His description of the brass band of which he was a member, and the way they were dressed, and the adventures they met with during the day, from early morning till late at night, was both interesting and amusing. Their first duty was to play round the town to waken people who were already awake—sleep was out of the question—children too had a share in the proceedings. They knew that booths or standings would be erected all over the town, some even on the footpath, displaying all manner of cakes, toffy, and nuts that would delight their eyes and sweeten their mouths, if they had the money wherewith to buy, and if not, there was the chance of persuading some stranger to come to the rescue! But first of all they must rush to the woods and fields in search of flowers and branches, for the town had to be decorated before the more imposing part of the ceremonies began. Meantime the bandsmen were busy devouring a good breakfast, for bandsmen's appetites are proverbial. Perhaps they are the only class of men who play while they work and work while they play. In any case, after breakfast they sauntered round the town talking to the girls until the auspicious hour arrived when they had to assemble in the market square to head the procession of the notables of the town dressed in all kinds of costumes, from that of William the Conqueror onwards. My brother was anxious to know what quickstep they played, and if it was "Havelock's Quick March"; but our friend said it was not a quickstep at all, but something more like a hornpipe. Was it the College or the Sailor's Hornpipe? It was neither, was the reply, as it had to be played slowly, for the people danced to it while they marched in the procession, and occasionally twirled their partners round; and then after some further ceremonies they separated and all the people began to dance both in the streets and through the houses, going in at one door and out at another, if there was one, tumbling about and knocking things over, and then out in the street again, and if not satisfied with their partners, changing them, and off again, this kind of enjoyment lasting for hours. Sometimes, if a man-of-war happened to be in the neighbourhood, the sailors came, who were the best dancers of the lot, as they danced with each other and threw their legs about in a most astonishing fashion, a practice they were accustomed to when aboard ship.
There were also shows and sometimes a circus, and the crowds that came from the country were astonishing. Now and then there was a bit of a row, when some of them had "a drop o' drink," but the police were about, and not afraid to stop their games by making free use of their staves; this, however, was the shady side of the great "Flurry" day.
Meantime every one had learned the strange dance-tune by heart, which our friend whistled for us, whereby we could tell it had come down from remote times. Indeed, it was said that these rejoicings were originally in memory of the victory of the great Michael over the Devil, and no one thought of suggesting a more modern theory than that the "Flurry" was a survival of the Floralia observed by the Romans on the fourth of the Calends of May in honour of Flora, the Goddess of Flowers.
The very mention of the names of band and hornpipe was too much for my brother, who could not resist giving the Cornishman a few samples of the single and double shuffle in the College Hornpipe, and one or two movements from a Scotch Reel, but as I was no dancer myself, I had no means of judging the quality of his performances. I kept a respectful distance away, as sometimes his movements were very erratic, and his boots, like those of the Emperor Frederick, were rather heavy. We could not persuade our friend to come with us a yard farther than the village. As a fellow bandsman, he confided the reason why to my brother; he had seen a nice young lady at the "Flurry" who came from that village, and he was going to see her now. He was standing in the street on the "Flurry" day when the lady came along, and stopped to look at the bandsmen, who were then at liberty, and he said to her jocularly, "Take my arm, love—I'm in the band," and, "By Jove," he said, "if she didn't come and take it," to his great astonishment and delight. Apparently his heart went at the same time, and we surmised that everything else would shortly follow. After bidding him good-bye, we looked round the church, and then my brother began to walk at an appalling speed, which fortunately he could not keep up, and which I attributed in some way to the effect of the bandsman's story, though he explained that we must try to reach Penzance before dark.
The church of St. Breage was dedicated to a saint named Breaca, sister of St. Enny, who lived in the sixth century and came from Ireland. There was a holed sandstone cross in the churchyard, which tradition asserted was made out of granite sand and then hardened with human blood! The tower was said to contain the largest bell in Cornwall, it having been made in the time of a vicar who, not liking the peals, had all the other bells melted down to make one large one. The men of St. Breage and those of the next village, St. Germoe, had an evil reputation as wreckers or smugglers, for one old saying ran:
Opposite Breage, on the sea-coast, was a place named Porthleven, where a Wesleyan chapel, with a very handsome front, had been built. No doubt there are others in the country built in a similar way, for to it and them the following lines might well apply:
After a walk of about two miles we arrived at the village of St. Germoe. The saint of that name was said to have been an Irish bard of royal race, and the font in the church, from its plain and rough form, was considered to be one of the most ancient in the county. In the churchyard was a curious structure which was mentioned by Leland as a "chair," and was locally known as St. Germoe's Chair, but why it should be in the churchyard was a mystery, unless it had been intended to mark the spot where the saint had been buried. It was in the form of a sedilium, the seat occupied by the officiating priest near the altar in the chancel of a church, being about six feet high and formed of three sedilia, with two pillars supporting three arches, which in turn supported the roof; in general form it was like a portion of the row of seats in a Roman amphitheatre.
