[B] ABBOTSBURY consists of a single parish, divided into three streets, nearly in the form of the letter Y, lying in a valley surrounded and protected by bold hills near the sea. There is a tradition that this place was called Abodesbyry by St. Peter himself, in the infancy of Christianity, but it is more probably supposed to have derived its name from the magnificent abbey, originally founded here, in the early part of the eleventh century. The ruins of the abbey (which was once large and splendid, but is now nearly demolished), consist of a large barn, a stable, supposed to have been the dormitory, a porch which belonged to the conventual church, the principal entrance, a portion of the walls, and two buildings conjectured to have been used for domestic purposes. The barn, which, when entire, was the largest in the county, is now so dilapidated, that only a part of it can be used. The church, in which Orcus and his wife, the founders, were buried, is, with the exception of the porch and a pile of ruins under some neighbouring elms, totally destroyed; but the numerous chantries and chapels which belonged to it sufficiently prove its ancient magnificence. On an eminence, at a short distance from the town, stands a small building called St. Catherine's Chapel, which is supposed to have been erected about the time of Edward IV., and which from its height and lofty situation, serves both for a sea and land mark. Abbotsbury Church appears to have been built a short time before the reformation; the pulpit is pierced by musket balls, said to have been fired by Cromwell's soldiers, at the officiating minister, whom, however, they missed. But it is more likely to have occurred at the time of Sir Anthony Astley Cooper's attack on the royalists, at the siege of Sir John Strangeway's house, in 1651. About a mile to the south-west of Abbotsbury, is the "decoy," where great quantities of wild fowl are annually taken. But the object which most engages the attention of strangers, in the neighbourhood of this town, is the celebrated "swannery," which, not long since, was the property of the Earl of Ilchester. In the open or broad space of the fleet are kept six or seven hundred swans, formerly one thousand five hundred, including hoppers--a small species of swans, who feed and range, and return home again. _Fair_, July 10, for sheep and toys. [Sidenote: Tradition of St. Peter] [Sidenote: A ruined abbey.] [Sidenote: St. Catherine's chapel, a sea mark.] [Sidenote: Wild fowl decoy, and swannery.]