Devonshire Characters and Strange Events

As to the sweet cyder, Mr. Stafford despises it. “It may be acceptable to a female, or a Londoner, it is ever offensive to a bold and generous West Saxon,” says he.

Mr. Stafford flattered himself one year that he had beaten the Royal Wilding. He had planted pips, and after many years brewed a pipe of the apples of his wildings in 1724. Mr. Wollocombe was invited to taste it. “The surprise (and even almost silence) with which he was seized at first tasting it was plainly perceived by everyone present, and occasioned no small diversion.” But, alas! after it was bottled this “Super-Celestial,” as it had been named, as the year advanced, appeared thin compared with the cyder of the Royal Wilding, and Hugh Stafford was constrained after a first flush of triumph to allow that the Royal Wilding maintained pre-eminence.

According to our author, the addition of a little sage or clary to thin cyder gives it a taste as of a good Rhenish wine; and he advises the crushing to powder of angelica roots to add to cyder, as is done in Oporto by those who prepare port for the English market. It gives a flavour and a bouquet truly delicious.

At the English Revolution, when William of Orange came to the throne, the introduction of French wines into the country was prohibited, and this gave a great impetus to the manufacture of cyder, and care in the production of cyder of the best description. But the imposition of a duty of ten shillings a hogshead on cyder that was not repealed, as already said, till 1830, killed the industry. Farmers no longer cared to keep up their orchards, and grew apples only for home consumption. They gave the cyder to their labourers, and as these were not particular as to the quality, no pains were taken to produce such as would suit men’s refined palates. The workman liked a rough beverage, one that almost cut his throat as it passed down; and this produced the evil effect that the farmers, who were bound by their leases to keep up their orchards, planted only the coarsest sort of apples, and the higher quality of fruit was allowed to die out. The orchards fell into, and in most cases remain still in a deplorable condition of neglect. Hear what is the report of the Special Commissioner of the Gardeners’ Magazine, as to the state of the orchards in Devon. “They will not, as a rule, bear critical examination. As a matter of fact Devonshire, compared with other counties, has made little or no progress of late years, and there are hundreds of orchards in that county that are little short of a disgrace to those who own or rent them. The majority of the orchards are rented by farmers, who too often are the worst of gardeners and the poorest of fruit growers, and they cannot be induced to improve on their methods.” The writer goes on to say, that so long as the farmers have enough trees standing or blown over, to bear fruit that suffices for their home consumption, they are content, and with complete indifference, they suffer the cattle to roam about the orchards, bite off the bark, and rend the branches and tender shoots from the trees.

“If you tackle the farmers on the subject, and in particular strongly advise them to see what can be done towards improving their old orchards and forming new ones, they will become uncivil at once.”

It is sad to have to state that the famous “Royal Wilding” is no longer known, not even at Pynes, where it was extensively planted by Hugh Stafford.

Messrs. Veitch, the well-known nurserymen at Exeter and growers of the finest sorts of apples, inform me that they have not heard of it for many years. Mr. H. Whiteway, who produces some of the best cyder in North Devon, writes to me: “With regard to the Royal Wilding mentioned in Mr. Hugh Stafford’s book, I have made diligent inquiry in and about the neighbourhood in which it was grown at the time stated, but up to now have been unable to find any trace of it, and this also applies to the White-Sour. I am, however, not without hope of discovering some day a solitary remnant of the variety.”

This loss is due to the utter neglect of the orchards in consequence of the passing and maintenance of Lord Bute’s mischievous Bill. This Bill was the more deplorable in its results because in and about 1750 cyder had replaced the lighter clarets in the affections of all classes, and was esteemed as good a drink as the finest Rhenish, and much more wholesome. Rudolphus Austen, who introduced it at the tables of the dons of Oxford, undertook to “raise cyder that shall compare and excel the wine of many provinces nearer the sun, where they abound with fruitful vineyards.” And he further asserted: “A seasonable and moderate use of good cyder is the surest remedy and preservative against the diseases which do frequently afflict the sedentary life of them that are seriously studious.” He died in 1666.