On the opposite coast, which was only about a mile away, was the famous Prussia Cove, named after a notorious smuggler who bore the nickname of the King of Prussia; and adjoining his caves might still be seen the channels he had cut in the solid rock to enable his boats to get close to the shore. His real name was Carter. He became the leader of the Cornish smugglers, and kept the "Old King of Prussia Inn," though having the reputation of being a "devout Methodist." He was said to be so named because he bore some resemblance to Frederick the Great, the King of Prussia. We had seen other inns in the south of the same name, but whether they were named after the king or the smuggler we could not say. He seemed to have had other caves on the Cornish coast where he stored his stolen treasures, amongst which were some old cannon.
One moonlight night, when he was anxiously waiting and watching for the return of his boats, he saw them in the distance being rapidly pursued by His Majesty's Revenue cutter the Fairy. The smuggler placed his cannon on the top of the cliff and gave orders to his men to fire on the Fairy, which, as the guns on board could not be elevated sufficiently to reach the top of the cliff, was unable to reply. Thus the boats escaped; but early the following morning the Revenue boat again appeared, and the officer and some of the crew came straight to Carter's house, where they met the smuggler. He loudly complained to the officer that his crew should come there practising the cutter's guns at midnight and disturbing the neighbourhood. Carter of course could give no information about the firing of any other guns, and suggested it might be the echo of those fired from the Fairy herself, nor could any other explanation be obtained in the neighbourhood where Carter was well known, so the matter was allowed to drop. But the old smuggler was more sharply looked after in future, and though he lived to a great age, he died in poverty.
Our road crossed the Perran Downs, where, to the left, stood the small village of Perranuthnoe, a place said to have existed before the time of St. Piran and named Lanudno in the taxation of Pope Nicholas. It was also pointed out as the place where Trevelyan's horse landed him when he escaped the inrush of the sea which destroyed Lyonesse, "that sweet land of Lyonesse," which was inseparably connected with the name of King Arthur, who flourished long before the age of written records. Lyonesse was the name of the district which formerly existed between the Land's End and the Scilly Islands, quite twenty-five miles away. When the waves from the Atlantic broke through, Trevelyan happened to be riding on a white horse of great swiftness. On seeing the waters rushing forward to overwhelm the country, he rode for his life and was saved by the speed of his horse. He never stopped until he reached Perranuthnoe, where the rocks stopped the sea's farther progress. But when he looked back, he could see nothing but a wide expanse of water covering no less than 140 parish churches. He lived afterwards in the cave in the rocks which has ever since borne the name of Trevelyan's Cave. It was beyond doubt that some great convulsion of nature had occurred to account for the submerged forests, of which traces were still known to exist.
Soon afterwards we reached a considerable village bearing the strange name of Marazion, a place evidently once of some importance and at one time connected with the Jews, for there were the Jews' Market and some smelting-places known as the Jews' Houses. Here we came to the small rock surmounted by a castle which we had seen in front of our track for some miles without knowing what it was. Now we discovered it to be the far-famed St. Michael's Mount. According to legend this once stood in a vast forest of the mysterious Lyonesse, where wild beasts roamed, and where King Arthur fought one of his many battles with a giant at the "Guarded Mount," as Milton has so aptly named it.
As we were told that the Mount was only about half a mile away, we decided to visit it, and walked as quickly as we could along the rough-paved road leading up to it. On the Mount we could see the lights being lit one by one as we approached, and, in spite of the arrival of the first quarter of the moon, it was now becoming dark, so we discussed the advisability of staying at St. Michael's for the night; but we suddenly came to a point on our road where the water from the sea was rushing over it, and realised that St. Michael's Mount was an island. We could see where the road reappeared a little farther on, and I calculated that if we made a dash for it the water would not reach above our knees, but it was quite evident that we had now come to a dead stop. The rock by this time looked much higher, spreading its shadow over the water beneath, and the rather serious question arose as to how or when we should be able to get back again, for we had to reach Land's End on the next day. Finally we decided to retrace our steps to Marazion, where we learned that the road to the Mount was only available under favourable conditions for about eight hours out of the twenty-four, and as our rules would have prevented our returning by boat, we were glad we had not proceeded farther.
According to the Saxon Chronicle, the inroad from the sea which separated St. Michael's from the mainland occurred in 1099. The Mount had a sacred character, for St. Michael himself was said to have appeared to a holy man who once resided there, and St. Keyne also had made a pilgrimage to the Mount in the year 490.
The rock rises about 230 feet above sea-level, and is about a mile in circumference, but the old monastery had been made into a private residence. At an angle in one of the towers, now called St. Michael's Chair, in which one person only could sit at a time, and that not without danger, as the chair projected over a precipice, was a stone lantern in which the monks formerly kept a light to guide seamen. The legend connected with this was that if a married woman sits in the chair before her husband has done so, she will rule over him, but if he sits down on it first, he will be the master. We thought this legend must have resulted from the visit of St. Keyne, as it corresponded with that attached to her well near Liskeard which we have already recorded.
