Chapter III: Part 3

The Atlantic it certainly was. Not a rood of land lay between us and America. Yet the illimitable ocean "where the great ships go down," rolled in to our feet in baby ripples, disporting itself harmlessly, and tempting my two little mermaids to swim out to the utmost limit that prudence allowed. And how delightful it was to run back barefoot across the soft sand to the beautiful dressing-room of serpentine rock, where one could sit and watch the glittering sea, untroubled by any company save the gulls and cormorants. What a contrast to other bathing places--genteel Eastbourne and Brighton, or vulgar Margate and Ramsgate, where, nevertheless, the good folks look equally happy. But our happiness! No words could describe it. Shall we stamp ourselves as persons of little mind, easily satisfied, if I confess that we spent the whole morning in Housel Cove without band or promenade, without even a Christy Minstrel or a Punch and Judy, our sole amusement being the vain attempt to catch a tiny fish, the Robinson Crusoe of a small pool in the rock above high-water mark, where by some ill chance he found himself. But he looked extremely contented with his sea hermitage, and evaded so cleverly all our efforts to get hold of him, that after a while we left him to his solitude--where possibly he resides still.

How delicious it is for hard-worked people to do nothing, absolutely nothing! Of course only for a little while--a few days, a few hours. The love of work and the necessity for it soon revive. But just for those few harmless hours to let the world and its duties and cares alike slip by, to be absolutely idle, to fold one's hands and look at the sea and the sky, thinking of nothing at all, except perhaps to count and watch for every ninth wave--said to be the biggest always--and wonder how big it will be, and whether it will reach that stone with the little colony of limpets and two red anemones beside them, or stop short at the rock where we sit placidly dangling our feet, waiting, Canute-like, for the supreme moment when the will of humanity sinks conquered by the immutable powers of nature. Then, greatest crisis of all, the sea will attack that magnificent castle and moat, which we grown-up babies have constructed with such pride. Well, have we not all built our sand-castles and seen them swept away? happy if by no unkinder force than the remorseless wave of Time, which will soon flow over us all.

But how foolish is moralising--making my narrative halt like that horse whom we amused ourselves with half the afternoon. He was tied by the leg, poor beast, the fore leg fastened to the hind one, as seemed to be the ordinary Cornish fashion with all animals--horses, cows, and sheep. It certainly saves a deal of trouble, preventing them from climbing the "hedges" which form the sole boundary of property, but it makes the creatures go limping about in rather a melancholy fashion. However, as it is their normal condition, probably they communicate it to one another, and each generation accepts its lot.

This horse did. He was a handsome animal, who came and peered at the sketch which one of us was doing, after the solemn fashion of quadrupedal connoisseurship, and kept us company all the afternoon. We sat in a row on the top of the "hedge," enjoying the golden afternoon, and scarcely believing it possible that yesterday had been yesterday. Of the wild storm and deluge of rain there was not a single trace; everything looked as lovely as if it had been, and was going to be, summer all the year.

We were so contented, and were making such progress in our sketch and distant view of Kynance over the now dry and smiling cornfield, that we had nigh forgotten the duties of civilisation, until some one brought the news that all the household was apparently dressing itself in its very best, to attend the rectory tea. We determined to do the same, though small were our possibilities of toilette.

"But what does it matter?" argued we. "Nobody knows us, and we know nobody."

A position rather rare to those who "dwell among their own people," who take a kindly interest in everybody, and believe with a pardonable credulity that everybody takes a kindly interest in them.

But human nature is the same all the world over. And here we saw it in its pleasantest phase; rich and poor meeting together, not for charity, but courtesy--a courtesy that was given with a kindliness and accepted with a quiet independence which seemed characteristic of these Cornish folk.

Among the little crowd, gentle and simple, we, of course, did not know a single soul. Nevertheless, delivering up our tickets to the gardener at the gate, we entered, and wandered at ease through the pretty garden, gorgeous with asters, marigolds, carnations, and all sorts of rich-coloured and rich-scented autumn flowers; where the hydrangeas grew in enormous bushes, and the fuchsias had stems as thick and solid as trees.

In front of the open hall door was a gravel sweep where were ranged two long tea-tables filled with the humbler but respectable class of parishioners, chiefly elderly people, and some very old. The Lizard is a place noted for longevity, as is proved by the register books, where several deaths at over a hundred may be found recorded, and one--he was the rector of Landewednack in 1683--is said to have died at the age of 120 years.

The present rector is no such Methuselah. He moved actively to and fro among his people, and so did his wife, whom we should have recognised by her omnipresent kindliness, even if she had not come and welcomed us strangers--easily singled out as strangers, where all the rest were friends.

Besides the poor and the aged, there was a goodly number of guests who were neither the one nor the other, playing energetically at lawn-tennis behind the house, on a "lawn" composed of sea-sand. All seemed determined to amuse themselves and everybody else, and all did their very best--including the band.

Alas, that band! I would fain pass it over in silence (would it had returned the compliment!); but truth is truth, and may benefit rather than harm. The calm composure with which those half-dozen wind-instruments sat in a row, playing determinedly flat, bass coming in with a tremendous boom here and there, entirely at his own volition, without regard to time or tune, was the most awful thing I ever heard in music! Agony, pure and simple, was the only sensation it produced. When they struck up, we just ran away till the tune was ended--what tune, familiar or unfamiliar, it was impossible to say. Between us three, all blessed, or cursed, with musical ears, there existed such difference of opinion on this head, that decision became vain. And when at last, as the hour of service approached, little groups began strolling towards the church, the musicians began a final "God save the Queen," barely recognisable, a feeling of thankfulness was the only sensation left.

Now, let me not be hard upon these village Orpheuses. They did their best, and for a working man to study music in any form is a good and desirable thing. But whatever is worth doing at all is worth doing well. The great bane of provincial life is that people have so few opportunities of finding out when they do _not_ do things well, and so little ambition to learn to do them better. If these few severe remarks should spur on that anonymous band to try and emulate the Philharmonic or the Crystal Palace orchestra, it will be all the better for the little community at the Lizard.

The music in the church was beautiful. A crowded congregation--not a seat vacant--listened to the excellent chanting, hymns, and a harvest anthem, most accurately and correctly sung. The organist too--it was a pleasure to watch that young man's face and see with what interest and enthusiasm he entered into it all. Besides the rector, there were several other clergymen, one of whom, an old man, read the prayers with an intonation and expression which I have rarely heard equalled, and another preached what would have been called anywhere a thoroughly good sermon. All the statelier guests at the Rectory tea--probably county families (one stout lady had the dignity of a duchess at least)--"assisted" at this evening service, and behind them was a throng of humbler folk, among whom we recognised our sole friend here, John Curgenven. We had passed him at the church door, and he had lifted his hat with the air of a _preux chevalier_ of the olden time; "more like King Arthur than ever"--we observed to one another.

He, and we, and the aristocratic groups, with a few more of the congregation, lingered for several minutes after service was over, admiring the beautiful flowers and fruit. I think I never saw any decorations so rich or so tasteful. And then, as the organ played us out with an exceedingly brilliant voluntary, the vision of light and colour melted away, and we came out upon the quiet churchyard, lying in the cold, still moonlight.

But what a moonlight! Clear as day, the round silver orb sailing through a cloudless sky of that deep dark which we know is blue, only moonlight shows no colours. Oh, Lady Moon, Lady Moon, what a dangerous night for some of those groups to go walking home in! We saw them in twos and threes, various young people whom we had got to know by sight, and criticise, and take an interest in, wandering slowly on through Lizard Town, and then diverging into quieter paths.

As we gladly did too. For there, in an open space near the two hotels which co-exist close together--I hope amicably, and divide the tourist custom of the place--in front of a row of open windows which showed the remains of a _table d'hôte_, and playing lively tunes to a group of delighted listeners, including some children, who had struck up a merry dance--stood that terrible wind band!

It was too much! All our sympathy with our fellow-creatures, our pleasure in watching them enjoy themselves, our interest in studying human nature in the abstract, nay, even the picturesqueness of the charming moonlight scene, could not tempt us to stay. We paused a minute, then put our fingers in our ears and fled. Gradually those fearful sounds melted away into distance, and left us to the silence of moonshine, and the sight, now grown familiar, but never less beautiful, of the far-gleaming Lizard Lights.

DAY THE SEVENTH

John Curgenven had said last night, with his air of tender patronising, half regal, half paternal, which we declared always reminded us of King Arthur--"Ladies, whenever you settle to go to Kynance, I'll take you."

And sure enough there he stood, at eight in the morning, quite a picture, his cap in one hand, a couple of fishes dangling from the other--he had brought them as a present, and absolutely refused to be paid--smiling upon us at our breakfast, as benignly as did the sun. He came to say that he was at our service till 10 A.M.; when he had an engagement.

Our countenances fell. We did not like venturing in strange and dangerous ground, or rather sea, without our protector. But this was our last chance, and such a lovely day.

"You won't come to any harm, ladies," said the consoling John. "I'll take you by a short cut across the down, much better than the cliff. You can't possibly miss your way: it'll lead you straight to Kynance, and then you go down a steep path to the Cove. You'll have plenty of time before the tide comes in to see everything."

"And to bathe?"

"Oh yes, miss, there's the Drawing-room, the Dining-room, and the Kitchen--all capital caves close together; I wouldn't advise you to swim out far, though. And keep a sharp look out for the tide--it runs in pretty fast."

"And the scrambling?"

"Oh, you can easy get on Asparagus Island, miss; it's quite safe. Only don't try the Devil's Throat--or Hell's Mouth, as some folk call it."

Neither name was inviting; but studying our guide-books, we thought we could manage even without our friend. So, long ere the dew was dried on the sunshiny down, we all started off together, Curgenven slackening his quick active steps--very light and most enviably active for a man of his years--to accommodate us, and conversing courteously with us all the way.

"Ower the muir amang the heather" have I tramped many a mile in bonnie Scotland, but this Cornish moor and Cornish heather were quite different. As different as the Cornishman with his bright, frank face, and his mixture of British honesty and Gallic courtesy, from the Scotch peasant--equally worthy, but sometimes just a trifle "dour."

John had plenty to say for himself, and said it well, with a quiet independence that there was no mistaking; never forgetting meanwhile to stop and offer a helping hand over every bit of rough road, puddle, or bog. He gave us a vivid picture of winter life at the Lizard: when the little community has to hybernate, like the squirrels and field-mice, upon its summer savings.

"Sometimes we don't earn a halfpenny for weeks and months, and then if we've got nothing to fall back upon it's a bad job, you see, ma'am."

I asked him if much money went for drink; they seemed to me a remarkably sober set at the Lizard.

"Yes, I think we are; we're obliged to be; we can't spend money at the public-house, for we've got none to spend. I'm no teetotaller myself," added John boldly. "I don't dislike a glass of beer now and then, if I can afford it, and when I can't afford it I can do without it, and if I do take it I always know when to stop."

Ay, that is the crucial test--the knowing when to stop. It is this which makes all the difference between a good man and a villain, a wise man and a fool. Self-control--a quality which, guided by conscience and common sense, is the best possession of any human being. And looking at the honest fisherman, one felt pretty sure he had his share of it.

"Now I must leave you, ladies," said he, a great deal sooner than we wished, for we much liked talking to him. "My time's nearly up, and I mustn't keep my gentleman waiting; he goes out in my boat every day, and has been a good friend to me. The road's straight before you, ladies; and there's another party just ahead of you. Follow the track, and you'll soon be at Kynance. It's a lovely day for the Cove, and I hope you'll enjoy yourselves."

John bared his grey head, with a salutation worthy of some old knight of the Round Table, and then strode back, in double-quick time, as active and upright as any young fellow of twenty-five, across the level down.

Beautiful Kynance! When, afterwards, I stood one dull winter day in a London Art Gallery, opposite the _Cornish Lions_, how well I recalled this day! How truly Brett's picture gives the long roll of the wave upon the silver sands, the richly-tinted rocks and caves, the brightness and freshness of everything. And those merry girls beside me, who had the faculty of enjoying all they had, and all they did, without regretting what they had not or what they might not do--with heroic resignation they promised not to attempt to swim in the tempting smooth water beyond the long rollers. Though knocked down again and again, they always emerged from the waves with shouts of laughter. Mere dots they looked to my anxious eyes--a couple of corks tossed hither and thither on the foaming billows--and very thankful I was to get them safe back into the "drawing-room," the loveliest of lovely caves.

There was no time to lose; by noon our parlour floor--what a fairy floor it was! of the softest, most delicious sand--would be all covered with waves. And before then there was a deal to be seen and done, the Bellows, the Gull Rock, Asparagus Island--even if we left out the dangerous points with the ugly names that Curgenven had warned us against.

What is there in humanity, certainly in youthful humanity, that if it can attain its end in two ways, one quiet and decorous, the other difficult and dangerous, is certain to choose the latter?

"We must manage to get you to the Bellows, it is such a curious sight," said my girls as they returned from it. "Don't be frightened--come along!"

By dint of pulling, pushing, and the help of stick and arm, I came: stood watching the spout of water which, in certain conditions of the tide, forces itself through a tiny fissure in the rock with a great roar, and joined in the childish delight of waiting, minute by minute, for the biggest spout, the loudest roar.

But Asparagus Island (where was no asparagus at all) I totally declined. Not being a goat or a chamois, I contented myself with sitting where I could gain the best view of the almost invisible path by which my adventurous young "kids" disappeared. Happily they had both steady heads and cool nerves; they were neither rash nor unconscientious. I knew they would come back as soon as they could. So I waited patiently, contemplating a fellow-victim who seemed worse off than myself; a benign-looking clergyman, who kept walking up and down the soppy sands, and shouting at intervals to two young people, a man and a woman, who appeared to be crawling like flies along the face of the rock towards another rock, with a yawning cave and a wide fissure between.

"Don't attempt it!" the clergyman cried at the top of his voice. "That's the Devil's Throat. She'll never manage it. Come down. Do make her come down."

"Your young people seem rather venturesome," said I sympathetically.

"Not _my_ young people," was the dignified answer. "My girls are up there, on Asparagus Rock, which is easy enough climbing. They promised not to go farther, and they never disobey their mother and me. But those two! I declare he is taking her to the most dangerous part, that rock where you have to jump--a good jump it is, and if you miss your footing you are done for, you go right into the boiling waves below. Well, it's no business of mine; she is his own property; he is engaged to her, but"--

I fear I made some very severe remarks on the folly of a young man who could thus risk life and limbs--not only his own, but those of his wife to be; and on the weakness of a girl who could allow herself to be tempted, even by a lover, into such selfish foolhardiness.

"They must manage their own affairs," said the old gentleman sententiously, perhaps not being so much given to preaching (out of the pulpit) as I was. "My daughters are wiser. Here come two of them."

And very sensible girls they looked, clad in a practical, convenient fashion, just fitted for scrambling. By them I sent a message to my own girls, explaining the best descent from Asparagus Island, and repeating the warning against attempting Hell's Mouth.

"Yes, you are quite right," said my elderly friend, as we sat down together on the least uncomfortable stone we could find, and watched the juniors disappear over the rocks. "I like to see girls active and brave; I never hinder them in any reasonable enjoyment, even though there may be risk in it--one must run some risk--and a woman may have to save life as well as a man. But foolhardy bravado I not only dislike--I _despise_ it."

In which sentiments I so entirely agreed that we fraternised there and then; began talking on all sorts of subjects--some of them the very serious and earnest subjects that one occasionally drops into by mere chance, with mere strangers. I recall that half hour on Kynance Sands as one of the pleasant memories of our tour, though to this day I have not the remotest idea who my companion was. Except that as soon as he spoke I recognised the reader whose voice had so struck me in last night's thanksgiving service; reminding me of Frederick Denison Maurice, whom this generation is almost beginning to forget, but whom we elders never can forget.

The tide was creeping on now--nay, striding, wave after wave, through "parlour" and "drawing-room," making ingress and egress alike impossible. In fact, a newly arrived party of tourists, who had stood unwisely long contemplating the Bellows, were seen to gaze in despair from their rock which had suddenly become an island. No chance for them except to wade--and in a few minutes more they would probably have to swim ashore. What became of them we did not stay to see, for an anxious, prudent little voice, always thoughtful for "mother," insisted on our precipitate flight before the advancing tide. Kynance, lovely as it is, has its inconveniences.

Departing, we met a whole string of tourist-looking people, whom we benevolently warned that they were too late, at which they did not seem in the least disappointed. Probably they were one of the numerous pic-nic parties who come here from Falmouth or Helstone, to spend a jovial day of eating and drinking, and enjoy the delights of the flesh rather than the spirit.

At any rate the romance and solitude of the place were gone. The quaint old woman at the serpentine shop--a mild little wooden erection under the cliff--was being chaffed and bargained with by three youths with cigars, which defiled the whole air around, and made us take refuge up the hill. But even there a white umbrella had sprung up like a gigantic mushroom, and under it sat an energetic lady artist, who, entering at once into conversation, with a cheerful avidity that implied her not having talked for a week, informed us of all she was painting, and all she had meant to paint, where she lodged, and how much she paid for her lodging--evidently expecting the same confidences from us in return.

But we were getting hungry, and between us and dinner was a long two-miles walk over the steep downs, that were glowing, nay, burning, under the September sun. So we turned homeward, glad of more than one rest by the way, and a long pause beside a pretty little stream; where we were able to offer the immemorial cup of cold water to several thirsty souls besides ourselves. Some of us by this time were getting to feel not so young as we had fancied ourselves in the early morning, and to wish regretfully for Charles and his carriage.

However, we got home at last--to find that sad accompaniment of many a holiday--tidings of sickness and death. Nothing very near us--nothing that need hurry us home--but enough to sadden us, and make our evening walk, which we bravely carried out, a far less bright one than that of the forenoon.

The girls had found a way, chiefly on the tops of "hedges," to the grand rock called Lizard Point. Thither we went, and watched the sunset--a very fine one; then came back through the village, and made various purchases of serpentine from John Curgenven's wife, who was a great deal younger than himself, but not near so handsome or so original.

But a cloud had come over us; it did not, and must not stay--still, there it was for the time. When the last thing at night I went out into the glorious moonlight--bright as day--and thought of the soul who had just passed out of a long and troubled life into the clearness of life eternal, it seemed as if all was right still. Small cares and worries dwindled down or melted away--as the petty uglinesses around melted in the radiance of this glorious harvest moon, which seemed to wrap one round in a silent peace, like the "garment of praise," which David speaks about--in exchange for "the spirit of heaviness."

DAY THE EIGHTH

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 Ph[oe]nician 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."

DAY THE NINTH

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.