Considerable difference of opinion exists as to the advantage or disadvantage of cyder for those liable to rheumatism. But this difference of opinion is due largely, if not wholly, to the kinds of cyder drunk. The sweet cyder is unquestionably bad in such cases, but that in which there is not so much sugar is a corrective to the uric acid that causes rheumatism. In Noake’s Worcestershire Relics appears the following extract from the journal of a seventeenth-century parson. “This parish (Dilwyn), wherein syder [sic] is plentiful, hath and doth afford many people that have and do enjoy the blessing of long life, neither are the aged here bed-ridden or decrepit as elsewhere, but for the most part lively and vigorous. Next to God, wee ascribe it to our flourishing orchards, which are not only the ornament but the pride of our country, yielding us rich and winy liquors.” At Whimple, in Devon, the rectors, like their contemporary, the Rev. Robert Wollocombe, the discoverer of the Royal Wilding a century or so later than the Dilwyn parson, were both cyder makers and cyder drinkers. The tenure of office of two of them covered a period of over a century, and the last of these worthy divines lived to tell the story of how the Exeter coach set down the bent and crippled dean at his door, who, after three weeks ‘cyder cure’ at the hospitable rectory, had thrown his crutches to the dogs and turned his face homewards “upright as a bolt.”1

The apple is in request now for three purposes quite distinct: the dessert apple, to rival those introduced from America; that largely employed for the manufacture of jams – the basis, apple, flavoured to turn it into raspberry, apricot, etc.; and last, but not least, the cyder-producing apple which is unsuited for either of the former requirements.

In my Book of the West I have given a lengthy ballad of instruction on the growth of apple trees, and the gathering of apples and the making of cyder, which I heard sung by an old man at Washfield, near Tiverton. The following song was sung to me by an aged tanner of Launceston, some twenty years ago, which he professed to have composed himself: —

In a nice little village not far from the sea,Still lives my old uncle aged eighty and three;Of orchards and meadows he owns a good lot,Such cyder as his – not another has got.Then fill up the jug, boys, and let it go round,Of drinks not the equal in England is found.So pass round the jug, boys, and pull at it free,There’s nothing like cyder, sparkling cyder, for me.My uncle is lusty, is nimble and spry,As ribstones his cheeks, clear as crystal his eye,His head snowy white as the flowering may,And he drinks only cyder by night and by day.Then fill up the jug, etc.O’er the wall of the churchyard the apple trees leanAnd ripen their burdens, red, golden, and green.In autumn the apples among the graves lie;“There I’ll sleep well,” says uncle, “when fated to die.”Then fill up the jug, etc.“My heart as an apple, sound, juicy, has been,My limbs and my trunk have been sturdy and clean;Uncankered I’ve thriven, in heart and in head,So under the apple trees lay me when dead.”Then fill up the jug, etc.

THE ALPHINGTON PONIES

During the forties of last century, every visitor to Torquay noticed two young ladies of very singular appearance. Their residence was in one of the two thatched cottages on the left of Tor Abbey Avenue, looking seaward, very near the Torgate of the avenue. Their chief places of promenade were the Strand and Victoria Parade, but they were often seen in other parts of the town. Bad weather was the only thing that kept them from frequenting their usual beat. They were two Misses Durnford, and their costume was peculiar. The style varied only in tone and colour. Their shoes were generally green, but sometimes red. They were by no means bad-looking girls when young, but they were so berouged as to present the appearance of painted dolls. Their brown hair worn in curls was fastened with blue ribbon, and they wore felt or straw hats, usually tall in the crown and curled up at the sides. About their throats they had very broad frilled or lace collars that fell down over their backs and breasts a long way. But in summer their necks were bare, and adorned with chains of coral or bead. Their gowns were short, so short indeed as to display about the ankles a good deal more than was necessary of certain heavily-frilled cotton investitures of their lower limbs. In winter over their gowns were worn check jackets of a “loud” pattern reaching to their knees, and of a different colour from their gowns, and with lace cuffs. They were never seen, winter or summer, without their sunshades. The only variation to the jacket was a gay-coloured shawl crossed over the bosom and tied behind at the waist.

The sisters dressed exactly alike, and were so much alike in face as to appear to be twins. They were remarkably good walkers, kept perfectly in step, were always arm in arm, and spoke to no one but each other.

They lived with their mother, and kept no servant. All the work of the house was done by the three, so that in the morning they made no appearance in the town; only in the afternoon had they assumed their war-paint, when, about 3 p.m., they sallied forth; but, however highly they rouged and powdered, and however strange was their dress, they carried back home no captured hearts. Indeed, the visitors to Torquay looked upon them with some contempt as not being in society and not dressing in the fashion; only some of the residents felt for them in their solitude some compassion. They were the daughters of a Colonel Durnford, and had lived at Alphington. The mother was of an inferior social rank. They had a brother, a major in the Army, 10th Regiment, who was much annoyed at their singularity of costume, and offered to increase their allowance if they would discontinue it; but this they refused to do.

When first they came to Torquay, they drove a pair of pretty ponies they had brought with them from Alphington; but their allowance being reduced, and being in straitened circumstances, they had to dispose of ponies and carriage. By an easy transfer the name of Alphington Ponies passed on from the beasts to their former owners.

As they were not well off, they occasionally got into debt, and were summoned before the Court of Requests; and could be impertinent even to the judge. On one occasion, when he had made an order for payment, one of them said, “Oh, Mr. Praed, we cannot pay now; but my sister is about to be married to the Duke of Wellington, and then we shall be in funds and be able to pay for all we have had and are likely to want!” Once the two visited a shop and gave an order, but, instead of paying, flourished what appeared to be the half of a £5 note, saying, that when they had received the other half, they would be pleased to call and discharge the debt. But the tradesman was not to be taken in, and declined to execute the order. Indeed, the Torquay shopkeepers were very shy of them, and insisted on the money being handed over the counter before they would serve the ladies with the goods that they required.

They made no acquaintances in Torquay or in the neighbourhood, nor did any friends come from a distance to stay with them. They would now and then take a book out of the circulating library, but seemed to have no literary tastes, and no special pursuits. There was a look of intelligence, however, in their eyes, and the expression of their faces was decidedly amiable and pleasing.

They received very few letters; those that did arrive probably contained remittances of money, and were eagerly taken in at the door, but there was sometimes a difficulty about finding the money to pay for the postage. It is to be feared that the butcher was obdurate, and that often they had to go without meat. Fish, however, was cheap.

A gentleman writes: “Mr. Garrow’s house, The Braddons, was on my father’s hands to let. One day the gardener, Tosse, came in hot haste to father and complained that the Alphington Ponies kept coming into the grounds and picking the flowers, that when remonstrated with they declared that they were related to the owner, and had permission. ‘Well,’ said father, ‘the next time you see them entering the gate run down and tell me.’ In a few days Tosse hastened to say that the ladies were again there. Father hurried up to the grounds, where he found them flower-picking. Without the least ceremony he insisted on their leaving the grounds at once. They began the same story to him of their relationship to the owner, adding thereto, that they were cousins of the Duke of Wellington. ‘Come,’ said father, ‘I can believe one person can go mad to any extent in any direction whatever, but the improbability of two persons going mad in identically the same direction and manner at the same time is a little too much for my credulity. Ladies, I beg you to proceed.’ And proceed they did.”

After some years they moved to Exeter, and took lodgings in St. Sidwell’s parish. For a while they continued to dress in the same strange fashion; but they came into some money, and then were able to indulge in trinkets, to which they had always a liking, but which previously they could not afford to purchase. At a large fancy ball, given in Exeter, two young Oxonians dressed up to represent these ladies; they entered the ballroom solemnly, arm in arm, with their parasols spread, paced round the room, and finished their perambulation with a waltz together. This caused much amusement; but several ladies felt that it was not in good taste, and might wound the poor crazy Misses Durnford. This, however, was not the case. So far from being offended at being caricatured, they were vastly pleased, accepting this as the highest flattery. Were not princesses and queens also represented at the ball? Why, then, not they?

One public ball they did attend together, at which, amongst others, were Lady Rolle and Mr. Palk, son of the then Sir Lawrence Palk. Owing to their conspicuous attire, they drew on them the attention of Lady Rolle, who challenged Mr. Palk to ask one of the sisters for a dance, and offered him a set of gold and diamond shirt studs if he could prevail on either of them to be his partner. Mr. Palk accepted the challenge, but on asking for a dance was met in each case by the reply, “I never dance except my sister be also dancing.” Mr. Palk then gallantly offered to dance with both sisters at once, or in succession. He won and wore the studs.

A gentleman writes: “In their early days they made themselves conspicuous by introducing the bloomer arrangement in the nether latitude.2 This, as you may well suppose, was regarded as a scandal; but these ladies, who were never known to speak to any one, or to each other out of doors, went on their way quite unruffled. Years and years after this, you may imagine my surprise at meeting them in Exeter, old and grey, but the same singular silent pair. Then, after an interval of a year or two, only one appeared. I assure you, it gave me pain to look at that poor lonely, very lonely soul; but it was not for long. Kind Heaven took her also, and so a tiny ripple was made, and there was an end of the Alphington Ponies.”

