Swymbridge Church should on no account be omitted. It possesses a magnificent screen, and an ancient pulpit with figures in niches. The modern reredos is bad. The Chichester monuments are curious, notably one of a youthful Chichester, whose portrait is given, and whom the bird of Jove is represented as carrying off to serve as Ganymede in heaven. Littleham possesses an ancient fresco of S. Swithun, and a rich screen and benches, that have been carefully and judiciously restored. NOTE.--Books on Barnstaple are:-- CHANTER (J. R.), _Sketches of some Striking Incidents in the History of Barnstaple_. 1865. CHANTER (J. R.), _Memorials of the Church of S. Peter, Barnstaple_. 1887. CHANTER (R.), _Sketches of the Literary History of Barnstaple, with the Diary of Philip Wyott_. _n.d._ CHAPTER IX. BIDEFORD Ugly modern buildings--"Westward Ho!"--Roman roads--The Torridge--The story of King Edmund--The ravages of the sons of Lodbrog--Hingvar and Hubba defeated at Appledore--Brictric the Golden-haired--Bideford Bridge--The herriot--Sir William Coffin--The Newfoundland Fisheries--Sir Richard Grenville--Colonisation of Wokohen--Captain White--The story of the life of Sir Richard Grenville--The _Revenge_--The north coast to Wellcombe--The Hobby Drive--Hartland--S. Nectan--The Promontory of Hercules--Wellcombe--Mutilation of the Church--Wear Gifford. Barnstaple and Bideford are towns that the jerry-builders have done their utmost to make hideous with white brick villas banded with red. It is a curious fact, but fact it is, that a builder without a grain of taste, if ambitious to make one of his domestic monstrosities attractive, will look into the pattern-book of a maker of terra-cotta, and select the most obtrusive ridge-tiles and, above all, hip-knobs he can find, frizzle the spine of his roof with the former, clap the latter on his gable, and think that the product is stylish. The foliations of the ridge-tiles get broken after a frost, and the roof acquires a mangy look, but not till after the villa has been let as a handsome suburban residence. [Illustration: SMITHY, HARTLAND] When one encounters this sort of thing, repeated again and again, the heart turns sick, and the visitor is impatient to fly from towns thus vulgarised. To Bideford he comes full of thoughts of "Westward Ho!" and expects to find an Elizabethan flavour about the place, only to be woefully disappointed. Even the church is new; only the bridge remains, and that has been menaced with destruction. Bideford has memories, but modern Bideford has made herself æsthetically unworthy of them. To begin with, the old Roman, or pre-Roman, road from North Cornwall passing through Stratton, that takes its name from the street or road, ran to the ford on the Torridge and passed on to Barnstaple.