And seven days were all we could allow ourselves at the Lizard, if we meant to see the rest of Cornwall. We began to reckon with sore hearts that five days were already gone, and it seemed as if we had not seen half we ought to see, even of our near surroundings.
We will take no excursion to-day. We will just have our bath at Housel Cove and then we will wander about the shore, and examine the Lizard Lights. Only fancy, our going away to-morrow without having seen the inside of the Lizard Lights! Oh, I wish we were not leaving so soon. We shall never like any place as we like the Lizard.
It was indeed very delightful. Directly after breakfast—and we are people who never vary from our eight o'clock breakfast, so that we always see the world in its early morning brightness and freshness—we went
Brushing with hasty steps the dew away,
along the fields, which led down to Housel or Househole Cove. Before us, clear in the sunshine, rose the fine headland of Penolver, and the green slopes of the amphitheatre of Belidden, supposed to be the remains of a Druidical temple. That, and the chair of Belidden, a recess in the rock, whence there is a splendid view, with various archæological curiosities, true or traditionary, we ought to have examined, I know. But—we didn't do it. Some of us were content to rejoice in the general atmosphere of beauty and peace without minute investigation, and some of us were so eminently practical that "a good bathe" appeared more important than all the poetry and archæology in the world.
So we wandered slowly on, rejoicing at having the place all to ourselves, when we came suddenly upon a tall black figure intently watching three other black figures, or rather dots, which were climbing slowly over Penolver.
It was our clerical friend of Kynance; with whom, in the natural and right civility of holiday-makers, we exchanged a courteous good morning.
Yes, those are my girls up on the cliff there. They have been bathing, and are now going to walk to Cadgwith.
Then nobody fell into the Devil's Throat at Kynance? They all came back to you with whole limbs?
Yes, said he smiling, "and they went again for another long walk in the afternoon. At night, when it turned out to be such splendid moonlight, they actually insisted on going launce-fishing. Of course you know about launce-fishing?"
I pleaded my utter ignorance of that noble sport.
Oh, it is the thing at the Lizard. My boys—and girls too—consider it the best fun going. The launce is a sort of sand-eel peculiar to these coasts. It swims about all day, and at night burrows in the sand just above the waterline, where, when the moon shines on it, you can trace the silvery gleam of the creature. So you stand up to your ankles on wet sand, with a crooked iron spear which you dart in and hook him up, keeping your left hand free to seize him with.
Easy fishing, said I, with a certain pity for the sand-eel.
Not so easy as appears. You are apt either to chop him right in two, or miss him altogether, when off he wriggles in the sand and disappears. My young people say it requires a practised hand and a peculiar twist of the wrist, to have any success at all in launce fishing. It can only be done on moonlight nights—the full moon and a day or two after—and they are out half the night. They go about barefoot, which is much safer than soaked shoes and stockings. About midnight they light a fire on the sand, cook all the fish they have caught, and have a grand supper, as they had last night. They came home as merry as crickets about two o'clock this morning. Perhaps you might not have noticed what a wonderful moonlight night it was?
I had; but it would not have occurred to me to spend it in standing for hours up to the knees in salt water, catching unfortunate fish.
However, tastes differ, and launce-fishing may be a prime delight to some people; so I faithfully chronicle it, and the proper mode of pursuing it, as one of the attractions at the Lizard. I am not aware that it is practised at any other part of the Cornish coast, nor can I say whether or not it was a pastime of King Arthur and his Knights. One cannot imagine Sir Tristram or Sir Launcelot occupied in spearing a small sand-eel.
The bathing at Housel Cove was delightful as ever. And afterwards we saw that very rare and beautiful sight, a perfect solar rainbow. Not the familiar bow of Noah, but a great luminous circle round the sun, like the halo often seen round the moon, extending over half the sky; yellow at first, then gradually assuming faint prismatic tints. This colouring, though never so bright as the ordinary arched rainbow, was wonderfully tender and delicate. We stood a long time watching it, till at last it melted slowly out of the sky, leaving behind a sense of mystery, as of something we had never seen before and might never see again in all our lives.
It was a lovely day, bright and warm as midsummer, tempting us to some distant excursion; but we had decided to investigate the Lizard Lights. We should have been content to take them for granted, in their purely poetical phase, as we had watched them night after night. But some of us were blessed with scientific relatives, who would have despised us utterly if we had spent a whole week at the Lizard and never gone to see the Lizard Lights. So we felt bound to do our duty, and admire, if we could not understand.
Which we certainly did not. I chronicle with shame that the careful and courteous explanations of that most intelligent young man, who met us at the door of the huge white building, apparently quite glad to have an opportunity of conducting us through it, were entirely thrown away. We mounted ladders, we looked at Brobdingnagian lamps, we poked into mysterious machinery for lighting them and for sounding the fog-horn, we listened to all that was told us, and tried to look as if we took it in. Very much interested we could not but be at such wonderful results of man's invention, but as for comprehending! we came away with our minds as dark as when we went in.
I have always found through life that, next to being clever, the safest thing is to know one's own ignorance and acknowledge it. Therefore let me leave all description of the astonishing mechanism of the Lizard Lights—I believe the first experiment of their kind, and not very long established—to abler pens and more intelligent brains. To see that young man, scarcely above the grade of a working man, handling his instruments and explaining them and their uses, seeming to take for granted that we could understand—which alas! we didn't, not an atom!—inspired me with a sense of humiliation and awe. Also of pride at the wonders this generation has accomplished, and is still accomplishing; employing the gradually comprehended forces of Nature against herself, as it were, and dominating her evil by ever-new discoveries and applications of the recondite powers of good.
The enormous body of light produced nightly—equal, I think he said, to 30,000 candles—and the complicated machinery for keeping the fog-horn continually at work, when even that gigantic blaze became invisible—all this amount of skill, science, labour, and money, freely expended for the saving of life, gave one a strong impression of not only British power but British beneficence. Could King Arthur have come back again from his sea-engulfed Land of Lyonesse, and stood where we stood, beside the Lizard Lights, what would he have said to it all?
Even though we did not understand, we were keenly interested in all we saw, and still more so in the stories of wrecks which this young man had witnessed even during the few years, or months—I forget which—of his stay at the Lizard. He, too, agreed, that the rocks there, called by the generic name of the Stags, were the most fatal of all on our coasts to ships outward and homeward bound. Probably because in the latter case, captain and crews get a trifle careless; and in the former—as I have heard in sad explanation of many emigrant ships being lost almost immediately after quitting port—they get drunk. Many of the sailors are said to come on board "half-seas over," and could the skilfullest of pilots save a ship with a drunken crew?
Be that as it may, the fact remains, that throughout winter almost every week's chronicle at the Lizard is the same story—wild storms, or dense fogs, guns of distress heard, a hasty manning of the life-boat, dragged with difficulty down the steep cliff-road, a brief struggle with the awful sea, and then, even if a few lives are saved, with the ship herself all is over.
Only last Christmas I saw a vessel go to pieces in ten minutes on the rocks below there, said the man, after particularising several wrecks, which seemed to have imprinted themselves on his memory with all their incidents. "Yes, we have a bad time in winter, and the coastguard men lead a risky life. They are the picked men of the service, and tolerably well paid, but no money could ever pay them for what they go through—or the fishermen, who generally are volunteers, and get little or nothing."
It must be a hard life in these parts, especially in winter, we observed.
Well, perhaps it is, but it's our business, you see.
Yes, but not all people do their business, as the mismanagements and mistakes of this world plainly show.
Still, it is a good world, and we felt it so as we strolled along the sunshiny cliff, talking over all these stories, tragical or heroic, which had been told us in such a simple matter-of-fact way, as if they were every-day occurrences. And then, while the young folks went on "for a good scramble" over Penolver, I sat down for a quiet "think"; that enforced rest, which, as years advance, becomes not painful, but actually pleasant; in which, if one fails to solve the problems of the universe, one is prone to con them over, wondering at them all.
From the sunny sea and sunny sky, full of a silence so complete that I could hear every wave as it broke on the unseen rocks below, my mind wandered to that young fellow among his machinery, with his sickly eager face and his short cough—indicating that his "business" in this world, over which he seemed so engrossed, might only too soon come to an end. Between these apparently eternal powers of Nature, so strong, so fierce, so irresistible, against which man fought so magnificently with all his perfection of scientific knowledge and accuracy of handiwork—and this poor frail human life, which in a moment might be blown out like a candle, suddenly quenched in darkness, "there is no skill or knowledge in the grave whither thou goest"—what a contrast it was!
And yet—and yet?—We shall sleep with our fathers, and some of us feel sometimes so tired that we do not in the least mind going to sleep. But notwithstanding this, notwithstanding everything without that seems to imply our perishableness, we are conscious of something within which is absolutely imperishable. We feel it only stronger and clearer as life begins to melt away from us; as "the lights in the windows are darkened, and the daughters of music are brought low." To the young, death is often a terror, for it seems to put an end to the full, rich, passionate life beyond which they can see nothing; but to the old, conscious that this their tabernacle is being slowly dissolved, and yet its mysterious inhabitant, the wonderful, incomprehensible me, is exactly the same—thinks, loves, suffers, and enjoys, precisely as it did heaven knows how many years ago—to them, death appears in quite another shape. He is no longer Death the Enemy, but Death the Friend, who may—who can tell?—give back all that life has denied or taken away. He cannot harm us, and he may bless us, with the blessing of loving children, who believe that, whatever happens, nothing can take them out of their Father's arms.
But I had not come to Cornwall to preach, except to myself now and then, as this day. My silent sermon was all done by the time the young folks came back, full of the beauties of their cliff walk, and their affectionate regrets that I "could never manage it," but must have felt so dull, sitting on a stone and watching the sheep and the sea-gulls. Not at all! I was obliged to confess that I never am "dull," as people call it, and love solitude almost as much as society.
So, each contented in our own way, we went merrily home, to find waiting for us our cosy tea—the last!—and our faithful Charles, who, according to agreement, appeared overnight, to take charge of us till we got back to civilisation and railways.
Yes, ladies, here I am, said he with a beaming countenance. "And I've got you the same carriage and the same horse, as you wished, and I've come in time to give him a good night's rest. Now, when shall you start, and what do you want to do to-morrow?"
Our idea had been to take for our next resting-place Marazion. This queer-named town had attracted us ever since the days when we learnt geography. Since, we had heard a good deal about it: how it had been inhabited by Jewish colonists, who bought tin from the early Phœnician workers of the Cornish mines, and been called by them Mara-Zion—bitter Zion—corrupted by the common people into Market-Jew. It was a quiet place, with St. Michael's Mount opposite; and attracted us much more than genteel Penzance. So did a letter we got from the landlord of its one hotel, promising to take us in, and make us thoroughly comfortable.
Could we get there in one day? Charles declared we could, and even see a good deal on the road.
We'll go round by Mullion. Mary will be delighted to get another peep at you ladies, and while I rest the horse you can go in and look at the old church—it's very curious, they say. And then we'll go on to Gunwalloe,—there's another church there, close by the sea, built by somebody who was shipwrecked. But then it's so old and so small. However, we can stop and look at it if you like.
His good common sense, and kindliness, when he might so easily have done his mere duty and taken us the shortest and ugliest route, showing us nothing, decided us to leave all in Charles's hands, and start at 10 A.M. for Penzance, viâ Helstone, where we all wished to stay an hour or two, and find out a "friend," the only one we had in Cornwall.
So all was settled, with but a single regret, that several boating excursions we had planned with John Curgenven had all fallen through, and we should never behold some wonderful sea-caves between the Lizard and Cadgwith, which we had set our hearts upon visiting.
Charles fingered his cap with a thoughtful air. "I don't see why you shouldn't, ladies. If I was to go direct and tell John Curgenven to have a boat ready at Church Cove, and we was to start at nine instead of ten, and drive there, the carriage might wait while you rowed to the caves and back; we should still reach Helstone by dinner-time, and Marazion before dark."
We'll do it! was the unanimous resolve. And at this addition to his work Charles looked actually pleased!
So—all was soon over, our easy packing done, our bill paid—a very small one—our goodnights said to the kindly handmaid, Esther, who hoped we would come back again some time, and promised to keep the artistic mural decorations of our little parlour in memory of us. My young folks went to bed, and then, a little before midnight, when all the house was quiet, I put a shawl over my head, unlatched the innocent door—no bolts or bars at the Lizard—and went out into the night.
What a night it was!—mild as summer, clear as day: the full moon sailing aloft in an absolutely cloudless sky. Not a breath, not a sound—except the faint thud-thud of the in-coming waves, two miles off, at Kynance, the outline of which, and of the whole coast, was distinctly visible. A silent earth, lying under a silent heaven. Looking up, one felt almost like a disembodied soul, free to cleave through infinite space and gain—what?
Is it human or divine, this ceaseless longing after something never attained, this craving after the eternal life, which, if fully believed in, fully understood, would take all the bitterness out of this life? And yet, that knowledge is not given.
But so much is given, and all given is so infinitely good, except where we ourselves turn it into evil, that surely more, and better, will be given to us by and by.
And so, to bed—to bed! Those only truly enjoy life who fear not death: who can say of the grave as if it were their bed: "I will lay me down in peace and take my rest, for it is Thou only, O God, who makest me to dwell in safety."
And our last at the Lizard, which a week ago had been to us a mere word or dot in a map; now we carried away from it a living human interest in everything and everybody.
Esther bade us a cordial farewell: Mrs. Curgenven, standing at the door of her serpentine shop, repeated the good wishes, and informed us that John and his boat had already started for Church Cove. As we drove through the bright little Lizard Town, and past the Church of Landewednack, wondering if we should ever see either again, we felt quite sad.
But sentimental considerations soon vanished in practical alarms. Leaving the carriage and Charles at the nearest point to the Cove, we went down the steep descent, and saw John rocking in his boat, and beckoning to us with a bland and smiling countenance. But between us and him lay a sort of causeway, of the very roughest rocks, slippery with sea-weed, and beat upon by waves—such waves! Yet clearly, if we meant to get into the boat at all, we must seize our opportunity and jump in between the flux and reflux of that advancing tide.
I am not a coward: I love boats, and was well used to them in my youth, but now—my heart misgave me. There were but two alternatives—to stop the pleasure of the whole party, and leave Cornwall with these wonderful sea-caves unseen, or to let my children go alone. Neither was possible; so I hailed a sturdy youth at work hard by, and asked him if he would take charge of an old lady across the rocks. He grinned from ear to ear, but came forward, and did his duty manfully and kindly. My young folks, light as feathers, bounded after; and with the help of John Curgenven, chivalrous and careful as ever, we soon found ourselves safely in the boat.
Safe, but not quite happy. "Here we go up, up, up, and here we go down, down, down," was the principle of our voyage, the most serious one we ever took in an open boat with a single pair of oars. Never did I see such waves,—at least, never did I float upon them, in a boat that went tossing like a bit of cork out into the open sea.
John seemed not to mind them in the least. His strong arms swept the boat along, and he still found breath to talk to us, pointing out the great gloomy cliffs we were passing under, and telling us stories of wrecks, the favourite theme—and no wonder.
This sunshiny morning that iron-bound coast looked awful enough; what must it have looked like, on the winter night when the emigrant ship Brest went down!
Yes, it was about ten o'clock at night, said John. "I was fast asleep in bed, but they knocked me up; I got on my clothes and was off in five minutes. They are always glad enough to get us fishermen, the coastguard are. Mine was the first boat-load we brought ashore; we would only take women and children that time. They were all in their night-gowns, and they couldn't speak a word of English, but we made them understand somehow. One woman threw her three children down to me, and stayed behind on the wreck with two more."
Were the women frightened?
Oh, no, they were very quiet, dazed like. Some of them seemed to be saying their prayers. But they made no fuss at all, not even the little ones. They lay down in the bottom of the boat, and we rowed ashore as fast as we could, to Cadgwith. Then we rowed back and fetched two boatloads more. We saved a lot of lives that wreck, but only their lives; they had scarcely a rag of clothes on, and some of the babies were as naked as when they were born.
And who took them in?
Everybody: we always do it, answered John, as if surprised at the question. "The fishermen's cottages were full, and so was the parsonage. We gave them clothes, and kept them till they could be sent away. Yes, it was an awful night; I got something to remember it by, here."
He held out his hand, from which we noticed half of one finger was missing.
It got squeezed off with a rope somehow. I didn't heed it much at the time, said John carelessly. "But look, we're at the first of the caves. I'll row in close, ladies, and let you see it."
So we had to turn our minds from the vision of the wreck of the Brest, which John's simple words made so terribly vivid, to examine Raven's Ugo, and Dolor Ugo; ugo is Cornish for cave. Over the entrance of the first a pair of ravens have built from time immemorial. It is just accessible, the opening being above the sea-line, and hung with quantities of sea-ferns. Here in smuggling days, many kegs of spirits used to be secreted: and many a wild drama no doubt has been acted there—daring encounters between smugglers and coastguard men, not bloodless on either side.
Dolor Ugo is now inaccessible and unusable. Its only floor is of heaving water, a deep olive green, and so clear that we could see the fishes swimming about pursuing a shoal of launce. Its high-vaulted roof and sides were tinted all colours—rose-pink, rich dark brown, and purple. The entrance was wide enough to admit a boat, but it gradually narrowed into impenetrable darkness. How far inland it goes no one can tell, as it could only be investigated by swimming, a rather dangerous experiment. Boats venture as far as the daylight goes; and it is a favourite trick of the boatman suddenly to fire off a pistol, which reverberates like thunder through the mysterious gloom of the cave.
A solemn place; an awful place, some of us thought, as we rowed in, and out again, into the sunshiny open sea. Which we had now got used to; and it was delicious to go dancing like a feather up and down, trusting to John Curgenven's stout arm and fearless, honest face. We felt sad to think this would be our last sight of him and of the magnificent Lizard coast. But the minutes were lessening, and we had some way still to row. Also to land, which meant a leap between the waves upon slippery sea-weedy rocks. In silent dread I watched my children accomplish this feat, and then—
Well, it is over, and I sit here writing these details. But I would not do it again, not even for the pleasure of revisiting Dolor Ugo and having a row with John Curgenven.
Honest fellow! he looked relieved when he saw "the old lady" safe on terra firma, and we left him waving adieux, as he "rocked in his boat in the bay." May his stout arms and kindly heart long remain to him! May his summer tourists be many and his winter shipwrecks few! I am sure he will always do his duty, and see that other people do theirs, or, like the proverbial Cornishmen, he "will know the reason why."
Charles was ready; waiting patiently in front of a blacksmith's shop. But, alas! fate had overtaken us in the shape of an innocent leak in John Curgenven's boat; nothing, doubtless, to him, who was in the habit of baling it out with his boots, and then calmly putting them on again, but a little inconvenient to us. To drive thirty miles with one's garments soaked up to the knees was not desirable.
There was a cottage close by, whence came the gleam of a delicious fire and the odour of ironing clothes. We went in: the mistress, evidently a laundress, advanced and offered to dry us—which she did, chattering all the while in the confidential manner of country folks.
A hard working, decent body she was, and as for her house, it was a perfect picture of cleanliness and tidiness. Its two rooms, kitchen and bedroom, were absolutely speckless. When we noticed this, and said we found the same in many Cornish cottages; she almost seemed offended at the praise.
Oh, that's nothing, ma'am. We hereabouts all likes to have our places tidy. Mine's not over tidy to-day because of the washing. I hadn't time to clean up. But if you was to come of a Sunday. Look there! Her eye caught something in a dark corner, at which she flew, apron in hand. "I declare, I'm quite ashamed. I didn't think we had one in the house."
One what?
One spider web!
Dried, warmed, and refreshed, but having found the greatest difficulty in inducing the good woman to receive any tangible thanks for her kindness, we proceeded on our journey; going over the same ground which we had traversed already, and finding Pradenack Down as bleak and beautiful as ever. Our first halt was at the door of Mary Mundy, who, with her unappreciated brother, ran out to meet us, and looked much disappointed when she found we had not come to stay.
But you will come some time, ladies, and I'll make you so comfortable. And you'll give my duty to the professor—it was vain to explain that four hundred miles lay between our home and his. "I hope he's quite well. He was a very nice gentleman, please'm. I shall be delighted to see him again, please'm," &c., &c.
We left the three—Mary, her brother, and Charles—chattering together in a dialect which I do not attempt to reproduce, and sometimes could hardly understand. Us, the natives indulged with their best English, but among themselves they talked the broadest Cornish.
It was a very old church, and a preternaturally old beadle showed it in a passive manner, not recognising in the least its points of interest and beauty, except some rows of open benches with ancient oak backs, wonderfully carved.
Our vicar dug them up from under the flooring and turned them into pews. There was a gentleman here the other day who said there was nothing like them in all England.
Most curious, in truth, they were, and suited well the fine old building—a specimen of how carefully and lavishly our forefathers built "for God." We, who build for ourselves, are rather surprised to find in out-of-the-way nooks like this, churches that in size and adornment must have cost years upon years of loving labour as well as money.
It was pleasant to know that the present incumbent, a man of archæological tastes, appreciated his blessings, and took the utmost care of his beautiful old church. Success to him! even though he cannot boast the power of his predecessor, the Reverend Thomas Flavel, who died in 1682, and whose monument in the chancel really expresses the sentiments—in epitaph—of the period:
"Earth, take thine earth; my sin, let Satan have it; The world my goods; my soul my God who gave it. For from these four, Earth, Satan, World, and God, My flesh, my sin, my goods, my soul, I had.
"But it does not mention that the reverend gentleman was the best ghost-layer in all England, and that when he died his ghost also required to be laid, by a brother clergyman, in a spot on the down still pointed out by the people of Mullion, who, being noted for extreme longevity, have passed down this tradition from generation to generation, with an earnest credulity that we of more enlightened counties can hardly understand.
From Mullion we went on to Gunwalloe. Its church, "small and old," as Charles had depreciatingly said, had been so painfully "restored," and looked so bran-new and uninteresting that we contented ourselves with a distant look. It was close to the sea—probably built on the very spot where its pious founder had been cast ashore. The one curious point about it was the detached belfry, some yards distant from the church itself. It sat alone in a little cove, down which a sluggish river crawled quietly seaward. A sweet quiet place, but haunted, as usual, by tales of cruel shipwrecks—of sailors huddled for hours on a bit of rock just above the waves, till a boat could put out and save the few survivors; of sea treasures continually washed ashore from lost ships—Indian corn, coffee, timber, dollars—many are still found in the sand after a storm. And one treasure more, of which the recollection is still kept at Gunwalloe, "a little dead baby in its cap and night-gown, with a necklace of coral beads."
After this our road turned inland. Our good horse, with the dogged persistency of Cornish horses and Cornish men, plodded on mile after mile. Sometimes for an hour or more we did not meet a living soul; then we came upon a stray labourer, or passed through a village where healthy-looking children, big-eyed, brown-faced, and dirty-handed, picturesque if not pretty, stared at us from cottage doors, or from the gates of cottage gardens full of flowers and apples.
Those apples! They were a picture. Hungry and thirsty, we could not resist them. After passing several trees, hung thickly with delicious fruit, we attacked the owner of one of them, a comely young woman, with a baby in her arms and another at her gown.
Oh yes, ma'am, you may have as many apples as you like, if your young ladies will go and get them.
And while they did it, she stood talking by the carriage door, pouring out to me her whole domestic history with a simple frankness worthy of the golden age.
No, really I couldn't, putting back my payment—little enough— for the splendid basket of apples which the girls brought back in triumph. "This is such a good apple year; the pigs would get them if the young ladies didn't. You're kindly welcome to them—well then, if you are determined, say sixpence."
On which magnificent "sixpenn'orth," we lived for days! Indeed I think we brought some of it home as a specimen of Cornish fruit and Cornish liberality.
Helstone was reached at last, and we were not sorry for rest and food in the old-fashioned inn, whence we could look out of window, and contemplate the humours of the little town, which doubtless considered itself a very great one. It was market day, and the narrow street was thronged with beasts and men—the latter as sober as the former, which spoke well for Cornwall. Sober and civil too was every one we addressed in asking our way to the house of our unknown friend, whose only address we had was Helstone. But he seemed well known in the town, though neither a rich man, nor a great man, nor—No, I cannot say he was not a clever man, for in his own line, mechanical engineering, he must have been exceedingly clever. And he was what people call "a great character;" would have made such an admirable study for a novelist, manipulated into an unrecognisable ideal—the only way in which it is fair to put people in books. When I saw him I almost regretted that I write novels no more.
We passed through the little garden—all ablaze with autumn colour, every inch utilised for either flowers, vegetables, or fruit—went into the parlour, sent our cards and waited the result.
In two minutes our friend appeared, and gave us such a welcome! But to explain it I must trench a little upon the sanctities of private life, and tell the story of this honest Cornishman. It will not harm him.
When still young he went to Brazil, and was employed by an English gold-mining company there, for some years. Afterwards he joined an engineering firm, and superintended dredging, the erection of saw-mills, &c., finally building a lighthouse, of which latter work he had the sole charge, and was exceedingly proud. His conscientiousness, probity, and entire reliableness made him most valuable to the firm; whom he served faithfully for many years. When they, as well as himself, returned to England, he still kept up a correspondence with them, preserving towards every member of the family the most enthusiastic regard and devotion.
He rushed into the parlour, a tall, gaunt, middle-aged man, with a shrewd, kindly face, which beamed all over with delight, as he began shaking hands indiscriminately, saying how kind it was of us to come, and how welcome we were.
It was explained which of us he had specially to welcome, the others being only humble appendages, friends of the family, this well-beloved family, whose likenesses for two generations we saw everywhere about the room.
Yes, miss, there they all are, your dear grandfather (alas, only a likeness now!), "your father, and your uncle. They were all so good to me, and I would do anything for them, or for any one of their name. If I got a message that they wanted me for anything, I'd be off to London, or to Brazil, or anywhere, in half-an-hour."
And he really looked as if he would.
But what will you take? added the good man when the rapture and excitement of the moment had a little subsided, and his various questions as to the well-being of "the family" had been asked and answered. "You have dined, you say, but you'll have a cup of tea. My wife (that's the little maid I used to talk to your father about, miss; I always told him I wouldn't stay in Brazil, I must go back to England and marry my little maid), my wife makes the best cup of tea in all Cornwall. Here she is!"
And there entered, in afternoon gown and cap, probably just put on, a middle-aged, but still comely matron, who insisted that, even at this early hour—3 P.M.—to get a cup of tea for us was "no trouble at all."
Indeed, she wouldn't think anything a trouble, no more than I should, miss, if it was for your family. They never forget me, nor I them.
It was here suggested that they were not a "forgetting" family. Nor was he a man likely to be soon forgotten. While the cup of tea, which proved to be a most sumptuous meal, was preparing, he took us all over his house, which was full of foreign curiosities, and experimental inventions. One, I remember, being a musical instrument, a sort of organ, which he had begun making when a mere boy, and taken with him all the way to Brazil and back. It had now found refuge in the little room he called his "workshop," which was filled with odds and ends that would have been delightful to a mechanical mind. He expounded them with enthusiasm, and we tried not to betray an ignorance, which in some of us would have been a sort of hereditary degradation.
Ah! they were clever—your father and your uncle!—and how proud we all were when we finished our lighthouse, and got the Emperor to light it up for the first time. Look here, ladies, what do you think this is?
He took out a small parcel, and solemnly unwrapped from it fold after fold of paper, till he came to the heart of it—a small wax candle!
This was the candle the Emperor used to light our lighthouse. I've kept it for nearly thirty years, and I'll keep it as long as I live. Every year on the anniversary of the day I light it, drink his Majesty's health, and the health of all your family, miss, and then I put it out again. So—carefully re-wrapping the relic in its numerous envelopes—"so I hope it will last my time."
Here the mistress came behind her good man, and they exchanged a smile—the affectionate smile of two who had never been more than two, Darby and Joan, but all sufficient to each other. She announced that tea was ready. And such a tea! How we got through it I hardly know, but travelling is hungry work, and the viands were delicious. The beneficence of our kind hosts, however, was not nearly done.
Come, ladies, I'll show you my garden, and—(give me a basket and the grape-scissors,) added he in a conjugal aside. Which resulted in our carrying away with us the biggest bunches in the whole vinery, as well as a quantity of rosy apples, stuffed into every available pocket and bag.
Nonsense, nonsense, was the answer to vain remonstrances. "D'ye think I wouldn't give the best of everything I had to your family? and so would my missis too. How your father used to laugh at me about my little maid! But he understood it for all that. Oh yes, I'm glad I came home. And now your father and your uncle are home too, and perhaps some day they'll come to see me down here—wouldn't it be a proud day for me! You'll tell them so?"
It was touching, and rare as touching, this passionate personal fidelity. It threw us back, at least such of us as were sentimentally inclined, upon that something in Cornish nature which found its exposition in Arthur and his faithful knights, down to "bold Sir Bedevere," and apparently, is still not lost in Cornwall.
With a sense of real regret, feeling that it would be long ere we might meet his like—such shrewd simplicity, earnest enthusiasm, and exceeding faithfulness—we bade good-bye to the honest man; leaving him and his wife standing at their garden-gate, an elderly Adam and Eve, desiring nothing outside their own little paradise. Which of us could say more, or as much?
Gratefully we "talked them over," as we drove on through the pretty country round Helstone—inland country; for we had no time to go and see the Loe Pool, a small lake, divided from the sea by a bar of sand. This is supposed to be the work of the Cornwall man-demon, Tregeagle; and periodically cut through, with solemn ceremonial, by the Mayor of Helstone, when the "meeting of the waters," fresh and salt, is said to be an extremely curious sight. But we did not see it, nor yet Nonsloe House, close by, which is held by the tenure of having to provide a boat and nets whenever the Prince of Wales or the Duke of Cornwall wishes to fish in the Loe Pool. A circumstance which has never happened yet, certainly!
Other curiosities en route we also missed, the stones of Tremenkeverne, half a ton each, used as missiles in a notable fight between two saints, St. Just of the Land's End, and St. Keverne of the Lizard, and still lying in a field to prove the verity of the legend. Also the rock of Goldsithney, where, when the "fair land of Lyonesse" was engulfed by the sea, an ancestor of the Trevelyans saved himself by swimming his horse, and landing; and various other remarkable places, with legends attached, needing much credulity, or imagination, to believe in.
But, fearing to be benighted ere reaching Marazion, we passed them all, and saw nothing more interesting than the ruins of disused tin mines, which Charles showed us, mournfully explaining how the mining business had of late years drifted away from Cornwall, and how hundreds of the once thriving community had been compelled to emigrate or starve. As we neared Marazion, these melancholy wrecks with their little hillocks of mining debris rose up against the evening sky, the image of desolation. And then St. Michael's Mount, the picture in little of Mont St. Michel, in Normandy, appeared in the middle of Mount's Bay. Lastly, after a gorgeous sunset, in a golden twilight and silvery moonlight, we entered Marazion;-and found it, despite its picturesque name, the most commonplace little town imaginable!
We should have regretted our rash decision, and gone on to Penzance, but for the hearty welcome given us at a most comfortable and home-like inn, which determined us to keep to our first intention, and stay.
So, after our habit of making the best of things, we walked down to the ugly beach, and investigated the dirty-looking bay—in the lowest of all low tides, with a soppy, sea-weedy causeway running across to St. Michael's Mount. By advice of Charles, we made acquaintance with an old boatman he knew, a Norwegian who had drifted hither—shipwrecked, I believe—settled down and married an English woman, but whose English was still of the feeblest kind. However, he had an honest face; so we engaged him to take us out bathing early to-morrow.
And to-night, ladies? suggested the faithful Charles. "Wouldn't you like to row round the Mount?—When you've had your tea, I'll come back for you, and help you down to the shore—it's rather rough, but nothing like what you have done, ma'am," added he encouragingly. "And it will be bright moonlight, and the Mount will look so fine."
So, the spirit of adventure conquering our weariness, we went. When I think how it looked next morning—the small, shallow bay, with its toy-castle in the centre, I am glad our first vision of it was under the glamour of moonlight, with the battlemented rock throwing dark shadows across the shimmering sea. In the mysterious beauty of that night row round the Mount, we could imagine anything; its earliest inhabitant, the giant Cormoran, killed by that "valiant Cornishman," the illustrious Jack; the lovely St. Keyne, a king's daughter, who came thither on pilgrimage; and, passing down from legend to history, Henry de la Pomeroy, who, being taken prisoner, caused himself to be bled to death in the Castle; Sir John Arundel, slain on the sands, and buried in the Chapel; Perkin Warbeck's unfortunate wife, who took refuge at St. Michael's shrine, but was dragged thence. And so on, and so on, through the centuries, to the family of St. Aubyn, who bought it in 1660, and have inhabited it ever since. "Very nice people," we heard they were; who have received here the Queen, the Prince of Wales, and other royal personages. What a contrast to the legendary Cormoran!
Yet, looking up as we rowed under the gloomy rock, we could fancy his giant ghost sitting there, on the spot where he killed his wife, for bringing in her apron greenstone, instead of granite, to build the chapel with. Which being really built of greenstone the story must be true! What a pleasure it is to be able to believe anything!
Some of us could have stayed out half the night, floating along in the mild soft air and dreamy moonlight, which made even the commonplace little town look like a fairy scene, and exalted St. Michael's Mount into a grand fortress, fit for its centuries of legendary lore—but others preferred going to bed.
So we landed, and retired. Not however without taking a long look out of the window upon the bay, which now, at high tide, was one sheet of rippling moon-lit water, with the grim old Mount, full of glimmering lights like eyes, sitting silent in the midst of the silent sea.
I cannot advise Marazion as a bathing place. What a down-come from the picturesque vision of last night, to a small ugly fishy-smelling beach, which seemed to form a part of the town and its business, and was overlooked from everywhere! Yet on it two or three family groups were evidently preparing for a dip, or rather a wade of about a quarter of a mile in exceedingly dirty sea water.
This will never do, we said to our old Norwegian. "You must row us to some quiet cove along the shore, and away from the town."
He nodded his head, solemn and mute as the dumb boatman of dead Elaine, rowed us out seaward for about half-a-mile, and then proceeded to fasten the boat to a big stone, and walk ashore. The water still did not come much above his knees—he seemed quite indifferent to it. But we?
Well, we could but do at Rome as the Romans do. Toilette in an open boat was evidently the custom of the country. And the sun was warm, the sea safe and shallow. Indeed, so rapidly did it subside, that by the time the bath was done, we were aground, and had to call at the top of our voices to our old man, who sat, with his back to us, dim in the distance, on another big stone, calmly smoking the pipe of peace.
We'll not try this again, was the unanimous resolve, as, after politely declining a suggestion that "the ladies should walk ashore—" did he think we were amphibious?—we got ourselves floated off at last, and rowed to the nearest landing point, the entrance to St. Michael's Mount.
Probably nowhere in England is found the like of this place. Such a curious mingling of a mediæval fortress and modern residence; of antiquarian treasures and everyday business; for at the foot of the rock is a fishing village of about thirty cottages, which carries on a thriving trade; and here also is a sort of station for the tiny underground-railway, which worked by a continuous chain, fulfils the very necessary purpose (failing Giant Cormoran, and wife) of carrying up coals, provisions, luggage, and all other domestic necessaries to the hill top.
Thither we climbed by a good many weary steps, and thought, delightful as it may be to dwell on the top of a rock in the midst of the sea, like eagles in an eyrie, there are certain advantages in living on a level country road, or even in a town street. How in the world do the St. Aubyns manage when they go out to dinner? Two years afterwards, when I read in the paper that one of the daughters of the house, leaning over the battlements, had lost her balance and fallen down, mercifully unhurt, to the rocky slope below—the very spot where we to-day sat so quietly gazing out on the lovely sea view—I felt with a shudder that on the whole, it would be a trying thing to bring up a young family on St. Michael's Mount.
Still, generation after generation of honourable St. Aubyns have brought up their families there, and oh! what a beautiful spot it is! How fresh, and yet mild blew the soft sea-wind outside of it, and inside, what endless treasures there were for the archæological mind! The chapel alone was worth a morning's study, even though shown—odd anachronism—by a footman in livery, who pointed out with great gusto the entrance to a vault discovered during the last repairs, where was found the skeleton of a large man—his bones only—no clue whatever as to who he was or when imprisoned there. The "Jeames" of modern days told us this tale with a noble indifference. Nothing of the kind was likely to happen to him.
Further still we were fortunate enough to penetrate, and saw the Chevy Chase Hall, with its cornice of hunting scenes, the drawing-room, the school-room—only fancy learning lessons there, amidst the veritable evidence of the history one was studying! And perhaps the prettiest bit of it all was our young guide, herself a St. Aubyn, with her simple grace and sweet courtesy, worthy of one of the fair ladies worshipped by King Arthur's knights.
We did not like encroaching on her kindness, though we could have stayed all day, admiring the curious things she showed us. So we descended the rock, and crossed the causeway, now dry, but very rough walking—certainly St. Michael's Mount has its difficulties as a modern dwelling-house—and went back to our inn. For, having given our horse a forenoon's rest, we planned a visit to that spot immortalised by nursery rhyme—
"As I was going to St. Ives I met a man with seven wives. Each wife had seven sacks; Each sack had seven cats; Each cat had seven kits; Kits, cats, sacks, and wives,— How many were there going to St. Ives?
"—One; and after we had been there, we felt sure he never went again!
There were two roads, we learnt, to that immortal town; one very good, but dull; the other bad—and beautiful. We chose the latter, and never repented.
Nor, in passing through Penzance, did we repent not having taken up our quarters there. It was pretty, but so terribly "genteel," so extremely civilised. Glancing up at the grand hotel, we thought with pleasure of our old-fashioned inn at Marazion, where the benign waiter took quite a fatherly interest in our proceedings, even to giving us for dinner our very own blackberries, gathered yesterday on the road, and politely hindering another guest from helping himself to half a dishful, as "they belonged to the young ladies." Truly, there are better things in life than fashionable hotels.
But the neighbourhood of Penzance is lovely. Shrubs and flowers such as one sees on the shores of the Mediterranean grew and flourished in cottage-gardens, and the forest trees we drove under, whole avenues of them, were very fine; gentlemen's seats appeared here and there, surrounded with the richest vegetation, and commanding lovely views. As the road gradually mounted upwards, we saw, clear as in a panorama, the whole coast from the Lizard Point to the Land's End,—which we should behold to-morrow.
For, hearing that every week-day about a hundred tourists in carriages, carts, and omnibuses, usually flocked thither, we decided that the desire of our lives, the goal of our pilgrimage, should be visited by us on a Sunday. We thought that to drive us thither in solitary Sabbatic peace would be fully as good for Charles's mind and morals as to hang all day idle about Marazion; and he seemed to think so himself. Therefore, in prospect of to-morrow, he dealt very tenderly with his horse to-day, and turned us out to walk up the heaviest hills, of which there were several, between Penzance and Castle-an-Dinas.
There it is, he said at last, stopping in the midst of a wide moor and pointing to a small building, sharp against the sky. "The carriage can't get further, but you can go on, ladies, and I'll stop and gather some blackberries for you."
For brambles, gorse bushes, and clumps of fading heather, with one or two small stunted trees, were now the only curiosities of this, King Arthur's famed hunting castle, and hunting ground, which spread before us for miles and miles. Passing a small farm-house, we made our way to the building Charles pointed out, standing on the highest ridge of the promontory, whose furthest point is the Land's End. Standing there, we could see—or could have seen but that the afternoon had turned grey and slightly misty—the ocean on both sides. Inland, the view seemed endless. Roughtor and Brown Willy, two Dartmoor hills, are said to be visible sometimes. Nearer, little white dots of houses show the mining districts of Redruth and Camborne.
But here, all was desolate solitude. A single wayfarer, looking like a working man in his Sunday best going to visit friends, but evidently tired, as if he had walked for miles, just glanced at us, and passed on. We stood, all alone, on the very spot where many a time must have stood King Arthur, Queen Guinevere, Sir Launcelot, and the other knights—or the real human beings, whether barbarian or not, who formed the originals of those mythical personages.
All had vanished now. Nothing was left but a common-place little tower, built up of the fragments of the old castle, and a wide, pathless moor, over which the wind sighed, and the mist crept. No memorial whatever of King Arthur, except the tradition—which time and change have been powerless to annihilate—that such a man once existed. The long vitality which the legend keeps proves that he must have been a remarkable man in his day. Romance itself cannot exist without a foundation in reality.
So I preached to my incredulous juniors, who threw overboard King Arthur and took to blackberry-gathering; and to conversation with a most comely Cornishwoman, milking the prettiest of Cornish cows in the lonely farm-yard, which was the only sign of humanity for miles and miles. We admired herself and her cattle; we drank her milk, offering for it the usual payment. But the picturesque milkmaid shook her head and demanded just double what even the dearest of London milk-sellers would have asked for the quantity. Which sum we paid in silence, and I only record the fact here in order to state that spite of our foreboding railway friend at Falmouth, this was the only instance in which we were ever "taken in," or in the smallest degree imposed upon, in Cornwall.
Another hour, slowly driving down the gradual slope of the country, through a mining district much more cheerful than that beyond Marazion. The mines were all apparently in full work, and the mining villages were pretty, tidy, and cosy-looking, even picturesque. Approaching St. Ives the houses had quite a foreign look, but when we descended to the town, its dark, narrow streets, pervaded by a "most ancient and fish-like smell," were anything but attractive.
As was our hotel, where, as a matter of duty, we ordered tea, but doubted if we should enjoy it, and went out again to see what little there seemed to be seen, puzzling our way through the gloomy and not too fragrant streets, till at last in despair we stopped a bland, elderly, Methodist-minister-looking gentleman, and asked him the way to the sea.
He eyed us over. "You're strangers here, ma'am?"
I owned the humbling fact, as the inhabitant of St. Ives must doubtless consider it.
And is it the pilchard fishery you want to see? It is just beginning. A few pilchards have been seen already. There are the boats, the fishermen are all getting ready. It's a fine sight to see them start. Would you like to come and look at them?
He had turned back and was walking with us down the street, pointing out everything that occurred to him as noticeable, in the kindest and civilest way. When we apologised for troubling him, and would have parted company, our friend made no attempt to go.
Oh, I've nothing at all to do, except—he took out the biggest and most respectable of watches—"except to attend a prayer-meeting at half-past six. I should have time to show you the town; we think it is a very nice little town. I ought to know it; I've lived in it, boy and man for thirty-seven years. But now I have left my business to my sons, and I just go about and amuse myself, looking into the shop now and then just for curiosity. You must have seen my old shop, ladies, if you came down that street."
Which he named, and also gave us his own name, which we had seen over the shop door, but I shall not record either. Not that I think the honest man is ever likely to read such "light" literature as this book, or to recall the three wanderers to whom he was so civil and kind, and upon whom he poured out an amount of local and personal facts, which we listened to—as a student of human nature is prone to do—with an amused interest in which the comic verged on the pathetic. How large to each man seems his own little world, and what child-like faith he has in its importance to other people! I shall always recall our friend at St. Ives, with his prayer-meetings, his chapel-goings—I concluded he was a Methodist, a sect very numerous in Cornwall—his delight in his successful shop and well-brought-up sons, who managed it so well, leaving him to enjoy his otium cum dignitate—no doubt a municipal dignity, for he showed us the Town Hall with great gusto. Evidently to his honest, simple soul, St. Ives was the heart of the world.
By and by again he pulled out the turnip-like watch. "Just ten minutes to get to my prayer-meeting, and I never like to be late, I have been a punctual man all my life, ma'am," added he, half apologetically, till I suggested that this was probably the cause of his peace and success. Upon which he smiled, lifted his hat with a benign adieu, hoped we had liked St. Ives—we had liked his company at any rate—and with a final pointing across the street, "There's my shop, ladies, if you would care to look at it," trotted away to his prayer-meeting.
I believe the neighbourhood of St. Ives, especially Tregenna, its ancient mansion transformed into an hotel, is exceedingly pretty, but night was falling fast, and we saw nothing. Speedily we despatched a most untempting meal, and hurried Charles's departure, lest we should be benighted, as we nearly were, during the long miles of straight and unlovely road—the good road—between here and Penzance. We had done our duty, we had seen the place, but as, in leaving it behind us, we laughingly repeated the nursery rhyme, we came to the conclusion that the man who was "going to St. Ives" was the least fortunate of all those notable individuals.
The last thing before retiring, we had glanced out on a gloomy sea, a starless sky, pitch darkness, broken only by those moving lights on St. Michael's Mount, and thought anxiously of the morrow. It would be hard, if after journeying thus far and looking forward to it so many years, the day on which we went to the Land's End should turn out a wet day! Still "hope on, hope ever," as we used to write in our copy-books. Some of us, I think, still go on writing it in empty air, and will do so till the hand is dust.
It was with a feeling almost of solemnity that we woke and looked out on the dawn, grey and misty, but still not wet. To be just on the point of gaining the wish of a life-time, however small, is a fact rare enough to have a certain pathos in it. We slept again, and trusted for the best, which by breakfast-time really came, in flickering sun-gleams, and bits of hopeful blue sky. We wondered for the last time, as we had wondered for half a century, "what the Land's End would be like," and then started, rather thoughtful than merry, to find out the truth of the case.
Glad as we were to have for our expedition this quiet Sunday instead of a tumultuous week day, conscience smote us in driving through Penzance, with the church-bells ringing, and the people streaming along to morning service, all in their Sunday best. Perhaps we might manage to go to afternoon church at Sennen, or St. Sennen's, which we knew by report, as the long-deceased father of a family we were acquainted with had been curate there early in the century, and we had promised faithfully "just to go and look at the old place."
But one can keep Sunday sometimes even outside church-doors. I shall never forget the Sabbatic peace of that day; those lonely and lovely roads, first rich with the big trees and plentiful vegetation about Penzance, then gradually growing barer and barer as we drove along the high promontory which forms the extreme point westward of our island. The way along which so many tourist-laden vehicles pass daily was now all solitary; we scarcely saw a soul, except perhaps a labourer leaning over a gate in his decent Sunday clothes, or two or three children trotting to school or church, with their books under their arms. Unquestionably Cornwall is a respectable, sober-minded county; religious-minded too, whether Methodist, Quaker, or other nonconformist sects, of which there are a good many, or decent, conservative Church of England.
We passed St. Buryan's—a curious old church founded on the place where an Irishwoman, Saint Buriana, is said to have made her hermitage. A few stray cottages comprised the whole village. There was nothing special to see, except to drink in the general atmosphere of peace and sunshine and solitude, till we came to Treryn, the nearest point to the celebrated Logan or rocking-stone.
From childhood we had read about it; the most remarkable specimen in England of those very remarkable stones, whether natural or artificial, who can decide?
"Which the touch of a finger alone sets moving, But all earth's powers cannot shake from their base.
"Not quite true, this; since in 1824 a rash and foolish Lieutenant Goldsmith (let his name be gibbeted for ever!) did come with a boat's crew, and by main force remove the Logan a few inches from the point on which it rests. Indignant justice very properly compelled him, at great labour and pains, to put it back again, but it has never rocked properly since.
By Charles's advice we took a guide, a solemn-looking youth, who stalked silently ahead of us along the "hedges," which, as at the Lizard, furnished the regular path across the fields coastwards. Soon the gleaming circle of sea again flashed upon us, from behind a labyrinth of rocks, whence we met a couple of tourists returning.
You'll find it a pretty stiff climb to the Logan, ladies, said one of them in answer to a question.
And so we should have done, indeed, had not our guide's hand been much readier than his tongue. I, at least, should never have got even so far as that little rock-nest where I located myself—a somewhat anxious-minded old hen—and watched my chickens climb triumphantly that enormous mass of stone which we understood to be the Logan.
Now, watch it rock! they shouted across the dead stillness, the lovely solitude of sky and sea. And I suppose it did rock, but must honestly confess I could not see it stir a single inch.
However, it was a big stone, a very big stone, and the stones around it were equally huge and most picturesquely thrown together. Also—delightful to my young folks!—they furnished the most adventurous scramble that heart could desire. I alone felt a certain relief when we were all again on smooth ground, with no legs or arms broken.
The cliff-walk between the Logan and the Land's End is said to be one of the finest in England for coast scenery. Treryn or Treen Dinas, Pardeneck Point, and Tol Pedn Penwith had been named as places we ought to see, but this was impracticable. We had to content ourselves with a dull inland road, across a country gradually getting more barren and ugly, till we found ourselves suddenly at what seemed the back-yard of a village public-house, where two or three lounging stable-men came forward to the carriage, and Charles jumped down from his box.
You can get out now, ladies. This is the Land's End.
Oh!
I forbear to translate the world of meaning implied in that brief exclamation.
Let us go in and get something. Perhaps we shall admire the place more when we have ceased to be hungry.
The words of wisdom were listened to; and we spent our first quarter of an hour at the Land's End in attacking a skeleton "remain" of not too daintily-cooked beef, and a cavernous cheese, in a tiny back parlour of the—let me give it its right name—First and Last Inn, of Great Britain.
We never provide for Sunday, said the waitress, responding to a sympathetic question on the difficulty it must be to get food here. "It's very seldom any tourists come on a Sunday."
At which we felt altogether humbled; but in a few minutes more our contrition passed into sovereign content.
We went out of doors, upon the narrow green plateau in front of the house, and then we recognised where we were—standing at the extreme end of a peninsula, with a long line of rocks running out still further into the sea. That "great and wide sea, wherein are moving things innumerable," the mysterious sea "kept in the hollow of His hand," who is Infinity, and looking at which, in the intense solitude and silence, one seems dimly to guess at what Infinity may be. Any one who wishes to go to church for once in the Great Temple which His hands have builded, should spend a Sunday at the Land's End.
At first, our thought had been, What in the world shall we do here for two mortal hours! Now, we wished we had had two whole days. A sunset, a sunrise, a star-lit night, what would they not have been in this grand lonely place—almost as lonely as a ship at sea? It would be next best to finding ourselves in the middle of the Atlantic.
But this bliss could not be; so we proceeded to make the best of what we had. The bright day was darkening, and a soft greyness began to creep over land and sea. No, not soft, that is the very last adjective applicable to the Land's End. Even on that calm day there was a fresh wind—there must be always wind—and the air felt sharper and more salt than any sea-air I ever knew. Stimulating too, so that one's nerves were strung to the highest pitch of excitement. We felt able to do anything, without fear and without fatigue. So that when a guide came forward—a regular man-of-war's-man he looked—we at once resolved to adventure along the line of rocks, seaward, "out as far as anybody was accustomed to go."
Ay, ay; I'll take you, ladies. That is—the young ladies might go—but you— eying me over with his keen sailor's glance, full of honesty and good humour, "you're pretty well on in years, ma'am."
Laughing, I told him how far on, but that I was able to do a good deal yet. He laughed too.
Oh, I've taken ladies much older than you. One the other day was nearly seventy. So we'll do our best, ma'am. Come along.
He offered a rugged, brown hand, as firm and steady as a mast, to hold by, and nothing could exceed the care and kindliness with which he guided every step of every one of us, along that perilous path, that is, perilous except for cautious feet and steady heads.
Take care, young ladies. If you make one false step, you are done for, said our guide, composedly as he pointed to the boiling whirl of waters below.
Still, though a narrow and giddy path, there was a path, and the exploit, though a little risky, was not fool-hardy. We should have been bitterly sorry not to have done it—not to have stood for one grand ten minutes, where in all our lives we may never stand again, at the farthest point where footing is possible, gazing out upon that magnificent circle of sea which sweeps over the submerged "land of Lyonesse," far, far away, into the wide Atlantic.
There were just two people standing with us, clergymen evidently, and one, the guide told us, was "the parson at St. Sennen." We spoke to him, as people do speak, instinctively, when mutually watching such a scene, and by and by we mentioned the name of the long-dead curate of St. Sennen's.
The "parson" caught instantly at the name.
Mr. ——? Oh, yes, my father knew him quite well. He used constantly to walk across from Sennen to our house, and take us children long rambles across the cliffs, with a volume of Southey or Wordsworth under his arm. He was a fine young fellow in those days, I have heard, and an excellent clergyman. And he afterwards married a very nice girl from the north somewhere.
Yes; we smiled. The "nice girl" was now a sweet silver-haired little lady of nearly eighty; the "fine young fellow" had long since departed; and the boy was this grave middle-aged gentleman, who remembered both as a tradition of his youth. What a sermon it all preached, beside this eternal rock, this ever-moving, never-changing sea!
But time was passing—how fast it does pass, minutes, ay, and years! We bade adieu to our known unknown friend, and turned our feet backwards, cautiously as ever, stopping at intervals to listen to the gossip of our guide.
Yes, ladies, that's the spot—you may see the hoof-mark—where General Armstrong's horse fell over; he just slipped off in time, but the poor beast was drowned. And here, over that rock, happened the most curious thing. I wouldn't have believed it myself, only I knew a man that saw it with his own eyes. Once a bullock fell off into the pool below there—just look, ladies. (We did look, into a perfect Maëlstrom of boiling waves.) "Everybody thought he was drowned, till he was seen swimming about unhurt. They fished him up, and exhibited him as a curiosity."
And again, pointing to a rock far out in the sea.
That's the Brisons. Thirty years ago a ship went to pieces there, and the captain and his wife managed to climb on to that rock. They held on there for two days and a night, before a boat could get at them. At last they were taken off one at a time, with rockets and a rope; the wife first. But the rope slipped and she fell into the water. She was pulled out in a minute or so, and rowed ashore, but they durst not tell her husband she was drowned. I was standing on the beach at Whitesand Bay when the boat came in. I was only a lad, but I remember it well, and her too lifted out all dripping and quite dead. She was such a fine woman.
And the captain?
They went back for him, and got him off safe, telling him nothing. But when he found she was dead he went crazy-like—kept for ever saying, 'She saved my life, she saved my life,' till he was taken away by his friends. Look out, ma'am, mind your footing; just here a lady slipped and broke her leg a week ago. I had to carry her all the way to the hotel. I shouldn't like to carry you.
We all smiled at the comical candour of the honest sailor, who proceeded to give us bits of his autobiography. He was Cornish born, but had seen a deal of the world as an A.B. on board her Majesty's ship Agamemnon.
Of course you have heard of the Agamemnon, ma'am. I was in her off Balaklava. You remember the Crimean war?
Yes, I did. His eyes brightened as we discussed names and places once so familiar, belonging to that time, which now seems so far back as to be almost historical.
Then you know what a winter we had, and what a summer afterwards. I came home invalided, and didn't attempt the service afterwards; but I never thought I should come home at all. Yes, it's a fine place the Land's End, though the air is so strong that it kills some folks right off. Once an invalid gentleman came, and he was dead in a fortnight. But I'm not dead yet, and I stop here mostly all the year round.
He sniffed the salt air and smiled all over his weather-beaten face—keen, bronzed, blue-eyed, like one of the old Vikings. He was a fine specimen of a true British tar. When, having seen all we could, we gave him his small honorarium, he accepted it gratefully, and insisted on our taking in return a memento of the place in the shape of a stone weighing about two pounds, glittering with ore, and doubtless valuable, but ponderous. Oh, the trouble it gave me to carry it home, and pack and unpack it among my small luggage! But I did bring it home, and I keep it still in remembrance of the Land's End, and of the honest sailor of H.M.S. Agamemnon.
So all was over. We could dream of an unknown Land's End no more. It became now a real place, of which the reality, though different from the imagination, was at least no disappointment. How few people in attaining a life-long desire can say as much!
Our only regret, an endurable one now, was that we had not carried out our original plan of staying some days there—tourist-haunted, troubled days they might have been, but the evenings and mornings would have been glorious. With somewhat heavy hearts we summoned Charles and the carriage, for already a misty drift of rain began sweeping over the sea.
Still, we must see Whitesand Bay, said one of us, recalling a story a friend had once told how, staying at Land's End, she crossed the bay alone in a blinding storm, took refuge at the coastguard station, where she was hospitably received, and piloted back with most chivalric care by a coastguard, who did not tell her till their journey's end that he had left at home a wife, and a baby just an hour old.
No such romantic adventure befell us. We only caught a glimmer of the bay through drizzling rain, which by the time we reached Sennen village had become a regular downpour. Evidently, we could do no more that day, which was fast melting into night.
We'll go home, was the sad resolve, glad nevertheless that we had a comfortable "home" to go to.
So closing the carriage and protecting ourselves as well as we could from the driving rain, we went forward, passing the Quakers' burial ground, where is said to be one of the finest views in Cornwall; the Nine Maidens, a circle of Druidical stones, and many other interesting things, without once looking at or thinking of them.
Half a mile from Marazion the rain ceased, and a light like that of the rising moon began to break through the clouds. What a night it might be, or might have been, could we have stayed at the Land's End!
That ghostly "might have been!" It is in great things as in small, the worry, the torment, the paralysing burden of life. Away with it! We have done our best to be happy, and we have been happy. We have seen the Land's End.
Monday morning. Black Monday we were half inclined to call it, knowing that by the week's end our travels must be over and done, and that if we wished still to see all we had planned, we must inevitably next morning return to civilisation and railways, a determination which involved taking this night "a long, a last farewell" of our comfortable carriage and our faithful Charles.
But it needn't be until night, said he, evidently loth to part from his ladies. "If I get back to Falmouth by daylight to-morrow morning, master will be quite satisfied. I can take you wherever you like to-day."
And the horse?
Oh, he shall get a good feed and a rest till the middle of the night, then he'll do well enough. We shall have the old moon after one o'clock to get home by. Between Penzance and Falmouth it's a good road, though rather lonely.
I should think it was, in the "wee hours" by the dim light of a waning moon. But Charles seemed to care nothing about it, so we said no more, but decided to take the drive—our last drive.
Our minds were perplexed between Botallack Mine, the Gurnard's Head, Lamorna Cove, and several other places, which we were told we must on no account miss seeing, the first especially. Some of us, blessed with scientific relatives, almost dreaded returning home without having seen a single Cornish mine; others, lovers of scenery, longed for more of that magnificent coast. But finally, a meek little voice carried the day.
I was so disappointed—more than I liked to say—when it rained, and I couldn't get my shells for our bazaar. How shall I ever get them now? If it wouldn't trouble anybody very much, mightn't we go again to Whitesand Bay?
A plan not wholly without charm. It was a heavenly day; to spend it in delicious idleness on that wide sweep of sunshiny sand would be a rest for the next day's fatigue. Besides, consolatory thought! there would be no temptation to put on miners' clothes, and go dangling in a basket down to the heart of the earth, as the Princess of Wales was reported to have done. The pursuit of knowledge may be delightful, but some of us owned to a secret preference for terra firma and the upper air. We resolved to face opprobrium, and declare boldly we had "no time" (needless to add no inclination) to go and see Botallack Mine. The Gurnard's Head cost us a pang to miss; but then we should catch a second view of the Land's End. Yes, we would go to Whitesand Bay.
It was a far shorter journey in sunshine than in rain, even though we made various divergencies for blackberries and other pleasures. Never had the sky looked bluer or the sea brighter, and much we wished that we could have wandered on in dreamy peace, day after day, or even gone through England, gipsy-fashion, in a house upon wheels, which always seemed to me the very ideal of travelling.
We reached Sennen only too soon. Pretty little Sennen, with its ancient church and its new school house, where the civil schoolmaster gave me some ink to write a post-card for those to whom even the post-mark "Sennen" would have a touching interest, and where the boys and girls, released for dinner, were running about. Board school pupils, no doubt, weighted with an amount of learning which would have been appalling to their grandfathers and grandmothers, the simple parishioners of the "fine young fellow" half a century ago. As we passed through the village with its pretty cottages and "Lodgings to Let," we could not help thinking what a delightful holiday resort this would be for a large small family, who could be turned out as we were when the carriage could no farther go, on the wide sweep of green common, gradually melting into silvery sand, so fine and soft that it was almost a pleasure to tumble down the slopes, and get up again, shaking yourself like a dog, without any sense of dirt or discomfort. What a paradise for children, who might burrow like rabbits and wriggle about like sand-eels, and never come to any harm!
Without thought of any danger, we began selecting our bathing-place, shallow enough, with long strips of wet shimmering sand to be crossed before reaching even the tiniest waves; when one of us, the cautious one, appealed to an old woman, the only human being in sight.
Bathe? she said. "Folks ne'er bathe here. 'Tain't safe."
Why not? Quicksands?
She nodded her head. Whether she understood us or not, or whether we quite understood her, I am not sure, and should be sorry to libel such a splendid bathing ground—apparently. But maternal wisdom interposed, and the girls yielded. When, half an hour afterwards, we saw a solitary figure moving on a distant ledge of rock, and a black dot, doubtless a human head, swimming or bobbing about in the sea beneath—maternal wisdom was reproached as arrant cowardice. But the sand was delicious, the sea-wind so fresh, and the sea so bright, that disappointment could not last. We made an encampment of our various impedimenta, stretched ourselves out, and began the search for shells, in which every arm's-length involved a mine of wealth and beauty.
Never except at one place, on the estuary of the Mersey, have I seen a beach made up of shells so lovely in colour and shape; very minute; some being no bigger than a grain of rice or a pin's head. The collecting of them was a fascination. We forgot all the historical interests that ought to have moved us, saw neither Athelstan, King Stephen, King John, nor Perkin Warbeck, each of whom is said to have landed here—what were they to a tiny shell, like that moralised over by Tennyson in "Maud"—"small, but a work divine"? I think infinite greatness sometimes touches one less than infinite littleness—the exceeding tenderness of Nature, or the Spirit which is behind Nature, who can fashion with equal perfectness a starry hemisphere and a glow-worm; an ocean and a little pink shell. The only imperfection in creation seems—oh, strange mystery!—to be man. Why?
But away with moralising, or dreaming, though this was just a day for dreaming, clear, bright, warm, with not a sound except the murmur of the low waves, running in an enormous length—curling over and breaking on the soft sands. Everything was so heavenly calm, it seemed impossible to believe in that terrible scene when the captain and his wife were seen clinging to the Brisons rock, just ahead.
Doubtless our friend of the Agamemnon was telling this and all his other stories to an admiring circle of tourists, for we saw the Land's End covered with a moving swarm like black flies. How thankful we felt that we had "done" it on a Sunday! Still, we were pleased to have another gaze at it, with its line of picturesque rocks, the Armed Knight and the Irish Lady—though, I confess, I never could make out which was the knight and which was the lady. Can it be that some fragment of the legend of Tristram and Iseult originated these names?
After several sweet lazy hours, we went through a "fish-cellar," a little group of cottages, and climbed a headland, to take our veritable farewell of the Land's End, and then decided to go home. We had rolled or thrown our provision basket, rugs, &c., down the sandy slope, but it was another thing to carry them up again. I went in quest of a small boy, and there presented himself a big man, coastguard, as the only unemployed hand in the place, who apologised with such a magnificent air for not having "cleaned" himself, that I almost blushed to ask him to do such a menial service as to carry a bundle of wraps. But he accepted it, conversing amiably as we went, and giving me a most graphic picture of life at Sennen during the winter. When he left me, making a short cut to our encampment—a black dot on the sands, with two moving black dots near it—a fisher wife joined me, and of her own accord began a conversation.
She and I fraternised at once, chiefly on the subject of children, a group of whom were descending the road from Sennen School. She told me how many of them were hers, and what prizes they had gained, and what hard work it was. She could neither read nor write, she said, but she liked her children to be good scholars, and they learnt a deal up at Sennen.
Apparently they did, and something else besides learning, for when I had parted from my loquacious friend, I came up to the group just in time to prevent a stand-up fight between two small mites, the casus belli of which I could no more arrive at, than a great many wiser people can discover the origin of national wars. So I thought the strong hand of "intervention"—civilised intervention—was best, and put an end to it, administering first a good scolding, and then a coin. The division of this coin among the little party compelled an extempore sum in arithmetic, which I required them to do (for the excellent reason that I couldn't do it myself!)—and they did it! Therefore I conclude that the heads of the Sennen school-children are as solid as their fists, and equally good for use.
Simple little community! which as the fisher wife told me, only goes to Penzance about once a year, and is, as yet, innocent of tourists, for the swarm at the Land's End seldom goes near Whitesand Bay. Existence here must be very much that of an oyster,—but perhaps oysters are happy.
By the time we reached Penzance the lovely day was dying into an equally lovely evening. St. Michael's Mount shone in the setting sun. It was high water, the bay was all alive with boats, and there was quite a little crowd of people gathered at the mild little station of Marazion. What could be happening?
A princess was expected, that young half-English, half-foreign princess, in whose romantic story the British public has taken such an interest, sympathising with the motherly kindness of our good Queen, with the wedding at Windsor, and the sad little infant funeral there, a year after. The Princess Frederica of Hanover, and the Baron Von Pawel-Rammingen, her father's secretary, who, like a stout mediæval knight, had loved, wooed, and married her, were coming to St. Michael's Mount on a visit to the St. Aubyns.
Marazion had evidently roused itself, and risen to the occasion. Half the town must have turned out to the beach, and the other half secured every available boat, in which it followed, at respectful distance, the two boats, one full of luggage, the other of human beings, which were supposed to be the royal party. People speculated with earnest curiosity, which was the princess, and which her husband, and what the St. Aubyns would do with them; whether they would be taken to see the Land's End, and whether they would go there as ordinary tourists, or in a grand visit of state. How hard it is that royal folk can never see anything except in state, or in a certain adventitious garb, beautiful, no doubt, but satisfactorily hiding the real thing. How they must long sometimes for a walk, after the fashion of Haroun Alraschid, up and down Regent Street and Oxford Street! or an incognito foreign tour, or even a solitary country walk, without a "lady-in-waiting."
We had no opera-glass to add to the many levelled at those two boats, so we went in—hoping host and guests would spend a pleasant evening in the lovely old rooms we knew. We spent ours in rest, and in arranging for to-morrow's flight. Also in consulting with our kindly landlady as to a possible house at Marazion for some friends whom the winter might drive southwards, like the swallows, to a climate which, in this one little bay shut out from east and north, is—they told us—during all the cruel months which to many of us means only enduring life, not living—as mild and equable almost as the Mediterranean shores. And finally, we settled all with our faithful Charles, who looked quite mournful at parting with his ladies.
Yes, it is rather a long drive, and pretty lonely, said he. "But I'll wait till the moons up, and that'll help us. We'll get into Falmouth by daylight. I've got to do the same thing often enough through the summer, so I don't mind it."
