S. Baring-Gould

“ Now when the three years were ended, one day there came an extraordinary ebb-tide. And when the saint saw that there was a way dry, or almost dry, to the land, "Arise," said he; "in God's name let us go over;" and he bade his disciples follow him. "But," said he, "let none go alone; let one hold my hand, and with his other hand hold his brother's, and so let us advance in chain, and we shall peradventure be able to reach the land before the tide turns and overwhelms all. Let us hold together, that the strong may support the weak, and that if one falls the others may lift him up." ”

“ Everyone has seen a chough, if only in a museum; and therefore knows the beautiful glossy black of the adult plumage, the long wings crossed over the back and extending beyond the squared tail, the long, slender red legs, and the brilliant red curved bill. But only those who have kept them know their marvellous docility. You may train a falcon to sit on your wrist and come down to the lure, with infinite labour ”

“ The story of the creation, subsequent history, and extinction of those English boroughs which were swept away by the Reform Bill of 1832, and which were commonly designated as pocket or rotten boroughs, is too curious an episode in Parliamentary history to be allowed to remain in the limbo of Parliamentary reports--a charnel-house of the bones of facts--unclothed with the personal reminiscences and local details which invest these dry bones with flesh, and give to them a living interest.
In a very few years there will not be a man alive who can recall the last election for them. ”

“ One day the rain came down in torrents, and the clergy did not relish being wet to the skin, so they decided not to beat the bounds. However, cross and banners would not be done out of their little flirt, and to the astonishment of all, away they trotted, none bearing them, and made the rounds by themselves. Popular tradition is prudently silent as to when this took place.
That Winnow should have been forced to leave Cornwall after his father had addressed the king in such forcible but inelegant terms as "Tyrannical whelp of the unclean lioness of Dumnonia," is not surprising. ”

“ From Callington a pleasing excursion may be made to the Cheesewring; and there is a very comfortable little inn there, where one can tarry and be well fed and cared for.
The height is a thousand feet, and the view thence over the fertile rolling land of Devon and East Cornwall is magnificent, contrasting strikingly with the desolation of the moors to the north. Here is Craddock Moor, taking its name in all probability from that Caradoc who ruled for Arthur in Gallewick, or Gelliwig. ”

“ Anyone with a very little experience can at once "spot" a camp or castle by the appearance from a distance of a hill or headland; and the traveller in Devon and Cornwall will pass scores of them, as he will see by his Ordnance Survey Map, without giving much attention to them, without supposing that they can be of great interest, unless his attention has been previously directed to the subject. It is a pity that anyone should go through a country which may really be said to make ancient camps and castles its speciality and not know something about them. ”

“ I believe that there does not live any single man who has actually explored all the isles of Scilly, stood upon every rock, climbed every hill, and searched on every island for its treasures of ancient barrows, plants, birds, carns, and headlands. ”

“ S. Michael's Mount is a grand upshoot of granite from the sea. As a rock it is far finer than its corelative in Brittany, but the buildings crowning the Cornish mount are vastly inferior to the magnificent pile on Mont Saint Michel. Nevertheless, those that now form the residence of Lord S. Levan are by no means insignificant or unworthy of their position. The masses of granite crag, especially to the west, are singularly bold, and if some of the modern work be poor in design, it might have been much worse. ”

“ Lostwithiel is not Lost-wi'in-a-hill as is the popular derivation, but Les-Gwythiel, the palace in the wood, as Liskeard is that on the rock. It is charmingly situated.
It is an old rotten borough, once in the hands of the Earls of Mount Edgcumbe. But before that it was a seat of the Stannary Court for Cornwall, and here the Dukes of Cornwall had their palace. Of this considerable remains exist, but it has been meddled with, and vulgarised by the insertion of quite unsuitable windows.
The church is interesting; it possesses a fine lantern of a character nowhere else met with in the West. ”

“ The hermit was undoubtedly a Cornish Briton, and Olaf was obliged to hold communication with him through an interpreter from Ireland or Wales.
The old man said to him, "There is a great future in store for thee, Olaf. Thou wilt have to pass through much conflict, but in the end wilt reign in thine own land; and when that comes to pass remember to advance the faith, and to use every opportunity to turn men from their idols." ”

“ Owing mainly to the remoteness of this mountain from the habitations of men, and from the mischievous activity of stone quarriers for buildings, there are scattered about this stately five-pointed tor some very interesting relics of antiquity, of an antiquity that goes back to prehistoric times. Among these most interesting of all are the beehive huts that cluster about the granite rocks like the mud nests of swallows. ”

“ The islands belong to the Duchy of Cornwall, and thereby leased to the late Mr. Augustus Smith, who, firmly imbued with the notion that men must be manufactured by education rather than allowed to bring themselves up in independence, transported the population from the smaller islands and planted them about the schools. No doubt that the native originality, freshness, and force will be drilled out of the new generation, and they will all spell and think, and write and act alike. ”

“ A modern range of buildings has been added for the accommodation of the nuns, but it is not unsightly. The lovely pinnacled tower of the church of S. Mawgan rises beside the ancient mansion, at a considerably lower level, and the interior is rich with sculptured oak, and with monuments of the Arundells.
Alas! the mighty family that once dominated in Cornwall, second in power only to the Princes of Wales, royal dukes of that duchy, is now represented in Cornwall by empty mansions, alienated to other holders, and by tombs. ”

“ Thus, like Camelford, Saltash has had six centuries of corporate existence, and, grey and antique, seems to gaze with scorn upon the odious Albert Bridge flung across the Hamoaze by Brunel in 1857-9, at a cost of £230,000, for the Cornwall line, and which, from whatever point it be looked at, is an eyesore.
Saltash occupies the steep slope of the hill that descends to the water's edge. The main street is as steep as the side of a roof. ”

