Guide-books tell of the “curious epitaphs” at Porlock, but they are not so curious as might thus be supposed; certainly not more so than those of the average country churchyard. The chief feature of these is their ungrammatical character, as where we read of Henry Pulsford and Richard Bale, “who was both drownd” at “Lymouth,” in 1784. Poetry—or rather, verse—that changed, in arbitrary fashion, from first person to third, was still possible in 1860, as witness these unpleasant lines upon one Thomas Fry: For many weeks my friends did see Approaching death attending me. No favour could his body find, Till in the earth it was confined, and so forth. The “Ship” inn is almost, if not even quite, as well known a feature of Porlock as the church, and is unaltered since Southey sheltered here considerably over a hundred years ago— By the unwelcome summer rain confined. The thatch has, of course, been renewed from time to time, but always in the old traditional style, and the white walls are obviously what they were a couple of centuries or more ago. The oldest part of the inn is probably a curious little trefoiled-headed wooden window, of semi-ecclesiastical design, under the eaves. [Illustration: INGLENOOK, “SHIP” INN, PORLOCK.] Southey sat in the little parlour still existing, and, by the inglenook that has fortunately been preserved, wrote the oft-quoted lines: Porlock, thy verdant vale, so fair to sight, Thy lofty hills, which fern and furze embrown, Thy waters, that roll musically down Thy woody glens, the traveller with delight Recalls to memory, and the channel grey Circling it, surging in thy level bay. [Illustration: “THE SHIP” INN, PORLOCK.] A small window in this chimney-corner commands a view up the road, just as of old, where the famed “Porlock Hill” begins that steep and long-continued rise which has made it known, far and near, as “the worst hill in the West of England.” This is a mile-long rise from Porlock Vale to the wild, exposed tableland that stretches, for seven miles, to Countisbury, where it descends steeply to Lynmouth. The rise of Porlock Hill is one thousand feet, but the tableland beyond it rises yet another 378 feet by Culbone Hill. The gradient of Porlock Hill is in parts as steep as one in six, and the surface is always, at all seasons of the year, bad in the extreme. A sharp bend to the right appears, a little way uphill. In summer a mass of red dust six or eight inches deep, and plentifully mixed with large stones, it is in winter a pudding-like mixture of a clayey nature. The spectacle of heavy-laden coaches toiling up this fearsome so-called “road” is a distressing one for those who love horses, and grieve to see them overtaxed. No cyclist could, of course, hope to ride up, while none but a madman would attempt to ride down.