made the acquaintance of the Bonds, and fell in love with my mother. As my father had very fair hair, and was tall, six feet, when on his way to the Bonds' house, my aunts would say to their sister, "Sophie! here comes the Silver Poplar again!"
Unfortunately, my grandfather induced him to agree to the sale of some remains of our Staverton and Buckfastleigh property that was entailed, with the arrangement that he should furnish my father with a comfortable annuity, on which he could live with ease. This had two disadvantages. It lost to the family a property at this date worth four times what it was sold for, and it prevented my father from taking a consulate or returning to India and pursuing his profession in the army.
The house taken by my father was in a valley, facing the west, watered by a little stream beyond which rises a steep and lofty hill crowned by the village and church of Bratton, shutting off afternoon sunlight from the house during the winter.
The parish was one of much interest. It had formerly been parcelled up among several gentle families, bearing arms, the Coryndons, Burnabys, Ellacotts, Langsfords, Hills, and Phayres, but all have disappeared, leaving no traces; their very houses retain little indication of ancient dignity. The only name remaining of former gentility is that of Pengelly. There was, in the seventeenth century, an Andrew Pengelly of the family that was estated at Whitchurch, near Tavistock. He was rector of Bratton, and left a number of children, who married and settled in that or neighbouring parishes, and a descendant was for many years our coachman, and his grandson is now my son's chauffeur. Another Pengelly is keeper. The last of the Coryndons of whom I could learn anything was a carpenter in Devonport dockyard.
The hill on which the village stands is a spur thrown out by the long upland ridge of Broadbury. Botanically the parish is interesting: pasture-land, wood, moor and fen supply great varieties of plants; it did more so in the early part of the century than at its close when drainage had dried up the morasses, and enclosures and the plough had banished the moorland plants. My mother enjoyed drying and painting the specimens she collected.
As my story is mainly concerned with that portion of S. Devon contained within the arc of Broadbury, I may as well give some particulars concerning it.
