Page:A book of the west; being an introduction to Devon and Cornwall.djvu/425

Rh mouth may be traced the entrenchments cast up by the Parliamentarians in the siege of Salcombe Castle.

The river Avon, that runs down from Dartmoor, is followed by the branch line of the Great Western Railway to Kingsbridge. A station is at Gara Bridge (Garw, Celtic for rough). The river passes under Loddiswell (Lady's Well), and then, unable to reach the Kingsbridge estuary on account of an intervening hill 370 feet high, turns sulkily to the right and enters Bigbury Bay far away to the west. Clearly Kingsbridge Harbour was made to receive it, but the river, like the life of many a man, has taken a twist and gone astray. But where the river went not, there goes the train by a tunnel.

The Avon enters the sea under Thirlstone, a parish that takes its name from a rock that has been "thirled" or drilled by the waves, on the beach. The church contains a few fragments of the screen worked up to form an altar.

An interesting expedition may be made from Kingsbridge to the mouth of the Erme. Above where the river debouches into the sea is Oldaport, the remains, supposed to be Roman, of a harbour commanded by two towers. One of the latter has of late years been destroyed.

The ancient port occupying two creeks remains silted up. There is absolutely no record of its having been used in mediaeval times, and this leads to the supposition that it is considerably earlier. It is a very interesting relic; but the two towers have