Lyme Regis II

Tuesday 21 October, 200

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Had our first bad weather since we arrived. It rained all day yesterday. Our fossil hunting tour was cancelled and there are no more until the end of the month, when we will be in Wales. Alex very disappointed. It’s because there are no low tides in daylight hours until then, I think. And today’s rain made the area dangerous and the cliffs liable to slips. Despite that we will have to go and have a try at least today even if it is still

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raining, otherwise Alex will be inconsolable.

Went to the Lyme Museum yesterday and saw information about the history of the place. Quite prominent were the major slips from the past especially the great landslip of 1840 when the wheat crops fell over the cliff and had to be harvested from the undercliff.

Despite the rain got out and about and saw the Royal Lion Inn where the Uppercross Party spotted their handsome cousin William Elliot in “Persuasion”. Yes, there was an entrance where the horses and carriages would have entered and departed and also one across the street from where William Elliot’s would have departed. Saw Captain Harville’s cottage where Loisa Musgrove was carried, senseless, when she was taken up from the Cobb. It’s now called Jane’s Cafe. Unfortunately, Anne-Marie Edwards, whose book I had been using as a bible for Jane Austen spotting, and the Jane Austen society, don’t agree totally on all points relating to Jane’s geography in Lyme. This means I check out two or three possible sites for every place. Some places have disappeared, such as the assembly rooms where Jane danced on September 13 1804. It’s now a car park. But, the particular letter which was addressed to Cassandra and recounted the happy Ball at the assembly rooms, might well have been posted from the extant letter box in the external wall of the Old Lyme Guest House, where Alex and I are now staying. I’ll get a photo of that hole in the wall when the rain stops.