“ All round the rocks at low tide hangs the long seaweed, undisturbed since the days when they manufactured kelp, like the rank growth of a tropical creeper: at high tide it stands up erect, rocking to and fro in the wash and sway of the water like the tree-tops of the forest in the breeze. Everywhere, except in the rare places where men come and go, the wild sea-birds make their nests ”

“ According to Celtic law, all sons equally divided the inheritance and principalities of their father. The consequence was that on the death of a king the most masterful of his sons cut the throats of such of his brothers as he could lay hold of. And as these little games were enacted periodically in Brittany, the breath was no sooner out of the body of a prince than such sons as felt that they had no chance of maintaining their rights made a bolt of it, crossed into Cornwall, and either halted there or passed through it on their way to Wales, where they very generally got married. ”

“ In some it was close and secret; in others open and democratic. In some the electors were nominated by the patron; in others they maintained a measure of independence, and disposed of their votes to the highest bidder.
One of the most notorious of the rotten boroughs was Mitchell, Modishole, or, as it was sometimes called in error, S. Michael. It is a wretched hamlet on a bleak portion of the great backbone of Cornwall, exposed to every blast from the Atlantic, without trade, without manufacture, almost without agriculture, so poor and unremunerative is the soil. ”

“ The whole of the Cornish moors, like Dartmoor, are strewn with prehistoric villages and towns of circular houses, sometimes within rings of rude walling that served as a protection to the settlement, and connected with enclosures for the cattle against wolves. But though in many cases the doorways remain, of upright jambs with a rude lintel of granite thrown across, complete examples roofed in are rare, and those to which we direct attention now are known to very few persons indeed. ”

“ Camelford has no public buildings of interest. It is situate on very high ground, on a wind-blown waste 700 feet above the sea, exposed to furious gales from the Atlantic; but it has this advantage, that it forms headquarters for an excursion to the Bodmin moors, to Brown Willy (1375 feet) , and Rough Tor (1250 feet) . These tors, though by no means so high as those on Dartmoor, are yet deserving of a visit, on account of their bold outlines, the desolation of the wilderness out of which they rise, and the numerous relics of antiquity strewn over the moors about them. ”

“ Olaf stormed the Castle of Bamborough, then harried the Scottish coast, the Western Isles and the Isle of Man, then Ireland, where "he burned far and wide, wherever inhabited."
Not yet content with blood and flame, he crossed to Wales and ravaged there, then sailed to France to do there what mischief he could. After a while he turned back, and sighted the Scilly Isles, and then ran his fleet into the harbour of S. Mary's, the largest of the isles. Here Olaf heard tell of a hermit who lived in a cell among the granite crags, and who was believed to have the gift of prophecy. ”

“ S. Breock was on his way from Cardigan to Brittany when his hide-covered boat was nearly upset by a whale, and so great was the alarm of those sailing with him that the vessel put into Hayle estuary and ran up to the head.
Breock was now an old man, and could not walk, so his companions made for him a sort of cart in which he could sit, and in which they drew him about. One day they left him to sing psalms in his cart whilst they were engaged at a distance over some pressing business. ”

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

“ The shock of the Reformation had upset men's minds. What had been held sacred for ages was sacred no longer, and the men who had been encouraged to profane the altar were ready enough to turn their hands against the throne. ”

“ There is plenty and to spare in the west of England now, but we may feel grateful that we do not exist in such detestable weather, nor exposed to such sousing rains, nor have to stand against such deluges, as those which granite had to encounter. ”

“ A ridge of high ground running from the north to south parallel with the coast dips sharply down, and rises as sharply again to a grassy hill, from the southern end of which there is a still deeper cleft through which the road descends steeply to the left into the valley in which lies the little town of Stratton. ”

“ He did not overthrow their lechs or pillar-stones; he simply cut crosses on them. When he found that the pagans had a holy well, he contented himself with converting the well into a baptistery. It is a question of judgment whether to wean people gently and by slow degrees from their old customs, or whether wholly to forbid these usages. S. Patrick must have known perfectly what the episcopal system was in Gaul, yet when he came into a land where the Roman territorial organisation had never prevailed, he accommodated Christian Church government to the conditions of Celtic tribal organisation. ”

“ S. Kew is really Docwin, otherwise called Cyngar, the founder of Congresbury, in Somersetshire. He was a son of Gildas the historian, that sour creature who threw all the dirt he could at the princes, people, and clergy of his own blood and tongue, and told us the least possible about their history, filling his pages with pious scurrility.
In S. Teath (S. Itha) is a very fine churchyard cross. Here may be noticed the arms of the Carminow family, once perhaps the most powerful in Cornwall, now gone--without a living representative remaining of the name. ”

“ Surely it affords an interest, and gives a zest to an excursion into Cornwall, when we know something of the founders of the churches, and they stand out before us as living, energetic characters, with some faults, but many virtues, and are to us no longer nuda nomina. ”

“ In Ireland every king had his dun. This was an enlarged rath with an outer court in which he held his hostages, for the law required this: "He is no king who has not hostages in lock-up."
Dun in Welsh is din, and dinas is but another form of the same word, and signifies a royal residence.
A gloss to an old Irish law tract says that a royal dun must have two walls and a moat for water.
Dun in Scotland is applied to any fort. According to the Gaelic dictionaries, it is "a heap or mound," and even a dung-hill is a dun.
In fact, the French dune and the Cornish towan derive from the same root. ”