MARIA FOOTE

If there was ever a creature who merited the sympathy of the world, it is Maria Foote. If there was ever a wife who deserved its commiseration, it is her mother.” With these words begins a notice of the actress in The Examiner for 1825.

About the year 1796 an actor appeared in Plymouth under the name of Freeman, but whose real name was Foote, and who claimed relationship with Samuel Foote, the dramatist and performer. He was of a respectable family, and his brother was a clergyman at Salisbury. Whilst on a visit to his brother, he met the sister of his brother’s wife, both daughters of a Mr. Charles Hart; she was then a girl of seventeen, in a boarding-school, and to the disgrace of all parties concerned therein, this simple boarding-school maid was induced to marry a man twenty-five years older than herself, and to give great offence to her parents, who withdrew all interest in her they had hitherto shown. Foote returned to Plymouth with his wife, a sweet innocent girl. He was at the time proprietor and manager of the Plymouth Theatre; and as, in country towns, actors and actresses were looked down upon by society, no respectable family paid Mrs. Foote the least attention, and although the whole town was interested in her appearance, it regarded her simply with pity.

Deserted by the reputable of one sex, she threw herself into the society of the other; and in Plymouth, her good humour, fascinating manner, long silken hair, and white hat and feather made havoc among the young bloods. The husband was too apathetic to care who hovered about his wife, with whom she flirted; and she, without being vicious, finding herself slighted causelessly, became indifferent to the world’s opinion. Her elderly husband, seeing that she was not visited, began himself to neglect her.

The produce of this ill-assorted union was Maria Foote, ushered into the world without a friend on the maternal, and very few on the paternal side, who took any interest in her welfare, and she was brought up amid scenes little calculated to give her self-respect, sense of propriety, or any idea of domestic love and happiness.

From the disappointment and weariness of mind that weighed on the slighted wife, Mrs. Foote sought relief in attending the theatre nightly and acting on the stage. Daily and hourly seeing, hearing, and talking of little else but the stage, as might be expected, a wish to become an actress took possession of the child’s mind at an early age.

When Maria was twelve years of age, her mother was so far lost to all delicacy of feeling, and her father so insensible to the duties of a father, that he suffered his only daughter to act Juliet to the Romeo of his wife.

Plymouth was disgusted, thoroughly disgusted, and whatever claims Mr. Foote had before to the notice of some private friends, they now considered these as forfeited for ever. From this moment a sort of reckless indifference seemed to possess the whole family. Nothing came amiss, so that money could be obtained; and Foote, who had been brought up as a gentleman, and his wife as a lady, took a small inn in Exeter, in 1811, lost his wife’s fortune, became the dupe of rogues, and was ruined.

The fame of Maria Foote’s beauty and charm of manner had reached London, and in May, 1814, she made her first appearance at Covent Garden Theatre, and personated Amanthis in “The Child of Nature” with such grace and effect that the manager complimented her with an immediate engagement. Young, beautiful, intelligent, and with natural refinement, she was almost the creature she represented. A liberal salary was assigned to her, and the managers always considered the announcement of her name as certain of obtaining for them a crowded house. That she had no pretensions to a rank higher than that of a second-rate actress must, perhaps, be allowed. “I was never a great actress,” she used to say in later life, “though people thought me fascinating, and that I suppose I was.”

She was always dressed tastefully, looked charming, and was a universal favourite among the lobby loungers. A writer in The Drama for 1825 says: “To those who know nothing of a theatre, it may be new to tell them that an interesting girl is in the jaws of ruin, who enters it as an actress, unless watched and protected by her family and friends. Constantly exposed to the gaze of men – inflaming a hundred heads, and agitating a thousand hearts, if she be as Maria was, fascinating and amiable – surrounded by old wretches as dressers, who are the constant conveyers of letters, sonnets and flattery – dazzled by the thunders of public applause, and softened by the incense of a thousand sighs, breathed audibly from the front of the pit or the stage boxes – associating in the green-room with licensed married strumpets, because she must not be affected! Or supping on the stage, after the curtain is dropped, with titled infamy or grey-headed lechery! – Let the reader fancy an innocent girl, from a country town, plunged at once into the furnace of depravity – let him fancy her father sanctioning her by his indifference or helping her by his example, and then let him say, if she be ultimately seduced and abandoned, whether it ought not to be a wonder she was innocent so long.”

