It is a handsome edifice, consisting of a lofty nave and side aisles, separated by clustered columns and pointed arches. The capitals of the pillars, which are of very fine moorstone, are ornamented with roses.

The Tower stands on the north side, and has a venerable appearance. Over the porch on the south side, there are three handsome niches. The whole building (particularly the interior) has, within the last seven years, undergone a thorough repair. It contains a fine altar-tomb, erected in memory of Prior Vivian, Suffragan Bishop of Megara, in Greece, who died in the year 1533, and on which is the effigy of the deceased in his pontifical robes, with a mitre and crozier, his hands clasped on his breast, and two angels supporting shields charged with the Vivian and Priory arms.

The Font is the most interesting piece of antiquity in the church, and of large dimensions. It is supported by a pedestal in the middle, and four pillars on the outside, with angel’s heads for capitals; and the basin in the centre is highly ornamented in the Saxon style, with grotesque animals, foliage, &c. A handsome painted window, by Lowe, of London, representing the Resurrection of our Saviour, will be put up in the course of a short time. It is the gift of Lord de Dunstanville, who is the patron of the vicarage.

A very particular account of the expense of rebuilding the church, is preserved among the town records. The whole cost, exclusive of presents of timber, amounted only to 194£. 3s. 6½d. The timber for St. John’s aisle cost 20£. 13s. 4d. Sir John Arundell gave several timber-trees for the building. The lead for roofing, came to 16£. 2s. 3½d. The rate of wages at this time appears to have been, for a labourer, four-pence by the day; for a mason, hewing stones, five-pence; for making the pillars, &c. sixpence; for a plasterer, five-pence half-penny. The following is a specimen of some of the charges:—“Forty-nine journeys (days work) for the windows above the Vyse, 24s. 6d.; fourteen journeys on the gabell window, 7s.” There was formerly a spire on the tower, said to have been built by Prior Vivian, and esteemed, as Tonkin tell us, the loftiest and finest in the West of England. It was destroyed by lightning in 1699.—Jasper Wood, 37 years vicar of Bodmin, who died in 1716, a man, it may be supposed, of deranged intellects, fancied himself bewitched, and that he was delivered from the witches’ power by his guardian-angel. Tonkin says there was a printed account of this man, and various traditions relating to him are still current in the town.

The Corporation consists of a Mayor, 11 Aldermen, 24 Common Councilmen, and a Town Clerk. This town was regularly incorporated by charter of Elizabeth, which was lost, by lapse, previously to the year 1798, when a similar charter was granted by his late Majesty.

The right of electing two representatives in Parliament is vested solely in the 37 members of the Corporation.

Among the antient corporation accounts, are the following curious items, relating to the election of members of Parliament, and the payment of their wages, in the reign of Henry VII.

“19, 20 Hen. VII, paide to Richard Watts and John Smyth, burgesses of the Parliament for the towne, 13s. 4d.

“Paide for the endentes for the burgesses of the parliament, 20d.

“Paide and yeven in malmesey to the under-sheryff, 4d.

“Paide for the makyng a payr of endentes and an obligation, 12d.

“It. Paide and yeven onto Thomas Trote in rewarde, 20d.

“It. Paide to Sir Richard Downa, the wich was promysed by the maier and the worshipfull in a reward towardes his wagys, 13s. 4d.

The town principally consists of one long street, running nearly a mile from east to west; the houses in general, are low, decayed, and irregular; but much improvement has been made within the last 20 years. Some centuries ago, Bodmin appears to have been of much greater extent, and more populous, than at present: it was probably largest, and contained the greatest number of inhabitants, about the fourteenth century. It is now smaller than either Helston, Liskeard, Megavissey, and Penryn; and considerably smaller than St. Austell, Truro, Redruth, Penzance, or Falmouth; yet in the reign of Queen Elizabeth, it appears to have still taken precedence of all the other Cornish towns.

The Grammar School, said to have been founded by Queen Elizabeth, and endowed with 5£. per annum, (which the Corporation have increased to 100£. per annum) was held in an old chapel, in the church-yard, until the last year, when a new school-room was opened in a more commodious situation.

The population, according to the late returns, amounts to 2902, but the whole parish contains 3278, being 802 more than the number returned in 1811.^[47]

The market on Saturday is much frequented, and well supplied with provisions; but some judicious regulations are necessary, (particularly to remedy the want of a market house,) which would render it more generally useful and commodious. There are also three fairs held here annually, chiefly for cattle.

