Chapter VI: Part 6

A pathetic interest attaches to the large copper butterfly. This splendid species was first discovered in Wales by the celebrated botanist Hudson. It was subsequently captured in considerable numbers about Whittlesea Mere, in Huntingdonshire. Now, alas! it is extinct, and a specimen such as one possessed by Mr. Bignell is worth some pounds. The last secured was in 1847. Greedy collectors and dealers from London, after its discovery, were waiting for it, and offered the country yokels five shillings for every caterpillar secured. Now it is as extinct as the dodo and the great auk.

There would seem to be no living creature that is not a home and feeding ground for parasites; even the butterflies are infested with them, and probably these parasites also have others infinitely small that attack them.

Great fleas have little fleas upon their backs to bite 'em,
And little fleas have lesser fleas--and so _ad infinitum_.

One of the most interesting discoveries made by Mr. Bignell is that a creature like a scorpion--but all claw--that is found upon the common house-fly is not a true parasite. It likes a ride, and to do it cheap. And when a fly comes within reach, it lays hold of it with its disproportionately huge claws, clings, and has a ride, free, gratis and for nothing. When it has seen enough of the world and is tired, it lets go and drops off.

Says Mr. Bignell: "The Blossom Underwing is a moth that was very abundant on the male flowers of the great sallow on April 13th, 1866. Previously this moth was very scarce; but on this night I saw at least a thousand; they were all in pairs, and each pair occupied a flower, a sight never to be forgotten. The fine flowering scrubby oaks were swarming with the larvæ. A friend of mine who kept birds in a very large cage, seeing the abundance of the caterpillars, decided to give his birds a treat; he accordingly gathered about a pint of them, carried them home, and instead of giving the birds two or three at a time, he incautiously put the tin into the cage and removed the lid. At once the caterpillars began to escape, and the seething mass of black and yellow wriggling over the floor, crawling about the wires, so frightened the birds that it caused the death of two of three, which beat themselves against the cage in vain hope to escape from these uncanny horrors."

As may be well imagined, Mr. Bignell with his lantern stealing up the side of a hedge in the night often enough routed the poachers and sent them flying, thinking they were being watched by a policeman. On one occasion he scared an owl. "I was enjoying myself, on my knees, hunting over the contents of my net that I had used for sweeping the low foliage, to see what captures I had made. My nose and bull's-eye lantern were thrust close to the ground, to prevent anything escaping observation. In the midst of this occupation an owl swooped down to see what was up, when I turned my lantern on him, and away he flew in a mighty hurry, bringing the back of his wings together with great force, like a man clapping his hands. He was evidently in great alarm, and uttered an unearthly scream. It certainly gave me also a turn, it was so sudden."

All moths with highly pectinated antennæ, that is to say with their feelers comb-like at the extremities, have the most extraordinary power of scenting a female moth at a great distance, even two or three miles, with a favourable wind.

Mr. Bignell says: "I once had a virgin female of the Oak-egger moth, and was desirous of getting some males. I started off with the lady in a tin box, with a perforated zinc top, to give her air and allow her perfume to escape. I walked through the fields towards Milehouse to where was a turnstile; and at this spot lighted on a weary policeman resting. As it was a dull day, without any token of the sun breaking out, to attract butterflies for their usual gambols, the policeman jeeringly remarked that I had missed the right day. I replied that I thought not, and that I could collect as many as I desired, in fact, I could make them come to me. He laughed incredulously. I then took out my tin box and placed it on the wall, and, magician-like, whistled and waved my hand. The policeman stared, and thought I was befooling him. But lo, in two or three minutes one male alighted close to the box, soon followed by others, and in a quarter of an hour I had at least fifty, and so tame that I picked them up with my fingers and distributed them among about a dozen people who had gathered to see what I was about. The policeman stared with open eyes and mouth, quite satisfied that my whistle and mysterious signs in the air with my hand had called the insects to me. Satisfied with what I had got I waved again and bade the moths depart, and clapped the box in my pocket. Next day I took the empty box out with me into the country. I had several males following me, and some actually penetrated into my pocket where was the empty box, proving that the perfume still remained in it, though wholly imperceptible to myself."

On one occasion Mr. Bignell and a friend set out at night to find the beautiful moth _Heliophobus hispidus_, knowing its haunts, between the south side of the Plymouth citadel and the sea, where it is to be found in September or October resting on the grass.

Accordingly, each furnished with a bull's-eye lantern, they visited the locality, but it was some time before one was discerned, and that was on a blade of grass overhanging the cliff and out of reach, a sheer drop of twenty feet at least into the sea fretting and moaning below. Loath to miss it, as its eyes shone like two rubies--in fact, both saw those glistening eyes before they observed that they were in the head of the moth--they arranged that one should lie flat on his stomach, and that Mr. Bignell should sit down, dig the heels of his boots into the turf, then take his friend by the legs and thrust him over the edge of the cliff, so far as to enable him to box the moth, whilst holding the handle of his lantern between his teeth. This was done, and the _Heliophobus_ was secured.

But, after all, it is in the direction of parasites living upon insects that Mr. Bignell has made the greatest research. He is the possessor of a unique collection of the parasites that live on the aphis, and also of the hyper-parasite which preys upon that parasite. The life-history of this insect was unknown till Mr. Bignell detected a hyper-parasite pierce the aphis which was itself a parasite. The specimen was secured, and from it was bred the hyper-parasite itself.

