A Book of the West. Volume I Devon

There is yet another, the Meavy Oak, sometimes called the Gospel Oak, for it is supposed that preaching was made from the steps of the village cross that stands before it. The oak, however, is of vast age. It is referred to in deeds almost to the Conquest, and that it was a sacred tree to which a certain amount of reverence was given is probable enough. The cross was set up under its shadow to consecrate it, and probably to put an end to superstitious rites done there. Anyhow this tree till within this century was, on the village festival, surrounded with poles, a platform was erected above the tree, the top of which was kept clipped flat like a table, and a set of stairs erected, by means of which the platform could be reached.

On the top a table and chairs were set, and feasting took place. Whether dancing I cannot say, but in all probability in former generations there was dancing there as well as feeding and drinking. These trees where dancing took place are precisely the May-pole in a more primitive form. The May-pole is a makeshift for an actual tree; a pole was brought and set up and adorned with flowers and green boughs, and then danced round. There was in Cornwall, and indeed elsewhere, a grand exodus from the towns and villages to the greenwood on May Day, when the lads and lasses at a very early hour went in quest of May bushes, green boughs and flowers wherewith to decorate the improvised May tree. This was then decorated profusely, and the merry-makers danced about it; ate, drank, and rose up to play, precisely as of old did the Israelites about the Golden Calf in the wilderness of Sinai.

And most assuredly in early times, before Christianity had been established, those dances and revels about a sacred tree, whether naturally grown or whether manufactured as a May-pole, were an act of religious worship addressed to the spirit of vegetation manifesting itself in full vigour in spring.

When S. Boniface strove to bring the Saxons to the knowledge of the truth, he cast down the great oak of Fritzlar which had received divine honours. In this lived the spirit of fertility, and till it fell beneath his axe, Boniface was well aware that he could not triumph over the popular superstition.

S. Germanus, Bishop of Auxerre, who visited Britain to expose the Pelagian heresy, was himself guilty before his ordination of paying superstitious reverence to a pear tree. He had been a hunter, and it was customary for those who returned from the chase to suspend in the tree the heads and antlers of the game killed, as an act of homage to the spirit that inhabited it. The Bishop Amator remonstrated, but in vain. Then one day, when Germanus was out hunting, Amator cut the tree down.

That some lingering notion of veneration due to trees hung on, and was regarded as savouring of something not orthodox, is perhaps shown by the following incident, which is perfectly true. It was told me by the person concerned. A new parson had been appointed to a remote parish in one of the north-western dales of Yorkshire under the Fells. Not being a native of Yorkshire, but a southerner, he was eyed with suspicion, and his movements were watched. Now in the parsonage garden was a large tree, and about the roots was a bed of violets. The suspicious villagers observed the pastor as he walked round the tree and every now and then bowed to pick a violet. This proceeding took place daily. Why he bowed they could not understand, unless it were in homage to the tree, and they actually drew up a memorial to the Archbishop of York complaining of their parson as guilty of idolatrous tree-worship.

The bush hung out of a wine-shop signified that within were drinking and dancing. The bush is but the sacred tree reduced to its smallest dimensions, and the drinking and dancing that in former times took place around the tree are now relegated to within the house, but the bush is retained to symbolise roystering and mirth. I remember the case of a gentleman who "went off his head;" his family were reluctant to allow it to transpire. But one day a climax was put to his eccentricities by his thrusting the stable broom out at an upper window, and proclaiming, "This bush is to give notice, that within I have got two marriageable daughters on sale. Sherry stood all round. Going to the highest bidder. Going – going – " His wife caught him by the shoulders, twisted him about, and said: "Gone completely – and off to the asylum you shall pack at once."

Moreton Hampstead was the birthplace of that remarkable genius George Parker Bidder. He was born in very humble circumstances, his father having been a stonemason; and at the age of seven, when his talent first became apparent, he did not know the meaning of the word "multiplication," nor could he read the common numerical symbols.

An elder brother had taught him to count to one hundred. His great haunt was the forge of the village blacksmith, a kindly old man, about whom more presently. In his workshop neighbours would gather to prove the boy with hard questions involving figures, as it soon became known that he had an extraordinary faculty for calculation. The earliest public notice of this that has been met with is in a letter dated January 19th, 1814, and signed "I. Isaac," printed in the Monthly Magazine (xxxvii. 104).

