There came a time when lawyers (and others) did not work so hard at Moreton. In his diary on 20 January 1870, two months before his death, my grandfather notes that he had been to Moreton in the morning to see the lawyer and the doctor--“neither at home, one hunting, the other shooting: so lost my labour.” That lawyer who went hunting, used to tell his clients, when they had a good possessory title, they had much better burn their title-deeds, as these were certain to have some blunder in them that would cause trouble some day. He had drawn a good many of these deeds himself, so I suppose he knew what they were likely to contain. Writing to my father on 3 December 1844, my grandfather says--“There is a literary society formed in Moreton. I suppose it must be a sort of mechanics’ institute. I fear the intellect of Moreton is too shallow to make much progress for some time. However, that is the way to make it better.” A friend of my father’s writes to him from Moreton on 23 November 1844, “We have a meeting tomorrow for the purpose of establishing a Reading Room and Library for all classes,” and then on 13 December, “I enclose a copy of the rules of our Society for the promotion of knowledge.... We have £11 to lay out in books at once. We have expended a portion of that sum already in the purchase of selections from the ‘Family Library’ 2/6 per vol, Cabinet and Lardner’s Cyclopedia 3/-, and Chambers very useful elementary books on the sciences etc., all the nos (27) of Knights weekly volume 1/-each (the cheapest and best almost now publishing) and two or three of Murrays cheap edition etc. etc., in all nearly 90 volumes: cost about £7. We are going to take in weekly the ‘Athenæum’, Chambers Journal and Chambers Miscellany, some mechanics magazine and one or two other monthlys. Lectures once a week till April. The object of the Society is to benefit all classes and particularly tradesmen and their apprentices and mechanics etc. who will be much better in the reading room for a couple of hours than in a public house.” The reading room was to be open three times a week, and the librarian was to have £8 a year for the use of the room (it being in his house) including coals and candles and his own services. There is now a Public Library at Moreton, an ostentatious building which must have cost at least a hundred times as much as the books that it contains. People can read newspapers there and bring away light literature to read at home. But such libraries are seldom of real use. There is not a library in Devon where real work can be done on very many subjects; and the buildings of these libraries might be turned to some account, if each one took a subject and acquired the proper books.