Teignmouth, about the year of Waterloo had acquired something of a reputation as a watering place or seaside resort and boasted not only the usual Public Assembly rooms, in which Georgian belles and Georgian beaux were wont to disport themselves at routs and balls, and (if gossip may be credited) drink dishes of tea, and game for high stakes; but also a theatre, library, and other social places of resort. A quaint but vivid picture of the life of the town at this period is obtained in the _Guide to Teignmouth_, by Risdon, published in 1817 in three slender volumes, one of which refers to Teignmouth and neighbourhood. There would appear to have been the usual attractions offered by seaside resorts in these times, for we have a mention of a good coach service between the town and Exeter, with carriers’ wagons for those who could not afford coach fares. And there were Sedan chairs for hire, Bath chairs, and donkeys for the venturesome maidens; with whom, we are told, such a means of locomotion was a passion. The more staid and steady matrons were accommodated with horses and pillions, and many a gay and humoursome scene was enacted, we may warrant, upon the “fine sandy beach” of which much is made, or along the shore where no “obstruction was permitted which could interfere with the pleasure and progression of riders.” In several old prints published early in the last century, one catches glimpses of the fashions, foibles, and pastimes of “young ladies and gentlemen” who, as regards attire and carriage, might have stepped out of the pages of _Persuasion_ or _Pride and Prejudice_. During the first three decades of the nineteenth century, Teignmouth appears to have suffered a gradual decline, from which it did not recover until the railway came in 1846, gradually making the town what it is to-day--a modern, picturesque, holiday resort, pleasant alike to landsmen and yachtsmen. To-day the trade of Teignmouth is considerable, as is indicated by the constant presence in harbour of a number of craft of medium tonnage, and groups of barges with picturesque square-cut, red-brown sails. The sea-going commerce of the place is nowadays chiefly the export of china clay, brought down from the pits at Newton Abbot in the barges, but there is also some little trade in wood pulp, timber from Norway, flour and oil. There is a tale with the true flavour of the supernatural about it relating to the jutting crag on Hole Head, to the north of the town, which bears some remote resemblance to a “Parson” after which it is named, and the “Clerk,” which stands far out from the shore. Once, so the tale goes, a priest of Dawlish was riding homeward with his clerk from Teignmouth, where they had been to collect tithes. They took their way by the inland road with its many lanes, and after wandering about came to a standstill, having lost their way.