In spite of an education that never cherished the best feelings of a child, Maria had a far sounder understanding than her parents, and an instinctive modesty that withstood the evil with which she was surrounded.

In the summer of 1815, Maria Foote was engaged as a star to perform at Cheltenham, and there attracted the attention of Fitzharding Berkeley, better known as Colonel Berkeley. This gentleman was the son of Frederick Augustus, fifth Earl of Berkeley, by Mary Cole, the beautiful daughter of a butcher at Gloucester, to whom he was married in 1796. The Colonel was born in 1786. The Earl, indeed, affirmed that a private marriage had taken place in 1785; the House of Lords disallowed the proofs, in consequence of which one of the Colonel’s younger brothers, born after 1796, became entitled to the earldom; he, however, always refused to assume the title. Colonel Berkeley was an enthusiastic amateur of the stage, and he offered his services to perform at the benefit of Miss Foote, and she accepted his offer. The house was full to the ceiling, and Maria, of course, felt grateful for the aid thus lent her. After thus ingratiating himself, he seized the opportunity to plead the passion with which she had inspired him. The old Earl, his father, had died in 1810, and the Colonel was endeavouring to establish his claim to the earldom. He pleaded with her, that till his claim was allowed he could not well marry her, as such a marriage, he asserted, would prejudice his suit to recover the forfeited earldom of Berkeley, but he solemnly vowed his intention to make her his wife the moment that he could do so without injuring his cause. By this means he deluded the unfortunate girl into a connexion with him that lasted for five years, and during all that time he made her no allowance beyond the payment of those expenses which he himself had led her to incur, and the presents he made to her did not in all that time amount to £100. In 1821, Maria bore the Colonel a child, and had again expectations of becoming a mother in 1824, and in the June of that year all connexion ceased between them.

In the spring of 1823, Mr. Joseph Hayne, a young man of fortune, commonly known, from the colour of his coat, as “Pea-green” Hayne, saw Maria Foote at Covent Garden Theatre, was struck with her beauty, called at her house in Keppel Street, and invited Mr. Foote to spend some days with him at Kitson Hall in Staffordshire, one of his seats. The invitation was accepted, and there Hayne informed the father that he desired to pay his addresses to his charming daughter. Mr. Foote hurried back to town, and as Maria was expecting her confinement, sent off his wife with her into the country under the feigned name of Forbes, to remain in concealment till after that event.

In the following January, Hayne again called at Keppel Street, and announced to Mrs. Foote that he seriously desired to be united in marriage to her daughter. Mrs. Foote informed him that Maria was engaged to be married to Colonel Berkeley, and that her daughter could not listen to his suit unless the Colonel failed to fulfil his promise. Hayne then said that he was about to go into the country, and asked permission to escort Mrs. and Miss Foote to the opera, and to tender to them his private box. To this the lady consented. As it happened, Colonel Berkeley with a Mr. Manse happened to be in the pit that evening, and the Colonel at once dispatched his friend to the box to request Hayne to speak with him in the pit. When the young buck came to him, Berkeley asked him for an explanation of his conduct with respect to Miss Foote, and desired a meeting on the following day. When they met the Colonel disclosed to Hayne everything relative to his connexion with Maria Foote, and told him that he was the father by her of two children. On hearing this Mr. Hayne at once wrote to the lady to withdraw his proposal of marriage. She, in reply, requested an interview with him in order to explain the circumstances. This took place at Marlborough in the presence of Mrs. Foote. The young man (he was aged only twenty-two) was moved by her sad story, and on his return to town found that his flame had not been quenched by the revelation. So he penned a letter to Maria, stating that his feelings remained unaltered, and begging her to marry him. After some negotiation she agreed to this, and at Hayne’s advice the children were sent to Colonel Berkeley, who had asked for them. Hayne proposed to settle £40,000 on Miss Foote, for himself and her to receive the dividends during their joint lives, and after the death of the survivor of them, to be distributed equally among the children of the marriage, if any; and if, at the death of Mr. Hayne, his wife should survive him, but have no children, then £20,000 was to become the absolute property of the widow. The day for the wedding was fixed to take place on the ensuing 4th September, and “May God strike me dead,” asseverated the young man, “if ever I consent to separate myself from you, dearest Maria.”