Perkin Warbeck, about whom we had heard at Exeter, and who in 1497 appeared in England with 7,000 men to claim the English throne, occupied the castle on St. Michael's Mount for a short time with his beautiful wife, the "White Rose of Scotland," whom he left here for safety while he went forward to London to claim the crown. He was said to be a Jew, or, to be correct, the son of a Tournai Jew, which possibly might in some way or other account for the Jewish settlement at Marazion. His army, however, was defeated, and he was hanged at Tyburn, November 23rd, 1499, while his wife was afterwards removed to the Court of Henry VII, where she received every consideration and was kindly treated.
We soon covered the three miles which separated us from Penzance, where we went to the best hotel in the town, arriving just in time for dinner. There was only one other visitor there, a gentleman who informed us he had come from Liverpool, where he was in the timber trade, and was staying at Penzance for a few days. He asked what business we were in, and when we told him we had practically retired from business in 1868, and that that was the reason why we were able to spare nine weeks to walk from John o' Groat's to Land's End, he seemed considerably surprised. We did not think then that in a few years' time we should, owing to unexpected events, find ourselves in the same kind of business as his, and meet that same gentleman on future occasions!
We shall always remember that night at Penzance! The gentleman sat at the head of the table at dinner while we sat one on each side of him. But though he occupied the head position, we were head and shoulders above him in our gastronomical achievements—so much so that although he had been surprised at our long walk, he told us afterwards that he was "absolutely astounded" at our enormous appetites.
He took a great interest in our description of the route we had followed. Some of the places we had visited he knew quite well, and we sat up talking about the sights we had seen until it was past closing-time. When we rose to retire, he said he should esteem it an honour if we would allow him to accompany us to the Land's End on the following day to see us "in at the finish." He said he knew intimately the whole of the coast between Penzance and the Land's End, and could no doubt show us objects of interest that we might otherwise miss seeing. We assured him that we should esteem the honour to be ours, and should be glad to accept his kind offer, informing him that we intended walking along the coast to the end and then engaging a conveyance to bring us back again. He thought that a good idea, but as we might have some difficulty in getting a suitable conveyance at that end of our journey, he strongly advised our hiring one at Penzance, and offered, if we would allow him, to engage for us in the morning a trap he had hired the day before, though we must not expect anything very grand in these out-of-the-way parts of the country. We thankfully accepted his kind offer, and this item in the programme being settled, we considered ourselves friends, and parted accordingly for the night, pleasantly conscious that even if we did not walk at all on the morrow, we had secured our average of twenty-five miles daily over the whole of our journey.
(Distance walked thirty-four and a half miles.)
Saturday, November 18th.
We had ordered breakfast much later than usual to suit the convenience of our friend, but we were out in the town at our usual early hour, and were quite astonished at the trees and plants we saw growing in the grounds and gardens there, some of which could only be grown under glass farther north. Here they were growing luxuriantly in the open air, some having the appearance of the palm-trees we had seen pictured in books. We had been favoured with fairly fine weather for some time, and although we had passed through many showers, we had not encountered anything in the nature of continuous rain, although Cornwall is naturally a humid county, and is said to have a shower of rain for every day in the week and two for Sunday. We kept near the edge of the sea, and the view of the bay, with St. Michael's Mount on one side and the Lizards on the other, was very fine; but the Mount had assumed quite a different appearance since yesterday, for now it appeared completely isolated, the connection with the mainland not being visible. We were sure that both St. Michael's Mount and Penzance must have had an eventful history, but the chief event in the minds of the people seemed to have been the visit of the Spaniards when they burnt the town in 1595. The Cornishmen made very little resistance on that occasion, owing to the existence of an old prophecy foretelling the destruction of Penzance by fire when the enemy landed on the rock of Merlin, the place where the Spaniards actually did land. Probably it was impossible to defend the town against an enemy attacking Penzance from that point, as it was only about a mile distant.
