Winding roads of considerable intricacy and almost absolute loneliness lead away from the creeks about Landulph to Botus Fleming, with a church remarkable only for the extraordinary quantity of stucco placed on its tower. Thence the good broad high-road leads on to Saltash, with milestones marked rather speculatively to "S" and "C"; Saltash and Callington being understood.
SALTASH--SALTASH BRIDGE--TREMATON CASTLE--ST. GERMANS--ANTONY--RAME--MOUNT EDGCUMBE--MILLBROOK
The name "Saltash" simply means "salt water"--the "ash" having originally been the Celtic "esc." Salt water is found, as a matter of fact, as far up river as Calstock, but here it is, by all manner of authorities, that the river Tamar, the "taw mawr," or "great water," joins that broad and often extremely rough and choppy estuary, the Hamoaze: "Hem-uisc," the border water.
[Illustration: PLYMOUTH SOUND, THE HAMOAZE, AND THE TAMAR.]
Saltash is a borough-town of an antiquity transcending that of Plymouth, and the rhyme
"Saltash wer' a borough town, When Plymouth wer' a vuzzy down,"
is equally proud and true. It was once also a Parliamentary borough, but that glory has faded away. Yet once more, it is in Cornwall, and that, according to any true Cornishman, is far better than being in Devonshire. So Saltash is amply blest. And if to these dignities we add the material advantage of possessing jurisdiction over Hamoaze, down even to Plymouth Sound, and over all its creeks, we shall see that Saltash does right to be proud. It was by virtue of the borough authority over those waterways that Saltash was enabled to be so splendidly patriotic in the time of good Queen Bess. At that period the harbour dues were one shilling for an English ship, and two shillings for a foreigner. After the Armada Saltash levied an extra discriminatory five shillings upon Spanish vessels. Among the Corporation regalia is a silver oar, typifying this jurisdiction.
It is perhaps a little grievous, after all these noble and impressive things, to learn that Saltash church, which crests the hill on whose steep sides the town is built, is really, although very ancient, not a church, but a chapelry of St. Stephen's, a quite humble village inland, on the way to Trematon. And there is one other thing: Saltash cannot see its own picturesqueness, any more than one can see the crown of one's head, except for artificial aid. The mirror by which Saltash is enabled to see itself is the Devonshire shore, and across the quarter of a mile to it the steam-ferry, that plies every half-hour or less, will take you for one penny. From that point of view, not only Saltash, but also the best picture of Saltash Bridge is to be had: that giant viaduct which carries the Great Western Railway across from Devon to Cornwall in single track, at a height of 100 feet above the water. Saltash Bridge--no one calls it by its official name, the "Royal Albert Bridge"--has in all nineteen spans, and is 2,240 feet long; but its great spectacular feature is provided by the two central spans of 455 feet each. Twelve years were occupied in building, and it was opened in 1859. The name of I. K. Brunel, the daring engineer, is boldly inscribed on it. There is a story told of some one asking Brunel how long it would last.