Baring-Gould Sabine
A Book of the West. Volume I Devon
The old house of the Oxenham family is in the neighbourhood, but has passed away into other hands. To this family belonged, there can be little doubt, the John Oxenham who was such an adventurous seaman and explorer in the Elizabethan days. He was one of those who accompanied Francis Drake in the expedition to Nombre de Dios in 1572, and afterwards, in an adventure on his own account, was the first Englishman who launched a keel on the Pacific Ocean, or South Sea, as it was then called. He fell into the hands of the Spaniards, and was carried to Lima, where he was executed as a pirate. His story has been worked into Kingsley's Westward Ho! The omen of the appearance of a white bird before death, supposed to belong to the family, is there effectively introduced.
The house of Oxenham is of the last century, and was built about the year 1714, the date which is sculptured on one of the granite pillars of the entrance gates. The family does not seem to have been qualified to bear arms in 1620, the last Herald's visitation, but the coat borne by the family is ar. a fess embattled between 3 oxen sa. The story is told that once upon a time a certain Margaret Oxenham was about to be married to the man of her choice. In the midst of the preparations on the wedding morn, when all was going merrily, the white bird appeared and hovered over the bride-elect. The ceremony, however, proceeded, and at the altar of South Tawton the hapless bride was stabbed to death by a rejected lover.
There is a remarkably circumstantial printed account of some appearances of the family omen in the year 1635 in a very rare tract, entitled, A True Relation of an Apparition in the likenesse of a Bird with a white brest, that appeared hovering over the Death-Beds of some of the children of Mr. James Oxenham, of Sale Monachorum, Devon, Gent. Prefixed to the tract is a quaint engraved frontispiece. It is in four compartments; in each of the first three is a representation of a person lying in a bed of the four-post type, and in the fourth is a child in a wicker cradle. Over each individual is a bird on the wing, hovering. At the foot of these pictorial compartments are the names of those above whom the bird appears: John Oxenham, aged 21; Thomasine, wife of James Oxenham the younger, aged 22; Rebecca Oxenham, aged 8, and Thomasine, a babe.
This tract may have been provoked by a letter of James Howell to "Mr. E. D.," dated 3rd July, 1632, and written from Westminster: —
"I can tell you of a strange thing I saw lately here, and I believe 't is true. As I pass'd by St. Dunstans in Fleet-street the last Saturday, I stepp'd into a Lapidary, or stone-cutter's shop, to treat with the Master for a stone to be put upon my Father's Tomb; and casting my eyes up and down, I might spie a huge Marble with a large inscription upon 't, which was thus to my best remembrance: —
"'Here lies John Oxenham, a goodly young man, in whose chamber, as he was struggling with the Pangs of Death, a Bird with a white brest was seen fluttering about his Bed, and so vanished.
"'Here lies Mary Oxenham, the sister of the said John, who died the next day, and the same Apparition was seen in the Room.'
"Then another sister is spoke of. Then: —
"'Here lies hard by James Oxenham, the son of the said John, who dyed a Child in his Cradel a little after, and such a Bird was seen fluttering about his head, a little before he expir'd, which vanish'd afterwards.'
"At the bottome of the Stone ther is: —
"'Here lies Elizabeth Oxenham, the Mother of the said John, who died sixteen years since, when such a Bird with a white Brest was seen about her bed before her death.'
"To all these ther be divers Witnesses, both Squires and Ladies, whose names are engraven upon the Stone. This Stone is to be sent to a Town hard by Exeter, wher it happen 'it."22
There are several suspicious points about the story. No such a monument exists or has existed in South Tawton Church, nor is one such known to have been set up in any other in the county. The stone was of marble, and therefore not for the graveyard, but for the interior of the church.
According to the registers there was a John Oxenham, senior, died, and was buried May 2nd, 1630, but not one of the others mentioned. There were two John Oxenhams in the parish: John, son of James and Elizabeth, born in 1613; and John, son of William and Mary, born in 1614. Mary was the sister of the latter, and their father was the village doctor. But it was Elizabeth, according to Howell, who was the mother. No James, son of John, was baptised at the time at South Tawton. Elizabeth, the mother, according to Howell, died about 1616. No such a person was buried at South Tawton at any date near that.