We returned to our hotel at the time arranged for breakfast, which was quite ready, the table being laid for three; but where was our friend? We learned that he had gone out into the town, but we had got half-way through our breakfast, all the while wondering where he could be, when the door opened suddenly and in he came, with his face beaming like the rising sun, although we noticed he glanced rather anxiously in the direction of the remaining breakfast. He apologised for being late, but he had not been able to obtain the conveyance he mentioned to us last night, as it was engaged elsewhere. He had, however, found another which he thought might suit our purpose, and had arranged for it to be at the hotel in half an hour's time. He also brought the pleasing intelligence that we might expect a fine day. The trap duly arrived in charge of the owner, who was to act as driver; but some difficulty arose, as he had not quite understood the order. He thought he had simply to drive us to the Land's End and back, and had contemplated being home again early, so our friend had to make another financial arrangement before he would accept the order. This was soon negotiated, but it was very difficult to arrange further details. Here our friend's intimate knowledge of the country came in useful. There was no direct driving road along the coast, so it was arranged that our driver should accompany us where he could, and then when his road diverged he should meet us at certain points to be explained by our friend later in the day. Mutual distrust, we supposed, prevented us from paying him in advance, and possibly created a suspicion in the driver's mind that there was something wrong somewhere, and he evidently thought what fools we were to walk all the way along the coast to Land's End when we might have ridden in his trap. We journeyed together for the first mile or two, and then he had to leave us for a time while we trudged along with only our sticks to carry, for, to make matters equal in that respect, our friend had borrowed one at the hotel, a much finer-looking one than ours, of which he was correspondingly proud.
He insisted upon our seeing everything there was to be seen, and it soon became evident that what our companion did not know about the fine rock scenery on this part of the coast of Cornwall was not worth knowing, so that we were delighted to have him with us. The distance from Penzance to Land's End was not great, but by the route selected it occupied the whole of the day, including many stoppages, and we had a glorious walk. The weather had been rather squally yesterday, and there was a steady breeze still blowing. We enjoyed seeing the breakers dash themselves into foam against the rocks and thunder inside the fissures and caverns below. Occasionally we got a glimpse of the red tinge given to the smoother waters of the sea by the shoals of pilchards passing along the coast, so that in the same journey we had seen the water reddened with herrings in the extreme north and with pilchards in the extreme south of Britain.
DOROTHY PENTREATH'S STONE, ST. PAUL'S CHURCH.
At Newlyn we were delighted with the quaint, crooked little passages which did duty for streets, and we were informed that the place was noted for artists and fish—a rather strange combination. We learned that when first the pilchards arrived at Land's End, they divided into two immense shoals, one going in the direction of Mounts Bay and the other towards St. Ives Bay, the record catch in a single haul at that place being 245 millions! There was a saying at Newlyn that it was unlucky to eat a pilchard from the head, as it should be eaten from its tail; but why, it was difficult to define, unless it was owing to the fact that it was the tail that guided the head of the fish towards the coasts of Cornwall.
We also passed through a village named Paul, which had been modernised into St. Paul. Its church had a rather lofty tower, which stood on the hill like a sentinel looking over Mounts Bay. This place was also burnt by the Spaniards in 1595. It appeared that George Borrow had visited it on January 15th, 1854, as he passed through on his way to Land's End, for the following entry appeared in his Diary for that day: "Went to St. Paul's Church. Saw an ancient tomb with the inscription in Cornish at north end. Sat in a pew under a black suit of armour belonging to the Godolphin family, with two swords." We copied this Cornish epitaph as under:
which translated means:
There was also an epitaph in the churchyard over the grave of an old lady who died at the age of 102, worded:
Here lyeth interred Dorothy Pentreath, who died in 1778, said to have been the last person who conversed in the ancient Cornish, the peculiar language of this county from the earliest records, till it expired in the eighteenth century in this Parish of St. Paul. This stone is erected by the Prince Louis Lucien Bonaparte, in union with the Rev. John Garrett, Vicar of St. Paul 1860.
Under the guidance of our friend, who of course acted as leader, we now passed on to the famous place known as Mousehole, a picturesque village in a shady hollow, with St. Clement's Island a little way out to sea in front. This place, now named Mousehole, was formerly Porth Enys, or the Island Port, and a quay was built here as early as the year 1392. We saw the cavern, rather a large one, and near it the fantastic rocks associated with Merlin the "Prince of Enchanters," some of whose prophecies applied to Cornwall. At Mousehole there was a large rock named Merlin's Stone, where the only Spaniards that ever devastated the shores of England landed in 1595. Merlin's prophecy in the Cornish language reads:
which means, translated:
They also burnt Mousehole, with the exception of one public-house, a house still standing, with walls four feet thick, and known as the "Keigwin Arms" of which they killed the landlord, Jenkin Keigwin. There was a rock here known as the "Mermaid," which stood out in the sea, and from which songs by female voices were said to have allured young men to swim to the rock, never to be heard of again.
We next came to the Lamora Cove, where we walked up the charming little valley, at the top of which we reached the plain of Bolleit, where Athelstan defeated the Britons in their last desperate struggle for freedom. The battle lasted from morning until night, when, overpowered by numbers, the Cornish survivors fled to the hills. After this battle in the light of the setting sun, Athelstan is said to have seen the Scilly Islands and decided to try to conquer them, and, if successful, to build a church and dedicate it to St. Buryana. He carried out his vow, and founded and endowed a college for Augustine Canons to have jurisdiction over the parishes of Buryan, Levan, and Sennen, through which we now journeyed; but the Scilly Islands appeared to us to be scarcely worth conquering, as, although they comprised 145 islets, many of them were only small bare rocks, the largest island, St. Mary, being only three miles long by two and a half broad, and the highest point only 204 feet above sea-level; but perhaps the refrangible rays of the setting sun so magnified them that Athelstan believed a considerable conquest was before him.
