In Ashburton stands a quaint slated house-front with the pips on cards cut in slate ornamenting the front. The old ring to which the bull was attached for baiting still remains where was the ancient bull-ring of the town. Ashburton was, as already said, originally composed of two manors--one royal, the other episcopal--and each had its portreeve. The King's Bridge united them, and the river divided one from the other. This was a relic of pre-Saxon times, when the chief of the land and the ecclesiastical chief had their separate establishments. At a later period Ashburton passed wholly into the hands of the Bishop of Exeter. Bishop Oldham, 1504-1519, was a benefactor to the church, and gave it a lectern with an owl, his symbol, supporting the desk. This owl was sold to Bigbury, along with the handsome pulpit. Holne pulpit is very similar to that formerly in Ashburton. [Illustration: OLD OAK CARVING, ASHBURTON] The church of Ashburton has been renovated, and is now very stately and beautiful. It is to be regretted that the architect, the late Mr. Street, was superior to restoring the screen from the fragments that remained, and instead evolved one out of his inner consciousness, quite out of character with the church, and entirely different in feeling from the work common throughout the neighbourhood, which is exquisite in beauty of design and in detail. But such is the way with architects. The Arlers of Gmünd designed Milan Cathedral, but were not allowed to complete it; it was given to sixteen different Italian architects to meddle with and to muddle it; the result is that the exterior is a bit of miserable frippery in marble. Happily the original design for the interior was not interfered with. But something incomparably worse may be seen near Ashburton, in the interior of Bickington. Ilsington Church retains a few poppy-head benches of rich work, unique in the county. In Ilsington is Ingsdon, once the seat of the Pomeroy family, but no relics of the ancient house remain. According to tradition, the Pomeroy ancestor was jester to Robert the Magnificent, father of William the Conqueror. He was a dwarf, full of comical movements as well as of quips and quirks. As he came in with the dessert he was called Pomme-roy, the Apple King. His son became a faithful servant of William, and was rewarded by him with large manors in Devon and Somersetshire. A junior branch was settled at Ingsdon. The tradition is of course groundless, as the family derived from a place Pomeraye in Normandy, near Bayeux. It probably originated with a family tendency to jest, and to a certain grotesqueness of appearance. It is told by Miss Strickland in her _History of the Queens of England_. But the odd circumstance about it is that there are Pomeroys now in and about Ashburton of humble degree--the children, the plague of the schoolmaster and mistresses, as they are born humourists, and withal have such a droll appearance and expression as to inevitably provoke mirth.