Bovey has a fire-engine, but no horses for it: so the engine is not sent to fires. This does not matter much to people living near the water-mains, as there is pressure enough for working with a stand-pipe and a hose, and the fire-brigade can come by car. People living further off have been instructed what to do, 6 August 1920, “The Parish Council feel it is their duty to notify all or any persons requiring the Fire Brigade with Engine that they must take the responsibility of sending a Pair of Horses for the purpose of conveying the Engine to and from the Scene of the Fire.” Motors are superseding horses, even here; and the horses that remain cannot take the fire-engine at more than a funereal pace. If a motor car or lorry towed it, there would probably be an upset in coming down steep lanes; and a motor fire-engine is a costly thing to buy. After motoring over to Moreton from Okehampton, a distance of twelve miles, a man told me that he had met no horses all the way--a camel and an elephant were the only beasts he met. The explanation was, a wild-beast show was going round the towns just then, and these beasts had to walk. There was a salamander in one of these wild-beast shows, and an old lady here described it to me as ‘a noxious critter as they calls a Sammy Maunder.’ Sammy Maunder was a Lustleigh boy--died in the War--and had played tricks on her; and she thought his fame had spread. She used to call him ‘an anointed one.’ Shakespeare says, ‘Aroint thee, Witch’; and I suspect she meant ‘arointed.’ I once had a letter from Jamrach’s informing me that they were now in a position to execute my esteemed order for antelopes. I had not ordered any antelopes or any other creatures, and found the letter was intended for a man whose name came next to mine in an alphabetical court-guide. I often have letters from foreign booksellers addressed to me as Monsieur Torresq--I suppose ‘Torr Esq’ has been misprinted in some list they use--and I have had one from a dealer in antîkas addressed to me as Torr Bey: also a local letter addressed to Thistletor Squire, as if I were a Dartmoor hill as well as being Torbay. There is a Seven Lords’ Land four miles from here; and if you go up there from Bovey, you pass Five Witches on the way. There is a Four Lords’ Land near Combe Martin, and the four were joint lords of a manor there; and Wreyland might likewise have become Four Ladies’ Land, had the last lord Dynham’s sisters all outlived him. I suppose the seven were joint lords of a manor, but I have no record of the fact. Prosaic people say the witches were wych elms.