We next went to see the "Merry Maidens" and the "Pipers." They were only pillars of stone, but our friend assured us they were lively enough once upon a time, and represented seven young but thoughtless ladies who lived in that neighbourhood. They were on their way to Buryan church one Sabbath day when they saw two pipers playing music in a field, who as they went near them began to play dance tunes. The maidens forgot the sacred character of the day, and, yielding to temptation, began to dance. By and by the music became extremely wild and the dancing proportionately furious. The day was beautifully fine and the sun shone through a clear blue sky, but the pipers were two evil spirits, and suddenly a flash of lightning came from the cloudless sky and turned them all, tempters and tempted, into stone, so there they stand, the girls in a circle and the pipers a little distance away, until the Day of Judgment.
By this time we were all getting hungry, as the clear air of Cornwall is conducive to good appetites; but our friend had thoughtfully arranged for this already, and we found when we entered the inn at Buryan that our conveyance had arrived there, and that the driver had already regaled himself, and told the mistress that she might expect three other visitors.
The old church of St. Buryan was said to be named after Buriena, the beautiful daughter of a Munster chieftain, supposed to be the Bruinsech of the Donegal martyrology, who came to Cornwall in the days of St. Piran. There were two ancient crosses at Buryan, one in the village and the other in the churchyard, while in the church was the thirteenth-century, coffin-shaped tomb of "Clarice La Femme Cheffroi De Bolleit," bearing an offer of ten days' pardon to whoever should pray for her soul. But just then we were more interested in worldly matters; and when, after we had refreshed ourselves in a fairly substantial way, our friend told us he would take us to see a "Giant's Castle," we went on our way rejoicing, to regain the sea-coast where the castle was to be seen, but not before the driver had made another frantic effort to induce us to ride in his trap.
The castle of Treryn, which our friend pronounced Treen, was situated on a small headland jutting out into the sea, but only the triple vallum and fosse of the castle remained. The walls had been built of huge boulders, and had once formed the cyclopian castle of Treryn. Cyclops, our friend explained, was one of a number of giants who had each only one eye, and that in the centre of the forehead. Their business was to forge the iron for Vulcan, the god of fire. They could see to work in mines or dark places, for their one eye was as big as a moon. Sometimes they were workers in stone, who erected their buildings chiefly in Europe and Asia, and their huge blocks of stone were worked so nicely that they fitted together without mortar. Treryn Castle was the stronghold of a giant who was stronger than most of the other giants who lived in those parts, and was, in addition, a necromancer or sorcerer, in communication with the spirits of the dead, by whose aid he raised this castle by enchantment from the depths of the sea. It was therefore an enchanted castle, and was kept in its position by a spell, a magic key, which the giant placed in a hole in a rock on the seacoast, still named the Giant's Lock. Whenever this key, which was a large round stone, could be taken out of the lock, the castle and the promontory on which it stood would disappear beneath the sea to the place from whence it came. Very few people had seen the key, because its hiding-place was in such a very dangerous position that scarcely any one was courageous enough to venture to the lock that held it. To reach the lock it was necessary to wait for a low tide, and then to walk along a ledge in the side of the rock scarcely wide enough for the passage of a small animal, where in the event of a false step the wanderer would be certain to be dashed to pieces on the rocks below. At the end of this dangerous path there was a sharp projecting rock in which was a hole wide enough for a man's hand and arm to pass down, and at the bottom of the hole he could feel a rather large but smooth stone in the shape of an egg, which he could easily move in any direction. Then all he had to do further was to draw it out through the hole; but the difficulty was that the stone was larger than the aperture, and the mystery was who placed it there.
The dangerous nature of the approach, in addition to the difficulty of getting back again, was quite sufficient to deter any of us from making the attempt; even if we gained possession of the magic key we might have been taken, with it and the castle and promontory, to the enchanted regions below, so we decided to refrain, for after all there was the desirability of reaching home again!
It was a very wild place, and the great rocks and boulders were strongly suggestive of giants; but our friend would not have us linger, as we must go to see the famous Logan Rock. In order to save time and risk, he suggested that we should secure the services of a professional guide. We could see neither guides nor houses, and it looked like a forlorn hope to try to find either, but, asking us to stay where we were until he came back, our friend disappeared; and some time afterwards he reappeared from some unknown place, accompanied by an intelligent sailorlike man whom he introduced to us as the guide. The guide led us by intricate ways over stone walls, stepped on either side with projecting stones to do duty as stiles, and once or twice we walked along the top of the walls themselves, where they were broad enough to support a footpath. Finally we crossed what appeared to be a boundary fence, and immediately afterwards found ourselves amongst a wilderness of stones and gigantic boulders, with the roar of the waves as they beat on the rocks below to keep us company.