"Sir, – Having heard that George Parker Bidder, seven years of age," (he was really seven months over the seven years, as he was born June 14th, 1806) "has a peculiar talent for combining numbers, I sent for him, desired him to read a few verses of the New Testament, and found he could scarcely do it even by spelling many words; and knew not the numbers of the letters from one to ten." (Mr. Isaac then asked him several questions in the first four rules of arithmetic, to each of which he replied correctly and readily. He then proceeds to say): "I then asked him how many days are in two years. But here he was at a stand, did not know what a year is, or how many hours are in a day, but having the terms explained, he soon made out the hours in a week, in a month, in twelve months. When asked how many inches are in a square foot, he soon signified that he knew neither of the terms, nor how many inches a foot contains, but with the aid of explanation he soon made out the number 1728; and when desired to multiply this by twelve, he complained the number was too large, but having time, about two minutes, he made out the number 20,738."

His father now took him over the country to exhibit his wonderful powers. In 1815 he was presented to Queen Charlotte. He is said to have been a singularly bright and prepossessing boy. In a memoir in the Proceedings of the Institute of Civil Engineers (lvii. pp. 294) we read: —

"Travelling about the country, for the purpose of exhibiting his son's powers, proved so agreeable and profitable to his father, that the boy's education was entirely neglected. Fortunately, however, amongst those who witnessed his public performances were some gentlemen who thought they discerned qualities worthy of a better career than that of a mere arithmetical prodigy. The Rev. Thomas Jephson and the late Sir John Herschel visited Moreton in the autumn of 1817, to see the 'Calculating Boy,' and they were so much impressed by his talent and general intelligence that before the vacation was over Mr. Jephson and his Cambridge friends agreed to defray the expenses of his education, and he was placed with the master of the grammar school at Camberwell. There he remained for about a twelvemonth, when his father insisted on removing him, for the purpose of resuming the exhibition of his talents. Among other places, he was taken to Edinburgh, where he attracted the notice of Sir Henry Jardine, who, with the assistance of some friends, became responsible for his education. Bidder was then placed with a private tutor, and afterwards, in 1819, he attended the classes at the University of Edinburgh."

He quitted Edinburgh in 1824, and was given a post in the Ordnance Survey. In April, 1825, he quitted the Ordnance Survey and was engaged as assistant to Mr. H. R. Palmer, a civil engineer.

It is deserving of remembrance that George Bidder's first care when starting in the world was to provide for the education of his two younger brothers, and for that purpose this lad of eighteen stinted and saved, denying himself all but the barest necessities.

In 1833 he superintended the construction of the Blackwall Wharf, and in 1834 joined George and Robert Stephenson, whom he had known in Edinburgh.

Experience showed him the importance of electric communication between stations; he introduced it on the Blackwall and Yarmouth railways, and became one of the principal founders of the Electric Telegraph Company.

In hydraulic engineering his chief works were the construction of Lowestoft Harbour and the Victoria Docks at North Woolwich.

"Mr. Bidder took a distinguished part in the great parliamentary contests which attended the establishment of railways. His wonderful memory, his power of instantaneous calculation, his quick perception and readiness at repartee, caused him to be dreaded by hostile lawyers, one of whom made a fruitless application before a committee in the House of Lords that Mr. Bidder should not be allowed to remain in the room, because 'Nature,' he said, 'had endowed him with qualities that did not place his opponents on a fair footing.'

"A remarkable instance of Mr. Bidder's wonderful readiness and power of mental numeration occurred in connexion with the passing of the Act for the North Staffordshire Railway.

"There were several competing lines, and the object of Mr. Bidder's party was to get rid of as many as possible on Standing Orders. They had challenged the accuracy of the levels of one of the rival lines, but upon the examination before the Committee on Standing Orders their opponents' witnesses were as positive as those of the North Staffordshire, and apparently were likely to command greater credence.

"Fortunately Mr. Bidder was present, and when the surveyors of the opposing lines were called to prove the levels at various points he asked to see their field-books, which he looked at apparently in the most cursory manner, and quietly put down without making a note or any observation, and as though he had seen nothing worthy of notice. When the surveyors had completed their proofs Mr. Bidder, who had carried on in his own mind a calculation of the heights noted in all the books, not merely of the salient points upon which the witnesses had been examined, but also of the intermediate rises and falls noted in the several books, suddenly exclaimed that he would demonstrate to the Committee that the section was wrong. He then went rapidly through a calculation which took all by surprise, and clearly proved that if the levels were as represented at one point they could not possibly be as represented at another and distant point. The result was that the errors in the levels were reported, and the Bill was not allowed to proceed."[26 - Obituary Notice in Transactions of the Devonshire Association, 1879. See also that for 1886, pp. 309-15.]