The persons named in the tract of 1635 – three years after Howell's letter – are also four, but they are of Zeal Monachorum. But the name of Oxenham does not occur at all in the registers of that parish, and in the tract, apparently, South Zeal has been mistaken for Zeal Monachorum.23 In the first edition of Howell's epistles there is no date to the letter; that was supplied later, probably by the publisher. Now it is curious that in 1635 the name John Oxenham does occur as having been buried at South Tawton on July 31st, aged twenty-one. He was baptised July 10th, 1614. But there are no entries of Thomasine, wife of James, nor of Rebecca, aged eight, either baptised or buried; nor of Thomasine the babe.
In the tract we are informed that the white-breasted bird appeared when Grace, the grandmother of John Oxenham, died, in 1618.
And in fact we do find in the South Tawton registers for that date, September 2nd, 1618, Grace, the wife of John Oxenham, was buried.
That Howell's quotation from memory refers to the same four as are named in the tract is, I think, probable. He had not seen the tract, or he would have quoted the names correctly. The letter was not written at the date added to it at a later period, but in the same year as the tract appeared, when he was a prisoner in the Fleet for debt. Whether he ever saw the monument may be doubted, and he may have merely written for publication with mention of the story which he had from hearsay. As to the tract, it was one of those pious frauds by no means uncommon among the "goody-goody" writers of that and other days, and the incident of the white-breasted bird was an invention employed to "catch" the attention of readers, and lead on to the moral and pious sentiments that stuff the remainder of the tract. The trick of giving a list of witnesses was one resorted to by the ballad and tract mongers of the period, and it is noticeable that those whose names are appended as witnesses never existed at South Zeal, in South Tawton parish.
When once this pious fraud had been launched, it rolled on by its own weight, and it became a point of honour in the family to uphold it; and plenty of after-apparitions were feigned or fancied to have been seen.
The whole story of the alleged appearances of the white bird has been gone into with thoroughness by Mr. Cotton, of Exeter, who to some extent credits it; that is to say, he thinks that some real instances of birds fluttering at the window may have given rise to the story. But the basis is rotten, and the superstructure accordingly will not stand.24
A mine had been worked formerly above South Zeal. It had been under a "captain," of practical experience but no scientific knowledge. It yielded a small but steady profit. Then the directors and shareholders became impatient. They discharged the old captain, and sent down a fellow who had passed through the mining college, had scientific geology and mineralogy at his fingers' ends. He scouted the machinery that had been hitherto in use, sneered at the old-fashioned methods that had been pursued, boasted of what he was going to do, revolutionised the mine, reorganised the plant, had all the old machinery cast aside, or sold for old iron; had down new and costly apparatus – then came heavy calls on the shareholders – renewed calls – and there was an end of profits, and as finis a general collapse.
Some years ago a great fraud was committed in the neighbourhood. It was rumoured that gold was to be found in the gozen – the refuse from the mines. All who had old mines on their land sent up specimens to London, and received reports that there was a specified amount of gold in what was forwarded. Some, to be sure that there was no deception, went up with their specimens and saw them ground, washed, and analysed, and the gold extracted. So large orders were sent up for gozen-crushing machines. These came down, were set to work, and no gold was then found. The makers of the machines had introduced gold-dust into the water that was used in the washing of the crushed stone. I made use of this incident in my novel John Herring.
But to return to the singers. Here is a song of local origin, which, however, I did not obtain from these South Zeal singers. I must premise that the local pronunciation of Okehampton is Ockington.
At Ockington, in Devonshire,
Old vayther lived vor many a year.
And I along wi' he did dwell
Nigh Dartimoor 'tes knawed vull well.
Diddle-diddle-dee.
It happ'nd on a zartain day,
Vour score o' sheep – they rinned astray.
Zeth vayther, Jack go arter'n, yū.
Zez I – Be darned if ee'r I dū.
Diddle-diddle-dee.
Purvokèd at my sāacy tongue,
A dish o' brāath at me he flung.
Then fu' o' wrath, as poppy red
I knacked old vayther on the head.
Diddle-diddle-dee.
Then drayed wor I to Ex't'r jail,
There to be tried – allowed no bail,
And at next Easter 'zizes I
Condemnèd was therefor to die.
Diddle-diddle-dee.
Young men and maydens all, I pray
Take warnin' by my tragedy.
Rin arter sheep when they are strayed,
And don't knack vaythers on the 'ead.
Diddle-diddle-dee.
South Tawton Church is fine. The restorer has taken the monumental slabs, sawn them in half, and employed them for lining the drain round the church, thus destroying the historical records of the parish. This is the more to be regretted, as a fire that occurred in the parsonage has seriously damaged the old registers. There is a fine Wyke monument in the church.
But by far the most interesting church within an excursion of Okehampton is Bratton Clovelly, which, although not large, has a stately grandeur internally that is very impressive. Much money has been spent in "restoring" this church. The glass is good, but the new work in wood and alabaster is barely passable. North Lew Church contains very fine old oak, beside modern woodwork of poverty-stricken design.
There are some early Christian monuments near Okehampton, a well at Sticklepath with an inscribed stone by it, and another inscribed stone by the roadside from Okehampton to Exeter.
Note. – Books that may be consulted: —
Bridges (M. B.), Some Account of the Barony and Town of Okehampton. New edition, Tiverton, 1889.
Worth (R. N.), "Okehampton Castle," in Transactions of the Devonshire Association, 1895.
CHAPTER XIII.
MORETON HAMPSTEAD
Moreton Church – The almshouse – The dancing tree – Other dancing trees – The vintner's bush – The calculating boy – Life of Mr. Bidder – The ravens of Brennan – Grimspound – The Great Central Trackway – Stone rows – The Lych Way – Churches – Bowerman's Nose – Ashton – The Duchess of Kingston – Hennock – The Loveys family – Parson Harris – John Cann's Rocks – Lustleigh Cleave – Hound Tor and Hey Tor Rocks – Widecombe – The Ballad of Tom Pearse.
Moreton, with its whitewashed cottages and thatched roofs, has a primitive appearance, and withal a look of cleanliness. It is now the fashion to go to Chagford, which has been much puffed, but Moreton makes quite as good a headquarters for Dartmoor excursions.
It has a fine church of the usual type, that was gutted at its so-called restoration, and a remarkably fine carved oak screen was turned out, but happily secured by the late Earl of Devon, who gave it to Whitchurch, near Tavistock. A few years ago the fine screen of South Brent was thrown out when the church was made naked under the pretence of restoration, and allowed to rot in an outhouse.
Moreton undoubtedly at one time was a town in the moors, and the bold ridge that runs from Hell Tor to Hennock to the east was till comparatively recently furze-and-heather-clad moor.
An object of singular picturesqueness in Moreton is the almshouse, with the date of 1637, with a charming arcade of granite stunted pillars. Opposite another almshouse has been erected in modern times, to show how badly we can do things now when our forefathers did things well.
In the same street is the base of the old village cross and the head of the same broken off. In the place of the cross the "Dancing Tree" has sprung up, that has been made use of by Mr. Blackmore in his novel of Christowel. The tree in question is unhappily now in a condition to be danced round, not any longer to be danced upon.
The tree is an elm, and it grows out of the basement of the old village cross, the lower steps of which engirdle the trunk; and a fragment of the head of the cross lies just below. The tree must have sprung up after the destruction of the cross, or, possibly enough, it was itself the cause of destruction, much in the same way as trees have destroyed and rent in sunder the tomb of Lady Anne Grimstone, in Tewin churchyard.
Of this latter the story goes that Lady Anne on her deathbed declared that she could not and would not believe in the resurrection of the body. Rather, she was reported to have said, will I hold that nine trees shall spring out of my dead body.
Now in process of time the great stone sepulchral mass placed over her grave split asunder, and through the rents issued the shoots of nine trees, six ash and three sycamores, together with great trunks and coils of ivy, that among them have tossed up and hold in suspense the fragments of Lady Anne's tomb. The story is of course made to account for the phenomenon.
But to return to the Cross Tree, Moreton Hampstead. The elm, grown to a considerable size, was pollarded and had its branches curiously trained, so that the upper portion was given the shape of a table. On this tree-top it was customary on certain occasions to lay a platform, railed round, access to which was obtained by a ladder, and on this tree-top dancing took place.
The following extracts taken from a journal kept by an old gentleman, a native and inhabitant of Moreton Hampstead at the beginning of this century, are interesting as giving us some actual dates upon which festivities took place on the tree.
"June 4th, 1800. – His Majesty's birthday. Every mark of loyalty was shown. In the afternoon a concert of instrumental music was held on the Cross Tree.
"August 28th, 1801. – The Cross Tree floored and seated round, with a platform, railed on each side, from the top of an adjoining garden wall to the tree, and a flight of steps in the garden for the company to ascend. After passing the platform they enter under a grand arch formed of boughs. There is sufficient room for thirty persons to sit around, and six couples to dance, besides the orchestra. From the novelty of this rural apartment it is expected much company will resort there during the summer.
"August 19th, 1807. – This night the French officers25 assembled on the Cross Tree with their band of music. They performed several airs with great taste."
Unfortunately, and to the great regret of the inhabitants of Moreton, the tree was wrecked by a gale on October 1st, 1891, when the force of the wind was so great that the ancient elm could not withstand it, and at about a quarter past two o'clock in the afternoon most of the upper part was blown down, carrying with it a large piece of the trunk, which is quite hollow. This latter has been replaced and securely fastened.
A recent visit to the Cross Tree shows that the old elm is not prepared to die yet; it has thrown forth vigorous spray and has tufted its crown with green leaves.
Moreton tree is not the only dancing tree in the West of England. On the high road from Exeter to Okehampton, near Dunsford, is a similar tree, but an oak, and this was woven and extended and fashioned into a flat surface.
The story in the neighbourhood used to be that the Fulfords, of Great Fulford, held their lands on the singular tenure that they should dine once a year on the top of the tree, and give a dance there to their tenants. But this usage has long been discontinued. The Fulfords are at Great Fulford still, notwithstanding.
Again another dancing tree is at Trebursaye, near Launceston. This also is an oak, but is now in a neglected condition and has lost most of its original form, looking merely as a peculiarly crabbed and tortured old tree. Here anciently a ghost was wont to be seen, that of a woman who had fallen from it during a dance and broken her neck, and many stories were afloat relative to horses taking fright at night and running away with the riders, or of passers-by on foot who were so scared as to be unable to pursue their journey, through seeing the dead woman dancing on the tree. At length matters became so serious that Parson Ruddle, vicar of Launceston, a notable man in his way, and famous as a ghost-layer, was induced to go to the tree at nightfall and exorcise the unquiet spirit. The ghost had so effectually frightened people that the dances on the top of the tree had been discontinued. They were never resumed.
According to tradition there was again another dancing tree on the road from Okehampton to Launceston, near the village of Lifton. This tree was held to be the earliest to put forth leaves in all the country round. Entertainments were given on it, but it has disappeared, and the only reminiscence of it remained till recently in "The Royal Oak" Inn, hard by which the old dancing tree stood.
There is yet another, the Meavy Oak, sometimes called the Gospel Oak, for it is supposed that preaching was made from the steps of the village cross that stands before it. The oak, however, is of vast age. It is referred to in deeds almost to the Conquest, and that it was a sacred tree to which a certain amount of reverence was given is probable enough. The cross was set up under its shadow to consecrate it, and probably to put an end to superstitious rites done there. Anyhow this tree till within this century was, on the village festival, surrounded with poles, a platform was erected above the tree, the top of which was kept clipped flat like a table, and a set of stairs erected, by means of which the platform could be reached.
On the top a table and chairs were set, and feasting took place. Whether dancing I cannot say, but in all probability in former generations there was dancing there as well as feeding and drinking. These trees where dancing took place are precisely the May-pole in a more primitive form. The May-pole is a makeshift for an actual tree; a pole was brought and set up and adorned with flowers and green boughs, and then danced round. There was in Cornwall, and indeed elsewhere, a grand exodus from the towns and villages to the greenwood on May Day, when the lads and lasses at a very early hour went in quest of May bushes, green boughs and flowers wherewith to decorate the improvised May tree. This was then decorated profusely, and the merry-makers danced about it; ate, drank, and rose up to play, precisely as of old did the Israelites about the Golden Calf in the wilderness of Sinai.
And most assuredly in early times, before Christianity had been established, those dances and revels about a sacred tree, whether naturally grown or whether manufactured as a May-pole, were an act of religious worship addressed to the spirit of vegetation manifesting itself in full vigour in spring.
