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THE

PAROCHIAL HISTORY

OF

J. B. NICHOLS AND SON, 25, PARLIAMENT-STREET.

THE

PAROCHIAL HISTORY

OF

CORNWALL,

FOUNDED ON THE MANUSCRIPT HISTORIES

OF

MR. HALS AND MR. TONKIN;

WITH ADDITIONS AND VARIOUS APPENDICES,

BY

SOMETIME PRESIDENT OF THE ROYAL SOCIETY,
F.A.S. F.R.S.E. M.R.I.A. &c. &c.
AND D.C.L. BY DIPLOMA FROM THE UNIVERSITY OF OXFORD.

IN FOUR VOLUMES.

VOL. II.

LONDON:

PUBLISHED BY J. B. NICHOLS AND SON;

AND SOLD BY

J. LIDDELL, BODMIN; J. LAKE, FALMOUTH; O. MATTHEWS, HELSTON; MESSRS. BRAY AND ROWE, LAUNCESTON; T. VIGURS, PENZANCE; MRS. HEARD, TRURO; W. H. ROBERTS, EXETER; J. B. ROWE, PLYMOUTH; AND ALL OTHER BOOKSELLERS IN CORNWALL AND DEVON.

1838.

HISTORY

OF THE

PARISHES OF CORNWALL.

HALS.

Is situate in the hundred of Kerryer, and hath upon the north Budock; east, the haven or harbour of Falmouth; south, the Black Rock and Pendennis Castle; west, Budock, and the British Channel. For the name, it is taken from the Vale river’s mouth, which here empties itself into the British Ocean. And the river itself takes its name from its original fountain in Roach, under Haynes-burrow, called Pen-ta-Vale, Fenton, or Venton; that is to say, the head or chief, good or consecrated, spring or well of water, or river Valley, from thence called the Vale river. This place, in Cornish, is called Val-genow, or Fal-genne; in Saxon, Val-mune; in English, Vale-mouth, synonymous therewith.

This harbour of Falmouth, as mariners tell us, is in all respects the largest and safest haven for ships that this Island of Britain affordeth. Its mouth or entrance from the British Ocean, between the Castles of St. Mawes and Pendennis, situate in St. Anthony and Falmouth parishes, is about a mile and a half distant, the centre or middle thereof above a league, from the said mouth or entrance up the Vale river, by the Rock Island aforesaid, to Carike Road, King’s Road, and Turner’s Wear, south-east about two leagues from thence, still on the Vale river, a 2 navigable arm or channel of the said harbour, extendeth itself up the country, by Trejago Creek and Castle, towards the incorporate town of Tregony, to the Bridge Place of which it formerly was navigable. [See Cuby.] And it is overlooked on the south-east side, by St. Anthony, St. Just, Philley, Ruan Langhorne, and Cuby parishes. Within the said parishes of St. Just and St. Anthony are also two navigable creeks or channels. Near the castle and incorporate town of St. Mawes, (where formerly stood a monastery of Black Canons Augustine, dedicated to the Virgin Mary, called St. Mary de Vale, for that it was situated on the Vale harbour or river, as its superior monastery is from the Plym river, in Devon, called St. Mary de Plym, whereon it is situate,) from the north-west part of this harbour of Falmouth, between the parishes of Budock, Gluvias, and Milor, another navigable channel extendeth itself up the country to the incorporate town of Penryn. And towards the north another channel or arm thereof, higher up, extendeth itself through the country from the centre about a league, and is navigable to Peran Well and Carnan Bridge. Further up, north-east, another arm or channel of Falmouth Harbour extends itself to the incorporate and coinage town of Truro, and the manor of Moris, and is navigable there about nine miles distance from the Black Rock, or island aforesaid. Lastly, another branch of this harbour extendeth itself to Tresilian Bridge, where it is navigable between the parishes of St. Erme, Probus, and Merther, about ten miles from the mouth of the haven, all which members or branches of the harbour of Falmouth are overlooked with lofty and pleasant hills and vales of land, and within the memory of man abounding with flourishing woods and groves of timber; and before that time Leland the antiquary, in his Itinerary, tells us that this river Vale in his days was encompassed about with the loftiest woods, oaks, and timber-trees that this kingdom afforded temp. Henry VII. and therefore was by the Britons called Cassi-ter, or Casse-ter, viz. wood land, 3 from which place and haven the Greeks fetching tin, called it in their language κασσιτερος, cassiteros, stanum, and the island aforesaid the Cassiteridan Island. But, alas! now this commodity tin hath made such havock of woods and timber-trees, in searching for and melting the same, that scarcely any of them are to be seen in those places; for, the woods and trees being eradicated, the hills and vales aforesaid have submitted to agriculture, and are made arable lands, which abound with cattle, sheep, corn, and pastures.

From the premises I suppose it is evident what Mr. Carew, in his Survey of Cornwall, saith of this harbour of Falmouth, that 100 sail of ships may lie at anchor within the same, and none of them see the others main tops, by reason of the steep hills and long windings of the several channels thereof. In further praise whereof take these rhymes:

The parish of Falmouth is a dismembered part of the old parish of Budock, taxed in the Domesday Roll 1087, and separated from it by virtue of an Act of Parliament made 15th Charles II. whereby that church is deprived of its rectory, the great and small tithes, as far as the boundaries of this new parish extends, on the humble petition of Sir Peter Killigrew, of Arwinike, Knt. who by his own bounty, and the charitable benevolence he had begged of others (by leave of the King and Bishop of Exeter), had built on his own land a church and cemetery, at the south end of Falmouth town, whereof he was lord and high lord, for convenience of himself, his servants, and tenants, that were far off from Budock church. This church, so built, 4 he endowed with the tithes aforesaid, as a rectory,[1] and so became patron thereof, or had jus patronatus; reserving to himself and his heirs the right of presenting to the Ordinary a Clerk to be Rector thereof when the same should become void; and the first Rector, as I take it, that he presented to this church was Mr. John Bedford. Thus, it is evident by what ways and means men became patrons of churches, viz. patronum faciunt dos, ædificatio, fundus; the patrons of churches were either founders, builders, or benefactors thereof. Jus patronatus est potestas præsentandi aliquem instituendum ad beneficium ecclesiæ simplex et vacans. (Statute of Westminster, 13th Edward III.) This patronage or advowson Sir Peter Killigrew annexed to his manor and barton of Arwinick.

This church of Falmouth being thus built and endowed, it was consecrated according to the rights and ceremonies for consecration of a church in England by Dr. Seth Ward, Lord Bishop of Exeter, 1664. Within the chancel of which church afterwards was laid, in a vaulted grave, the dead body of its patron and founder, Sir Peter Killigrew, Knt. The present incumbent Quarm. Sir Peter Killigrew also gave the first Rector thereof, and his successors for ever, a house and garden to dwell in, for profit and pleasure; as also a very rich pulpit-cloth, with gold fringes, whereon in needlework of gold was placed the letters I. H. S. Whether it be a contraction of ΙΗΣΟΥΣ Jesus, or to be construed as being the initial letters of Jesus Hominum Salvator, or Servator, let others resolve.

Ar-win-ike [I above said is] in this parish, [and signifies] the beloved still lake, creek, cove, or bosom of waters, according to the circumstances of the place; on part of which manor formerly stood the insular island Iktam, or Ictam, of Diodorus Siculus, before mentioned. Otherwise, if the name of this place be Ar-wynn-ike, it signifies the victorious or conquering still lake, cove, or busom of waters; 5 perhaps to be so construed with reference to Pendennis Castle, contiguous with, and built upon Arwinick lands.

This place is the chief mansion of that ancient and famous family surnamed de Killy-grewe, Killygreu, or Killy-greue, from a local place in St. Herme, called Killygrew barton, downs, and hill, now in possession of Jago in fee, where Henry, the son of Maugan de Killygrew, held three parts of a knight’s fee of lands, and at Trewince in Gerance, 3d. Henry IV. [according to] Carew’s Survey of Cornwall, p. 44. Of this family further speaks Mr. Carew, p. 150. The stock is ancient, and divers of the branches have grown to great advancement in calling and livelihood by their greater deserts.

Sir John Killigrew, knight, 1571, built the greatest part of the old house now standing here. He married Wolverston of Wolverston, and had by her issue John Killigrew, Esq.; that married Monk, who had issue by her William Killigrew, Esq. created the 585th Baronet of England, patent 22d December, 12th Charles II. 1660, with limitation to Peter Killigrew, Esq. son of Sir Peter Killigrew aforesaid, Knt. This Sir William Killigrew, Bart. by ill conduct wasted his whole paternal estate, which was valued at about 3,000l. per annum; and lastly, sold this manor and barton of Arwinick to his younger brother, Sir Peter Killigrew, Knt. aforesaid, who had issue Sir Peter Killigrew, Bart. aforesaid, who married one of the coheirs of Judge Twysden, and had issue by her George Killigrew, Esq. that married Ann, daughter of Sir John Seyntaubyn, Bart. and had issue by her one daughter.

This Mr. George Killigrew was afterwards, in a drunken humour, at a tavern in Penryn, slain in the chamber, in a duel, by Walter Vincent, Esq. barrister-at-law, who was tried for his life at Launceston for the fact, and acquitted by the petty jury, through bribery and indirect acts and practices, as was generally said; yet this Mr. Vincent, through anguish and horror at this accident, (as it was said,) within two years after wasted of an extreme atrophy of his flesh and spirits, that at length at the table 6 whereby he was sitting, in the Bishop of Exeter’s palace, in presence of divers gentlemen, he instantly fell back against the wall and died.

Sir Peter Killigrew had issue also two daughters, the one married to Richard Erisey, Esq. and another married to Martin Lister, Esq. of Liston, in Staffordshire, a captain or lieutenant in Pendenis Castle, under John Earl of Bath; upon whose issue by her Sir Peter settled much of his lands, on condition he should assume the name of Killigrew, and is now in possession of this lordship.

The country people here about will tell you, (as such are superstitious enough to do,) that this murder or manslaughter of Mr. Killigrew by Mr. Vincent, whereby the male line of that family is extinct, was a just judgment of God; for that Jane Killigrew, widow of Sir John Killigrew, Knt. aforesaid, his great-grandmother, in the Spanish wars in the latter end of the reign of Queen Elizabeth, went on board two Dutch ships of the Hans Towns, (always free traders in times of war,) driven into Falmouth Harbour by cross winds, laden with merchandize, on account (as was said) of Spaniards, and with a numerous party of ruffians, murdered the two Spanish merchants or factors on board those ships, and took from them two barrels or hogsheads of Spanish pieces of eight, and converted them to her own use.

Now, though Fleta, Liber 1. chap. iii. temp. Edward II. tells us that it is no murder except it be proved that the party slain was English, and no stranger, yet afterwards, by the Statute 4 Edward III. his son, chap. 4, the killing any foreigner under the King’s protection, out of evil design or malice, is made murder, upon which Statute those offenders were tried and found guilty at Launceston of wilful murder, both by the grand and petty juries, and had sentence of death passed accordingly upon them, and were all executed, except the said Lady Killigrew, the principal agent and contriver of the barbarous fact, who, by the interest and favour of Sir John Arundell, of Tolverne, Knt. and his son-in-law, Sir Nicholas Hals, of Pengersick, Knt. 7 obtained of Queen Elizabeth a pardon or reprieve for the said lady, which was seasonably put into the Sheriff of Cornwall’s hands.

This Lady Jane Killigrew afterwards gave a silver cup to the Mayors of Penryn for ever, in memory of some kindness in her troubles received in that Corporation, 1612. Sir Henry Killigrew, Knt. temp. Elizabeth, was a younger brother to Sir John Killigrew aforesaid, and followed the Court for advantage, and to raise his fortunes (according to the constant genius of his family). He, as Mr. Carew in his Survey of Cornwall saith, “after embassies and messages, and many other profitable employments, both of peace and war, in his prince’s service, to the good of his country, hath made choice of a retired estate, and was reverently regarded by all sorts, and places his principal contentment in himself; which to a life so well acted can no wise be wanting.” He married Katherine, daughter of Sir Anthony Cooke, of Giddy Hall, in Essex, Knt. who had issue by her a daughter, married to Sir Jonathan Trelawny, of Poble, Knt.

This Sir Henry Killigrew, by the favour of Queen Elizabeth, as a boon procured Gervase Babington, Lord Bishop of Exeter, 1594, by lease and release, fine and recovery, to dismember from the church and bishopric of Exeter, the great manor, barton, and lordship of Kirton, in Devon, worth 1,000l. per annum, rents of assize, which had been in the possession of the Bishops of Kirton and Exeter, from the time of Edulphus, the first Bishop thereof, anno Dom. 907, being 687 years to that time; but long since this manor of land is gone out of the name and possession of Killigrew. In like manner, about that time John Coldwell, Lord Bishop of Salisbury, passed the manor of Sherburne to the Crown, by whom it was given to Sir Walter Ralegh, Knt. which is also long since gone out of his name and family.

The arms of Killigrew are, within a field Argent, an imperial eagle with two necks, within a bordure Bezanté 8 Sable. Which arms and bordure seem to inform us that this family was indirectly descended from Richard Earl of Cornwall, King of the Romans, by that concubine Jane de Valletorta, widow of Sir Alexander Oakeston [see St. Stephen’s by Saltash]. For that, as this bordure Bezanté Sable was the proper arms of Richard Earl of Cornwall, viz. 5, 4, 3, 2, 1, the imperial eagle was the cognizance of the said Earl of Cornwall as King of the Romans.

Within this parish also now stands the borough town of Falmouth, which compound word is etymologized before. It was incorporated 14th Charles II. by the name of the Mayor and Aldermen and Magistrates of the Borough of Falmouth, with the jurisdiction of a Court-leet, wherein plea of debt and damage is tried within its precincts. But, alas! notwithstanding its present grandeur, neither this town nor its modern name is of any great antiquity, neither being extant 500 years past; for long since that time it was known by no other appellation than that of Smith-ike, that is, the Smith’s creek, leat, or bosom of waters, from a smith that lived at the creek, or cove, now in the centre thereof. And verily, I have been told by some aged persons lately living, that they remembered not above five houses standing in this place; though now, I suppose, they are increased to five or six hundred. And for its name Falmouth, it was not recorded till, at the request of Sir Peter Killigrew, it was inserted in its charter of incorporation as aforesaid. Which thing I do not mention to disparage this really good name, but to let the inhabitants of this place, and many other families now flourishing in Cornwall, know that many of them are mistaken in their antiquity and former appellations, if truly examined.

Moreover, concerning the first buildings of this town by John Killigrew, Esq. In 1613, happened a notable controversy between him and the Corporations of Penryn, Truro, and Helston, which suggested, by a petition to James the First, promoted and backed by the interest of the Burgesses 9 thereof, viz. Sir Richard Robartes, Bart. and John Arundell, Esq. for Truro; Sir Francis Godolphin, Knt. for Helston; Richard Penwarne, Esq. for Penryn; and others, “that the erecting of a town at Smith-ike would tend to the ruin and impoverishing of the ancient coinage-towns and market-towns aforesaid, not far distant from thence; and therefore humbly prayed the King’s Majesty that the buildings and undertakings of Mr. Killigrew might be inhibited for the future.” Who, upon receipt and hearing of this petition in Council, ordered the Lords thereof, Egerton, Buckhurst, Hume, Marre, Sir Robert Cecil, Principal Secretary of State, and others, to write to Sir Nicholas Hals, of Fentongollon, Knt. then Governor of Pendennis Castle, to be better informed of the true merits of this case, and to know his own particular sentiments about it. Which gentleman, as soon as he received this letter, made answer, that he well approved of Mr. Killigrew’s project for building a town and custom-house at Smith-ike, as being near the mouth of the harbour of Falmouth; and briefly, amongst many others, for these reasons especially:

1. For the quick and necessary supply of such ships whose occasions, or contrary winds, brought them in there, without being obliged (as then they were) to go up two miles the river to Penryn, or nine miles to Truro, in order thereto, or to take in and out their cargoes or lading, and make entries at the custom-houses at such distance, by reason of which delays of time they many times lost the opportunity of a fair wind to prosecute their intended voyages, longer than was for their advantage.

2. For the speedy supplying or reinforcing the Castle of Pendennis, contiguous therewith, with men, ammunition, and provisions, in case of any enemy’s sudden invasion, or endeavouring to take the same by storm or surprise, before the country militia could be raised, or recruits brought in for that purpose.

3. For that other castles for the same reasons were 10 built near towns, or towns erected near them, as Dover, Portsmouth, Plymouth, Newcastle, Gravesend, and many more.”

As appears more at large from the letters and reasons of Sir Nicholas Hals to the Lords of the Council aforesaid, whereof, by fees to the Clerk of the Council, or Secretary of State, copies were privately taken forth, at the special instance and request of the said Richard Penwarne, and other Members of Parliament then in London, who transmitted them, by the hands of Mr. Anthony Mundye, to the Corporation aforesaid, where the writer of these lines hath had a full view of them, amongst the papers and records of the borough of Penryn, then lodged in the chest of its town-hall. Whereupon King James, upon a full hearing of this controverted matter between the parties aforesaid, and what could be alleged on either part, gave his opinion (with which all the Council agreed) that the erecting a town at Smith-ike by Mr. Killigrew, could in no sense be prejudicial to the coinage and incorporate towns aforesaid, they standing at such considerable distances from it; but especially for that every man might lawfully do what he would for the utility and advantage of his own proper goods or lands, without the licence or approbation even of the King, or any contiguous neighbour, who had no public or private nuisance thereby done him: how much more reasonable was it, therefore, when the owners of such lands converted them to such uses as tended not only to his own, but the public good and advantage of the king and country together.

Whereupon Mr. Killigrew proceeded with his intended buildings, and his tenants, the inhabitants thereof, quickly grew rich by trade and merchandize both at home and abroad: so that in about twenty years’ time the town became notably famous in respect thereof, and is now, for wealth, trade, and buildings, scarcely inferior to any town in Cornwall. It is privileged also with a weekly market on Thursdays, and with fairs upon July 27 and October 30. 11 The chief inhabitants of this town are Mr. Russell, Mr. Tresahar, Mr. Corker, Mr. Hill, Mr. Gwyn.

In this town his Majesty hath his custom-house collector, comptroller, customer, surveyor, sea and land waiters; and from this town the packet-boats from the Groyne, Lisbon, and America, receive their despatches from their agent, to the great advantage of this place in times of peace and war: since, as I am informed, removed to Flushing, in Mylor parish, opposite thereto.

This town also was the honorary title of Charles Lord Berkeley, Viscount Fitzhardinge, created Lord Bottetourt and Earl of Falmouth, 17th March, 16th Charles II. 1664. He was slain in the Dutch wars 1665, without legitimate issue, and gave for his arms, Gules, a chevron Ermine, between ten crosses patée, 6 and 4, Argent.

Afterwards it became the honorary title of George Fitz-Roy, third son of Barbara Duchess of Cleveland by King Charles the Second, by whom he was created Earl of Northumberland, Viscount Falmouth, and Baron Pontefract in Yorkshire; and giveth for his arms, the imperial shield of England, with a baton sinister, gobonée, Ermine and Azure. This Barbara Villiers was one of the daughters of the Lord Viscount Grandison, of the Kingdom of Ireland, and was married to Roger Palmer, Esq. created Earl of Castlemaine, in Ireland; but afterwards, when Charles the Second took a liking to this Countess, he sent the Earl her husband, with his own good liking, Governor of a Castle and Colony of the English at Surat, in the East Indies. His lady King Charles further created Countess of Southampton and Duchess of Cleveland, during life. After the death of George Fitz-Roy, in the year 1722, Hugh Boscawen, of Tregothnan, Esq. Lord Warden of the Stannaries, was created by King George, Lord Boscawen of Tregothnan, Baron Boscawen of Boscawen Ros, in Burian, and Viscount Falmouth.

In this parish, on the lands of the manor of Arwynick (the Icta and Island of Diodorus Siculus aforesaid), upon 12 a lofty peninsula or promontory of land, stands the famous and impregnable Castle of Pendennis, for which the Crown pays annually to the lord of the manor aforesaid, out of the Exchequer, about 13l. 6s. 8d. rent, as I take it. For the compound name Pen-den-is Castle, it is British, and signifies that it is the head or chief man’s castle, viz. the King or Earl of Cornwall. Otherwise, if the true name thereof be Pen-dun-es Castle, it signifies that it is the head or chief fort or fortress castle. This castle of old consisted only of a treble intrenchment of turf, earth, and stones, after the British and Roman manner, upon the top of the highest hill in those parts, abutting upon the west side of the mouth or entrance of the harbour of Falmouth, and containeth about twenty statute acres of ground within the lines. Repaired and indifferently fortified by Henry the Eighth, in the latter end of his reign, in the French war, with allowance of a petty garrison, whose daughter, Queen Elizabeth, in her Spanish wars, raised the new fort, and bettered the old fortification, as they are now extant; so that it is looked upon as one of the most invincible castles in this kingdom, having had in it above one hundred pieces of cannon mounted, and some thousands of foot arms. After Queen Elizabeth had thus fortified and munified the Castle of Pendennis, she placed therein a band of 100 soldiers, and over them placed as her Governor Sir Nicholas Parker, Knt. (a Devonshire gentleman, as some say, though his arms, a fess fretty or chequey,[2] differs from the arms of Parker of Burrington,) of whom thus speaks Mr. Carew in his Cornish Survey, p. 150: “He now demeaneth himself no less kindly and frankly towards his neighbours for the present, than he did resolutely and valiantly against his enemies when he followed the wars, where-through he commandeth not only their bodies by his authority, 13 but also their hearts by his love, to live and die in his assistance, for their common preservation and her Highness’ service.” He died without issue, anno Dom. 1608, and lies buried in Budock church. His successor in the government of this castle was Sir Nicholas Hals, of Fentongollan, Knt. (a domestic servant to Prince Henry, eldest son of James the First,) son of John Hals, of Efford, Esq. in Devon, who died Governor thereof in 1637; and was succeeded in that dominion by Sir Nicholas Slanning, of Marstow, in Devon, Knt. who was slain on the part of his master Charles the First against the Parliament army at the battle of Bristol, 6th July, 1643. After his death his widow (daughter of Sir James Baggs, of Plymouth, Knt.) was married to Richard Arundell, of Trerice, Esq. son of John Arundell, of that place, Esq. commonly called John of Tilbury, for that he was an officer under Queen Elizabeth when she was encamped there with her army, in expectation of the Spaniards landing, 1588.

Which gentleman, (John Arundell,) was by Charles the First made Governor of Pendennis Castle; during whose command there happened a tragical siege thereof by the Parliament army under Colonel Fortescue; wherein the besiegers and the besieged showed unparalleled valour and conduct for about six months’ space, when at length it was surrendered upon honourable conditions, the soldiers going forth with their arms mounted and colours flying, more consumed with sickness and famine within the walls than destroyed by their enemies from without, having been driven to that extremity that the governor, soldiers, and many other gentlemen and ladies therein, were forced for some time to eat horseflesh, for want of other victuals; as being hemmed in by the Parliament frigates at sea on the one side, and surrounded with their army at land on the other, so that no relief of men or provisions could be brought into the garrison, whereby it was forced to capitulate and surrender as aforesaid 1647, (before which time all other castles in England, except Ragland in Wales, 14 were yielded up to the Parliament,) and the hunger-starved soldiers of Pendennis, that came out thence, feeding too freely on victuals and drink, brought themselves into incurable diseases, whereof many died; so that here, as in many other places, it was observed that more men and women died by two frequently putting their hands to their mouths, than by clapping their hands to their swords; as the Jews did on surrender of Jerusalem to the Romans, after the siege and famine there.

After the surrender of this castle, as aforesaid, by Colonel John Arundell, he was succeeded in that dignity by Colonel Fortescue, and he was succeeded by Captain Fox; as after the restoration of Charles the Second, Fox was succeeded by Richard Lord Arundell, and he by the Earl of Bath.

One Mr. Thomas Killigrew, of this Arwinick family, was Jester or Master of the Revels to Charles the Second, who, (to give but a single instance of his wit and humour,) having been at Paris on business, went to Versailles to see the French Court for diversion; where, being well known to many French courtiers who had been in England, he was by them introduced into Louis the Fourteenth the King of France’s presence, who had a long time had a desire to see him whom fame reported the wittiest man in England. But at that time Killigrew was politically out of humour, and spoke very little, out of a desire he had to hear the wisdom of the French Court, and what little discourse he had it was trivial and of no consequence; whereupon King Louis told the noblemen that gave him such encomiums of his wit, that he looked upon him as a very dull fellow. Whereupon the courtiers told him, notwithstanding what his Majesty’s opinion was, assuredly he was a most ingenious and witty man. Whereupon, soon after, the King resolved to make a further trial of him, and therefore led him into a long gallery, where were many fine pictures, and asked Killigrew what they were? And amongst the rest of those draughts showed the picture of 15 our Saviour upon the Cross; and then again asked Killigrew if he knew what it was? To which, as to the former demands, he pleaded ignorance, and answered, “No.” “Why, then,” said King Louis, “Monsieur Killigrew, “I will tell you what they are. The picture in the centre is the draught of our Saviour on the Cross, and that on the right hand of him is the Pope’s picture, and that on the left hand of him is my own.” To which Killigrew replied, “I humbly thank your Majesty for the information you have given me, for though I have often heard that our Saviour was crucified between two thieves, yet I never knew who they were till now.” Which sharp repartee convinced that King of his wrong opinion of Killigrew’s wit in satire and ridicule, especially it being at the time when the Pope and French King grievously persecuted the French Protestants, and either dragooned them to mass or drove them out of France.

Mr. Thomas Killigrew is further said to have put under the candlestick where Charles the Second supped, five small papers, on which he had written the word ALL. The King, on sight thereof, asked him what he meant by these five words of one signification. “Your Majesty’s pardon granted, I will tell you, sir,” said Mr. Killigrew; which being promised, he said, “The first All signified that the Country had sent all; the second, the City had lent all; the third, that the Court had spent all; the fourth, if we did not mend all; the fifth, that it will be worse for us all.”

This was reflected on the royal family of William the Third, “That he was William Think-all; his Queen Mary, Mary Take-all; Prince George of Denmark, George Drink-all; and the Princess Ann, Ann Eat-all, which ill habit diminished her health and hastened her death.”

TONKIN.

Sir Henry Killigrew, Knt. married Katherine, the second daughter and coheir of Sir Anthony Cooke, of Giddy Hall, 16 in Essex. Her other sisters married Sir William Cecil, Lord Treasurer, Sir Nicholas Bacon, Lord Chancellor, Sir Thomas Hobby, and Sir Ralph Howlet, Knts. Which ladies were all accounted of the most learned in the kingdom, eminently skilled in the Latin and Greek tongues. To give an instance for the whole:

Sir Henry Killigrew being appointed by Queen Elizabeth, ambassador to Henry the Fourth of France, lately turned Papist, was not very fond of that employment, and would have excused himself, but knew not how: whereupon his lady wrote a letter to her sister Mildred, wife to Sir William Cecil, to try her interest with his lordship to get the Queen to excuse him, and that some other person might be appointed for that employment. The letter was these words:

Which I find thus translated by Dr. Fuller, in his Worthies, though much abated of their elegancy in Latin:

Whether this letter did procure Sir Henry Killigrew’s stay, and dismission from the intended service, I am unable to resolve, although well assured I am that his daughter by this Catherine Cooke was married to Sir Jonathan Trelawney, of Poole, Knt. Sheriff of Cornwall 36th Eliz.

As for the harbour itself, it is agreed by all mariners to be one of the best for safe anchorage, large circumference, and good riding for ships, that this kingdom affords. The 17 mouth or entrance, between the castles of Pendennis and St. Mawes, is about two miles over. The body of the harbour, from St. Mawes to Falmouth town, is about a league. From Falmouth to Turner’s Weare, upon the river Vale, two leagues; from whence an arm of it goes up towards Tregony, another towards Tresilian Bridge, a third towards Truro; all which places the salt water visits every tide. Beneath Turner’s Weare, on the north, another channel goes by Restrongar Passage to Carnen, and St. Perron Arworthal. From Falmouth town goeth up another creek to Penryn. Lastly, on the south there go into the country two creeks towards St. Mawes and St. Anthony. All these members or branches of the harbour are overlooked by lofty and pleasant hills, and are supplied with deep water, so that boats, ships, barges, and lighters every day, one where or another, carry and recarry goods and merchandizes to the remotest parts thereof. Hence it is that Mr. Carew says, “a hundred sail of ships may lie at anchor within the harbour of Falmouth, and none of them see the other’s topmast,” because of the steep hills and windings of the river.

The Killigrews are also lords of the land whereon the Castle of Pendennis stands, and receive yearly out of the Exchequer for the same 13l. 6s. 8d. Of all which premises take the following rhyme:

Arwinick signifies upon the marsh; ar being the same as war, upon, and winick, a marsh, exactly suitable to the situation of the place.

Sir John Killigrew, of this place, ought not to be forgotten; who, seeing the Parliament Army to prevail every 18 where, with his own hands set fire to his noble house here, that they might not find shelter in it when they came to lay siege to Pendennis Castle, as they did soon after: an action which was well rewarded by Charles the Second; although the house hath not been rebuilt, a few rooms only having been fitted up just to receive the family, who have not much resided in it ever since.

THE EDITOR.

Falmouth Harbour, situated within thirty miles of the Land’s End, is without all comparison the most advantageous station for packets, maintaining a regular communication with Lisbon, the West Indies, and the Mediterranean. It has also been found admirably adapted for receiving smaller ships of war; a squadron of frigates, under the command of Admiral Lord Hugh Seymour, of Admiral Pellew, &c. cruised from hence against the French during a part of the great contest following the Revolution; but, although the largest ship may enter the port, and anchor there in safety, yet it is very inferior for their accommodation either to Plymouth or to Portsmouth.

Falmouth is also a great resort of vessels coming from foreign countries, to receive orders as to their ultimate destination; and this is not only owing to the western situation of the harbour, but, in a very considerable degree, to the residence of a family which has maintained the highest reputation through a long series of years, as merchants, as men of integrity and of talent. They are said to be lineal or collateral relatives of the patriarch George Fox. On their first arrival in Cornwall, this family settled themselves at Par, near St. Austell; but afterwards removing to Falmouth, they have mainly contributed towards the prosperity of the whole county, as merchants, as manufacturers, as spirited and enlightened adventurers in mines, and in the fisheries. Among many so eminent, it would be absolute injustice not to mention particularly Mr. Robert Ware Fox, who has most successfully employed his 19 leisure in the philosophical investigation of geology and of chemistry, in connexion with mechanics, not only by his own exertions, but as the judicious and liberal encourager of similar pursuits in others.

Many individuals have acquired wealth in Falmouth by a very peculiar species of commerce, carried on with Lisbon by means of the packets. The interchange of various commodities was legally prohibited, but at the same time practically allowed, by both Governments; and to such an extent did this half-contraband trade arise, that a Mr. Nowell, who kept a retail shop at Falmouth, is said to have made a fortune, by which his son became Sheriff of the county in 1787, chiefly as a carrier of these goods to and from London on packhorses; and a fortune still larger has been made by Mr. Russell, of Exeter, by conveying increased quantities in waggons over improved roads, through Devonshire and Cornwall.

It is quite impossible for such an harbour as Falmouth to have escaped the knowledge of the Phœnicians, when they came to Cornwall for tin, and strangely mistook it for a cluster of islands. The Greeks must also have known this port; and the Romans not merely encamped in various parts of the county, but having fixed stations within it, and on the very banks of the Fall, cannot have failed of noticing the longest and best roadsted and navigable river within the limits of Cornwall: but so vague and uncertain are all the descriptions transmitted to us either by geographers or by the writers of itineraries, that we are utterly unable to discriminate most places within certain limits of each other except by conjecture. It is truly a matter of astonishment that nations having made such ample progress in abstract geometry, and in astronomy itself, should have altogether disregarded latitudes which were within their reach; and even approximations towards longitudes, which might have been obtained through the medium of lunar eclipses.

20 Various names derived from ancient authors have been applied to Falmouth. Valuba is the one most commonly received. The Ocrinum promontory being taken for the Lizard, and Bolerium for the Land’s End.

The late Sir Christopher Hawkins seems to have established, with the full degree of certainty applicable to such subjects, that the Ictis of Diodorus Siculus must have been St. Michael’s Mount, and not the hill occupied by Pendennis Castle.

The British name of Falmouth was Smithick. The last syllable, ick, has doubtlessly some reference to water.

The few houses standing at Smithick before Mr. Killigrew built the new town, are said to have been called Pen-y-cum-quick; and an idle story is related of some old woman having brewed ale for a public meeting, and having apologized to the people when they assembled for all her stock being gone, by stating that foreign sailors coming to her house drunk the whole, and that “Pennies came so quick” she could not resist the temptation for parting with it.

But the Right Hon.Charles Williams Wynn, M.P. for Denbighshire, has informed me that Pen-y-cwm-cuick is, in good Welch, the head of the contracted valley or dingle. Cuch signifies contracted, or knit together, as knitting the brows. This corresponds with the valley going up from the strand by the new market-house. Sir George Clark’s seat, near Edinburgh, situated in a similar manner in respect to a narrow vale, is written Pen-y-cuick, and pronounced Pennyquick, the Celtic PEN-Y being always corrupted by Saxon lips into penny; as Pen-y-darran, on the Taff.

The church at Falmouth is dedicated to King Charles the First, with the proud additions of Saint and Martyr. It evidently suited with the views and with the interest of those in power after 1660, to identify Charles the First with the Established Church, and to inculcate that he died in its defence. The new church at Plymouth is dedicated in a similar manner to St. Charles; and in this instance 21 the pleasure of outraging the feelings of their adversaries may have acted in aid of political expediency.

Mr. Hals does not seem to have treated the very distinguished family of Killigrew in a manner that might have been expected, from his attachment to aristocracy in general, or from his prejudices as a Cavalier. The horrible story of Jane Killigrew cannot possibly be true, in the manner or to the extent in which it is related, and the whole should have been omitted, were there not reasons for believing that it rests on some foundation.

If the lady is exonerated from the most atrocious part of the tale, representing her as actually boarding the vessels and participating in the destruction of foreign merchants, and for which mere popular tradition at the interval of two centuries cannot form an adequate proof, we must not too rigidly apply the manners and feelings of our own times to a period so dissimilar. Many exploits performed by the great Sir Francis Drake, would now create very different impressions from those stamped on men’s minds at the time; and the more gentle and courteous, though not less brave, Sir Walter Raleigh, would now hardly escape without blame.

No one seems to have suffered greater degradation, from common report, than Mr. Thomas Killigrew. He is usually represented as the Jester, or even licensed fool, of Charles the Second; and the anecdotes given by Mr. Hals contain much more of rudeness than of wit.

His history is thus related in the Biographical Dictionary of 1784:

“Thomas Killigrew, descended from the ancient Cornish family of that name, was a younger son of Sir Robert Killigrew, and born in 1611. He was distinguished by uncommon abilities. He was page of honour to King Charles the First, and groom of the bedchamber to King Charles the Second, with whom he had suffered many years of exile. During his abode beyond the sea, he took a view of France, Italy, and Spain, and was honoured by his Majesty 22 with the employment of Resident at the State of Venice. In his absence from this country he applied his leisure hours to poetry, and to the composition of several plays, of which Sir John Denham takes notice in his poem on our author’s return from his embassy. Though Denham mentions but six, our author wrote nine plays in his travels, and two at London; all which were printed, with his picture before them, in 1664. There is, besides, “A Letter concerning some Nuns in the Nunnery of Tours,” dated from Orleans in 1635, and printed in three folio sheets. Mr. Killigrew died in 1682, and was buried in Westminster Abbey. He had been twice married.

“He was a man of a very droll and uncommon vein of humour, with which he used to divert that merry monarch Charles the Second; who on that account was fonder of him than his best Ministers, and would give him access to his person when he denied it to them.” It was usually said of him, that when he attempted to write he was nothing near so smart as he was in conversation: which was just the reverse of Cowley, who shone but little in conversation, although he excelled so much with his pen. Hence Denham, who knew them both, has taken occasion thus to characterize their respective excellences and defects:

Another brother, Henry Killigrew, is mentioned in the same work, Chaplain to James the Second while he was Duke of York, and a Prebendary of Westminster. He is there stated to have written a tragedy at the age of seventeen, called “The Conspiracy,” which obtained the high approbation of Ben Jonson.

He had a daughter, Ann Killigrew, recorded as

This young lady was maid of honour to the Duchess of York, but died of the smallpox at the early age of twenty-five.

23 The elder brother, William, was also a poet and an author. The representative of the Killigrew family is Lord Wodehouse, in right of his late wife, Sophia Berkeley, niece of Lord Berkeley of Stratton.

Falmouth has now outgrown the property of those who originally built the town, and is extended northward, at Green Bank, into the land of Lord de Dunstanville, where the houses have all the convenience and decoration suited to modern times. The older part of Falmouth, although it dates no further back than about two centuries, is unfortunately distinguished by its narrow, crooked streets, and by every defect usually found in the smallest fishing-towns. It is, however, surrounded by beautiful villas.

Falmouth has been associated, in 1832, with Penryn, in the privilege of sending two Members to Parliament.

This parish measures 621 statute acres.

giving an increase on the population of the parish of 116 per cent., on the population of the town 29 per cent., in 30 years; on both together 50 per cent. in the same period.

The latitude of Falmouth is given in the best tables at 50° 8′. The longitude has been ascertained by Dr. Tiarks with the greatest care (see Philosophical Transactions for 1824): the flag-staff at Pendennis Castle 20^m. 11.5^s. west. Times of high water at the new and full moon 51^h. 15′.

Present Rector, the Hon.and Rev. W. Wodehouse, instituted 1828.

THE GEOLOGY, BY DR. BOASE. 24

Hornblende rocks, both schistose and compact, such as occur near the junction of the porphyritic and calcareous series, constitute this little parish. The Castle Hill appears to belong to the latter series.

[1] The Mayor of Falmouth, by Act of Parliament, pays yearly at Michaelmas three pounds to the Vicar of Budock, for the small tithes.

[2] The arms of Parker of Rathon, in Sussex, were, Azure, fretty Or, over all a fess of the Second. And in the pedigree of that family Sir Nicholas Parker, Knt. is styled Captain of Pendennis Castle, Cornwall. Edit.

HALS.

Is situate in the hundred of Powdre, and has upon the north St. Kea, east and south the harbour of Falmouth towards the Vale river, west Restrongat creek, or Carnan river. As for the name Feock, or Feighe, Veage, Feage, it signifies the top of a house, or high mountain, as this parish is on, and there is still extant the lofty local place called Le Feock, Le Feage. At the time of the Domesday Tax, 20th William I. (1087), this parish was taxed by the name of Ros-carnon, now part thereof. In the Inquisition of the Bishops of Lincoln and Winchester into the value of Cornish Benefices, Ecclesia de Sancto Feoko was valued xls. in Decanatu de Powdre; Vicar ejusdem xiiis. iiiid.; in Wolsey’s Inquisition, 1521, and Valor Beneficiorum, the Vicarage of Feock was valued in 11l.; the patronage in the Bishop of Exeter, who endowed it. The incumbent Ange; and the parish rated to the 4s. per pound Land Tax, 1696, 126l. 12s.

St. Feock, the presidual guardian of this church, in all probability lived at the local place aforesaid, called Le-Feock, i. e. Feock’s place and dwelling; but who or what his parents were, when or where born, &c. I must plead non sum informatus.

In the glass windows is the figure of a man in priest’s robes, with a radiated or shining circle about his head and face, and under his feet written St. Feock; beneath whom, 25 also in the glass, were painted, kneeling and bending forward, in way of adoration, the figures of a man and woman, and behind them several children, out of which figurative man and woman’s mouths proceeded a label, with this inscription—“Sancte Feock, ora pro bono statu S. Trewonwoll et Elionoræ uxoris ejus.” From whence I was fully satisfied that he was indeed the tutelar guardian of this church.

At Le-Feock aforesaid, temp. Charles II. was the dwelling, by lease, of Captain Thomas Penrose, whose father married Verman; originally descended from the Penroses of Penrose in Sythney. This gentleman having in his youth, temp. Charles I. been bred at sea, in the study and practice of the art of navigation, it appears from his journal that, in the year 1650, he was by the Admiral of the States of England made Captain or Commander of the Bristol frigate or man-of-war, in which he fought, together with the English fleet under command of General Blake, near Dover, against the Dutch fleet, under their General Van Tromp, who was shrewdly worsted by Blake. He was also in the engagement against the Dutch fleet under Sir George Ayscough, 1652, before Plymouth, where the victory inclined to neither side, but great losses on both. He also, 28th of October, the same year, fought in General Blake’s squadron against the General of the States De Witt, who was then worsted, on one side of the North Foreland, in the Downs. Captain Penrose was also in that engagement between General Blake and Van Tromp wherein the English Fleet was worsted, and came off with great loss, so that Van Tromp sailed into the Downs in great triumph, with a broom on his main-topmast.