Some of his extraordinary achievements have been reported, but they are somewhat doubtful. It will be best to quote only one that is well authenticated from the Proceedings of the Institute of Civil Engineers (lvii. 309).

"On 26 September, 1878, being in his 73rd year, he was conversing with a mathematical friend on the subject of Light, when, it having been remarked that '36,918 pulses or waves of light, which only occupy 1 inch in length, are requisite to give the impression of red,' the friend 'suggested the query that, taking the velocity of light at 190,000 miles per second, how many of its waves must strike the eye and be registered in one second to give the colour red, and, producing a pencil, he was about to calculate the result, when Mr. Bidder said, 'You need not work it; the number of vibrations will be 444,433,651,200,000.'"

Mr. Bidder died suddenly from disease of the heart on September 20th, 1878, aged seventy-two years.

Mr. Bidder remembered many of the old stories of the moor told him by the blacksmith in whose forge he spent so many hours.

I have given one in my chapter on Dartmoor and its tenants. Here is another, as recorded by Miss Bidder, the daughter of Mr. George P. Bidder.

There was a woman, and she lived at Brennan[27 - Bran, pl. bryny, Cornish, a crow.] on the moor. And she had a baby. And one day she left her baby on the moor to play and pick "urts" (whortleberries), and she hasted to Moreton town. Now as she went she saw three ravens flying over her head from Blackiston. And she said, "Where be you a goin' to, Ravens cruel?" They answered, "Up to Brennan! up to Brennan!" She had not gone far before she saw three more flying in the same direction. And again she asked, "Where be you a goin' to, Ravens cruel? "And these three likewise answered her, "Up to Brennan! up to Brennan!" Now when she had gone somewhat further, and was drawing nigh to Moreton, again she saw three ravens fly over her head, and for the third time she put the same question and received the same answer. When in the evening she returned to Brennan Moor, there no little baby's voice welcomed her, for all that remained of her child was a heap of well-picked white bones.

Brennan is what is marked on the Ordnance Survey as Brinning, a lonely spot south of Moreton Hampstead, and between it and North Bovey. It seems to me that the story needs but a touch, and it resolves itself into a ballad.

BRENNAN MOOR

Three ravens, they flew over Blackistone,
Down-a-down, hey and hey!
And loudly they laughed over Moreton town,
Over Moreton town,
Saying, Where and O where shall we dine to-day?
On the moor, for sure, where runneth no way.

As I sat a-swaying all in a tree,
Down-a-down, hey and hey!
I saw a sweet mother and her babie,
And her babie,
Saying, Sleep, O sleep. I'm to Moreton fair,
For Babie and me to buy trinkets rare.

As I was a-flying o'er Brennan Down,
Down-a-down, hey and hey!
I saw her a-wending her way to town,
Away to town.
Our dinners are ready, our feasting free,
Away to Brennan, black brothers, with me.

The babe upon Brennan, so cold and bare,
Down-a-down, hey and hey!
The mother a-gadding to Moreton fair,
To Moreton fair.
We'll laugh and we'll quaff the red blood free,
There is plenty for all of us, brothers three.

Three ravens flew over Blackistone,
Down-a-down, hey and hey!
And loudly they laughed over Moreton town,
Over Moreton town.
With an armful of toys, came mother, to none
Save a little white huddle of well-picked bone.

From Moreton an expedition may be made to Grimspound.

This is an enclosure, prehistoric, on the slope between Hookner Tor and Hameldon.

The circumference wall measures over 1500 feet, and was not for defence against human foes, but served as a protection against wolves. Grimslake, a small stream that dries up only in very hot summers, flows through the enclosure at its northern extremity. It passes under the wall, percolates through it for some way, and then emerges three-quarters of the way down.

The pound was constructed where it is for two reasons: one, to take advantage of the outcrop of granite that divides the waterways, and which was largely exploited for the construction of the enclosure wall and of the huts within; and the other, so as to have the advantage of the stream flowing through the pound.