Kitabı oku: «A Book of Cornwall», sayfa 8

On the other side of Brown Willy, the west side, at no great distance from the source of the river Fowey, is another beehive hut, not absolutely perfect, but nearly so; one course and the smoke-hole coverer have fallen in on one side. The doors to these hovels are so low that he who enters one must crawl on hands and knees. In the beehive hut last mentioned the height in the middle is but three feet six inches, so that those who tenanted it could not stand upright inside. On Rough Tor, divided from Brown Willy by a valley, are three or four more of these huts, and the flanks of the mountains are covered with others, hundreds of them, in a more or less dilapidated condition. Some of these were originally stone-roofed; others were not. In connection with these remains of habitations are numerous relics of interments at some distance from them, for our primeval population always buried their dead away from the living. These consist of cairns, covering stone coffins or kistvaens that have been for the most part rifled by treasure-seekers. One has a somewhat pathetic interest, for beside the large stone chest just outside the ring of upright stones that encloses it is a child's cist, formed of four blocks of granite two feet seven inches long, the covering-stone removed, and the contents scattered to the winds. Near at hand also is the largest circle of upright stones in Cornwall. The stones themselves are not tall, and are much sunk in the boggy soil, but it is very perfect, consisting of fifty-five stones, and 140 feet in diameter. On the neighbouring height of Leudon is a logan rock that still oscillates easily. The question naturally arises, Do these beehive huts actually date back to prehistoric times? That is not a question we can answer with certainty, for we know that the same methods of construction were observed to a comparatively late period, and that in the Isles of Lewis and Harris, in the Hebrides, precisely similar huts are even now inhabited, and are certainly in many cases of recent construction. But what is extremely interesting to find is the existence in Cornwall of these beehive habitations of man exactly like those found in Scotland; and in Cornwall, as in Scotland, associated with rude stone monuments of pre-Christian times. In the Hebrides the beehive huts still occupied are not stone-roofed. The roof is of straw, and is renewed every year because of the value as manure of the peat smoke that saturates it. But there remain earlier beehive huts in Lewis of exactly the same nature as those in Cornwall. It is therefore by no means unlikely that both belong to the primitive race that first colonised our isles.

Camelford has given a title, and that to a remarkable man, Lord Camelford, the duellist. He was the great-grandson of Governor Pitt, who acquired an ample fortune in India. He was born in 1775, and even when a boy was violent and unmanageable. He was put in the navy, but owing to his refractory conduct was treated with severity by his captain, Vancouver, and on his return home, meeting Vancouver in Bond Street, was only prevented from striking his captain by his brother throwing himself in the way.

In town he was incessantly embroiled. On the night of April 2nd, 1799, during a disturbance at Drury Lane Theatre, he savagely attacked and wounded a gentleman, and was fined for so doing the sum of £500 by the Court of Queen's Bench. He attacked watchmen, insulted anyone who crossed his humour in the least degree, committed all kinds of violence, till his name became a terror, and he was involved in first one quarrel and then in another. His irritable and ungovernable temper at length brought about fatal consequences to himself. He had been acquainted with a Mrs. Simmons. He was told that a Captain Best had reported to her a bit of scandal relative to himself. This so incensed his lordship, that on March 6th, 1804, meeting with Best at a coffee-house, he went up to him, and in the hearing of everyone called him "a scoundrel, a liar, and a ruffian." A challenge followed, and the meeting was fixed for the next morning. The seconds having ascertained the occasion of Lord Camelford's wrath, Best declared himself ready to apologise, and to retract any words that had given offence which he had used to Mrs. Simmons, but his lordship refused to accept such an apology. Agreeably to an appointment made by the seconds, Lord Camelford and the captain met early next morning at a coffee-house in Oxford Street, where Captain Best made another effort to prevail on Lord Camelford to make up the quarrel and to withdraw the expressions he had addressed to him in public. To all remonstrance he replied, "Let it go on."