It was a circuitous and intricate course by which our guide conducted us, up and down hill, and one not altogether free from danger, and we had many minor objects to see before reaching the Logan Rock, which was the last of all. Every precaution was taken to prevent any accident at dangerous places on our way. Amongst other objects our guide pointed to the distant views of the Lizard Point, the Wolf Rock Lighthouse, and the Runnel Stone Bell Buoy, and immediately below us was the Porthcurnow Bay and beach. Then there were some queerly shaped rocks named the Castle Peak, the "Tortoise," the "Pig's Mouth," all more or less like the objects they represented, and, as a matter of course, the giants were also there. Our guide insisted upon our sitting in the Giant's Chair, where King Arthur, he said, had sat before us. It was no easy matter to climb into the chair, and we had to be assisted by sundry pushes from below; but once in it we felt like monarchs of all we surveyed, and the view from that point was lovely. Near by was the Giant's Bowl, and finally the Giant's Grave, an oblong piece of land between the rocks, which my brother measured in six long strides as being eighteen feet in length. The Logan or Swinging Stone was estimated to weigh about eighty tons, and although it was quite still when we reached it, we were easily able to set it moving. It was a block of granite, and continued to oscillate for some little time, but formerly it was said that it could not be moved from its axis by force. This led to a foolish bet being made by Lieutenant Goldsmith of the Royal Navy, who landed with his boat's crew on April 8th, 1824, and with the united exertions of nine men with handspikes, and excessive vibration, managed to slide the great stone from its equilibrium. This so roused the anger of the Cornish people that the Admiralty were obliged to make Mr. Goldsmith—who, by the way, was a nephew of Oliver Goldsmith, the author of the Vicar of Wakefield—replace the stone in its former position, which, owing to its immense weight and almost inaccessible situation, was a most difficult and costly thing to do. Mr. Davies Gilbert persuaded the Lords of the Admiralty to lend the necessary apparatus from Pymouth Dockyard, and was said to have paid some portion of the cost; but after the assistance of friends, and two collections throughout the Royal Navy, Goldsmith had to pay quite £600 personally, and came out of the transaction a sadder, wiser, and poorer man.
Like other stones of an unusual character, the Logan Rock was thought to have some medicinal properties, and parents formerly brought their children to be rocked on the stone to cure their diseases; but the charm was said to have been broken by the removal of the stone, which did not afterwards oscillate as freely as before. It was reinstated in its former position on November 2nd, 1824. We also saw the Ladies' Logan Rock, weighing nine tons, which could easily be moved. In a rather dangerous portion of the rocks we came to a "wishing passage," through which it was necessary to walk backwards to obtain the fulfilment of a wish —doubtless in the case of nervous people that they might get away from the rocks again in safety.
The rocks hereabouts are very vividly coloured at certain times of the year, and in the spring are covered with lichens and turf, with blossoms of the blue scilla.
Porthcurnow, which runs a short distance into the rocky coast, is one of Cornwall's most picturesque little bays. Round the foot of the rocks we saw what appeared to be a fringe of white sand, which at first sight we thought must have been left there by the Giant Tregeagle, as it was part of his task to sweep the sands from Porthcurnow Cove; but we ascertained that what we thought was white sand was in reality a mass of extremely small shells. The surface of the rocks above abounded with golden furze, which in summer, mingled with purple heather, formed a fine contrast. In the background was a small and dismal-looking valley known locally as the "Bottoms," which was often obscured by mists rising from the marshes below, and which few people cared to cross after nightfall. It was near the "Bottoms" that a mysterious stranger took up his abode many years ago. He was accompanied by an evil-looking foreign man-servant, who never spoke to any one except his master—probably because he was unable to speak English. No one knew where these strange people had come from, but they kept a boat in the cove, in which they used to start off to sea early in the morning and disappear in the distance, never returning until dead of night. Sometimes when the weather was stormy they remained out all night. Occasionally, but only on stormy and dark nights, they stayed on shore, and then they went hunting on the moors, whence the cry of their hounds was often heard in the midnight hours.
At length the mysterious stranger died and was buried, the coffin being carried to the grave followed by the servant and the dogs. As soon as the grave was filled in with earth the servant and the dogs suddenly disappeared, and were never heard of again, while at the same time the boat vanished from the cove.
Since this episode a ghostly vessel had occasionally appeared in the night, floating through the midnight air from the direction of the sea—a black, square-rigged, single-masted barque, sometimes with a small boat, at other times without, but with no crew visible. The apparition appeared on the sea about nightfall, and sailed through the breakers that foamed over the dangerous rocks that fringed the shore, gliding over the sands and through the mist that covered the "Bottoms," and proceeding in awful silence and mystery to the pirate's grave, where it immediately disappeared; and it is an ill omen to those who see that ghostly vessel, the sight of which forebodes misfortune!