There was a market at Bodmin when the survey of Domesday was taken, the profits of which, belonging to the Prior, were then valued at 35s. per annum: the tolls were afterwards let at a fee-farm rent to the burgesses, in whom the market and fairs are now vested. Leland speaks of the market at Bodmin as being like a fair for the confluence of people; and Hals compares it, in point of supply of all kinds of provisions &c., to those of Exeter and Tavistock. The fairs, which are great marts for cattle and horses, are on the feast of the Conversion of St. Paul, Saturday after Midlent Sunday, Saturday before Palm Sunday, Wednesday before Whitsuntide, and on the feast of St. Nicholas the Bishop (December 6.) Leather-shoes are made in great quantities at this town, and exposed to sale in standings at the markets and fairs.

Bodmin is said to have been one of the coinage towns which had the privilege of stamping tin; but it appears that it had been lost before the year 1347, when the burgesses petitioned parliament, complaining, that although by royal charter they were authorised to deal in all kinds of merchandise, tin as well as other, in the county of Cornwall, they had of late been hindered by the Prince and his men from buying or coining tin: they were unsuccessful in their application, the answer of Parliament being, that the Prince might order the tin to be sold where he pleased.

The Summer Assizes for the county have been held in this town, with few exceptions, since the year 1716, and the Michaelmas Quarter Sessions are also held here.

The races usually commence the week following the assizes, and are held about a mile and a half from the town, on the left of the road leading to Launceston. The course is considered one of the finest in England.

The County Gaol was erected in the year 1780, from the designs of Sir John Cull, on the principles recommended by the great philanthropist, the late John Howard, Esq. It stands in a healthy situation, on the side of a hill, to the north of the town.

Within the last three years a very handsome and commodious Lunatic Asylum has been erected at the western end of the town, and is fitted up in a very comfortable manner, for persons afflicted with that dreadful malady.

The earliest historical event, of any importance, connected with this place, is, that it became the head-quarters of Thomas Flanmauck and Michael Joseph, the ringleaders of the rebellion of 1496, both of whom indeed appear to have been inhabitants of this parish.—Perkin Warbeck, after his landing in Cornwall, in the year 1498, assembled at Bodmin a force of 3000 men, with which he advanced to attack Exeter.—In 1550, the Cornish rebels, under the command of Humphry Arundell, encamped at Castle-Hynock, near this town, and marched thence to the siege of Exeter. After the suppression of this rebellion, which soon followed, Sir Anthony Kingston, the Provost-marshal, came, with the King’s commission, to punish some of the chief offenders; and, it is said, he hanged the mayor at his own door, after partaking of the hospitalities of his table.—Bodmin does not appear to have had any garrison during the Civil War, though it was occasionally occupied by both parties. General Fairfax finally took possession of it for the Parliament in 1646, a few days before the capitulation with Sir Ralph Hopton, near Truro.

At St. Lawrence, about a mile north-west of Bodmin, are some remains of the Hospital for Lepers, founded by Queen Elizabeth, in the year 1582, but which was abolished a few years since owing to certain abuses, and the lands belonging to it, worth about £140. per annum, appropriated to the Infirmary at Truro. The remains chiefly consist of three fine arches, springing from clustered columns, with ornamented capitals, and some ruinous walls, now fast mouldering into decay. On one part of the old buildings, is the following inscription:

The seal of this hospital is a curious relic of antiquity, containing the figure of St. Lawrence, under a Gothic canopy, and another figure below it, in the attitude of prayer, with this inscription:—“S. Sci Lawrencie Bodmons de peupo.”

St. Lawrence is merely a hamlet to Bodmin, but is remarkable as having two very large fairs for cattle annually.

At Lanhwit, the adjoining village, about three miles from Bodmin, are some remains of an antient Monastery, called St. Bennet’s, which, although greatly defaced some years ago, by the removal of the cloisters, still displays a fine tower, richly mantled with ivy. The other parts have been fitted up at the expense of the proprietor, the Rev. F. V. I. Arundell, as a family residence. The remains are seated in a narrow valley, almost surrounded by wood, with a rapid stream in the front, which adds greatly to the beauty of this romantic spot.

Tremere, an ancient seat of the Courtenays, in this parish, is now a farm-house.

A ride from hence to the Roach Rocks, will be highly gratifying to the curious traveller, or an admirer of natural curiosities. They consist of three immense piles of craggy ponderous stones, rising to a considerable height, and at a distance resembling an antient castle. On the summit of the pile, in the centre, stand the remains of a small building, which formerly contained two apartments, and is supposed to have been erected for religious purposes.

These rocks, says Dr. Maton, “consist of a white sparry quartz, mixed with schoerl, which appears in innumerable needle-like crystals. Two or three varieties of this substance are observable; in one the schoerl being more sparingly interspersed, and in another more abundantly.” A pile of rocks starting abruptly out of a wide green surface, and covering some space with enormous fragments, on which there are only a few vestiges of incipient vegetation, form a singular scene, exhibiting a kind of wild sublimity, peculiar to itself. The accompanying view was taken from the south side, and the chapel on the summit is a very beautiful and picturesque feature in the picture.