Accordingly both mounted their horses and took the road to Kensington, followed by their seconds in a post-chaise. On their arrival at the "Horse and Groom" they dismounted, and entered the fields behind Holland House. The seconds measured the ground, and took their stations at the distance of thirty paces. Lord Camelford fired first, but without effect. An interval ensued, and those who looked on from a distance believed that Best was again urging his lordship to come to amicable terms. But Lord Camelford shook his head; then Best fired, and his lordship fell at full length. The seconds, together with the captain, at once ran to his assistance, when he seized his antagonist by the hand and said, "Best, I am a dead man; you have killed me, but I freely forgive you." The report of the pistols had attracted the attention of some of Lord Holland's gardeners and servants, who ran to the spot and endeavoured to arrest Captain Best and his second, who were making off. Lord Camelford asked "why they endeavoured to detain the gentlemen; he himself was the aggressor, and he frankly forgave the gentleman who had shot him, and he hoped that God would forgive him as well."

A chair was procured, and Lord Camelford was carried into Little Holland House, where he expired after three days of suffering.

On the morning after his decease an inquest was held on the body, and a verdict of wilful murder was returned against "some person or persons unknown." A bill of indictment was, however, preferred against Captain Best and his second, but was ignored by the grand jury, who were sensible that Lord Camelford had brought his death on himself.

In the neighbourhood of Camelford are several very charming old mansions of Cornish families, small but eminently picturesque, all now converted into farmhouses. In next generation they will not be considered good enough for labourers. One of these is Penvose in S. Tudy, another Trewane, hard by the station of Port Isaac Road. Both these belonged to the Nicholls family, to two brothers it is said, and the magnificent carved slate monuments of the family are to be seen in S. Tudy Church. The slate in this district was sculptured in a way really marvellous, and there are numerous examples in the churches round. In S. Endellion are Treshunger, the seat of the Matthews family, and Rosecarrock-a fragment only. Basil, previously mentioned, is in S. Clether. It belonged to the Trevillians. One day a party of Roundheads came to Basil to seize on the squire. Trevillian looked out of the window. "If you come on," said he, "I will send out my spearmen against you." As they did come on, he threw a beehive among them, and away they fled, every man. Near Slaughter Bridge is Worthyvale, the seat of a family of the same name.

The churches of this district are planted, some on the top of hills, and with high towers, to serve as waymarks over land that was all formerly waste, or else nestle into sweet dells surrounded by Cornish elms-warm, sunny nooks where the primrose comes out early and the grass is emerald-green all the winter. Of the former description are S. Tudy and S. Mabyn. Of the latter S. Kew, a church on no account to be passed over, as it is not only singularly beautiful and well restored, but also contains superb old glass, moved from Bodmin Priory at its dissolution. One window represents the Passion, and is perfect; another once contained a Jesse tree, but is much broken and defective.

S. Kew is really Docwin, otherwise called Cyngar, the founder of Congresbury, in Somersetshire. He was a son of Gildas the historian, that sour creature who threw all the dirt he could at the princes, people, and clergy of his own blood and tongue, and told us the least possible about their history, filling his pages with pious scurrility.

In S. Teath (S. Itha) is a very fine churchyard cross. Here may be noticed the arms of the Carminow family, once perhaps the most powerful in Cornwall, now gone-without a living representative remaining of the name. A junior branch was settled at Trehannick, in S. Teath, at which place William Carminow died in 1646, the last male heir of this ancient family, which was at home when the Conqueror came. Their arms are simplicity itself-azure, a bend or-the same as those of Scrope and of Grosvenor. In the reign of Richard II. there was a great heraldic dispute over these arms, and it was carried before the Earl of Northampton, who was king of arms, and was then in France. As the Carminows could show that they had borne this coat from time immemorial, certainly as long as any Scropes and Grosvenors, it was allowed.

If there be churches dedicated to odd and out-of-the-way saints in this region, there be also parishes with odd and out-of-this-world names, as Helland and Blisland. Of the former a tale circulates.

The vicar was going to town, and hoped that the Archdeacon of Cornwall could be induced to take his service on the Sunday following, and he left it to his neighbour at Blisland to negotiate this little arrangement for him. All went well, and the latter gave in a telegram at the nearest office: -

"The Archdeacon of Cornwall is going to Helland; you need not return."

But when it was delivered in London it was thus divided: -

"The Archdeacon of Cornwall is going to Hell; and you need not return."

Slaughter Bridge, the scene as reputed of the fatal battle between Arthur and his nephew Modred, should be seen, a bleak spot hard by Camelford Road Station. Under a rock, prostrate by the river-bank, lies an early inscribed stone to Latinus, son of Macari, an Irish form of name. Here-

 
"All day long the noise of battle roll'd
Among the mountains by the winter sea;
Until King Arthur's Table, man by man,
Had fall'n in Lyonness about their Lord."
 

CHAPTER IX
BUDE

An ugly place-Its charm in the air-Stratton-The battle of Stamford Hill-Churches-Norman remains-Frescoes at Poughill-Pancras Week-Bench-ends-Tonnacombe-Marhayes-Old Stowe-Church towers-Landmarks-The candle-end in Bridgerule Church-Bridget churches-The clover-field-Ogbeare Hall-Whitstone-Camps-Thomasine Bonaventura-Week S. Mary-The coast about Bude-Morwenstow-Robert S. Hawker-One of his ballads.

An unpicturesque, uninteresting place, windblown, treeless, but with sands-not always obtainable on the north coast-and with noble cliff scenery within easy reach.

There is nothing commendable in the place itself; the houses are as ugly as tasteless builders could contrive to erect; the church is of the meanest cheap Gothic of seventy years ago; but the air is exhilarating, the temperature is even, there are golf-links, and a shore for bathers.

Nestling in a valley by a little stream newly designated the "Strat," as though Stratton were called from the stream and not the street-the Roman road that runs through it-is the parent town, crouching with its hair ruffled, and casting a sidelong, dissatisfied eye at its pert and pushing offspring, Bude. But Stratton has no reason to be discontented. It is sheltered from the furious gales, which Bude is not; it has trees and flowers about it, which Bude has not; it has a fine parish church, which Bude has not; and it has a history, deficient to Bude, which is a parvenu, and self-assertive accordingly.

And Stratton further has got its battlefield. The height above the town was the scene of one of those encounters in which the Royalist forces for Charles I. were successful. The following description of the battle is from Professor Gardiner's History of the Great Civil War: -¹¹

"The Earl of Stamford placed himself at the head of the army under his command, and resolved on carrying the war into Cornwall. As he could dispose of 6800 men, whilst Hopton and the Cornish leaders at Launceston had with them less than half the number, he determined to despatch the greater part of his horse to Bodmin in order to suppress any attempt to muster the trained bands there. With his infantry and a few remaining horse he established himself near Stratton, in the extreme north-west of the county, in a position apparently strong enough to secure him from attack, at least till his cavalry returned.

"The ground occupied by Stamford was well chosen. A ridge of high ground running from the north to south parallel with the coast dips sharply down, and rises as sharply again to a grassy hill, from the southern end of which there is a still deeper cleft through which the road descends steeply to the left into the valley in which lies the little town of Stratton. On the top of this hill, the sides of which slope in all directions from the highest point to the edge of the plateau, the Parliamentary army lay. Beyond this plateau the ground falls away in all directions, more especially on the eastern side, where the position was almost impregnable if seriously defended. The ascent from the west was decidedly the easiest, but an earthwork had been thrown up on this side, the guns from which commanded the whole approach from this quarter.¹²

"Undismayed by the odds against them, Hopton and his comrades resolved to break up from Launceston in order to seek the enemy. As they approached Stratton on the morning of the 16th (May, 1643) they had the advantage of having amongst them one to whom every inch of ground must have been perfectly familiar. But a few miles to the north, on the bleak hillside above the waves of the Atlantic, lay that house of Stowe from which Sir Richard Grenville had gone forth to die in the Revenge, and where doubtless the Lady Grenville of a younger generation was watching anxiously for the return of him who had ventured his life in the king's quarrel. It would have been strange if on this day of peril the ordering of the fight had not fallen into Sir Bevil Grenville's hands.

"The little army of Royalists consisted of but 2400, whilst their adversaries could number 5400, well provided with cannon and ammunition. The attacking force was divided into four bands, prepared to storm, or at least to threaten, the hill from every side. For some hours every effort was in vain against superiority of numbers and superiority of position. At three in the afternoon word was brought to the commanders that their scanty stock of powder was almost exhausted. A retreat under such circumstances would have been fatal, and the word was given that a supreme effort must be made. Trusting to pike and sword alone, the lithe Cornishmen pressed onwards and upwards. Their silent march seems to have struck their opponents with a sense of power. The defence grew feeble, and on the easier western slope, where Grenville fought, and on the northern, on which Sir John Berkeley led the attack, the outer edge of the plateau was first gained. Immediately the handful of horse which had remained with Stamford turned and fled, the commander-in-chief, it is said, setting the example. In vain Chudleigh, now second in command, rallied the force for a desperate charge. For a moment he seemed to make an impression on the approaching foe, but he incautiously pressed too far in advance, and was surrounded and captured. His men, left without a commander, at once gave way, and retreated to the further part of the plateau. By this time the other two Royalist detachments, finding resistance slackening, had made their way up, and the victorious commanders embraced one another on the hard-won hill-top, thanking God for a success for which at one time they had hardly ventured to hope. It was no time to prolong their rejoicings, as the enemy, demoralised as he was, still clung to the heights. Seizing the cannons which had been abandoned in the earthwork, the Royalist commanders turned them upon Stamford's cowed followers. The frightened men had no one to encourage them to deeds of hardihood, and, following the example of the cavalry, they too dashed down the slope in headlong flight. Of the Parliamentary soldiers, 300 had been killed and 1700 were taken prisoners, besides Chudleigh and thirty of his officers. All the cannon, with a large store of ammunition and provisions, fell into the hands of the victors. From that day the spot on which the wealthy earl demonstrated his signal incompetence as a leader of men has been known as Stamford Hill."

The scene of the battle deserves a visit, as it has remained almost unaltered since that day. Whether the earthworks belong to the period or were earlier, utilised by Stamford, remains open to question. They hardly seem disposed with skill and intelligence for the use of cannon.

The Royalists were not merely about half in number to the Roundheads, but they were short of ammunition, and without cannon. They were also "so destitute of provisions, that the best officers had but a biscuit a man."

A monument erected on the hill in commemoration of the battle was destroyed a few years ago, and the plate with an inscription on it recording the victory moved to the front of a house in Stratton.

There is a good deal to be seen in the way of old houses and churches near Bude. Stratton Church itself is fine, and contains a good tomb of an Arundell. It has suffered less than most of the sacred edifices in the neighbourhood from the wrecker. Week S. Mary under his hands has become a shell out of which life and beauty have fled. Morwenstow has been reduced to nakedness, but its grand Norman pillars and arches and doorway remain. Kilkhampton has been lovingly treated and the wrecker held at bay. It also has a Norman doorway, and very fine bench-ends; Poughill has these latter, also two frescoes of S. Christopher that have been restored-one, through a blunder, as King Olaf. The idea grew up in the fifteenth century that he who looked on a figure of S. Christopher would not that day die a sudden death. Consequently representations of the saint were multiplied. On the river Wulf in Devon at a ford it was held that at night anyone who came to the side of the water and cried out was caught up and carried over by a gigantic spirit, and there are those alive who protest that they have been so transported across the Wulf. Recently the County Council has built a bridge, and so this spectral Christopher's occupation is gone.

Pancras Week has a very fine waggon roof of richly-carved wood. Holsworthy is a good church well restored. Here during the restoration a skeleton was found in the wall, evidently hastily covered up with mortar and stone.

At Poundstock and Launcells are good bench-ends. The most interesting old house in the district, because best preserved, is Tonnacombe in Morwenstow, very small, with hall and minstrel gallery and panelled parlours, but perfect and untouched by the restorer, except in the most conservative manner.

Penfound in Poundstock, the seat of the ancient family of Penfound, is in a condition verging on ruin. The family has its representatives in Bude as plain labourers. The last squire died in the poor-house in 1847.

What is so delightful about these old Cornish houses is the way that, in a wind-swept region, they nestle into leafy combes.

Elford, now the parsonage of Bude, was the seat of the Arundells, but it has been so altered as to have lost most of its character. Marhamchurch has a good Jacobean pulpit, and in the parish is Marhayes, an interesting house, the basement Tudor, on top of which a Charles II. house was reared. In one room is a superb ceiling of plaster-work. At Dunsland is another, richer, but not so good in design. Sutcombe Church has the remains of a remarkably good screen and some bench-ends. The church has been judiciously restored and not wrecked.

In Poughill, close to Bude, old Broom Hill, now turned into cottages, has a good Elizabethan ceiling. It was here that Sir Bevil Grenville slept the night before the battle of Stamford Hill.

In the deep glen that leads from Kilkhampton to the sea is the site of Stowe House, built by John, Earl of Bath, in 1680. The title became extinct in 1711, and Stowe became the property of the widow of Lord Carteret, who was created Countess Grenville. The house was pulled down in 1720, so that the same persons saw it built and saw its destruction. The Earl of Bath had the best artists brought there to decorate the mansion, and it is due to this that so much splendid plaster-work is to be seen in North-east Cornwall and near Holsworthy. An exquisite plaster ceiling of delicate refinement and beauty existed at Whitstone, but was destroyed by the owner of the house, who had not any idea of its artistic beauty.

Marsland in Morwenstow, without any architectural features, is a charming example of a small country squire's house of the seventeenth century. Stowe Barton, though much altered and spoiled, is the ancient seat of the Grenvilles; that has stood, whilst the splendid mansion has disappeared, leaving only its terraces to show where it once was.

Bridgerule Church stands high; its tower, that of Pancras Week, and that of Week S. Mary were landmarks when all the land except the combes was a great furzy and rushy waste. The soil is cold, clayey, and unproductive. It serves for the breeding of horses and for rough stock, and grew grain when grain-growing paid; now it is reverting to moor, but anciently it was entirely uncultivated and open, saving in the valleys. Bridgerule has a fine tower, and in the church is a respectable modern screen, though not of local character. About the rood-loft door hangs a tale.

There was a widow who had a beautiful daughter, and one evening a gentleman in a carriage drawn by four black horses and with a black-liveried driver on the box drove to the cottage door. The gentleman descended. He was a swarthy but handsome man. He entered the cottage on some excuse, sat by the fire and talked, and eyed the damsel. Then he called, and his liveried servant brought in wines from the sword-case of his carriage, and they drank, till the fire was in their veins, and the gentleman asked the girl if she would accompany him home if he came for her on the following night. She consented. He would arrive at midnight, so he said.

Now next morning the mother's mind misgave her, and she went to Bridgerule and consulted the parson. Said he, "That was the devil. Did you see his feet?"

"No-that is, I saw one," said the widow. "One that was stretched out by the fire, but the other he kept under the chair, and he had let fall his cloak over it. But I did notice that he limped as he walked."

"Now," said the parson, "here is a consecrated candle; it has burned on the altar. Take it home, and when the visitor asks your wench to go with him, let her say she will do so as soon as the candle is burnt out. He will consent. At once take the candle and run to Bridgerule Church and give it to me, and see what happens."

Next night the woman lit the candle and set it on the table, and it burnt cheerily. But just before midnight the tramp of horses was heard and the roll of wheels, and the black coach drew up at her door and the gentleman descended. He entered the cottage and asked if Genefer were ready to attend him.

"She is upstairs dressing in her Sunday gown," replied the mother.

"I am impatient; let her come as she is," said the stranger.

"Suffer her to have time till this candle burns into the socket," asked the mother.

"I consent, but not for a moment longer," was his reply.

Then the widow took the candle, and saying she went in quest of her daughter, she left the room, went out at the back door, extinguished the candle, and ran till she reached the church, where the parson awaited her with his clerk, who was a mason. He took the candle, gave it to his clerk, who placed it in a recess in the wall, and at once proceeded to build up the recess.

The mother hastened home. But as she came to a moor called Affaland she saw the coach drawn by four black horses arrive on it, and proceed to a pool that was there, but is now dried up or drained away, and in went horses, driver, coach, and all, and a great spout of blue flame came up where they descended, and after that, they were seen no more. When she came home, she found her daughter in a dead faint.

Now that candle remains behind the wall that closes up the rood-stair door. And the devil cannot claim the girl, because the candle is not burnt out. But if ever that wall be pulled down and the candle be removed, and anyone be wicked enough to burn it, then he will ascend from the place of outer darkness and the gnashing of teeth, and snatch the soul of Genefer away, even though it be in Abraham's bosom.

Bridgerule is Llan-Bridget, that was granted at the Conquest to a certain Raoul. It is one of the cluster of Bridget churches that are found near the Tamar, of which the others are Virginstow and Bridestow, and Landue-now only a house with a holy well of S. Bridget and the foundations of a chapel. Clearly there was in this district a colony from Leinster, from Magh Brea, the great plain in which Bridget had her foundations. S. Bridget was a real person, and one of great force of character; but what gave her such an enormous popularity in Ireland was that she inherited the name of one of the old pagan goddesses, she of the fire, also the earth mother, and the great helper of women in their trouble.

When the real Bridget saw the vast plain in Leinster covered with white clover, from which the wind that wafted over it was sweet as if it had breathed from paradise, "Oh!" said she, "if this lovely plain were mine I would give it to God."

S. Columba heard this story. He smiled, and said, "God accepts the will for the deed. It is the same to Him as if Bridget had freely given Him the wide white clover field."

The centre of the cult of S. Bridget in ancient Dumnonia must have been Bridestow, for there is a sanctuary which marks the main monastic establishment.

One day a party of bishops and clergy arrived at Bridget's house of Kildare very hungry and clamorous for food, and particularly desirous to know what they were going to have for dinner.

"Now," said Bridget, "I and my spiritual daughters also suffer from hunger. We have not the Word of God ministered to us but exceptionally when a stray priest comes this way. Let us go to church first, and do ye feed us with spiritual nourishment whilst dinner is getting ready, and then do you eat your fill."

It is a long way to North Tamerton, but worth a visit, for the church is well situated above the Tamar, and contains some good bench-ends; and in the parish is Ogbeare with a very fine old hall, but a very modern villa residence attached to it-new cloth on the old garment.

Whitstone is so called from the church being founded on a piece of white sparry rock. When the late Archbishop Benson was bishop of Truro he came to open the church after restoration. As the rector was taking him in he pointed out the white stone. Bishop Benson at once seized on the idea suggested, and preached to the people on the text, "To him that overcometh will I give … a white stone." (Rev. ii. 17.) In the churchyard is a holy well of S. Anne, not of the reputed mother of the Virgin, for her cult is comparatively modern, not much earlier than the fifteenth century, but dedicated to the mother of S. Sampson, sister of S. Padarn's mother. There must have been much fighting at some time in this neighbourhood. There is a fine camp in Swannacot Wood over against Whitstone. Week S. Mary occupies an old camp site, and another is in West Wood, and another, again, in Key Wood, all within a rifle-shot of each other.

Week S. Mary occupies a wind-blasted elevation, over 500 feet above the sea, and with no intervening hills to break the force of the gales from the Atlantic. The place has interest as the birthsite of Thomasine Bonaventura. She was the daughter of a labourer, and was one day keeping sheep on the moor, when she engaged the attention of a London merchant who was travelling that way, and stayed to ask of her his direction.

Pleased with her Cornish grace of manner, with her fresh face and honest eyes, he took her to London as servant to his wife, and when the latter died he made her the mistress of his house. Dying himself shortly afterwards, he bequeathed to her a large fortune. She then married a person of the name of Gale, whom also she survived. Then Sir John Percival, Lord Mayor of London, succumbed to her charms of face, and above all of manner, and he became her third husband. But he also died, and she was once more a widow. The lady was by this time content with her experience as a wife, and returning from London to Week S. Mary-think of that! to Week S. Mary, the wind-blown and desolate-she devoted her days and fortune to good works. She founded there a college and chantry, and doubtless largely contributed towards the building of the parish church. She repaired the roads, built bridges, gave dowries to maidens, and relieved the poor. She contributed also to the building of the tower of S. Stephen's by Launceston.

Her college for the education of the youth of the neighbourhood continued to flourish till the Reformation, and the best gentlemen's sons of Devon and Cornwall went there for their education. But as there was a chantry attached to the school, this served as an excuse for the rapacity of those who desired to increase their goods at the cost of Church and poor, and school and chantry were suppressed together. Week S. Mary till lately had its mayor, and was esteemed a borough, though it never returned members.