It was near St. Levan's Church that the stranger was buried, but when this happened was beyond record. St. Levan himself appeared to have been a fisherman, but only for food, not sport; the valley in his day was not the dreary place it was now, for grass and flowers sprang up in his footsteps and made a footpath from his church to the sea. He only caught one fish each day, as that was sufficient for his frugal meal. One evening, however, when he was fishing, he felt a strong pull at his line, and on drawing it up found two fish (bream) on his hook. As he only needed one and desired to be impartial and not to favour one more than the other, he threw them both into the sea. Then he threw his line in afresh, and again they both came on the hook, and were again thrown back; but when they came a third time, St. Levan thought there must be some reason for this strange adventure, and carried them home. On reaching his house he found his sister St. Breaze and her two children had come to visit him, and he was glad then that he had brought the two fish, which were cooked for supper. The children were very hungry, as they had walked a long distance, and ate fast and carelessly, so that a bone stuck in the throat of each and killed them!
St. Levan must have been a strong man, for he once split a rock by striking it with his fist, and then prophesied:
The stone was still to be seen, and in the fissure made by the saint the flowers and ferns were still growing; but there did not appear to be any danger of the immediate fulfilment of the saint's prophecy!
We now walked on to one of the finest groups of rocks in the country, named "Tol-Peden-Penwith"—a great mass of granite broken and shattered into the most fantastic forms and wonderfully picturesque. It formed the headland round which Tregeagle had to carry the sand, and the remainder of the coast from there to Land's End and beyond formed similar scenery. We were quite enraptured with the wild beauty of the different headlands and coves pointed out to us by our friend; but suddenly he saw a church tower in the distance, and immediately our interest in the lovely coast scenery faded away and vanished, for our friend, pointing towards the tower, said he knew a public-house in that direction where he had recently had a first-class tea. We all three hurried away across stone fences towards the place indicated until we reached a road, and we had just turned off on coming to a junction, when we heard a stentorian voice in the distance saying, "Hi! That's not the way!" We had forgotten all about the driver for the moment, but there he was in another road a few fields away, so we shouted and motioned to him to follow us, and we all had tea together while his horse was stabled in the inn yard. The tea, for which we were quite ready, was a good one, and when we had finished we walked on to the Land's End, giving our driver an idea of the probable time we should be ready for him there.
The name of the village was Sennen, and near the church was a large stone 8 feet long and 3 feet wide, said to have been the table-stone at which seven Saxon kings once dined. An old historian gave their names as Ethelbert V, King of Kent; Cissa II, King of the South Saxons; Kinigils, King of the West Saxons; Sebert, King of Essex or the East Saxons; Ethelfred, King of Northumbria; Penda, King of Mercia; and Sigebert V, King of East Anglia. It was also supposed that King Alfred had on one occasion dined at the same stone after defeating the Danes at Vellandruacher.
The mile or so of moorland over which we now walked to the Land's End must have looked very beautiful earlier in the year, as the gorse or furze was mingled with several varieties of heather which had displayed large bell-formed blooms of various colours, and there had been other flowers in addition. Even at this late period of the year sufficient combination of colour remained to give us an idea how beautiful it must have appeared when at its best. From some distance away we could see the whitewashed wall of a house displaying in large black letters the words: "THE FIRST AND LAST HOUSE IN ENGLAND," and this we found to be an inn. Here we were practically at the end of our walk of 1,372 miles, which had extended over a period of nine weeks. We had passed through many dangers and hardships, and a feeling of thankfulness to the Almighty was not wanting on our part as we found ourselves at the end. We had still to cross a narrow neck of land which was just wide enough at the top for a footpath, while almost immediately below we could hear the sea thundering on each side of us. As we cautiously walked across in single file our thoughts were running on the many Cornish saints in whose footsteps we might now be treading, and on King Arthur and the Giant Tregeagle, when our friend, who was walking ahead, suddenly stopped and told us we were now on the spot where Charles Wesley stood when he composed a memorable verse which still appeared in one of his hymns:
As we were crossing the narrow path we had not thought of the Wesleys as being amongst the Cornish saints; but where was there a greater saint than John Wesley? and how much does Cornwall owe to him! He laboured there abundantly, and laid low the shades of the giants and the saints whom the Cornish people almost worshipped before he came amongst them, and in the place of these shadows he planted the better faith of a simple and true religion, undefiled and that fadeth not away!
We must own to a shade of disappointment when we reached the last stone and could walk no farther—a feeling perhaps akin to that of Alexander the Great, who, when he had conquered the known world, is said to have sighed because there were no other worlds to conquer. But this feeling soon vanished when with a rush came the thoughts of those dear friends at home who were anxiously awaiting the return of their loved ones whom they had lost awhile, and it was perhaps for their sakes as well as our own that we did not climb upon the last stone or ledge or rock that overhung the whirl of waters below: where the waters of the two Channels were combining with those of the great Atlantic.
