An amusing story is told of Lord North in connection with this tax. Not long after it had been imposed, he and Sir Robert Hamilton came to Ashe, near Axminster, on a visit--Lord North, then a Lord of the Treasury, distinctly uneasy as to the risk of coming into Devonshire, for the county was still seething with dissatisfaction against the Government. 'He was one day thrown into great alarm by a large party of reapers, who, having finished cutting the wheat of the estate, approached the house with their hooks in their hands, shouting the usual cry, "We have'n! we have'n!" The portentous words Lord North applied to himself, and, pale with terror, considered himself a dead man. Sir Robert Hamilton seized a sword, and was sallying forth to repulse the visitors, when, meeting a member of the household, an explanation took place, by which the fears so unconsciously excited were removed.'
It was a most ancient custom in the West--indeed, it is said to be a remnant of the pagan rite of dedicating the first-fruits to Ceres--to set aside either the first armful of corn that was cut or else some of the best ears, and bind them into a little sheaf, called a 'neck'. A fragment of the vivid description given by Miss O'Neill in 'Devonshire Idyls' must be quoted: 'The men carried their reaping-hooks; the sheaf was borne by the old man. Bareheaded he stood in the light of the moon. Strange shadows flecked the mossy sward on sundown as he held the first-fruits aloft and waved his arms.
'"We ha'un!" cried he, and the cry was long and wailing. The strange intimation fell on the ear like an echo from pagan days. One could fancy the fauns and weird beings of old had taught the cadence to the first reapers of earth. "We ha'un!" cried he, and all the men in the circle bowed to the very ground.... "We ha'un!" cried Jonas again, and again the reapers bowed and waved. Then the old men took up another strain, at once more jubilant and more resonant, and with an indescribable drawling utterance sang out "Thee Neck!"--sang it out three times, and twice the waving circle of bright steel flashed.'
On leaving Honiton, if the river is followed upstream for a short distance, the traveller will find himself close to ruined Ottery Mohun, the home of two celebrated families in succession. Unfortunately, it has been entirely destroyed by fire. A farm now stands among the ruins, and two fine Perpendicular archways, and a deeply moulded and hooded arch over the frontdoor, alone bear witness to its former state. In the spandril above the outer archway is carved, 'amid elegant scroll-work and foliage, an arm, vested in an ermine maunch, the hand grasping a golden fleur-de-lys'--the old coat-armour of the Mohuns; and on the other spandril 'three lions passant in pale,' the bearing of the Carews.