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CHAPTER IX.

BUDE

An ugly place—Its charm in the air—Stratton—The battle of Stamford Hill—Churches—Norman remains—Frescoes at Poughill—Pancras Week—Bench-ends—Tonnacombe—Marhayes—Old Stowe—Church towers—Landmarks—The candle-end in Bridgerule Church—Bridget churches—The clover-field—Ogbeare Hall—Whitstone—Camps—Thomasine Bonaventura—Week S. Mary—The coast about Bude—Morwenstow—Robert S. Hawker—One of his ballads.

AN unpicturesque, uninteresting place, wind-blown, treeless, but with sands—not always obtainable on the north coast—and with noble cliff scenery within easy reach.

There is nothing commendable in the place itself; the houses are as ugly as tasteless builders could contrive to erect; the church is of the meanest cheap Gothic of seventy years ago; but the air is exhilarating, the temperature is even, there are golf-links, and a shore for bathers.

Nestling in a valley by a little stream newly designated the "Strat," as though Stratton were called from the stream and not the street—the Roman road that runs through it—is the parent town, crouching with its hair ruffled, and casting a

sidelong, dissatisfied eye at its pert and pushing offspring, Bude. But Stratton has no reason to be

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