But, maugre his success, pride, and insolence, the States of England fitted forth their shattered ships sooner than was expected, to the number of eighty sail of men-of-war, when Captain Penrose was removed from the Bristol to the command of the Maidstone frigate. Then also were Penn and Burne discharged from command of particular 26 squadrons, and the supreme command of the fleet was put into the hands of General Blake, General Monk, and General Dean; when soon after happened that bloody and tremendous sea-fight betwixt the English and the Dutch fleets, before Weymouth and Dungeness, wherein General Monk declared (upon the sudden death of General Dean, killed at breakfast on the deck of their ship by Monk’s side, with a defiance gun-bullet shot at random by the Dutch to his destruction) that this fifth battle should put an end to the war one way or other, and gave forth strict order and command to the officers of the English fleet upon penalty of death, that they should neither take from nor give quarter to the enemy; which commands in the engagement being for a considerable time kept and observed by the English, the terror thereof so amazed the Dutch, that, after great losses of men and ships by them sustained, they declined to fight, and bore or ran away with their fleet, leaving the victory and British Channel wholly to the English fleet. In this fight, as appears from Penrose’s Journal, he lost above fifty men out of the Maidstone, besides had many more wounded. Afterwards the English fleet, coasting westwards in pursuit of the vanquished Dutch fleet, were by cross winds forced into Falmouth harbour, where also for some days, as appears from Penrose’s Journal aforesaid, he entertained at his house in this place of Le-Feock (opposite the harbour aforesaid) General Monk, General Blake, Sir George Ayscough, and many other officers and gentlemen of the fleet, to good content and satisfaction.

Afterwards they sent him many letters concerning the war, fleet, and ship he sailed in, and the course he should take; and in particular, amongst others, thanked him for his great valour and conduct in the several engagements aforesaid. From some of which it appears General Blake was a better soldier than scholar, as being very badly able to write the letters of his name to the letters his secretary had formed, as yet may be seen; which is not to be wondered 27 at, as I am credibly informed he was at first but a man of no higher education than that of a petty mechanic, viz. a ribbon and galloon weaver in Taunton; whereof, at last, for his valour in the siege, in opposition to Charles the First, he was made governor thereof by the Parliament.

Captain Penrose fought also in the Maidstone frigate under General Monk, in the sixth and last engagement of the English at sea against the Dutch fleet, wherein Van Tromp their general was slain, and his fleet extremely shattered, sunk, and disabled, to the great terror of the United Provinces. Then also the Maidstone frigate underwent the loss of many seamen; and the Captain continued his post till the restoration of Charles the Second, when he was dismissed from his command, and another commander placed in his room; after which he retired to his country-house of Le-Feock aforesaid.

It also appears from Penrose’s Journal whilst he commanded the Maidstone, that she was one of the five ships under Sir George Ayscough that was ordered by the then Parliament of England to sail into the Sound, or German Sea, to assist the King of Sweden against the Danes. But a peace being concluded betwixt those nations, soon after the arrival of those ships, nothing of action was performed by them. Nevertheless, the King of Sweden rewarded the five captains of those ships in this expedition, with so many medals and neck-chains of gold, with the King of Sweden’s face on one side of the medal, and the several arms of those gentlemen on the other, weighing about eighteen ounces each together with the chain. Penrose’s medal is yet to be seen with his daughter.

In the year 1664, when another Dutch and French war broke out between them and Charles the Second, and able sea-officers were wanted for the fleet, Penrose (who as aforesaid for several years had been displaced) had divers letters sent to him from James Duke of York, and the Duke of Albemarle (formerly General Monk), by order of 28 Charles the Second, requesting in this time of need that he would come up to London, accept of the command, and take the charge of the Monk frigate, in the Dutch war; which at length with some reluctance he accepted. In which post he discharged the place with such care and faithfulness as before he had done in the Parliament service. And, moreover, in the three sea-fights which the Duke of York and the Duke of Albemarle had with the Dutch fleets, (in all which he was commanded, though but a third-rate ship, to follow the admiral or general’s ships,) he behaved himself with such prudent valour and conduct (though with the loss of several hundreds of his men) that he preserved his ship, to the admiration of all that saw her, from destruction, though often boarded and surrounded with enemies.

In brief, those matters are so abundantly set forth in the several letters of thanks, after those engagements, from the said Dukes and their Secretaries to Penrose, that if I should take the pains to transcribe them, they would only be thought a romance, as containing in them almost unparallelled adventures and dangers, which he most valiantly and successfully passed through, in the midst of seas, slaughter, fire, and bullets, were not the originals yet extant, and to be seen.

Lastly, it appears from letters, and his Journal, which he kept daily for eighteen years’ space, which he spent at sea in the public service of his country, that in the year 1667 he was by Charles the Second made Admiral of a squadron of ships of sixteen men-of-war, which were ordered to cruise between Harwich and Newcastle towards the coasts of Holland, to watch the motion of the enemy. Where he received many letters by King Charles’s order from the Secretaries of State, War, and Admiralty, as also from the Dukes aforesaid (yet to be seen), containing thanks for his good service, and further desiring the continuance of his care, conduct, and watchfulness against the enemy, whensoever they should put out to sea again: in 29 the mean time to observe such further orders as should be sent him.

In this kind of post he remained till his death, 1669, King Charles then owing him for his salary or pay above 1,500l. of which neither he nor his heir or executor ever received a farthing. His death was thought to be hastened through grief and vexation (being scarcely fifty-six years old when he died), and the occasion thus:—His ship, the Monk, being all manned with Cornish men in those three last engagements with the Dutch, who for the love and respect they bore him, their countryman, were all volunteers without being impressed for the public service; now it happened that, in the year 1668, peace being concluded betwixt King Charles and the States of Holland, the greatest part of our English fleet were hauled up, the officers, seamen, and soldiers disbanded, without satisfaction, wages, or pay for their service; and amongst them Captain Penrose’s ship and squadron underwent the same fate. So that soon after, he happening to be at London upon some occasions, his disbanded company of Cornish men from the Monk, being far from home, were very troublesome and tumultuous with him about their pay, and so clamorous as to tell him that he, by his fair promises, had cajoled them into the public service, and that now they could get nothing for their labour and the hazard of their lives.

The Captain answered for himself, as well as he could, that it was his own case, as well as many other officers’ and theirs, at this exigence to want his money, and therefore desired their patience till the King was better provided with cash for their satisfaction. But the Cornish men being more and more dissatisfied with him by those delays, and their wants and necessities pressing hard upon them, they formed a petition, setting forth the premises, to his Majesty, and with the same came to the Captain’s chamber, and endeavoured (after words would not prevail) to constrain or compel him in person to present it to the King’s Majesty, which he refusing to undertake, a scuffle 30 happened at the top of the stairs between him and the petitioners; in which conflict one Lampeer, of Truro, by thrust of Penrose’s hands, his feet and hands failing, was thrown over the stairs, and so much bruised with the fall that soon after he died.

Whereupon Penrose was apprehended, held upon bail, and afterwards indicted before the grand jury of Middlesex or Westminster, and found guilty of murder or manslaughter, and afterwards was tried for his life, and by the grand and petty jury found guilty of manslaughter: that is to say, the unlawful killing of a man without premeditated malice, (which is felony, because wilful—but admits of the benefit of clergy for the first crime,) whereupon Penrose was condemned to death, and put into Newgate, where forthwith he received a reprieve or pardon of this offence from Charles the Second, under the broad seal of England, yet to be seen. Nevertheless, for the drawing, sealing, or procuring this pardon, the clerks and officers through whose hands it passed extorted from the Captain 200l. before he could get out of their hands to show it to the Sheriff of Middlesex.

This unhappy accident so troubled Penrose, that, to put off the thoughts thereof, he kept company more than ordinary with gentlemen and officers of the fleet and others; so that at length, by excess of drinking healths, and otherwise, he fell into a malignant fever, whereof he died, leaving issue one only daughter, his heir, named Martha, married to James Hals, of Merther, Gent.

Tre-gew, alias Tregue, in this parish, synonymous words, signifying the spear or javelin town, is the dwelling of Henry Edmunds, Gent. originally descended from the Edmunds of Middlesex, whose ancestor, being a person well qualified for the purpose, temp. James I. was sent from London by the Company of Pewterers to inspect and try the Cornish tin, then corrupted by the blowers thereof, before it was coined, that so the bad metal might be examined and taxed before it was coined, proportionable to 31 the badness. In which assay-master’s office he thrived so well, that at length he became a tin-factor himself, grew rich, and bought this place, and other lands near, as also the manor of Truro, of Sir Bevill Grenvill, Knt. But he and his security failing in paying the consideration money, he was cast into prison, where he died without further satisfation to his said creditor; notwithstanding which, those lands descended to his heir, now in possession thereof, except the manor of Truro, sold to Samuel Enys, Esq.

The Cornish tongue was retained in this parish by the old inhabitants thereof, till about the year 1640. Mr. William Jackman, then Vicar thereof, Chaplain of Pendennis Castle, at the siege thereof by the Parliament Army, was forced for divers years to administer the Sacrament to the communicants in the Cornish tongue, because the aged people did not well understand the English, as himself often told me. Now because it may not be unacceptable to the curious to know the Cornish words then used in administering the bread and wine to the communicants, I will here set them down, for their satisfaction:

Again:

Mr. John Lanyon, of this parish, a sea sand-barge daily labourer, had a son named John Lanyon, who having had his education under Hugh Boscawen, Gent. Master of Arts, who kept a school at St. Michael Penkivell Church, became afterwards a steward to Trefusis, St. Aubyn, Coryton, and lastly came into the service of Brook Lord Chandos, and having by these services accumulated considerable riches, he gave lands, and built and endowed an almshouse for poor people.

TONKIN.

Mr. Tonkin does not make any addition to the history of this parish, except by stating that James Hals, who married Martha Penrose, the only child of Captain Thomas Penrose, was “an elder brother of the author; and that their eldest son, then about fourteen years of age, was engaged in the pursuit of his grandfather’s profession, by serving as one of the King’s scholars, or gentlemen volunteers, on board the Sunderland, Captain Tudor Trevor commander, receiving about 30l. per annum of his Majesty.”

THE EDITOR.

Trelisick is now the most splendid feature of this parish. The situation, beautiful in all other respects, commands a view of the whole inland sea constituting Falmouth Harbour. The House was built about the middle of the last century, by Mr. John Laurence, a captain in the county militia, during the Seven Years’ War, still remembered for his good-nature, convivial habits, and wild eccentricities. It is perhaps deserving of notice that the architect was Mr. Davy, grandfather of the celebrated chemist.

33 The property became divided on Mr. Laurence’s decease; and it was purchased, about the year 1800, by the late Mr. Ralph Allen Daniell; other lands were added to the domain, and the whole became a handsome seat suited to the natural advantages of the place.

Still further additions and decorations have been made by his son, Mr. Thomas Daniell; but this gentleman choosing to quit Cornwall, has sold the whole to Lord Falmouth, the proprietor of Tregothnan, a still more magnificent seat, and removed from Trelisick only a few miles further up on the Truro river.

Mr. Thomas Daniell, the grandfather, was chief clerk to Mr. Lemon, and having married Miss Elliott, niece of Mr. Allen, of Bath, he found himself enabled to take the whole of Mr. Lemon’s great concerns off the hands of his executors in 1760; and soon after to build the house in Truro, remarkable not only on account of its being the largest and most decorated mansion in that very splendid town, but as being constructed of Bath Oolite, the gift of Mr. Allen, from Prior Park.

Mr. Daniell continued throughout his whole life to conduct most extensive concerns as a general merchant, as a tin smelter, and, above all, as a spirited adventurer in mines on the largest scale. He left one son and one daughter.

The daughter married the Rev. John Napleton, a dignitary in the church of Hereford, and previously tutor at Brasenose college, Oxford; where he is well known as the author of a work (“Elementa Logicæ, subjicitur Appendix de Usu Logicæ et Conspectus Organi Aristotelis”) which has been adopted into the lectures of every college throughout the University. The son, Mr. Ralph Allen Daniell, continued most of his father’s concerns, adding to them a large smelting-work for copper in Glamorganshire; and so successful were his mining speculations, that he is said to have gained, in the course of a very few years, above a hundred and fifty thousand pounds from Wheal Tower alone.

34 Mr. Daniell was twice Member for West Looe. He married the only daughter of the Rev. Mr. Pooley, Rector of Ladock, and has left a numerous family. His eldest son has married Miss Osbaldeston, and they have several children.

Killiganoon, probably the grove by the downs, is next to be noticed in Feock.

The place was entirely created by Mr. Richard Hussey. This gentleman was the son of an attorney at Truro, who died insolvent, leaving a widow with one son, and three or four daughters. The son is represented to have exerted himself with efforts proportional to the embarrassments in which he found the affairs of his family, and he became in consequence one of the most distinguished lawyers of the time. He had the honour of being appointed Attorney General to the Queen; and he was Counsel to the East India Company, and Member of Parliament, I believe, for Michael. Mr. Hussey died in the year 1770, under sixty, and divided his fortune among his sisters. One had married the Rev. Mr. Vivian, and her grandson is the distinguished officer, General Sir Hussey Vivian. Another sister married Mr. Walker, of Lanlivery, and left an only son, the Rev. Robert Walker, Vicar of St. Winnow. A third sister married Mr. Ustick, of Penzance.

Mrs. Mary Hussey, widow of Mr. Hussey of Truro, married, secondly, Mr. William Davies of St. Earth, a half-brother of the Editor’s grandfather, where she continued to reside; and her funeral appears on the parish register September 18th, 1750.

Killiganeen was sold after Mr. Hussey’s decease, and passed into the hands of Mr. Dagge. Two brothers of that name went to London from Bodmin to seek their fortunes. One became the manager of Covent Garden Theatre; the other pursued the law, to which both were probably educated, and ultimately retired to this place. It has since become the property of Admiral Spry, who improved and enlarged the house and the plantations; and it belongs at 35 this time to his son, Samuel Thomas Spry, Esq. M.P. for Bodmin.

A coarse part of this parish remained uninclosed till within a few years, and was known by the name of Feock Downs. The surface appeared to be more smooth and even than any other piece of open ground in the west of Cornwall; consequently, when local political dissensions were at a great height, about sixty years ago, this place was selected by one party for establishing races, in rivalship of others conducted by their opponents at Bodmin. These races fell, however, with the temporary feeling which gave them birth, and the ground is now inclosed.

A small village in this parish is distinguished by the name of “Come-to-Good;” a name probably given to it at first in ridicule, because there was established the earliest Quakers’ meeting in that part of Cornwall. And, for some reason now quite forgotten, the first Sunday in August became designated all over that populous mining district as “Come-to-Good Sunday,” when several thousand persons continued to assemble, till the very prudent Society to whom the house belongs, adopted the expedient of discontinuing their meeting on that particular day.

This parish measures 2,580 statute acres.

giving an increase of 74 per cent. in 30 years.

GEOLOGY.

Dr. Boase remarks on this parish, that the rocks are similar to those of Falmouth.

HALS.

Is situate in the hundred of Powdre, and hath upon the north Glant, east the haven or harbour of Fowey, south the British Channel. For the name, it is taken from foys-fenton, i. e. the walled well or spring of water, rising about Alternun, St. Cleather, or Temple Moors.

In the Domesday Tax, 20th William I. (1087,) this place or parish was rated under the jurisdiction of Tywardreth. Neither was there any endowed church here extant at the time of the Inquisition of the Bishops of Lincoln and Winchester (1294), unless (what can hardly be supposed) Ecclesia de Funum appropriata domui de Tywardreth, in Decanatu de Powdre, be a corruption of Faoi, or Foy-town. In Wolsey’s Inquisition, and Valor Beneficiorum, the Vicarage of Foye is rated 10l. The patronage formerly in the Prior of Tywardreth, who endowed it, now Treffry. The incumbent Trubody. The parish and town rated to the 4s. per pound Land Tax, 1696, 195l. 14s. The rectory, sheaf, or impropriation, in ——.

In the ancient chapel at Foy, now the minister’s chancel, was inscribed temp. Edward III. the name of Fisart Bagga, a famous sea commander in the then French wars, a native of this town of Foy. [Carew’s Survey of Cornwall, p. 135.] This church and town I take to be under the tutelary guardianship of St. Catherine, whose history is misplaced under Lanteagles by Fowey.

[Mr. Hals’s history of St. Catherine is lost. It may, therefore, be sufficient to give the following short statement of her legend.

In the Μηνολογιον, the Menology, (the Monthly Register, synonymous with Martyrology,) of the Emperor Basil, said to be composed by himself, but certainly written under his own inspection, St. Catherine is stated to have sprung from one of the families which in those times obtained a transient possession of the imperial throne.

37 She was probably born at Alexandria, and suffered martyrdom there under the reign of Maximus the Second, about the year 310.

Her learning, abilities, and zeal were so great, that, having been ordered to dispute with several of the most able philosophers, she confuted them all, and even converted some among them to the Christian faith. These new proselytes are said to have been instantly hurried to the flames, but that the Saint herself was reserved for a still more cruel fate, the persecutors of religion having contrived a wheel set round with hooks and spikes, for the purpose of tearing and lacerating its victim. The legends, however, go on to say that this horrible engine was dashed in pieces by angels, just as the tormentors were about to use it against the Saint, whom they nevertheless decapitated, unawed by the recent miracle, and no longer interrupted by any supernatural interference.

The body of St. Catherine was found five hundred years afterwards, when the Saracens had possession of Egypt, although it is not recorded by whom the discovery was made, nor how the identity was proved. A subsequent great event, however, placed that most important circumstance beyond all doubt; for it having been resolved to translate the body from the immediate power of the Mahometans to a monastery built on Mount Sinai by St. Helena, and augmented by Justinian, a company of angels, probably the very same who destroyed the wheel, conveyed the relics to Mount Sinai through the air.

Some recent martyrologists have endeavoured to explain away the latter miracle, by asserting that angels meant monks, who on account of the purity of their morals, the sanctity of their divine duties, and the eminent utility of their lives, are frequently confounded with the inhabitants of heaven.—It is almost needless to add that St. Catherine’s Wheel has uniformly reference to the intended instrument of her martyrdom, and never to a spinning-wheel, of which the Saint is sometimes supposed in England to have been the inventor. Editor.]

38 But for the church and tower of Foy, as it now stands, it was built about the year 1466, towards which Richard Neville, Earl of Warwick, was a great benefactor; as appears from his badge, or cognizance, viz. ragged staves, yet to be seen cut in many parts of the stones of the said church and tower thereof.

The town of Foys is the voke lands of an ancient lordship by prescription, which the Prior of Tywardreth held of the ancient Earl of Cornwall’s manor of Pow-vallet-coyt, now Lostwithiel, or Restormel Castle, under the rent of ——; from whom also they had their privilege of sending two members to sit in the Commons’ House of Parliament. It was incorporated by Charles the Second, by the name of the Mayor, Recorder, Portreeve, eight Aldermen, and a Town Clerk. Notwithstanding which, by ancient custom, the members of Parliament were elected by the freemen, (viz. scot and lot men, that pay rates and taxes) and the precept from the Sheriff for the writ for election of them must be thus directed: Præposito et Senescallo Burgi de Foy, in Comitatu Cornubiæ, salutem, &c. As also the writ for removing any action at law depending in Foy court-leet to a superior court, must be directed to the Portreeve and Town Clerk or Steward.

The arms of this town are, a ship in full course, with sails expansed, on the waves of the ocean. It is further privileged with a weekly market on Saturdays, and fairs annually, on Shrove Tuesday, May 1st, and September 10th. This town hath also added to its privileges some of the liberties and freedoms of the Cinque Ports, which other towns or harbours have not: what they are, the inhabitants there best know. Those privileges were first granted only to the ports of Hastings, Hythe, Dover, Romney, and Sandwich, in Kent, by Edward the Confessor; afterwards much increased in the days of the three Edwards, the First, Second, and Third: which in this place are too long for me to recite. Mr. Carew tells us, that in Edward the Third’s days sixty tall ships did belong to this harbour; and that the town of 39 Foys did assist that King with forty-seven sail of men-of-war and transport-ships, anno Dom. 1347, in order to the siege of Calais; whereupon that King granted commissions to the chief commanders of those Foy ships to take French prizes, during his wars with those people, or French nation; so that in few years those Foy men were grown so rich and formidable, by taking French prizes, that by force and arms they would enter many ports of that kingdom, and carry with them all ships they could conquer, and what they could not, would use means to set them on fire in the places where they lay. In fine, when French prizes grew scarce, (I speak upon the authority of Mr. Carew,) they scrupled not to turn sea-robbers, or pirates, taking, plundering, and destroying all ships they could master, of what country soever, not sparing the sailors’ lives. By which means the townsmen grew unspeakably rich and proud and mischievous, which occasioned the Lord Pomier, and other Normans, to petition John, King of France, to grant them a private commission of marque and arms, to be revenged on the pirates and thieves of Foy town, which accordingly they obtained, and carried their design so secretly that a small squadron of ships, and many bands of marine soldiers, were prepared and shipped without the Foymen’s knowledge or notice, who accordingly put to sea out of the river Seine, in the month of July 1457, in 35th Henry VI. and with a fair wind sailed thence across the British Channel, and got sight of Foy harbour, where they lay off at sea till night, when they drew towards the shore and dropped anchor, and in the night landed their marine soldiers and seamen, and at midnight approached the south-west end of Foy-town, where they killed all persons they met with, set fire to the houses, and burned one half thereof to the ground, to the consumption of a great part of the inhabitants’ riches and treasures, a vast deal of which was gotten by their piratical practices; in which massacre and conflagration, the women, children, 40 and weakest sort of people, forsook the place, and fled for safety into the hill country.

But others of the stoutest men, under conduct of John Treffrye, Esq. fortified themselves as well as they could in his then new-built house of Plase, yet extant, where they stoutly opposed the assaults of their enemies; whilst the French soldiers plundered that part of the town which was unburned, without opposition, in the dark. The news of this French invasion in the morning flew far into the county, and the people of the contiguous parts as quickly put themselves in arms, and in great multitudes gathered together, in order to raise the siege of Foy; which the Frenchmen observing, and fearing the consequence of their longer stay, having got sufficient treasures to defray the charge of their expedition, as hastily ran to their ships as they had deliberately entered the town, and as privately returned into France as they had clandestinely come into England, with small profit and less honour.

The town of Foy being thus consumed by fire, and plundered by the French soldiers and seamen, the inhabitants’ former wealth and glory reduced to poverty and contempt, they politically cast themselves at the feet of Richard Nevill, Earl of Warwick (aforesaid), who, pitying their distressed condition, and being Lord High Admiral of England, granted some of them new commissions for privateering and taking French ships, on promise of their just and righteous proceedings, and renouncing the trade of piracy (for which reason their former commissions were revoked); whereupon in few years they plied their sea-business so effectually, that they increased their riches to such degree that they began to repair and rebuild their damnified houses, and in the stones of many of them, in memory of the Earl of Warwick’s favour and bounty towards them, there is cut his arms, badge, and cognizance, as aforesaid.

Nevertheless (so hard it is for those to do well who are accustomed to do evil, as for a blackmoor to wash himself white) those Foy men, not content with lawful privateering, 41 fell again to their old trade of piracy, robbing and killing the seamen of all nations whose ships they could conquer; of which they were again detected 18th Edward IV. 1478, who thereupon sent a messenger or serjeant-at-arms to Foy, to apprehend some of those delinquents, and bring them up to London to be tried for those crimes, in order to receive condign punishment. But, instead of obeying the King’s command and officer, in contempt of his authority they barbarously cut off his ears, and so dismembered sent him back to his master King Edward; at which affront the King was so distasted, that soon after he sent down Commissioners to Lostwithiel, under pretence of raising able seamen to go in war against the French, and that such amongst them as appeared most fit and able should have command of some of the King’s best ships. At this news a great part of the freemen and seamen of Foy were drawn to Lostwithiel; where they no sooner came, but immediately they were apprehended and taken into custody for the crimes aforesaid, their ill-gotten goods and chattels seized by the Sheriff and King’s officers, and one Harrington, a most notorious pirate, executed; and the chain of their harbour was removed to Dartmouth. (Carew’s Survey of Cornwall, p. 135.)

The harbour of Foy aboundeth with deep and navigable waters for ships of the greatest burthen, overlooked with winding and lofty hills, and, though narrow, extends itself in several branches three or four miles up the country, and is navigable to Lanlivery and Lostwithiel, St. Wenow and Laranbridge, and abounds with all sorts of fish proper to that country, as salmon, peal, trout, plaice, soal, millet, bass, eels, congers, pullocks, &c. here daily sold at a cheap rate. At the mouth or entrance of this harbour, are two petty bulwarks, or blockhouses, the Polman, or Porth-Eran on the Lanteglos side, the other at St. Catherine’s, under Foy town, most famous for a fight they had with a Dutch man-of-war of seventy guns, doubly manned, that was sent from their main fleet of ships of eighty sail, that lay at anchor 42 and cruised before this haven, 16th July, 1666, then in pursuit of our Virginia fleet of eighty sail, which, escaping their cognizance, safely got some hours before them into this harbour, and, on notice given of the war, sailed up the branches thereof as far as they could, and grounded themselves on the mud lands thereof.

Notwithstanding which, this Dutch frigate resolved to force the two forts or fortresses aforesaid, and to take or burn our said Virginia fleet. Accordingly, it happened on that day, a pretty gale of wind blowing, this ship entered the haven, and as soon as she came within cannon-shot of those forts, fired her guns upon the two blockhouses with great rage and violence; and these made them a quick return of the like compliment or salutation. In fine, the fight continued for about two hours’ time, in which were spent some thousands of cannon-shot on both sides, to the great hurt of the Dutch ship, in plank, rigging, sails, and men, chiefly because the wind slacked, or turned so adverse, that she could not pass quick enough between the two forts up the river, so as to escape their bullets, but lay a long time a mark for them to shoot at, till she had opportunity of wind to tack round, turn back, and bear off at sea to their fleet, to give them an account of her unsuccessful attempt and great damage as aforesaid, to the no small credit and reputation of Foy’s little castles, manned out with gunners and seamen from the ships of the Virginia fleet for that purpose, who all, by reason of the walls and intrenchments thereof, were preserved from death, notwithstanding the continual firing of the cannons of the Dutch man-of-war upon them; whereby the contiguous lands by the bullets were ploughed up, to the terror and astonishment of all beholders.

After this engagement, the cargo of the whole Virginia fleet was landed at Foy, (its owners at London fearing the hazard of the sea in time of the Dutch war, to transport it there by water,) and gave opportunity to the townsmen to buy much tobacco at a very cheap rate, which instantly, upon 43 the conclusion of the peace between England, France, and Holland, was sold in this kingdom, France, Spain, and Holland, at a dear rate, and much enriched the townsmen thereby, as Mr. Major, one of those merchants, informed me.

The chief place in this town is Plase, in British a palace, which is the dwelling of John Treffrye, Esq. so called from some of the many local places passing under that denomination in Cornwall, and compounded of treu or tref frye, synonymous words, signifying the free or manumitted town. He was the son of John Treffrye, of Rooke, Esq. that married Vivian of Truan; the which John Treffrye succeeded to the patrimony or lands of the Treffrys of this place, more for similitude of name than consanguinity or affinity of blood, by the will, devise, or entail of the last gentleman that died without issue in this house. The present possessor, as aforesaid, is John Treffrye, Esq. my very kind friend and kinsman, Member of Parliament for the town of Foy, whereof comparatively he is lord and high lord. He married Stephens. His predecessors in this place were gentlemen of great fame and estates, and have served their country in the several capacities of Parliament men for this town, justices of the peace, and sheriffs of Cornwall; particularly John Treffrye, Esq. was Sheriff of Cornwall 1st Richard III. 1482. He was a great benefactor towards building the present church of Foy, as appears from his arms being cut in divers places of the stones and tower thereof. Sir John Treffrye, Knt. (probably his son), was Sheriff of Cornwall 5th and 15th Henry VII.; William Treffrye, Esq. was Sheriff of Cornwall 16th Hen. VII. 1501, when Richard Whiteleigh, of Efford, was Sheriff of Devon. The arms of those gentlemen are, Sable, a chevron between three hawthorns Argent (i. e. summer thorn, hau, haw, in British is summer).

The chief inhabitants of this town, besides Mr. Treffrye, are Mr. Pomeroy, Mr. Goodall, Mr. Major, Mr. Toller, Mr. Tyncombe, and others.

In this town Philip Rashleigh, Esq. temp. Charles I. built and endowed a hospital with the garb or tithe sheaf 44 of the parish of St. Wen for ever, towards the relief of six poor widow women, two of the said parish and four from another parish, who receive weekly 15d. in money, and suits of apparel yearly, with other privileges, but are prohibited from begging the country, or any parish stipend. [See Tywardreth.]

This gentleman got great riches by trade and merchandize, and sea adventures; more particularly by a small ship or frigate, of about eighty tons, bearing about sixteen cannons or demi-culverins, besides small arms, and 60 men, for defence thereof; the commander of which ship had a commission from Queen Elizabeth as a privateer, in her wars with the Spaniards, to take all Spanish ships it should meet with at sea, and make them prizes for him, his adventurers, and the Queen’s advantage, which said privateer, or man-of-war, was so successful and fortunate in its adventures at sea for some years, and in traffic, and merchandizes, and prizes, that those gentlemen accumulated and laid up great riches thereby; and in remembrance and memory of this ship, caused the figure in memory of it to be perpetuated in a small ship, about five feet long, made and formed by a ship carpenter, of timber, with masts, sails, ropes, guns, and anchors, and figures of men thereon; which is hanged up to the roof, or planking, with an iron chain, in their old house in this town, of which ship those gentlemen have often given me ocular observation, as well as told me the above history of the premises, in the time of Charles the Second.

TONKIN.

Mr. Tonkin has not any thing of the least importance but what is copied from Mr. Hals.

THE EDITOR.

I have retained the whole of what is stated by Mr. Hals respecting the proceedings at Fowey, in the periods of its 45 greatest prosperity and of its subsequent fall, given partly on the authority of Mr. Carew, (p. 313, &c. of Lord Dunstanville’s edition,) and in part from what he himself had heard. It must, however, be remembered that tradition always exaggerates facts, more especially such as bear unfavourably either on individuals or on communities, and that the times of Edward the Third were essentially different from those of order, protection, and impartial administration of justice, in which we have the happiness to live; nor can the license or excesses imputed to some adventurers at Fowey, be more abhorrent to our feelings than the mean artifice of a feeble government, practised to entice men from Fowey to Lostwithiel, under a pretence of enabling them to assist their country in the prosecution of a war, but really with the view of arresting them as criminals.

The fact of this port having sent forty-seven ships, with seven hundred and seventy mariners, to the siege of Calais in 1346-7, would exceed all belief, were it not established by national records; and Mr. Carew relates their vanquishing, in a private feud, the naval armaments of Winchelsea and Rye, two members of the Cinque Ports (p. 315). But these two ancient towns, and the Five Ports themselves, exhibit a contrast scarcely less remarkable than Fowey, between their actual appearances and the relative importance they must have once attained; except that Hastings is enlarged for the temporary residence of strangers, and Dover from the like cause, in addition to its being the well-known station for packets.

It is quite certain that the Priory of Tywardreth exercised considerable feudal authority over Fowey, which, however, not only fell into disuse after the general dissolution of monasteries, but, in all probability, was greatly diminished by the subsequent incorporation of the town.

The right of voting for Members of Parliament, up to the period when it discontinued to send any, in 1832, was vested jointly in resident payers of scot and lot, and in 46 copyhold tenants of the manor taken from Tywardreth by Henry the Eighth, and annexed by him to the Duchy of Cornwall.

This manor was purchased by the late Mr. Philip Rashleigh, about the year 1800, under the powers created by the Land Tax Redemption Act. This gentlemen and his ancestors had long represented Fowey, and he was succeeded by his nephew, Mr. William Rashleigh, who subsequently sold the manor, and the whole borough property, to Mr. George Lucy, of Charlecot, near Stratford-upon-Avon. Mr. Lucy, in consequence, represented Fowey, and retained what he had purchased till in 1832 it became quite useless for all election purposes.

Mr. Joseph Thomas Austen is the present representative of the ancient and distinguished family of Treffry, one of the most spirited adventurers in mines, and of the most judicious and enlightened managers, that Cornwall has witnessed for many years. Mr. Austen has diverted a river for the use of machinery; and he has sat the first example of bringing a canal to mines, for the purpose of conveying coal and other heavy articles, from the sea-coast, and of taking down the ores, which are then exported from a harbour of his own construction.

Mr. Lysons gives an account somewhat different from that of Mr. Hals, respecting the final repulse of the French from Fowey. He attributes the achievement to one of Mr. Austen’s female ancestors; and, quoting from Leland, adds that after this event “Thomas Treffry builded a right fair and strong embattled tower in his house, and embattling the walls of the house, in a manner made it a castle, and even to this day it is the glory of the town buildings in Fowey.” The present possessor has, however, added considerably to the beauty of this “right fair” mansion, by completely restoring whatever might be defective in the existing parts, and by completing, or perhaps by improving, the original plan.

The late Mr. Philip Rashleigh, who represented Fowey 47 during the greater part of a long life, added to his character of a most respectable country gentleman, the well-deserved reputation of a skilful and zealous naturalist, more especially in the department of minerals, to which, as a Cornish man, his attention would be more particularly directed. Mr. Rashleigh led the way in Cornwall as a collector, on a large scale, of the interesting and curious products of the mines, and left at his decease perhaps the most valuable collection of minerals belonging to any individual throughout England. Geology had not acquired the semblance of a regular science when Mr. Rashleigh directed his attention to the metallic ores, and to the chrystallography, not of Cornwall alone, but of all parts of the known world. He has given to the public two volumes of coloured engravings from his choicest specimens.

Mr. Rashleigh attained a good old age, with the satisfaction of witnessing the progress through life, in various lines, of the younger branches of his family, with the highest credit to themselves, and of leaving his ample property to a nephew in all respects worthy of receiving it.

For various further details respecting Fowey, the Editor must refer to the recent Histories of Cornwall.

Mr. Lysons gives an ample account of the descents or alienations of manors; and a very curious letter from Lord Thomas Cromwell to the Prior of Trewardreth, dated on the 21st of May, but without the insertion of any year, probably, however, not long before the dissolution. See p. 109 of Lysons’s Magna Britannia, vol. iii. Cornwall.

A considerable property was accumulated about the middle of the last century by two brothers, natives of this town, of the name of Lamb. One filled the office of Collector of the Customs at Fowey, the other practised medicine at St. Austell; both left their fortunes to an only sister, who after their deaths, and late in life, married Mr. Graham, a gentleman from London; through whom the property has passed to his nephew, Thomas Graham, Esq. Sheriff of Cornwall in 1806, a magistrate for the county, 48 and resident within the limits of Fowey, where he has built a new and handsome house.

The parish of Fowey measures 1,726 statute acres.

giving an increase of 53 per cent. in 30 years.

Present Vicar, the Rev. John Kempe, instituted 1818.

Latitude of the Windmill near Fowey 50° 20′ 7″. Longitude 18ᵐ. 30ˢ. west. High water at the full and change of the moon 5ʰ 20ᵐ.

THE GEOLOGY, BY DR. BOASE.

This parish appears to be situated entirely in the calcareous series, near its junction with the porphyritic; and thus its rocks are very similar to those at the entrance of Falmouth Harbour.

HALS.

Is situate in the hundred of Lesnewith, and has upon the north St. George’s Channel, or the Irish Sea, east Minster, west Trevalga, south Lantegles. For the name it is Saxon Fara bury, i. e. the far off hiding or burying-place, being a promontory of land shooting far out into the sea. Otherwise Fara-bury may be interpreted as a fair or beautiful burying-place. (See Buryan.)

In the Domesday Roll it was taxed either under the jurisdiction of the Botterell, now Botreaux, or Tollcarne, now 49 Minster. In the taxation of Benefices made by the Bishops of Lincoln and Winchester, 1294, Ecclesia de Farabury, in Decanatu de Trigminorshire, was valued xxs. In Wolsey’s Inquisition, 1521, 4l. 12s. 8d. The patronage formerly in the Prior of Hartland, Lancells, or Minster, who endowed it, and passeth in presentation and consolidation with Minster. The patronage now in Amye; the incumbent Amye; and the parish rated, together with Minster, to the 4s. per pound Land Tax, 1696, 98l. 7s. 4d.; of which parish, in the first Inquisition (1294), I thus read: Abbas de Hartiland percepit de Eccles. Farabury p’ an. viis. Prior de Morton (percepit) per annum in eadem vis.

TONKIN

thinks that this name means fare bury. The patronage in Edward Amy, Esq. as heir of Sir John Cotton. The incumbent James Amy, his brother.

THE EDITOR.

This is the least extensive parish in Cornwall. It probably owes its existence to the monastic establishment in the adjoining parish of Minster, with which, as a benefice, it has long been consolidated. The church is situated very near to the sea, and commands an extensive view of the romantic cliffs forming that iron-bound coast, with Lundy Island in the horizon. The name is sometimes written, and I believe always pronounced, Fotherbury.

This parish measures 432 statute acres.

giving an increase of 156 per cent. in 30 years.

GEOLOGY, BY DR. BOASE. 50

This little parish is formed by a belt of high and precipitous hills, and is principally composed of a very interesting rock. It is of a dark colour, does not alter in the streak, and abounds in iron pyrites; it is a kind of shale, and in the cliff, not far from the church, contains a layer of some carbonaceous mineral, to the intimate diffusion of which the colour of this rock appears to be owing. The section of the hill by the road side, from the church to Valancey Bridge, exhibits the layers of this rock convoluted and contorted in a most extraordinary manner; and the same appearance is beautifully illustrated in the cliffs at the entrance of Boscastle harbour.

HALS.

Is situate in the hundred of Powdre, and hath upon the north St. Just in Rosland, east Verian, west St. Anthony, south the British Channel. For the modern name, Gerans, whether it be so called in memory of Geruncius, a king of the Britons, successor of King Rimo, that lived a hundred years before King Lud, according to Galfridus’ Chronicle, or if from Ferint ab Erbyn, one of King Arthur’s admirals at sea, I cannot determine; especially for that, in the Domesday Tax in Cornwall, 20th William I. 1087, this district, St. Just, and St. Anthony, all passed under the name of Ros-land, or Tre-gara-due, now the Bishop of Exeter’s manor of Tregare (of which more under) and Elerchy.

51 In the Taxation of Benefices in Cornwall aforesaid, 1294, Ecclesia de Sancto Gerando, in Decanatu de Penryn, is rated xl. porcionis Rectoris in eadem xlvis. viiid.; porcionis Prioris Sancti Antonii in eadem xlvis. viiid. From whence it is evident that the Bishop of Exeter, lord of Penryn, and the Prior of St. Anthony endowed this church, the one half as a Rectory, the other as a Vicarage, viz. that of the Prior’s part. For the name of this church in the Inquisition aforesaid, St. Gerandus, whether it may not possibly relate to one St. Gereon, a Roman whose feast is October 12. In Wolsey’s Inquisition, 1521, it is valued 15l. 6s. 0½d. by the name of Gerens. The patronage in the Bishop of Exeter; the incumbent Fowler; and the parish rated to the 4s. per pound Land Tax, 1696, by the name of Gerance, 156l. 16s. 4d.

Tregeare, in this parish, was the voke lands of the Bishop of Bodmin, now the Bishop of Exeter’s great lordship, so called. In the Domesday Book for Cornwall, 20th William I. 1087, it is named Tregara-an, id est, the town of the friend, or lover, of God. Concerning the possession of this manor, by virtue of the Bishop of Exeter’s lease, there happened a costly and troublesome suit, both in law and equity, between Edward Nosworthy, Esq. then in possession thereof, and Hugh Trevanion, of Treligan, Esq. in the latter end of the reign of Charles the Second, James the Second, and part of the reign of William the Third (as I was informed). The case being thus:

The tenure of those lands being copy of Court Roll, or freehold for life, the Bishop of Exeter, the lessor, grants to the lessee a fee-farm lease of the said manor, for three lives absolute: and so, by custom and law, each of these lives named in the said lease are entitled to the land successively after each other’s death, and have power successively in like manner to grant copies of court roll to the under-tenants of those lands absolute for three lives, to succeed each other. Now it happened that Trevanion bought the remainder of one of those lives, in reversion, of 52 Nosworthy or some other first life named in the Bishop’s lease; after the death of whom, Trevanion’s right by custom commenced; who accordingly delivered ejectments upon the lands and tenements of the said manor, by consent and approbation of the Bishop of Exeter for the time being, and brought down a trial at Launceston on the same, where the issue passed for Trevanion.

Thereupon Nosworthy filed his bill in chancery, prays a writ of injunction to stop further proceedings at common law, and to be relieved in the premises; where, after many commissions for examination of witnesses, and hearing of the merits of the cause in favour of Nosworthy’s title, it passed for him. The plaintiff Trevanion thereon prays that another issue at law might be directed out of Chancery to try this matter; which accordingly being granted, upon the issue it again passed for the plaintiff, and afterwards, as before, upon all hearings in Chancery it passed against him, by the universal opinion and judgment of the Lord Chancellors and Lord Keepers for the time being: “That it was contrary to equity and good conscience that any person, who was only named a life on the bishop’s lease, to the farmer of the manor, or the lives named on the farmer’s lease, or copy of court roll, to under-tenants, without ever paying a farthing consideration of money, should sell or carry away the original lessee’s estate, who pays a valuable consideration for it, or from his heirs or assigns after his death.” So that, in fine, Nosworthy’s title was confirmed by a decree in Chancery. But, as I said before, the cost of this controversy pro and con lasted so long, and proved so chargeable, as was very conducing to the ruin of both those gentlemen’s estates, (vide Cargoll in Newland,) Nosworthy absconding into Holland, and Trevanion procuring himself to be made one of the Poor Knights of Windsor.

It was the happiness of Cornwall, in the latter end of the reign of Charles the Second, to behold Mr. Justice Dolben, appointed for two or three Assizes one of the Judges Itinerant 53 for this county, who so discouraged the injustice, delay, and frivolousness of many Cornish law-suits, and so uprightly and succinctly, upon proof of matters of fact and law, directed the jury as to their verdict, that there was little or no occasion for the wrangling and jangling arguments of counsel at the bar. He further told the people in general, that he admired how they should be so weak in judgment, as to be persuaded into so many lawsuits in this province, wherein was nothing but pride, heat, mistakes, or malice, by the advice and direction of lawyers and attornies, whose trade and occupation was only to get money, without regard had to the merit or success of their causes longer than their client could dispense with cash. Upon those and the like arguments of this upright and conscientious judge, the number of our Cornish trials was much abated, and fell from a hundred and sixty venire facias brought to about seventy; so that it was generally hoped by this means we should have had as few lawsuits depending in this as in other countries, or that all controversies would be ended by references amongst ourselves, and that it would be said of the Court of Common Pleas by commission transmitted to Launceston, as was said of the Court of Chancery when Sir Thomas More was Lord Chancellor thereof, tempore Henry VIII., who by his upright judgment, and discouragement of trivial Chancery suits, had ended all causes depending therein, so that the clerks and counsel had no more business there to do; whereupon one made this rhyme:

But, alas! this good Judge Dolben soon after, by the attornies and lawyers of the Western Circuit all in confederacy together, as the shrine-makers of Diana at Ephesus against St. Paul, prompted a petition to Charles the Second against him, suggesting that the overhasty proceedings of 54 this judge, and his discouraging lawsuits, tended not only to the damage of his Majesty’s revenues proceeding from lawsuits in those parts, but to their great prejudice, hurt, and damage, in point of their support and livelihood, as having little else besides their profession and practice of law to subsist by; which petition Charles the Second taking into further consideration, against the next assizes he ordered the clerk to leave Judge Dolben’s name out of the commission of oyer and terminer, and then he was never more seen in those parts. Since which time the judges that come this circuit are content to hear with great patience the loud, reflective, perplexed arguments of counsel upon trials of small moment and concern, if not to suffer themselves to be at some times imposed upon in point of law and evidence therein, by the importunate arguments of topping serjeants-at-law, according to the magnitude of the fees they receive from their clients; so that it is become a proverb among those men in this province, it matters not what the case be so the client hath store of money.

Tre-ligan, or Tre-ligon, in this parish, (i. e. the legate, nuncio, or ambassador’s town, perhaps the rector’s,) is the dwelling of the said Hugh Trevanion, Gent. a branch of Caryhaye’s family. He married Crossman, the relict of Courtney of Penkivell, and had issue by her —— Trevanion, Gent. his son and heir, whose estate being greatly depressed by his father’s debts and lawsuits aforesaid, hath sold his patrimony, and is by Hugh Boscawen, Esq. Privy Councillor to William the Third, promoted to be one of the Poor Knights of Windsor as aforesaid.

Ros-teage, in this parish, (i. e. the valley house, or fair valley,) is the dwelling of Nicholas Kempe, Gent. that married Sprye; his father Williams of Probus; his grandfather Budge. Ther arms, Gules, within a bordure engrailed three garbs Or.

At Tre-wince, (i. e. the under town, or town exposed to the weather,) is the possession of Nicholas Hobbs, Gent. that married Kempe; his father Prouse; and giveth for his arms, three eagles displayed Purple.

TONKIN. 55

Most of the lands in this parish, if not the whole, are either part of the manor of Tregear, or are held from it. This hath been, ever since the first erection of the see, in the Bishop of Cornwall, and in the united bishopric seated at Exeter. It has for many ages been held by different gentlemen under the Bishops, on leases for lives.

The family of Nosworthy held it for some time; the last of which family, Edward Nosworthy, Esq. assigned it, a few years before his death, to Henry Vincent, of Trelevan, Esq. but Mr. Nosworthy, who was the last life, dying suddenly at Dunkirk in 1701, it fell into the Bishop’s hands, then Sir Jonathan Trelawny, who granted a new lease of it in trust for his own family, with whom it now resteth. But the barton was separated from the manor and granted apart, as it was in the time when Nosworthy held the manor, to the Trevanions of Trelegar, between whom and the Nosworthys arose a great lawsuit, as is related by Mr. Hals.

Near to this barton is Trewithian, that is, the town of peace. In this village Mr. Edward Cregoe hath lately built a good house. He married Sarah, the daughter of John Foot, of Treleyassick, Gent. and is lately dead, leaving a young widow and three sons, of which the eldest is christened Friend.

To the south of this is Trelegar, the downy town. This is likewise a large village, at one end of which stood the seat of a younger branch of the Trevanions of Carhays. Hugh Trevanion, who was engaged in the expensive lawsuit with Mr. Nosworthy, had a son, Hugh Trevanion. This gentleman was so reduced as to become Governor of the Poor Knights of Windsor. The father sold Trelegar, in the latter end of Charles the Second’s reign, to Stephen Johns, Esq.

56 Between Trelegar and Trewithian is a double round Danish intrenchment, which being very high, the middle serves for a beacon, by which name of Beacon it is called.

To the westward of Trewithian is Tregalravean, that is the small miry dwelling; and such it really is. This place has recently been leased by copy of court roll from the manor of Tregear, to Edward Hobbs, Gent.

Roseteage. This is rightly interpreted by Mr. Hals, the fair or beautiful valley; and its delightful situation doth fairly entitle it to this appellation.

This place, in the reign of Elizabeth, and of James the First, was the seat of Reginald Mohun, Esq. a younger brother to Sir William Mohun, of Hall, and a captain under Sir Walter Raleigh. This gentleman never marrying, sold the barton (which is held from the manor of East Greenwich, in Kent, by the payment of three peppercorns yearly when demanded,) with the royalty of wreek, and in November 1619, the 19th year of James the First, to Nicholas Kempe, Gent. who was the younger brother of Humphrey Kempe, of Lavethan, in Blisland, Esq. who is the chief of that name in Cornwall.

THE EDITOR.

Since the splendour of the Bishop’s residence has disappeared, if it ever existed, Roseteague has been, without all comparison, the leading place in this parish, and indeed few more beautiful situations can any where be found. It continued in the family of Mr. Kempe from the year 1619 till about 1780, when Roseteague was purchased by Mr. Harris, of Rosewarne, in Camborne, aad given by him to Mr. Richard Harris, one of his younger sons; but this gentleman having remained single, the estate has reverted to the only daughter and heiress of the eldest son, William Harris, Esq. Sheriff of Cornwall in 1773, married to Henry Winchcombe Hartley, Esq. of Berkshire.

57 Trewince, situated on a hill northward of Roseteague, and separated from it by a deep valley, is also a place well deserving of notice. An extremely good house was built here about the year 1750, by the grandson or great-grandson of the gentleman who made the purchase of Trelegar from Mr. Trevanion, and it is now inhabited by his grandson.

The church commands an extensive prospect from an elevated piece of ground, and contains a splendid monument to the family of Hobbs; and near the church still exists a public bowling-green. Bowling appears to have been the favourite amusement of gentlemen residing in the county up to a later period than the middle of the last century. A weekly meeting used to be here numerously attended during the summer, but as most landed proprietors then occupied a portion of their own estates, it was an invariable rule to discontinue their pastime when the appearance of a single Arrish Mow, indicated the more important avocations connected with harvest.

Mr. Hals has noticed that a Bishop of Exeter endowed this church, the one half as a rectory, the other as a vicarage. This division was effected in a very unusual manner, although in one not quite without example. Instead of apportioning the tithe of corn to the rector, and all other portions, as small tithes, to the vicar, the whole has here been divided into equal shares; so that Mr. Johns, of Trewince, the lay impropriator, is entitled to one-twentieth of every thing titheable, and the incumbent to another twentieth.

On the coast eastward of the church town is a village called Polskatho, or Porthskatho, the boat-harbour; and here an extensive fishery is carried on, more especially for mackarel. This place, with the manors of Pettigrew and Nanquitty, belongs to J. S. Enys, of Enys, Esq. and they have been long possessed by this very ancient and respectable family.

The barton of Tregeare was purchased in 1712 of the Hoblyns of Bradridge, by Samuel Kempe, Esq. of Carclew. 58 In 1765 it was leased by Frederick Bishop of Exeter, on lives, to Nicholas Kempe, Esq. of Rosteague, of whom it was purchased in 1767 by his cousin Nicholas Kempe, Esq. of Chelsea, and it remained in 1823 in the possession of John Kempe, Esq. of Newington, Surrey. The Kempes sold Rosteague to John Harris, Esq. in 1780.

Trewithian is now vested in Matthew Garland Cregoe, Esq. who married Anna Coryton Kempe, eldest daughter of the late Arthur Kempe, Esq. Admiral of the White.

The Kempes of Cornwall were derived from the knightly family of Kempe, of Olantigh, in Wye, in Kent; Richard Kempe, Esq. grandson of Sir William Kempe, Sheriff of Kent 20 Henry VIII. is the first of the family recorded to have settled at Lavethan, in Blisland.

Gerans measures 2,460 statute acres.

giving the unusual result of a diminution, although extremely small, on the population, 5 on 771, or about ⅔ per cent. in 30 years.

GEOLOGY, BY DR. BOASE.

The rocks of this parish belong to the same series as those of St. Anthony in Powder. On the eastern side of Porthskatho Cove the blue slate is very much curved and contorted; and is intersected by innumerable quartz veins, which are exceedingly irregular, and partake much of the same arrangement as the laminæ of the slate. Here also occur, interstratified with the slate, beds of a compact blue rock, which is very hard, and effervesces with acids, occasioned by particles, and minute veins or strings, of calcareous spar. In the cliff also may be seen a small patch of conglomerates, and red sandstone of the most recent formation, such as is common on these shores.

HALS.

Is situate in the hundred of Eastwellshire, and hath upon the east Landrak and Saltash, north Menhynet, west Morvall, south Shevyock, and the British Channel; as for the name of this parish it is derived from the tutelar guardian of the church, St. German, Bishop of Anticiodorum in Gallia, now France, anno Dom. 425. Whether this name be derived from the Latin Germanus, i. e. come of the same stock, very like or natural; or the adverb Germaine, brother or a very brother; or from Garnan or Gernan, Saxon German, signifying altogether a man, or a complete and entire man; I must leave to others to resolve.

At the time of the Domesday Tax 20 William I. 1087, this district was taxed either under the jurisdiction of Abbe one, i. e. Abbey Town, or Cudan-woord, of which more under. In Liber taxationum omnium beneficiorum in Cornubia, folio 148, Ecclesia Sancti Germani, in Decanatu Sancti Germani, by the Bishops of Lincoln and Winchester 1294, was valued towards the Pope’s Annates 10l.; Vicar ejusdem xls. But before the statute 15th of Richard the Second, against wholly impropriating vicarages, the revenues of this church were wholly impropriated by the convent, and only 14l. per annum deducted towards maintenance of two vicars to serve the cure, for which reason it is not named in Wolsey’s Inquisition 1521. The patronage formerly in the King of England, afterwards in the Abbat and Prior of St. German’s. The incumbent Kendall, the rectory or sheaf in possession of Glanvill, and the parish rated to the 4s. in the pound land tax 1696, 649l. 6s. 8d. The now minister’s chancel of this church was a chapel, founded and endowed by King Athelstan, at such time as he was in Cornwall, anno Dom. 930 (see Burian 60 and Bodman) and dedicated to St. German, of which fact thus speaks Roger Hoveden, a priest of Oxford, in his Annals of the Kings of England, anno Dom. 1200, p. 160.

“Rex Athelstanus in potestatem Anglorum dedit unum mansionem Deo, ad fundandum monasterium pro monachis, et Sancti Germani fratribus canonicis ibi famulantibus in Cornubia, anno Dom. 930,” i. e. King Athelstan, being in full possession of all England, gaue to God one mansion, tarrying, or abiding place, for laying the foundation of a monastery of monks, and for St. German’s canonical brothers and servants in Cornwall. He also enriched with jewels, money, or lands, every considerable abbey in this land. Baker’s Chron. p. 10.

This Abbey of St. German’s was afterwards endowed with larger revenues by King Canute, anno Dom. 1020, who turned it, after ninety years continuance in monkery, to a collegiate church of secular canons, which might marry wives, converse in the world, as not tied to a monastic life, first introduced by St. Berinus, Bishop of Dorchester, anno Dom. 635; that is to say, a society or corporation of religious men, under the government of a dean, warden, provost, and master, to whom belonged clerks, chaplains, singing men, or choristers. Of those men, the gloss upon the Canons Clementine tells us, that secular priests have no certain order or fashion of apparel appointed them, forasmuch as there is no express mention made in any canon, neither of the colour or form thereof, by which two differences the other several orders of religious men and women are distinguished or discerned.

In this Abbey of St. German’s, anno Dom. 986, Bishop Stidio placed the see or seat of his Cathedral Church, (for Bodman was before burnt by the Danes,) which he and his successors enjoyed till the year 1032, at which time Livignus, first a monk of Winchester, afterwards Abbat of Tavistock, then made Bishop of Kirton, by King Canutus, who after the death of Berwoldus, the thirteenth Bishop of Cornwall, prevailed with that King to annex the bishopric 61 of St. German’s, thus translated there, to his bishopric of Kirton, and turned this college of secular priests into a priory of Black Canons Augustine, from whence afterwards Leofrick, chaplain to King Edward the Confessor, 1049, by licence, consent, and approbation of that King, removed both those bishoprics to Exeter. And this fact of Kirton is more manifest from the missal or mass book of the said Leofrick, given to the church of Exeter.

This Monastery or Abbey of St. German’s, founded by King Athelstan, was as aforesaid by King Canute turned into a collegiate church of secular canons, over which a prior was governor or ruler, who, after he had endowed the same with lands and revenues, King Ethelred the Second having before given Bishop Stidio, to recompense his loss by the Danes, the great lordship of Cunan Boake, still pertaining to the Bishop of Exeter (see Prince’s Worthies of Devon, p. 9) he ordained many good laws which sound thus in English:

“We will and command that God’s Ministers, the Bishops, Abbats, Priors, &c. do in especial manner take a right course and live according to rule, that they call to Christ night and day much and oft, and that they do it earnestly: and we further command that they hearken to God, and love chastity; full truly they wit that it is against the right to meddle with women.” Canute’s Laws, No. 6.

The word abbat is derived from the Hebrew abba, pater, for that he is the father or governor of his monks, who together make up a spiritual society or corporation. Some abbats were elective by the convent, others presentative, and under this title also was comprehended other corporations spiritual, as a prior and his convent, friars, canons, and such like; and as there were lord abbats so there were lord priors, who had exempt jurisdiction, and were lords of parliament, and what consecration is to a bishop, the same is benediction to an abbot or prior, but in different respects, for a bishop is not such before consecrated, but an abbat or 62 prior, being elected or confirmed, is properly such before benediction.

Some abbats were mitred from the pope, and so exempt from the bishop’s jurisdiction, as having granted them from him episcopal authority; and if either abbats or priors were called by the King’s writ as barons to parliament, they were called abbats and priors sovereign; see statute 9th Richard II. chap. 4. But, alas! neither this Abbat of St. German’s, nor the Prior of Bodmin, nor any other in this province, was either a baron of Parliament or a mitred man, but were all subject to the visitation and spiritual government of the Bishop of Exeter, till 23d Henry VIII. when all those orders of religious men were dissolved.

In this abbey of St. German’s, anno Dom. 1040, in the time of Lurginus Bishop of Kirton, lived Hucarius, commonly called the Levite, as Bale and Pits, in their writings of Britain, tell us; either for that he assisted the priest at the altar as the Levites of old did, and was more excellent, or did excel all others in that particular; otherwise, by the appellation Levite we must understand him a priest, and that he was universally famous in performing his function of preaching and divine service. Certain it is, he was a holy and learned man, (according to the laws of King Canutus aforesaid,) as the 110 homilies or sermons, and many other books which he wrote, declare; but whether he was a native of this province or not, I know not.

This Priory of Canons Augustine was dissolved 26th Henry VIII. and its revenues valued per annum 243l. 8s. according to Speed and Dugdale’s Monasticon Anglicanum.

This borough town of St. German’s, as Mr. Carew saith, mustereth many inhabitants, and sundry ruins, but little wealth; occasioned either by abandoning their fishing-trade, as some conceive, or their being abandoned of their religious people, as others imagine. It appears to have been the voke lands of a manor before the Norman Conquest; since it is rated in Domesday Roll, 20th William I. 1087, by the name of Abbytone, i. e. abbey-town, (for that 63 before that time it was a monastery or abbey of monks,) and consists of a Portreeve and forty Censors; and the Portreeve yearly chosen, in the manor court, by the major part of the Censors. And the Members of Parliament are in like manner elected by the major part of them, and the precept from the Sheriff for their election, (as also to remove any action at law depending in this to a superior court,) must be thus directed: “Præposito et Seneschallo Burgi nostri de St. Germanᵒ, in Comitatu Cornub. salutem,” &c. Note, that in old British, reve, reeve, is rent, tithes, or revenues. Port-reeve is the bearer or gatherer of the gate or borough rent.

The arms of this priory are only the letters G. P.

It is further privileged with a weekly market on Friday, and a fair yearly, August 1.

The history of St. German. He was a native of Gaul, about the year of our Lord 380, born of wealthy, rich, and Christian parents, by whom he was bred up and baptized into the Christian religion. After which he followed the study of the liberal arts and sciences, and so profited therein that he was generally noted for a very learned man. But that which made him most famous was his piety and virtue; wherein he so far excelled most other men of his time, that he could not be at rest, or have peace in himself, till he made known his propensions to a religious course of life. Whereupon he was admitted into deacon’s orders, then into priest’s, and lastly advanced to the dignity of Bishop of Antiscidorum, or Auxerre, in France, anno Dom. 425.

After he took upon him the office of a bishop, he discharged the same with great justice and piety, admitting none into orders within his jurisdiction, but such as were men of great learning and sound faith, but especially such as were neither Arians nor Pelagians. For about that time the Christian church was grievously pestered with two heretics; the one Arius, born and bred at Constantinople; the other an inhabitant of Britain, viz. Pelagius.

64 But the doctrines of Pelagius manifesting themselves throughout this land, to the great disturbance of the orthodox faith and churches thereof, after great heats and animosities between Catholics and heretics about those doctrines, it was at last agreed upon between those parties that a General Council of the Clergy in Britain should be convened at St. Alban’s, in Hertfordshire, and those tenets further examined and discussed. But the British Catholics, knowing the interest, skill, and subtlety of the heretics to be great, thought it not safe for religion, and the orthodox faith, in this convention to trust alone to their own skill and learning, therefore concluded on this expedient, viz. against the day of meeting to send for some foreign divines for their coadjutors or helpers in this controversy; and accordingly applied to St. German, Bishop of Antiscidorum aforesaid, or Auxerre, in Gallia, now France, a city situate upon the river Auxona, now called Le Disne, and Lupus, Bishop of Troyes, in that country, for their counsel and assistance, who gladly granted their request; and accordingly against the day, and at the place appointed, met the British Clergy on both sides; where the tenets and doctrines being heard, and particularly examined, chiefly by the skill and learning of St. German, were all refuted and condemned, according to the sense of the General Councils, as impious and heretical, to the great satisfaction of the orthodox clergy.

After this dispute and council ended, St. German, as a good bishop, resolved, though out of his country and diocese, whilst he stayed here, to preach the Gospel publicly, and to that end caused a pulpit to be set up in an open place at St. Alban’s, (so called from St. Alban, the Briton, martyred there under Dioclesian, anno Dom. 303,) anciently Verulam; where on set days he preached to the multitude there assembled, and first began to handle the doctrine of Pelagius against original sin, taking for his text the words of St. John the Evangelist: “If we say that we 65 have no sin we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us.” Upon which subject he shewed that the doctrine of Pelagius was contrary to the writings and doctrines of Moses and the Prophets.

These and the like words and preachings of St. German seemed so angelical and full of power to the Britons, that generally they were convinced of Pelagius’s errors, and abandoned their former opinions; and in testimony of their unfeigned respect and remembrance of him, in the very place where he preached at St. Alban’s, they erected a chapel, and dedicated it to the honour of God, in the name of St. German; which chapel was extant (and still bears his name) tempore James I. though misapplied to profane uses. (See Camden, in Hertfordshire.) After St. German had thus preached down Pelagianism at St. Alban’s, he travelled through Britain, Wales, and Scotland, on the same account, as our chronologers tell us; and that, in the place where Oxford stands, he preached six months against the heresies aforesaid. That he was in Cornwall upon the same account I doubt not, since there is still extant in this parish whereof I treat, a large church bearing his name. He was in Wales, for Camden, in Flintshire, informs us a field bearing his name, called Mars Garman, i. e. German’s field, in memory of a battle there obtained by the Welch over the Picts, on the prayers of St. German, and by crying Hallelujah! To him also is ascribed the building or augmenting Landaff cathedral there, and dedicating it to St. Delyan, if there be not a mistake in the chronology thereof, St. German, as appears to me, being dead before Delyan.

That he preached in Scotland, is evident from his meeting and converse with Patrick, born at Bluisdale, in that country, who became his disciple, and afterwards the apostle of Ireland.

This priory-house, before its dissolution, was called Porth-Prior, or Port-Prior, synonymous words, signifying either the prior’s creek, cove, or haven. It is now, after the name of its owner, transnominated to Port or Porth-Eliot, 66 who derives his title thereto from Champernowne, as he did by a boon from King Henry the Eighth.

These gentlemen I take to be of Scots original, and so denominated from the local place of Eliot, near Dundee, in Scotland, and their descent of later time from the Eliots of Devonshire, Berkshire, or Cambridgeshire, of which last county one Sir Thomas Eliot, Knt. was Sheriff 24th Henry VIII. also in 36th. This gentleman wrote a book called Defensorium bonarum Mulierum, The Defence of good or virtuous Women. But that which made him most famous was, (to the disgrace of the critics and clergy that get their livings by the liberal arts and sciences, he being only a layman,) he wrote and composed the first Latin and English Dictionary that ever was seen in England, about the year 1540. Upon whose stock and foundation Bishop Cooper and others built and grafted all the Latin and English dictionaries now extant in Britain. He died in Suffolk, 1546; and upon the foundation, rules, and observation of this my Parochial History of Cornwall, it will be very easy for any other person to make a better and more perfect History thereof.

Those gentlemen settled here about the middle of Queen Elizabeth’s reign, and there ever since flourished in this place in genteel and worshipful degree, serving their king and country in the several capacities of Justices of the Peace and Members of Parliament for their Borough of St. German’s; and amongst them, in particular, it were great injustice to forget the memory of that worthy patriot Sir John Eliot, Knt. for his bold asserting the prerogative and privilege of Parliament, the freedom and liberty of the subject, in the House of Commons, against the arbitrary and despotic power of the British Monarch, then exerted and setting up by the Attorney-general Noye and others, temp. Charles I. as before it had been done by Cecil Earl of Salisbury temp. James I.: for which reasons and arguments of law he was committed prisoner to the Tower of London by order of that King, where he died, without payment of the 2,000l. 67 fine laid upon him, but not without suspicion of poison, about the year 1638.

Edward Eliot, Esq. is now in possession of this estate. He married the daughter of Craggs.

Bake, in this parish, is the dwelling of the ancient and gentle family of the Moyles; so called, I presume, from the local place of Moyle, in or about St. Minvor, who have flourished here for several generations in worshipful degree, ever since they married with the sole inheretrix of this name and place; originally descended, as I am informed, from the Moyles of Tresurans, in St. Colomb, or the Moyles of Bodmin. The present possessor, Sir Walter Moyle, Knt. son of John Moyle, Esq. Sheriff of Cornwall 22 James I. that married Morrice, giveth for his arms, in allusion to their name, Gules, a moyle (or mule) passant Argent.

I take Thomas Moile, Esq. Speaker of Parliament 34th Henry VIII. 1543, ancestor of the Moyles of Oxford and Kent, whose name, blood, and estate is terminated in the Finches, to be a younger brother of this family, or those of his.

Colt-dryn-ike, in this parish, i. e. dry neck lake, leate, or riveret of waters, (perhaps so called from some lake or leate that intermits its current in summer season,) is the dwelling of Jonathan Trelawney, Esq. one of his Majesty’s Commissioners of the Peace, a younger branch of the Trelawneys of Poole and Trelawne houses, and therefore giveth the same arms which they do. Since the writing hereof this gentleman is dead without issue; and his second brother, my very kind friend, Major John Trelawney, Fort Major of the royal citadel of Plymouth, succeeded to his estate.

Millin-ike, alias Melin-ike, i. e. the mill lake, leate, or bosom of waters, (so called from some river and a mill heretofore thereon,) was the dwelling of William Scawen, Esq. that died without issue.

The name Scawen is local, and signifies a place where 68 skawan or elder trees grow, (as I have said before,) and is derived from the Japhetical Greek, σκοβιεμ, sambachus, ebulus, the elder-tree, who, suitable to his name, gives for his arms, Argent, a scawen or elder-tree Vert. This is an ancient and mere British family of gentlemen, as their name implies.

Hendre, in this parish, (i. e. the old or ancient town,) is the dwelling of the gentle family of the Hancocks; particularly William Hancock, Esq.

Catch-French, in this parish, was the seat of the Keckwitches, originally descended from the Keckwitches of Essex, gentlemen heretofore also of considerable estates in those parts, now by ill conduct wasted, so that this barton was sold by John Keckwitch, Esq. temp. Charles II. to Hugh Boscawen, Esq. who settled it upon his daughter Bridget, married to Hugh Fortescue, of Filley, Esq. now in possession thereof. George Keckwitch, Esq. of this house, was Sheriff of Cornwall 17th of Elizabeth, as was also his son George Keckwitch, Esq. 33d of Elizabeth. He was also a Commissioner of the Peace temp. James I. who gave for his arms, Argent, two lions on a bend Sable, coticed Or.

TONKIN.

The town of St. German’s lieth to the southward of Port Eliot, but adjoining with it, and between that and Cuddenbeck: but as Browne Willis, in his Notitia Parliamentaria, has given a particular description of this town and parish, of which he was the most capable, having married his lady out of it, I shall here insert what he has said thereof:

“Its first return of Members to serve in Parliament, was in the session held by proclamation in the 5th year of Queen Elizabeth, A. D. 1562, at which time their having Representatives was questioned; however, Mr. Speaker declared in the House that the Lord Steward agreed that they (i. e. the two Members) should resort there with all 69 convenient speed to show their letters patent, whereby they be returned. In this indenture the returning officer is called the Mayor, but in the next, and in all other records, the Portreeve; which magistrate is yearly nominated and chosen at the lord’s court-leet, held about Michaelmas by his steward, who impannels a jury for that purpose. As to the choice of Members of Parliament, all the inhabitant householders have votes, that have lived a year within the borough, the bounds of which do not extend very far, and only comprehend about fifty or sixty houses lying near the church, and not the whole vill of St. German’s, great part of which is without the borough, as is the rest of the parish. It is styled in some writings Cuddenbeck Borough; a privilege which it might perhaps have obtained from Walter Bishop of Exeter, temp. Henry III. when Penryn seems to have been made a borough; and from this example the Prior, with the assistance of the Bishop, might also have dignified in like manner the vill of St. German’s, though neither of them, anno 30th Eliz. when they certified respecting their liberties, and claims of privilege, as of markets, fairs, &c. styled this place otherwise than the manor of St. German’s; nor have I met with it under any other denomination than till Queen Elizabeth’s time, or seen any record mentioning its incorporation, nor any other charter of privileges granted thereunto; though the inhabitants have a tradition that they had an ancient charter, which was unfortunately stolen from them by a person imprisoned by the Portreeve, who is by prescription bailiff of the town, and may make what house he pleases within the borough, his prison. As to a description of this borough, called by Carew ‘a church town,’ it mustereth, as that author tells us, sundry ruins, but little wealth.”

Browne Willis gives the following account of the Priory:

“After the removal of the bishoprics from Crediton and from this place to Exeter, A. D. 1050, Leofric, the first Bishop of Exeter, changed the seculars of this collegiate church, founded by King Athelstan, and endowed by 70 King Canute, into Black Canons, between whom, and his new-erected episcopal see, the manor of this town was divided; and it stood upon that establishment at the time of the Norman invasion, as appears from Domesday Book, which informs us, that the manor or parish of St. German’s consisted of twenty-four hides, whereof the Bishop of Exeter had twelve, and the Canons of that place twelve also. What belonged to the Bishop was valued at 81s. per annum, and what belonged to the Canons at 100s. Domesday also shews us, that in this manor there was then a market on the Lord’s Day; but it became reduced to nothing, by reason of that of the Earl of Morton’s being very near, which I conceive might have been kept at Trematon, that Earl having privilege of a market at his castle there. That such was the state of this town and parish at the time of the Conquest, is plain from the above-stated record; and the division into two manors continues to the present day, the Bishop’s moiety being held by lease for three lives by Edward Eliot, Esq. proprietor of the other manor; whose predecessors have probably ever since the dissolution of the monasteries been farmers, or lessee tenants, to the See of Exeter, by virtue of which lease, as this manor is vested in them, so the other, belonging to the Priory, has thus descended since the surrender thereof, dated March the 2d., anno 30th Henry VIII. when Robert Swimmer, the last Prior, with seven Monks, yielded up the same into the King’s hands, who not long after, by letters patent dated March the 10th, anno regni 33, A. D. 1542, granted to John Champernoun, John Ridgeway, and Walter Smith. Among other lands, the site, &c. of this priory, upon partition, came to John Champernoun’s share, whose heir sold it, about thirty or forty years afterwards, to Richard Eliot, Esq. my wife’s ancestor, in which family both those manors yet continue: which place, soon after Mr. Eliot had made the purchase, was named Port Eliot, since when this appellation has so far prevailed that Port Eliot has been inserted in maps, as if it was a particular vill. This family flourished for eight 71 or ten generations in Devonshire, before their transplanting themselves hither, and had matched into several considerable families in that county, as the Sigdons, Cotlands, Bonvilles, Sumasters, Fitzes, Careswells, &c. Walter Eliot was returned among the gentlemen of Devonshire anno 1433, temp. Henry VI. And to this family, as it should seem by the arms, was allied Sir Richard Eliot, made by King Henry the Eighth one of the Justices of the King’s Bench, who was, as I take it, father to the famous Sir Thomas Eliot. Richard Eliot seated himself here, where he lived (as Carew tells us) in great hospitality. He left issue John Eliot, born and baptized here April 20, 1592. This John, A. D. 1607, became a gentleman commoner of Exeter College, Oxford, which place leaving about two or three years after, he went to the Inns of Court, and May the 10th, 1618, received the honour of knighthood, and was all his lifetime after a member of the succeeding Parliaments, in one of which, 3d. Charles I. he was chosen knight of the shire for Cornwall. He was a very plausible speaker in the House of Commons, as his speeches published testify, but, being a virulent enemy to the Court, often suffered confinement, and died in custody in the Tower of London; and, as appears by the inquisition on the 27th of November, 8th Charles I. A. D. 1632, leaving issue John, his son and heir, then twenty years old. This John was born at Port Eliot, and baptized October 18th, 1612, where he died and was buried March the 25th, 1685, leaving an only son, Daniel Eliot, my father-in-law, who departed this life about the sixtieth year of his age, and was buried among his ancestors October 28th, 1702. This gentleman, in regard that he had only one daughter, named Katherine, bequeathed his estate, in order to keep up the name of his family, to Edward Eliot, grandson to Nicholas Eliot, fourth son to Sir John Eliot, Knight, aforesaid.”

Mr. Browne Willis then goes on to state respecting the remains of the monastery.

“The Priory fronts the river, now called, as above 72 noted, Port Eliot. It is a handsome large building, containing several spacious rooms, and has a court before it, adorned with a strong pier by the present proprietor, Edward Eliot, Esq. who has much beautified the whole building.” Since Mr. Willis wrote the above, almost the whole of the ancient building has been taken down, so that except the refectory, now called the gallery, very little remains.

In the 26th year of the reign of King Henry the Eighth, this place had an honour bestowed on it (little taken notice of, if not altogether forgotten), by being established by Act of Parliament the see of a suffragan bishop for the county of Cornwall, in the diocese of Exeter.

The advowson of this church, together with the impropriate rectory, late the possessions of the priory, valued at 61l. 13s. 4d. per annum, were granted by King Edward the Sixth to the Dean and Chapter of Windsor, in whose hands they now continue.

THE EDITOR.

St. Germanus is among the most celebrated saints of the fourth and fifth centuries, having gained his reputation by furiously opposing the unpopular doctrines of Pelagius; at the same time that he adopted all the brutalizing austerities, which in those days conveyed power, influence, and reputation to all who practised them.

Pelagius maintained that Almighty God has been pleased to bestow on mankind, from their births, power and inclination to execute his will, and to render themselves acceptable in his sight; while the orthodox supported, on the contrary, a doctrine more analogous to the practices of earthly despots and tyrants, by declaring that such powers were capriciously given, by little and little and from time to time, branding their opponents with an accusation, well suited to the understanding of those from whom distinction could then be obtained, namely, that Pelagius set up man 73 as independent and in opposition to God; forgetting or concealing that the free gift was and must have been the same in both cases, differing only in the manner after which it is bestowed. Perhaps the arbitrary disposition of fiefs, commencing about that period, afforded an additional analogy for assimilating the practices in heaven to those on earth, while appeals to the capricious exercise of arbitrary power afforded evidently the most ample field for vehement declamation. The saint is stated in his legend to have sprung from an illustrious family, and, while the appellation implied a real office, to have been made Duke of a Roman province, and in that capacity to have been leader of the troops, with whom he obtained repeated victories, and acquired the just reputation of an able warrior. He also excelled in the chace, but neither his skill in military stratagems nor in the devices of the field, could protect him against falling into an ambuscade laid by St. Amator, Bishop of Auxerre, who, having learnt from a dream, that the young Duke should succeed to the bishopric, enticed him into the church, and then, securing the doors and passages, imposed on him the tonsure, with the order of a deacon. Germanus appears to have submitted with perfect resignation to this important change in the whole tenor of his life, and adopting the line afterwards pursued by Sir Thomas of Canterbury in regard to spiritual matters, and that in respect to his wife, which enrolled King Edward the Confessor in the list of saints, he soon obtained a reputation so high as to point him out as the most proper person, first to succeed St. Amator, as Bishop of Auxerre, in fulfilment of the dream, and then to go on a spiritual crusade against the Pelagians of Britain. He accordingly embarked, accompanied by St. Lupus, in the midst of winter, and soon encountered a violent storm, raised, it would seem, on purpose to evince the divine mission of these two saints, for, on their throwing some holy water into the sea, it immediately subsided.

Saint Germanus and St. Lupus not only preached with 74 such power as to astonish and to convince whole congregations, too large for any building to contain, but they gave sight to the blind, cast out devils, and raised the dead. St. Germanus was even induced to assist the faithful in the way of his original profession; for a Pagan army of Northmen and Picts invading the Christian provinces, the saint took the command of such persons as he found willing to defend their country, and having selected a place suited to his purpose, either by naturally possessing an echo, or by receiving it miraculously from his prayers, he there awaited the enemy, and on their approach shouting three times Alleluiah, and the whole army joining with their utmost might, the divine sounds, repeated and enforced by the reverberation on all sides, so terrified the assailants as to drive them into immediate flight, with the casting away of their arms, who were, in consequence, readily and safely pursued with great slaughter, through the whole space separating them from their fleet, none being spared but such as had the grace instantly to acquiesce in a method of conversion so clear, so powerful, and so coercive.

St. Germanus and St. Lupus soon afterwards left Britain, in the full confidence of having suppressed the heresy; but so obstinate and perverse were the people, that it broke out with increased violence, the circumstance of Pelagius being their countryman having probably more weight with the inhabitants than the arguments on either side, as in modern times all German Protestants are followers of Luther, as those of France are invariably of Calvin.

On receiving this intelligence, St. Germanus made a second voyage to Britain, armed with a small box of relics, suspended round his neck by a leathern string, which acting in aid of his own inherent sanctity, produced a train of miracles more wonderful even than those of the first expedition. Success of course attended him; and when the work of conversion was complete, he deposited the box of relics in the shrine of St. Alban, to be preserved for future use, if the seeds of heresy should again vegetate, taking in 75 exchange some ashes of the British protomartyr. He then finally left Britain, returning to his diocese of Auxerre, on the confines of Burgundy; but on the way he encountered a second Pagan army, employed by the Christian Emperor of Rome to ravage the saint’s province, in revenge for some popular insurrection. The saint succeeded, however, in converting the general, with all his forces, and then proceeded to Ravenna, in Italy, to obtain a pardon for the offenders. In this he was also successful; but having now filled the measure of his earthly services, and, as was usual in such cases, having predicted the hour of his own dissolution, he expired at Ravenna, in the odour of sanctity, on the last day of July, A. D. 448. His remains were brought back to France, with all the honours due to the successful leader of any party, spiritual or temporal, and they were finely enshrined in the oratory of St. Morice, which he had founded at Auxerre, and where an abbey has since been built. Various places in Britain were dedicated to him as to their tutelar saint. Of these the abbey of Selby was on the largest scale, and the priory in Cornwall distinguished by his own name, held the next place; although a chapel near the church of St. Alban, where he had triumphed in a general disputation with the heretics, became most celebrated, multitudes flocking there, as to St. Mary of Walsingham, for remission of their sins.

The ancient Priory of St. German’s has again assumed a new form since the time of Mr. Tonkin, in consequence of Mr. Richard Eliot having greatly increased his fortune by marrying Harriet, daughter of James Craggs, Secretary of State in the time of King George the First. This gentleman, and still more his son, Mr. Edward Craggs Eliot, who obtained an hereditary seat in Parliament, after representing Cornwall in the House of Commons, added so much to the place, by enlarging the house, by embanking against the sea, and by laying out the grounds, as to make it one of the first among gentlemen’s seats in the West of England. The 76 statute referred to by Mr. Tonkin, for conferring the honour of a suffragan see on this town, in the 26th Henry VIII. c. 14, passed in the year 1534, by which it is declared that Thetford, Ipswich, Colchester, Dover, Guilford, Southampton, Taunton, Shaftesbury, Molton, Marlborough, Bedford, Leicester, Gloucester, Shrewsbury, Bristow, Penrith, Bridgewater, Nottingham, Grantham, Hull, Huntingdon, Cambridge, Pereth, Berwick, St. Germain’s, and the Isle of Wight, shall be taken and accepted for sees of Bishops Suffragans, to be made in this Realm. This statute appears to have been very little if at all acted on; but two of the towns, Gloucester and Bristol, as is well known, became the seats of independent bishoprics.

At Bake lived Mr. Walter Moyle, of whom Cornwall has reason to be proud. He represented Saltash in the reign of King William; but, notwithstanding several successful efforts in the House of Commons, Mr. Moyle retired to his family seat, and past the remainder of his time in learned leisure, where he died in 1721, not having completed his fiftieth year. Most of his works were published separately, but in 1727 came out in London, “Works of W. Moyle that were published by himself; with some account of his life and writings, by Anthony Hammond, Esq. 8vo.” His works were principally:

An Argument, showing that a Standing Army is inconsistent with a free Government.

Translations from Xenophon.

The Miracle of the Thundering Legion explained.

A Charge to the Grand Jury at a Sessions in Liskeard.

Letters to Dr. W. Musgrave, of Exeter, on subjects of Criticism and Antiquity.

A Dissertation upon the Age of Philopatris, a Dialogue commonly attributed to Lucian.

Letters to and from Mr. Moyle on various subjects.

Remarks on Prideaux’s Connection of the Old and New Testament.

77 Democracy Vindicated; an Essay on the Constitution of the Roman Government.

Bake now belongs to Sir Joseph Copley, whose grandfather, a brother’s son of Mr. Walter Moyle, having married the heiress of Copley, of Sprotborough, in Yorkshire, assumed her name.

Aldwinnick is the property of Mr. Charles Trelawny, son of Mr. Edward Trelawny, who acquired it under the will of Mr. Charles Trelawny, who died in 1764, the last male descendant of their branch of the family. Mr. Edward Trelawny’s original name was Stephens.

Catchfrench was till lately the residence of Mr. Francis Glanville, Member some time for Plymouth. This gentleman’s ancestors purchased Catchfrench from the Fortescues more than a century ago. Mr. Glanville has given it up to his son, and on quitting the county he has carried with him the regret of every one in it.

Much obloquy having been cast upon Sir John Eliot, by a misrepresentation on the part of his political adversaries, of an affair in which sudden passion very probably caused him to act in a manner different from what would have been his conduct under other circumstances, I will add a narrative of the occurrence, taken from Lord Nugent’s Life of Hampden.

“In a letter in the possession of Miss Aikin, written by an ancestor of one of the most respectable families in Devonshire, the cause and course of the quarrel are given, as described by the daughter of Mr. Moyle himself, a witness not likely to be unjustly partial to Sir John Eliot.

“Mr. Moyle having acquainted Sir John Eliot’s father with some extravagancies in his son’s expenses, and this being reported with some aggravating circumstances, young Eliot went hastily to Mr. Moyle’s house, and remonstrated.

“What words passed she knew not; but Eliot drew his sword, and wounded Mr. Moyle in his side. On reflection,” continues Mr. Moyle’s daughter, “he soon 78 detested the fact, and from thenceforward became as remarkable for his private deportment, in every view of it, as his public conduct. Mr. Moyle was so intirely reconciled to him, that no person in his time held him in higher esteem.”

The editor cannot induce himself to believe that an English gentleman, a patriot, and ultimately a martyr in the cause of national freedom, could have formed and endeavoured to execute a plan for deliberate assassination; he is, moreover, unwilling perhaps to believe it of one who married the heiress of his own paternal family. It would be unfair, however, not to state that Mr. D’Israeli,[3] one of the most intelligent and candid of modern writers, and of the highest authority, has found in the course of his miscellaneous researches, various documents placing this transaction in a point of view much less favourable to Sir John Eliot, than would be inferred from Lord Nugent’s account of it. The editor, however, continues to hope that these documents are coloured, at least, by the party spirit of times immediately preceding civil war, when all occurrences, private as well as public, receive their tincture from contending factions.

St. German’s measures 9,029 statute acres.

giving an increase of about 27½ per cent. in 30 years.

GEOLOGY, BY DR. BOASE. 79

This extensive parish is entirely situated within the calcareous series. On the northern part it touches the serpentine of Clicker Tor; and from thence to the sea-shore it exhibits many repetitions of clay slate, of calcareous schist, and of black limestone. An extensive quarry of the latter rock, near Trerule Foot, shews the nature of this limestone. It is of a dark-blue colour, compact, and rather hard; and in some parts of the mass it is very glittering, in consequence of the numerous shining facets of calcareous spar disseminated throughout. This rock abounds also in veins of calcareous spar, and the whole may be traced passing gradually into the adjacent calcareous schist.

In this tract beds of compact, and of schistose hornblende rocks, are also found, such as are common in this series of rocks at Saltash, at Padstow, Veryon, and at various other places.

[3] For the extraordinary “Apology of Sir John Eliot” regarding this “hasty and unpremeditated act of violence,” as Lord Eliot has judiciously described it, see Mr. D’Israeli’s “Commentaries on the Life and Reign of Charles the First,” vol. iv. p. 512. It must be also observed, that the fact was published by Echard, in the life-time of Dean Prideaux, who had communicated it to that historian. For other particulars hitherto unknown respecting the interesting character of Sir John Eliot, the reader may be referred to an historical pamphlet, entitled “Eliot, Hampden and Pym,” by the author of the “Commentaries.”

HALS.

Is situate in the hundred of Kerryer, and has upon the north St. Erth; south and east St. Breage; west St. Hilary. In the Domesday Tax (20 Will. I. 1087), it was rated under the jurisdiction of Lan-migell, i. e. Michael’s Temple or Church, now St. Michael’s Mount. In the Inquisition of the Bishops of Lincoln and Winchester, 1294, Ecclesia de Sancto Gordon in decanatu de Kerryer, is valued viiil. In Wolsey’s Inquisition, 1521, it is valued, together with Breock, Cury, and Gonwallow, in all 33l. The patronage formerly, as I take it, in the Prior of St. Michael’s Mount, who endowed them. The Incumbent Trewinard. The rectory or sheaf in the possession of ——; and the parish, rated to the 4s. per pound Land Tax, 1694, 40l.

In this parish stands Godolphin-Ball. This is that inexhaustible mountain, or tin-work, which for some hundreds of years hath afforded its owners or lord, the Lamburns, Stephens, Navas, now Godolphins, and other adventurers, several thousand pounds worth of tin.

TONKIN.

In this parish stands Godolphin, or Godolphin-Ball, from whence the lands thereof were denominated de Godolphin; who for many ages have had a considerable augmentation of their paternal estate by the casualties of tin from thence issuing. The same is a barren mountain, of pretty large extent and great height; and, although wrought for tin at the least during three hundred years, seems still, like the widow’s cruise of oil and barrel of meal, to increase in the using, for, notwithstanding the incredible quantities of tin that have been taken thence in former ages, it still affords employment, and pays the wages, with 81 some overplus, of at least three hundred men throughout the year.

The name of this parish is derived from its patron St. Germow, or Germach, said to be an Irish king, who came over with St. Breage. St. Germow is there buried, and his tomb or chair is still to be seen in the churchyard.

THE EDITOR.

Mr. Hals has given the history of St. Gordian at very great length, to whom, without the slighest authority, he assumes this church and parish to have been dedicated. I have omitted the whole, as entirely unconnected with Cornwall, and because the very existence of such a saint is at the least doubtful. The writers of legends now content themselves with stating that some one of that name was beheaded at Rome in the year 362, as appears from the ancient Martyrologies; that his body lay many centuries in a cave, together with the remains of St. Epimachus, brought there from Alexandria, and that both relics are preserved in the Benedictine Abbey of Kempton, in the diocese of Ansbury.

The tradition of St. Germoe having been a king in his native country, is cherished by the inhabitants up to the present time, and they point to his tomb or shrine in the churchyard, with an evident feeling of their being elevated by his dignity.

But, on whatever grounds the ancient claims of this parish may rest to a canonized or to a royal patron, the village of Bojil has in modern times bestowed more real honour on the whole district, than could be derived from regal missionaries or from legendary saints.

In the parish register of Breage may be seen the following entry: “William, the son of William Lemon, of Germo, was baptized the 15th day of November, 1696.”

I have endeavoured, but without much success, to collect 82 information respecting this very extraordinary man. It appears that his father and mother, whose maiden name was Rodda, were in a situation of life raised above the common level, and that they bestowed on their son the best education easily attainable, who on his part became eminently distinguished among his companions. If young Lemon ever, therefore, employed himself in executing the inferior labours usually performed by mining boys, as some have alleged with the view of increasing the wonder of his subsequent progress, and others impelled by less laudable motives, it is clear that they must have been undertaken from a desire of making himself practically acquainted with all the details of perhaps the most delicate operations in metallurgy.

His bodily strength and firmness of mind seem to have been commensurate with those abilities, which displayed themselves most conspicuously in after life. Within my recollection, the people of Breage and Germoe were fond of relating that Squire Lemon in his youth made the foremost link of a living chain, which, connected only by the grasp of their hands, extended itself into a tremendous surf, and rescued various human beings from a watery grave.

At a very early age, Mr. Lemon became one of the managers of a tin-smelting house at Chiandower, near Penzance; and the career which he pursued with so much ability and success, was traced for him at this place.

The ancient mining of Cornwall, like that of Banka in the present day, had been confined for a long succession of ages to merely collecting diluvial deposits of tin ore, which, from its great specific gravity, is always found beneath every other debrit, and immediately incumbent on the solid rock, or unmoved strata, provincially called “the Fast.” As the first operation invariably consists in washing away the lighter ingredients, by agitating the whole in streams, which never fail of gliding through the vallies where alone these deposits are found, the name “stream-work” has 83 been adopted, to distinguish these sources of tin from mines which descend on the lodes themselves.

Mines invariably grew out of the stream-works, but with a progress so very slow as scarcely to be imagined by persons conversant only with the rapid improvements of modern times. Pits were at first sunk on the backs of lodes, till the presence of water impeded the work. Shallow adits, or drains, were obviously used in favourable situations, and the windlass, with its bucket and rope, must be of great antiquity. To this succeeded the rack and chain pump, identical with those still used in large ships; but the span beam and cage, moving on a perpendicular axis, by which the labour of horses became applicable to what had previously been done by the human arm, are so very modern, that the Editor remembers a carpenter who used to boast that he assisted in making the first whim ever seen westward Hayle.

A new era had, however, now commenced. The steam-engine, which consists essentially in a piston alternately sliding through a cylindrical vessel, invented by Mr. Newcomen, of Dartmouth, had been used at least on one mine, called the Great Work, in Breage, when Mr. Lemon came forward, gifted with the ability and the energy which enabled him to anticipate, by nearly half a century, everything that could add to the wealth and to the prosperity of his native county.

Mr. Lemon first associating himself with Mr. George Blewett, of Marasion, and with Mr. Dewen, commenced working a mine on a farm called Trowel, in the parish of Luddvan, the property of Lord Godolphin, and named Whele Fortune, where the second steam-engine was used. Capital was of course requisite for the undertaking, and that is said to have been supplied to Mr. Lemon by his marriage. It appears, from the register of Gulval, that “William Lemon and Isabel Vibert were married April the 22d, 1724.” The Viberts were among what are termed the good lines in Gulval parish, and Mrs. Lemon had recently 84 succeeded by will to the property of Mrs. Elizabeth Noles her godmother, and probably relation, who had acquired a fortune by some business at Chiandower.

But fortune, except perhaps for its timely supply of capital, was the least of Mrs. Lemon’s recommendations; uniform report has represented her as entirely worthy of the very extraordinary person to whom she was united.

Mr. Lemon is said to have gained from Whele Fortune ten thousand pounds; and, thus enabled to execute more extensive plans, he removed to Truro, and commenced working the great Gwennap mines, on a scale never witnessed before, and perhaps never contemplated, in Cornwall. Cavnon Adit was either actually commenced, or at the least was effectually prosecuted, by Mr. Lemon; a work unrivalled for extent or for utility in the mines of England, and his exertions increasing as his means enlarged, Mr. Lemon soon became the principal merchant and tin-smelter of Cornwall. But the energies of his mind were not limited to these undertakings, great as they were; he cultivated a taste for literature, and, what is extremely unusual, acquired, amidst business, and at a middle age, the power of reading the Classic authors in their original language. In the year 1742, we find his name in the list of Sheriffs. He became one of the magistrates of Truro, and might have represented the borough in Parliament. He obtained from Government a drawback of the duty on coal used in mines, when Sir Robert Walpole, then at the head of public affairs, complimented him on the clear and able manner in which he had made every statement; and a present of silver plate from Frederick Prince of Wales, as Duke of Cornwall, is preserved in his family.

About the same time he was mainly distinguished as “the great Mr. Lemon;” but, above all, so strongly were the impressions received of his abilities, his exertions, and general merit, that a progress so rapid and unexampled does not appear to have excited envy, or any of those bad passions which usually alloy the enjoyments of prosperity.

85 Mr. and Mrs. Lemon had but one son, and no daughters. Mr. William Lemon, Jun. married Ann, only daughter of Mr. John Willyams, of Cannerton, near St. Colomb, and sister of the late Mr. John Oliver Willyams, many years Colonel of the Cornwall Militia. He died at an early period of life, and several years before his father, who lived to the 25th of March 1760, and is buried in Truro church, where he had built by far the largest and most decorated house in the town. He had also purchased and improved Carclew, since become the family seat.

The younger Mr. William Lemon left two sons and a daughter. The elder of the sons, Sir William, represented the County of Cornwall in Parliament during fifty years, and commanded the regiment of militia. The second son, John, became a Colonel in the Guards, represented Truro, and commanded the Miners’ Militia. The daughter married Mr. John Buller, of Morval, near Looe.

As instances of the respect paid to the commanding genius of Mr. Lemon, the people of Truro are said to have drawn back from their doors or windows as he passed through the street. And the Rev. Samuel Walker, a respectable although a fanatical clergyman, exhorting the children to be circumspect in the presence of Almighty God, incautiously added, “Only think, my dear children, how careful you would be if Mr. Lemon were looking upon you.”

The parish of Germow measures 1,062 statute acres.

giving an increase of 87 per cent. in 30 years.

GEOLOGY, BY DR. BOASE.

The geology of this parish is identical with that of Breage, of which in fact it forms a part, occupying only a segment of the Godolphin Hills.

HALS.

Is situate in the hundred of Lesnewith, and hath upon the north the Irish sea, west St. Juliot, east Jacobstow, south Otterham.

In Domesday Roll, 20 William I. 1087, this district was taxed under the jurisdiction of Otterham. In the taxation of benefices, made by the Bishops of Lincoln and Winchester, 1294, into the value of benefices in Cornwall, Ecclesia de Sancto Genesy, in Decanatu de Trigmajorshire, is rated c.s.; Vicar ejusdem £iiii. vis. viiid. In Wolsey’s Inquisition and Valor Beneficiorum, St. Genis is taxed £8. The patronage in ——. The incumbent Crew. The rectory or sheaf in possession of —— and the parish rated to the 4s. per pound Land Tax, 1696, £160. 6s.

TONKIN

has not added any thing to the little said by Mr. Hals.

THE EDITOR.

It seems to be quite uncertain to whom this parish is dedicated.

There was a St. Genesius, or St. Genes, of Auvergne in France; he exterminated heresies and founded monasteries. His festival is kept on the third of June, and he is said to have died in the year 662. Such were the heroes of those days, and therefore he may possibly have been selected as patron of this church.

Mr. Lysons states that Treveeg, formerly a seat of the Yeos, is now the property of Lord Eliot, and that the 87 great tithes, with the advowson of the vicarage, have passed to him with the priory of St. German’s.

The Yeos were persons of consequence in the north of Cornwall and of Devonshire; they bore arms, Argent, a chevron Gules, between three birds.

Mr. Lysons further states that the manor of St. Gennis was for some time the property of Treise, from whom it passed by marriage to Morshead. It must since have been sold in the general wreck of that family.

Lord Rolle has also a manor in this parish. And another manor, called Treworgy, (a name common in Cornwall, and meaning a house or village on a stream,) belonged to the Priory of Canons of the Order of St. Augustine, founded at Launceston by William Warlewast, Bishop of Exeter from 1150 to 1159, in the time of King Stephen and of Henry the 2d..

Treworgy appears among the lands of this priory in the roll of 31 Henry VIII. preserved in the Augmentation Office; where it is stated as then paying the following sums, £4. 13s. 7d., £3. 17s., and 6s. 8d.

This is one of the manors given to the Duchy of Cornwall, in exchange for the manor of Wallingford, and it has been held for a long time under the Duchy by the family of Braddon.

One of this family, Captain William Braddon, was an officer of some distinction on the Parliamentary side in the Civil War. He is buried in the chancel of this church, where some verses to his memory begin with these lines:

Henry Braddon, his son, or grandson, has the following verses:

This parish is said to afford an excellent specimen of the 88 romantic scenery distinguishing many portions of the north coast, from Cornwall, through Devonshire, to Somersetshire. The cliffs are bold, and the land is intersected by deep narrow vallies.

The parish of St. Gennys measures 5350 statute acres.

giving an increase of 27½ per cent. in 30 years.

The Rev. John Symmons, Vicar, was presented by Sir W. Molesworth in 1783.

THE GEOLOGY, BY DR. BOASE.

The whole of this parish is situated on the massive and schistose varieties of Dunstone, which are so prevalent in the northern parts of Cornwall and Devon. The Dunstone is in general very silicious, and it thus constitutes high and barren hills. A very curious variety of this rock occurs at Tresparret Down. It is in a state of decomposition, but when it is broken numerous hard rounded nodules fall out, having uniformly small crystals of pyrites in their centres. The same rock, in an unaltered state, forms the cliff on the left side of Crackington Cave, near the church, where it is inclined at an angle of 40°, having the entire surface covered with projecting nodules, which give it a blistered appearance not unlike that of hæmatites.

HALS.

Is situate in the hundred of Powdre, and hath upon the north Lanlivery, east part of Foye Harbour, south Foye town, west Tywardreth.

89 At the time of the Norman Conquest this district was taxed under the name of Tywardreth, or Lan-tine. In the taxation of benefices made by the Bishops of Lincoln and Winchester, 1294, in this province, the church is not named, probably it was not then extant, or not endowed; neither is it mentioned in Wolsey’s Inquisition 1521, or Valor Beneficiorum, so that I take it to be wholly impropriated under Tywardreth. However, 24 Henry VI. St. Sampson’s was rated to the Cornish clergy’s fifteenths 35s. Carew’s Survey of Cornwall, page 91. It was endowed by the prior of Tywardreth. The patronage now in Barret, the curate or vicar Hosken, the sheaf or rectory in Barrett. The parish of St. Sampson’s was rated to the 4s. per pound Land Tax, 1696, temp. William III. £103. 2s.

Pen-coit, alias Pen-coid, alias Pen-quite, all synonymous words, signifying head or chief wood, or head of the wood, is a name given and taken from the once natural circumstances of the place, from whence was denominated an ancient family of gentlemen, surnamed de Pencoit. And here lived John de Pencoit, temp. Henry III. and Edward I. who held one acre of land in Lamellyn of 5s. price, (that is to say a Cornish acre, consisting of 60 statute acres) for making and keeping the king’s grey coat when he came into Cornwall, due out of Cabulion, from Peter, the son of Orger. [Carew’s Sur. Corn. p. 45. See also Pengelly in St. Breock, Pyder, and Warliggan.]

This barton is now the dwelling of John Barret, esq. Sheriff of Cornwall 3 William III. whose ancestor is said to have come out of Normandy with William the Conqueror, 1066, an ensign under Colonel Henry de Ferrers, commonly called Henry Earl Ferrars, son of Wakelyn; to whom the Conqueror gave the castles of Tutbury in Staffordshire, and Oncomb in Rutlandshire. Since which time this gentle family of Barrets have flourished in this county in good fame and reputation for above twenty descents. The present possessor of Pencoit married Kendall of Medroff, and giveth for his arms, Gules, a bend Varry.

90 In this parish is the dwelling of Reginald Couch, gent. Attorney at Law, that married Vincent of Creed; his father, Hawkey of St. Wenowe.

TONKIN.

How these names of Glant or Golant prevailed over that of St. Sampson I am not able to determine, unless perhaps it was the primitive name thereof before the parish church was erected, consecrated, and endowed to God under the name of St. Sampson. For in Cardinal Wolsey’s Inquisition, and in Carew’s Survey, it is called St. Sampson.

The name Golant is obviously compounded of Gol, holy, and of lan, a church. (Mr. Whitaker remarks that Y-Gol, by the Holy One, is still an oath in Cornwall.)

THE EDITOR.

Mr. Hals has given a very long and uninteresting account of St. Sampson, the patron saint of Golant, involving a dissertation on the antiquity of archbishops.

He is reported to have commenced his ecclesiastical career by the practice of ascetic observances, in due time he became the chief of a monastic institution, from whence he was taken to be Archbishop of York; but the north of England being at that time ravaged by the northern pirates, he was driven from thence, and going over into Brittany he founded a monastery at Dal, and became the first Bishop of that place, where a see was created at his request by Pope Pelegius the First, who honoured him moreover personally with the pallium or pale. He was present at the Second Council of Paris, held in 557, and died about the year 564. His remains were enshrined at Dal, but when the Normans began in the tenth century to invade and pillage Neustria, these barbarians, equally hostile 91 to the saint alive or dead, obliged his brethren to remove the relics to Paris, where they are supposed to have been preserved up to the period of the great revolution.

Penquite was acquired by purchase about the beginning or towards the middle of last century from the Prestwoods, by Mr. Rashleigh, of Menwhilly, by whom a perpetual lease was soon after granted in favour of a relation, which has since passed through various hands.

Mr. Lysons says that the manor of Lentyon in this parish, belonged to the Montacutes Earls of Salisbury.

It appears from Dugdale’s Baronage that this property was seized by king Henry VIII., on his judicial murder of the last Plantagenet, Margaret Countess of Salisbury. It now belongs to Mr. William Rashleigh, who is impropriator of the great and small tithes, and appoints the perpetual curate, in right of the monastery of Tywardreth.

A castle is said to have belonged to this manor, but no traces of it remain; the appellation seems indeed to have been very loosely applied in the latter part of our feudal times, so as frequently to indicate no more than the residence of a chief.

The village round the church, or, according to the expression used in Cornwall, “the church town,” is always called Golant. The houses are situated in a romantic cross valley, nearly where it terminates in Fowey River.

The inhabitants boast that in this village was established the first boarding-school for young ladies that appeared in Cornwall, and they call the attention of visitors to these peculiarities connected with this church:—“That it has a fire-place within it; that a well of water flows over in the porch; and that a tree in the churchyard o’ertops the tower.”

This parish measures 1340 statute acres.

giving an increase of 86 per cent. in 30 years.

The Rev. Thomas Pearse was presented to St. Sampson’s chapel in 1815, by W. Rashleigh, Esq.

THE GEOLOGY, BY DR. BOASE.

The rocks of this parish are intermediate between those of the porphyritic and calcareous series: on the northern part passing into the former, which are better developed as they pass on towards the granite in Tywardrath; on the southern part the rocks begin to assume the character of the calcareous series, which is complete in Fowey.

HALS.

Is situated in the hundred of Kerryer, and hath upon the north Peran-Arwothan, east Mylor, west Mabe, south Budock. Here was an endowed church or chapel, or place of jurisdiction, before the Norman conquest; for in the Domesday Roll, 20 William I. 1087, Gluvias is rated as such. In the taxation of benefices in Cornwall, made by the Bishops of Lincoln and Winchester, 1294, Ecclesia de Sancto Gluviano, in Decanatu de Penryn, is rated xls. In Wolsey’s Inquisition, 1521, it is valued together with Budock, in 21l. 16s. 9d.; before which time it seems those churches were united and consolidated by the Bishops of Exeter, the patrons and endowers thereof; the incumbent Collyer; the rectory, or sheaf, in possession of 93 Enys; and the parish rated to the 4s. per pound Land Tax, 1696, 132l. 11s.

Roscrow is the dwelling of Alexander Pendarves, Esq. that married the Lady Dorothy Burke, daughter of the Earl of Clanricarde, and afterwards the daughter of Colonel Granville; his father Carew, his grandfather St. Aubyn, his great-grandfather (Roberts of Truro); viz. Samuel Pendarves, Esq. Sheriff of Cornwall, 19th James I. who gave for his arms, Sable, a falcon rising between three mullets Or; originally descended from the Pendarves of Pendarves, or Constenton, as I am informed.

Roscrow gave name and origin to an old family of gentlemen surnamed Roscrow, whose heir, about the time of Richard II. was married to one of the Seneschalls of Holland, where John de Seneschall held by the tenure of knight’s service part of a knight’s fee of land, 3 Henry IV. (See Carew’s Survey of Cornwall, p. 40.) from whence it appears also that Luke, the son of Bernard Seneschallus, was by letters mandatory, or a mandamus, made one of the Barons of the Exchequer, by King Richard I. (See his arms under Gwendron.)

Innis, Enys, Ennis, is an island or place encircled with water, in this place to be construed as a river island; where two rivers in their confluence meet, and shape the land between them in form of a corner, or triangle; from which place was denominated an old British family of gentlemen now in possession thereof, surnamed Enys; particularly John Enys, Esq. that married the inheritrix of Gregor of Truro, his father Pendarves, his grandfather Winifred, daughter and coheiress of Thomas Price, of Trewardreva; and giveth for his arms, Argent, three water enets Vert, creatures frequently seen in the rivers by which those lands are insulated.

A great number of places, or lands, in Cornwall, under the like circumstances, are from thence denominated Enys, Ennis, and Ennys in St. Erme, Roach, Luxsilian, Peransand, taken some times with other words.

94 Gosose river, in this parish (the slow-wood river), situate upon Gosose creek of the sea: from whence was denominated Gosose tenement, the native place of Captain Henry Carverth (i. e. rock-strength, or car-veth, rock-grave), who being bred to sea affairs and navigation in his youth, was taken into the service of King Charles II. in the beginning of his Dutch and French war, 1665, to whom he gave the command of a frigate, in the several engagements of the Dukes of York and Albemarle in their sea-fights with those nations; wherein he demeaned himself so well in point of valour and conduct, that after those wars were ended he was chosen one of the standing Captains under the Earl of Ossory, for which he received about 300l. per annum salary, during his life, which ended about the year 1684, when he had a military interment in this church: who dying without legitimate issue, left his brother, Thomas Carveth, of this place, gentleman, his heir and executor, who giveth for his arms, Argent, a chevron between three talbots Sable. Those gentlemen, from living at Carveth, or Carverth, in Mabe, were transnominated from Thoms to Carverth; as another family of those Thomses, from living at Carnsew, in the said parish, were transnominated to Carnsew; and there are some deeds yet extant dated tempore Henry VIII. which will evidence the truth of this fact, as Mr. Carverth told me.

Between the parishes of Budock and Gluvias, on a promontory of land shooting into the sea creek of Falmouth harbour, between two vales and hills, where the tide daily makes its flux and reflux, stands the ancient borough of Penrin, or Penryn, a name given and taken from the natural circumstances of the place; and by the name of Penrin it was taxed as the voke lands of a considerable manor in Domesday Roll, 20 William I. 1087. (See Brin, Bryn, in Withell.)

This place I take to be the Οκρινυμ (Ocrinum) of Ptolemy. The town was a privileged manor, with a court leet, before the Norman Conquest; and in the year 1230 95 King Henry III. granted a charter to William Brewer, Bishop of Exeter, then lord thereof, as his successors still are, in right of the bishopric of Bodman, or Cornwall, long before annexed to Exeter. (See more in Lanwhitton.) It was also incorporated by King James I. by another charter, consisting of a Mayor, Recorder, and Portreeve, eleven Magistrates, and twelve Assistants; with liberty to send two of its members to sit in the Commons’ House of Parliament, to be elected by the majority of those that are freemen, and pay rates and taxes. It is also, amongst many other things, appurtenanced with markets weekly, upon Wednesdays and Saturdays; fairs on May 1, July 7, December 21; and of old had free warren in all the King’s lands. The arms of this town are a Saracen’s head couped at the shoulder, and crowned, or environed, with a laurel.

The precept from the Sheriff on the Parliament writ, as also to remove an action at law depending in this leet to a superior court, must be thus directed: “Majori et Burgensibus Burgi sui de Penrin in Comitatu Cornubiæ salutem,” otherwise, “Proposito, Ballivis, et Burgensibus Burgi sui de Penryn;” and to remove an action from the court leet of Penryn foreign: “Senescallo et Ballivis manerij de Penrin forreigne salutem.”

But, alas! notwithstanding all its privileges, our Cornish historian, Mr. Carew, in his time, tells us that on the top of a creek Penrin town hath taken up its seat; rather passable than notable for wealth, buildings, or inhabitants. Though now, tempore Charles II. I take it to be much altered for the better in these particulars, and to be parallel with, or equal therein, with any other town in Cornwall. And, moreover, I look upon it as the most commodious, pleasantly situated, and healthful borough within that province, it being situated upon a hill, and having continually passing through its streets a useful river of water, and through the gardens and orchards of the town, behind the street-houses on each side, pass two considerable mill-leats, or rivers of water, met daily by the flux and reflux of the sea.

96 Where, on the south of this town, on one of those rivers, Walter Brounscomb, Bishop of Exeter, 1260, at a place called Glasnith, or green-ford, so named from the estuaries, or ebbing and flowing of the sea under it, founded and endowed a collegiate church of Black Canons, or Canons Augustine, that could not marry wives, consisting of twelve prebends and a dean; “Clerici tresdecem, personæ discretæ,” are the very words of the leger book of its foundation; and then endowed and confirmed all by a charter in these words, as translated from Bishop Brounscomb’s original Latin.

“To give to God, the blessed Virgin Mary, and St. Thomas of Canterbury, in Budock, Penryn, and Glasnith College, and his thirteen canonical brothers and their successors, all lands, woods, meadows, waters, pastures, mills, laws, rents, and courts, and all things to the same pertaining, to possess, have, hold, and enjoy for ever. This agrees with the register,

Robert Michell, Register, 1611.”

Afterwards this collegiate church, thus founded and endowed, and dedicated to the Virgin Mary and Thomas Becket, Archbishop of Canterbury, received a greater augmentation of wealth, lands, and revenues from John Grandison, Bishop of Exeter, 1358, who had persuaded all rich priests of his diocese to make him his heir and executor, in order to build and endow churches with their riches; which trust, in a great measure, he performed to his lasting credit and renown; so that at length, amongst others, this collegiate church’s yearly revenues, at the suppression, 26 Henry VIII. was valued at 205l. 10s. 6d. according to Speed and Dugdale’s Monasticon Anglicanum, now worth 1200l.

This collegiate church is now entirely demolished. Since the beginning of this century there was one of its towers standing, but it is lately pulled down, and a dwelling-house built in the place where it stood.

97 Bishop Brounscomb died 1280, and lies buried in his cathedral church of Exeter.

The chief inhabitants of this town of Penrin are Mr. Hallamore, Mr. Worth, Mr. Hearle, Mr. Kempe, Mr. Bloyse, Mr. Melhuish, Mr. Vellhuish.

The Lady Jane Killigrew, of Arwinick (see Falmouth), for some protection and favour shewn her in her troubles by the Mayor of this town, gave a silver cup and cover to the Mayor of this town and his successors for ever, containing about three quarts, and about 12l. value, whereon is this inscription: “From Mayor to Mayor, to the town of Penryn, when they received me in great misery.

Jane Killygrew, 1613.” (of which before).

TONKIN.

After transcribing, with little variation, what has been stated from Mr. Hals, Mr. Tonkins adds,

Enis, in this parish, gave name to an old family of gentlemen from thence, denominated de Enis; that is to say, of this island; for innis, ennis, enys, signify in Cornish, an island, and also a tongue of land where two rivers meet.

John Enys, Esq. acquired a great flow of wealth by his marriage with Ann, only daughter of Mr. Henry Greys of Truro. His son, Samuel Enys, is the present possessor of the estate; he married Dorothy, daughter of Thomas Willis, of London, merchant, and has lately succeeded to a considerable fortune by the decease of her two brothers, Sir Thomas and Sir William Willis, of Fen Ditton, in Cambridgeshire, Baronets, the last in the year 1733. This gentleman is in the commission of the Peace, and was Sheriff of Cornwall, 8 Anne, A.D. 1709. He has expended large sums of money in the improvement of his seat, as well by enlarging the house as by making beautiful gardens.

98 Roscrow means clearly the valley cross; although the house stands on a very elevated station.

The family of Pendarves settled here, have far outstripped all the other branches in estates, and have served their country as Members of Parliament, Commissioners of the Peace, Sheriffs, and Deputy-Lieutenants. The arms of Pendarves are, Sab. a falcon rising Arg. between three mullets, Or. I cannot refrain from making some remarks on Alexander Pendarves, Esq. the last of this family.

He was Surveyor-general of the Crown and Duchy lands in Cornwall to Queen Anne, and a Member of Parliament the greatest part of his life. He married Mary, eldest daughter of the Honourable Bernard Grenville, brother of Lord Lansdowne, a beautiful young lady, but she did not bring him any children. He died in 1726, very suddenly, at his house in London, being then a burgess for the town of Launceston. His death was a great surprise to all his friends, and especially to me, with whom I had taken a hearty breakfast that very morning at my aunt Vincent’s, at Chelsea. I must add, that on the Sunday before he and I bore up the pall to John Goodall, of Fowey, Esq. buried in St. Margaret’s, Westminster; and that on the Sunday fortnight after, I had the misfortune to bear up his in St. Mary’s, Savoy. He was the last male of the family of Pendarves in this place, which, with the rest of his property, has devolved to his niece, Mary, the only daughter and heiress of his brother, John Pendarves, clerk, Rector of Drews Teignton, in Devonshire, and relict of Francis Basset, of Tehidy, Esq.; and this lady is now the possessor, paying an annuity of £.400 a-year to her uncle’s widow. But before I leave this place I must not forget to give this just character of my deceased friend, with whom I had the honour to serve as burgess for Helston, in Queen Anne’s last Parliament; that for good humour, good sense, for a true and sincere adherence to the interests of his country, and for a harmless merry disposition, 99 he hath left not many his equals, and none that exceed him, in this county.

This parish takes its name from the saint to whom the church is dedicated.

THE EDITOR.

Mr. Hals gives a very improbable etymology for the name of this parish, deriving it from the Cornish verb, glewas, to hear, which he quotes from the 12th stanza of Mount Calvary.

The first line is transcribed from Mr. Hals, the second is the line as it stands in the MS. from which the editor of this work has printed Mount Calvary.

The Editor has not been able to find any traces of St. Gluvias, but these may have easily disappeared amidst the throng of our provincial hierarchy.

The borough of Penryn, with enlarged limits, has been united with Falmouth in sending two Members to Parliament under the constitution of 1832. Of the principal inhabitants noticed by Mr. Hals, the Hearles had risen into most importance. They were the younger branch of a family said to have migrated into Cornwall, and to have settled at Prideaux, in Luxulian, and afterwards at Trelawn, in Pelynt, usually written Trelawny, since it was purchased by a gentleman of that name. The last Mr. Hearle, of Penryn, married the heiress of Paynter, of Trelisick, in St. Erth; and having lost an only son, his daughters became coheiresses, who married Mr. Rodd, of Trebartha, the Rev. Henry Hawkins Tremayne, and Captain Wallis of the R. N.

Enys is now the property of John Samuel Enys, Esq. where his family are ascertained, by authentic documents, to have been seated from times far back in the reign of 100 the Plantagenets, and probably from periods antecedent to them. Samuel Enys represented Penryn in the first Parliament of Charles II. and they appear in every page of our list of Sheriffs. Mr. Enys has built an excellent new house on the foundation of the old; and very recently (1834) he has married Catherine Gilbert, the Editor’s eldest daughter.

The manor of Cosawis, or Gosose, was a part of the large possessions taken from the Bodrugons by Henry VII. and given by him to Sir Richard Edgecumbe, whose descendant, Lord Mount Edgecumbe, parted with it to the late Sir William Lemon.

But a farm called Bohelland has for two centuries continued to excite great curiosity and attention on account of its having been the place where events occurred in real life more horrible than the most heated and gloomy imagination could well invent. Mr. Lysons refers to a small pamphlet of eight leaves, printed in black letter, and accompanied with several wood-cuts, entitled, “News from Perin, in Cornwall, of a most bloody and unexampled Murder, &c.” but not having given any clue for finding it, the Editor has examined several public libraries without success. The following narrative has, however, been extracted from a work entitled “The Reign and Death of King James, of Great Britain:”

“He had been blessed with ample possessions and fruitful issue, unhappy only in a younger son, who taking liberty from his father’s bounty, and with a crew of like condition, that wearied on land, they went roving to sea, and in a small vessel southward, took boot from all they could master, and so increasing force and wealth, ventured on a Turk’s man in the Streights; but by mischance their own powder fired themselves, and our gallant, trusting to his skilful swimming, got on shore upon Rhodes, with the best of his jewels about him; where offering some to sale to a Jew, who knew them to be the Governor’s of Algier, he was apprehended, and, as a pirate, sentenced to the gallies among other Christians, whose miserable slavery made them all 101 studious of freedom, and with wit and valour took opportunity and means to murther some officers, got on board of an English ship, and came safe to London; where his misery, and some skill, made him servant to a surgeon, and sudden preferment to the East Indies. There, by this means he got money; with which returning back, he designed himself for his native county, Cornwall. And in a small ship from London, sailing to the west, was cast away upon that coast. But his excellent skill in swimming, and former fate to boot, brought him safe to shore; where, since his fifteen years’ absence, his father’s former fortunes much decayed, now retired him not far off to a country habitation, in debt and danger.

“His sister he finds married to a mercer, a meaner match than her birth promised. To her, at first, he appears a poor stranger, but in private reveals himself, and withall what jewels and gold he had concealed in a bow-case about him; and concluded that the next day he intended to appear to his parents, and to keep his disguise till she and her husband should meet, and make their common joy complete.

“Being come to his parents, his humble behaviour, suitable to his suit of clothes, melted the old couple to so much compassion as to give him covering from the cold season under their outward roof, and by degrees his travelling tales, told with passion to the aged people, made him their guest so long by the kitchen fire, that the husband took leave and went to bed. And soon after his true stories working compassion in the weaker vessel, she wept, and so did he; but compassionate of her tears, he comforted her with a piece of gold, which gave assurance that he deserved a lodging, to which she brought him; and being in bed, shewed her his girdled wealth, which he said was sufficient to relieve her husband’s wants, and to spare for himself, and being very weary fell fast asleep.

“The wife, tempted with the golden bait of what she had, and eager of enjoying all, awakened her husband with 102 this news, and her contrivance what to do; and though with horrid apprehension he oft refused, yet her puling fondness (Eve’s enchantments) moved him to consent, and rise to be master of all, and both of them to murder the man, which instantly they did; covering the corpse under the clothes till opportunity to convey it out of the way.

“The early morning hastens the sister to her father’s house, where she, with signs of joy, enquires for a sailor that should lodge there the last night; the parents slightly denied to have seen any such, until she told them that he was her brother, her lost brother; by that assured scar upon his arm, cut with a sword in his youth she knew him; and were all resolved this morning to meet there and be merry.

“The father hastily runs up, finds the mark, and with horrid regret of this monstrous murther of his own son, with the same knife cuts his own throat.

“The wife went up to consult with him, where in a most strange manner beholding them both in blood, wild and aghast, with the instrument at hand, readily rips herself up, and perishes on the same spot.

“The daughter, doubting the delay of their absence, searches for them all, whom she found out too soon; with the sad sight of this scene, and being overcome with horror and amaze of this deluge of destruction, she sank down and died; the fatal end of that family.

“The truth of which was frequently known, and flew to court in this guise; but the imprinted relation conceals their names, in favour to some neighbour of repute and kin to that family. The same sense makes me therein silent also.”

These dreadful events have been wrought into a drama by Lillo, the author of George Barnwell; and if terror and pity form the essential bases of tragedy, the “Fatal Curiosity” is built on a most ample foundation; the sister, of course, changes her character to heighten the effect, but in other 103 respects the play scarcely differs from the actual course of events.

The celebrated Mr. Harris of Salisbury, has given the following account of this drama in his last work, entitled, “Philological Inquiries.”

“A long lost son, returning home unexpectedly, finds his parents alive, but perishing with indigence.

“The young man, whom from his long absence his parents never expected, discovers himself to an amiable friend, his long-loved Charlotte, and with her concerts the manner how to discover himself to his parents.

“It is agreed that he should go to their house, and there remain unknown till Charlotte should arrive and make the happy discovery.

“He goes thither accordingly, and having by a letter of Charlotte’s been admitted, converses, though unknown, both with father and mother, and beholds their misery with filial affection; complains, at length, he was fatigued (which, in fact, he really was), and begs he may be admitted for a while to repose. Retiring he delivers a casket to his mother, and tells her it is a deposit she must guard till he awake.

“Curiosity tempts her to open the casket, when she is dazzled with the splendour of innumerable jewels. Objects so alluring suggest bad ideas; and poverty soon gives to those ideas a sanction. Black as they are, she communicates them to her husband; who, at first reluctant, is at length persuaded, and for the sake of the jewels stabs the stranger while he sleeps.

“The fatal murder is perpetrating, or at least but barely perpetrated, when Charlotte arrives, full of joy, to inform them that the stranger within their walls was their long-lost son.

“What a discovery? What a revolution? How irresistibly are the tragic passions of terror and pity excited?”

It is no small praise to this affecting fable that it so much resembles the Œdipus Tyrannus of Sophocles. In both 104 tragedies, that which apparently leads to joy, leads in its completion to misery; both tragedies concur in the horror of their discoveries, and both in those great outlines of a truly tragic revolution, where (according to the nervous sentiment of Lillo himself) we see

It is a very curious circumstance that the name of these wretched people, having been kept back at first from compassion towards their relatives, it is now actually unknown.

This parish has been peculiarly fortunate in its succession of clergymen. The Rev. John Penrose, who died in 1776, after being thirty-five years Vicar, has left the reputation of learning, of piety, and of all the virtues which adorn a clergyman. Mr. Temple bore a very high reputation as a man of letters; Mr. Howell was universally esteemed; and the present vicar, Mr. Sheepshanks, ranked in the first lists of science and of literature at Cambridge, and became a distinguished tutor in a college, which continues to support the rank bestowed upon it by the greatest of philosophers.

The town, lying on the back of a sharp ridge of land dividing two deep vallies, has great beauty of situation, and deserves in other respects the praises bestowed by Mr. Tonkin. To travellers, however, all the circumstances are quite different; the main street descending with the ridge is scarcely safe for carriages; and the great road from London through Truro to Falmouth, passing directly across the ridge, has to go up and then down through streets so steep and narrow, and in parts so turned, as to make the safe-passage of the mail-coach a matter of wonder; these defects have been, however, completely remedied by a road carried round the point and accommodated with a drawbridge; thus reducing the road to a level, and preserving the communication by water; this improvement was made about the year 1830.

This parish measures 2,271 statute acres. 105

giving an increase on the Parish of 55⅓, on the Town 51½, on both 52¼,—per cent. in 30 years.

Present Vicar, the Rev. John Sheepshanks, collated by the Bishop of Exeter in 1824.

THE GEOLOGY, BY DR. BOASE.

The western side of this parish skirts along the boundary of the granite of Mabe; but it does not extend on this rock, with the exception of a small triangular space near Chywoon, at its northern corner. The rest of the parish lies on felspar rocks, both slaty and massive; some of which contain hornblende, whence it passes into green stone.

These felspar rocks, when they are disintegrated, afford a soil which is covered with luxuriant vegetation, forming a striking contrast with the utter barrenness of the adjacent granite.

HALS.

Is situate in the hundred of Powdre, and hath upon the north St. Ewe, east Mevaguisey, south the British Channel. 106 By this name it was taxed in Domesday Roll, 20th William I. 1087. Also in the Inquisition of the Bishops of Lincoln, &c. into the value of Cornish benefices, 1294, Ecclesia Sancti Goran in Decanatu de Powdre, was valued in vil. xiiis. iiiid. Vicar ibidem, xxvis. viiid. In Wolsey’s Inquisition, 1521, it was rated by the same name of Goran at 20l. The patronage in the Bishop of Exeter, who endowed it; and when it was made a Vicarage reserved to him and his successors 100l. per annum rent out of the garb, or sheaf, which is in the possession of Ratcliff. The Incumbent Shapter. And the parish rated to the 4s. per pound Land Tax, 1696, temp. William III. by the name of Goran, 317l. 14s. This, undoubtedly, was an endowed church before the Norman Conquest, or, at least, a privileged manor, since it appears from that time to this it hath not admitted of any mutation of name.

Goran-hoane, in this parish, signifies Goran-haven, bay, winding of the sea, or harbour. A place much frequented by ships, boats, barges, and lighters, for fishing and carrying and re-carrying fish, goods, and merchandizes; and wherein is a convenient quay, or landing-place, for that purpose, made secure by a considerable promontory of land that shoots far out into the sea on the west side thereof, commonly called (for what reason I have not learned) the Dead-man; which forms a large bay, or winding bosom of the sea, on the east, betwixt it and Ram Head, twenty miles distant; and such another west, to the Lizard Point, at a like distance, all notable and well-known places, and sea-marks to such mariners as navigate the British Channel in those parts. In this haven town is still extant the ruins of an ancient free chapel, wherein God was duly worshipped in former ages by the inhabitants of the place.

The barton of Bo-drig-ham, or Bod-rig-an, also Botrigan (for in British d and t are indifferently used and pronounced for each other) gave name and origin to an old family of gentlemen surnamed de Bodrigham, or Bodrigan, also 107 Botrigan, who flourished here in great fame, wealth, and reputation for several descents; and in particular here lived Otho de Bodrigan, temp. 17th Edward II. of whom we read in Carew’s Survey of Cornwall, p. 51: viz. “Otto de Bodrugan peregrinatus est ad San. Jacobum licentia Domini Regis;” i. e. Otho de Bodrigan, by license of our Lord the King, is gone a pilgrimage to St. James; that is to say, to the apostle St. James’s Church, at Compostella, in Spain; who had for his fellow-traveller Radolphus de Belloprato, “qui peregrinatus est cum Ottone de Bodrigan, cum licentia Regis, pro se et duobus valectis;” that is to say, Ralph of the fair meadow, who by license of the King for himself and two servants, or young gentlemen, is gone a pilgrimage with Otho of Bodrigan. And of those it follows, in the same page, “isti prænominati habent 40 libras terræ et redditus per ann.;” that is to say, held by the tenure of knight’s service.

This Otho de Bodrigan, Sheriff of Cornwall, 3d. Richard II. anno Dom. 1400, gave for his arms (as appears yet on the door of this house), Argent, three bends or bendlets Gules. And as a further testimony thereof, Nicholas Upton, in his Latin Manuscript of Heraldry, written before printing was invented (now in my custody), said of his son, 1440, “Monsieur William Bodrigham port de Argent trois bends de Gules;” who dying without issue, his two sisters became his heirs; the one married to Champernowne, of Halewin, or Haleworth, who in her right held in this place by the tenure of knight’s service, 3d. Henry IV. a Knight’s fee of land (Carew’s Survey of Cornwall).

His other sister, as tradition saith, was married to Trenowith, who thereupon discontinued his own paternal name and arms, viz. in a field Argent, on a fess Sable, three chevrons transverse (to the dexter) of the Field; and assumed those of Bodrigan. He had issue by her Henry Trenowith, or Bodrigham, temp. Henry VI. who married Jane, sixth daughter of William Herbert, Earl of Pembroke, 108 slain 8th Edward IV. 1469, the relict of Thomas Viscount Lisle, and by her had issue. He was knighted by King Edward IV. or King Richard III. by the name of Sir Henry Bodrigham; who siding with King Richard III. at the battle of Bosworth Field (where he, the said King Richard, was slain by the Earl of Richmond’s soldiers), he was therefore, with many others, attainted of treason against King Henry VII.; and in order to shun justice he made his escape after the battle aforesaid, and secretly repaired to this place, where he was kept close for a season, but not so private but King Henry’s officers got notice thereof, and at an appointed time beset the same in quest of him; which he understanding, by a back-door fled from thence, and ran down the hills to the sea cliff near the same, the officers pursuing so quick after him that he could not possibly make his escape. As soon therefore as he came to the cliff, about a hundred feet high, he leaped down into the sea, upon the little grassy island there, without much hurt or damage; where instantly a boat which he had prepared in the cove, attended him there, which transported him to a ship that carried him into France. Which astonishing fact, and place, is to this day well known and remembered by the name of Harry Bodrigan’s leap, or jump. But notwithstanding his own escape beyond the seas, this lordship and his whole estate were forfeited and seized by King Henry VII. for attainder of treason; and the greatest part thereof he settled upon Sir Richard Edgcumb and his heirs for ever; whose posterity are still in possession thereof. This Sir Richard Edgcumb, not long before, on suspicion of being confederated with the Earl of Richmond against King Richard III. (as tradition saith), was shrewdly sought after and pursued by means of this very Sir Henry Bodrigan, in order to be taken into custody, who from his house at Cotehele, made also a wonderful escape thence, and got into France, to the Earl of Richmond; of which see more in Carew’s Survey of Cornwall, p. 114 (p. 270, 109 Lord Dunstanville’s edition), so unavoidable a thing is fortune or destiny.

Tradition tells us that there was great discord and variance between the families of Bodrigan and the knightly family of the Haleps of Lammoran, either upon account of private affronts or grudges, or upon the different interests or factions, and wars between the houses of York and Lancaster, wherein they were associated and engaged against each other, so that as often as they met between themselves and servants some combat or battle ensued, whereby blood was shed and the peace broken; and they often came to each other’s gates armed in defiance on horseback.

At Tre-garden lived John de Tregarthyn, temp. Edward I. how long before I know not; after which his posterity in this place married with the great inheritrixes of Pever, Chamberlayne, and Hendower, of Court, in Branell, by which last, by the Cornwalls of that place, they were lineally descended from Richard Earl of Cornwall, King of the Romans, by his concubine, Joan de Valletort, widow of Sir Alexander Oakeston. (Vide St. Stephen’s.) Certainly this was an ancient, rich, and famous family in those parts, for it appears by their seats, or pews, in Goran church, they had the precedence or right hand of the seats pertaining to the great family of Bodrigan, as is yet to be seen. Thomas Tregarthyn, Esq. was Sheriff of Cornwall, 7 Henry VII. 1492, who married Hendower aforesaid, and removed to Court, in St. Stephen’s, in Branell. He had issue by her, John Tregarthyn, Esq. and two daughters; Margaret, the eldest, married to Richard Whiteleigh, of Efford, in Devon, Esq. Sheriff of that county 16th Henry VII.; from whose two daughters and heirs the Grenvilles of Stowe, and the Halses late of Efford aforesaid, and Fentongallan, in Cornwall, are lineally descended. Catherine, the second daughter of Thomas Tregarthyn, was married to John Carmenow, of Fentongollan, Esq. Sheriff of Cornwall 5th Henry VIII. whose posterity are extinct.

110 John Tregarthyn, Esq. aforesaid, son of Thomas, married Jane, daughter of Thomas Trethyrfe, Esq. and had issue by her four daughters that became his heirs; Mary married to Degory Grenvill, of Penheale, Esq.; Jane to Tripcony, who passed those lands to Richard Trevanion, Esq. (ancestor to Richard Trevanion, now in possession of this place); Margaret, married to George Tanner, of Cullumbton, Esq. to whose share and partage the manor of Court and Branell, in St. Stephen’s, fell; Joan married to John Kellaway, of Egge, in Devon, Esq.; after his death to Wadham of Merryfield, in Somerset, as appears from her tombstone in Branscombe church, Devonshire, where is to be read and seen those words:

“Here lyeth the body of a virtuous and ancient gentlewoman, descended of the ancient house of the Plantagenets, some time of Cornwall, namely, Joan, one of the daughters and coheirs of John Tregarthin, of Tregarthyn, Esq.; she was first married to John Kellaway, Esq. who had by her much issue. After his death she was married to John Wadham, of Meryfield, in the county of Somerset, Esq. by whom she had children. She lived a virtuous and godly life, and died in an honourable age, in the year of our Lord 1581.” Now because this dark phrase, “descended of the house of the Plantagenets,” needs a clavis to unlock it, let the reader view the history of St. Stephen’s in Branell, and St. Stephen’s by Saltash, and he shall find one that will do it effectually. The arms of Tregarthin, whose name and whole family is now extinct, were, Argent, a chevron between three escallops Sable.

The present possessor of this barton is Richard Trevanion, Esq. that married Bond, of Earth; who had issue by her one only daughter, married to Peter Major, of Foye, merchant, now in possession thereof, whose names are the same as the Trevanions of Caryhayes.

Trewoola, Tre-wolla, or Tre-wole, gave name and origin to an old family of gentlemen surnamed de Trewolla; who, in allusion to their names, gave for their arms, Sable, three owls. This estate, in the latter end of the reign of 111 Charles II. was sold to Charles Trevanion, of Cary-Hayes, Esq. for 900l. by John Trewolla, gentleman, attorney-at-law, which was the last parcel of land Trewolla had to sell of a considerable estate elsewhere, formerly sold by his ancestors; and this place was so depressed with mortgages, statutes, and judgments, that the whole consideration-money fell much short of paying his creditors, and the incumbrances that were upon it; so that, in order to make a clear title to the purchaser, several of Trewolla’s creditors came to a loss, and in particular, James Hals, of Merthyr, Gent. and Martha his wife, who had a statute staple for 700l. on those lands, who, to comply with Trewolla’s bad circumstances, on Mr. Trevanion’s paying them 250l. he and his wife levied a fine thereon, and executed a deed, then declaring the uses thereof to be for the only use of the said Charles Trevanion, Esq. his heirs and assigns for ever.

In this parish, at ——, was the dwelling of my very kind friend Dr. James Gibbs, third son of James Gibbs, Vicar of this parish, who had his education in Exeter College, as a servitor to his kinsman Mr. Davis, son to Dr. Davis late of Plymouth; where, after he had taken his Bachelor’s degree, he declared for the study of physic in Oxford; and soon after, to better his study and experience, went with the said Mr. Davis into France, and fixed at Montpelier, where he practised physic (and also surgery in an hospital, as himself informed me) for several years; afterwards in the College of Physicians there took his degree of Doctor of that science; and, lastly, returned to this place, where he practised physic with admirable care, skill, and success, and through multitudes of patients and moderate fees, hath purchased a considerable estate. Since the writing hereof this gentleman, to the great grief and loss of his country, departed this life of the hemorrhoides sickness; and before his death (who for many years had been his patient, to the great benefit of my health, by God’s blessing, after the endeavours of all other physicians proved ineffectual,) left me this legacy,—that if I myself or friends 112 were sick, and had occasion to make use of physic, that we should in all distempers make use only of the common, plain, and natural remedies.

Anthony Wills, of this parish, Gent. farmer of the sheaf thereof, having by misfortune much incumbered his estate with debts, quitted the same at such time as the Prince of Orange landed with his forces at Torbay, and presented himself and his six or seven sons to that Prince, for soldiers of war in his army; which proposal was graciously accepted; and they were all posted as officers of command in his bands, or troops. And after the Coronation of this Prince, King William III. they followed him in all his Flanders and Irish wars against King James II. and King Lewis XIV. and discharged their trusts with such great care, faithfulness, valour, and conduct, that (as I am informed,) before their deaths they all arrived to the dignities of Captains, and some of them to the authority or commands of Majors, Colonels, and one of them to become a standing Major-General of the field. Who afterwards, about the year A.D. 1714, being made principal commander of the army and troops of horse of King George the First, against the Pretender’s (James Henry Edward Stewart,) army at Preston, in Lancashire, where, after a furious, violent, and bloody battle with them, he obtained the victory over that pretended Prince’s forces; for which fact, and other noble deeds, he was created a Baronet of England, and is since made General of all the land forces in England next the King, his salary amounting to 7000l. per annum, as reported.

TONKIN.

For the name, I take it to be a contraction of St. Gordian, pronounced in Cornwall St. Gorian, who having been, like St. Paul, a violent prosecutor of the Christians, became a proportionably zealous convert, and was beheaded at Rome in the year 341.

113 A tradition in the parish, nevertheless, assigns the guardianship of this church to St. Gorien, or Coren, one of the missionaries from Ireland who accompanied St. Perran.

The name of Trevennen, or Tremenen, probably the town of birth, in reference to its fertility, belonged to the Priory of Tywardrith, and formed a part of the lands given by Henry VIII. to the Duchy in exchange for the manor of Wallingford.

Adjoining to Trevennen, and within the manor, is Trevasens, which was long the seat of a family of the same name, but passed to the Hoblyns of Nanswydan, in St. Columb, through an heiress.

Polgorror was heretofore a country residence of the Provost of Glasnith College, at Penryn, to which the great tithes were impropriated. This place, with the great tithes and the advowson of the vicarage, now belong to the bishopric of Exeter.

Adjoining to this is Treveor, the great town, or dwelling, formerly the seat of Treveors; and the parishioners still talk of Sir Henry Treveor, who lived here; and a part of his house is yet standing.

Pennore, or Penarth. I take nore to signify the same as in Saxon, a promontory; and that it is here applied to a point jutting out into the sea, namely, to the Dead-man, which is separated from the village by a double intrenchment, yet pretty entire, running from cliff to cliff, and cutting off about an hundred acres of coarse ground. The intrenchment is about twenty feet broad and twenty-four feet high in most places; but the outer wall is the least high. The people call it Thica Vosa, which is the Vallum, and the Hack and Cast, fabling it to be the work of a giant, who performed the whole in one night. They show also a hole in the cliff which opens into a hollow below, formed by the sea; and the people relate that this giant growing unwell, applied to a physician, who, that he might rid the world of such a monster, bled him near this spot, and recommended 114 him to let the blood flow into this hole till it became full. The giant did so, and bled himself to death, when his body fell over on a rock, still called the giant’s house. The hole thus attempted to be filled with blood is denominated from the immense quantity of ivy growing round it.

The church is placed very conveniently in the middle of the parish. It is well built, with a handsome square tower of hewn moor stone, with four tunable bells; and by reason of its high situation this church is seen from a great distance. It consists of a large lofty nave, one south aile of the same length, and two cross ailes to the north, of which one is but small. In the chancel, near the north wall, before the communion table, is a plain marble stone, on which are seen the hollows where the figure of a woman kneeling, with arms, inscription, &c. must have been inlaid. Tradition calls it the tomb of Lady Brannell, but who this Lady Brannell was is unknown, although some conjectures are formed of her belonging to the family of Tregarthen.

Against the eastern wall, by the window, is a comely monument of black marble, to Richard Edgecombe, of Bodrigan, Esq. son of Sir Richard Edgecombe, of Mount Edgecombe, Knight, who died Nov. 5, 1755.

THE EDITOR.

The manor of Trevascus belongs by purchase to Mr. Slade Gulby, who resides on the barton of Trevenion, which has been in his family since the time of the Tudors.

Treveor belonged to the late Rev. Dr. Wynne, and was given by him to Mr. Pendarves. On this barton may be seen one of those round entrenchments usually denominated castles in the West of England. It is at least doubtful in most cases whether any permanent dwelling was ever connected with them.

The barton of Bodrigan has descended in the family of Edgecombe since the time of Henry VII.

115 It is generally apprehended that Sir Henry Bodrigan was present at the battle of Bosworth Field; and that, having escaped from thence to Cornwall, he endeavoured to defend his property in a private house against Edgecombe and Trevenion, who, in despoiling and endeavouring to take his life, did no more than he would have done, had the fortune of arms inclined the other way; or than what he actually did against Sir Richard Edgecombe a few years before at Cotehele. Such are the effects of civil wars, when—

Bodrugon’s property was mainly divided between Edgecumbe and Trevanion, who are also believed to have fought against King Richard in Bosworth Field, and then to have attacked Sir Richard Bodrugon near his own house after the defeat at that place. He effected his retreat to a vessel by the extraordinary effort already mentioned, and left the shores of England never to return. He had a brother settled in the north of Devon, but his line became soon extinct.

Goran measures 4,596 statute acres.

giving an increase of somewhat less than 19½ per cent. in 30 years.

Present Vicar, the Rev. David Jenkins, collated by the Bishop of Exeter in 1824.

GEOLOGY, BY DR. BOASE.

This parish forms a continuation of the calcareous series of St. Ewe. At the Deadman point the rock is for the most part siliceous, affording an example of the quartz rock of Dr. Macculloch.

HALS.

Is situate in the hundred of Kerryer, and has upon the north Ruan Major, west Mullyan, east Ruan Minor, south Landawidnick. At the time of the Norman conquest this district was taxed under the jurisdiction of Lisart.

In the taxation of benefices in Cornwall, towards the Pope’s annats, made by the Bishops of Lincoln and Winchester, 1294, Ecclesia Sancti Grade in decanatu de Kerryer, was valued lxs. in Wolsey’s Inquisition, 1521, 11l. 1s. 5d. The patronage in the Bishop of Exeter; the incumbent Symons; and the parish rated to the 4s. per pound Land Tax, 1696, 58l. 12s.

TONKIN.

This parish takes its name from its titular female saint, St. Grada. In the taxation of 1294, in the 20th year of Edward I. it is valued by the name of Ecclesia Sanctæ Gradæ.

THE EDITOR.

The etymologies offered by Mr. Hals appear so very improbable that they are omitted. If any such person as St. Grade ever existed, she must have been among the tribe of early missionaries, of whom no traces are left except that of their names being affixed to churches.

This parish has within its limits the manor and barton of Erisey, the seat of a very respectable family bearing the same name, who gave for their arms, Sable, a chevron between three griffins segreant Or. The name has been 117 extinct above a century, and the barton belongs by purchase to Lord Falmouth. Several monuments of different members of the family remain in the church.

The advowson of the living belongs by purchase to Mr. Rogers, of Penrose. The parish feast is kept on the nearest Sunday to St. Luke’s day. The family of Lord Wodehouse, through his marriage with Sophia Berkeley, niece of Lord Berkeley, of Stratton, are supposed to represent the Eriseys.

This parish measures 2,005 statute acres.

giving a decrease of nearly 4½ per cent. in 30 years; but with unusual anomalies in intermediate enumerations.

Present Rector, the Rev. John Peter, instituted in 1818.

GEOLOGY, BY DR. BOASE.

The portion of this parish around the church, and the various insulated portions, are situated on magnesian rocks; the most abundant variety of which is serpentine. This rock is generally of a red colour, but this is evidently in some cases derived from a partial chemical change. In its perfect state this serpentine is generally of a dark-green, with shining scales of diallage, which are commonly of a bronze colour, and at other times of a fine green. The serpentine at Cadgwith may be seen to pass gradually into a schistose rock of a dark bottle-green, and very glassy and spangled on the surface of its lamellæ. This slate is generally called greenstone, but it differs therefrom, and consequently requires a distinct appellation. At Cagar there is a quarry in the serpentine; and at Kennick Cove adjoining, many varieties of these rocks may be obtained.

HALS.

Is situate in the hundred of Penwith, and hath upon the north Ludgvan, south the Mount’s Bay, west Maddaran, east St. Hilary.

In the time of William the Conqueror’s survey of lands, anno Dom. 1087, this parish, I suppose, passed in tax under the jurisdiction of Ludgvan. In the Inquisition and Taxation of Benefices in Cornwall, by the Bishops of Lincoln and Winchester, 1294, Ecclesia de Laneseley, in decanatu de Penwith, appropriata priori Sancti Germani, is valued lxvis. viiid. Vicar ibidem, xxs. At which time it seems it was but a Vicarage church; the garb impropriated, though since restored. Neither was the name of Gulval then mentioned. However, in Wolsey’s Inquisition, 1521, it is rated by the name of Gulval, also Laneseley, 6l. 11s. 0½d. The patronage was formerly in the Prior of St. German’s, now in the crown. The incumbent Penhellick; and the parish rated to the 4s. per pound Land Tax, 1696, by the name of Gulval, 120l.

This manor of Laneseley, in this parish, was, in the time of Richard I. and King John, the lands of the family surnamed De Als, now Hals, so called from the barton and dismantled manor of Als, now Alse and Alesa, in Buryan, as tradition saith, or Beer Alseton, Alston, in Devon, in possession of Trevanion and others, whereof they were lords; and in particular William de Als, in the beginning of the reign of King Henry III. that married Mary, the daughter of Francis de Bray, was possessed thereof; father of Simon de Alls, who lived at Halsham, in Yorkshire (from him denominated), that married Jane, daughter of Thomas de Campo Arnulpho (now Champernown), Sheriff of York second, third, sixth, and seventh years of King Henry III. Anno Dom. 1222, as appears from the catalogue 119 of those Sheriffs, and the Hals’s allowed pedigree, 1483; from which also it is manifest, by an authentic deed or record therein, yet legible, that the said Simon for the health and salvation of his soul, his wife’s, his ancestors, and other relations, gave the said manor of Laneseley to the Prior of St. German’s, his canonical brothers, and their successors for ever, in these words.

In nomine Domini, &c. Ego Simon de Als, pro salute animæ meæ, et Janæ uxoris meæ, et parentum meorum, dono et concedo manerium de Laneseley, in comitatu Cornubiæ, Priori Sancti Germani, et fratribus canonicis, et successoribus eorum, cum dominicis redditibus, &c. et omnibus ibidem appendentibus, terra, sylva, pratos, et aquam, &c. ut habeant, teneant, et possideant in perpetuum, &c.; dat vicesimo sexto die Augusti, anno regni nostri Regis Henrici tertii post conquestum octavo. Hiis testibus, Thoma de Tracye, Henrico de la Pombre, Reginaldo de Valtorta, Roberto de Cheni, Radolpho de Esse. This grant, or donation, was in the year 1266. (See Lelant.)

By virtue whereof the Prior of St. German’s and his successors were possessed of this manor from that time till the 26th Henry VIII. 1536, when that Priory was dissolved, and the lands thereof vested in the crown. At which time King Henry VIII. gave the lands thereof to Champernown, Beaumont, Barry, and others; and to Beaumont’s and Barry’s share fell this manor of Laneseley; who parted with it either by purchase or in marriage with his daughter, to John Tripcony, about the year 1565; whose son, John Tripcony, having by riot and excess comparatively wasted his paternal estate, mortgaged this manor of Laneseley to Sir Nicholas Hals, of Fentongollan, knight, about the year 1620, who was lineally descended from Simon de Als, aforesaid, and died seised thereof about the year 1637. After his decease his unthrifty son and heir, John Hals, became possessed thereof, who assigned the mortgage thereof for 500l. to one Mr. Downes, A.D. 120 1655; and soon after, having spent his whole paternal estate elsewhere, went beyond the seas, and was never since heard of to this day; leaving issue, by Jane Arundel his wife, Major Thomas Hals, of Hals’s Savana, in Clarendon parish and province, in Jamaica, who had issue Thomas Hals, Esq. his son and heir.

After the departure of the said John Hals beyond the seas, the said Mr. Downes assigned over the mortgage of the premises to one Mr. Collwell, a scrivener of London; who dying soon after, his son, Thomas Collwell, became seised thereof; and after his death his widow, who by her last will and testament (as executrix of her said husband,) conveyed the said manor to Charles Bonython, Esq.—Spur, Longeville, and others, in trust, now in possession thereof, 1700; before which time, between the said Downes and Collwell, on pretence of the equity of redemption reserved in Downes, John Hals being beyond the seas, and that the mortgage money to Collwell was satisfied out of the profits of these lands; and a cross bill of Collwell’s against Downes, alleging the contrary, and to foreclose him; happened so many tedious and costly Chancery suits as comparatively undid them both. But, maugre all their endeavours, the old titles of Tripcony and Hals were foreclosed by a decree in Chancery, betwixt Downes and Collwell, in Hillary term 1689, yet extant and to be seen.

This manor of Laneseley, for goodness of land, jurisdiction, court leet, fishing craft, and royalties over all that part of the sea of the Mount’s Bay, between Longbridge and Chiandower, near Penzance, may equal, if not surpass, any other manor in those parts of its value, which is now scarcely worth 300l. per annum, though in former ages it was of far larger extent; for in the survey of Cornish acres, tempore Edward II. (Carew’s Survey of Cornwall, p. 46, p. 131, of Lord Dunstanville’s edition), it was numbered in the Exchequer to contain twenty-eight acres, that is, about six thousand statute acres;[4] every ancient Cornish acre being 121 sixty statute acres of land; the contents of the whole now not exceeding a thousand statute acres, which lies in Gulval and Ludgvan.

In Fosses Moor, part of this manor of Lanesely, in this parish, is that well-known fountain called Gulval Well. To which place great numbers of people, time out of mind, have resorted for pleasure and profit of their health, as the credulous country people do in these days, not only to drink the waters thereof, but to inquire after the life or death of their absent friends; where, being arrived, they demanded the question at the well, whether such a person, by name, be living, in health, sick, or dead; if the party be living, and in health, the still quiet water of the well-pit, as soon as the question is demanded, will instantly bubble or boil up as a pot, clear christaline water; if sick, foul and puddle waters; if the party be dead, it will neither bubble, boil up, or alter its colour or still motion. However, I can speak nothing of the truth of those supernatural facts from my own sight or experience, but write from the mouths of those who told me they had seen and proved the veracity thereof. Finally, it is a strong and courageous fountain of water, kept neat and clean by an old woman of the vicinity, to accommodate strangers for her own advantage, by blazing the virtues and divine qualities of those waters.

TONKIN.

After copying from Hals, Mr. Tonkin adds of Lanistley manor:—It extendeth throughout the parish of Gulval from the Moreps to the Gundrons; that is to say, from above the sea to the Down Hills; it extendeth also through a part of the parish of Ludgvan.

At Kenneggy is the dwelling, by lease (the fee being in his elder brother, William Harris, of Hayne, Esq.), of Christopher Harris, Gentleman, an attorney-at-law, who married a daughter of John Foote, of Truro, Esq. His 122 elder brother, who married the daughter of John St. Aubyn, Esq. of Clowance, in the parish of Crowan, is now in possession of Hayne, near Lifton, in Devonshire, having succeeded to it on the decease of Sir Arthur Harris, jun. the last heir male of the elder branch. On removing to Hayne he leased Kenneggy to his younger brother aforesaid; who, by reason of the elder brother’s yet want of issue, is likely to become his heir. The arms of Harris are, Sable, within a bordure three crescents Argent.

Mr. Edward Llwyd, in his letter to me, would have this parish to take its name from the inscription on the stone in Maddern parish, “Riolabran: Cunoval: Fil:” and that Cunoval is turned by corruption into Guloval, for that he found many such instances in Wales.

I should be glad to agree with so great a critic, but since there is a saint, or bishop, whose name comes very near to this—St. Gunwall, whose memory the church celebrates on the 6th of June, I cannot forbear fancying, especially the humour of the country being considered, that he is the patron and the namer of this parish.

THE EDITOR.

There cannot be any reasonable doubt of St. Gunwall having bestowed his name on this parish, more especially when the prophetic well is taken into account, since saints scarcely ever failed of imparting some supernatural quality to their favourite streams.

St. Gunwall was, moreover, a Briton, and is stated to have been in Cornwall.

Saint Gudwall, or Gunwall, was born in Wales about the year 500. Being entirely devoted to God, he collected eighty-eight monks in a little island called Plecit, being no more than a rock surrounded by water. For some reason, however, he abandoned this establishment, and passed by sea into Cornwall; and from thence he went into Devonshire, 123 where he betook himself to the most holy, perfect, and useful state of a solitary anchorite; at length, however, again emerging, he sailed into Britany, and there succeeded St. Malo, as Bishop of that see, although he is said even then to have dwelt in a solitary cell, and to have died there at a very advanced age. His relics have been widely distributed, and various places in France have been called by his name.

Mr. Whitaker explains the ancient name of this parish, Lanisley, by Lan and Ishei, low, or lower, the low church, which appears to agree very well with the situation.

The great tithes certainly belonged to the Priory at St. German’s, for in the returns made to Henry VIII. of the property belonging to them, appears—

Gulval, decimæ Garbarum, £10. 6s. 8d.

These tithes, since the law-suits mentioned by Mr. Hals, have passed by purchase into the possession of the Beauchamps of Gwenap, and now belong to the two daughters and coheiresses of the late Mr. John Beauchamp.

The vicarage, although it has risen into one of the most valuable to be found in that district, in consequence of modern improvements, and of its being situated near Penzance, is yet rated under twenty pounds a-year in the King’s Books, and therefore passes by the presentation of the Lord Chancellor. Two Mr. Pennerks, father and son, held this living in succession. It was then given, in 1789, to Mr. John Cole, afterwards Doctor in divinity and Rector of Exeter College, and his successor is the present Vicar, the Rev. Robert Dillon.

Kenegie passed from Mr. William Harris, of Hayne, accordingly as Mr. Tonkin had conjectured, to the family of his brother, Mr. Christopher Harris; and the family becoming extinct in the male line by the death of this gentleman’s grandson in 1775, by much the largest part of the estate went, under the provisions of a will, to Mr. William Arundell, then resident at Crane, in Camborne, who assumed the name of Harris; but his grandson 124 choosing to fix his permanent residence at a very handsome seat of his own creating near Lifton, parted with all his Cornish property; and Kenegie now belongs, in fee, to the farmer, who had occupied it at an annual rent. This place having formerly belonged to the family of —— Tripcony, who bore for their arms, Argent, three rabbits passant Sable, and kynin and kyninger being the Cornish names for a rabbit, I cannot but suspect that kynneggy, or kenegie, must have some relation to the name of Tripeney.

Trevailer is the place next of importance in this parish. It has been long the residence of a very respectable family, the Veales. They are said to have come from Gloucestershire, their ancestor having been the first Protestant Vicar of Gulval. The Reverend William Veale, the present possessor, has rebuilt the house; the second brother of his grandfather, Mr. George Veale, made a large fortune at Penzance, by the practice of the law and by success in mines, which became divided between three daughters who married Hichens, Baines, and Jenkins. Mr. William Veale has married the only daughter of the Rev. Richard Gerveys Grylls, of Helston.

But the most beautiful place in this parish, and one of the greatest ornaments to the whole neighbourhood, is Rosemorron, the Vale of Blackberries, formed by Mr. George John. This gentleman having married Jane, the eldest daughter of Mr. Arundall, who assumed the name of Harris on succeeding to the large fortune of that family, and having been for many years at the head of his profession in Penzance, has at length retired to this delightful spot in the summer months. Nor have his decorations of the country been confined to one situation; he has shewn, by extensive plantations at Try, that the most elevated and barren tracts, even on a granite soil, may be rendered useful and decorative by the growth of trees.

The lower part of the parish, adjoining to the sea, is fertile in the highest degree, from the village of Chiandower 125 (the house by the water), through Pendrea to the Church Town. And the vallies, abounding in trees, rival those of any country. Chiandower is also become a place worthy of the adjacent scenery, through the taste and the exertions of Messrs. Bolitho, who, in making ample fortunes, have benefited the country still more than themselves by promoting every species of productive industry. The parish feast does not certainly corroborate the supposition of the patron saint; it is held on the nearest Sunday to the 12th of November, the day of St. Martin, the first Pope of that name, a native of Todi, in Tuscany, and elected Pope in the year 649. He assembled in the same year the sixth council of Lateran, where the heresy of the Monothelites was condemned; but the schismatic Emperor, Constans, sent Olympius, his chamberlain, to Rome, to support the obnoxious sect, who arrived there while the council were deliberating; and failing in his attempts to divert them from supporting the orthodox faith, he suborned a person to murder the Pope, but in attempting to execute the atrocious deed the assassin was miraculously struck blind. Yet, nevertheless, Constans persevered in his speculative errors and in his wicked conduct, by causing St. Martin to be seized, and after suffering many casualties, to be banished to the Tauric Chersonesus, where he died in 655.

His relics were afterwards brought to Rome, and deposited in the church of St. Martin of Tours, on the 12th of November, which, from thenceforward, was observed as a festival to his honour.

The day of St. Martin of Tours, the popular patron of beggars, happens to be on the day before, and several parishes give their feasts on the nearest Sunday to November the 11th, but Gulval alone honours the Pope and Saint.

Gulval measures 3950 statute acres.

giving an increase of nearly 36½ per cent. in 30 years.

GEOLOGY, BY DR. BOASE.

The northern part of this parish rests on granite, which is for the most part a coarse crystalline rock, containing very large porphyritic crystals of felspar. The granite is, however, in some places very fine-grained, and near its juncture with the slate abounds in shorl. The schistose rocks composing the southern part of the parish, have a basis of compact felspar, assuming various appearances according as it is more or less siliceous; those rocks are often beautifully marked with crystalline patches and veins of actynolite, as may be seen in the rocks on the sea shore, and they are traversed here and there by beds of felspar porphyry, into which they gradually pass.

[4] Surely sixteen or seventeen hundred. Ed.

HALS.

Is situate in the hundred of Kerryer, and hath upon the north the Loopoole and part of Mawgan, east Cury, south Mullyan, west the British Channel, or Ocean.

At the time of the Norman Conquest this district was taxed either under the jurisdiction of Lisart, now Lisard, or Trevery. In the value of Benefices towards the Pope’s Annates made by the Bishops of Lincoln and Winchester, 1294, Ecclesia Sancti Winwalli, i. e. the church of the holy, victorious, or conquering Wallo, in decanatu de Kerryer, was rated iiiil. iiis. iiiid. In Wolsey’s Inquisition, 1521, it goes in value and consolidation with Breock, Germo, and Cury, by the name of the Vicarage of Wynnanton, i. e. the conquering, or victorious town; all doubtless referring to the conquests of King Gunwallo, or Dunwallo. 127 The patronage, I take it, was formerly in the Prior of St. Michael’s Mount, or the Duke of Cornwall, who endowed it. It is now in the King, or Duke; the incumbent Trewinard, and parish rated to the 4s. per pound Land Tax, 1696, temp. William III. 53l. 9s. 8d. by the name of Gunwallo.

The manor of Gunwallowinton, a lordship in this parish, claimeth the royalty and jurisdiction, by sea and land, over the whole parish, and was formerly the lands of Carmenow, now of Arundell of Lanhearne, by match with one of the daughters and heirs of that name.

TONKIN.

In this parish stands a circle of rude unwrought stones in the shape of a wall heaped together, and called Earth.

THE EDITOR.

Mr. Whitaker remarks in a note on Hal’s MS. that the name of this parish is clearly derived from its patron saint, Winnwallo.

I find that Winwallo was the son of a petty Prince in Wales; who, flying with his family from the Saxons, went into Britany, where he acquired the habit of undergoing monastic austerities under the guidance of St. Budock. He ultimately founded a monastery called Landevenech, about three miles from Brest. He became the first Abbat, and died on the 3d. of March about the year 529. His body was buried at Landevenech; but in after ages, when the northmen extended their ravages to this part of the Continent, his relics were removed to places of greater safety; and as an effectual security against an entire loss, portions were preserved at St. Peter’s, at Blandinberg, at Ghent, at Montreuil, and at other places.

The Celtic name has given origin to various pronunciations, and to as many corresponding orthographies; the G and W at the beginning of words are well known to take 128 each the place of the other almost without discrimination. In Picardy, where he is esteemed the patron, Winwallo is changed into Vignevaley and Walovay; in Britany into Guignole and Vennole; in other parts of France into Guingalois.

It is the more probable that St. Winwallo may be the patron saint of this parish, and that he may have given it his name, since a parish in the neighbourhood stands in that relation towards his teacher St. Budock. The parish feast, however, is held on the last Sunday in April, although St. Winwallo is honoured in the Roman calendar on the third of March.

Mr. Lysons says that the manor of Wynyaton, or Winington, called by Mr. Hals Gonwallowinton, was given about the year 1235, by Roger Earl of Cornwall, in exchange for Bossiney, to Gervase de Harnington; from whom it passed by an heiress to the family of Trevanthians, and again in the same way to Roskymers. It ultimately belonged to the Arundells till the general sale of all Lord Arundell’s property in Cornwall, when this manor was purchased by Mr. John Rogers, of Penrose, near Helston.

The church is situated among sandbanks, and very near the sea. In those banks Captain Avery, the celebrated buccaneer, is reported to have buried several chests of treasure previously to his leaving England on the voyage from which he never returned. So strongly has this opinion prevailed, that Mr. John Knill, collector of the customs at St. Ives, procured, about the year 1770, a grant of treasure trove, and expended some money in a fruitless search.

This gentleman is still remembered on account of his singularities, and his having erected a pyramid on a hill near the town where he had long resided.

In the churchyard of Gunwallo is a tombstone with the following conceit:

129 The parish measures 1175 statute acres.

giving an increase of 31½ per cent. in 30 years.

GEOLOGY, BY DR. BOASE.

This parish runs parallel with the sea shore from Poljew Cove to Loo Bar. The shore, where the land lies low, is covered with banks of siliceous sand, which near the church form an extensive down. At the Cove the rocks consist of a blue glassy slate, and of a compost rock of the same colour which decomposes into a white clay. Nearly the whole of the cliff is a diluvial mass; the lower part of which, just above high-water mark, is consolidated into a conglomerate sandstone, apparently through the cementing medium of a solution of carbonate of iron, derived from the percolation of rain-water through the bed of ferruginous clay that forms the upper part of this deposit.

HALS.

Is situate in the hundred of Keryer, and hath upon the north, part of Redruth, east Peranwell and Key, south Gluvius, west Stithians. That this church was extant before the Norman Conquest is plain from the name thereof, for in the Domesday Tax, 20th William I. 1087, it is rated by the name of Gwenap. In the Inquisition into the value of Cornish Benefices made by the Bishops of Lincoln and Winchester, 1294, Ecclesia Sancti Wenap in decanatu de Kerrier, is rated at viil. Vicar ejusdem 130 xxvis. viiid. In Wolsey’s Inquisition, 1521, the Vicarage of Wenap is valued 16l. 18s. 9d. The patronage in the Bishop of Exeter, who endowed it. The incumbent Bishop; and the parish rated to the 4s. per pound Land Tax, 1696, 148l. 3s. by the name of Gwenap. The garb, or rectory, in Wright or Nicholls.

Trefyns (i. e. the springs of water, or fountains town,) came to Beauchamp by marriage with the heiress of this name and land, where they have ever since flourished in gentle degree. The present possessor, William Beauchamp, Esq. that married Courtney of Trehane, his father Boaden, his grandfather Tregoze, giveth for his arms, Vairy Argent and Azure. The first progenitor of the tribe and name of Beauchamp came into England a soldier under William the Conqueror, and probably some of his posterity were planted in this province, from whence those gentlemen are descended; especially if the name, Stephen de Bellocampo, 40th Henry III. who held in Cornwall by tenure of knight’s service 15l. per annum land and rents, may be interpreted the same as Beauchamp (Carew’s Survey of Cornwall, p. 40), for otherwise verily I know not from what family of gentlemen those Beauchamps are descended; since none other of that name give the same arms as these do; for Guy de Beauchamp, Sheriff of Devon, 12th King John, gave for his arms, Gules, a fess between three crosses bottony Or; from whom are descended the Beauchamps of Bletsho and Hatch, in Wiltshire. Beauchamp Earl of Warwick gave for his arms, Gules, a fess between six cross-crosslets Or. William Beauchamp, Sheriff of Devon 18th Henry VI. that married the inheritrix of Henry de Ties, lord of Alverton and Tywarnhayle, summoned to Parliament as a Baron temp. Henry IV. gave for his arms, Gules, a fess between six martlets Or; from whence I gather there were diverse families of those Beauchamps heretofore in England, no way related in blood to each other. Query, whether the arms of those gentlemen living in this place be not the 131 arms of Bochym, as I have been informed they are, which is Vaire Argent and Azure.

Notwithstanding this place of Trefyns was heretofore denominated from springs of water abounding there in winter season, yet I assure you now in summer time, by reason of the tin-mines and subterranean adits near it that carry those springs of water invisibly under ground, water is very scarce and much wanting in those lands. It is also called Trevense, and Trewince.

St. Dye chapel in this parish was heretofore a chapel of ease to Gwenap; the tutelar guardian whereof is St. Dye, of Gaul, very famous in that country for his piety and holy Christian living about the fifth century, who held the faith in opposition to Arianism and Pelagianism, then raging in the church. And there is a church in the province of Lorraine still bearing his name. If it were as easy for the Vicar to attend and perform divine service in this remote quarter of the parish where this chapel is, as it is convenient to his parishioners in the town of St. Dye, it had been doubtless still applied to the end and use for which it was erected.

Not far from this place is that unparalleled and inexhaustible tin-work called Paldys; i. e. the top or head of St. Dye’s Town, which for above forty years’ space hath employed yearly from eight hundred to a thousand men and boys, labouring for and searching after tin in that place, where they have produced and raised up for that time yearly, at least twenty thousand pounds worth of that commodity, to the great enriching of the lords of the soil, the bound owners, and adventurers in those lands.

Of those miners, or searchers for metals, hath Ovid written elegantly in Latin verse, which sounds thus in English, tempore Augusti:—

Memorandum.—On Friday, 19th September, 1707, about four of the clock in the afternoon, happened in those parts divers flashes of lightning and cracks of thunder, which not only terrified the inhabitants thereof, but after one of those cracks a ball of fire, or Jupiter’s thunderbolt (as the Greeks called it), entered by the window into the house of one John Kent, a carpenter of this parish, where he was working, the windy force thereof instantly struck him dead on the place, scalded his wife and two children in that room, then passed out through the chimney wall, and so shattered the same that a great part of it instantly fell to the ground.

TONKINS.

In this parish, on the top of a lofty mountain called Carne-mark, are two or three stone tumuli, under which are doubtless interred the bodies of some distinguished persons.

The right name of this parish is St. Wenep, a female saint, to whom the parish is dedicated.

THE EDITOR.

Saint Wenep is, I believe, only remembered by the dedication of this parish; but St. Dye is a personage of 133 more consequence. He was a native of France, and in the year 655 became Bishop of Nevres; but St. Dye happened to live at a period when the prevalent fanaticism induced persons to believe that the Author of all good was most gratified by beholding the misery of his rational creatures, accompanied by their voluntary debasements through ignorance and solitude below the level of the brute creation. With this persuasion, St. Dye resigned his bishopric, and founded a house for monks at a place called Jointures, but retired himself to an anchorite cell. He is said to have died on the 19th of June, 680.

The chapel, dedicated to St. Dye, in Gwenap, had long been in ruins; but since the eager contest has grown up between the Establishment and Dissenters for retaining or acquiring power through the media of extensive education and proselytism, and Chapels, Meeting Houses, and Schools have arisen all over England, St. Dye has seen a new and spacious building displace the ruins that remained from former times.

The Beauchamps had removed from Trewince to Pengreap; where the family became extinct in the male line about the year 1818, by the decease of Mr. Joseph Beauchamp, who had lost his only son a few years before, and the estate is now divided between the two daughters of his elder brother, Mr. John Beauchamp.

Cornmarth has been already mentioned. Mr. Whitaker says that the true name is Cornmarke, and that it means the Knight’s barrow.

On the southern declivity of Cornmarth is a large excavation, supposed by some to have been made long ago for the exhibition of games, but by others to owe its general form to the accidental running together of an old mine. It is, at all events, admirably adapted to the purpose of enabling a speaker to address an extremely large assembly; and the late Mr. John Wesley has been distinctly heard by many thousands at a time in Gwenap pit.

134 Scornier, which a few years since exhibited the appearance of a small village, has now become perhaps the chief place in this parish. Mr. John Williams, one of the most extensive and most successful managers and adventurous miners of the present time, built here an excellent house, and adorned it with the finest collection of Cornish minerals ever brought together. Mr. Williams, after making a large fortune, has retired at an advanced age, leaving several sons engaged in the same pursuits with equal advantage to themselves and to the public; one of whom has added a second splendid house to the village.

It is quite impossible for me to enter fully into a description of the mines, which have continued in work on the most extensive scale from the period when Mr. Leman commenced the modern system up to the present time. It is said that no district of the same extent in any part of the world ever produced so much riches.

Poldice was worked for tin about the commencement of the last century by Mr. Hearle, of Penryn. The mine happened to have very little water, and this was exhausted by rock and chain pumps moved by human labour.

Copper seldom appears near the surface, as is the case with tin; but tin lodes out of granite frequently produce copper in depth. All the lodes in Gwenap have done so, and in some places the mines have gone to the depth of two hundred and thirty or forty fathoms from the surface, more than two hundred fathoms under the level of the sea, assisted by steam engines having working-cylinders ninety inches in diameter and ten feet long.

The freehold of the land containing those mines is possessed in undivided shares between several persons; Mr. Hearle had one-third, that is now divided again into thirds between the descendants of three daughters, Mr. Tremayne, Mr. Rodd, and Mr. Stephens.

The church in Gwenap is large in every dimension, but, what is very unusual, the tower stands apart. One of our 135 late historians very justly complains of what he terms the “mangling of modern Vandalism,” in alterations of the church; Venetian frames have been substituted for stone mullions; windows of painted glass bearing the figures of saints have been removed; and the screen, or rood-loft, of beautiful workmanship has disappeared; modern deal seats have been introduced throughout the church, and a glare of light on the white-washed walls has completed the overthrow of very thing venerable.

The interior is divided into a nave, a chancel, and two side ailes, supported on each side by seven handsome columns.

The burial-ground contains a monument of fine marble in memory of the Beauchamps.

There is a tradition in the parish of monks having been established in the church tower, and that a house now converted to an inn, was a part of the building. No notice whatever is taken of such a monastery in any authentic work. If therefore this tradition rests on any fact, the house cannot have been more than an hostelry for friars.

The parish measures 5,289 statute acres.

giving an increase of 86 per cent. in 30 years, and a numerical increase of three thousand nine hundred and forty-five persons.

Present Vicar, the Rev. W. Marsh, presented by the Dean and Chapter of Exeter in 1825.

GEOLOGY, BY DR. BOASE.

Gwenap has long been one of the most important mining districts of Cornwall. Its western part rests on the same 136 patch of granite as the eastern part of Cornborne, the one stretching to the east and the other to the west. The slate is also similar to that of Cornborne, and like that it is traversed by numerous beds of porphyry, some of which, in the vicinity of Burncoose, are of the most beautiful description, containing well-defined crystals of felspar and of quartz.

HALS.

Is situate in the hundred of Kerryer, and hath upon the north Camburne, south Maugan in Meneage, east Stithiany, Constantine, west Sithney.

In the taxation of benefices in Cornwall, as aforesaid, 1294, Ecclesia Sancte Wendrone (I suppose together with Helston, its daughter church,) in decanatu de Kerryer, is valued xviil. vis. viiid. In Wolsey’s Inquisition, 1521, it is valued, together with Helston, at 26l. 19s. 3d. The patronage formerly, as I am informed, in the Hospital and Prior, or Governor, of St. John the Baptist, at Helston, or the College of regular Canons at Glasnith, or Abbat of St. Michael’s Mount; now Jago, and the Incumbent Jago. The rectory, or sheaf, in Boscawen. And the parish rated to the 4s. per pound Land Tax, 1696, 174l. 8s. 4d.

Trenithike, in this parish (i. e. the town of the bridge or ford, leate or lake of waters). It is the dwelling of Sampson Hill, Esq. one of his Majesty’s Commissioners for the Peace, that married Callmady, the relict of Silly, and giveth for his arms, Or, a fess between two chevrons Sable, which is the coat-armour of the ancient family of the Seneschalls of this place, whose daughter and heir was married to the gentleman’s ancestor now in possession thereof, as I am informed.

137 Query, whether these arms are not the same as given by Sir John Lisle, knight, one of the first founders of the noble order of the Garter, lord of the manor of Wilbraham, in the county of Cambridge, whose posterity enjoy, as I take it, those lands and his arms to this day, viz. in a field Or, a fess between two chevrons Sable.

In this parish, by the post road, or highway, are set up, in perpendicular manner, about ten feet asunder in a line, nine large moor stones commonly called the Nine Maids, or Virgin Sisters; probably set up in memory of so many sister nuns heretofore interred there.

TONKIN.

This church, although a Vicarage, is endowed with the sheaf over all the southern part of the parish, which most abounds in grain. It carries with it Helston in the same presentation. The patronage in Mr. William Iago. The Incumbent Mr. John Jago. The sheaf not endowed in the possession of Mr. Hugh Boscowen, of Tregothnan.

At Trenithike is the dwelling of Sampson Hill, Esq. a Commissioner of the Peace, who married a sister of Joseph Colmady, of Longdon, in Devonshire, and widow of Heale of Battlesford.

All the lands in this parish lie within the great duchy, lordship, and manor of Helston in Kerrier, as it is named for distinction from Helston in Trigg. The church is certainly called Wendron, from its female patroness.

Bodilly I interpret the house by the church, from ilis, the same as eglis, a church, from which it is not far distant. There are two houses adjacent so called, Bodilly Veor and Bodilly Vear, the great and the little. Bodilly Veor was the seat of Thomas Tresilian, Gent. descended from the Tresilians of Roughtra, who, having mortgaged it to Sir Peter Killigrew, sold the freehold to Mr. William Glynn, and younger brother to Mr. Thomas Glynn, of Polkinhorne.

138 At Trenere there is an arched vault of moorstone adjoining to the house, said to have been a cellar, and this place a hunting seat to the ancient Dukes of Cornwall.

THE EDITOR.

It appears that the vicarage of Wendron, and perhaps the endowed portion of the great tithes, belonged to Rewley Abbey, near Oxford, founded by Edmund Earl of Cornwall, in compliance with an injunction of his father Richard Earl of Cornwall; although Richard himself seems to have commenced the foundation, for a manuscript history in the Cotton Library says,

“Frater enim hujus regis (Henrici tertii) Ricardus primus Comes Cornubiæ, post Rex Alemaniæ et Semper Augustus, fundavit Abbatias monachorum Cisterciensis ordinis de Royal alias Rewley Oxoniæ, et de Hayles in Comitatu Gloucestriæ, ubi honorifice est sepultus. Cor tamen suum Oxoniæ in choro fratrum minorum, sub sumptuosa et mirandi operis pyramide humatum est.”

The Charter of his son Edmund begins,

“Sciant præsentes et futuri, quod nos Edmundus, claræ memoriæ Domini Ricardi regis Alemannii filius, et Comes Cornubiæ, dedimus concessimus et hac præsenti carta nostra confirmavimus Deo, et ecclesiæ beatæ Mariæ de Regali Loco in North Oseney juxta Oxon, et abbati inibi commoranti et quindecim monachis capellanis ordinis Cisterciensis ibi professis, pro anima Ricardi quondam regis Alemanniæ patris nostri, divino celebrantibus, et eorum successoribus ibidem commorantibus Deo servientibus et in perpetuum servituris, omnes terras et tenementa quæ habuimus in North Oseneye prope Oxon et (inter alia) unam acram terræ, secundum Angliæ consuetudinem mensuratam, de dominico nostro in terra de Bel juxta Roslyn, cum advocatione ecclesiæ de Sancta Wendrova, et aliis pertinentiis suis in hundredo de Kerier in Cornubia.”

139 And in the schedule returned to King Henry VIII. after the dissolution of property belonging to Rewley Abbey,

Com. Cornub.

Wendromo et Stadyon, firma Rector’ … £.22.

This advowson had passed through various hands till it was assigned by Mr. Matthew Wills, of Helston, on whose decease, in 1782, it came to his son, Mr. Thomas Wills. This gentleman, although not intended for the church, had received his education at Winchester and Oxford, and the living happening to become vacant just at the period of his father’s death, Mr. Wills was induced to take holy orders, and he is now (1834) the Incumbent; but the advowson has been transferred to Queen’s College, Oxford, for its Michell or new foundation; thus returning almost to the very spot where it was bestowed almost six hundred years before.

The barton of Trenethick is traced back to the family of Seneschalls, from whom it came by a marriage to the Hills; the last of whom, Mr. John Hill, gave it by will, about seventy years since, to a family long seated in Constantine, of the same name, but, from their bearing different arms, probably not related.

Nansloe, the vale leading to the lake, is beautifully situated in a valley near the Loo. It has been for some time the seat of the Robinsons, since they removed there from Bochim in Cury. The last representative of this family in the male line was the late Reverend William Robinson, Vicar of Crowan.

Trelil belonged to Mr. Rowe, steward to Lord Godolphin. His only daughter and eventual heiress married Mr. William Harris, of Rosewarne, in Camburne, Sheriff of Cornwall in the year 1773; and their only daughter, married to Winchcombe Hartley, Esq. of Berkshire, is its present possessor.

This parish has for ages been one of the most productive 140 of tin in the whole county; and before the improved operations of smelting had placed all ores nearly on the same level as to the quality of their products, the neighbourhood of Porkellis boasted of producing the best tin in Cornwall.

The church is situated nearly at one extremity of this immense parish, and has nothing to distinguish it but a monument to the memory of Warin Penhallinyk, a prebendary of the monastery at Penryn, Rector of St. Just, in Roseland, Vicar of Wendron and of the adjoining parish, Stithyans. The Vicarage-house is a mere hovel. The parish feast is on the nearest Sunday to October the 28th, St. Simon and St. Jude.

Mr. Jago, Vicar of Wendron, was perhaps the last clergyman in the west of Cornwall supposed to exercise supernatural powers; various anecdotes were current about him sixty years ago, and then generally believed; all I apprehend to his credit, being such as laying spirits, discovering thieves, &c. mixed up, however, with frivolities, as seems ever to have happened in those popular legends. Whenever parson Jago got off from his horse he struck the ground with his whip, and a demon immediately appeared to hold or take care of his horse till he wanted it again. The Rev. Francis Vyvyan Jago Arundell is descended either from this gentleman or from his father.

This parish measures (including Helston) 12,317 statute acres.

giving an increase on the Parish of 59, on the Town 46½, on both together 53½,—per cent. in 30 years.

THE GEOLOGY, BY DR. BOASE.

About two-thirds of this extensive parish is situated on granite, which is the same as that of Camborne, Crowan, and Sithney adjoining; the other third, which forms the southern part of the parish, is composed of slate rocks, which near the granite are felspathic, and clearly referrible to the porphyritic series; but as the sea is approached, the character of these slates becomes obscure, such as they generally are whenever the porphyritic and calcareous series pass into each other.

HALS.

Is situate in the hundred of Penwith, and hath upon the north Gwythian, west Phelack, south Crowan and St. Erth, east Camburne.

In the Domesday Tax this district passed under the jurisdiction either of Caerton in Crowan, Lewellen in Gwythian, or Hella in Camburne. In the Inquisstion of the Bishops of Winchester and Lincoln into the value of Cornish Benefices, 20th Edward I. 1294, Ecclesia de Sancto Winer in decanatu de Penwid, was valued cxiiis. iiiid. In Wolsey’s Inquisition, 1521, it is valued 12l. by the same name of Winer. The patronage in the Bishop of Exeter, who endowed it. The Incumbent Thomas 142 Paynter. The Rectory, or garbe sheaf, in possession of Howell, under lease from Exeter College, Oxford. And the parish rated to the 4s. per pound Land Tax, 1696, 147l. 7s. 2d. by the name of Gwiniar.

Lanyon, in this parish, a seat of the Lanyons, the first propagators of this family in Cornwall, came, with many other French gentlemen, into England, with Isabella, wife of King Edward II. and settled themselves in those parts; amongst which Lanyon’s posterity have ever since flourished in gentle degree in Cornwall; and for further proof of this matter, that originally they came from the town of Lanyon, situate upon a sea-haven, or harbour, in France, they give still the arms of that town for their paternal coat armour, viz. in a field Sable, a castle Argent, standing on waves of the sea Azure, over the same a falcon hovering with bells. The present possessor, Tobias Lanyon, Gent. that married Pineck; his father Reynolds.

Polkinhorne, in this parish (eminent or notable iron head). From this place was denominated an old family of gentlemen surnamed Polkinhorne, who gave for their arms, Argent, three bars Sable; whose only daughter and heir, temp. Charles II. was married to Thomas Glynn, Gent. a younger branch of the Glynns of Glynn, whose father giveth for his arms, Argent, a chevron between three salmon-spears handled and barbed Sable, two in chief, and one in the base part, with points downwards.

Coswin, in this parish (i. e. the white wood or fair) gave name and original to an old family of gentlemen surnamed De Coswyn, who lived reputably in this place for several descents, till John Coswyn, temp. Charles II. by ill husbandry, wasted his paternal estate, and sold this little barton to the person now in possession thereof.

TONKIN.

The right name of this parish is St. Wynnier, a corruption of St. Wymer, its tutelar saint, by which name it is called in the Taxatio Beneficiorum, Ecclesia Sancti Wymeri.

143 The great tithes of this parish are believed to have been bestowed on Exeter College, by its founder, Walter de Stapledon, Bishop of Exeter, A.D. 1318.

A younger brother’s daughter of Coswin, who squandered the property, married Peter Pendarves, gent. and brought Bodrigge in Thellark into that family.

THE EDITOR.

The parish of Gwiner has been extremely productive in copper. Herland Mine, usually called the manor, produced so large a return to Mr. Hobbin, only part proprietor of the land, as paid for the building of Nansewidden in St. Columb, about the middle of the last century. It has been since wrought on a most extensive scale, and to a great depth.

Whele Alfred, Whele Trelistion, and others, have been very productive; but at present they are all discontinued.

The family of most consequence connected with this parish is that of Lanyon.

The first syllable certainly implies an inclosed place, from which it has become specifically applied to a church, to a castle, and even to a town. Mr. Hals’ conjectures as to the termination of the name, appear to be so utterly groundless that they are omitted.

Mr. Whitaker believes that Lanyon in Normandy bears only a castle for its cognisance, and that the falcon has been added on account of the similarity in sound of Lanyer to Lanner, the favourite bird in falconry.

It must be observed however that Lanyon is always in Cornwall pronounced La-nine.

The Gwinear and Madern branches of the Laryon family were together possessed of extensive property in the adjacent parishes; combinations of unfortunate circumstances have diminished their possessions, but hopes may be entertained that the Lanyons of Gwinear, who have never 144 lost the sense of what is due to the memory of their ancestors, may again resume the former station of their family.

The Rev. Malachy Hitchins, Vicar of St. Hilary, held this living for almost thirty years.

Gwinear measures 3,882 statute acres.

giving an increase of 65 per cent. in 30 years.

Present Vicar, the Rev. John Thomas Wilgress, collated, by the Bishop of Exeter in 1813.

GEOLOGY, BY DR. BOASE.

This parish, like those adjoining, Camborne and Crowan, has been long celebrated for its mines, but it does not resemble them by reposing in part on granite, being confined entirely to rocks of the slate series.

The porphyritic courses are not so common here as in Gwennap; but they often assume a very interesting form, occurring as insulated masses, which in some cases are perfectly granitic, and at the same time afford every indication of their having been formed contemporaneously with the slate. The most curious geological phenomenon of this parish is to be met with in Relistion Mine, where one of the lodes, (metalliferous veins) at a considerable depth, is composed of rounded pedules, cemented together in a hard solid mass; at first sight it would be pronounced to be a decided conglomerate of derivative origin; but on a more close examination it is found to have the spheroidal structure, which is common to many rocks, and which in regard to this mineral was probably coeval with its original formation.

HALS.

Is situate in the hundred of Penwith, and hath upon the north the Irish Sea, or St. George’s Channel, and that creek or cove called Gwithian Bay, east Illigan, west Phelack, south Gwyniar.

The entry occurs, Rex tenet Canardi-tone, in the Domesday tax 20 William I. 1087.

For in this parish is the voke lands of the great and privileged manor of Coner, or Conner-ton, which claims by prescription not only the royalties and jurisdiction within its limits, but also over the whole hundred of Penwith (id est, the head tree). Hence it is that this manor of Connerton is privileged not only with the jurisdiction of a Court Leet or Baron for the whole hundred of Penwith, within which two courts are tried all matters of debt and damage between party and party within the same, (life, land, and limb excepted,) wherein heretofore infinite number of causes have been depending, by reason of its being the most remote part of the kingdom from the Courts of Westminster; the steward or judge of which courts, (which offices commonly are vested in one person,) takes his deputation from the now lord of the manor, viz. Sir John Arundell, of Lanherne, Knight, and not from the King or Duke of Cornwall’s stewards, as other bailiwicks do.

For in the time of King Henry III. this manor was the King of England’s or Earl of Cornwall’s lands, who, by letters patent, yet to be seen at Lanherne, passed it over, together with the bailiwick of the said hundred, to Simon Pincerna, or Butler, lord of Lanherne, in consideration that he the said Simon had enfeoffed the said King Henry, 146 his heirs and successors, with the lordship and manor of St. James at Westminster, in the county of Middlesex. After which exchange or settlement, Pincerna and his heirs enjoyed this manor for several descents, till Edward III.’s days. At which time one of the two daughters and heirs of Pincerna was married to Arundell of Trenibleth, the direct ancestor of Sir John Arundell of Lanherne, Knight, now in possession of both those lordships. The other daughter to Umphravill.

To remove an action at law depending in those Courts, the writ must be thus directed: “Senescallo et Ballivo hundredi et libertatis suæ de Penwith in Comitatu Cornubiæ salutem.”

In the Inquisition of the Bishops of Lincoln and Winchester into the value of Cornish benefices, 1294, “Ecclesia de Sancto Gwyth-ran, in decanatu de Penwidh,” is valued cxiiis. iiiid. It seems at the time of this inquisition this church was not consolidated into Phillack; but before Wolsey’s Inquisition, 1521, it past in consolidation and value together with it, at 45l. 10s. 8d. The patronage was formerly in the King of England, who endowed it; now Arundell of Lanherne. And the parish is rated to the 4s. per pound Land Tax, 1696, 58l. 2s. by the name Gwith-ran.

TONKIN.

This church is a rectory, daughter to Phillack, together with which it is rated in the King’s Books, and passeth in the presentation. The patronage is in Arundell of Lanherne, the incumbent Mr. Jasper Phillips. This gentleman is since deceased, and has left the next presentation, held by lease under the Arundells, to his nephew Mr. Gregory, who has presented his brother-in-law, Mr. Edward Collins, son of Mr. Collins, of Treworgy in St. Erm (great-grandfather to the Editor).

This parish takes its name, like many others, from the 147 Saint to whom the church is dedicated, called by Mr. Carew, St. Gothian.

THE EDITOR.

Mr. Hals’s derivation is again so utterly improbable as to be omitted.

The Arundells, being Catholics, leased the advowson of Phillack and Gwithian on lives, to prevent its lapsing to the University of Oxford, under an Act of Parliament. On the death of Mr. Edward Collins it did so lapse, and the University presented Mr. William Glover, of Worcestershire, first of Balliol College and then a chaplain of All Souls. A lease was then granted to Mr. Hoskin, of Gwithian, and his son the Rev. Richard Hoskin succeeded Mr. Glover, who on the general sale of all the Arundell property in Cornwall, purchased the freehold, so that his son is now patron and incumbent of the united parishes.

Mr. Lysons says that the advowson of these united parishes belonged to the Priory of St. James in Bristol, and I find a charter of King Henry II.

“Henricus Dei gratia Rex Angliæ, et Dux Normanniæ et Aquitaniæ, et Comes Andegaviæ, Archiepiscopis, &c. salutem. Sciatis me concessisse et præsenti carta mea confirmasse ecclesiæ sancti Jacobi de Bristow omnia subscripta, quæ Willielmus comes Gloecestriæ ei rationabiliter concessit et dedit in perpetuam elemosinam, scilicet inter alia et omnes ecclesias quæ sunt de feodo jam dicti comitis in Cornubia cum capellis et cum omnibus pertinentiis suis; scilicet Ecclesiam de Eglosrek, Ecclesiam de CONORTON, Ecclesiam de Eglasheil, Ecclesiam de Eglossant, Ecclesiam de Egloscraweyn, et Capellam de Bennartona, Ecclesiam de Melioton, et Ecclesiam Sancti Germoch.”

It is understood that the manor of Conorton had in some way been connected with the honour of Gloucester before the Conquest. William certainly gave it with that honour to Alan Earl of Britanny. Rufus had it again to bestow, 148 and under his grant it descended to the Earls of Gloucester, originating in an illegitimate son of King Henry I. William, the second of these earls, endowed the Priory of St. James.

Mr. Lysons says that Robert Earl of Gloucester, son of this Robert, gave Conorton to Richard Pincerna in 1154, but he is clearly mistaken, for the date proves it to be done by the same William. Pincerna is a word used by writers mediæ et infimæ Latinitatis for butler. Qui vinum convivis miscet, a Græco πινειν κιρνα. Ducange.

The son of this Pincerna took the name of Conorton, as was usual in those times, and settled at Lanherne; from this family it passed with Lanherne to the Arundells, by marriage, in whom it continued till the general wreck above referred to, when being reduced to a mere royalty it was bought by the late Sir Christopher Hawkins, and since his decease in 1829 the royalty has been purchased by an attorney, for the purpose in all probability of holding the courts.

There is a tradition, supported by the authority of Leland, that a town so large as to contain two churches stood on this manor, which has been destroyed by sand; but the tale must at the least be a very great exaggeration.

The account given by Mr. Hals of the exchange of the manor of Conorton for St. James’ in Westminster, can scarcely be made to quadrate with the above account, which appears to be authentic, and it is still further opposed by the history of St. James’s Hospital, as given by Tanner and Dugdale, they say:

“At a distance from the city, in the fields near Westminster, some well disposed citizens of London, beyond the memory of man, and (as some think) long before the Conquest, founded a hospital for the reception of fourteen 149 leprous women, to whom were afterwards added brethren, to minister divine service.” This house was dedicated to St. James, and rebuilt in the time of King Henry III.

It was under the government of a master (although the Abbat of Westminster claimed a jurisdiction over it) till King Henry VI. granted the perpetual custody of it to Eton College, who surrendered it to King Henry VIII. anno Regni 23, (A. D. 1531) when it was valued at 100l. per annum, in exchange for Chattisham in Suffolk. On or near the place where this hospital stood has been since built the present Royal Palace of St James.

Mr. Lysons has been so fortunate as to obtain from the late rector some information respecting the inundation of sand, which has devastated a large portion of these two parishes, extending its ravages wherever the coast is low, throughout the whole northern space of Cornwall, from the Land’s End to Devonshire. There has always existed a traditional account of this inundation, corroborated by the ecclesiastical valuations, which are far too high for the actual extent of land, and also said to be confirmed by documents preserved in the Arundell family, carrying back the commencement of the evil nearly to the period of their acquiring the property.

With respect to more recent inundations, Mr. Hoskin in stated to Mr. Lysons, that the barton of Upton, one of the principal farms, was suddenly overwhelmed; that his great-grandfather remembered the occupier residing in the farmhouse, which was nearly buried in one night, the family being obliged to make their escape through the chamber windows; and that in consequence of the wind producing a shifting of the sand, in the winter of 1808-9, the house, after having disappeared for more than a century, came again to view.

The rector further stated that he himself remembered two fields lost at Gwithian, and that they are now covered with sand to the depth of ten or twelve feet, and that the church-town would have been also lost, if the parish 150 officers had not promptly resorted to an expedient, which, simple as it may seem, has every where proved to be the most efficacious in arresting this gigantic evil, that of planting rushes; these stop completely the progress of sand, and greatly facilitate the growth of other vegetation on the surface, so as to create a thin turf. The hillocks of sand exhibit a model in miniature of the Alps.

This sand is entirely calcareous, being a mass of comminuted shells, and immense quantities are carried away for manure, more especially in the cultivation of strong clay lands; but no method sufficiently cheap for practice has yet been invented for burning this shell sand into lime, as the fine powder chokes the fuel in any kiln, and a reverberatory furnace is much too expensive.

On the opposite coast of Cornwall the sand is siliceous.

Godrery belongs to Lord De Dunstanville, a bold promontory distinguished by an island beyond it, and by a dangerous reef extending far into St. Ive’s Bay.

Other lands are much divided. Mr. Hoskin the present rector, and his relations, are considerable proprietors, and several resident farmers live on their own freeholds, Mr. Veal, Mr. Phillips, and others.

Notice has been taken of a very large fig tree growing in the churchyard; the wonder is much diminished by knowing that this tree was planted by the late rector; but as chalk is of all soils the most favourable to figs, it is not improbable that calcareous sand may participate in the same quality.

The parish feast is held on the nearest Sunday to the first of November, All Saints Day.

This parish measures 2,249 statute acres.

giving an increase of about 64 per cent. in 30 years.

GEOLOGY, BY DR. BOASE. 151

The rocks of this parish are well exhibited at Godrery Point, they consist of a fine blue and fissile slate, and of a thick lamellar and somewhat compact rock. They are not metalliferous, and resemble those of Trevaunance in St. Agnes. The greater part of the parish is covered with hillocks of calcareous sand, as is common on many parts of the north coast.

HALS.

Is situate in the hundred of Trigge, and hath upon the north St. Mabyn, East Blissland, and part of Bodmin parish; south, Bodmin Town; west, part of St. Mabyn and Egleshayle. The name refers to the church, and signifies the hall college, temple, or church.

That there was an endowed rectory church here before the Norman Conquest I make no doubt, since in the Domesday Roll it is taxed by the name of Henland, and also in the Inquisition of the Bishops of Lincoln and Winchester into the value of Church Benefices in Cornwall, 1294, “Ecclesia de Hellan in decanatu de Trigminorshire,” is valued xls. In Wolsey’s Inquisition, 1521, 9l. 13s. 4d. The patronage formerly in the Prior of Bodmin, who endowed it; after in Heale and Bulteel; now in Robins, or Tress, or Trelawny; and the parish rated to the 4s. per pound Land-Tax, 1696, by the name of Helland, 84l. 17s. 4d. The incumbent White.

At Bo-cuny-an, in this parish, is the dwelling of my very kind friend Dr. Robert Heart, who married Molesworth 152 and Hawkey; originally descended from the Hearts of Tencreek, of Mynhyniet, or St. German’s, and giveth for his arms, Gules, on a chief Argent three human hearts Proper.

Note further, that whosoever is possessed in fee of the barton of Helland, (for Bara-ton, i. e. the Bread Town lands in this parish,) is legal patron of the same, paying only 40s. to the Rector Incumbent for the time being, in full satisfaction for all the great and small tithes of the said barton, according to an ancient pact or composition made between the first Rector thereof and the Prior of Bodmin, who endowed it. Which sum of 40s. per annum at the time of the Inquisition aforesaid, was the value of the tithes of the whole parish.

Note further, wherever the word barton occurs in this history, it being Cornish British, it must be interpreted either as the barred, bolted, or fenced towne, or as a contraction of the word Bara-ton aforesaid, for as bara is bread in British, so ton or tone is a town or village, a manor, parish, tenement, or part thereof; the place where commonly the lord of the land had a well bolted or barred house to dwell in; or else a town or house which was notable for keeping or dispensing freely of bread for support of man’s life.

TONKIN.

The words Hel or Hale are at least the Cornish pronunciation of the English hall, atrium, and this word was applied to churches as well as to gentlemen’s houses in various parts of England, as Helldon Rectory in Norfolk Halling, Kent, &c., and see the 140th stanza of Mount Calvary.

But after all, if we may believe the parishioners, the name 153 is a contraction for Helen’s Land, the church being dedicated to St. Helena, the mother of Constantine.

In this parish lived the old family of the Giffords, who married one of the inheritrixes of the Esses, or Vanstorts, in the time of Henry VI. as Gifford’s heiress was married to Nicholls of Penrose.

THE EDITOR.

Mr. Whitaker has observed, in a note on what Mr. Hals says on the word barton, a term now almost indiscriminately applied to all large farms, although in former times it was probably restricted to what Mr. Hals denominates the yoke land of a manor.

Barton in English is Bere-ton, as Berwick, and signifies primarily a farm-house distinguished by the corn generally raised, once bere, or barley; and from the house the term has been transferred to the estate annexed. Baraton here means the same as bara, bread or corn, bara pill the corn harbour, bara-Llan, barton (Cornish) a cornfield, and barn (as in English) a corn-house.

Mr. Lysons mentions several manors in this parish, but they do not appear ever to have possessed any importance or curiosity, except that the manor of Penhargard belonged to the unfortunate Chief Justice Trevilian, and that the barton of Brades or Broads was for some time the seat of a younger branch of the Glynns.

Robert Glynn, Esq. residing there, married in 1711 Lucy Clobery, and their only son was Doctor Glynn, a Fellow of King’s College, Cambridge, well known and distinguished for his abilities, learning, and philanthropy, and in some degree also for occasional eccentricities. He obtained not merely one of the University prizes, but great reputation by a Latin Poem on the Day of Judgment, in the year 1757; and in illustration of other parts of his character, having attended as a physician on the family of some agricultural labourer near Cambridge, and restored 154 them to health, the man’s wife lamented their poverty, but begged of the Doctor to take a tame bird in their possession, as the only thing in their power to bestow. Doctor Glynn accepted the present, but declared that he could not keep his bird in a college room, and that therefore they must keep it for him, at an allowance of half a crown a week.

To be invited by Doctor Glynn to drink tea at his room was always considered as an honour by the younger members of the University, and the Editor remembers to have heard that Mr. Pitt, then at the head of the government, and just elected into a seat more flattering than any office the crown could confer, expressed himself pleased by the repetition of these invitations from Doctor Glynn.

Helland measures 2,053 statute acres.

giving an increase of 29 per cent. in 30 years.

Present Rector, the Rev. Francis J. Hext, presented in 1817, by William Morshead, Esq.

GEOLOGY, BY DR. BOASE.

The geology of this parish is similar to that of the western part of Bodmin. It is however worthy of remark that in the road from Bodmin to Camelford several beds of granitic elvan are exposed to view. The first at the top of the hill near Smith’s, resembles a coarse granitic sandstone, and at its junction with the slate both rocks are perfectly distinct, not having any appearance of transition, which circumstance is in favour of its being a derivative rock. This subject, however, requires further examination. The other elvans are more compact and porphyritic, and contain hornblende, resembling those of Carraton Hill, near Liskeard, situated within the granite.

HALS.

Is situate in the hundred of Kerryer, and hath upon the east Gwendron, west Sythney and the Loopoole, south Maugan and Gunwallo.

That this was a privileged place, and the voke lands of a manor, with court leet, before the Norman Conquest, I make no doubt, since the whole hundred of Kerryer, in King Alfred’s days, was in chief denominated from it. Besides this testimony, in Domesday Roll 20 William I. 1087, we read that by the name of Henliston, it was then taxed. Moreover, Brooke, York Herald, tells us temp. James I. in the Catalogue of Cornish Earls, that the privileges of this town or manor were concerted into a charter, and incorporated by Richard Plantagenet, Earl of Cornwall, 3d. son of King Henry II. surnamed Cur-lyon, from his lion-like heart, in the name of Helleston, as appeared from the charter, which he had then in his custody, to the seal whereof was affixed a lion rampant. It was also made one of the four coinage towns by King Edward I. in his charter to the Tinners, by the same name (See the charter under Luxilian). As also incorporated into the Duchy of Cornwall, by the same name 1336, when King Edward III. to his son the Black Prince promoted or translated the Earldom of Cornwall into a Duchy or Dukedom.

Whereby this town is also confirmed to be the voke lands of the manors or stanneries of Helston and Kerryer, (id est, Hall, Broad Town, and Lover,) and privileged with a Court Leet, wherein all pleas of debt and damage, between party and party, concerning tin matters, are tried by a jury of six men, before the Vice Warden and Steward of the Stanneries, (under the Lord Warden thereof,) life, land, and limb excepted. It is also privileged with a Court 156 Leet before the tribunal of the Mayor and Aldermen, and Quarterly Sessions of the Peace, and sending two members to Parliament; markets weekly on Saturday; fairs on August 29, October 28, Saturday before Midlent Sunday, Saturday before Palm Sunday, Whitsun Monday, and two fairs before St. Thomas à Becket’s day. Moreover, these privileges were confirmed and enlarged by charters temp. Queen Elizabeth and King Charles I. by the name of the Mayor and Burgesses, who consist of a Mayor (who is a Justice of the Peace for the Borough, the year succeeding his Mayoralty), and four Aldermen, who elect as many Common Councilmen as make their number twelve. Their Members of Parliament are elected by the majority of the freemen, and returned by the Mayor, to whom the precept on the writ for election must be thus directed, as well as that for removing an action depending in the Leet of Helston to a superior Court:

“Majori et Burgensibus Burgi nostri de Helleston in Comitatu Cornubiæ, salutem.”

Not far from this town stands the ruins of an old camp, or intrenchment, called Castle Werre, or Wera, an old fort or citadel to defend it from its enemies’ invasion. The arms of which town are Argent, a castle, or house, garreted on the top thereof, between two watch-towers, the Archangel St. Michael fighting with a dragon, or the devil.

That King Edward I. frequented this place for delight or pleasure, or designed so to do, upon the death of his uncle Richard Earl of Cornwall, King of the Romans, when the Earldom of Cornwall reverted to himself, in right of his Crown of England, Anno Dom. 1272, is evident from his granting lands by the tenure of grand sergeantry to William de Treville, on condition of bringing a fishhook and a boat and net, at his own proper costs and charges, for the king’s fishing in the lake of Helston, whensoever the King should come to Helston, and as long as he should tarry there. See the copy of this enfeofment deed in Sythney parish.

157 The chief inhabitants of this coinage town for tin are Mr. Penrose, Mr. Polkinhorne, Mr. Hooker, attorney at law, Mr. Williams, Mr. Rawe, Mr. Burges, Mr. Pinock, and others.

In the Inquisition of the Bishops of Lincoln and Winchester, into the value of Cornish Benefices, 1294, the church of Helston is not named, but passed then under the title of its mother or superior church, Gwendron, into which it was consolidated, 17l. 6s. 8d.; in Wolsey’s Inquisition, by the names of Wendron and Helston, 26l. 19s. 3d.; both endowed, I suppose, by the Master or Governor of St. John’s Hospital at Sythney, who were patrons thereof till the 6th Henry VIII. when it was dissolved, now Jago; the incumbent Jago; and the town or parish of Helston rated to the 4s. per pound Land Tax, 1696, 181l. 9s. 4d.

In the year 1727 happened in those parts astonishing claps of thunder and lightning, which in fine broke down and tore in pieces the greatest part of this town’s church and tower, and did it damage to the value of two or three hundred pounds in repair thereof.

TONKIN.

This church is a Vicarage, endowed, and passeth in the presentation with Gwendron.

Mr. Carew, in his Survey of Cornwall, tells us that within this town was an hospital, but gives no further account of it; so that it is unknown to me whether it were a spital erected for the relief of pilgrims from abroad, or for the use of sick impoverished people within the town. Most assured I am that near this place there was a priory erected to the name of St. John the Baptist.

THE EDITOR.

I have omitted some paragraphs from Hals and from Tonkin respecting several derivations of the name “Helstone,” 158 as all the circumstances of the place seem to point at one so decidedly as to exclude all consideration of the others. No doubt this one transgresses an arbitrary rule confining the themes of all derivations to a single language; but the instances in contradiction are so numerous throughout all England, as to render this circumstance of no importance.

The spot long used as a bowling-green is acknowledged on all hands to have been the site of an ancient castle. It must therefore have been the nucleus of the town; and the marsh extending from the Loo Pool along the valley, passes under the scarped rampart of the castle.

Hellas is well known to signify a marsh in the Celtic dialect used in Cornwall, and the termination Ton, the origin of our general word town, signified, in the Saxon,—more especially a walled town, or fortress; Helleston is therefore the fortress on the marsh.

The first charter of incorporation given to Helston, at least from the supreme feudal chief, is said to have been by King John. It is, however, highly probable that privileges of guild may have been bestowed long before by the Princes of Cornwall, vassals from the time of Athelstan. Various other charters were granted, till, in the early part of the reign of George III. the number of corporators became so reduced that the remainder were incapable of performing any corporate act; a new charter was in consequence obtained, and at the next general election the individuals named in it returned two members; but six persons remaining of the former party did the same: and so strong at that period was the feeling for chartered rights, in consequence of the conduct pursued by King Charles II. and his successor, that a committee of the House of Commons determined the right to remain in this fragment, incapable of performing any other civil act. And songs were made on the occasion, comparing these heroes with Eustace de St. Pierre and his companions.

One, if not two more returns were made in the same manner, till the number being fallen down to two very old men, they were induced to wave their privilege, partly, it is said, from an apprehension entertained that the maxim of Roman law, tres faciunt collegiam, might be effectually urged against them.

A custom had grown up at Helston, from early times, and by no means peculiar to that place, in compliance with which the patron, a well known and definite appellation, paid all the parochial rates; but an opinion may be formed of their small amount at no distant period, from the following statement. The Editor being on a Committee of the House of Commons, to consider and report on the poor laws soon after the conclusion of the late war, laid before the Committee a copy of a poor rate made for a parish in the west of England in the year 1704: it amounted to four pounds and some few shillings, while in the current year it exceeded six hundred pounds.

This practise in Helston became the ground of a petition after the general election of 1812; and, opinions having now changed, the matter was taken up so seriously in the House of Commons, as to induce the passing of a bill for disfranchising the borough. The other branch of the legislature, however, considered the practice, although wrong in itself, yet a delictum sine crimine, in this particular instance, as it most clearly appeared that some leading gentlemen, possessed of such influence as would have enabled them to make great lucrative advantages for themselves other ways, were benefited in so slight a degree by these payments, as to make it quite evident that self-interest had not been the motive of their conduct. The 160 bill did not pass into a law, and the town became regularly assessed like other places. The well-known connection usual in such cases had long subsisted between this town and the neighbouring family of Godolphin.

At the period of the last heraldic visitation in 1640, the signatures to the return of arms, &c. were,

The mark × of John Roe Moyes.

Thomas Seyntaubyn.

William Robinson.

Thomas James.

John Herbert.

 Dated October 9, 1640.

And the members of the corporation are stated to be,

 BURGESSES.

John Rowe Moyes.

Thomas St. Aubyn, Gent.

William Robinson.

Alexander Bolytho.

John Harbert.

John Alexander.

Thomas Godolphin, of Godolphin, Esq. Recorder.

Thomas James.

Robert Cock.

William Penhaluwick.

Daniel Bedford.

William Trewin.

Patrick Pesseme.

John Cock.

Thomas Randall, Steward of the said Town and Corporation.

In the Parliament preceding that, the Editor’s great-great-grandfather, William Noye, afterwards Attorney-General, represented Helston; and he himself had the same honour in the Parliament following the Union with Ireland. On the total change of the parliamentary constitution in 1832, the limits of Helston were extended so as to include a large portion of Wendron and the entire parish of Sithney. And the whole was reduced to sending one Member, or, according to a familiar expression, it was placed in Schedule B.

On that occasion a letter was addressed to a gentleman of the town, in return for a present of some delicacies, so 161 full of wit and humour that the Editor, having been favoured with a copy, is induced to insert it.

“Your very obliging present made its appearance this day, together with your note of the 2d. instant; pray, accept my best thanks for the same, the quality of which will, I have no doubt, on trial fully justify the favourable impression already made by their fragrance.

“Under the melancholy circumstances of affliction in which your town must be plunged by the announcement of the intended spoliation of a moiety of its electoral privileges, it is most pleasing to recognise a disposition in the leading citizens to impart of their good things to others; and although I should at all times have been much delighted by any mark of your friendly remembrance, yet it is doubly gratifying at a period like the present, when public embarrassments might naturally be supposed to absorb every other feeling, and to leave little room for indulging a spirit of individual philanthropy.

“Allow me, however, to express the hope, that as, when Hercules broke off the horn of the river god Achelous, it became the medium through which the golden gifts of the Genius of Plenty were showered down, so the ancient and patriotic borough of Helston, although shorn of a part of its long-enjoyed honours, and mutilated as to one of its protectors, may still flourish with a cornucopia of abundance and of prosperity.

2671. (φυε, φυε, οττοτοι, παπαι, αι, αι) 2671.

“quoth the Population Return for 1821.

“For which slight numerical deficiency, and for no earthly offence imputable to the inhabitants, save that of a practical application of the principle ‘non numero, sed honore valemus,’ the long-standing privileges of loyal men are scandalously invaded, and a body of independent electors declared incapable of exercising more than one half of their prescriptive rights.

162 “I seem to hear an indignant voter of Helston exclaim, ‘Why this measure of penal severity, accompanied at the same time with an apparent mitigation and leniency?’ Political annihilation had been a milder doom; extermination from the lists of suspected corruption had been far better than thus to suffer mutilation from the pruning knife of reform, beneath the wound inflicted by which the gangrene of dissatisfaction will still lurk and fester for ever.

“Happier were it to have sunk amidst the ruins of Sarum, or to have perished in the plains of Gatton,

“than to be thus sent adrift, single-masted and disabled, on the doubtful sea of political adventure. They who now fall,

“will meet no inglorious fate; under the banners of Peel, or the shield of Wetherall, it will be honourable to be conquered; and the page of history will supply a never-dying splendour for the illustrious patriots whose destinies were sealed by the Parliament of 1831. But to be denied this noble privilege, to remain a still-enduring monument of the wrongs inflicted, and of the mercies awarded! to be held up as an example of the wisdom of half-measures, and the policy of semi-destruction! to be denied the consolation of despair! and to be snatched from the gulph of ruin to an acuter sensation of helplessness!

“The remainder of this classic dirge, or ælinon, no less remarkable for the purity of its diction than for the fine 163 flow of feeling and tone of patriotism by which it is characterised, is intended to form a part of a great national work, to be printed at the Clarendon press, and to be sent forth into the world,—Iliadum lachrymas inter[5] justasque querelas.

“But I find that I must come to a hasty conclusion; trusting therefore that you will pardon my adventuring to meddle with any thing so sacred as a venerable borough in affliction, and begging you will present my unfeigned condolence to all parties interested to whom I have the honour of being known, I remain, &c.”

The old church is said by Mr. Hals to have been greatly injured by a thunder-storm in 1727. It appears never to have been thoroughly repaired; and in 1763, Lord Godolphin, the patron, built a large church and a lofty tower, nearly on the site of the former. The church is without pillars, and capable of containing a numerous congregation; but the whole is strongly characteristic of the bad taste prevalent at the period when it was erected.

Just over the bridge leading to the westward stood the hospital dedicated to St. John, and founded by a member of the Killegrews. The spot is still marked by a large upright stone near the bridge, bearing the sword with its crosletted hilt, the cognizance of the military order of St. John. Little, however, is known about it. Dugdale states that at the dissolution in the 26th of Henry VIII. the total annual revenue of the house amounted to 14l. 7s. 4d. and the actual receipts to 12l. 16s. 4d.

About the year 1805 the town received a very considerable improvement by the removal of the Coinage Hall from the middle of the principal street leading south-west from 164 the middle of the town. The Editor at that time represented Helston, and had the good fortune to assist materially in promoting the negociation with the Duchy officers, in consequence of his acquaintance with Mr. Sheridan, and with others whose consent was necessary to be obtained. The Market-house is a venerable monument of former times; yet, if this also could be removed, the improvement would equal that effected by the former.

Helston, in great measure unconnected with trade or with a sea port, little of a thoroughfare before the turnpike road was made, surrounded by the residences of ancient, respectable, and wealthy families, and inhabited by gentlemen of a similar description, has ever been celebrated for the superior quality of its social manners, and at the same time for an easy and familiar intercourse between all the people in their various stations; the inferior experiencing the truth of what all the histories of all nations have confirmed from the earliest periods of Greece to the recent events of our own time,

And the reverse of

These circumstances account for the continuance of old manners and of old customs longer here than in other places.

All towns appear to have adopted, on one day at least in the year, practices similar to the Roman Saturnalia; in most places, the lines of society having become broad and strongly impressed, their observances descended to the more vulgar, or rather perhaps to the vicious; and changing their character from harmless amusements to practices of 165 outrage and violence, they have been discontinued or suppressed: but in Helston an ancient observance of this kind, refining with the refinement of the age, still continues in activity.

The origins of all these customs are obscured or totally lost in their remote antiquity. That of Helston corresponded, however, precisely with its name—“a foray,” locally corrupted into furray; the young people rushed out of the town into the country early on the eighth of May, when, entering all houses without leave or ceremony, they appeared to seize whatever they wanted, and from the real nature of the transactions, whatever they wanted was sure of being found; and ultimately they returned to the town in triumph, dancing and decorated with flowers, where the scenes of the morning were, in some degree, repeated. All these practices, however, are less and less persevered in from year to year, so that the whole is rapidly tending towards the single entertainment of a ball; and if the ladies had succeeded in a classical fancy, which, some how or other, got possession of their minds, the very memory of this festival would have been lost.

Not intimately acquainted, one may presume, with the true history of the patroness they had selected to sanction their gaieties, the goddess Flora was made to preside over a foray, instituted, as some assert, before the Norman conquest, and in commemoration of a victory obtained over the Saxons, who had landed at a cove still called Perthsasnac; but the utter absurdity of the substitution, and the popularity given to the word FORAY by Sir Walter Scott’s Poems, have restored the ancient and true appellation.

Causes similar to those which have retained the foray, have also kept up the practice of bowling; so that in Helston alone can one now see the principal gentlemen of the town assembled on the bowling-green, enjoying at once exercise, fresh air, and agreeable intercourse, free from any 166 spirit of gambling and from the slightest indulgence of a habit more common and less excusable.

The word faddy is used to express the dance, the air, or both, used in celebrating the foray; the origin of this term is quite unknown.

The air is preserved by Edward Jones in his Musical and Poetical Relics of the Welsh Bards. He has also printed some lines which were sung by the dancers; they are, however, so entirely devoid of sense, or even of antiquity, that I shall not transcribe them.

The air is supposed to be a remnant of British music; one very like it, if not identically the same, has been found in Ireland, and according to report in Scotland. It may therefore be justly esteemed a curiosity.

The measurement of Helston is included in Gwendron; and the value of Real Property is not distinguished in the returns to Parliament from the parish.

The Poor Rates and Population have been given under Gwendron (Wendron), but they are here repeated.

Poor Rate in 1831, £889. 17s.

giving an increase of 46½ per cent. in 30 years.

GEOLOGY, BY DR. BOASE.

The northern part of this parish, approaching the granite of Wendron, is composed of felspar and hornblende rocks; the southern so much abounds in some parts with siliceous varieties of rock as to form barren downs, which stretch from Love Bar to the vicinity of Gweek.

[5] “An old scholiast upon this passage proposes to read meritas; but says little in defence of his suggestion, beyond adverting to divers suicidal acts of the ultra Tories, as he calls them, which are said to have been perpetrated by them on various occasions.”

Mr. Hals begins his account of this parish with a long history of the patron saint, including all the controversies or disputed points of doctrine in which he was engaged; all this, extending through many pages, is omitted.

St. Hilary was born at Poictiers, in France, about the end of the third or the beginning of the fourth century.

He was descended from an illustrious family, and received an education suited to his station in life, by which he was initiated into all the secular learning of those times; but finding the Pagan mythology utterly absurd, and the prevalent system of philosophy quite unsatisfactory, he examined the Christian writings, and became a convert. He seems never to have adopted the brutalizing austerities so prevalent in those ages, but to have employed his talents, his acquired eloquence, and his learning, against the Arians and in defence of the Nicene creed. Several of his works are extant, and have gone through many editions. The whole were printed by the Benedictine Monks of Paris, “St. Hilarii Opera omnia per Monachos Benedictinos edita; Gr. et Lat. Parisiis, 1693, Fol.” Erasmus published the works of St. Hilary in 1544, and says in his Preface, “Quicquid ingenio, quicquid eloquentia, quicquid sacrarum literarum cognitione posset;” and his contemporary, St. Jerome, says of him, “Hilarius, meorum Confessor temporum, et Episcopus, duodecim Quintiliani libros et titulo imitatus est et numero;” referring to his twelve books on the Trinity.

In the judgment of modern critics his style at least is not thought worthy of all the praise bestowed on it by St. Jerome; for, although it is stated to be lofty and noble, and moreover beautified with rhetorical ornaments and figures, yet it is too much studied and lengthened in many periods, so as to be obscure and even unintelligible.

168 The following passage on singleness of heart, has been cited by various authors.

“Christ teaches that only those who become again, as it were, little children, and by the simplicity of that age cut off the inordinate affections of vice, can enter into the kingdom of heaven. Those follow and obey their father, love their mother, are strangers to covetousness, ill-will, hatred, arrogance, lying, and are inclined easily to believe what they hear. This disposition of affection opens the way to heaven. We must therefore return to the simplicity of little children, in which we shall bear some resemblance to our Lord’s humility.” From his commentary on the Gospel of St. Matthew.

St. Hilary, previous to his conversion, had married, and his family consisted of one daughter; he immediately separated himself from them; his wife retired into a religious society. And after the saint had been consecrated Bishop of Poictiers in the year 355, he learned with the utmost horror and affright that his daughter was about to take on herself the unholy bonds of matrimony. His prompt and impassioned remonstrances conveyed in a letter which is printed among his works, conjuring her by the God of heaven not to act so unworthy a part, were successful; the marriage was broken off, and he had the gratification of seeing his daughter, a spouse of Christ, expire not long after at his feet.

St. Hilary composed a treatise which might in ordinary times have conciliated him to every sect then in existence. He there maintained that errors on speculative points of abstruse doctrine, were more sinful in the sight of God than any conduct the most atrocious; but controversy ran so high, and St. Hilary had taken a part so violent against the Arians, that even this merit could not save him from banishment, when that equally poised division of the church obtained some temporary preponderance in a synod, or succeeded in acquiring to their party the temporal chief; who, without using the form of words, practically 169 evinced that he was “over all persons and over all causes, ecclesiastical as well as civil, within those his dominions supreme.”

The saint, however, died at Poictiers in the year 368. St. Augustine relates many miracles wrought at his tomb; but the relics are said to have been removed to the Abbey of St. Denis, near Paris; and his festival is kept on the 14th of January, although it is not certain either that he died, or that his relics were translated on that particular day.

HALS.

Hilary is situate in the hundred of Penwith, and hath upon the north St. Earth, west Gulval, [Ludgvan Editor,] east Germow, south and west the Mounts Bay and Peranuthno. As for the name Hilary, it is derived from the tutelar guardian and patron of this church, viz. St. Hilary, Bishop of Poictiers in Gaul, the maul and hammer against the Arians, whose fame is eternized in the Roman agonals and festivals, though his memory and day is not celebrated as a martyr, but as one of the principal confessors of the Roman church; that is to say, one of those that suffered great persecution for the name and Gospel of Christ Jesus.

In Domesday book this district, or parish, was taxed under the jurisdiction of Lanmigall, i. e. Michael’s church or temple; now St. Michael’s Mount and Tremarastell, i. e. the market hole or cell, of which more under.

In the Taxation, or value, of Cornish Benefices aforesaid, made by the Bishops of Lincoln and Winchester, 1294, Ecclesia de Sancti Hilary in decanatu de Penwith, appropriata Priori Sancti Micaelis, is rated to first fruits lxxiiis. iiiid. In Wolsey’s Inquisition and Valor Beneficiorum, St. Hilary Vicarage is valued 11l. 6s. 0d. The patronage formerly in the Abbat or Prior of St. Michael’s Mount, who endowed it. After its dissolution, 26th Henry VIII. it fell to the crown, and was sold to Militon, whose six 170 daughters and heirs invested their husbands and purchasers therewith; the patronage now alternately in Erisey, Godolphin, Buller, and others (or Roberts); the garb, or rectory, in possession of Pennock. The parish of St. Hilary was rated to the 4s. per pound Land Tax, of 1696, at 120l.

Tregumbo, also Tregimbo, is the dwelling of Captain John Pinneck, Deputy-Governor of the Island of Scilly, under Sir William Godolphin, Knight, salary about 13l. per annum; who married Davies.

Treveneage, in this parish, was formerly the lands of Sir Thomas Arundell, of Tolverne, Knight, who sold this barton and manor to Sir Nicholas Hals, of Fentongallan, knight, whose son and heir, John Hals, sold it to Walker of Exeter; from whose heirs it came by purchase to Sir Joseph Tredinham, Knight, now in possession thereof.

On the confines of this parish is situate the ancient manor and borough of Marazion.(a)

In Domesday Roll, 20th William I. 1087, this place was taxed by the name of Tremarastoll; that is to say, the cell, chapel, or hole market-town; situate in a remote corner, vallum, or pit, upon the seashore of St. Michael’s Mount. At which time, no doubt, the Abbat or Prior of St. Michael’s Mount (as they were afterwards till 26th Henry VIII. when that Abbey was dissolved), were lords and high lords thereof; when it was privileged with the jurisdiction of a court leet; as afterwards, temp. Henry II. with sending two of its members to sit in the Commons’ House of Parliament. But, as appears from the Parliament Rolls in the Tower of London, after the dissolution of the Abbey or Priory aforesaid, this town neglected to send its Members, “for that it could not conveniently pay its burgesses their daily wages, propter paupertatem,” which are the words of the record.(b) It is also privileged with a fair, or mart, on July 11th, November 30th, Good Friday, and Palm Monday; and a market weekly on Saturdays.

171 And as a further mark of its ancient grandeur, I take it still to be an incorporate mayor or portreeve town; but more sure I am, that, as some other petty corporations’ names in Cornwall are adjectives merged or fallen in or upon the parishes wherein they are situate, as Camelford, Mitchell, &c. this town is a noun substantive, and stands charged by itself in the Exchequer to the 4s. per pound Land Tax, 1696, by the name of the borough of Maraszeyan, 76l. 12s. 6d.

In the beginning of the reign of King Henry VIII. (1514) when war had been proclaimed against the French King, a fleet of French men of war, consisting of thirty sail, with some marine regiments of soldiers therein, coasting in our British Channel, at length came into this Mount’s Bay, and there dropped anchor; when soon after they landed a considerable number, or quantity, of seamen and soldiers, and marched in hostile manner towards this town. Which the inhabitants observing, they forsook their houses, and fled to the hill country; whereby the Frenchmen became peaceably possessed thereof, and plundered the same for some days, till they understood that John Carminow, of Fentongollan, Esq. was coming or marching towards them, with his posse comitatus, to give them battle; when instantly they set the town on fire, and the houses on the contiguous part of the country, and burnt the same totally to the ground, to the great loss and damage of the inhabitants, and forthwith fled to their ships for safety and protection; and thereupon their ships hoisted anchors and put forth to sea again. Where they had not long been till Sir Anthony Oughthred, King Henry VIII.’s Admiral at sea, with a squadron of thirty men of war, met and gave them battle, to their great loss of men and some ships of war, whilst the rest of their fleet ran away, and fled into the haven of Brest for safety and protection.

THE HISTORY OF ST. MICHAEL^’S MOUNT.—PART I. 172

So called, for that our ancestors, the Britons, apprehended the appearance of the Archangel St. Michael, about the year of our Lord 495, was in this place, though the Italians say it was upon Mount Garganus, in their country, and the Frenchmen tell us that it was upon their Mount St. Michael, in Normandy; such difference amongst writers is about it; and verily this matter of fact is worth contending for, since the etymology of Michael is “sicut Deus,” i. e. as God, as I have shewn elsewhere under other churches to him dedicated. It appears from the history of the church of Landaff, as Mr. Camden hath observed, that this mount was called Dinsill, and Dinsull, but what those words should signify he could not tell.(c)

Mr. Carew, in his Survey of Cornwall, p. 154, tells us, that beside those religious appellations that were given to it, it was called in British, Cara cowz in clouz, which he interprets as the Grey rock in the flood, a corruption of Carra clo gris en an coos; i. e. rock-clo-grey in the wood.(d) Of this place Mr. Carew, and Mr. Camden that trode in his steps, tells us, that it was the Ocrinum, Οκρινυμ, or Ocrinium of Ptolomy and Atticus, the Greek geographers; and yet Camden, in another place, fixes that name on the Lizard Point.

This Mount is comparatively a pyramidal crag, containing about seven acres of land in compass; at the foot whereof, towards the land, is a level piece of ground covered with grass, where there is a wharf, or key, for landing goods and merchandize from the sea; also some dwelling-houses and fish-cellars, and a cemetery for burying the dead. To this Mount the sea daily makes its flux and reflux, and affords safe riding and anchorage to boats, barks, and barges, with some winds. And that which tends more to the convenience and security of this place, that at low water it is all part of the insular continent of Britain, and 173 at full sea an island of itself. To which purpose thus speaks Mr. Carew out of the Cornish Wonder Gatherer:

For to this Mount and chapel of St. Michael devout Christians in former ages came as pilgrims from the furthest part of this land, with rich offerings and oblations to St. Michael’s altar, Abbat, or Prior; also tradition tells us that in former ages this mount was parcel of the solid lands of this parish of St. Hilary, and severed or disjointed from it by some earthquake, terrestrial concussion, or inundation of the sea; and to prove this, it is alleged that in the Mount’s Bay, after some great tempests, the bodies and roots of oak-trees have been discovered in the sand, broken up by the surges of the sea; the like observation is made by Camden and Lhuyd on the sea shores of Pembrokeshire, and I myself, and many others, in the moors of Calestock Veor, Calestock Rule, Rheese, and Polgoda in Peransand, have seen and found, deep under ground, far from the sea, in the fens and turf lands, the bodies and roots of several oak trees, the hearts whereof were firm and solid. But whether those seas were formerly dry land, and the fens aforesaid the places where these trees grew (none in those parts being now to be seen there), let others resolve; or rather whether they are not subterraneous trees, that grew or are generated there, as some philosophers hold and teach, under the earth.

From the foot of Mount St. Michael you ascend the hill or rock through a narrow, crooked, craggy path to the outer portal or gate; a considerable height on the one side, by the way in the rock, is a small spring of water, that falls into pits made in the stones to lodge the same, for the lower or bottom inhabitants’ use; which water never intermits its currrent. Above the second gate there is another 174 spring of water issuing out of the rocks, that makes a pretty confluence for six or seven winter months, and then intermits, which renders the portage of it upwards much the easier for the inhabitants’ use in that season. After you pass through this second gate, betwixt a winding and crooked path, artificially cut in the rocks on the north side thereof, and follow the same, you arrive to the top of this Mount, where towards the north-west is a kind of level plain, about four or six land-yards, which gives a full prospect of the Mount’s Bay, the British Ocean, Penzance town, Newlyn, Moushole, Gulvall, Maddarn, Paul, and other parishes, over a downright precipice of rocks towards the sea, at least twenty fathoms high. From this little square or plain, there is an artificial kind of ascent also going towards the east, which offers you a full sight of the outer walls of the castle, and brings you to Porth-Horne, (i. e. the Iron Gate) part of which is yet to be seen. This little fortress comprehendeth sufficient rooms and lodgings for the captain or governor and his soldiers to reside in, to which adjoining are several other houses or cells, heretofore pertaining to the monks that dwelt here; all admirable for their strength, buildings, and contrivance, on the top of a rock naturally fortified: so that a small number of soldiers, having provision and ammunition, might defend themselves against the greatest armies in former ages, though I confess now, since the art of war is grown to greater perfection in mischief and destruction, a few cannon or bombs from the opposite hills would soon shatter it to pieces.

On this Mount, King Edward the Confessor, anno Dom. 1044, founded and endowed an Abbey or Priory of Benedictine Monks, that is to say Augustines reformed, with a little chapel yet standing, and dedicated the same to the Archangel St. Michael, part whereof is now converted to a dwelling house, in which there is yet to be seen cut in stone three or four coats of arms, one of which was, as I remember, a Chevron between three fleurs-de-lis.

175 That it had at that time considerable revenues belonging to it I make no question, since in the Domesday Book, 20 William I. 1087, Lan-migell was then taxed, that is to say Michael’s church or Temple, as aforesaid. But that which renders this place most famous is the present church or chapel and tower, cemetery, and cells cut in the rocks for hermetical monks of the order aforesaid; built and further endowed by William Earl of Morton and Cornwall, yet extant and kept in good repair, with pews; to whose father, Robert Earl of Morton, King William the Conqueror had given the lands of many rebels in those parts, and in particular this Mount, with its appurtenances, (dedicated as aforesaid) and created him Earl of Cornwall, whose successors held the same by tenure of Knight Service till temp. Charles II. Of which sort of tenures there were lately extant, in the hundred of Penwith, thirteen knight’s fees.—Carew’s Survey of Cornwall, p. 39. And in other hundreds three hundred more in Cornwall.

Upon the tower of this church or chapel, for it is bigger than many other Cornish parish churches, is that celebrated place called Kader Migell, i. e. Michael’s Chair, viz. a kind of seat artificially made or cut in the stones on the top of its tower, very dangerous in the access and tremendous to behold.

Contrary to this description, Mr. Carew, in his Survey of Cornwall, p. 154, tells us that St. Michael’s Chair is a bad seat, in a craggy place without the castle, dangerous for the access and therefore holy for the adventure; so that I conceive he had this report by hearsay, not ocular demonstration. In this chapel are yet to be seen the tombstones of several persons there interred, in the rocks, (with a small quantity of earth, though without the chapel there is a bank of earth, brought there by art for burying the dead,) but the inscriptions on those tombstones are so obliterated with dust and time, that I had not leisure much to examine them. The roof and timber of this temple is yet so firm and uniformly kept in repair, that no decay, 176 moth, or spider’s web are to be seen in the roof thereof, which gives occasion to a conjecture that the same was all built of Irish oak, which drives that poisonous creature the spider from it. Certes, this fabrick is not only an evident proof of the great skill which former ages, in William the Conqueror’s days, had in the art of architecture, but that many other such of much later erection can hardly equal the same, though it has stood firm above six hundred years.

This abbey or priory of Benedictine Monks of St. Michael, after the donation thereof by the Conqueror to his nephew Robert Earl of Morton aforesaid, was by him annexed and made subject for religious matters to the Abbey of Mount St. Michael in Normandy, under which circumstance it stood till the French wars, temp. Henry V. 1414, when the Statute, made 1380, in the reign of King Richard II. was put in force, for suppressing alien priories (who secretly communicated the state affairs to foreigners). King Henry V. or VI. then gave this Alien Priory of St. Michael to Sion Abbey in Middlesex, under which rule and jurisdiction it remained till 26 Henry VIII., 1533, when it was dissolved; when, I take it, it passed in value with Sion, since the Monasticon Anglicanum does not mention it separate.

The Mount is now in possession of Sir John Saintaubyn, (formerly Bassett) who for melancholy retirement dwelleth here. It is still privileged with royalties over the Mount’s Bay, as far north as Long Bridge in the manor of Lanesely, with wrecks, anchorage of ships, quayage or wharfage of goods, and with keeping annual fairs on the sea shore near it, September 29, Monday after Midlent Sunday. Round this Mount, for two leagues space, is an indifferent safe road for anchorage of ships, when the wind is proper for it; and here, as Froissart saith, landed Sir Robert Knollys, a valiant commander of the Black Prince’s in the French wars temp. Edward III. (who drew the traitor Sir Perducas D’Albert from the French to the English army, to 177 which afterwards he returned again most perfidiously,) where he had been highly instrumental in taking the forts of Froyns, Roach, Vandower, Ville Franck, and other places for the English; from hence he went to London by land, was graciously received and plentifully rewarded for his good services by King Edward III.

PART II.

This Mount, from the time of King Edward the Confessor to the middle of the reign of King Richard I. for the space of 150 years, was a sacred nursery of religion; but then, notwithstanding the sanctity thereof, and the guardianship of St. Michael, it was seized by one Henry de la Pomeray, Lord of Berry-Pomeray in Devon, and Tregony Pomeray in this county, being distasted at the government of King Richard I. as many others were, by reason of the Pope’s request he engaged in the Holy War, and forsook his kingdom, leaving for his vicegerent William Longchamp, a Norman Bishop of Ely; who had extorted great sums of money from the people in his absence, without a Parliament; and moreover so insulted over the nobility and gentry of this kingdom in his office, that he discontented the greatest part of them; and to countenance his grandeur he seldom rode abroad with less than a thousand attendants. Those and others his exorbitances gave occasion to John Earl of Cornwall and others to fall into treasonable practices, and of this number it seems this Sir Pomeray was one, who not only informed the King beyond the seas of these topping, magisterial, and illegal practices of Longchamp at home, but that by reason thereof King Philip of France, in those distractions, took occasion with a great army of soldiers to invade Normandy, and had taken the town of Guisors and many other places by force and arms, and would reduce the whole province in short while (if not resisted) to his dominion. Whereupon the King, in answer, by his letters patent, deposed Longchamp from his 178 authority, and placed the Archbishop of Rouen in his place, when soon after Longchamp, in women’s apparel, made his escape into his own country, but was detected and shrewdly beaten with rods before his departure out of England, by the women there.

Longchamp, as tradition saith, having notice that de la Pomeray was in confederacy with Earl John, who under pretence of opposing his vice-government, designed the usurpation of King Richard’s Crown, (though he had told him that in case his brother should die, before he returned into his kingdom, without issue, that the right of succession was in Arthur Duke of Britany, his elder brother’s son, not him,) sent a sergeant at arms to the castle of Berry Pomeray in Devon, where he then resided, in order to arrest and take him into custody, which he no sooner did but Pomeray stabbed him to the heart, of which wound he instantly died. Upon which tragical accident the murderer fled into Cornwall, where he had great possessions in lands, and besides twelve lordships held by the tenure of knight service. And there cast himself upon his amicus, John Earl of that province, who as tradition saith secretly supplied him with divers men at arms to secure his person against his enemy the Viceroy, which accordingly they did till Longchamp was displaced.

Afterwards, notice being given that King Richard was taken prisoner coming from the Holy War, 1194, by Leopold, Archduke of Austria in Germany, and cast into his prison called Trivalis, in which no man before was known to be put that escaped with life, this news prompted Pomeray from the sin of murder to that of rebellion; resolving to reduce this Mount of St. Michael to Earl John’s dominion, and to place himself therein for better safety. In order to which he found out this expedient, to go with his guard of armed men that daily attended him in disguise to that place, under pretence of visiting a sister that he had amongst the religious people there;(e) who upon discovering who he was, and the occasion of his coming, had the gates 179 opened, where he entered with his followers, who soon after discovered under their clothes their weapons of war, and declared their design was for reducing the Mount to the dominion and use of John Earl of Cornwall, and that if any person opposed them therein, they would revenge it upon him to the loss of their lives; whereupon, he commanded the Prior and his monks to deliver him the keys of the gates, and possession of the houses thereof for common uses, though therein they much discommoded the monks with their soldiers. Nevertheless, for fear of greater damage, they patiently submitted to his pleasure; who thereupon with his soldiers fortified the place, and so made it comparatively impregnable, and so there lived in great pomp and triumph for some time, not expecting ever to hear that King Richard was in the land of the living, or delivered from prison, it being for some time reported he was dead. But, alas! many times common fame is a common liar, and all men are apt to believe such matters and things as they would willingly have come to pass, or stand well affected to.

But contrary to the expectation of Pomeray and his confederates, King Richard, after fifteen months’ durance in prison, was ransomed for one hundred thousand pounds, and returned safe to London; when he found his brother John formidable, and making way to his crown, having got possession of the castles of Lancaster, Marlborough, Nottingham, St. Michael’s Mount, and other fortresses, into which he had placed governors and soldiers. Whereupon, in order to reduce those places, King Richard raised a considerable army; at the news whereof Earl John fled into France, and was by his brother deprived of all his possessions in England: notwithstanding which, the garrisons aforesaid stood firm to Earl John’s interest, till at the siege of Vernoil in Normandy, he fled from the French army to that of his brother, threw down his arms and submitted to his mercy; whereupon he was restored to all his lands and dignities, both in Normandy and England. 180 But notwithstanding this concord and agreement between King Richard and his brother John, the castles aforesaid stood out, and would not surrender for some time after, especially this Mount, which Pomeray commanded. Whereupon King Richard commanded Richard Revell, then sheriff of Cornwall, with his posse comitatus, to assist Hubert Walter, Archbishop of Canterbury, Chief Justice and Lord Chancellor of England, whom he had sent as his general into Cornwall to besiege St. Michael’s Mount, and reduce Pomeray to his duty and allegiance; which army of men, and bands of soldiers, no sooner approached the same (as Hoveden saith) and gave him summons, but the sight of the numerous army he was to contend with so affrighted Pomeray and his confederates, that forthwith, without resistance, he surrendered the garrison on mercy to the said Walter, for the use of King Richard, 1194, at the consideration of which and his other facts, through trouble of mind he soon after died, as despairing of pardon.

Mr. Carew, in his Survey of Cornwall, tells us, by report of some of his posterity, that he made his will and bequeathed part of his lands to the monks of St. Michael’s Mount, others to the Knights of St. John of Jerusalem, to pray for his soul; the remainder descended to his heir (which we have no reason to doubt of, since Henry de la Pomeray, one of his posterity, 3 Henry IV. at Tregony, held twelve knights’ fees of land in Cornwall, id. Mr. Carew); having so done, he caused himself to be blooded to death, to make his bequests good and valid in law; after his death King Richard restored the prior and his monks to the full possession of their cells, revenues, and chapel; and in de la Pomeray’s fort, he placed a small garrison of soldiers, to defend the same against sudden invasion of enemies; and in this condition St. Michael’s Mount remained from the year 1196 to the year 1471, 275 years, manned out with carnal and spiritual soldiers.(f)

PART III. 181

Richard de Vere, the eleventh Earl of Oxford, married Alice, one of the daughters and coheirs of Sir Richard Sergeaulx, knight, Lord of Collquite and Killygarth, widow of Guy Seyntaubyn, Sheriff of Cornwall 22 Richard II. 1399; but she passed her lands from her son by her first husband, to her second husband the Earl of Oxford, who had issue by her John de Vere, the 12th Earl of Oxford, who married Elizabeth, daughter of Sir John Howard Knight; the which John, the 12th Earl, was the chief of those barons that opposed the precedence in parliament of the Lords Spiritual, temp. Henry VI. the which Parliament roll in the Tower of London, is thus endorsed:

Memorandum.—The Lords Spiritual alleged that, forasmuch as they were spiritual Barons, they ought to have the right of precedence of the Lords Temporal, for it was well known how far things spiritual exceeded carnal or temporal. To which this Earl of Oxford replied on behalf of the Lords Temporal, that whatsoever right or privilege they had or could challenge, [see Brooke on Oxford, Earl,] it came from them and their ancestors, and their almsdeeds, who had been the worthy founders and benefactors of the Lords Spiritual; and further said it was an unseemly thing for masters to be inferior to their servants, who were descended of regal, honourable, and noble families, which most of the Spiritual Barons were not; which matter being fully understood, and indifferently heard, the Lords Temporal, by means of the logic and rhetoric of this Earl, had then the precedence of place in Parliament given them. But, alas! this bold demand, question, and argument of his, at that time, was a project rather pitied than admired by his best friends, for though it succeeded well in one Parliament, it got him many enemies in another. So that in the Parliament, held 2d. November, 1462, tempore Edward 182 IV., this Earl, and his son Aubrey, were attainted of treason against that King, on the behalf of Henry VI., and both beheaded without trial or answer.—(Baker’s Chronicle, page 204.)

Whereupon John, his second son, succeeded, and was the 13th Earl of Oxford, who married Margaret daughter of Richard Nevill, Earl of Salisbury, who, as his father had done before, adhered to the interest of King Henry VI., against Edward IV., and was at the battle of Barnet Heath 1471, and had, with the Marquess Montacute, the command of the right wing of King Henry’s horse, under Richard Earl of Warwick, general of his army; and when in the battle, it appeared the vanward of King Henry’s horse had somewhat worsted King Edward’s party, by the valour of the Earl of Oxford, the news presently fled to London that Warwick had obtained the victory; but, alas! Fama est mendax; for immediately after a strange misfortune befel the Earl of Oxford and his men in the latter part of this encounter. They having a star with streams on their liveries, as King Edward’s soldiers had the sun, the General Warwick’s men, by reason of a great mist, (raised as was thought by the magic art of Friar Bungey) mistaking the badges, shot at the Earl of Oxford’s men, which were of their own party, to their great hurt and destruction; whereupon the Earl, seeing how matters went, cried out treason, and forthwith fled with 800 men, whose departure gave King Edward opportunity to obtain a total victory over his enemies.

Whereupon the Duke of Somerset and this Earl of Oxford fled to Jasper Earl of Pembroke, in Wales, for safety and protection; from whence Oxford, and a convenient number of men of arms, shipped themselves from Milfordhaven, and with a fair wind sailed down St. George’s Channel, turned the Land’s End, and came safely at anchor in this Mount’s Bay. Where, as soon as the Earl and his men had disguised themselves in pilgrims’ and friars’ apparel, under which all had lodged a small sword 183 and a dagger, they went on shore, pretending that they were pilgrims that had come a long pilgrimage from the remotest part of this kingdom, to perform the penance imposed upon them by their father confessors, and to perform their vows, make orisons and oblations to the altar of St. Michael, who presided there; upon which pious pretext the monks and inhabitants opened their gates and let them into the castle, where they were no sooner entered, but, as de la Pomeray had done before, they shewed their weapons, discovered their impious fraud, and made known who they were, and their designs to kill all persons that made resistance or opposed King Henry VI. for whom the Earl of Oxford was come to take possession of this Mount, and would keep it to his use; whereupon, the monks and the small garrison were necessitated to comply with their demands, and yield them a quiet possession thereof; which forthwith the Earl put in better repair, and by the interest of King Henry and the Earl’s friends and relations in those parts, his grandmother as aforesaid being Sir Guy St. Aubyn’s widow and Sergeaulx’s coheir, he soon got ammunition, provision, and soldiers sufficient for their defence.

As soon as King Edward IV. heard of the surprise of St. Michael’s Mount by the Earl of Oxford, he issued forth his proclamation, proclaiming him and all his adherents traitors, and then consulted how to regain both to his obedience; and in order thereto he forthwith sent to Sir John Arundell of Trerice, Knight, then Sheriff of Cornwall, to reduce and besiege the same by his posse comitatus; which gentleman, pursuant to his orders, and by virtue of his office, soon rose a considerable army of men and soldiers within his bailiwick, and marched with them towards St. Michael’s Mount, where being arrived he sent a trumpeter to the Earl with a summons of surrender of that garrison to him for King Edward upon mercy; especially for that in so doing, in all probability, he would prevent the effusion of much Christian blood.

To this summons of the trumpeter the Earl sent a flat 184 denial; saying further, that rather than he would yield the fort on those terms, himself and those with him were all resolved to lose their lives in defence thereof. Whereupon the Sheriff commanded his soldiers, being very numerous on all parts, to storm the Mount, and reduce it by force; but, alas! maugre all their attempts (of this kind) the besieged so well defended every part of this rocky mountain that in all places the Sheriff’s men were repulsed with some loss; and the besieged issued forth from the outer gate and pursued them with such violence, that the said Sir John Arundell and some others were slain upon the sands at the foot of the Mount, to the great discouragement of the new-raised soldiers, who quickly departed thence, having lost their leader; leaving the besieged in better heart than they found them, as much elevated at their good success as themselves were dismayed at their bad fortune. This Sir John Arundell, as Mr. Carew, in his Survey of Cornwall, tells us, p. 119, had long before been told by some fortune-teller that he should be slain in the sands; wherefore, to avoid that destiny, he removed from Efford, near Stratton on the sands, where he dwelt, to Trerice, far off from the sea-sands, yet by this misfortune fulfilled the prediction in another place.

King Edward, upon news of this tragical accident, forthwith ordered letters patent to be drawn for making John Fortescue, Esq. Sheriff of Cornwall, in the place of Sir John Arundell, slain as aforesaid; who being accordingly sworn in that office, received the same commands, and took the same measures for reducing the Mount as the former Sheriff had done, by summons and assault, but was always, and in all places, repulsed with dishonour and loss, the same being as stoutly defended within as it was assaulted without; the fort thus appearing invincible. All which circumstances being transmitted to King Edward by Mr. Fortescue, the Sheriff, the King, for prevention of further bloodshed, ordered him to have a parley with the said Earl of Oxford, and know what his designs and expectations 185 were; who thereupon sent a messenger to him for that purpose; from whom he received this resolute and desperate answer,—that, if the King would pardon the offences of him and his adherents, and grant them their lives, liberties, and estates, that then he would yield up the fort to his use; otherwise they would fight it out to the last man. Which answer being sent up to the King, he granted their request; and forthwith ordered a proclamation of free pardon to be made unto them, under the broad seal of England; which, with all convenient speed was sent down, and by Mr. Sheriff Fortescue delivered to the Earl, to the great quiet and content of all parties. Whereupon the fort was yielded to him for the King’s use; and the Earl of Oxford was soon after sent prisoner to the castle of Hamms, in Normandy, where he was continued a prisoner till the first year of King Henry VII. 1485, with whom he came into England, and led the vanward of his army at Bosworth Field against King Richard III. where he was slain. After the death of this Earl’s first wife, he married Elizabeth, daughter of Sir Richard Scrope, Knight, widow of William Lord Beaumont, by whom he had no issue; so that, he dying the 4th Henry VIII. left John, the son of George Vere his brother, his heir and successor, and the fourteenth Earl of Oxford, who gave for his arms, Gules, escartellé de Or, le premier brisé d’un molette de Argent.

King Edward attributed this ineffectual long siege of St. Michael’s Mount either to the cowardice or disloyalty of the Sheriffs and country people of Cornwall; but there was no just cause for this conjecture, since Sir John Arundell and several of his men lost their lives about it: at other times, he would say the inhabitants were more affected to the house of Lancaster than that of York; whereupon, when the said Mr. Fortescue went out of his office after four years’ service, he made his brother Richard Duke of Gloucester Sheriff of Cornwall during life; for that he was often heard to say he looked upon Cornwall only as the 186 back-door of rebellion; so that those several persons set down in the catalogue of Sheriffs of Cornwall after Fortescue, were not absolute Sheriffs, but Deputies under the said Duke, viz. Daubeny, Carnesew, Willoughby, Nanfon, Grenvill, Fullford, Treffry, Terrill, and Houghton, who stiled themselves Vicecomes, and their under Sheriffs Sub-Vicecomes.

PART IV.

About the year of our Lord 1496, when James IV. King of Scotland, upon a truce with King Henry VII. of England, had expulsed from Scotland that counterfeit sham Prince, Perkin Warbeck (the pretended Richard of Shrewsbury, youngest son of King Edward IV. who had before been murdered in the Tower), to whom he had given in marriage his near kinswoman the Lady Katherine Gordon; he, together with his wife and family, sailed from thence over into Ireland, to seek friendship there of the rebels and all others well affected to the House of York; where being arrived, and fortune favouring him according to his expectation, news was brought him there that the Cornish rebels were ready to renew their former hostility, and venture their lives in battle upon the title of the house of York against that of Lancaster, had they a valiant and able General to lead them, notwithstanding Flammock and his confederates under the same engagement were defeated and executed in 1495.

These tidings were very acceptable to Perkin; who thereupon consulted his privy councillors, Hearn, Astley, and Skelton, a mercer, a tailor, and a scrivener, all bankrupts; these all agree, nemine contradicente, that his four ships of war should forthwith be rigged and manned for an expedition into Cornwall; which accordingly being prepared, himself with his lady, and 120 soldiers, embarked thereon, and being favoured with a fair wind, took his leave of his Irish friends, and in the month of September, 1499, 15th Henry VII. (Carew’s Survey of Cornwall, 187 p. 98,) came safely to anchor in St. Michael’s Mount’s Bay; where soon after he landed, and went up to the Mount, and made himself known to the monks and other inhabitants, publishing himself to be the true and real Richard of Shrewsbury aforesaid, the true heir of the House of York; which the monks, greatly affected to that title, were so very ready to believe, that they yielded the Mount and garrison without resistance into his hands; who presently renewed the old fortifications, and put the same into a better posture of defence.

Which having done, himself with a band of soldiers marched from thence to Bodmin (where the rendezvous of Flammock’s rebels in those parts formerly was,) in which place, by false words and promises, he so prevailed with the discontented rebels of that town and contiguous country, that he soon got together, without money or reward, at least three thousand men that could bear arms; these he divided into companies, and bands, and regiments, under Captains, Majors, and Colonels expert in war to instruct them in military discipline, till at length his army grew to six thousand well-armed soldiers. Whereupon King Henry VII. having notice of Perkin’s landing and formidableness in these parts, ordered Sir Peter Edgecombe, Knight, then Sheriff of Cornwall (whose father, Sir Richard Edgecombe, Knight, was one of that King’s Privy Councillors, and had comparatively been raised to his great estate by his boon and favour), that he should forthwith, by virtue of his office, raise the country, and give battle to this counterfeit Richard of Shrewsbury and his confederate rebels. Whereupon, the Sheriff did as he was commanded, and raised an army of twenty thousand men, as tradition saith, and led them towards Bodmin; but when they approached near, and saw Perkin entrenched at Castle Keynock, on the east hill of Bodmin Downs, with the body of his army, and divers troops of horse and bands of foot placed towards Lanhydrock and the roads from Cardenham, in order to resist and oppose the Sheriff, his men resolved to 188 march no further, but to return from whence they came without giving battle. Which accordingly they did (notwithstanding the Sheriff’s threats and commands to the contrary), in great terror and confusion and astonishment; but whether this fear proceeded from the cowardice of the Sheriff and his men, or their disaffection to the Lancastrian dominion of King Henry, is uncertain, for the like fact was committed two years before by the posse comitatus of John Basset, of Tehidy, then Sheriff, which he had raised to suppress Flammock’s rebellion.

Upon news of this flight and disbanding of the Sheriff’s men, Perkin was saluted by his soldiers and confederates as King of England: and soon after, not only in his camp, but in divers places of Bodmin town, was proclaimed by a trumpeter and others, King of England and France, and Lord of Ireland, with great shouts and acclamations of the people, and bonefires, by the name of Richard IV. And it is reported he assumed majesty with such a boon grace and affable deportment, that immediately he won the affections and admiration of all who made addresses unto him; in which art of kingship he had long before been educated and instructed by his pretended aunt, Margaret Duchess of Burgundy, sister to King Edward IV. which he had also acted to the good liking of all that saw him in Burgundian, Irish, Scots, and French courts. And, moreover, besides his magisterial port and mien, being an incomparable counterfeit, natural crafty, liar and dissembler, “Qui nescit dissimulare, nescit regnare,” as the old proverb saith; so that in short time he grew to be so popular and formidable about Bodmin that no power durst oppose him there. But, alas! this Cornish regniculum gave him not content, for his pride and ambition put him upon further expedients, viz. to get possession of the whole kingdom of England, and reduce it also to his obedience; in order to which, with a well-prepared army of four thousand men and two thousand of other sorts, he marched out of Cornwall into Devon, where met him also great numbers 189 of volunteers of that county and Somerset, that joined with his forces; the dread whereof so terrified James Chudleigh, Esq. then Sheriff of Devon, and the power of his bailiwick raised to stop his march to Exeter, that they durst not give him battle or obstruct his passage till he came before that city, pitched his camp, and laid siege thereto.

Upon whose approaches the citizens shut their gates and prepared to defend themselves; when soon after he sent a message or summons to them in the name of Richard IV. King of England, commanding them to surrender the same to him upon their allegiance: but the citizens so ridiculed his pretended title, and slighted his summons, that by his own messenger they gave him defiance; at which time Dr. Richard Redman was Lord Bishop of Exeter; William Burgoigne, Esq. Recorder; William Frost, Mayor; Francis Gilbert, Sword-bearer; John Bucknam, William Wilkinson, John Doncaster, and Richard Howse, were Stewards, or Bailiffs; John Clodworthy, John Bonifant, Philip Bullock, John Wilkin, Nicholas Auburne, John Atwell, William York, Thomas Lanwordaby, Philip Binks, John Slugg, Thomas Andrews, Thomas Oliver, and others, Aldermen. See Isaack’s Memorials of Exeter, 1499.

Soon after this defiance given, Perkin and his soldiers surrounded the city walls, and attempted to scale the same in several places daily for some time, but always were repulsed with considerable loss by the valour of the citizens. During which siege they sent to King Henry for his aid and assistance in this great distress; whereupon the Lord Daubeny was ordered to raise forces and march towards Exeter therewith, in order to remove the siege thereof; but before he came, Edward Courtenay, sixteenth Earl of Devon, and the Lord William his son, accompanied with Sir Edmund Carew, Sir Thomas Fulford, Sir William Courtenay, Sir John Halwell, Sir John Croker, Walter Courtenay, Peter Edgecombe, William St. Maur, Richard Whiteleigh of Efford (Sheriff of Devon the year after), 190 Richard Hals of Kenedon, John Fortescue of Vallapit, James Chudleigh aforesaid, and other gentlemen of those parts, had raised a considerable army of soldiers, with which they marched towards the rebels. At the sight of whose approach Perkin and his host were as much dispirited then as they were elevated before; whereupon he called a council of war, in which it was unanimously agreed upon, that it was not advisable to give them battle, being at least ten thousand fighting men, but to dislodge from their trenches, and leave the siege of that place, and forthwith to march into Somersetshire, a country better affected to King Perkin, where he might raise more soldiers. Accordingly, this order of council was observed and put in practice, so that the night after Perkin and all his army marched towards Taunton; where he mustered his men as if he intended to give battle; but when, by the muster-roll, he saw what numbers of men had deserted him in his nightly march from Exeter, falling then much short of six thousand, and further, notice being brought him that King Henry was in pursuit of him with a much greater army, he foresaw the worst, and doubted that fortune would favour him no longer in his military and regal practices; and therefore contrived, for the preservation of himself, with sixty horse troopers, to forsake his army by night, and fly to the Abbey of Beauley, in Southampton, as resting upon the name and privilege of the place, where he took sanctuary. As soon as King Henry understood Perkin had deserted his soldiers and had taken sanctuary at Beauley, he forthwith ordered a band of soldiers to guard and surround that Abbey to prevent his escape beyond the seas (from whence it appears that at that time the privilege of sanctuary was allowed to traitors). So that Perkin, despairing of getting thence, submitted to the King’s mercy, and was committed prisoner to the Tower of London; from whence he made an escape, and fled to the Priory of Sheen, at Richmond; where, on condition of making a true confession who he was, in a pair of stocks set before Westminster Hall door, and true answer 191 make to such questions as should be demanded of him, the Prior got the King’s pardon for him. And accordingly, he sat in the stocks a whole day before Westminster Hall door, afterwards on a scaffold in Cheapside, openly reading, declaring, and giving manuscripts under his own hand, wherein he told his parentage, the place of his birth, the passages of his life; that he was a cheat, an impostor, and by what ways and means he was drawn into those treasonable and bloody attempts and practices, &c. After which he was again committed to the Tower of London, where endeavouring to make an escape, he was afterwards, with others, executed at Tyburn.

After Perkin took sanctuary at Beauley, his soldiers from about Taunton and elsewhere, were all brought to Exeter; where King Henry, in St. Peter’s church-yard, pardoned them all, on their promise of being good subjects afterwards. But some of them were not so good as their word. King Henry also then sent the Lord Daubeny to St. Michael’s Mount for Perkin’s wife, the Lady Katherine Gordon, whom he brought to King Henry; who commiserating her youth, birth, and beauty, bestowed a competent maintenance upon her, which she enjoyed during that King’s life and long after, to her dying day.

PART V.

This Priory, or Abbey, being dissolved by act of Parliament, and given to the King, 33d Henry VIII. 1542, he gave the revenues and government of the place to Humphry Arundell, Esq. of the Lanherne family, who enjoyed the same till the first year of King Edward VI. 1549; at which time that King set forth several injunctions about religion: amongst others, this was one, viz. that all images found in churches, for divine worship or otherwise, should be pulled down and cast forth out of those churches; and that all preachers should perswade the people from praying to saints or for the dead; and from the use of beads, ashes, 192 processions, masses, dirges, and praying to God publicly in an unknown tongue; and least there should be a defect of preachers as to those points, homilies were made and ordered to be read in all churches. Pursuant to this injunction one Mr. Body, a commissioner for pulling down images in the churches of Cornwall, going to do his duty in Helston church, a priest, in company with Killtor of Kevorne and others, at unawares stabbed him in the body with a knife; of which wound he instantly fell dead in that place. And though the murderer was taken and sent up to London, tried, found guilty of wilful murder in Westminster Hall, and executed in Smithfield, yet the Cornish people flocked together in a tumultuous and rebellious manner by the instigation of their priests in diverse parts of the shire or county, and committed many barbarities and outrages in the same; and though the justices of the peace apprehended several of them, and sent them to jail, yet they could not with all their power suppress the growth of their insurrection; for soon after Humphry Arundell aforesaid, Governor of this Mount, sided with those mutineers, and broke out into actual rebellion against his and their Prince. The mutineers chose him for the General of their army, and for inferior officers as Captains, Majors, and Colonels,—John Rosogan, James Rosogan, Will. Winslade of Tregarrick or St. Agnes at Mithian, John Payne of St. Ives, Robert Bochym of Bochym, and his brother, Thomas Underhill, John Salmon, William Segar; together with several priests, rectors, vicars, and curates of churches, as John Thompson, Roger Barret, John Woolcock, William Asa, James Mourton, John Barrow, Richard Bennet, and others, who mustered their soldiers according to the rules of military discipline at Bodmin, where the general rendezvous was appointed. But no sooner was the General Arundell departed from St. Michael’s Mount to exert his power in the camp and field aforesaid, but diverse gentlemen, with their wives and families, in his absence possessed themselves thereof; whereupon he dispatched a party of 193 horse and foot to reduce his old garrison; which quickly they effected, by reason the besieged wanted provision and ammunition, and were distracted with the women and children’s fears and cries, and so they yielded the possession to their enemies on condition of free liberty of departing forthwith from thence with life, though not without being plundered.

The retaking of St. Michael’s Mount by the general Arundell proved much to the content and satisfaction of his army at Bodmin, consisting of about six thousand men, which they looked upon as a good omen of their future success, and the first-fruits of the valour and conduct of their general. Whereupon the confederates daily increased his army with great numbers of men from all parts, who listed themselves under his banner, which was not only pourtrayed, but by a cart brought into the field for their encouragement, viz. the pyx under its canopy, that is to say, the vessel containing the Roman host, or sacramental sacrifice, or body of Christ, together with crosses, banners, candlesticks, holy bread and water, to defend them from devils and the adverse power; (see Fox’s Martyrology, p. 669,) which was carried wheresoever the camp removed; which camp grew so tremendously formidable at Bodmin, that Job Militon, Esq. then Sheriff of Cornwall, with all the power of his bailiwick, durst not encounter with it during the time of the general’s stay in that place, which gave him and his rebels opportunity to consult together for the good of their public interest, and to make out a declaration, or manifesto, of the justice of their cause, and grounds of taking up arms; but the army, in general, consisting of a mixed multitude of men of diverse professions, trades, and employments, could not easily agree upon the subject matter and form thereof. Some would have no justice of the peace, for that generally they were ignorant of the laws, and could not construe or English a Latin bill of indictment without the clerk of the peace’s assistance, who imposed upon them, with other 194 attornies, for gain, wrong sense, and judgment; besides, in themselves, they were corrupt and partial in determining cases; others would have no lawyers nor attornies, for that the one cheated the people in wrong advice or counsel, and the other of their money by extravagant bills of costs; others would have no court leets, or court barons, for that the cost and expense in prosecuting an action at law therein was many times greater than the debt or profit. But generally it was agreed upon amongst them, that no inclosure should be left standing, but that all lands should be held in common; yet what expedients should be found out and placed in the room of those several orders and degrees of men and officers, none could prescribe.

However, the priests, rectors, vicars, and curates, the priors, monks, friars, and other dissolved collegiates, hammered out seven articles of address for the King’s majesty; upon grant of which they declared their bodies, arms, and goods should all be at his disposal, viz.

1. That curates should administer baptism at all times of need, as well week days as holy days.

2. That their children might be confirmed by the Bishop.

3. That mass might be celebrated, no man communicating with the priest.

4. That they might have reservation of the Lord’s body in churches.

5. That they might have holy bread and water in remembrance of Christ’s body and blood.

6. That priests might not be married.

7. That the six articles set forth by King Henry VIII. might be continued at least till the King came of age.

Now those six articles were invented by Stephen Gardiner, Bishop of Winchester (who was the bastard son of Lionel Woodvill, Bishop of Salisbury, by his concubine, Elizabeth Gardiner; the which Lionel was fifth son of Richard Woodvill, Earl Rivers, 1470), and therefore called his creed, viz.

195 1. That the body of Christ is really present in the sacrament after consecration.

2. That the sacrament cannot truly be administered under both kinds.

3. That priests entered into holy orders might not marry.

4. That vows of chastity entered into upon mature deliberation, were to be kept.

5. That private masses were not to be omitted.

6. That auricular confession was necessary in the church of God.

To those demands of the Cornish rebels the King so far condescended as to send an answer in writing to every article, and also a general pardon to every one of them if they would lay down arms. (See Fox’s Acts and Monuments, Book ix. p. 668.) But, alas! those overtures of the King were not only rejected by the rebels, but made them the more bold and desperate; especially finding themselves unable longer to subsist upon their own estates and money, or the bounty of the country, which hitherto they had done. The general therefore resolved, as the fox who seldom chucks at home, to prey upon other men’s goods and estates further off, for his army’s better subsistence. Whereupon he dislodged from Bodmin, and marched with his soldiers into Devon, where Sir Peter Carew, Knight, was ready to obstruct their passage with his posse comitatus. But when they saw the order and discipline of the rebels, and that their army consisted of above six thousand fighting men, desperate, well-armed, and prepared for battle, the Sheriff and his troops permitted them quietly to pass through the heart of that country to Exeter; where the citizens, upon notice of their approaches (as formerly done), shut the gates, and put themselves in a posture of defence. At which time Dr. John Voysey was Bishop of Exeter, viz. 10th July, 1549, John Blacaler was Mayor, William Tothill was Sheriff, Lewis Pollard, Recorder, William Beaumont, Sword-bearer; John Drake, Geffery Arundell, Henry Maunder, and John 196 Tooker, were Bailiffs or Stewards; Thomas Prestwood, John Maynard, John Webb, William Hals, Hugh Pope, William Hurst, Nicholas Limmet, Robert Midwinter, Henry Booth, John Berry, John Britnall, John Tuckfield, John Stawell, Edward Bridgman, Thomas Grigg, John Drake, Thomas Skidmore, John Bodley, and others (all which had before that time been Mayors), Stewards or Bailiffs of the city.—See Isaack’s Memorials of Exeter, p. 122.

Things being in this posture, the general Arundell summoned the citizens to deliver their town and castle to his dominion; but they sent him a flat denial. Whereupon, forthwith he ordered his men to fire the gates of the city, which accordingly they did; but the citizens on the inside supplied those fires with such quantities of combustible matter, so long till they had cast up a half-moon on the inside thereof, upon which, when the rebels attempted to enter, they were shot to death or cut in pieces. Their entrance being thus obstructed at the gates, they put in practice other expedients, viz. either to undermine the walls or blow them up with barrels of gunpowder, which they had placed in the same; but the citizens also prevented this their design, by countermining their mines and casting so much water on the places where their powder barrels were lodged, that the powder would not take fire. Thus stratagems of war were daily practised between the besieged and besiegers, to the great hurt and damage of each other.

King Edward being informed by his council of this siege, and that there was little or no dependance upon the valour and conduct of the Sheriff of Devon, and his bailiwick, to suppress this rebellion or raise the siege of Exeter, granted his commission to John Lord Russell, created Baron Russell of Tavistock by King Henry, and Lord High Admiral and Lord Privy Seal, an old experienced soldier who had lost an eye at the siege of Montrueil in France, to be his general for raising soldiers to fight those 197 rebels; who forthwith, pursuant thereto, raised a considerable army and marched with them to Honiton; but when he came there he was informed that the enemy consisted of ten thousand able fighting men armed; which occasioned his halting there longer than he intended, expecting greater supplies of men, that were coming to his aid under conduct of the Lord Grey; which at length arrived and joined his forces, whereupon he dislodged from thence and marched towards Exeter; where on the way he had several sharp conflicts with the rebels with various success, sometimes the better and sometimes the worse; though at length, after much fatigue of war, maugre all opposition and resistance of the rebels, he forced them to raise their siege, and entered the city of Exeter with relief, 6th August, 1549, after thirty-two days’ siege; wherein the inhabitants had valiantly defended themselves, though in that extremity they were necessitated by famine to eat horses, moulded cloth, and bread made of bran; in reward of whose loyalty King Edward gave to the city for ever the manor of Evyland, since sold by the city for making the river Exe navigable.

After raising the siege as aforesaid, the general Arundell rallied his routed forces of rebels, and gave battle to the Lord Russell and the King’s army, with that inveterate courage, animosity, and resolution, that the greatest part of his men were slain upon the spot, others threw down their arms on mercy, the remainder fled, and were afterwards many of them taken and executed. Sir Anthony Kingston, Knight, a Gloucestershire man, after this rebellion was made Provost Marshal for executing such western rebels as could be taken, or were made prisoners in Cornwall and Devon, together with all such who had been aiders or assisters of them in that rebellion; upon whom, according to his power and office, he executed martial law with sport and justice (as Mr. Carew and other historians tell us); and the principal persons that have come to my knowledge, over whose misery he triumphed, was Boyer 198 the Mayor of Bodmin; Mayow of Clevyan, in St. Colomb Major, whom he hanged at the tavern sign-post in that town, of whom tradition saith his crime was not capital; and therefore his wife was advised by her friends to hasten to the town after the Marshal and his men, who had him in custody, and beg his life. Which accordingly she prepared to do, and to render herself the more amiable petitioner before the Marshal’s eyes, this dame spent so much time in attiring herself and putting on her French hood then in fashion, that her husband was put to death before her arrival. In like manner the Marshal hanged one John Payne, the Mayor, or Portreeve of St. Ives, on a gallows erected in the middle of that town, whose arms are still to be seen in one of the fore-seats in that church, viz. in a plain field three pine apples. Besides those he executed many more in other places in Cornwall, that had been actors, assisters, or promoters of this rebellion. Lastly, it is further memorable of this Sir Anthony Kingston, that in Sir John Heywood’s Chronicle he is taxed of extreme cruelty in doing his Marshal’s office aforesaid. Of whom Fuller, in Gloucestershire, gives us this further account of him: that afterwards, in the reign of Queen Mary, being detected, with several others, of a design to rob her exchequer, though he made his escape and fled into his own country, yet there he was apprehended and taken into custody by a messenger, who was bringing him up to London in order to have justice done upon him for his crime, but he being conscious of his guilt, and despairing of pardon, so effectually poisoned himself that he died on the way, without having the due reward of his desert.

After the death of Humphrey Arundell, Governor of St. Michael’s Mount, executed for treason as aforesaid, King Edward VI. sold or gave the government and revenues thereof to Job Militon, Esq. aforesaid, then Sheriff of Cornwall, during his life; but his son dying without issue male, the government, by what title I know not, devolved upon 199 the Bassets of Tihidy, from some of whom, as I am informed, it came by purchase to Sir John St. Aubyn, Bart. now in possession thereof.

In the month of July, 1676, at St. Michael’s Mount, about four of the clock in the afternoon, came from the British ocean, or sea, a ball of fire, seen by the inhabitants and fishermen at sea, which struck against the south moorstone wall of this Mount’s church or chapel; where, meeting resistance from the wall, it glanced through the stones thereof with some rebounds, making a path, or strake, through the same, in some places about four inches broad and two inches deep, from one end of the long side wall almost to the other; and from thence, by another rebound, it struck the strong oak durns of the dwelling-house entry, and broke the same in two or three pieces, and so flew into the hall, where it fell to the ground, having spent its force and strength as aforesaid, and then brake asunder in pieces, by the side of Mrs. Catherine St. Aubyn, without doing her any manner of hurt, leaving a sulphurous smoke behind it in the room; which ball of fire then appeared to consist of a black-blue metally matter, congealed or melted by fire like as coal and cinders may be, as Sir John St. Aubyn, the elder, and other spectators told me.

TONKIN.

Mr. Tonkin has not any thing in addition to Mr. Hals, except an uninteresting dissertation to prove that St. Michael’s Mount is not the Ocrinum of Ptolemy.

WHITAKER.

Mr. Whitaker has given several notes and comments on the narrative of Mr. Hals, which will here be placed, together with references to the passages to which they relate.

p. 170. (a) The name is Mara-zion, or zien, on the sea, I 200 believe, and Market-Jew is merely a similar appellation in English. A Jew, in Cornish language, is Ethow, and Edheuon, Ethchan, are Jews.

p. 170. (b) This corrects Mr. Willis, in ii. 3, who there says of the Market-Jew, and other towns expressly, “none of them ever sent Members to Parliament, or were ever summoned so to do.” Yet it coincides exactly with what Dr. Brady remarks in his very valuable treatise on Boroughs, p. 57, 59, and adds one more to his few returns, and instances of very many more which might have been produced “if needful,” p. 59.

p. 172. (c) Sel, sil, or sul is merely a view, or prospect, from the Welsh sylly, to look or behold, and the Armorick sell, a look or sight; and din-sil, or din-sul, means only the hill of prospect.

(d) The real name of St. Michael’s Mount in Cornish is this, Carreg luz en kuz, a hoary rock in a wood. Borlase’s Scilly Isles, p. 94.

p. 178. (e) This notice, unobserved by the noticer himself, lets us into a part of the history of this Mount, which has never been unfolded yet. There was plainly a nunnery here, as well as a monastery. Accordingly we find before what this circumstance alone explains, that there were two chapels upon the Mount. One is described before as “a little chapel yet standing, and dedicated to the Archangel St. Michael, part whereof is now converted to a dwelling-house.” The other is thus, as “that which renders this place most famous, the present church or chapel, yet extant, and kept in good repair with pews; upon the tower of this church or chapel, for it is bigger than many other Cornish parish churches, is that celebrated place called Kader-Migell, i. e. Michael’s chair.” So distinct are these chapels! The monastery I apprehend to have been, “where, towards the north-west, is a kind of level plain about four or six landyards,” with “a downright precipice of rocks towards the sea, at least twenty fathoms high.” And where, about the greater chapel, are “cells cut in the 201 rocks for hermitical monks of the aforesaid order.” And the nunnery I suppose to have been where, “from this little square, or plain, there is an artificial kind of ascent going towards the east, which offers you a full sight of the outer walls of the castle, and brings you to Porth Horne (Hourn), part of which is yet to be seen.”

Thus do we get a glimpse of a nunnery that is invisible from every other point. Tanner, that witness for all other authors upon monastic notices, gives us no intimation from any of them concerning this nunnery. Yet Leland confirms what I have observed in Mr. Hals before, the existence of two churches, or chapels, upon the summit of the Mount. “The way to the church,” he says, concerning the ascent to the top, “entereth at the north side from half ebb to half flood, to the foot of the Mount, and so ascendeth by steps and grices westward, and thence returneth eastward to the utterward of the church,” or Mount. Within the said ward is a court strongly walled, “wherein on the south side is the Chapel of St. Michael, and in the east side a chapel of our Lady. The Captain and priest’s lodgings be in the south side of St. Michael’s Chapel.” (Itin. VII. 118.) When this Captain was fixed there with a garrison, as we shall soon see when he was, the nuns were obliged to relinquish their cells to him and them. For this reason we have not a hint in all the ages afterwards of a nunnery here. Only the chapel was continued for the use of the garrison, while the church itself was still left to the monks. Such an union as this, of a monastery and a nunnery upon the summit of a pyramidal hill, and amid the sequestrations of solitude, carries a strange appearance with it to our Protestant suspiciousness; yet it was not very uncommon in the reign of popery. It seems to have been peculiarly calculated for that purpose for which both monastery and nunnery were generally calculated, to shew the triumph of faith over the impulses of sense, and to shew that triumph more conspicuously, by the association of monks and nuns in monastic vicinity 202 to each other. “This little fortress,” as Mr. Hals has told us before, “comprehendeth sufficient rooms and lodgings for the Captain, or Governor, and his soldiers to reside in,” which I have supposed above “to have been the original habitations of the nuns and their Abbess; to which adjoining are several other houses, or cells, heretofore pertaining to the monks that dwell here, all admirable for their strength, buildings, and contrivance,” and all probably therefore contemporary or nearly so.

p. 180. (f) This account of St. Michael’s Mount is in a strain of intelligence and judiciousness much superior to the general tenor of Mr. Hals’s writings. To it I wish to add some useful notices, in accompaniment of some that I have given before.

Upon the very crown and summit of this pyramidal hill, stands proudly eminent the church, stretching from east to west, and having a tower in the middle. It was built by Edward the Confessor, who was the first to consecrate the Mount to religion, and erected the church on the little plain at the top of it. Having done this, and erected habitations for the clergy attending it, he gave them, by charter still existing in recital, the whole of the Mount, and many lands beside. “Ego Edwardus, Dei gracia Anglorum Rex, dare volans pretium redemptionis animæ meæ vel parentum meorum, sub consensu et testimonio bonorum virorum, tradidi Sancto Michaeli Archangelo, in usum fratrum Deo servientium in eodem loco, Sanctum Michaelem,” the church, “qui est juxta mare.” He also gives them “totam terram de Venefire;” and proceeds “portum addere qui vocatur Ruminella.” Romney, in Kent. Then came Robert Earl of Mortaigne, the falsely reputed founder, merely to associate this church with another of the same appellation in Normandy, and to enlarge its endowments. In a new charter, equally as the old without a date, he, “habens in bello Sancti Michaelis vexillum,” says, “do et concedo Montem Sancti Michaelis de Cornubiâ Deo et monachis ecclesiæ Sancti Michaelis de Periculo 203 Maris servientibus, cum dimidiâ terræ hidâ.” But, as he adds, “postea autem ut certissime comperi, Beati Michaelis meritis monachorumque suffragiis michi a Deo ex propriâ conjuge mea filio concesso, auxi donum ipsi beato militiæ celestis principi, dedi et dono in Amaneth (Quere, where?) tres acras terræ, Travalaboth videlicet, Lismanoch, Trequaners, Carmailoc,” &c. 2. And, finally, comes the Bishop of Exeter, in a charter dated expressly 1085, to free “ecclesiam Beati Michaelis Archangeli de Cornubiâ,” from all episcopal jurisdiction. 3. Thus erected and thus privileged, the church remained till the day of William of Worcester, and he thus notes the dimensions of it: “Memorandum, longitudo ecclesiæ Montis Sancti Michaelis continet 30 steppys, latitudo continet 12 steppys.” 4. Carew also speaks of it as “a chapel for devotion, builded by William Earl of Morton,” (Carew so speaking with the multitude, when he ought to have given the building to the Confessor,) “and greatly haunted while folk endured (endeared) their merits by farre travailing.” 5. Carew thus refers obscurely, perhaps unconsciously, to a particular privilege annexed to the church, which was given by one decree from Pope Gregory, and confirmed by another from Bishop Leofric. “Universis Sanctæ Matris ecclesiæ presentes literas inspecturis vel audituris salutem,” cries the former, “noverit universitas vestra quod sanctissimus Papa Gregorius, anno ab incarnatione Domini millesimo septuagesimo,” the very year, therefore, in which Earl Montaign gave this church to the other in Normandy, “ad ecclesiam Montis Sancti Michaelis, in comitatu Cornubiæ, gerens eximiæ devocionis affectum, piè concessit ecclesiæ predictæ, [et] omnibus fidelibus, qui illam cum suis beneficiis et elemosinis,” (with alms and oblations, so that “folke endeared their merits,” not merely “by farre travailing,” but by a tax upon their purse,) “exepecierint seu visitaverint, tertiam partem penetenciarum suarum eis condonari,” a third of all those acts 204 being remitted, which penitents were enjoined to perform, in order to prove the sincerity of their penitence to God, and to themselves. The same privilege is repeated by the Bishop of Exeter in 1085, thus: “omnibus illis, qui illum ecclesiam suis cum beneficiis et elemosinis expetierint et visitaverint, tertiam partem penitentiarum condonamus.” Yet, what is surprising, the privilege became nearly as much unknown afterwards as it is at present, and was therefore promulgated by the clergy of the church at the beginning of the fifteenth century: “Tota verba,” adds the reciter, “in antiquis registris de novo,” a little before William’s visit, “in hâc ecclesiâ repertis, inventa,” being then unknown to the very clergy themselves, and only discovered by the discovery of some registers equally unknown, “prout his in valvis ecclesiæ publicè ponuntur,” were exhibited to public view by being posted upon the folding-doors of the church. “Et quia pluribus istud est incognitum, ideo nos, in Christo Dei famuli et ministri hujus ecclesiæ, universitatem vestram qui regimen animarum possidetis,” all the rectors and vicars of the kingdom, “ob mutuæ vicissitudinis obtentum requirimus et rogamus, quatenus ista publicetis in ecclesiis vestris, ut vestri subditi et subjecti ad majorem exoracionem devocionis attentius animentur, et locum istum gloriosius peregrinando frequentent ad dona et indulgencias predicta graciosè consequenda.” From this republication of the privilege, undoubtedly, did the numerous resort of pilgrims to the church begin. Then too was formed assuredly that seat on the tower, which is so ridiculously described by Carew, as “a little without the castle—a bad seat in a craggy place—somewhat dangerous for access;” when it is only a chair, composed of stones, projecting from the two sides of the tower battlements, and uniting into a seat without the south-western angle, but elevated above the battlements on each side. It thus appears somewhat dangerous from the elevation or projection only, is an evident addition to the tower, and was assuredly 205 made at this period for the pilgrims, that they might complete their devotions at the Mount by sitting in this St. Michael’s Chair, as denominated, and by showing themselves as pilgrims to the country round. Hence, in an author[6] who alludes to customs without feeling the force of his allusion, we read this intimation:

We thus find a reason for the construction of such a chair, that comports with all the purposes of the church on the tower of which it is constructed, and that shows it ministered equally with this to the uses of religion then predominant; making it not, as Carew most extravagantly makes it, “somewhat dangerous for access, and therefore holy for the adventure,” but holy in itself, as on the church-tower, holy in its purposes, as the seat of the pilgrims, and doubly holy as the seat of accomplishment to all their vows, as the seat of invitation to all the country. And the whole church remains to this day, beaten by the rains and buffeted by the winds, yet a venerable monument of Saxon architecture.

This Mount appears decisively, from the charter of the Confessor, to have been in his time not surrounded with the sea during all the flood tide, and not accessible by land only during some hours of the ebb-tide, as it is at present. It was then not surrounded at all. It was only near the sea then. Thus the Confessor describes it expressly, as “Sanctum Michaelem qui est juxta mare.” But as Worcestre adds, with a range back into the past that is very striking, yet is in general confirmed by the charter above, “the space of ground upon Mount St. Michael is two hundred cubits, surrounded with the ocean,” at flood tide; “the place aforesaid was originally inclosed with a very thick wood, distant from the ocean six miles, affording the finest shelter for wild beasts.”

THE EDITOR. 206

Nothing is known with any certainty respecting the ancient state of St. Michael’s Mount.

It may have been the seat of a Celtic superstition somewhat similar to that imagined and described by Dr. William Borlase. Sir Christopher Hawkins has adduced many arguments for proving this semi-island to have been the Ictis of Diodorus Siculus; and its situation, united to its sea-port, may well have recommended such a place for a factory to the merchants of any civilized nation engaged in commercial transactions with people so rude as were the Britons of those remote times. The universal practice in our days, is to establish fortified stations under similar circumstances, since neither person or property can be effectually protected in any other way.

The earliest definite tradition of a Christian establishment dates with the pilgrimage of St. Kenna, in consequence of the appearance of the Arch-angel at that place. No particular circumstances are ever related of this extraordinary vision, neither as to the occasion nor as to the persons so eminently favoured as to behold the celestial glory, nor as to the time, nor of the exact spot, since it could not have taken place on the top of the tower, that building having been constructed in honour of the vision itself.

It may be remarked that lofty and elevated situations throughout Europe are dedicated to St. Michael, probably on account of the Archangel being uniformly painted with wings, and therefore tacitly imagined to have habits similar to birds; and perhaps the dedication of the largest of our domestic fowls to the celebration of his festival, may owe its origin to a similar analogy.

Saint Kenna is believed to have imparted the same identical virtue to the chair which overhangs the tower, as she 207 bestowed on the celebrated well near Liskeard, and since no one obtains a seat in this chair without much resolution and steadiness of head, one may be inclined to anticipate the supposed effect with greater certainty from the achievement of sitting in St. Michael’s chair, than from drinking water from St. Kenna’s well. The time of St. Kenna’s visitation is not accurately known. She is supposed to be the same St. Keyna, daughter of a prince of Brecknockshire, who lived a recluse life for many years near a town situated midway between Bristol and Bath, since called Cainsbarn, after her name, where she founded a monastery in the beginning of the sixth century, and cleaned the neighbourhood from snakes and vipers by converting them all into Cornua Ammonis, which have abounded there ever since, in testimony of her sanctity and of the fervour of her prayers.

The supposed ancient site of St. Michael’s Mount, its being the hoary monk in a wood surrounded by forests, is deduced from arguments very similar to those which prove the miraculous power of St. Kenna in converting serpents into stones.

Trees have been found buried under the sand and silt in the Mount’s Bay, as they are frequently found in every similar inlet of the sea on the southern coast of England. And the tradition, if a term so respectable may be applied to such vague conjectures, applies equally to Mount St. Michael; or they may have been derived from a common origin. See Le Grand Dictionaire Historique, par M. Moreri, Paris edition of 1188, with the Supplement of 1735. In the 5th folio volume of the Dictionary, p. 193, and in the 2d. folio volume of the Supplement, p. 261, will be found these passages:

“Saint Michel ou Mont Saint Michel, en Latin Mons Sancti Michaelis in periculo Maris. Bourg de France en Normandie, avec une Abbaie celebre et un chateau. Sa situation est assez particuliere, sur un rocher qui s’etend au milieu d’une grand greve, que la mer couvre de son reflux. 208 On dit qu’ Augustin, evêque d’Avranches, qui vivait au commencement du huitieme siecle, y suit des chanoines apres une apparition de l’Archange Seint Michel.

“Ce mont s’appelloit le Mont de Tombe à cause de sa figure. On pretend qu’une foret occupoit autrefois sont le terrain depuis le mont jusques aux Paroisses de Tanis et d’Ardevon; que la mer a detruit cette foret, et qu’elle en a pris la place; et c’est de la, dit on, que le Mont Saint Michel est surnomme, ‘Au peril de la mer,’ Mons in periculo Maris.”

The first authentic document relative to St. Michael’s Mount is the charter of Saint Edward the Confessor, the original of which remained among the archives of Mount St. Michael.

In the recent edition of Dugdale’s Monasticon Anglicanum, vol. vii. p. 988:

Priory of St. Michael’s Mount, in Cornwall.—A priory of Benedictine monks was placed here by King Edward the Confessor. Before A.D. 1085, however, it was annexed by Robert Earl of Moreton and Cornwall, to the Abbey of St. Michael in Periculo Maris, in Normandy.

The following entry relating to the property of St. Michael’s Priory, in Cornwall, occurs in the Domesday Survey:

“Terra Sancti Michaelis.—Ecclesia S. Michaelis tenet Treiwal, Brismar tenebat tempore regis Edwardi. Ibi sunt ii hidæ quæ numquam geldaverunt. Terra est viii car. Ibi est i. car. cum uno villano, et ii. bord. et x. acr. pasturæ. Val. xx. solid. De hiis ii. hid. abstulit Comes Moriton i. hidam. Val. xx. sol.”

In Hampshire, Domesday, tom. i. fol. 43, there is another entry concerning St. Michael’s Priory:

In Basingstoches Hund.—Ecclesia S. Michaelis de Monte tenet de lege unam ecclesiam cum i. hida et decima M. de Basingestoches. Ibi est presbyter et ii. villani et iiii. 209 bord. cum i. car. et molin. de xx. sol. et ii. acr. prati. Tot. val. iiii. lib. et v. sol.

Oliver, in his Historic Collections relating to the monasteries of Devon, p. 147, gives the following list of Priors of St. Michael’s Mount:—

As the alien priories were suppressed by Henry V. who began his reign in 1413, William Lambert was probably the last Prior.

Bishop Tanner says, in his Notitia Monastica:—After the suppression of the alien priories, this was first given by King Henry VI. to King’s College, Cambridge, and afterwards by King Edward IV. to the nunnery of Sion, in Middlesex. At the first seizure by King Edward III. the farm was rated but at 10l. per annum, but at the general dissolution by Henry VIII. the lands belonging to this house, as parcel of Sion Abbey, were valued at 110l. 12s. per annum.

The charter of Saint Edward may be thus translated:

“In the name of the holy and indivisible Trinity. I Edward, by the grace of God King of the English, willing to give the price of the redemption of my own soul, or of the souls of my parents, with the consent and attestation of good men, have delivered to St. Michael the Archangel, for the use of the brethren serving God in that place, Saint Michael, which is near the sea, with all its appendages, that is to say, with its towns, castles, lands, and other appurtenances. I have added, moreover, all the land of Vennefire, with its towns, villages, fields, meadows, and grounds, cultivated or uncultivated, with their proceeds. 210 And I have joined, as an addition to the things already given, the harbour called Ruminella, with all things belonging to it, that is, with mills and establishments for fisheries and with their proceeds.

“But if any one shall endeavour to interpose subtile impediments against these gifts, let him be made an anathema, and incur the perpetual anger of God.

“And that the authority of our donation may be held the more truly and firmly hereafter, I have, in confirming it, underwritten with my own hand, which many also of the witnesses have done.

Signum Regis Edwardi ✠

Roberti Archiepiscopi Rothomagensis ✠

Herberti Episcopi Lexoviensis ✠

Roberti Episcopi Constantiensis ✠

Radulphi ✠

Vinfredi ✠ Nigelli Vicecomitis.

Anschitelli Choschet. Turstini.

The next charter:

“In the name of the holy and indivisible Trinity, I Robert, by the grace of God Earl of Moriton, influenced with the fire of divine love, supporting in battle the standard of St. Michael, do make known to all the sons of our holy mother church, that for the salvation of the souls of myself and of my wife, also for the salvation, the prosperity, and safety of the most glorious King William, and for obtaining the reward of eternal life, do give and grant Mount Saint Michael, of Cornwall, to God and to the monks serving (God) of the church of Saint Michael in danger of the sea; with half a hide of land, so unbound, and peaceable and free from all customs, complaints, and suits, as I hold them. And I appoint, the King my Lord consenting, that they may hold a market on every Friday. Lastly, as I have most certainly ascertained that a son has been given me from God by my wife, through the merits of the blessed Michael, by the prayers of the monks, I have increased the gift to him the blessed chief of the heavenly host. I have given 211 and do give in Amaneth three acres of land; that is to say, Trevelaboth, Lismanoch, Trequaners, Carmailoc, my most pious Lord King William assenting, together with the Queen Mathilde, and their noble sons the Earl Robert, William Rufus, and Henry yet a boy, to be quiet and free from all pleas, complaints, and forfeits, so that the monks shall not answer in any matter to the King’s justice, homicide alone excepted.