Then low at your feet,
From this airy retreat,
Reaching down where the fresh and the salt water meet,
The roofs may be seen of an old-fashioned street;
Half village, half town, it is—­pleasant but smallish,
And known where it happens to be known, as Dawlish. 
A place I’d suggest
As one of the best
For a man breaking down who needs absolute rest,
Especially too if he’s weak in the chest;
Torquay may be gayer,
But as for the air
It really can not for a moment compare
With snug little Dawlish—­at least so they say there.

[Illustration:  ON THE COAST NEAR DAWLISH.]

The light-coloured cliffs of Dorsetshire had now given place to the dark red sandstone cliffs of Devonshire, a change referred to by Barham in “The Monk of Haldon,” for he wrote: 

’Tis certainly odd that this part of the coast,
While neighbouring Dorset gleams white as a ghost,
Should look like anchovy sauce spread upon toast.

We were now bound for Teignmouth, our next stage; and our road for a short distance ran alongside, but above, the seashore.  The change in the colour of the cliffs along the sea-coast reminded my brother of an incident that occurred when he was going by sea to London, about nine years before our present journey.  He had started from Liverpool in a tramp steamboat, which stopped at different points on the coast to load and unload cargo; and the rocks on the coast-line as far as he had seen—­for the boat travelled and called at places in the night as well as day—­had all been of a dark colour until, in the light of a fine day, the ship came quite near Beachy Head, where the rocks were white and rose three or four hundred feet above the sea.  He had formed the acquaintance of a young gentleman on board who was noting every object of interest in a diary, and who, like my brother, was greatly surprised at the white cliffs with the clear blue sky overhead.  Presently the captain came along, and the young man asked him why the rocks were white.  “Well, sir,” said the captain, “the sea is as deep there as the rocks are high, and they are so dangerous to ships in the dark that the Government has ordered them to be whitewashed once a month to prevent shipwreck.”  Out came the pocket-book, and as the captain watched the passenger write it down, my brother looked hard in the captain’s face, who never moved a muscle, but a slight twinkle in one of his eyes showed that he did not want to be asked any questions!

The Devon red sandstone was not very durable, and the action of the sea had worn the outlying rocks into strange shapes.  Before reaching Teignmouth we had some good views of the rocks named “the Parson and the Clerk,” the history of which was by no means modern, the legend being told in slightly different ways: