The Devonshire Commons are not to be confused with the Forest of Dartmoor. They constitute rather the purlieus, and, in general, afford better pasturage than the forest itself. Neither are they identical with the commons of the separate vills--the manorial or parochial commons. The whole of the inhabitants of the county may be regarded as possessing an interest in the Devonshire Commons, with the exception of the people of Barnstaple and Totnes, the reason being that those districts not having been afforested with the rest of the county, the residents acquired no new privileges when Devonshire was disafforested. The other inhabitants retained whatever rights they had previously enjoyed not only in respect of the Devonshire Commons, but of the Forest of Dartmoor, of which, at some early period--before the era of perambulations, in which they were not included--those commons had no doubt formed part. One effect of the wide extent of the right of common was that the rule of _levant and couchant_ did not obtain here. Naturally, when all Devonshire men were entitled to the use of the land, it was impossible to fix a limit to the number of the beasts that might be turned out throughout the length and breadth of the county. Mention was made above of royal forests as occupying, in some respects, a different position from other lands in which a right of common was exercised. Dartmoor, although the property of the Prince of Wales as Duke of Cornwall, may be taken as, to all intents and purposes, answering to that description; and thus peculiar interest attaches to the usages which prevailed, and still prevail, within its bounds.