The life-story of the aphis, that tiny green pest that infests the roses, has been unrolled by this enthusiastic student, and is full of surprises. The ichneumon fly as well has been watched, and all its wicked acts recorded.

Caterpillars, so fat and fleshy, form a delightful feeding ground for the deposit of eggs, and serve as luscious food for the young to pasture upon. We human beings, in common with all mammals, have the obligation imposed on us of nourishing our own young, and with some of us we go on sustaining them till we are exhausted in the process, but the ichneumonidæ are more clever than we. They make others, notably the caterpillars, maintain their young, and the frivolous mothers, after having once deposited their eggs, gad about and enjoy themselves as having no concern for their future well-being. It is a comfort to reflect that the insects thus preyed upon do not seem to suffer much, if at all, and it may almost be said that they exhibit a maternal regard for the young bred out of their bodies.

With his wonderful microscopes Mr. Bignell can explore far down the ladder of life, but whether to its lowest rung may well be doubted. There is always some living being to be found preying on the last of the minutest creature last seen.

After a visit to Mr. Bignell's house in Saltash with a friend, I turned to him and said: "I came here believing myself to be an Individual. I leave knowing myself to be a Community."

SIR JOHN CALL, BART.

The _Dictionary of National Biography_ says of Sir John Call that he was "descended from an old family which, it is said, once owned considerable property in Devon and Cornwall." That proviso "it is said" is conveniently inserted. Anything may be said, as that the cow jumped over the moon, but that a saying may be believed we must know who uttered it. Now the originator of this saying was probably William Playfair, in his _British Family Antiquity_, 1809. In that the following interesting statement occurs: "From papers in the possession of the family, partly fabulous, though partly true, it appears that the family of the Calls, consisting of three brothers, came into England from Saxony towards the end of the eighth century. One of these brothers settled in Scotland, from whom is descended the clan of the McColls; the second in Norfolk, where the family continued until the beginning of the last (eighteenth) century; and the third settled in Cornwall, from whence the present family derives its origin. This very ancient, but latterly not very opulent family, was formerly possessed of considerable landed property both in Devonshire and Cornwall, which was first reduced by the civil wars in the time of Henry VII, and afterwards nearly annihilated, in consequence of the loyal attachment of some of its individuals to the royal cause during the civil wars in the reign of Charles I."

_From a portrait (by A. Hickle) in the possession of his great-granddaughter, Mrs. de Lacy Lacy_]

Why was the eighth century fixed on for the advent of the Calls upon the scene? Presumably because the first Norsemen arrived in 787. Conceive the Calls coming over in a dragon ship, filled with berserker rage, to ravage England and glut themselves with our blood.

But we shall look for Calls in vain among the records of the past. As it happens, Saxons and Northmen had no family, only personal names. The story is as absurd as that also put forth that Callington derived its name from the Calls, who only settled near it in 1770.

But these "family papers" are not so ancient as Sir John Call, who would have been above such a pretence. As a matter of fact, the account supplied to Playfair shows a surprising ignorance in the writer as to the existence of Heralds' Visitations, Inquisitiones post mortem, Wills, Royalist Composition Papers, Parish Registers, and all the material at hand to confirm or disprove reckless genealogical assertions. Playfair does admit that the story contained in the "family papers" is "partly fabulous." He might have said that it was fabulous from beginning to end.

The Calls had no right whatever to bear arms, till a grant was made to them--after reading the above flourish not inappropriate--of three trumpets.

The MS. "Names of Gentlemen in Devonshire and Cornwall with their Arms," drawn up by John Hooker, _alias_ Vowell, in 1599, is the only armoury of the West that gives the name of Call with arms: Party per pale or and gules; upon a chief az. 3 geese sable. But he gives no indication of place where such a gentleman possessed land--and that, before this "opulent family" had been ruined by the civil wars. Hooker probably included the name, because, at the time, there was some gentleman Call from another part of England living in Exeter. That the Calls of Whiteford had no claim to his arms, nor could exhibit descent from him, is shown by their not adopting his coat. In a MS. armoury of all England dating from 1632, that belonged to C. Pole, the name and arms of Call do not occur.

According to Foster's _Baronetage_, the Calls hailed from Prestacott, in Launcells.

Actually the great-grandfather of Sir John was of Grove, in Stratton, a tenant farmer. A good many Calls appear in the register of the parish, never with _gent._ appended to the name, or even with Mr. preceding it, a title generally accorded to a yeoman or a well-to-do tradesman; and one in 1735 is buried as a pauper. Their marriages also show to what class they belonged, with the Uglows, Tanners, and the Jewells, in a humble walk of life.

John Call, described as of Prestacott, in Launcells, was born in 1680, and in 1702 married Sarah Jewell, and died in 1730.

Prestacott consisted of three very small farms on the right-hand side of the old road from Stratton to Holsworthy. Of late years the ramshackle buildings have been pulled down and the lands thrown together and constituted one farm, and a new house has been built. It belonged at the time that John Call rented one of these little holdings to the Orchards of Hartland Abbey. John Call had two sons, John and Richard. John was born 1st March, 1704-5, and married Jane, daughter of John Mill, of Launcells, "the descendant of a respectable family, which had considerable possessions there, as well as in Middlesex," says Playfair. He might have added with equal truth that they possessed castles in the air. As it happens, the Visitations of Cornwall and Lysons knew nothing of the family of Mill. The Mills were of Shernick, a farm in Launcells, which they rented of the Arundels of Trerice. Their ledger-stones are in the parish church, but they are never described as _gents._ Mrs. Judith Mill was buried on October 14th, 1723, and Mr. John Mill on December 1st in the same year, and Mr. Richard Mill on July 11th, 1766.

Sarah Call, widow of John Call (without even Mr. and Mrs. prefixed), was buried on February 1st, 1747-8. Shernick is now the property of Sir C. T. Acland, Bart., inherited through an heiress in the nineteenth century of the Arundels.

John Call, who married Jane Mill, had a son, the subject of this memoir. Afterwards, when this son was rich, he set up a tablet to the memory of his father in Launcells Church, on which he gives him the title of "gent."

In Memory of John Call gent of Shernick
in this parish, and of Whiteford in Stoke Climsland.
He was interred in this church 3 Jan. 1767,
aged 63. Also of Jane Call his widow, who
was interred 9 Nov. 1781, aged 70.
Also of Jane Jones their daughter, wife of
the Rev^d Cadwalader Jones, minister of this parish,
who was here interred 2 April, 1790, aged
50, and of their two children, etc.

Concerning Mrs. Cadwalader Jones, more hereafter. The old gentleman, John Call, had died on December 31st, 1766, going out with the old year.

John, the younger, was born June 30th, 1732, at Fenny Park, near Tiverton, and was educated at a private school. For some reason or other, not known, his mother disliked him, and when aged seventeen, and he had been recommended to the notice of Benjamin Robbins, who was going out to India, she refused to furnish him with the money required for his outfit and passage to India, so that his more distant relatives, probably the Mill family of Shernick, supplied the money.

Benjamin Robbins had composed a treatise on the principles of gunnery and the price of gunpowder, that was not as yet published, and also an account of Lord Anson's voyages. He was a mathematician, and had been appointed chief engineer and captain-general in the East India Company's service, and he was looking about for commercial clerks who would serve on a small pay, when Call was recommended to him as a shrewd lad. John Call was glad of the chance of seeing something of the world and of escaping from a mother who flouted him, and he embraced the offer with gladness. Robbins quitted England in 1749, and arrived with his clerks at Fort William in July, 1750.

Call had been given by Robbins his treatise on explosives to transcribe for the press, and this interested the young man in the subject, and he pursued the theme, and made considerable improvements in rifling barrels. He also introduced one that enabled shells to be discharged from long guns. When Robbins landed he had with him eight young clerks, of whom Call was one. Robbins died in July, 1751, and Call then became the leading engineer.

War broke out among the native princes, backed up upon one side by the French, on the other by the English, and Call was employed to carry out the erection of defensive works at Fort S. David. This was an English settlement near the mouth of the Southern Pennair River, and was only twelve miles from Pondicherry, the French head-quarters.

Madras, at the mouth of the Triplicane, consisted of the native or black city and of Fort S. George, which lay on the sea, and was almost engirdled by the North River that with the Triplicane formed an island crossed by the main road from Chinglapett and Vandalone.

The French, whilst in possession of Fort S. George, after it had been taken by Labourdonnais in 1746, had made several improvements and additions to the slight works they found, which, nevertheless, rendered the fort little capable of long resistance against the regular approaches of a European enemy; nor had they given any attention to the internal area, which did not exceed fifteen acres of ground. Nevertheless, the English let the place remain in the same state after its recovery from the French in 1751 till the beginning of the year 1756, when the expectation of another war with that nation, and the reports of the great preparations making in France against India, dictated the necessity of rendering it completely defensible; and Call was employed in the extension and perfecting of the work, that had received the consideration of Robbins before his decease. Accordingly all the coolies, labourers, and tank diggers whom the adjacent country could supply were from this time constantly employed on the fortifications: their daily number generally amounted to four thousand men, women, and children. The river channel was diverted, and the old channel was filled up; very extensive bastions and outworks were erected; and it was due to this undertaking that Fort S. George was able to stand successfully against the siege by the Count de Lally in 1759.

In the beginning of the year 1752 Call accompanied Captain (afterwards Lord) Clive in an expedition against the French, who had possessed themselves of the province of Arcot, and were plundering up to the very gates of Madras; and he was with him in his occupation and subsequent defence of Arcot, during a fifty days' siege. Clive had marched from Madras with two hundred English soldiers and three hundred sepoys. He had with him eight English officers, but of these only two had smelt powder, whilst four, Call among them, were only commercial clerks forced by Clive's example to draw the sword. The battle of Coverplank, near Arcot, gained by Captain Clive in the February of 1752, in which the French lost all their artillery and were totally dispersed, cleared the province of their influence and established the English in the garrison of that capital. From Arcot the victorious army, consisting of about five hundred Europeans and one thousand natives, marched through the country back to Fort S. David, when Mr. Call was appointed chief engineer at Madras, and eventually of all the Coromandel coast.

In 1753 the French under Bussy and Dupleix were full of schemes to retrieve the honour of their arms, and to obtain the absolute empire of the Deccan and the south. In that year, the cession of five important provinces had made them masters of the sea-coast of Coromandel and Orissa for an uninterrupted line of six hundred miles, and also furnished the convenient means of receiving reinforcements of men and military stores from Pondicherry and Mauritius. But neither the Court of Versailles nor the French India Company at home had approved the grand projects of Bussy and Dupleix. The Court questioned the propriety of these wars with the English in a time of peace, and the Company was impatient at the cost of these wars, and doubted whether the territorial acquisitions could be maintained profitably to themselves. The English Company also was impatient at the heavy outlay, and was willing to leave the French in possession of the Northern Circars; but Dupleix was not to be restrained. He saw further into the future than did the merchants of Paris; he perceived that an unrivalled opportunity was open to him to make all India tributary to France, and he was determined to seize it. But to do so he must expel the English. He claimed to be Nabob of the Carnatic, and unless his authority as such were recognized by the English, he would make no terms whatever with them. But Dupleix had had his day. His protectors and admirers were now out of office, and he was recalled to France.

As soon as war had been declared in Europe, the Government of Louis XV commenced preparations on a large scale for an expedition to the East, and the arrival of a great armament was daily expected at Pondicherry.

It was not, however, until 28th April, 1758, that a squadron of twelve vessels reached the coast. These ships had on board a regiment of infantry eleven hundred strong, a corps of artillery, and a number of officers, all under the command of the Count de Lally, a veteran officer of Irish extraction, who had been all his life in the service of France. He had been appointed Governor-General of the French possessions in India. He was a man of great ability and ambition, and was animated by intense and passionate hatred of England. Had he been supported from home, he would almost certainly have made France predominant in the peninsula. No sooner was he landed than he organized an expedition against Fort S. David, and in June, 1758, he captured it. He then prepared to take Madras as a preliminary to an advance on Bengal, and he hoped to drive the English out of Calcutta. But he was without resources; there was no money to be had at Pondicherry. At last he raised a small sum, chiefly out of his own funds, and began the march to Madras; his officers preferring to risk death before the walls of Madras to certain starvation within the walls of Pondicherry. Lally reached Madras on the 12th December, 1758, and at once took possession of the black or native town, commanded by Fort S. George, and began the siege of that fort with vigour. Call was within. It was due to him that the defences were in such a condition that the garrison could look with confidence to withstand a siege. We hear, indeed, nothing of any active part taken by him during the progress of the siege, but undoubtedly his knowledge and talent had much to do with rendering the defence effective. The real command was with Major Laurence and Mr. Pigot. The total force collected was 1758 Europeans and 2220 sepoys. On the other side Lally had an army of 2700 Europeans and 4000 native troops.

On 14th December the French took possession of the black town, which was open and defenceless; and there the soldiers, breaking open some arrack stores, got drunk and mad, and committed great disorders.

Taking advantage of this, a sortie was resolved upon, and six hundred chosen men, under the command of Lieutenant-Colonel Draper and Major Brereton, with two field-pieces, rushed into the streets of the black town. Unluckily the drummers, who were all little black boys, struck up the "Grenadiers' March" too soon and gave warning to the French, who left off their drinking and plundering, and, running to their arms, drew up at a point where the narrow streets crossed at right angles. Those who were drunk were joined by those who were sober, till the whole number far exceeded that of the English detachment. If Bussy, who was at hand, had made one of the bold and rapid movements which he had been accustomed to make when acting on his own responsibility, he might have taken the English in rear. But he was sulky, and jealous of Lally, and remained inert. When Draper saw that he must retreat, he found that all his drummer-boys who should sound the recall had run away. He, however, managed to bring off his troops, leaving two field-pieces behind, and having lost or killed, wounded and prisoners, about two hundred men.

The siege dragged on. Most of Lally's heavy artillery was still at sea, and a corps of sepoys captured and spiked his only 13-inch mortar, which was coming by land. All his warlike means were as deficient as those of the garrison were perfect, and dissensions and ill-will against him increased among his officers.

For six weeks the French were without any pay, and during the last fifteen days they had no provisions except rice and butter. Then the ammunition of the besiegers failed. On the 15th February, 1759, he resolved on raising the siege. He had thrown away his last bomb three weeks before, and he had blazed away nearly all his gunpowder. Pouring forth invectives and blaming every one but himself, Lally decamped on the night of the 17th as secretly and expeditiously as he could.

In March, 1760, Call was employed in reducing Karikal, and at the latter end of the year and in the beginning of 1761 he was employed as chief engineer under Sir Eyre Coote in the reduction of Pondicherry, which, after it had been battered furiously during two days, surrendered at discretion. Then the town and fortifications were levelled with the ground. A few weeks after the strong hill-fortress of Gingi surrendered, and the military power of the French in the Carnatic was brought to an end.

In 1762 Call had the good fortune, when serving under General Cailland, to effect the reduction of the strong fortress of Vellore, one hundred miles west of Madras, which has since been the _point d'appui_ of the English power in the Carnatic.

In July, 1763, Mahomed Usuff Cawn, a native of great military talent, employed in the service of the English, for usurping the government of Madura and Tinnevelly, the two southernmost provinces of the peninsula, had to be dealt with summarily. A considerable force marched against him, under the command of Colonel Monson, of His Majesty's 69th Regiment. Call acted as chief engineer under him, till the heavy rains in October obliged the English army to retire from before Madura. Eventually that place and Palamata were reduced, and Mahomed Usuff Cawn was taken and hanged.

At the latter end of 1764 Call went into the Travancore country to settle with the Rajah for the arrears of tribute due to the Nabob of Arcot. Having satisfactorily accomplished that business and other concerns with southern princes, he returned to Madras in January, 1765, and took his seat at the Civil Council, to which he was entitled by rotation, and he obtained the rank of colonel.

During a great part of the war with Hyder Ali in 1767 and 1768 Call accompanied the army into the Mysore country, and whilst he was there the Company advanced him to the third seat in the Council, and he was strongly recommended by Lord Clive to succeed to the government of Madras on the first vacancy. But news reached him of the death of his father, and he made up his mind to return to England. He had managed to scrape together a very considerable fortune, and he desired to spend the rest of his days in the enjoyment of it. He embarked on February 8th, 1770, after a service of nearly twenty years, and he landed at Plymouth on July 26th.

_From a drawing in the possession of Mrs. de Lacy Lacy_]

He bought Whiteford, in the parish of Stoke Climsland, and greatly enlarged the house. In 1771 he was appointed Sheriff of Cornwall, and in March, 1772, he married Philadelphia, third daughter of Wm. Battye, M.D., a somewhat distinguished physician living in Bloomsbury.

From this period till the autumn of 1782 he lived in retirement at Whiteford.

Whilst in India, Call had not forgotten his parents and sister at home, and had sent to his mother priceless Indian shawls, which she, not knowing their value, cut up and turned into under-petticoats for herself and daughter and maids. A pipe of Madeira sent to the father was also as little appreciated. It was distributed among the farm-labourers during harvest time to economize the cider.

Now that he was in England and wealthy, he resolved on doing something for his sister. She had married Cadwalader Jones, the vicar of the parish, and the vicarage was a small, mean building, so Cadwalader Jones had taken the manor house that was near the church on a long lease from the Orchards, who were lords of the manor. This house had been a cell of Hartland Abbey, but at the Restoration had been given to the Chammonds. That family had died out, and now it had come to the Orchards, owners of Hartland Abbey. Call rebuilt the house, or, to be more exact, built on a modern house to the old, and installed Cadwalader and his sister in the new mansion; he also made for them a large walled garden. When he did this, he was under the impression that the property belonged to Cadwalader, and not till he had completed his building did he learn that Mr. Jones had only a lease of it. Moreover, Mrs. Jones did not live to enjoy the new house very long, as she died in 1780, and then Cadwalader married again. In course of time Cadwalader went to join his ancestors, and thereupon Mr. Hawkey saw and loved the widow and the mansion, and married her. Thus it came about that the manor house built for Mrs. Jane Jones passed into other hands. But thus it happens also that through Miss Charlotte Hawkey we have some account of Sir John Call.

Lord Shelburne, when Prime Minister, being desirous of investigating some of the existing abuses and reforming some of the public departments, fixed on Call and engaged him along with Mr. Arthur Holdsworth, of Dartmouth, to inquire into the state and management of Crown lands, woods, and forests, which had long been neglected; Call had seen this with regard to the Duchy property at his doors, and had drawn attention to it. In November, 1782, they made their first report; but a change of Ministry taking place soon after, their proceedings were interrupted till the Duke of Portland, then First Lord of the Treasury, authorized them to continue their investigation. Before they had gone far another change took place in the Ministry, and Pitt became Prime Minister. These frequent interruptions interfered with the progress of the investigation, and to obviate that, in 1785-6 Sir Charles Middleton, Call, and Holdsworth were appointed permanent Parliamentary Commissioners.

Call became a banker, a manufacturer of plate-glass, and a copper-smelter. He designed and saw to the execution of the Bodmin gaol in 1779. He was elected M. P. for Callington in 1784, and retained his seat till 1801. On July 28th, 1791, he was created a baronet, and granted as his arms, _gules_, _three trumpets fessewise in pale, or_; as crest, a _demi-lion ramp. holding between the paws a trumpet erect, or_.

By his wife he had six children. In 1785 he purchased the famous house of Field-Marshal Wade, in Old Burlington Street. He became totally blind in 1795, and died of apoplexy at his residence in town on March 1st, 1801, and was succeeded in the baronetcy by his son, William Pratt Call, who died in 1851, leaving a son, William Berkeley Call, the third baronet, who died in 1864, and with the son of this latter, Sir William George Montague Call, the fourth baronet, the title became extinct. It will be noticed that the two last affected aristocratic Christian names, Berkeley and Montague. Whiteford was sold to the Duchy of Cornwall, and all the noble trees in the park were cut down and turned into money, and the mansion converted into an office for the Duchy. Davies Gilbert, in his _Parochial History of Cornwall_, tells a couple of anecdotes of Sir John, but they are too pointless to merit repetition.

Call was one of those admirable, self-made men who have been empire-makers in the East, and, better than that, have been makers of the English name as synonymous with all that is powerful and true and just. He well deserved the title accorded to him. He was a man of whom Cornwall may be proud, and it needed no trumpets in his arms and fictions about the origin of his family to make the name honourable.

As Dr. Johnson said, "There are some families like potatoes, whose only good parts are underground."

The authorities for the life of Sir John Call are Playfair's _British Family Antiquity_, 1809; Clement R. Markham's _Memoir on the Indian Surveys_, 1878; H. G. Nicholl's _Forest of Dean_; and _Neota_, by Charlotte Hawkey, 1871.

The grant of the baronetcy to Sir John Call, dated 1795, is now in the Museum of the Royal Institution of Cornwall, at Truro.

JOHN KNILL

In August, 1853, appeared the following account in the _Gentleman's Magazine_:--

"An eccentric old gentleman of the name Knill, a private secretary some fifty or sixty years ago to the Lord-Lieutenant of Ireland, becoming afterwards collector of the port of S. Ives, built a three-sided pyramid of granite on the top of a high hill, near the town of S. Ives. The pyramid is represented as a pocket edition of an Egyptian one, and in it this gentleman caused a chamber to be built, with a stone coffin, giving out his intention to be buried there, and leaving a charge on an estate to the corporation of S. Ives for the maintenance and repair, etc., of the pyramid. He, however, died in London; and by his latest will, so far from perpetuating the ostentatious idea, desired that his body should be given up to the surgeons for dissection, a penance, it is supposed, for past follies, after which the remains were buried in London. The pyramid, however, still stands as a landmark. On one side, in raised letters in granite, appear the words 'Hic jacet nil.' It was understood that the 'K' and another 'l' would be added when the projector should be placed within; and on the other side, 'Ex nihilo nil fit,' to be filled up in like manner, Knill. The mausoleum obtained then, and still bears the name of Knill's Folly."

This account, full of inaccuracies, called forth a letter to the editor from a relative of John Knill, at Penrose, by Helston, dated October, 1853, which appeared in the November issue of the same magazine. He stated that John Knill was educated for the law, but did not adopt it as a profession. He preferred to accept the office of collector of customs at S. Ives. After a while he was sent as Inspector-General of Customs to the West Indies, whence he returned to his duties at S. Ives, after having discharged his office of inspectorship. In 1777 the Earl of Buckinghamshire, who was recorder of S. Ives, invited Mr. Knill to accompany him to Ireland as his private secretary, when he, the earl, had been made lord-lieutenant. The offer was accepted.

In 1782, thirty years before his death, he erected the mausoleum, partly actuated by a philanthropic motive as affording a landmark to ships approaching the port, and partly by a wish to find employment for men at a time of considerable distress, having also a desire to be buried there, if the ground could be consecrated. This intention was afterwards abandoned.

Mr. Knill resided for some years previous to his death in Gray's Inn, and was a bencher of that society. He died there in 1811, and was buried in the vaults of S. Andrew's, Holborn. On one side of the monument is the word "Resurgam." On the second side, "I know that my Redeemer liveth," and on the third is no inscription at all, and the silly puns given by the informant of the _Gentleman's Magazine_ had no existence save in the imagination of the correspondent.

The same writer adds: "Though he had a wide circle of acquaintances and he was highly esteemed by all who knew him, he resisted every invitation to dine in private society, and for many years past dined at Dolly's Coffee House, Paternoster Row, walking through the chief avenues of the town in the course of the day, in order to meet his friends and to preserve his health by moderate exercise."

_After a picture by Opie in the possession of Captain Rogers of Penrose_]

We are able to supplement this scanty record from a memoir of him by Mr. John Jope Rogers, of Penrose, published in 1871 by Cunnack, of Helston.

John Knill was born at Callington on January 1st, 1733. His mother was a Pike of Plympton, and her mother was an Edgcumbe of Edgcumbe, it is stated in the memoir, but no entry of any such marriage is in the pedigree of the Edgcumbes in Vivian's _Heralds' Visitations of Devon_.

Mr. Knill was very desirous to trace a descent from the family of Knill of Knill, in Hereford, but entirely failed to do so.

John Knill's mother, one of the seven daughters of Mr. Pike, married secondly Mr. Jope, and it is thus that the portrait of the subject of this memoir came into the possession of Mr. John Jope Rogers, of Penrose, author of the memoir.

John Knill, according to Davies Gilbert, "served his clerkship as an attorney in Penzance, and from thence removed to the office of a London attorney, where, having distinguished himself by application and intelligence, he was recommended to the Earl of Buckinghamshire, who, at that time, held the political interests of S. Ives, to be his local agent." In the year 1762 he was appointed collector of customs at S. Ives, in Cornwall, and held it during twenty years, at the end of which time he wrote to Mr. William Praed, March 30th, 1782: "I purpose to be in London in May, in order to resign my office of collector, which I shall finally quit at the end of next midsummer quarter."

In November, 1767, he was chosen mayor of S. Ives, and lived in a red-brick house facing the beach, in Fore Street. Although mayor and collector of customs, it was strongly believed that he was in league with smugglers and wreckers.

One day, during the latter half of the eighteenth century, a strange vessel ran on the rocks on the Hayle side of Carrick Gladden, and the crew escaped to land and disappeared. The ship, now a derelict, had apparently no owner, and next day a number of people boarded her, and found her full of chinaware and other smuggled goods. The ship's papers could not be found; they had been carried off when the crew deserted her, and it was strongly supposed that they were destroyed, as implicating Knill and Praed, of Trevetho. The customs officer, Roger Wearne, went on board and stuffed his clothes full of china; having a pair of trousers on with a very ample and baggy seat, he thought he could not do better than stow away some of the choicest pieces of porcelain there. But as he was getting down the side of the ship into the boat, very leisurely, so as not to injure his spoils, a comrade, getting impatient, struck him on the posteriors with the blade of his oar, shouting to him, "Look out sharp, Wearne!" and was startled at the cracking noise that ensued, and the howl of Wearne when the broken splinters of china entered his flesh.

In 1773 the Government sent him to Jamaica to inspect the ports there; he remained in the West Indies one year, and used his eyes and ears, for in 1779 he wrote an account of the religion of the Coromandel negroes for Bryant Edwards' _History of the West Indies_, from information he then and there gathered. For his services he received from the Board of Customs the substantial sum of £1500. He returned to his duties at S. Ives in 1774. In 1777 he became private secretary to the Earl of Buckinghamshire, in Dublin, but he returned to S. Ives after six months in Ireland. In 1779 he speculated in a bootless search for treasure, which the notorious pirate, Captain John Avery, was supposed, on his return from Madagascar, to have secreted near the Lizard. But, as none of the Lives of that freebooter gave any hint of his having done so, the attempt was not the least likely to lead to satisfactory results. Davies Gilbert says that Knill equipped some small vessels to act as privateers against smugglers, but if local tradition may be relied on, these vessels were only nominally for this purpose, and were actually engaged in running contraband goods; but this is highly improbable.

_From the Collection of Percy Bate, Esq. of Glasgow_]

In 1782 he was employed in the service of the customs as inspector of some of the western ports, making occasional visits to London, where he settled for the rest of his days. In 1784 he purchased chambers in Gray's Inn Square, where he died on March 29th, 1811, at the age of seventy-seven. He was painted by Opie in 1779, dressed in a plain suit of blue, with frilled shirt and ruffles. He made his half-brother, the Rev. John Jope, of S. Cleer, his sole executor.

It was in the year 1782 that John Knill erected his mausoleum on Worral Hill, on land purchased from Henry, Lord Arundell, for five guineas. The total cost of the monument was £226 1s. 6d. Sixpence a year is paid to the owner of Tregenna for a right of way to the obelisk. By a deed dated May 29th, 1797, Knill settled upon the mayor and capital burgesses of S. Ives, and their successors for ever, an annuity of £10 as a rent-charge, to be paid out of the manor of Glivian, in Mawgan, which sum is annually to be put into a chest which is not to be opened except at the end of every five years. Then, out of the accumulated sum, a dinner was to be given to the mayor, collector of customs, and vicar of S. Ives, and two friends to be invited by each of them, and £15 to be equally divided among ten girls, natives of S. Ives, under ten years old, who should, between 10 a.m. and noon on S. James the Apostle's Day, dance and sing round the mausoleum, to the fiddling of a man who was to receive a pound for so doing and for fiddling as the procession of girls went to the obelisk and returned. One pound was to be laid out in white ribbons for the damsels and a cockade for the fiddler. Some of the money was to go to keep the mausoleum in repair, and there were certain benefactions also recorded.

The first Knillian celebration took place in July, 1801, when, according to the will of the founder, a band of little girls, all dressed in white, with two widows and a company of musicians, marched in procession to the top of the hill, where they danced about the monument, then, as Knill desired, sang the Hundredth Psalm to its old melody, and after that returned in the same order to S. Ives. The ceremony still takes place every fifth year.

In dancing the children sing the following in chorus:--

Shun the bustle of the bay,
Hasten, virgins, come away;
Hasten to the mountain's brow,
Leave, O leave, S. Ives below.
Haste to breathe a purer air,
Virgins fair, and pure as fair;
Fly S. Ives and all her treasures,
Fly her soft voluptuous pleasures;
Fly her sons and all their wiles,
Lushing in their wanton smiles;
Fly the splendid midnight halls;
Fly the revels of her balls;
Fly, O fly the chosen seat,
Where vanity and fashion meet.
Hither hasten from the ring,
Round the tomb in chorus sing,
And on the lofty mountain's brow, aptly dight,
Just as we should be, all in white,
Leave all our troubles and our cares below.

THOMAS TREGOSS

A certain Roscadden going on a pilgrimage in the days before the Reformation, and being absent some years, was surprised on his return to find that his wife had borne one if not more children. Very much and very naturally put out, he consulted with one John Tregoss, who advised him to settle his estate upon some friend whom he could trust, for the use and benefit of his children whom he would own, and for the wife not to be left absolutely destitute in the event of his death. Mr. Roscadden approved of this counsel, and constituted John Tregoss his heir absolutely, but always with the understanding that the said Tregoss should administer his estate according to the wishes and instructions of Roscadden. But this gentleman dying soon after, John Tregoss entered on possession of the estate, "turned the wife and children out of doors, who for some time were fain to lye in an hog-stye, and every morning went forth to the Dung-hill, and there upon their faces imprecated and prayed that the vengeance of God might fall upon Tregoss and his posterity for this so perfidious and merciless deed.

"And after this, God's severe but righteous judgments fell upon Tregoss's family. For his son Walter, one day riding upon a Horse in a fair way, the horse threw him, and broke his neck: and some of his issue came to untimely ends, and it is observed that a curse hath remained ever since: and this Mr. Tregoss of whom we write was so sensible of it, that it cost him many fervent prayers to God for the removal of that dreadful curse, as himself assured a bosom friend"--but it does not seem to have occurred to him to give up the heritage to the Roscaddens--that is, if he were the possessor.

The family of Tregose, or Tregosse, was one of the oldest in the neighbourhood of S. Ives. The names of Clement and John Tregose of S. Ives appear in the Subsidy Roll of 1327. In the list of _circa_ 1520, Thomas Tregoos' lands in Towednack were assessed at the yearly value of 13s. 4d., and those of John Tregoz, in the parish of S. Ives, at 11s.; but Thomas also had lands at S. Ives, valued the same as those of John.

In 1641, William Tregose, gent., had at S. Ives goods to the annual value of £3.

Thomas Tregoss, the subject of this notice, was the son of William Tregoss of S. Ives. His parents were strong Puritans and very austere, and they hedged about their son with restrictions, not suffering him to partake in games or any childish relaxations from the strain of study or the contemplation of religious themes. At first he seemed to be of poor capacity, but at the age of seven years he began to show that he had a quick apprehension and a retentive memory. Cut off from all worldly distractions, he was allowed but one direction in which his faculties and his ambitions could stretch and expand. He had not the force of character and strength of will to revolt against the numbing restraints that bound him in. His only play as a boy was standing on a chair and preaching to his fellow pupils.

He was sent to Oxford and admitted into Exeter College, and after a few years spent there, returned to S. Ives; and as the Parliamentary Commissioners had ejected the vicar, he was thrust in as Puritan preacher in 1657, and he then married a Margaret Sparrow of the same way of thinking.

The life of Thomas Tregoss, as given by Samuel Clark in his _Lives of Some Eminent Persons_, 1683, is interspersed with Remarkable Providences and Extraordinary Judgments, but for the most part they are neither remarkable nor interesting.

The following is, perhaps, an exception:--

Shortly after his arrival at S. Ives, in the summer, the greater portion of the fishing season had passed without the pilchards appearing, and this to the great distress of the people. By the advice of Tregoss a day was set apart for humiliation and prayer, and next day a shoal of pilchards arrived.

In the ensuing summer the fishermen, having taken a great number of fishes on the Saturday, wanted to spread and dry their nets on the Sunday. Tregoss learning this, came forth and rebuked and denounced God's judgment on them if they should profane the "Sabbath" in this manner. They did not hearken to him, observing that their nets must be dried or would rot. From that day no more pilchards visited the bay during that season.

From S. Ives Tregoss was transferred to Mylor in October, 1659, but was ejected from the living on August 24th, 1660, as not ordained, and unwilling to receive ordination, and to subscribe to the articles and confirm to the liturgy. However, he continued to preach to a privately assembled number of puritanically minded people, and he was proceeded against and committed to the custody of the marshal in Launceston gaol, where he remained for three months, and was then released by order of the Deputy Lieutenant.

In September, 1663, he removed to Kigilliath, near Penryn. On October 1st, 1664, whilst he and his wife were lying awake in bed, they experienced an earthquake shock, and this he held to be "a symbolick image of that trembling Heartquake which he shortly felt in his conversion."

On January 1st ensuing, he fell into deep despondency and the spirit of bondage--his liver being probably out of order--till he fancied himself relieved by receiving the spirit of adoption. He had been converted half a dozen times before, but never before preceded by an earthquake, so that there could be no mistake about its reality this time.

Fired with new zeal, he broke into Mabe church at the head of a number of his adherents, mounted the pulpit, and harangued his congregation. For this he was arrested and imprisoned again in Launceston gaol, but was shortly released, July 29th, 1665; and he had the pleasing satisfaction of knowing that a bull had gored Justice Thomas Robinson, who had sent him to prison.

Undeterred by what he had gone through, he again invaded Mabe church, and was again committed to gaol on September 18th, but was once more released, on December 14th.

On February 4th, 1666, he once more broke into the parish church of Mabe at the head of a body of Puritans, and was again arrested and sent to the marshal at Bodmin, but by the order of the King was at once set free.

In 1669 he was at Great Torrington, where he preached, and was sent to Exeter gaol, but was at once bailed out. He died at Penryn in January, 1672.

On September 4th, 1775, John Wesley preached at S. Ives "in the little meadow above the town." He wrote in his diary that "the people in general here (excepting the rich) seem almost persuaded to be Christians. Perhaps the prayer of their old pastor, Mr. Tregoss, is answered even to the fourth generation."

ANTHONY PAYNE

Anthony Payne, the "Falstaff of the West," was born in the manor house, Stratton, the son of a tenant farmer, under the Grenvilles of Stowe. The registers do not go back sufficiently far to record the date of his birth. The Tree Inn is the ancient manor house in which the giant first saw the light. He rapidly shot up to preternatural size and strength. So vast were his proportions as a boy, that his schoolmates were accustomed to work out their arithmetic lessons in chalk on his back, and sometimes even thereon to delineate a map of the world, so that he might return home, like Atlas, carrying the world on his shoulders for his father with a stick to dust out.

It was his delight to tuck two urchins under his arms, one on each side, and climb, so encumbered with "his kittens," as he called them, to a height overhanging the sea, to their infinite terror, and this he would call "showing them the world." A proverb still extant in Cornwall, expressive of some unusual length, is "As long as Tony Payne's foot."