When S. Boniface strove to bring the Saxons to the knowledge of the truth, he cast down the great oak of Fritzlar which had received divine honours. In this lived the spirit of fertility, and till it fell beneath his axe, Boniface was well aware that he could not triumph over the popular superstition.
S. Germanus, Bishop of Auxerre, who visited Britain to expose the Pelagian heresy, was himself guilty before his ordination of paying superstitious reverence to a pear tree. He had been a hunter, and it was customary for those who returned from the chase to suspend in the tree the heads and antlers of the game killed, as an act of homage to the spirit that inhabited it. The Bishop Amator remonstrated, but in vain. Then one day, when Germanus was out hunting, Amator cut the tree down.
That some lingering notion of veneration due to trees hung on, and was regarded as savouring of something not orthodox, is perhaps shown by the following incident, which is perfectly true. It was told me by the person concerned. A new parson had been appointed to a remote parish in one of the north-western dales of Yorkshire under the Fells. Not being a native of Yorkshire, but a southerner, he was eyed with suspicion, and his movements were watched. Now in the parsonage garden was a large tree, and about the roots was a bed of violets. The suspicious villagers observed the pastor as he walked round the tree and every now and then bowed to pick a violet. This proceeding took place daily. Why he bowed they could not understand, unless it were in homage to the tree, and they actually drew up a memorial to the Archbishop of York complaining of their parson as guilty of idolatrous tree-worship.
The bush hung out of a wine-shop signified that within were drinking and dancing. The bush is but the sacred tree reduced to its smallest dimensions, and the drinking and dancing that in former times took place around the tree are now relegated to within the house, but the bush is retained to symbolise roystering and mirth. I remember the case of a gentleman who "went off his head;" his family were reluctant to allow it to transpire. But one day a climax was put to his eccentricities by his thrusting the stable broom out at an upper window, and proclaiming, "This bush is to give notice, that within I have got two marriageable daughters on sale. Sherry stood all round. Going to the highest bidder. Going – going – " His wife caught him by the shoulders, twisted him about, and said: "Gone completely – and off to the asylum you shall pack at once."
Moreton Hampstead was the birthplace of that remarkable genius George Parker Bidder. He was born in very humble circumstances, his father having been a stonemason; and at the age of seven, when his talent first became apparent, he did not know the meaning of the word "multiplication," nor could he read the common numerical symbols.
An elder brother had taught him to count to one hundred. His great haunt was the forge of the village blacksmith, a kindly old man, about whom more presently. In his workshop neighbours would gather to prove the boy with hard questions involving figures, as it soon became known that he had an extraordinary faculty for calculation. The earliest public notice of this that has been met with is in a letter dated January 19th, 1814, and signed "I. Isaac," printed in the Monthly Magazine (xxxvii. 104).
"Sir, – Having heard that George Parker Bidder, seven years of age," (he was really seven months over the seven years, as he was born June 14th, 1806) "has a peculiar talent for combining numbers, I sent for him, desired him to read a few verses of the New Testament, and found he could scarcely do it even by spelling many words; and knew not the numbers of the letters from one to ten." (Mr. Isaac then asked him several questions in the first four rules of arithmetic, to each of which he replied correctly and readily. He then proceeds to say): "I then asked him how many days are in two years. But here he was at a stand, did not know what a year is, or how many hours are in a day, but having the terms explained, he soon made out the hours in a week, in a month, in twelve months. When asked how many inches are in a square foot, he soon signified that he knew neither of the terms, nor how many inches a foot contains, but with the aid of explanation he soon made out the number 1728; and when desired to multiply this by twelve, he complained the number was too large, but having time, about two minutes, he made out the number 20,738."
His father now took him over the country to exhibit his wonderful powers. In 1815 he was presented to Queen Charlotte. He is said to have been a singularly bright and prepossessing boy. In a memoir in the Proceedings of the Institute of Civil Engineers (lvii. pp. 294) we read: —
"Travelling about the country, for the purpose of exhibiting his son's powers, proved so agreeable and profitable to his father, that the boy's education was entirely neglected. Fortunately, however, amongst those who witnessed his public performances were some gentlemen who thought they discerned qualities worthy of a better career than that of a mere arithmetical prodigy. The Rev. Thomas Jephson and the late Sir John Herschel visited Moreton in the autumn of 1817, to see the 'Calculating Boy,' and they were so much impressed by his talent and general intelligence that before the vacation was over Mr. Jephson and his Cambridge friends agreed to defray the expenses of his education, and he was placed with the master of the grammar school at Camberwell. There he remained for about a twelvemonth, when his father insisted on removing him, for the purpose of resuming the exhibition of his talents. Among other places, he was taken to Edinburgh, where he attracted the notice of Sir Henry Jardine, who, with the assistance of some friends, became responsible for his education. Bidder was then placed with a private tutor, and afterwards, in 1819, he attended the classes at the University of Edinburgh."
He quitted Edinburgh in 1824, and was given a post in the Ordnance Survey. In April, 1825, he quitted the Ordnance Survey and was engaged as assistant to Mr. H. R. Palmer, a civil engineer.
It is deserving of remembrance that George Bidder's first care when starting in the world was to provide for the education of his two younger brothers, and for that purpose this lad of eighteen stinted and saved, denying himself all but the barest necessities.
In 1833 he superintended the construction of the Blackwall Wharf, and in 1834 joined George and Robert Stephenson, whom he had known in Edinburgh.
Experience showed him the importance of electric communication between stations; he introduced it on the Blackwall and Yarmouth railways, and became one of the principal founders of the Electric Telegraph Company.
In hydraulic engineering his chief works were the construction of Lowestoft Harbour and the Victoria Docks at North Woolwich.
"Mr. Bidder took a distinguished part in the great parliamentary contests which attended the establishment of railways. His wonderful memory, his power of instantaneous calculation, his quick perception and readiness at repartee, caused him to be dreaded by hostile lawyers, one of whom made a fruitless application before a committee in the House of Lords that Mr. Bidder should not be allowed to remain in the room, because 'Nature,' he said, 'had endowed him with qualities that did not place his opponents on a fair footing.'
"A remarkable instance of Mr. Bidder's wonderful readiness and power of mental numeration occurred in connexion with the passing of the Act for the North Staffordshire Railway.
"There were several competing lines, and the object of Mr. Bidder's party was to get rid of as many as possible on Standing Orders. They had challenged the accuracy of the levels of one of the rival lines, but upon the examination before the Committee on Standing Orders their opponents' witnesses were as positive as those of the North Staffordshire, and apparently were likely to command greater credence.
"Fortunately Mr. Bidder was present, and when the surveyors of the opposing lines were called to prove the levels at various points he asked to see their field-books, which he looked at apparently in the most cursory manner, and quietly put down without making a note or any observation, and as though he had seen nothing worthy of notice. When the surveyors had completed their proofs Mr. Bidder, who had carried on in his own mind a calculation of the heights noted in all the books, not merely of the salient points upon which the witnesses had been examined, but also of the intermediate rises and falls noted in the several books, suddenly exclaimed that he would demonstrate to the Committee that the section was wrong. He then went rapidly through a calculation which took all by surprise, and clearly proved that if the levels were as represented at one point they could not possibly be as represented at another and distant point. The result was that the errors in the levels were reported, and the Bill was not allowed to proceed."26
Some of his extraordinary achievements have been reported, but they are somewhat doubtful. It will be best to quote only one that is well authenticated from the Proceedings of the Institute of Civil Engineers (lvii. 309).
"On 26 September, 1878, being in his 73rd year, he was conversing with a mathematical friend on the subject of Light, when, it having been remarked that '36,918 pulses or waves of light, which only occupy 1 inch in length, are requisite to give the impression of red,' the friend 'suggested the query that, taking the velocity of light at 190,000 miles per second, how many of its waves must strike the eye and be registered in one second to give the colour red, and, producing a pencil, he was about to calculate the result, when Mr. Bidder said, 'You need not work it; the number of vibrations will be 444,433,651,200,000.'"
Mr. Bidder died suddenly from disease of the heart on September 20th, 1878, aged seventy-two years.
Mr. Bidder remembered many of the old stories of the moor told him by the blacksmith in whose forge he spent so many hours.
I have given one in my chapter on Dartmoor and its tenants. Here is another, as recorded by Miss Bidder, the daughter of Mr. George P. Bidder.
