Sept. 8.-Torquay to Paington, Totness, and Kingsbridge. Tor Abbey is principally remarkable for some fine ruins, stone coffins, large elms, and an avenue of lime trees. There is a Catholic chapel, which always commands our respect, as being characteristic of an old family and an old place. The effect of the ruins is in a great measure destroyed by the sycamores, elders, and other trees with which they are overgrown. Ivy is almost the only plant that can luxuriate among ruins without injuring their dignity. Trees may be allowed to spring out of the actual walls, because in that situation they never grow large, or, if they do, that circumstance enhances the idea of the age of the ruin; but luxuriant trees growing out of the ground, which completely cover the ruins by their branches, prevent them from being seen as a whole, and consequently from making their characteristic impression. There is here a fine old Saxon doorway, and near it a sweet bay, 30 ft. high. In the kitchen-garden, Cistus ladaniferus is upwards of 10 ft. high. The gardener, Mr. Pullinger, from Prudhoe Castle, Northumberland, is an intelligent industrious man, who reads, and who deserves a more extensive charge.
