Though my father’s letters were pretty full, my grandmother detected gaps. She writes, 15 January 1840, “You don’t say who you were with at Covent Garden seeing out the old year and bringing in the new. I should like to know.” And then she gives him a little bit of good advice--“Youth passes rapidly away: therefore, my dear son, make the most and the best of it.” Later on she feared that he was making a little too much of it. She writes him, 20 November 1842, “I hope never to hear you express a wish to go on the Continent more. I recollect your saying when you came to Wreyland that you had not been in bed for two nights.” I see from his diary that it was three: one in the diligence, Paris to Boulogne, the next in the steamer, Boulogne to London, and the next in the train, London to Taunton, and in the coach from there. I see also from his diary that he was at Covent Garden with persons of complete respectability. I have nearly a thousand letters that my grandfather and grandmother wrote to him from here, and I suppose he wrote as many in reply; but few of these survived. My grandfather writes to him, 29 October 1848, “I looked all the house over for your letter, but could not find it, your mother having destroyed lots of my papers, as she does when it takes her in head, without asking whether it is of importance or not: which very often inconveniences me.” I wish my grandfather had locked his papers up. People have told me that they have destroyed old parchments, “as nobody could read such things.” And out of ignorance or wantonness people have been destroying things year after year. In 1837 my father was taking notes and copying documents, as if he meant to write a history of the neighbourhood. On coming to Wrey Barton he observes, “The late owner is said about fifteen years ago to have burnt all the deeds which were then more than sixty years old.” In the winter of 1838-39 he copied out a document of 20 August 1607 with a copy of a document of 21 September 1342 annexed to it, “which roll is now shewed forth to the said commissioners, and the copy thereof is filed unto these presentments.” The old roll sets out the customs of the manor of South Teign. That manor extended into the parishes of Chagford, Moreton and North Bovey, and first belonged to the Crown and then to the Duchy of Cornwall. Under an Act of 13 July 1863 (26 & 27 Victoria, cap. 49) the Duchy was empowered to sell the manor; and there is a letter from the Duchy office, 4 November 1863, asking my father for a copy of his copy. I suppose the original had disappeared since 1839.