A Book of Dartmoor: Second EditionBaring-Gould, S. (Sabine)
History
A Book of Dartmoor: Second Edition
Baring-Gould, S. (Sabine)
Dartmoor (England)
A little way, but a few steps below the bridge, on the west side, is
a comparatively modern blowing-house; two mould-stones for tin may be
seen there lying among the nettles. This house is built with mortar
and is of considerable size, whereas the ancient blowing-houses are
very small, and no lime has been employed in their construction. One of
these with a _cache_ may be found in the midst of the tinners' heaps
if the Dart be followed up to where it makes a sudden bend and comes
from the east. Here a tongue of hill stands out above it, and a stream
sweeps down from the north to join it. A very short distance up this
stream is the blowing-house with a beehive _cache_.
If this stream be pursued, and Sittaford Tor be aimed at, then a few
hundred yards to the right of the tor the Grey Wethers will be found,
two very fine circles in contact with one another; but the stones of
one are nearly all down.
If the Ordnance Sheet XCIX., N.W., be taken, and the ridge followed
north-west along the line indicated by bench-marks, Cut Hill will
finally be attained, which is all bog, but which has a gash cut in it
to afford a passage through the moors from Okehampton to Post Bridge.
This expedition will take the visitor into some of the wildest and most
desolate portions of the northern half of Dartmoor.
Many years ago the question was mooted in, I think, the _Times_,
whether there were really such things as Jack-o'-lanterns.
Few instances can be recorded where this _ignis fatuus_ has been seen
on Dartmoor, probably because so few cattle are lost in the bogs there.
I was told by a man accustomed to draw turf, that he has seen the legs
and belly of the horse as though on fire, where it had been splashed by
the peat water.
I walked one night from Plymouth to Tavistock across Roborough Down,
before it was inclosed and built upon, and I then saw a little blue
flame dancing on a pool. I went on my knees and crept close to it, to
make quite sure what it was, and that it was not a glow-worm.
Mr. Coaker, of Sherberton, informs me that he has on several occasions
seen the Jack-o'-lantern. There is a bit of marshy land where rises
Muddy Lake, near the road from Princetown to Ashburton, and he has seen
it there. Sometimes, according to his account, it appears like the
flash of a lantern, and then disappears, and presently flashes again.
It has also been seen by him in the boggy ground of Slade by Huccaby
Bridge. There, on one occasion, he made his way towards it. From a
distance the light seemed to be considerable, but as he approached it
appeared only as a small flame.
The Rev. T. E. Fox, curate, living at Post Bridge, and serving the
little chapel there and that at Huccaby, has also seen it, in Brimpts,
hovering, a greenish-blue flame, about three feet above the soil; and a
woman living near informs me that she also has noticed it in the same
place.[23]
[Illustration: LAKE-HEAD, KISTVAEN]
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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