Thus said the good fellow, putting a cheery face on it, then with a hasty "Good-bye, ladies," he rushed away. But we had taken his address, not meaning to lose sight of him. (Nor have we done so up to this date of writing; and the fidelity has been equal on both sides.)
Then, in the midst of a peal of bells which was kept up unweariedly till 10 P.M.—evidently Marazion is not blessed with the sight of a princess every day—we closed our eyes upon all outward things, and went away to the Land of Nod.
Into King Arthurs land—Tintagel his birth-place, and Camelford, where he fought his last battle—the legendary region of which one may believe as much or as little as one pleases—we were going to-day. With the good common sense which we flattered ourselves had accompanied every step of our unsentimental journey, we had arranged all before-hand, ordered a carriage to meet the mail train, and hoped to find at Tintagel—not King Uther Pendragon, King Arthur or King Mark, but a highly respectable landlord, who promised us a welcome at an inn—which we only trusted would be as warm and as kindly as that we left behind us at Marazion.
The line of railway which goes to the far west of England is one of the prettiest in the kingdom on a fine day, which we were again blessed with. It had been a wet summer, we heard, throughout Cornwall, but in all our journey, save that one wild storm at the Lizard, sunshine scarcely ever failed us. Now—whether catching glimpses of St. Ives Bay or sweeping through the mining district of Redruth, and the wooded country near Truro, Grampound, and St. Austell, till we again saw the glittering sea on the other side of Cornwall—all was brightness. Then darting inland once more, our iron horse carried us past Lostwithiel, the little town which once boasted Joseph Addison, M.P., as its representative; gave us a fleeting vision of Ristormel, one of the ancient castles of Cornwall, and on through a leafy land, beginning to change from rich green to the still richer yellows and reds of autumn, till we stopped at Bodmin Road.
No difficulty in finding our carriage, for it was the only one there; a huge vehicle, of ancient build, the horses to match, capable of accommodating a whole family and its luggage. We missed our compact little machine, and our brisk, kindly Charles, but soon settled ourselves in dignified, roomy state, for the twenty miles, or rather more, which lay between us and the coast. Our way ran along lonely quiet country roads and woods almost as green as when Queen Guinevere rode through them "a maying," before the dark days of her sin and King Arthur's death.
Here it occurs to me, as it did this day to a practical youthful mind, "What in the world do people know about King Arthur?"
Well, most people have read Tennyson, and a few are acquainted with the "Morte d'Arthur" of Sir Thomas Malory. But, perhaps I had better briefly give the story, or as much of it as is necessary for the edification of outsiders.
Uther Pendragon, King of Britain, falling in love with Ygrayne, wife of the duke of Cornwall, besieged them in their twin castles of Tintagel and Terrabil, slew the husband, and the same day married the wife. Unto whom a boy was born, and by advice of the enchanter Merlin, carried away, from the sea-shore beneath Tintagel, and confided to a good knight, Sir Ector, to be brought up as his own son, and christened Arthur. On the death of the king, Merlin produced the youth, who was recognized by his mother Ygrayne, and proclaimed king in the stead of Uther Pendragon. He instituted the Order of Knights of the Round Table, who were to go everywhere, punishing vice and rescuing oppressed virtue, for the love of God and of some noble lady. He married Guinevere, daughter of King Leodegrance, who forsook him for the love of Sir Launcelot, his bravest knight and dearest friend. One by one, his best knights fell away into sin, and his nephew Mordred raised a rebellion, fought with him, and conquered him at Camelford. Seeing his end was near, Arthur bade his last faithful knight, Sir Bedevere, carry him to the shore of a mere (supposed to be Dozmare Pool) and throw in there his sword Excalibur; when appeared a boat with three queens, who lifted him in, mourning over him. With them he sailed away across the mere, to be healed of his grievous wound. Some say that he was afterwards buried in a chapel near, others declare that he lives still in fairy land, and will reappear in latter days, to reinstate the Order of Knights of the Round Table, and rule his beloved England, which will then be perfect as he once tried to make it, but in vain.
Camelford of to-day is certainly not the Camelot of King Arthur—but a very respectable, commonplace little town, much like other country towns; the same genteel linendrapers' and un-genteel ironmongers' shops; the same old-established commercial inn, and a few ugly, but solid-looking private houses, with their faces to the street and their backs nestled in gardens and fields. Some of the inhabitants of these said houses were to be seen taking a quiet afternoon stroll. Doubtless they are eminently respectable and worthy folk, leading a mild provincial life like the people in Miss Martineau's Deerbrook, or Miss Austen's Pride and Prejudice—of which latter quality they have probably a good share.
We let our horses rest, but we ourselves felt not the slightest wish to rest at Camelford, so walked leisurely on till we came to the little river Camel, and to Slaughter Bridge, said to be the point where King Arthur's army was routed and where he received his death-wound. A slab of stone, some little distance up the stream, is still called "King Arthur's Tomb." But as his coffin is preserved, as well as his Round Table, at Winchester; where, according to mediæval tradition, the bodies of both Arthur and Guinevere were found, and the head of Guinevere had yellow hair; also that near the little village of Davidstow, is a long barrow, having in the centre a mound, which is called "King Arthur's grave"—inquiring minds have plenty of "facts" to choose from. Possibly at last they had better resort to fiction, and believe in Arthur's disappearance, as Tennyson makes him say,
"To the island-valley of Avillion ... Where I may heal me of my grievous wound.
"Dozmare Pool we found so far out of our route that we had to make a virtue of necessity, and imagine it all; the melancholy moorland lake, with the bleak hill above it, and stray glimpses of the sea beyond. A ghostly spot, and full of many ghostly stories besides the legend of Arthur. Here Tregeagle, the great demon of Cornwall, once had his dwelling, until, selling his soul to the devil, his home was sunk to the bottom of the mere, and himself is heard of stormy nights, wailing round it with other ghost-demons, in which the Cornish mind still lingeringly believes. Visionary packs of hounds; a shadowy coach and horses, which drives round and round the pool, and then drives into it; flitting lights, kindled by no human hand, in places where no human foot could go—all these tales are still told by the country folk, and we might have heard them all. Might also have seen, in fancy, the flash of the "brand Excalibur"; heard the wailing song of the three queens; and pictured the dying Arthur lying on the lap of his sister Morgane la Faye. But, I forgot, this is an un-sentimental journey.
The Delabole quarries are as un-sentimental a place as one could desire. It was very curious to come suddenly upon this world of slate, piled up in enormous masses on either side the road, and beyond them hills of debris, centuries old—for the mines have been worked ever since the time of Queen Elizabeth. Houses, walls, gates, fences, everything that can possibly be made of slate, is made. No green or other colour tempers the all-pervading shade of bluish-grey, for vegetation in the immediate vicinity of the quarries is abolished, the result of which would be rather dreary, save for the cheerful atmosphere of wholesome labour, the noise of waggons, horses, steam-engines—such a contrast to the silence of the deserted tin-mines.
But, these Delabole quarries passed, silence and solitude come back again. Even the yearly-increasing influx of tourists fails to make the little village of Trevena anything but a village, where the said tourists lounge about in the one street, if it can be called a street, between the two inns and the often-painted, picturesque old post-office. Everything looked so simple, so home-like, that we were amused to find we had to get ready for a table d'hôte dinner, in the only available eating room where the one indefatigable waitress, a comely Cornish girl, who seemed Argus and Briareus rolled into one, served us—a party small enough to make conversation general, and pleasant and intelligent enough to make it very agreeable, which does not always happen at an English hotel.
Then we sallied out to find the lane which leads to Tintagel Castle, or Castles—for one sits in the sea, the other on the opposite heights in the mainland, with power of communicating by the narrow causeway which now at least exists between the rock and the shore. This seems to confirm the legend, how the luckless husband of Ygrayne shut up himself and his wife in two castles, he being slain in the one, and she married to the victorious King Uther Pendragon, in the other.
Both looked so steep and dangerous in the fast-coming twilight that we thought it best to attempt neither, so contented ourselves with a walk on the cliffs and the smooth green field which led thither. Leaning against a gate, we stood and watched one of the grandest out of the many grand sunsets which had blessed us in Cornwall. The black rock of Tintagel filled the foreground; beyond, the eye saw nothing but sea, the sea which covers vanished Lyonesse, until it met the sky, a clear amber with long bars like waves, so that you could hardly tell where sea ended and sky began. Then into it there swam slowly a long low cloud, shaped like a boat, with a raised prow, and two or three figures sitting at the stern.
King Arthur and the three queens, we declared, and really a very moderate imagination could have fancied it this. "But what is that long black thing at the bow?"
Oh, observed drily the most practical of the three, "it's King Arthur's luggage."
Sentiment could survive no more. We fell into fits of laughter, and went home to tea and bed.
DAYS FOURTEENTH, FIFTEENTH, AND SIXTEENTH—
And all Arthurian days, so I will condense them into one chapter, and not spin out the hours that were flying so fast. Yet we hardly wished to stop them; for pleasant as travelling is, the best delight of all is—the coming home.
Walking, to one more of those exquisite autumn days, warm as summer, yet with a tender brightness that hot summer never has, like the love between two old people, out of whom all passion has died—we remembered that we were at Tintagel, the home of Ygrayne and Arthur, of King Mark and Tristram and Iseult. I had to tell that story to my girls in the briefest form, how King Mark sent his nephew, Sir Tristram, to fetch home Iseult of Ireland for his queen, and on the voyage Bragswaine, her handmaiden, gave each a love-potion, which caused the usual fatal result; how at last Tristram fled from Tintagel into Brittany, where he married another Iseult "of the white hands," and lived peacefully, till, stricken by death, his fancy went back to his old love, whom he implored to come to him. She came, and found him dead. A tale—of which the only redeeming point is the innocence, simplicity, and dignity of the second Iseult, the unloved Breton wife, to whom none of our modern poets who have sung or travestied the wild, passionate, miserable, ugly story, have ever done full justice.
These sinful lovers, the much-wronged but brutal King Mark, the scarcely less brutal Uther Pendragon, and hapless Ygrayne—what a curious condition of morals and manners the Arthurian legends unfold! A time when might was right; when every one seized what he wanted just because he wanted it, and kept it, if he could, till a stronger hand wrenched it from him. That in such a state of society there should ever have arisen the dimmest dream of a man like Arthur—not perhaps Tennyson's Arthur, the "blameless king," but even Sir Thomas Malory's, founded on mere tradition—is a remarkable thing. Clear through all the mists of ages shines that ideal of knighthood, enjoining courage, honour, faith, chastity, the worship of God and the service of men. Also, in the very highest degree, inculcating that chivalrous love of woman—not women—which barbaric nations never knew. As we looked at that hoar ruin sitting solitary in the sunny sea, and thought of the days when it was a complete fortress, inclosing a mass of human beings, all with human joys, sorrows, passions, crimes—things that must have existed in essence, however legend has exaggerated or altered them—we could not but feel that the mere possibility of a King Arthur shining down the dim vista of long-past centuries, is something to prove that goodness, like light, has an existence as indestructible as Him from whom it comes.
We looked at Tintagel with its risky rock-path. "It will be a hot climb, and our bathing days are numbered. Let us go in the opposite direction to Bossinney Cove."
Practicality when weighed against Poetry is poor—Poetry always kicks the beam. We went to Bossinney.
Yet what a pretty cove it was! and how pleasant! While waiting for the tide to cover the little strip of sand, we re-mounted the winding path, and settled ourselves like seabirds on the furthermost point of rock, whence, just by extending a hand, we could have dropped anything, ourselves even, into a sheer abyss of boiling waves, dizzy to look down into, and yet delicious.
So was the bath, though a little gloomy, for the sun could barely reach the shut-in cove; and we were interfered with considerably by—not tourists—but a line of donkeys! They were seen solemnly descending the narrow cliff-path one by one—eleven in all—each with an empty sack over his shoulder. Lastly came a very old man, who, without taking the least notice of us, disposed himself to fill these sacks with sand. One after the other the eleven meek animals came forward and submitted each to his load, which proceeding occupied a good hour and a half. I hardly know which was the most patient, the old man or his donkeys.
We began some of us to talk to his beasts, and others to himself. "Yes, it was hard work," he said, "but he managed to come down to the cove three times a day. And the asses were good asses. They all had their names; Lucy, Cherry, Sammy, Tom, Jack, Ned;" each animal pricked up its long ears and turned round its quiet eyes when called. Some were young and some old, but all were very sure-footed, which was necessary here. "The weight some of 'em would carry was wonderful."
The old man seemed proud of the creatures, and kind to them too in a sort of way. He had been a fisherman, he said, but now was too old for that; so got his living by collecting sand.
It makes capital garden-paths, this sand. I'd be glad to bring you some, ladies, said he, evidently with an eye to business. When we explained that this was impracticable, unless he would come all the way to London, he merely said, "Oh," and accepted the disappointment. Then bidding us a civil "Good day," he disappeared with his laden train.
Poor old fellow! Nothing of the past knightly days, nothing of the busy existing modern present affected him, or ever would do so. He might have been own brother, or cousin, to Wordsworth's "Leech-gatherer on the lonely moor." Whenever we think of Bossinney Cove, we shall certainly think of that mild old man and his eleven donkeys.
The day was hot, and it had been a steep climb; we decided to drive in the afternoon, "for a rest," to Boscastle.
Artists and tourists haunt this picturesque nook. A village built at the end of a deep narrow creek, which runs far inland, and is a safe shelter for vessels of considerable size. On either side is a high footpath, leading to two headlands, from both of which the views of sea and coast are very fine. And there are relics of antiquity and legends thereto belonging—a green mound, all that remains of Bottrieux Castle; and Ferrabury Church, with its silent tower. A peal of bells had been brought, and the ship which carried them had nearly reached the cove, when the pilot, bidding the captain "thank God for his safe voyage," was answered that he "thanked only himself and a fair wind." Immediately a storm arose; and the ship went down with every soul on board—except the pilot. So the church tower is mute—but on winter nights the lost bells are still heard, sounding mournfully from the depths of the sea.
As we sat, watching with a vague fascination the spouting, minute by minute, of a "blow-hole," almost as fine as the Kynance post-office—we moralised on the story of the bells, and on the strange notions people have, even in these days, of Divine punishments; imputing to the Almighty Father all their own narrow jealousies and petty revenges, dragging down God into the likeness of men, such an one as themselves, instead of striving to lift man into the image of God.
Meantime the young folks rambled and scrambled—watched with anxious and even envious eyes—for it takes one years to get entirely reconciled to the quiescence of the down-hill journey. And then we drove slowly back—just in time for another grand sunset, with Tintagel black in the foreground, until it and all else melted into darkness, and there was nothing left but to
"Watch the twilight stars come out Above the lonely sea.
"Next morning we must climb Tintagel, for it would be our last day.
And what a heavenly day it was! How softly the waves crept in upon the beach—just as they might have done when they laid at Merlin's feet "the little naked child," disowned of man but dear to Heaven, who was to grow up into the "stainless king."
He and his knights—the "shadowy people of the realm of dream,"—were all about us, as, guided by a rheumatic old woman, who climbed feebly up the stair, where generations of ghostly feet must have ascended and descended, we reached a bastion and gateway, quite pre-historic. Other ruins apparently belong to the eleventh or twelfth centuries. But to this there is no clue. It may have been the very landing-place of King Uther or King Mark, or other Cornish heroes, who held this wonderful natural-artificial fortress in the dim days of old romance.
Here are King Arthur's cups and saucers, said the old woman, pausing in the midst of a long lament over her own ailments, to point out some holes in the slate rock. "And up there you'll find the chapel. It's an easy climb—if you mind the path—just where it passes the spring."
That spring, trickling down from the very top of the rock, and making a verdant space all round it—what a treasure it must have been to the unknown inhabitants who, centuries ago, entrenched themselves here—for offence or defence—against the main-land. Peacefully it flowed on still, with the little ferns growing, and the sheep nibbling beside it. We idle tourists alone occupied that solitary height where those long-past warlike races—one succeeding the other—lived and loved, fought and died.
The chapel—where the high altar and a little burial-ground beside it can still be traced—is clearly much later than Arthur's time. However, there are so few data to go upon, and the action of sea-storms destroys so much every year, that even to the learned archæologist, Tintagel is a great mystery, out of which the imaginative mind may evolve almost anything it likes.
We sat a long time on the top of the rock—realising only the one obvious fact that our eyes were gazing on precisely the same scene, seawards and coastwards, that all these long-dead eyes were accustomed to behold. Beaten by winds and waves till the grey of its slate formation is nearly black; worn into holes by the constant action of the tide which widens yearly the space between it and the main-land, and gnaws the rock below into dangerous hollows that in time become sea-caves, Tintagel still remains—and one marvels that so much of it does still remain—a landmark of the cloudy time between legend and actual history.
Whether the ruin on the opposite height was once a portion of Tintagel Castle, before the sea divided it, making a promontory into an island—or whether it was the Castle Terrabil, in which Gorlois, Ygrayne's husband, was slain—no one now can say. That both the twin fortresses were habitable till Elizabeth's time, there is evidence to prove. But since then they have been left to decay, to the silent sheep and the screeching ravens, including doubtless that ghostly chough, in whose shape the soul of King Arthur is believed still to revisit the familiar scene.
We did not see that notable bird—though we watched with interest two tame and pretty specimens of its almost extinct species walking about in a flower-garden in the village, and superstitiously cherished there. We were told that to this day no Cornishman likes to shoot a chough or a raven. So they live and breed in peace among the twin ruins, and scream contentedly to the noisy stream which dances down the rocky hollow from Trevena, and leaps into the sea at Porth Hern—the "iron gate," over against Tintagel. Otherwise, all is solitude and silence.
We thought we had seen everything, and come to an end, but at the hotel we found a party who had just returned from visiting some sea-caves beyond Tintagel, which they declared were "the finest things they had found in Cornwall."
It was a lovely calm day, and it was our last day. A few hours of it alone remained. Should we use them? We might never be here again. And, I think, the looser grows one's grasp of life, the greater is one's longing to make the most of it, to see all we can see of this wonderful, beautiful world. So, after a hasty meal, we found ourselves once more down at Porth Hern, seeking a boat and man—alas! not John Curgenven—under whose guidance we might brave the stormy deep.
It was indeed stormy! No sooner had we rounded the rock, than the baby waves of the tiny bay grew into hills and valleys, among which our boat went dancing up and down like a sea-gull!
Ay, there's some sea on, there always is here, but we'll be through it presently, indifferently said the elder of the two boatmen; and plied his oars, as, I think, only these Cornish boatmen can do, talking all the while. He pointed out a slate quarry, only accessible from the sea, unless the workmen liked to be let down by ropes, which sometimes had to be done. We saw them moving about like black emmets among the clefts of the rocks, and heard plainly above the sound of the sea the click of their hammers. Strange, lonely, perilous work it must be, even in summer. In winter—
Oh, they're used to it; we're all used to it, said our man, who was intelligent enough, though nothing equal to John Curgenven. "Many a time I've got sea-fowls' eggs on those rocks there," pointing to a cliff which did not seem to hold footing for a fly. "We all do it. The gentry buy them, and we're glad of the money. Dangerous?—yes, rather; but one must earn one's bread, and it's not so bad when you take to it young."
Nevertheless, I think I shall never look at a collection of sea-birds' eggs without a slight shudder, remembering those awful cliffs.
Here you are, ladies, and the sea's down a bit, as I said. Hold on, mate, the boat will go right into the cave.
And before we knew what was happening, we found ourselves floated out of daylight into darkness—very dark it seemed at first—and rocking on a mass of heaving waters, shut in between two high walls, so narrow that it seemed as if every heave would dash us in pieces against them; while beyond was a dense blackness, from which one heard the beat of the everlasting waves against a sort of tunnel, a stormy sea-grave from which no one could ever hope to come out alive.
I don't like this at all, said a small voice.
Hadn't we better get out again? practically suggested another.
But no sooner was this done than the third of the party longed to return; and begged for "only five minutes" in that wonderful place, compared to which Dolor Ugo, and the other Lizard caves, became as nothing. They were beautiful, but this was terrible. Yet with its terror was mingled an awful delight. "Give me but five, nay, two minutes more!"
Very well, just as you choose, was the response of meek despair. So of course, Poetry yielded. The boatmen were told to row on into daylight and sunshine—at least as much sunshine as the gigantic overhanging cliffs permitted. And never, never, never in this world shall I again behold that wonderful, mysterious sea-cave.
But like all things incomplete, resigned, or lost, it has fixed itself on my memory with an almost painful vividness. However, I promised not to regret—not to say another word about it; and I will not. I did see it, for just a glimpse; and that will serve.
Two more pictures remain, the last gorgeous sunset, which I watched in quiet solitude, sitting on a tombstone by Tintagel church—a building dating from Saxon times, perched on the very edge of a lofty cliff, and with a sea-view that reaches from Trevose Head on one side to Bude Haven on the other. Also, our last long dreamy drive; in the mild September sunshine, across the twenty-one miles of sparsely inhabited country which lie between Tintagel and Launceston. In the midst of it, on the top of a high flat of moorland, our driver turned round and pointed with his whip to a long low mound, faintly visible about half-a-mile off. "There, ladies, that's King Arthur's grave."
The third, at least, that we had either seen or heard of. These varied records of the hero's last resting-place remind one of the three heads, said to be still extant, of Oliver Cromwell, one when he was a little boy, one as a young man, and the third as an old man.
But after all my last and vividest recollection of King Arthur's country is that wild sail—so wild that I wished I had taken it alone—in the solitary boat, up and down the tossing waves in face of Tintagel rock; the dark, iron-bound coast with its awful caves, the bright sunshiny land, and ever-threatening sea. Just the region, in short, which was likely to create a race like that which Arthurian legend describes, full of passionate love and deadly hate, capable of barbaric virtues, and equally barbaric crimes. An age in which the mere idea of such a hero as that ideal knight
"Who reverenced his conscience as his God: Whose glory was redressing human wrong: Who spake no slander, no, nor listened to it: Who loved one only, and who clave to her—
"rises over the blackness of darkness like a morning star.
If Arthur could "come again"—perhaps in the person of one of the descendants of a prince who was not unlike him, who lived and died among us in this very nineteenth century—
Wearing the white flower of a blameless life—
if this could be—what a blessing for Arthur's beloved England!