ENYS-DODNAN, ARMED KNIGHT, AND LONGSHIPS.
We placed our well-worn sticks, whose work like our own was done, on the rock before us, with the intention of throwing them into the sea, but this we did not carry out.
LONGSHIPS LIGHTHOUSE, LAND'S END.
We stood silent and spell-bound, for beyond the Longships Lighthouse was the setting sun, which we watched intently as it slowly disappeared behind some black rocks in the far distance. It was a solemn moment, for had we not started with the rising sun on a Monday morning and finished with the setting sun on a Saturday night? It reminded us of the beginning and ending of our own lives, and especially of the end, as the shadows had already begun to fall on the great darkening waters before us. Was it an ancient mariner, or a long-forgotten saint, or a presentiment of danger that caused my brother to think he heard a far-away whisper as if wafted over the sea?
Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil: for Thou art with me; Thy rod and Thy staff they comfort me.
HOMEWARD BOUND
(BY MR. ROBERT NAYLOR)
We retraced our steps to the "First and Last House in England," where we found our driver waiting for us with his conveyance, which we had now time to examine, and found to be a light, rickety, two-wheeled cart of ancient but durable construction, intended more for use than ornament, and equivalent to the more northern shandrydan or shandry. The strong board which formed the seat was placed across the conveyance from one side to the other a few inches below the top-rail, and would slide to any point required between the front and back of the trap, the weight of the driver or other passengers holding it in its place. It would only hold three persons, including the driver. The first difficulty that presented itself, however, was the fact that we were not sufficiently provided with warm clothing to face the twelve-mile drive to Penzance in the cold night air; but, fortunately, our friend had an overcoat which had been brought out by the driver; so after a short consultation we arranged that I should sit between the driver and our friend, a comparatively warm position, while my brother sat on the floor of the conveyance, where there was a plentiful supply of clean dry straw, with his face towards the horse and his back supported by the backboard of the trap, where our presence on the seat above him would act as a screen from the wind.
After arranging ourselves as comfortably as possible in our rather novel positions, with which we were rather pleased than otherwise, we proceeded on our way at a brisk speed, for our horse was quite fresh and showed no disposition to loiter on the road, since like ourselves he was on his way home.
Lighting regulations for vehicles were not in force in those days, and conveyances such as ours carried no lights even on the darkest night; but with a total absence of trees, and lighted by the first quarter of the new moon, we expected to reach Penzance before the night became really dark.
The conversation as we passed into the open country was carried on by the three of us in front, as my brother could not join in it owing to his position; and we had just turned towards him with the jocular remark, "How are you getting on down there?" and had received his reply, "All right!" when, with scarcely a moment's warning, we met with an accident which might have killed him and seriously injured ourselves. We suddenly crashed into a heavy waggon drawn by two horses, the first wheel of the waggon striking dead against ours. The force of the collision caused our seat to slide backwards against my brother, pinning him against the backboard of the cart, but, fortunately for him, our driver, who had retained his hold on his reins, jumped up at the same moment and relieved the pressure, so that he had only the weight of two men against him instead of three.
Meantime all was confusion, and it was a case of every one for himself; but the only man who was equal to the occasion was our driver, who with one hand pulled his horse backwards almost as quickly as the other horses came forward, and with his whip in the other hand slashed furiously at the face of the waggoner, who was seated on the wide board in front of his waggon fast asleep and, as it afterwards appeared, in a state of intoxication.
Our conveyance was on its proper side of the road and quite near the fence, so that our friend jumped out of it on the land above, quickly followed by myself, and, rapidly regaining the road, we ran towards the horses attached to the waggon and stopped them.
A tremendous row now followed between the waggoner, who was a powerfully built man, and our driver, and the war of words seemed likely to lead to blows; but my brother, whom in the excitement of the moment we had quite forgotten, now appeared upon the scene in rather a dazed condition, and, hearing the altercation going on, advanced within striking distance of the waggoner. I could see by the way he held his cudgel that he meant mischief if the course of events had rendered it necessary, but the blood on the waggoner's face showed he had been severely punished already.
Seeing that he was hopelessly outnumbered, the waggoner, who was almost too drunk to understand what had happened, became a little quieter and gave us his name, and we copied the name of the miller who employed him from the name-plate on the waggon, giving similar information to the driver concerning ourselves; but as we heard nothing further about the matter, we concluded the case was settled out of court.
We all congratulated my brother on his almost providential escape from what might have been a tragic ending to his long walk. He had told me he had a foreboding earlier in the evening that something was about to happen to him. From the position in which he was seated in the bottom of the trap he could not see anything before him except the backs of the three men sitting above, and he did not know what was happening until he thought he saw us tumbling upon him and myself jumping in the air over a bush.
He described it in the well-known words of Sir Walter Scott: