STOKE-PERO, a parish in the hundred of CARHAMPTON,
county of SOMERSET, 6 miles (W. S. W.)
from Minehead, containing 81 inhabitants. The living
is a discharged rectory, in the archdeaconry of Taunton,
and diocese of Bath and Wells, rated in the king's
books at £4. 10. 10., endowed with £400 private benefaction,
and £ 600 royal bounty, and in the patronage
of John Quick, Esq. The rusty appearance of the
water among the hills indicates the probability of ironore
lying beneath. Dunkry Beacon, a large and lofty
mountain, is partly in the parishes of Cutcombe, Luccombe,
Wotton-Courtney, Stoke-Pero, and Exford: its
base is about twelve miles in circuit, and its height
above the sea at high water is one thousand seven hundred
and seventy feet, being the highest eminence in the
western part of England: it serves as a distant landmark,
but the summit is often obscured by clouds. On
the top are many loose stones of large dimensions, and
among them the ruins of three large fire-hearths, the
remains of beacons. Collinson says, when the air is
serene and clear, the line which bounds the horizon cannot
be less than five hundred miles in circumference.