On leaving Plymouth, we proceed easterly, and at the distance of five miles, pass through Plympton, or Plympton Earle, an ancient borough town, situated in a pleasant valley, about one mile south-east of the river Plym.

This is a market-town, and parish; it consists of two irregular streets, containing about 100 houses and 700 inhabitants. The church and Guildhall are ancient buildings, in the latter of which is a well-endowed free-school, erected in 1664, by Sir John Maynard, one of the trustees of Elizius Hele, Esq. who left 1500l. per annum for such purposes. Plympton is well known as the birth-place of that eminent painter Sir Joshua Reynolds, a fine portrait of whom, painted by himself, adorns the Guildhall. The town is extremely clean, and four fairs are held in it annually, for cattle, cloth, &c. Plympton is one of the Stannary towns for Devon; it is governed by a mayor, recorder, and seven aldermen, a bailiff, and two serjeants at mace; and sends two members to parliament. Some ruins of a castle, which was once the seat of the Earls of Devon, are still to be seen on a hill near the town.

These, with an artificial mount about seventy feet high and two hundred in circumference, stand on the north side of the town. The fortress included nearly two acres, and was encompassed by a high rampart and a very deep ditch. Some fragments of the castle on the top of the mount are of great thickness.

Sir Joshua Reynolds, by his illustrious character and abilities, not only shed a lustre on the place of his nativity, but was the great agent in advancing the arts and artists of England to a rivalship with those of enlightened Greece and Rome. Before the time of Sir Joshua, elegant art was an alien to this country; he naturalized it to the soil, and thus disproved the assertions of Du Bos, Winckelman, and Montesquieu, who had contended that the climate of England was inimical to the genius of painting.

This illustrious artist was born on the 36th July, His father was master of the grammar-school, and was either a very singular man or had accidentally obtained that character. Mr. Malone observes, that he fancied "an uncommon Christian name" for his son, might be the means of bettering his fortune, and therefore gave him the scriptural appellation of Joshua, Young Joshua evinced an early propensity for drawing, and began by copying some sketches made by his elder sisters, and also the prints from Cat’s Book of Emblems. When only eight years old, "he read, with great avidity and pleasure, The Jesuits' Perspective, ’" with the rules of which he soon made himself perfectly acquainted. Afterwards he obtained Richardson’s Treatise on Painting: the perusal of which so delighted and inflamed his young mind, that he thought Raphael the most exalted of mortal men, and resolved to become a painter himself. To gratify his propensity for the fascinating art, his father placed him under Thomas Hudson, the most celebrated portrait painter of that time. This gentleman was a native of Exeter, and was born in 1701. As a scholar, and son-in-law to Richardson the painter and author, he derived some practical knowledge, recommendation, and connections. Though a very indifferent artist, when compared to his distinguished pupil, he obtained considerable business in painting "the honest similitudes" of country gentlemen, who were faithfully represented, as Walpole observes, "in the fair tied wigs, blue velvet coats, and white satin waistcoats," which constituted the fashionable dress of the time. But our young artist soon excelled his master, and sought further excellence by a visit to Rome, and other places on the continent, where paintings were collected and preserved. On returning from Italy, where he had spent three years with Lord Keppel, he attracted the public notice and applause, by a full length portrait of his patron, the above nobleman. From this period he continued to advance in fame and fortune; and, by associating with the most distinguished literari of the age, by an amiable suavity of manners, and a union of literary and professional talents, he exalted his own honour with that of the arts and his country. He died much beloved and lamented, February 23rd, 1792, and was interred in the crypt of the Cathedral of St. Paul’s, with every honour that could be shown to worth and genius by an enlightened nation. His pall was supported by three Dukes, two Marquisses, and five other noblemen, and a numerous retinue of the most distinguished characters attended the funeral ceremony. Of his private and professional character, we shall give some account in the language of a living artist, as inserted in the supplement to Pilkington’s Dictionary of Painters.

"In many respects, both as a man and a painter, Sir Joshua Reynolds cannot be too much praised, studied, and imitated, by every one who wishes to attain the like, eminence. All nature, and all art, was his academy; and his mind was constantly awake, ever on the wing, comprehensive, vigorous, discriminating, and retentive. With taste to perceive all the varieties of the picturesque, judgment to select, and skill to combine what would serve his purpose, few have ever been empowered by nature to do more from the funds of his own genius; and none ever endeavoured more to take advantage of the labours of others, in making a splendid and useful collection, for which no expence was spared: his house was filled, to the remotest corners, with casts from the antique, pictures, statues, drawings, and prints, by the various masters of all the different schools and nations.

