there they did not amalgamate with the natives. The Saxon town was quite apart from that occupied by the Britons, or West Welsh, as they called our Dumnonians. That part of Exeter which contains dedications to Celtic saints was the British town, as was also Heavitree,8 with its daughter churches of S. Sidwell and S. David; but the Saxons occupied where now stands the Cathedral; and each settlement was governed by its own laws. It was not till 823 that Egbert, by a decisive battle at Gavulford (Gafl a holdfast, and ffordd a road), established Saxon supremacy. He apparently drove the Devonshire Celts back along the Old Street, or Roman road, past Okehampton, till they made a stand at Coombow (Cwm-bod = the habitation in a combe). There the hills close in on the road on both sides, and the way branched to Lydford. Commanding both roads is Galford Down; there the Britons threw up formidable entrenchments, or, what is more probable, occupied an earlier camp that remains intact to the present day. Here they made a desperate stand, and were defeated; after which the king, Egbert, cast up a burgh beyond the old dun, which gives its second name to the place, Burleigh, or Burgh-legh. The last relics of the independence of the Dumnonian kingdom disappeared after Athelstan's visit in 926 and 928. A relic of this visit may be seen in Rougemont Castle, Exeter, where the Anglo-Saxon work – notably some herring-bone masonry, and windows rudely fashioned without arches – remains.
A Saxon school had been established in Exeter before A.D. 700, to which S. Boniface, or Wynfrith as he was then called, had been sent. He was a native of Crediton, then a Saxon stockaded settlement, and over the palisades, as a boy, he had looked with scorn and hatred at the native Britons occupying the country. When he was in Exeter he, in like manner, regarded the native Christians with loathing as heretics, because they did not observe Easter on the same day as himself, and perhaps with accentuated hate, because he knew that they had possessed Christian teachers and Christian privileges three centuries before his own people had received the Gospel. Perhaps also his German mind was offended at the freshness, vivacity, and maybe as well the fickleness of purpose of the native Celt. This early acquired aversion lasted through life, and when he went into Germany and settled at Mainz, to posture as an apostle, he was vexed to discover that Celtic missionaries had preceded him and had worked successfully among his Teutonic forefathers in their old homes. Thenceforth he attacked, insulted, and denounced them with implacable animosity, and did his utmost to upset their missions and supplannt them with his own. Virgilius, an Irishman, with a fellow Paddy, Sidonius, was at Salzburg, and Virgilius was bishop there. Boniface beat about for an excuse to get rid of them both. He found that the bishop, having discovered that one of his priests had been accustomed to baptise using a bad Latin formula, had acknowledged this man's baptisms as valid, for the will was present: the fault was due to ignorance of the Latin tongue. Boniface, hearing of this, laid hold of it with enthusiasm, and denounced Virgilius at Rome. Pope Boniface, however, took the side of the Irishman against his over-zealous henchman.
Mortified at this rebuff, Boniface lay in wait to find another excuse for ruining Virgilius. He ascertained presently that the Irishman taught that the earth was round, and that there was an antipodes to those living in Germany. Now the Irish schools were the most learned in Europe, and Irish saints had sailed far into the west over the Atlantic: they had formed their own opinions concerning the shape of the world. Boniface wrote to the Pope to denounce the doctrine of Virgilius as "perverse and unjust, uttered against God and his own soul."
This doctrine Pope Zacharias hastened to condemn as heretical.9 Virgilius had to go to Rome to justify his opinion before ignorant Latin ecclesiastics – with what results we do not know.
Athelstan came to Exeter in 926, and drove out the British inhabitants. He built towers and repaired the old Roman walls; he it was who founded the monastery of SS. Mary and Peter, afterwards to become the Cathedral; and, we are told, he gave to it relics of S. Sidwell. This was a local saint, of whom very little is known, save that she was the sister of Paul, who became abbot and bishop of Léon, in Brittany. She had two sisters, Wulvella and Jutwara, called also Jutwell and Eadware. Though the names seem Saxon, they are corruptions of Celtic originals. Wulvella became an abbess at Gulval, near Penzance, where she entertained her brother as he was on his way to Armorica. Sidwell is supposed to have been a martyr, possibly to Saxon brutality, but this is very uncertain, as her story has not been preserved. She has as her symbols a scythe and a well – "canting" symbols framed from her name. Her brother Paul founded a church that still retains his name, in the British portion of Exeter.
The bishop's seat had been at Crediton: the Saxon bishops did not like it. There were no walls there, and the Danes made piratical excursions. So Bishop Leofric induced Edward the Confessor to move the seat to Exeter, and this was done by Edward in person, in 1050.
In Fore Street is an odd misshapen little church, S. Olave's. This was endowed by Gytha, sister of Sweyn, the Danish king, and wife of Earl Godwin. She was the mother of Harold. She is said to have endowed it (1053) that prayer might be offered for the soul of her husband, and in honour of Olaf, King of Norway, who had fallen in battle in 1030. As S. Olaf fought against the Danes, and it was through the machinations of Canute that he came to his end, it is hard to see how a Danish lady should have felt any enthusiasm about Olaf, who was regarded as a saint and martyr by the national Norwegian party, which was bitterly opposed to the Danish. I suspect that the church already existed, and was dedicated to S. Gwynllyw of Gwent, who at Newport was also converted into Olave, by the English-speaking colonists. Both Gwynllyw and Olaf were kings, and it is noticeable that S. Olave's Church is in the British portion of Exeter. When William the Conqueror arrived before the city, Gytha, who was within the walls, escaped and took refuge in Flanders. William gave the church, with her endowments, to Battle Abbey. But I am not writing a history of Exeter. For those who desire to learn its story in full, I must refer them to the work of Mr. Freeman.
The Cathedral is disappointing, and that because it is built, not of the warm, red sandstone that abounds in the neighbourhood, and is very good building material, but of Beer stone, which is cold and grey. It has another defect: it is too low; but this was determined by the towers. When it was resolved to rebuild the Cathedral, it was decided to preserve the Norman towers, employing them as transepts. This settled the business. The church could not be made lofty; and on entering the western doors the visitor is at once disappointed. He feels a lack of breathing-space; the vaulting depresses him. The architectural details are not to be surpassed, but the whole effect is marred by the one mistake made at the outstart. One cannot wish that the towers had been removed, but one does regret that they were allowed to determine the height of nave and choir. The choir was begun by Bishop Quivil, in 1284, when also the great and incomparably beautiful windows were inserted in the towers. The nave was finished by Bishop Grandisson, in 1369, the year of his death.
Grandisson was a friend of the detestable John XXII., one of the Avignon Popes; and John appointed his intimate to Exeter in total disregard to the rights of the chapter to elect. He was consecrated at Avignon. Hitherto almost all the bishops had been local men.
Grandisson was a man very Romanly inclined, and appointed to a see that was redolent with Celtic reminiscences. He did not relish these. Whenever he had the chance of rededicating a church he endeavoured to substitute a patron from the Roman calendar in place of the British founder. He drew up a Legendarium, a book of Lessons on Saints' Feasts to be used in the Cathedral Church, and ignored nearly every saint whose name was not approved by admission into the Latin martyrology.
"The Church of Exeter is a remarkable case of one general design being carried out through more than a hundred years. It was fixed once for all what the new Saint Peter's should be like, and it grew up after one general pattern, but with a certain advance in detail as the work went westward. Bishop Grandison, when the church was about half built, said that when it was finished it would surpass in beauty all churches of its own kind in England and France. Whatever he meant by 'genus suum,' the prediction was safely risked. As far as outline and general effect goes, the Church of Exeter forms a class by itself." – Freeman.
A more remarkable church than the Cathedral of Exeter is that of Ottery S. Mary, also built by Grandisson. It is, of course, not by any means so large. It gave, perhaps, the original type to Exeter, for there also the towers have been employed as transepts, and was begun in the Early English style. But there a stateliness and an originality of effect are reached that Exeter cannot approach.
There the side aisles have but lancet windows, and a flood of light pours down through the very original clerestory lights. There is no east window. What the general effect must have been before the levels were wantonly altered at the "restoration" one can now hardly surmise. But the church, in spite of this and some odiously vulgar woodwork, is one of the most striking in England, and perhaps the boldest in originality of conception.
The Guildhall, in High Street, is a good example of Elizabethan architecture, in bad stone.
A beautiful excursion may be made from Exeter to Fingle Bridge,10 on the Teign, where the river winds between the hills densely wooded with coppice, that close in on each other like the fangs of a rat-trap. With this may be combined Shilstone cromlech, the sole perfect specimen of the kind remaining in the county, and once but a single member in a series of very remarkable monuments.
The Teign is frowned down on by several strongly fortified camps. Fingle should be seen when the hills are clothed in flowering heather, as though raspberry cream had been spilt over them. White heather may be picked there.
Fulford House is a quadrangle in a sad state of dilapidation; originally of Tudor architecture, but disfigured by bad alterations in the Prince Regent's days, when cockney Gothic was in vogue. In the house is a bad portrait of the "Royal Martyr," presented by Charles II., and one of "Red Ruin," a spendthrift Fulford. In the hall is some superb carved panelling, early Tudor.
Exeter may be made a centre for ecclesiological excursions of no ordinary interest. Dunchideock Church has a well-restored screen; but by far the richest carved oak rood-screen in the county is that of Kenton, where also the pulpit is of incomparable beauty. The carver employed thereon was a man of no common talent, and the work is one of brilliant execution. There is much difference in the carving in the county – some is common, mechanical; that in the Kenton screen and pulpit is of the very finest quality.
In the little church of S. Mary Steps, in Exeter, may be seen a portion of the screen removed from S. Mary Major when that monstrosity was erected. At Plymtree the screen bears on it contemporary portraits of Prince Arthur (son of Henry VII.) and Cardinal Morton. That of Bradninch has on it paintings of the Sibyls, the Doctors of the Church, and the Legend of S. Francis.
Pinhoe was the scene of a great battle with the Danes in 1001. They had come up the Exe, and burned Pinhoe, Broadclyst, and some of the neighbouring villages. Levies in Devon and Somerset met them, but were defeated with great slaughter. The church contains a fine coloured screen with the vaulting-ribs and gallery. The alms-box is curious: it represents a serving-man supporting himself with a stick in one hand, the other extended soliciting alms.
East Budleigh should be visited for its fine bench-ends, some very curious; one represents a cook roasting a goose; another a ship in full sail. Their date is 1534. There is a screen, but not of first quality.
Littleham, near Exmouth, has a good screen. Screens are the features of Devonshire churches: a church was built to contain one. Without it the proportions are faulty.
Books on Exeter: —
Freeman (E. A.), Historic Towns: Exeter. 1895.
Northy (T. J.), Popular History of Exeter. 1886.
Jenkins (A.), History of Exeter. 1841.