In front of Hayes Barton is a hill covered with oak-woods, and to the west the ground begins to slope upwards to the high moorland of Woodbury Common. Sir Walter had a great affection for his boyhood's home, and later, in trying to buy it back, he wrote to the then owner: 'I will most willingly give you whatsoever in your conscience you shall deem it worth; ... for ye naturall disposition I have to that place, being borne in that house, I had rather seat myself there, than anywhere else.'
To realize Sir Walter at all adequately, he must be contemplated as soldier, sailor, statesman, courtier, explorer, poet, historian, Governor of colonies abroad and of very important offices at home--most of all as a seer, for his eyes discerned a light that did not dawn on his contemporaries. He and his half-brother, Sir Humphrey Gilbert, foresaw 'that colonization, trade, and the enlargement of empire, were all more important for the welfare of England than the discovery of gold.' Major Hume, who is by no means over-prejudiced in Raleigh's favour, has said in his 'Life of Sir Walter Raleigh': 'To him is due the undying glory of having made the great northern continent of America an English-speaking country. With him it was no accident. The plan sprang fully formed from his great brain. He was greedy of gain, but he spent his money like water in this great project. He knew full well that there was no gold to reward him; that the profit, if any, must be slow, and must accrue mainly to the nation, and not to an individual; and yet he laboured on for thirty years in the face of defeat, disaster, contumely, and disgrace, in full faith and confidence that the great continent was by God's providence reserved for England.'
Raleigh's biographers have wondered at his immense knowledge of naval matters, and particularly of naval warfare, for the _Ark Raleigh_, which he had built after his own plans, was admitted to be the best ship in the fleet at the time of the Armada. Perhaps his genius for absorbing information developed very early, and Sir John Millais's picture of the two little boys, fascinated by the words of the sailor speaking to them of the breathless adventures he had fought through, the gorgeous sights that he had seen in the lands overseas, helps to explain it. Most West-Countrymen can tell a tale dramatically, as the sailor is telling it--the picture was painted at Budleigh Salterton--and it may be that, with Raleigh's amazing faculty for gathering knowledge, he learned enough of seamanship as he grew up to enable him to grasp and hoard in his memory every detail of the subject as it came before him in later life.