" Beautiful and seducing as his style undoubtedly was, it cannot be recommended in so unreserved a manner, as his industry both in study and practice. Colouring was evidently his first excellence, to which all others were, more or less, sacrificed; and though in splendour and brilliancy he was exceeded by Rubens and Paul Veronese, in force and depth by Titian and Rembrandt, and in freshness and truth by Velasquez and Vandyck, yet, perhaps, he possessed a more exquisite combination of all these qualities, and that peculiarly his own, than is to be found in the works of either of those celebrated masters.

"His discourses are written in an easy, agreeable manner, and contain many just observations, much excellent criticism, and valuable advice; but being undertaken before he had profoundly considered the subject, they are frequently vague and unintelligible, and sometimes contradictory."

The lines written on this great artist, by his friend Goldsmith, in his poem of Retaliation, are too characteristic to be omitted.

"Here Reynolds is laid; and, to tell you my mind,

He has not left a wiser or better behind.

His pencil was striking, resistless, and grand;

His manners were gentle, complying, and bland:

Still born to improve us in every part;

His pencil, our faces; his manners, our heart:

To coxcombs averse, yet most civilly steering,

When they judg’d without skill, he was still hard of hearing;

When they talk’d of their Raphaels, Correggios, and stuff,

He shifted his trumpet (Sir Joshua was so deaf, as to be obliged to use an ear-trumpet in company. ), and only took snuff."

Plympton St. Mary—adjoins the former parish, and contains 245 houses, and about 1600 inhabitants. Here was formerly a college, founded by one of the Saxon kings, but the society was dissolved in 1121, by the Bishop of Exeter, who established in its stead a priory of Augustines, whose revenues exceeded those of any other similar foundation in the diocese. After a further ride of six miles, embracing many pleasing views of villages, private seats, &c. we arrive at Ivy Bridge.

PLYMPTON ST. MARY, in Domesday, “Plintona,” is a parish and head of a union, with a station on the main line and another, called “Marsh Mills,” on the Launceston branch of the Great Western railway, and is 5 miles north-east-by-north from Plymouth, 13 south from Tavistock, 48 south-west from Exeter, 124 from Bristol by rail and 237 from London, in the Southern division of the county, Plympton hundred, Ermington and Plympton petty sessional division, county court district of East Stonehouse, rural deanery of Plympton, archdeaconry of Totnes and diocese of Exeter. The place is lighted with gas from works at Underwood, the property of the Plympton District Gas Co. Waterworks were erected here for Plympton St. Mary and St. Maurice in 1893, at a cost exceeding £10,000; these are now under the control of the Plympton Rural District Council and a good supply of water is obtained from Bottle Hill. The church of St. Mary, restored in 1860, is a very fine building of granite, chiefly in the Decorated and Perpendicular styles, and consists of chancel, nave, aisles, transept, south porch and an embattled western tower 108 feet in height, with pinnacles, containing a clock and 8 bells, dated respectively 1766, 1614 (2 and 6), 1754, 1725 (4 and 5); the dials of the clock were presented and the clock restored in 1889 by the late George Coaker esq. of Plym villa: the church retains sedilia and piscina, a side altar and some ancient brasses and monuments: two doorways belonging to the rood loft stairs also exist: there are several stained windows, the gift of the Treby family; the west window is a memorial to the Rev. W. T. Coppard, a former vicar, and the east window to Edmund, 2nd and late Earl of Morley, d. August 28, 1864: there is another memorial window to Fanny, wife of Sir Thomas Villiers Lister K.C.M.G, placed by the Earl and Dowager Countess of Morley; and one to Mr. Osmond, given by his son: the reredos was presented as a memorial to the Rev. Merton Smith M.A. late vicar, by his family, and a large cross has also been erected to his memory in the churchyard by public subscription: in the church are two fine recumbent effigies of knights in plate armour and bare headed; one of these, now in the north aisle, represents Richard Stroode, of Newnham, esq. c. 1464; the other, in the south aisle, placed on an altar-tomb within an arched recess, probably represents William Courtenay, of Loughtor esq.; the tomb bears the impaled shield of Courtenay, and on the arch above is the badge of the Hungerfords: in the north aisle is a large mural monument with kneeling effigies of a man in half-armour and trunk hose, and two ladies, one on either side; below these the busts, in low-relief, of ten children, and an inscription in Latin to Sir William Strode kt. ob. June 27, 1637, and his wives, Mary (Southcot) and Dionisia (Glanville); the monument, erected by his son, has a quartered shield above, and four shields below, with the motto “HIEME VERESCO”: a flat stone in the aisle is inscribed to Sidney Strode esq. ob. 1721, and Ann (Trevanion) his wife, ob. 1723, and bears a shield of arms; and one of the oaken benches displays eight shields illustrating the alliances of the Strodes and Courtenays; there are 900 sittings. The register of baptisms and marriages dates from the year 1603; burials, 1604. The living is a vicarage, net yearly value £230, in the gift of the Dean and Canons of Windsor, and held since 1883 by the Rev. Joseph Mercer Cox M.A. sometime fellow of Corpus Christi college, Cambridge, and chaplain to Plympton union. The impropriate tithes are commuted at £1,800 yearly. Here are Congregational, Wesleyan and Free Methodist chapels, and there is also a chapel for the Brethren. The early closing day is on Wednesday. A small Convalescent Hospital for Women was established here in 1883. The charities amount to £97 yearly. This village was formerly the site of a priory, founded in 1121 by Robert Warlewast, Bishop of Exeter 1150—9, and formerly Dean of Salisbury, in the place of a college, consisting of a dean and four canons, which had existed here from a very early period; the priory, dedicated to SS. Peter and Paul, was intended for canons of the order of St. Augustine: at the Dissolution there were 21 canons and its yearly revenues were estimated at £912: the Early English refectory, over a Norman undercroft, and a kitchen of the 15th century still remain at the Priory Mills; attached to this priory were cells at Marisca, near Exeter, and St. Anthony in Roseland, Cornwall. Saltram House, the seat of the Earl of Morley P.C., D.L., J.P. lord of the manor and barony of Plympton, is a stately mansion in an extensive and finely-wooded park on the east side of the river Plym, about 3 miles east-north-east of Plymouth, and was mostly built by Lady Katherine Parker, mother of the first Lord Boringdon; the beauty of the situation induced the Parkers to continue the enlargement of the mansion and the embellishments of the grounds, the groves and lawns of which overlook the waters of the estuary of the Plym, called the Laira; the house has been much improved by former earls and is surrounded by a beautiful lawn and grounds of about 300 acres in extent; its western front is 170 feet in length and the southern and eastern fronts each extend to 159 feet: adjoining the grounds is Plymouth race-course, and across the Plym is the Laira bridge, built by the 1st Earl of Morley. Boringdon House came into the possession of the Parker family in the 6th century, one of the Parkers of North Molton having married in 1583 Miss Mayhew, the heiress of Boringdon: the house is of considerable interest and contains a fine hall with a minstrels’ gallery; over the chimney-piece are the Royal arms, with the date 1604: it is now used as a farmhouse. Old Newnham, the ancestral seat of the Strode family, was erected by the monks of Plympton in the 11th century; it is now a farmhouse and in the occupation of Mr. B. W. Coaker. Newnham Park, the seat of George Sydney Strode Strode esq. J.P. is pleasantly situated the park of 236 acres is well timbered and watered by the river Tory; in the park is kept a fine herd of deer. The other principal seats are Elfordleigh, the residence of Mrs. Bainbridge, and Chaddlewood, of George William Culme Soltau-Symons esq. D.L., J.P. The Earl of Morley P.C. who is lord of the manor, George S. Strode Strode esq. G. W. C. Soltau-Symons esq. the Rev. George Ley Woollcombe M.A. of Hemerdon, Lord Seaton. Mrs. Bainbridge and Major-Gen. Paul Winsloe Phillipps-Treby, of Goodamoor, are the chief landowners. The soil is loam; subsoil, clay. The chief crops are wheat, barley, oats and root crops. The area, is 10,177 acres of land, 34 of water, 8 of tidal water and 47 of foreshore; rateable value, £31,641; the population in 1891 was 2,633 in the ecclesiastical and 3,837 in the civil parish, including 9 officers and 110 inmates in the workhouse, and 16 in the St. Elizabeth House of Rest.

PLYMPTON ST. MARY UNION.

Board day, alternate Fridays, at the Union house, Plympton, at 2 p.m.

The Union comprises the following parishes, viz.:-Bickleigh, Brixton, Compton Gifford, Cornwood, Egg Buckland, Ermington, Harford, Holbeton, Ivybridge, Newton Ferrers, Plympton Earls or Plympton St. Maurice, Plympton St. Mary, Plymstock, Revelstoke, St. Budeaux, Shaugh Prior, Tamerton Foliott, Wembury, Weston Peverel & Yealmpton. The population of the union in 1891 was 26,791, & in 1901 was 211,358; area, 74,081 acres; rateable value in 1901, £157,675.

By order of the Local Government Board, gazetted October 20, 1896:-(1) The parts of Compton Gifford, Egg Buckland & Laira Green civil parishes, which were by the “Plymouth (Extension) Order, 1896,” added to Charles civil parish, were transferred from Plympton sub-district of Plympton St. Mary registration district to Charles sub-district of Plymouth registration district. (2) The parts of Compton Gifford & Pennycross civil parishes, which were by the same order added to St. Andrew civil parish, were transferred from Plympton sub-district of Plympton St. Mary registration district to St. Andrew sub-district of Plymouth registration district.

The Workhouse, erected in 1836, is a plain building of stone & occupies the site of an ancient hospital founded as a lazar house in the time of Edward III.; it is endowed with land yielding £50 yearly & will hold 200 inmates.

VOLUNTEERS

2nd Devonshire Volunteer Artillery, Western Division Royal Garrison Artillery (No. 9 Co.), Lieut. S. Vosper, commanding.

SCHOOLS

National (mixed), built in 1866, for 290 children; average attendance, 160.

Public (mixed), built in 1877, & enlarged 1900, for 300 children; average attendance, 250.

Infants’ (Public) (2), for 70 children; average attendance, 57.

Infants’. Underwood, for 60 children; average attendance, 55.

PLYMPTON ST. MAURICE (otherwise Plympton Erie) is a small market town and parish, half a mile south-by-east from Plympton station on the South Devon section of the main line of the Great Western railway, 48 miles south-west from Exeter, 5 north-east-by-east of Plymouth, 13 south-east from Tavistock and 237 from London, in the Southern division of the county, Plympton hundred, Ermington and Plympton petty sessional division, union of Plympton St. Mary, county court district of East Stonehouse, rural deanery of Plympton, archdeaconry of Totnes and diocese of Exeter. Plympton derives its name from the river Plym, the estuary of which is now 2 miles distant, but was in ancient times much nearer; it was one of the ancient Stannary towns and was made a borough by charter from Baldwin de Redvers, 7th Earl of Devon, in March, 1241, subsequently confirmed by Edward I. Richard II. Henry V. Henry VI. and later monarchs, including Elizabeth, James II. and William and Mary; its municipal character was maintained until 1859, when the charter, which conferred no exclusive jurisdiction, as against the county, was allowed to lapse. The Corporation consisted of a mayor and 9 other aldermen, an indefinite number of freemen, bailiff, recorder, town clerk and subordinate officers. The borough returned two members to Parliament from 23 Edward I. (1294—5) up to the passing of the Reform Act of 1832, and amongst these are found the names of Serjeant Hele, William Strode, one of the famous “five members” in the reign of Charles I. Sir Nicholas Slanning kt. (1639), Sir John Maynard kt. Sir Christopher Wren (1685) and Lord Castlereagh. The church, anciently a chapel appendant to the Priory of Plympton St. Mary and dedicated to St. Thomas of Canterbury, was rebuilt in 1440 and rededicated to St. Maurice in the reign of Henry VIII.: it is a building of stone, in the Perpendicular style, consisting of chancel, nave, aisles, south porch and an embattled western tower, containing a clock and 8 bells, the first three and the fifth dating from 1768, the fourth was re-cast in 1735, the tenor was re-cast in the parish in 1833, and about 1897 2 additional bells were presented, in memory of Col. Buller, by members of the family: there are nine memorial windows and several mural tablets: the church was thoroughly restored in 1879, at a cost of £2,940, and now affords 340 sittings. The register dates from the year 1616. The living is a rectory, net yearly value £98, including 14 acres of glebe, with residence, in the gift of the Dean and Canons of Windsor, and held since 1876 by the Rev. Henry Tubal Hole M.A. of Corpus Christi College, Oxford. There are Wesleyan and Calvinistic chapels and several small charities, amounting to about £18 yearly. The ancient Town Hall is now leased by the representatives of the old Corporation and is used for lectures and concerts: it formerly contained a portrait of Sir Joshua Reynolds, painted by himself, but this was sold by the Corporation in 1832 to the Earl of Egremont, for a sum of £150. The insignia of the defunct Corporation includes three maces and a common seal; the three maces, which data from the latter part of the Stuart period, are of copper gilt, 2 feet 6 inches in length and precisely similar in every respect; the shafts are plain, banded with projecting belts of foliaged work, and terminating in foot knops, adorned in like manner; the heads are divided into compartments by armless winged cherubs, merged into acanthus foliage, and exhibit the national badges crowned; from the cresting rise open-arched crowns, and on the flat top of the heads are the royal arms of the Stuarts; the borough seal displays the figure of an eagle rising and is surrounded by a legend of the name of the town. Here is a private lunatic asylum, once the residence of the Treby family; it is a spacious building, licensed for 43 patients; Charles Aldridge M.D. and Alfred Turner M.D. are the proprietors and medical-superintendents. A cattle market is held the first Monday in each month. Sir Joshua Reynolds, elected president of the Royal Academy at its first establishment, was born here 16th July, 1723, his father, a clergyman, being then master of the Plympton Grammar School: on the foundation of the Royal Academy in 1768, he was chosen president and knighted; in 1773 he was elected mayor of Plympton and received from the University of Oxford the honorary degree of D.C.L, and in 1783 became principal painter to the king; he died at his house in Leicester square, London, 23rd February, 1792, and was buried in St. Paul’s Cathedral.

Plympton Castle, situated north of the town, was built, by Richard de Abrincis or de Redvers, 1st Earl of Devon, in the reign of Henry I.; it was sometime the seat of the Earls of Devon, and in Domesday Book is spoken of as “terra regis,” or part of the king’s demesne. In the reign of Stephen, Baldwin de Redvers, 2nd Earl of Deven, espousing the cause of the Empress Maud, fortified the castle against the king, but was compelled to surrender without any active resistance; during the Civil War it served as the head quarters of Prince Maurice during the siege of Plymouth in 1643, but in 1644 was captured by the Earl of Essex; the remains consist chiefly of a mound on which linger some fragments of the keep, situated at the eastern end of the inner court. The earthworks are in good preservation, and retain, if not the actual vallum, at least the outline of the Roman camp which preceded the later fortifications. Erie Hall is the residence of Admiral Sir Alexander Buller K.C.B., J.P. The Rt. Hon. the Earl of Morley P.C. who is lord of the manor of Plympton, Tollexfen Colmore Copleston Radcliffe esq. of Derriford, who is lord of the manor of Plympton Grange, Admiral Sir A. Buller K.C.B, and Arthur Thomas Mudge esq. J.P. are the principal landowners. The soil is shale and clay; the subsoil is principally clay. The area is 232 acres; rateable value, £3,871; the population in 1891 was 1,139, including 51 in Plympton House private asylum.

SCHOOLS

Grammar School, founded in 1658 by Elize Hele & restored in 1870 at a cost of £2,000: there are six Hele scholarships, assigned to the most meritorious boys from the elementary schools of Plympton & Brixton, & entitling the holders to free education at the Grammar school; a founder’s prize of £10 is annually awarded to the scholar who does best in the yearly examinations; the curriculum includes certain forms of technical instruction, & there is a chemical laboratory & a carpenter’s workshop: the income of the school is about £200 yearly: a portrait of Sir Joshua Reynolds P.R.A, who was educated at this school, was presented to it by the late Miss Jones; here also were educated James Northcote R.A.; Sir Charles L. Eastlake P.R.A. & Benjamin R. Haydon, the historical painter, who was at the head of the school in 1801.

National (mixed), built in 1874, for 140 children; average attendance, 123.