DAVIES GILBERT, (continued 6)

Morewinstow measures 7038 statute acres.

£. s. d.

Annual value of the Real Property, as returned to Parliament in 1815 4201 0 0

Poor Rate in 1831 707 7 0

Population,—

in 1801, 874 in 1811, 940 in 1821, 1091 in 1831, 1102

giving an increase of 26 per cent. in 30 years.

The Rev. Denis Young died Vicar of Morewinstow in 1834, having held the living from 1807.

GEOLOGY, BY DOCTOR BOASE.

Like the adjoining parish of Kilkhampton, Morewinstow is entirely confined to rocks of the calcareous series, known in Devonshire by the name of Dunstone. The schistose and compact varieties of this rock are extensively exposed on the shores, and in the precipitous cliffs of Stanbury Creek, where they may be seen curved and contorted in the most intricate manner.

257

MULLION.

HALS.

The manuscript relating to this parish is lost.

TONKIN.

Mullion is in the hundred of Kerrier, in that part of it called Maneage, bounded to the west by the Channel, to the north by Cury, Gunwallo, and St. Mawgan, to the east by Ruan Major, and to the south by Grade.

This parish has its name from St. Melina, and is dedicated to her. It is a vicarage valued in the King’s Book at £9. 4s. 4d. The patronage in the Bishop of Exeter. The incumbent Mr. Wills. The great tithes belong to the Chapter of Exeter, with the exception of an endowment to the vicar made by Robert Lyddra, sometime Provost of Glassney College, as may be seen in the registry of Exeter.

In the valuation of Pope Nicholas anno 1291, the 20th of Edward the First, this church is valued at £8; but since it is there called Ecclesia Sancte Melanie, and that in Usherde Brit. & Eccles. Primordiis, pp. 145 and 146 (I presume Archbishop Usher De Christianarum Ecclesiarum, in Occidentis præsertim partibus, Successione et Statu, London, 1613, 4to. Hamburgh, 1658, London, 1687, with a continuation. Edit.) the famous St. Malo is called St. Mellonus, St. Melanius, and Meloninus Britannus, I rather take him to have been the patron of this church, and to have given his name to the parish.

THE EDITOR.

The church of this parish has the appearance of antiquity, and the windows contain some remains of painted glass, exhibiting the arms of several families heretofore 258 connected with the parish, the De Ferrers and the Eriseys. There is a marble monument to the Rev. T. Flavell, on which he is stated to have received his education at Tiverton school, and to have been a member of Trinity College, Oxford; and that in addition to this vicarage he had the rectory of Ruan Major, and that he held a prebend of Exeter Cathedral. He died in 1682.

At the foot of the inscription, which is in Latin, was the following:

The tower was built by Mr. Robert Luddra, probably an inhabitant of the parish, in 1500.

The great tithes do not form a part of the general funds belonging to the Dean and Chapter of Exeter, but they are specially appropriated to support the vicars choral of the Cathedral Church.

The manor of Pradannack is said by Mr. Lysons to have belonged to the family of Serjeaux, and to have passed from them by a coheiress to the De Veres, Earls of Oxford. It is now divided into Higher and Lower Wortha and Wollas, one belonging to Mrs. Agar, heir of the Robartes family, the other to the Vyvyans of Trelowarren, and the manor of Clahar to the family of Boscawen.

The parish feast is held on the nearest Sunday to November the 4th; St. Malo’s day is November the 15th, just with an interval of eleven days, but in the wrong direction for reconciling the difference by our change of style. St. Melina is not noticed in the Roman calendar.

The Rev. T. L. Bluett died Vicar of Mullion in 1834.

This parish measures 4663 statute acres.

£. s. d.

Annual value of the Real Property, as returned to Parliament in 1815 2478 0 0

Poor Rate in 1831 299 13 0

259

Population,—

in 1801, 529 in 1811, 571 in 1821, 692 in 1831, 733

giving an increase of 38½ per cent. in 30 years.

GEOLOGY, BY DOCTOR BOASE.

By far the greater part of this parish rests on serpentine, the nature of which is beautifully displayed in Kinance Cove, where many rocks are highly polished by the action of the waves, exhibiting a mottled and variegated surface not unlike the skin of a serpent, from which resemblance the rock derives its name.

Between Pradanack and the sea, and between the church and the sea, bounded on the south by the rivulet which flows to Mullion Cove, there are two patches of hornblende rocks, both massive and schistose. These rocks are not of the same nature as the greenstone which occur near the granite, but resemble those of Porthoustock, Cadgwith, Landowednack, and other places near the serpentine: it is therefore very probable that the analysers may detect magnesia in both the hornblende and the felspar, of which these rocks are composed. North of a line drawn from the church to about the middle of Bolerium Cove, the rocks appear to belong to the calcareous series.

The Editor cannot pass by the mentioning of Kinance Cove without remarking on the extreme beauty and elegance of its appearance.

Whenever the granite reaches the shore, and it does so only with some interruptions for a few miles round the Land’s End, the cliffs are composed of angular blocks piled on each other, seeming with masculine strength to defy the utmost strength of the ocean. At Kinance, on the contrary, the whole scenery appears feminine. The rocks are rounded, smooth, polished, and variegated with beautiful colours; and although they are of large dimensions, yet every face and every turn is elegant; the very sand that 260 lies between them is of the most fine and shining texture. No one desirous of viewing the beauties of Cornwall should neglect to visit this Cove. The serpentine formation, one of the most rare, is highly interesting to geologists, with its accompanying diallage, and veins of asbestos and of steatite, frequently shot through by native copper in the form of dendrites. Here too the botanist will find various plants besides the Erica Vagans, peculiar, in Cornwall at least, to this formation, among which one of the most rare is the Asparagus Officinalis; and, lastly, the serpentine of Kinance is now turned in lathes, and made into some of the most pleasing ornaments for chimney pieces or cabinets.

ST. NEOT.

HALS.

The manuscript relating to this parish is lost.

TONKIN.

St. Neot is situate in the hundred of West, and is bounded to the west by Cardinham and Warleggon, to the north by Alternun, to the east by St. Clair, and to the south by St. Pinnock and Leskeard.

This parish takes its name from, and is dedicated to, the famous St. Neot, whose fabulous miracles are painted in one of the windows of this church.

It is a vicarage, valued in the King’s Book at £9. 11s. The patronage in Mr. John Pomeroy, the widow of Mr. John Robins, and Mr. Jonathan Randill, for one turn, and in Mr. Christopher Grylls, for the other; all in right of the manor of St. Neot, to which the great tithes are annexed. The incumbent Mr. John Parsons.

261 In 1291, the 20th Edward I. on the taxation of Pope Nicholas, this church is valued at £10, being then, or since, appropriated to the priory of Montacute, in Somersetshire; and the vicarage at twenty shillings.

THE MANOR OF ST. NEOT.

This in Domesday Book is called Neoteston, that is Neot’s Place, and it was one of the manors given to the Earl of Morton.

In p. 49 of Carew’s History, St. Neot is printed by mistake St. Wot. (This error is corrected in Lord de Dunstanville’s edition, p. 135. Ed.)

THE EDITOR.

Mr. Tonkin has not stated with his general accuracy the value assigned to the vicarage of St. Neot in the Taxation of Pope Nicholas. The entry in the parliamentary publication stands thus:

Ecclesia Sancti Rufati (Neoti) £10 0 0

Vicar’ ejusdem 6 13 4

The following entry occurs in the valuation of property belonging to the priory of Montacute, at its surrender to the king, preserved in the First Fruits Office.

Sanctus Neotus.— Valet in exit’ x^mar’ pdial’ psonal’ cum al’ casual’ ib^m cõib; annis £14. ult^a 13s. 4d. in feod’ Johs Calwey, ball’ ib^m, p annu’ clare £13. 6s. 8d.

Mr. Lysons gives a very detailed account of the different manors in this parish, and of the descents and alienations of each, but wholly uninteresting to any others than the proprietors.

The principal manor and advowson of the church, which had been both divided, are most fortunately again united in the Rev. Richard Gerveys Grylls, since we are indebted to the taste and to the liberality of this gentleman, for more 262 than restoring the beautiful decorations of the church to their original splendour.

The church is situated in a pleasing and retired vale, watered by a branch of the Fowey river, and abounding with trees; while the country surrounding it, on almost every side, is even now little cultivated, and must in former times have been a desert. No situation could be more adapted for the retreat of an anchorite; and monkish legends inform us that St. Guevor, or Guervier, or Guerer, fixed his abode at this place; and in after times, the sound of his name being found to somewhat resemble the French verb Guerir, to heal, tales were invented of his performing miraculous cures; and in particular of his having enabled King Alfred to sit on a horse at the precise moment when his presence in the field became indispensably necessary to oppose the pagan Danes.

If St. Guerir ever resided here at all, he must have very opportunely made way for St. Neot, since it is well ascertained that he also occupied this retreat in the reign of his brother or relation the Great Alfred.

St. Neot, having withdrawn from the Abbey of Glastonbury, founded by St. Joseph of Arimathea, retired into this solitude; where he adopted the singular penance of plunging himself daily into a well of cold water, and there remaining immersed to his neck till he had repeated the whole Book of Psalms. The miraculous powers however bestowed on him by the Almighty, in recompense for conduct so conducive to the happiness and well-being of his creatures, forbad St. Neot to remain secreted. Multitudes flocked to him from all parts; he founded a monastery, and repaired to Rome for a confirmation and for blessing at the hands of the Pope: these were readily obtained. He returned to his monastery, where frequent visits were made to him by King Alfred, on which occasions he admonished, instructed, and informed the great founder of English liberty; and finally quitted this mortal life on the 31st of July, about the year 883, in the odour 263 of sanctity so unequivocal, that travellers all over Cornwall were solaced by its fragrance. Nor did the exertions of our Saint terminate with his existence on earth; he frequently appeared to King Alfred, and sometimes led his armies in the field. But if the tales of these times are deserving of any confidence, the nation is really and truly indebted to St. Neot for one of the greatest blessings ever bestowed on it. To his advice, and even to his personal assistance as a teacher, we owe the foundation by Alfred of the University at Oxford.

The relics of St. Neot remained at his monastery in Cornwall till about the year 974, when Earl Alric, and his wife Ethelfleda, having founded a religious house at Eynesbury, in Huntingdonshire, and being at a loss for some patron saint, adopted the expedient of stealing the body of St. Neot; which was accordingly done, and the town retains his name, thus feloniously obtained, up to the present time. The monastery in Cornwall continued feebly to exist after this disaster through the Saxon times; but having lost its palladium, it felt the roiner’s hand; and almost immediately after the Norman Conquest, it was finally suppressed; yet the memory of the local saint is still cherished by the inhabitants of the parish and of the neighbourhood, endeared perhaps by the tradition of his diminutive stature, reduced in their imaginations to fifteen inches of height; and to these feelings we in all probability owe the preservation of the painted glass, the great decoration of this church, and one of the principal works of art to be seen in Cornwall.

The church itself is of the best description, having a nave and two aisles of equal length, with a square tower at the western end, and with the rare addition of an embattled parapet towards the south, but probably not older than the fifteenth century, with the exception of some parts of the walls near the chancel, which seem to have been a part of the former church. Soon after the new building had been completed, individuals in some cases, and associations 264 in others, as the unmarried men of the parish, the unmarried women, and the wives, contributed a window, either in honour of the local saint, or of their particular patrons; and the peculiar attachment felt for the little saint seems to have preserved these fragile materials at the two important periods of our modern history, the time when the great change of religion took place, and at that of the Civil Wars. It may however be recollected that no violent change occurred here, the monastic institution having been dissolved by the Earl of Morton, half brother of the Conqueror; and no place could be more retired from the observation of strangers, or from the passage of fanatical armies.

From the time of the Reformation, however, all care about maintaining these decorations ceased, and the whole in a few years more would have fallen into utter decay, if Mr. Grylls had not nobly stepped forwards, not to support or repair, but to renew these gems; which he has most effectually done, at an expense not short of two or three thousand pounds. The church has now sixteen windows entirely filled with painted glass of the most beautiful colours and designs; about half of the whole consisting of the old glass most carefully preserved, and the new added in a style completely harmonizing with the former: all executed in London by Mr. J. P. Hedgeland, an eminent artist, to whose work, with sixteen coloured plates, the reader is referred for a full description of each window, and of the various subjects it contains:

“A Description of the Splendid Decorations recently made to St. Neot’s Church, in Cornwall, by J. P. Hedgeland, price £2. 2s. To which are added some Collections and Translations respecting St. Neot, &c. by Davies Gilbert, M.A. F.R.S. F.A.S.” Printed for the Author in London, 1830, and sold by Messrs. Nichols.

This parish contains a natural curiosity which must not be omitted.

On an elevated part of the uncultivated lands which 265 extend for many miles to the north and east of St. Neot Church Town, there happens to be a depression without any channel leading from it; the hollow is, of course, filled with water, and resting on the granite soil of these moors, the margin all round is covered by a white siliceous sand, one of the constituent parts of this compound rock.

Most marvellous stories used to be current respecting this little lake; no lead could sound the depth of the water, which rose and fell with the tide, &c.:—but the depth nowhere exceeds two or three fathoms, and any consent with the tide is obviously impossible. A tale of a very different nature, connected with this lake, was as universally repeated, and more than half believed, sixty years ago.

Tregagle is the name of a family not long extinct. Mr. Lysons says Tregagle, of Trevorder, in St. Breock; arms, Argent, three bucks passant Or. One of this family having, for some reason, become unpopular, the traditions respecting a mythological personage have been applied to him. The object of these tales of unknown antiquity was, like Orestes, continually pursued by an avenging being, from whom he could find refuge only from time to time, by flying to the cell or chapel on Roach Rock; till at last his fate was changed into the performance of a task, to exhaust the water from Dozmere, with an implement less adapted, if possible, for its appropriate work, than were the colanders given to the daughters of Danaus:

Tregagle is provided simply with a limpet shell, having a hole bored through it; and with this he is said to labour without intermission; in dry seasons, flattering himself that he has made some progress towards the end of his work; but when rain commences, and the “omnis effusus labor” becomes apparent, he is believed to roar so loudly, in utter despair, as to be heard from Dartmoor Forest to the Land’s End.

266 The name of this small lake, about a mile in circumference, has excited much curiosity, remaining still unsatisfied. I approach etymology with diffidence, proposing nothing but as a conjecture. On the second syllable of Doz-mere indeed there has not been a doubt, it is understood on all hands to mean a lake; now Doz is said in our glossaries to agree with the English verb to come, but that joined with water it means the tide; may not Doz-mere then represent the currently received opinion of these waters ebbing and flowing, and mean literally the tide lake? The English termination, utterly destructive of its dignity or importance, is at all events unnecessary to the sense.

St. Neot measures 12,789 statute acres.

£. s. d.

Annual value of the Real Property, as returned to Parliament in 1815 4635 0 0

Poor Rate in 1831 701 18 0

Population,—

in 1801, 906 in 1811, 1041 in 1821, 1255 in 1831, 1424

giving an increase of 57 per cent. in 30 years.

Present Vicar, the Rev. Richard Gerveys Grylls, instituted in 1793.

THE GEOLOGY, BY DR. BOASE.

A line drawn N. W. and S. E. about half a mile north of the church town, will divide this parish so into two unequal parts, that the northern, by far the most extensive, will be found to rest on granite, forming a barren waste for several miles in extent; its valleys, however, have afforded stream tin in considerable quantities, and of the very best quality, rendering it therefore probable that this valuable and rare metal may exist in the granite more than has generally been supposed. The other portion of the parish is situated on slate, resembling that of the parishes of Cardinham and St. Clear, immediately in the vicinity.

267

NEWLIN, or ST. NEWLIN.

HALS.

The manuscript relating to this parish is lost.

TONKIN.

Newlin is in the hundred of Pider, and joins to the west with St. Piran in the Sands and St. Cuthbert, to the north with Crantock and Lower St. Columb, to the east with Little Colan and St. Enador, and to the south with St. Allen.

This parish takes its name from, and is dedicated to, a female saint, Sancta Newlina. It is a vicarage, valued in the King’s Books at £16. 13s. 4d. The patronage in the Bishop of Exeter. The sheaf appropriated to the Chancellor of Exeter, and held under lease by Richard Arundell, esq. uncle and heir presumptive to the present John Lord Arundell, of Trerice. The incumbent Mr. Reginald Trenheale.

The manor of Cargaul, or Cargol, which signifies the holy town, as having been for a long time, ever since the settling of the Bishop’s see at Bodmin, part of the lands belonging to the bishoprick still appertaining to the Bishop of Exeter. I take this to be what in Mr. Camden is called Caeling, or I do not know where else you will find that place. There are many ruins at Cargol, which show that it must have been once a considerable place. A large prison is still standing there, although now scarcely used, and a barn of the same size; both show something of its pristine glory, although as to the rest it be but a sorry village of three or four poor houses.

Treluddero, or Treludra, which is not far from Cargol, and is held from it.

268 Humphrey Borlase, esq. of this place, was Sheriff of Cornwall in the third and fourth years of King James the Second, in the commission of the peace and lieutenancy, and also a member of parliament; but following the fortunes of that king, (by whom it is said that he was created Baron of Mitchell, at St. Germain’s,) he ran out a large estate, and died a prisoner for debt in the Fleet; and soon after his decease, this place, with several other lands, were sold under a decree in chancery, to Sir William Scawen, and the lease of the manor of Cargol held under the Bishop to Philip Hawkins, esq. to whose son, the Rev. John Hawkins, D.D. it at present belongs. From hence originated the well-known apple, the Treludra or Borlase’s pippin; but the place is so much fallen to decay that no traces remain of the house, nor even of the orchard. [The small dwelling of a farmer, and a few stumps of trees, alone mark the spot. Ed.]

To the south of Treludra, just in from the downs, stands the borough of Mitchell, the best part of which being in this parish, as the rest is in St. Eroder, Mr. Browne Willis thus describes it: “Mitchell is a small hamlet, scarce containing thirty houses, all cottages save one, which is a public inn, not long since erected, which is the only healed (slated) house in this poor borough. Concerning the antiquity of this borough, and when it was created so, I have little to say; but that it first sent members to parliament in the sixth year of Edward the Sixth, in which return it is called villa Mychell, as it is in all the ancient indentures, styled burgus or villa Mychell, Mitchell, or Modishole. Mr. Carew calls it Meddleschale, the name Mitchell never occurring till in modern times.

The manor of this place is still in possession of the ancient family of Arundell, of Lanherne, whose ancestor, Ralph de Arundell, purchased the same in the time of Henry the Third, by whose interest, I presume, with Richard Earl of Cornwall, King of the Romans, this little town obtained the privileges of a market and fairs. In anno the thirtieth 269 Edward the First, John de Arundell (grandson of the aforesaid Ralph, who had been Sheriff of Cornwall in the forty-fourth of Henry the Third,) certified his claim to a market and fair in his manor of Modishole, which he challenged by hereditary descent from Ralph de Arundell, his ancestor, and pleaded that the said Ralph purchased this manor of Piers de Ralegh, heir of Walter de Ralegh.

The manor of Degembris was one of those forfeited by Francis Tregian, esq. (see Probus). It was either given or sold to John Arundell, of Trerise, esq. by King Charles the First.

In this manor Pallamaunter, or Palmaunter, was formerly a gentleman’s seat, and gave name to an ancient family since removed to Trevyrick, in St. Columb Minor.

The manor of Tresulion. Here it is said was born Sir Robert Tresulion, or Tresilian, Lord Chief Justice of England under Richard the Second, though some say he was born at another place. It certainly however belonged to a family of that name, till it went, or rather the barton, with a female heir, to a branch of the Carnes of Glamorganshire. The manor went probably, by purchase, to the Arundells. But in the year 1599, Thomas Davies, of Canon Teign, in Devon, esq. seized the barton under a mortgage, and his descendant, Mary, widow of Sir George Cary, of Clovelly, in Devonshire, sold it to —— Gully, gent. who settled himself there, from whom, having lost all his children, it devolved on his nephew Samuel Gully, esq.

The manor of Treworthen was the seat of a very considerable family, of which Walter de Treworthen, or Treworden, was Sheriff of Cornwall 7th of Henry the Third, as was Sir Otho de Treworthen 4th Henry the Fifth, and Sir John de Treworthen was knight of the shire 21st Richard the Second. The arms of Treworthen were Argent, three boar’s heads couped Sable, armed Gules. This manor, now reduced nearly to the barton, is the property of Wills, of Wivelscomb, a minor.

MANOR OF TRERICE. 270

Mr. Carew says, in Edward the Third’s reign Ralph Arundell matched with the heir of this land and name, since which time his issue hath there continued, (not so, for their chief seat was at Efford, Carew, p. 119, till the reign of Edward the Fourth,) and increased their livelihood by sundry like inheritors, as St. John, Jew, Durant, and Thurlebear.

John Arundell, mentioned by Mr. Carew, p. 146, and his father-in-law, lived to a very great age, being the same who was called “the Tilbury,” and “John for the King.”

The arms of Arundell of Trerice were, Sable, three chevrons Argent, but of later times the same as Arundell of Lanherne.

THE EDITOR.

In the taxation of Pope Nicholas, Newlin is valued:

Ecclesia S’ce Neweline £9

Vicar ejusdem 1

The Great Tithes are held on lease by John Hawkins, esq. having been purchased by him.

The church stands on an elevated ridge, and is conspicuous, with its lofty tower, from great distances; both are built with stone common in that district, which is hard, and capable of forming permanent structures; but the laminated surface of the stone, and its colour, approaching to olive, are quite unfavourable to exterior beauty. The inside of the church consists of two long aisles, extending east and west, with a short cross aisle on either side; the north cross aisle being appropriated to the manor of Cargol, and that on the other side to Tresilian. The old carved work of this church has not been destroyed, and therefore much decoration may be seen on the seats, presenting the arms of various families, figures, monograms, &c.

Under the eastern part of the church remains a vault appropriated to the Arundells of Trerice, and against one 271 of the walls over it is a handsome monument to Margaret Arundell, wife of John Lord Arundell, and daughter of Sir John Acland, who died in 1691. From this connection, and from various settlements and arrangements growing out of it, Trerice, with a considerable estate annexed, has devolved on Sir Thomas Dyke Acland, late member for Devonshire.

There is also a monument to the Rev. Henry Pooley, the late vicar, who departed this life in Sept. 1821, esteemed as a clergyman, as a gentleman, and in his domestic relations. On his decease Doctor William Carey, then Bishop of Exeter, bestowed the living on the Rev. Richard Polwhele, in consideration of his eminence in almost every department of literature.

MANOR OF CARGOLS.

The leasehold property of this manor, purchased by Mr. Philip Hawkins, remained in his family till his great grandson, the late Sir Christopher Hawkins, acquired the freehold in the year 1804 or 5, under the authority of parliament, for redeeming the Land Tax from the See of Exeter.

The other portion of the Borlase property, sold to Sir William Scawen, has not remained so permanently in the possession of any family. Treludra, and its appendages, had certain incorporeal rights, which made them objects of peculiar attention. Mr. Scawen, who inherited this property from the original purchaser, sold it to Mr. Basset, afterwards Lord de Dunstanville; and about the year 1798 it was finally sold to Sir Christopher Hawkins, who thus united again the Borlase property in this neighbourhood.

It is now needless to investigate the constitution of the little borough of Michell, further than to state that the right of voting for Members of Parliament had been determined to reside in five individuals, holding certain nominal tenures within the borough, and denominated mesne lords, and in such persons living within the borough, as paid 272 scot and lot. These last were in latter times reduced to four, so as to constitute the five mesne lords a majority.

Nothing could primâ facie appear more absurd, or bear more the appearance of a childish mockery of representation. But in point of fact, this and other close boroughs had nothing to do with representation at all, in the sense usually applied to that word: they were fortuitous contrivances giving weight to property, and restraining an assembly partly delegated, and thereby possessing a strong spirit of freedom, within such bounds as allowed distinct branches of government to co-exist with this otherwise all powerful body. They are now swept away, and new institutions seem fast arising; but whether these shall prove advantageous to the happiness and to the welfare of mankind, or the contrary, our posterity will be more able to decide. They may perhaps discover that the apparent obstacles in our Constitution, really contained the secret springs which gave a regulated motion to the British Government, when it was esteemed the wonder and the admiration of the world.

A large extent of waste ground, belonging to the Treludra purchase, having been enclosed, and efforts made to bring it into cultivation by various methods, and among these by folding sheep, it received the name of Shepherds. The late Sir Christopher Hawkins continued with eagerness what he found commenced; and trying the expedient of ploughing deep, to remove the stratum of shattered siliceous spar, which occurs immediately under the peaty turf of all such lands throughout Cornwall, lead ore was brought to the surface; when this spirited individual, who is said to have expended five thousand pounds a year in wages for a considerable length of time, began a mine at his own expense, and encouraged by its first efforts he brought in an adit, erected more than one steam engine, and wrought the mine to a very considerable depth. The quantity of lead raised from the mine proved sufficient to pay all the expenses, and in addition, the lead was found to be rich in silver, much above the general average of such as are usually tested.

273 All the operations were conducted on the place. The ores were smelted, silver to the amount of some tens of thousands of pounds value was extracted from the lead, and the litharge again revived.

In all these matters Sir Christopher Hawkins was mainly assisted by one whose name I am happy to record.

Mr. John Giddy was born in January 1760, and having received the common school education, he found himself compelled to waste the greater part of his life in an inferior situation at a tin smelting house. He had however the advantage of much leisure, which he employed in the cultivation of his mind and in the acquirement of knowledge; and without any apprehension of my judgment being warped in favour of one, whom I have esteemed more as a brother than a relation, throughout a period exceeding fifty years, I will venture to say that in matters connected with chemistry and practical science, few excelled him; that in honour and integrity he was excelled by none; and that in more recondite studies, even in the acquirement of foreign literature, his progress much more resembled what might be expected from persons having every artificial advantage in life, than from him who had been in a great measure deprived of them all. He never married, and died suddenly in last January (1835), at Shepherds, having just completed his seventy-fifth year.

I am myself approaching the age of man, and but that children, and grandchildren, carry our views forward and enliven old age, I should acquiesce in the sentiment of Juvenal:

274 Mr. Lysons says that a manor, called the manor of Newlyn, belonged to the other branch of the Arundells—that of Lanherne. It may, however, be remarked that a manor bearing the name of a parish is frequently limited to a very small part of that with which it would seem to be co-extensive: in such cases the manor probably derives its name from the church having been built on it.

Sir John Arundell, who was Sheriff of Cornwall in the 10th year of Edward the Fourth, lost his life in an attack on St. Michael’s Mount, then recently seized by Richard de Vere, Earl of Oxford. This gentleman had removed his residence from Efford, on the coast near Stratton, and amidst the sands, to Trerice; and these circumstances gave origin to one of the thousand idle tales invented on such occasions, and which the diffused intelligence of the present time has scarcely yet eradicated,—that some foreteller of future events had warned him of dying in the sand, that he went from Efford to counteract the will of fate, which became accomplished however at the foot of St. Michael’s Mount.

The Sir John Arundell, mentioned by Mr. Tonkin as known by the name of “John for the King,” and as living to a great age, defended Pendennis Castle with the utmost bravery, after he had passed his eightieth year; and his son, Sir Richard Arundell, distinguished himself at several battles in the Civil War. This gentleman, soon after the Restoration of King Charles the Second, was created Lord Arundell, of Trerice; his grandson, the last heir male, died in 1773.

The house retains the appearance of a splendid mansion in times passed by. The south-western wing has been repaired and beautified internally by Sir Thomas Acland.

Tresilian, improved of late years into a handsome seat, is now the residence of Richard Gully Bennet, Esq.

The parish feast is kept on the last Sunday in April.

Newlyn measures 7683 statute acres.

275

£. s. d.

Annual value of the Real Property, as returned to Parliament in 1815 6,663 0 0

Poor Rate in 1831 451 9 0

Population,—

in 1801, 735 in 1811, 798 in 1821, 1045 in 1831, 1218

giving an increase of 65½ per cent. in thirty years.

Present Vicar, the Rev. Henry Pooley, collated by Bishop Pelham in 1815.

GEOLOGY, BY DOCTOR BOASE.

This parish is composed of the same kind of rocks as the neighbouring parishes of Cubert, Colan, and St. Columb Minor. It is entirely placed within the calcareous series. At Trevemper bridge is a bed of compact limestone, similar to that which is so common in many parts of Cornwall, and is provincially known by the name of black lime. This rock has been noticed under the head of St. Germans, and it is very abundant at Rock Ferry, in St. Minver, opposite Padstow.

It may be proper to add that Newlyn, west of Penzance, grown to be in reality a town of some importance, is legally no more than a village in the parish of Paul, without any separation whatever.

OTTERHAM.

HALS.

The manuscript relating to this parish is lost.

TONKIN.

Otterham is in the hundred of Lesnewith, and is bounded to the west by St. Juliot, to the north by St. Gennis, to the east by Jacobstow, to the south by Davidstow and Warbstow.

276 This church, in the taxation of Pope Nicholas, 1291, was valued at £2 by the name of Otham. It is a rectory, valued in the King’s Book at £6. 14s. The patronage in John Saltren, Esq. The incumbent Mr. Crewys.

There is the manor of Otterham. In Domesday Book it is called Othram, being one of the 288 manors in this county, which were given by William the Conqueror to his half brother the Earl of Morton. Mr. Carew says, “3 H. 4, Will. de Campo Arnulphi held in Otterham 1 fee,” p. 40.

THE EDITOR.

Mr. Lysons states that the manor of Otterham belonged in the reign of Edward the Third to the Champernownes, that it came afterwards to the family of Copleston, that John Saltern died possessed of the manor and the advowson in 1639, in whose family it continued for about a hundred years. The manor belongs at present to George Welch Owen, Esq. and the advowson to Mr. William Chilcott, of Tiverton. Mr. Lysons adds, that a barton in this parish, sometime the property and the residence of a family called French, is now the property of Charles Chichester, Esq. The church is said to be small, and not to contain any thing worthy of attention.

Otterham measures 2694 statute acres.

£. s. d.

Annual value of the Real Property, as returned to Parliament in 1815 1,186 0 0

Poor Rate in 1831 67 0 0

Population,—

in 1801, 141 in 1811, 176 in 1821, 212 in 1831, 227

giving an increase of 61 per cent. in 30 years.

GEOLOGY, BY DR. BOASE.

This parish is of the same structure as Lesnewith, in its vicinity, being both situated on the Dunstone and other rocks of the calcareous series.

277

PADSTOW.

HALS.

The manuscript relating to Padstow is lost.

TONKIN.

Padstow, in the hundred of Pider, is bounded to the west by St. Merrin, to the north and east by the sea, its own harbour, and the river Alan, to the south by Little Petherick.

Leland (Itinerary, vol. ii. fol. 75), speaking of the town here saith, “this town is ancient, bearing the name of Lodenek in Cornish, and in English after the true and old writings Adelstowe, Latin, Athelstani locus, and the town there taketh King Adelstane for the chief giver of privileges unto it.” In Tax. Benef. 20 Edw. I. it is also called Eccles’ de Aldestowe, and valued—the rectory in 106s. 8d. and the vicar in 13s. 4d. being appropriated to the priory of Bodmin. Notwithstanding which I take it that it has its name from the famous St. Petrock, an abbreviation of Petrockstow, St. Petroc’s Place, to whom this church is by all allowed to be dedicated, and who most probably was born here; as more certain it is that he was buried in St. Petroc’s church in Bodmin, as you may see there.

But Fuller (Worthies in Wales, p. 13), from Bale calls Petrok, a Welsh-Irish-Cornish man, as having his birth in Wales, his breeding in Ireland (according to the custom of that age), from whence after twenty years’ studying he came into Cornwall, and fixed himself at Petrok’s-stowe, now corruptly Padstowe, from a small oratory so called from him; that he wrote a book of Solitary Life, whereto he was much addicted, and flourished anno 560; but Collier from Harpsfield, whose authority I prefer, makes him to go from Cornwall into Ireland, so that as I said before we may claim the honour of his birth.

This church is a vicarage, valued at £11. 3s. The 278 patronage in Edmund Prideaux, Esq. the impropriation of the sheaf in Sir John Prideaux, of Netherton in Devon, Bart.; the present incumbent Mr. Charles Guy.

THE EDITOR.

The most probable opinion respecting the name of Padstow seems to be, that St. Petroc originally fixed his hermitage or his monastic establishment at this place, from whence he afterwards removed to Bodmin.

At the taxation of Pope Nicholas this parish stands, Ecclesia de Aldestowe £5. 6s. 8d.; Vicarius ejusdem 13s. 4d.

In the Valor Ecclesiasticus, 26th of Henry the Eighth, preserved in the First Fruits Office, among the property belonging to the monastery at Bodmin, the following entries occur with respect to Padstow:

£. s. d.

Padistowe, Decimæ garbæ 14 9 6

Decimæ piscatoriæ 4 0 0

Oblac’ 2 0 0

Reddita et Firmæ Temporalium 10 7 5

Leland says, that the name of this Athelstow indicates its being founded by Athelstan on his conquest of Cornwall, but this appears mere conjecture, unsupported by the slightest authority; in contradiction to the orthography used in the Valuation by the Bishops of Winchester and Lincoln in 1291, where the name is Aldestowe, not Athelstowe; and Athelstan’s conquest took place more than three centuries and a half after the death of St. Petroc.

Mr. Whitaker conjectures that the original monastic establishment of this Saint occupied the spot, since inhabited by one of greater learning, and we may fairly presume imbued with a more deep infusion of real piety, the well known and respected author of the Connection of The Old and New Testament, and of a variety of other works, all evincing his profound erudition, strong abilities, and goodness of heart.

279 The Prideauxes are understood to have held this property before the Reformation under a lease for lives from the priors of Bodmin, who appear to have been high lords, at least, of the whole town.

Mr. Carew, after noticing Padstow, and referring to a charter of incorporation which unquestionably never had any existence, says, “Mr. Nicholas Prideaux, from his new and stately house thereby, taketh a full and large prospect of the town, haven, and country adjoining, to all which his wisdom is a stay, his authority a direction. He married one of Viel’s coheirs; and, though endowed with fair revenues in Devon, maketh Cornwall beholden to his residence. He beareth, Argent, a chevron Sable, in chief a file with three lambeaux Gules.” P. 144; 340, Lord de Dunstanville’s edit.

This family appears to have been greatly benefited by the confiscations of those times, since the Devonshire branch acquired all the ecclesiastical possessions of Bodmin Priory, and what had been held under lease from the monastery about Padstow, became converted into freehold; and soon after the possession could be considered as assured, Mr. Nicholas Prideaux built this house, which continues to be one of the most handsome and imposing of all the gentlemen’s houses in Cornwall. The exterior retains its original appearance, the interior has received various and recent improvements; a splendid staircase is understood to have been brought from Stowe in Kilkhampton. The late Mr. Charles Prideaux went into holy orders during the life of his elder brother; and afterwards assumed the name of Brune in addition to Prideaux on his succeeding to the estate of that family. He married Miss Patten, sister of Mr. Peter Patten Bowles; they have left one son, who is married to Miss Glynn, and three daughters, the eldest married to Mr. Sawle, of Penrice.

The church is handsome and spacious, and is said to have been built by Thomas Vivian, Prior of St. Petroc’s, Bodmin, and titular Bishop of Megara in Greece. It contains 280 several monuments to the Prideaux family, and to others.

The town is not large, and the harbour is so surrounded by rocks and obstructed by sand, that vessels even of a small size are unable to find shelter there when the wind blows on the shore, and security is much wanted. Plans have been suggested for constructing a mole from the eastern side of the harbour, near its entrance, so as to greatly narrow the opening, and by so doing give power to the very extensive back-water to deepen the channel, and this work, with the removal of some rocks, would, it is believed, make Padstow a safe place of refuge for all ships navigating St. George’s Channel or the Severn sea; but the expense must far exceed all that could be contributed to a private undertaking, and therefore no hope can be entertained of such an improvement being made, unless the forming of a safe harbour in such a situation should be deemed worthy of becoming a national work.

A considerable trade was brought to this part about the middle of the last century by Mr. William Rawlings, who, emerging from a shop at St. Columb, raised himself, and conferred benefits on all around him by an union of talent, industry, and integrity. He was succeeded by his son Mr. Thomas Rawlings, who served the office of Sheriff in the year 1803, and built a large house just out of the town, named Saunder’s Hill; but various concerns having proved less successful in the latter part of his life, and leaving a large family, the property has been sold, and the house taken down.

It is a curious and singular occurrence respecting the tithes of this parish, that they have been split; probably in consequence of leases granted by the priory of St. Petroc. The Prideaux family have continued to possess the tithe of fish, and some other advantages, while the general tithes of the parish belong to a gentleman of the name of Hall.

There are said to have been several chapels in the parish; one dedicated to St. Sampson, not to the Jewish 281 Hercules, but to a native of Glamorganshire, born in the fifth century, who after spending years in solitude, converting whole nations, performing miracles, and in Britany raising a man from the dead, founded the splendid abbey of Dole in Franche Comté, where he died on the 6th of July in 564. This chapel is believed to have been built on the ruins of St. Petroc’s monastery, destroyed by the Danes in 981, and therefore on the spot now occupied by Mr. Prideaux’s house, which would be called Padstow Place, but for the alliteration.

Another chapel stood in a direction from the town, now distinguished by one of the most beautiful walks any where to be seen, when the high water overflows the sand of this extensive estuary.

This chapel, called St. Saviour’s, in common with various others in similar situations, was dedicated by navigators to our Lord, in a capacity very limited with respect to that of the Redeemer of the whole world from the destruction caused by original sin; they made it only as a votive offering in return for their own temporal preservation from shipwreck.

An account is given in a black-letter pamphlet, written by G. Classe, of Torrington in Devonshire, of a most melancholy domestic tragedy which took place in this town early in the reign of King James the First, arising entirely from the violent spirit of fanaticism then raging in men’s minds with ten-fold fury in consequence of recent persecution and existing intolerance. The details had better be forgotten.

The latitude and longitude of St. Minver spire are given in the Trigonometrical Survey. Lat. 50° 33′ 31″, long. 4° 51′ 28″; in time 19m. 26s. west of Greenwich; therefore, Trevose Head will be in latitude 50° 32′ 52″, longitude 4° 57′ 16″; Pentire point in latitude 50° 35′ 15″, longitude 4° 55′ 16″.

Stepper Point, forming the mouth of the harbour, is about a sea mile south of Pentire Point, and less than half 282 as much to the west. The time of high water at the change and full of the moon must be between half past four and five o’clock.

This parish measures 3073 statute acres.

£. s. d.

Annual value of the Real Property, as returned to Parliament in 1815 6934 0 0

Poor Rate in 1831 1004 0 0

Population,—

in 1801, 1332 in 1811, 1498 in 1821, 1700 in 1831, 1822

giving an increase of nearly 37 per cent. in 30 years.

Present Vicar, the Rev. William Rawlings, instituted in 1790.

GEOLOGY, BY DR. BOASE.

The rocks of this parish are somewhat similar to those of St. Mervyn, which is already stated to belong to the calcareous series. The rocks are well exposed on the shores of Padstow harbour, and therefore they merit a more particular description.

The southern part of this parish consists chiefly of a blue slate, which in some strata is very fissile, and in other strata it separates into thick lamellar pieces, and passes in the adjoining strata into calcareous schist. This slate at Dinah’s Cave contains a bed of black limestone, which may be a continuation of that on the opposite side of the harbour at Rock ferry. At the latter place, the transitions between the blue slate and the limestone are beautifully displayed.

The limestone is of the same nature as that in Veryan on the south coast. Proceeding towards Slepper Point, at the entrance of the harbour, after passing the town of Padstow, the cliffs consist of alternate beds of compact and of schistose greenstone; these continue to line the shore with broken rocks for more than a mile, and they are succeeded by red and greenish slates, which are lamellar, of a fine texture, and rather hard, resembling the mineral called novaculite or hornestone; and connected with this slate occurs 283 a compact crystalline rock like that of Trevose Head in St. Mervyn, consisting of small crystals of glossy felspar, and of a scaly pulverulent mineral of a greenish colour, the nature of which is not very apparent. This singular rock may be the equivalent of diallage rock, a member of the serpentine series, as its position bears a great resemblance to that of the Lizard magnesian rocks.

At Penniscen Bay, on the north side of the parish, the cliff exhibits many alternations of limestone and slate; this limestone is more crystalline than the black limestone of Rock Ferry, approaching nearer to the Plymouth limestone in its appearance; but organic remains have not yet been discovered in it.

The slate between the beds of limestone is a calcareous schist, and is of a white colour, and earthy where it has been weathered; but when perfect it is found, especially near the limestone, to be of a blue colour with broad diagonal bands or stripes of brown, precisely like the calcareous slate which occurs in Werrington, near Yealm Bridge, where it is extensively quarried for chimney-pieces, and for other domestic or ornamental purposes.

PAUL.

HALS.

The manuscript relating to this parish is lost.

TONKIN.

Paul is in the hundred of Penwith, and is bounded to the west by St. Burian and Sancreed, to the north by Maddern, to the east and south by the Channel and Mount’s Bay.

284 This parish is dedicated to the famous St. Paulinus (and not the apostle Paul, as it is commonly thought), who was sent by Pope Gregory the First in 601 from Rome, with St. Justus, to accompany St. Austin the Monk for the conversion of the Saxons. In 625 he accompanied the Princess Ethelburgha, daughter to Ethelbert King of Kent, when she married Edwyn King of the Northumbrians, where he laboured so effectually that he converted that king and the greatest part of his people,[7] so that he was consecrated the first Archbishop of York, and Pope Honorius sent him the pall about the year 630; but, Edwyn being killed in battle in 633 by Cadwallo King of the Britons, and Penda King of Mercia, he was forced to fly back into Kent with Queen Ethelburga and her children, where her brother Eadbald, King thereof, receiving them with all kindness, made Paulinus Bishop of Rochester, where he ended his days on the 10th of October 644.

This church is a vicarage, valued in the King’s Book at £13. 11s. 6d.; the Patronage in the Crown; the Impropriation of the sheaf and tithes of fish in William Guavis, esq.; the Incumbent Mr. Henry Pendarves.

In anno 1291, 20 Edw. I. this church was valued at £9. 6s. 8d. being then appropriated to the Abbey of Hailes, in Gloucestershire. To this abbey the tithes of corn and fish were appropriated, and so became lay-fees at the dissolution of the abbey.

THE EDITOR.

It is universally understood that this parish is not dedicated to the great apostle of Tarsus; and it is rather a curious circumstance that the word saint, so generally used as a prefix to the names of parishes in Cornwall, should invariably be omitted in this instance.

The honour of protecting the parish of Paul has been 285 given by conjecture to St. Paul de Leon, a native of Cornwall, celebrated as a founder of monasteries, as a zealous and successful champion of the faith in converting the Pagans of Britany, where he was made the first bishop of the town, since called from him St. Pol de Leon; but, not satisfied with the services that he might render to God and man, in this important station, amidst newly converted Christians, he endeavoured to make himself more useful by retiring into a solitude, where he died on the 12th of March, about the year 573, and nearly in the hundredth year of his age.

The parish feast is celebrated on the nearest Sunday to October the 10th; and although this saint is generally commemorated on the 12th of March, the day of his decease, yet in his own city of Leon the very 10th of October is consecrated to his memory: which, together with his being a Cornish man, seems to fix St. Paul de Leon as the Patron Saint, in opposition to St. Paulinus the first Archbishop of York, who was sent by Pope Gregory the Great into England shortly after the mission of St. Austin; his festival is held on October the 12th.

This church and that of Breage were attached to the mitred abbey of Hailes in Gloucestershire, as founded by one of the greatest promoters of monastic establishments on record, Richard King of the Romans and Earl of Cornwall. He began the building in 1246; and in 1251, when he had expended ten thousand marks in finishing the monastery, he had the church dedicated to St. Mary on the 9th of November, in the presenee of the King and Queen, thirteen Bishops, most of the Barons, and above three hundred Knights, all of whom he entertained with incredible state and plenty, letting fall this generous and devout expression: “I wish it had pleased God that all my great expenses in my Castle of Wallingford had been as wisely and soberly employed.”

Edmund Earl of Cornwall, son and heir of Richard the founder, having, in his travels through Germany with his 286 father, obtained a relic considered to be blood of our Saviour, gave a third part to this monastery in 1272, thereby causing a great increase in the number of people resorting to it.

In the return made to King Henry the Eighth, preserved in the Augmentation Office, of the property belonging to this monastery, are these entries:

£. s. d.

Com. Cornub. Paulyn firma rectorie 41 0 0

S. Breac firma rectorie 47 0 0

This reign, more unsettled, and more disturbed by domestic wars throughout its whole extent than any other, was nevertheless most fertile in the production of monasteries; and the honour and castle of Wallingford, accidentally united with the Duchy of Cornwall in the person of Richard Plantagenet, King of the Romans, remained so till it was taken in exchange by Henry the Eighth for certain manors and lands in Cornwall, known as the new Duchy holdings.

A great part of the lands surrendered by the Abbey of Hailes are in possession of the Tracy family; but the impropriated tithes of Paul belonged, in the early part of the last century, to the family of Gwavas, since which time they have passed with two coheiresses to Veale and Carlyon.

The church is placed a little beyond the brow of a lofty ridge ascending from the sea, so that it is not much seen, but the tower rising above the ridge is visible from a great distance. The church is large, and contains several monuments to members of different families,—Godolphin, Pendarves, Hitchins, &c.

In this parish are situated Mousehole and Newlyn, two towns of pretty considerable size, although, being very near to Penzance, they have not any regular market.

Mousehole, formerly called Porth Enys, the Island Port, on account of a small island close in upon the shore, had in remote times not the privilege merely, but the actual possession of a market and fairs, but having been destroyed by 287 a predatory invasion of some Spaniards in July 1595, and Penzance rising fast into importance, the practice of holding them has been discontinued ever since.

Mr. Carew, p. 156 (p. 381 of Lord de Dunstanville’s edition), gives a detailed account of this invasion, which is said to have occasioned the capture of Cadiz by a combined English and Dutch squadron in the ensuing year. In Paul church is the following inscription, recording the savage conduct of these invaders:

“The Spanyer burnt this church in the year 1595.”

And the parish register commences with this notice:

“Register of St. Pawle in the countie of Cornwall, from the 23 daye of Julie, the year of our gracious Lord God 1595, on which daie, soon after the sun was risen, the church, tower, bells, and all other things pertaining to the same, together with the houses and goods, was burned and spoiled by the Spaniards in the said parish, being Wensdaie the daye aforesaid, in the 37th year of the raigne of our Soveraine Ladie Elezabeth, by the grace of God of England, France, and Ireland Queene, Defender of the Faith, &c.

“Per me, Joh’nem Tremearne, Vicarium.”

Entries, 1595:

“Jenken Keigwyn, of Mousehole, being killed by the Spaniards, was buried the 24th of Julie.

Jacobus de Newlyn occisus fuit per inimicos, et sepultus est 26 die Julie.

Similiter Teek Cornall, et sepultus the 26 Julie.”

The cannon ball which caused the death of Mr. Keigwyn, the principal inhabitant of the place, is still preserved; and to within these few years an implacable hatred was entertained against the very name of a Spaniard.

There is said to have been a chapel at Mousehole; and another, on the island dedicated to St. Clement, served probably for St. Michael’s Mount, as the island is understood to remain an appendage to that place.

288 No satisfactory account has ever been given of the change of name from Porth Enys to the ludicrous one now in use; there is indeed a cavern at some distance beyond, spacious, lofty, and strewed with large rocks, therefore as unlikely to suggest the name as any thing that can well be imagined. It most likely arose from some trifling circumstance now forgotten.

Newlyn is somewhat larger than Mousehole, having annexed to it a collection of houses called by a mixture of English and Cornish, “Street Nowan,” the New street.

Both the towns are provided with a pier capable of sheltering small vessels, and above all of protecting the immense assemblage of boats employed in the seine fishery, and in driving for pilchards, mackarel, and herrings; from which large supplies, especially of mackarel, are sent in the spring to London, and pilchards exported to the amount of several thousand hogsheads.

The principal family of this parish in early times was probably Keigwin. To Mr. John Keigwin, born in 1641, we are indebted for the Translations of Mount Calvary, and of the Creation of the World with Noah’s Flood, both of which have been printed by the Editor of this Work, with the original Cornish on the opposite pages; he died about the year 1710. The affairs of the Keigwins got entangled in family disputes, accompanied by protracted litigation in the Court of Chancery, which occasioned their estates to be sold in parcels, and thus gave rise to the extraordinary number of freeholders in the parish of Paul.

Mr. Lysons gives the history of several manors, but they do not contain any thing curious.

The younger branch of the Godolphins, which settled at Treworveneth, having acquired it by a marriage with the daughter and heiress of John Cowling of that place, became extinct by the death of Col. William Godolphin in 1689.

Trungle was the seat of Mr. Hitchens, and afterwards became the residence of Capt. Clutterbuck, a gentleman 289 from Kent, who came into Cornwall as commandant of the garrison at Scilly. He married a Cornish lady, and settled there. His son practised the law at Marazion.

The late Mr. John Price commenced the formation of a pretty retreat in a small declivity near the ridge of this parish, at a place called Chi-owne, the house in a croft. Trees were found to flourish there, and the whole promised so much that his son Mr. Rose Price began to lay the foundation of a handsome seat on an adjoining farm; and he went so far as to construct an immense mound to act as a shelter for trees, and also to give them an elevation on its slope, a work which the country people named “The Chinese Wall:” the whole was, however, discontinued for want of sufficient space, which was afterwards afforded in the adjacent parish of Maddern by the purchase of Trengwainton.

It is not easy to imagine a more beautiful view than the one obtained from the summit of the hill above Newlyn; the ascent is, however, extremely steep, and in consequence a new line of road has been projected; but the great value and subdivision of land will probably defeat the execution of a plan having more for its object the decoration of the country than any facility of communication, although that would be found important.

Not far from the top of this hill is erected a small stone monument by the late Mr. John Price, to commemorate a circumstance scarcely deserving of such attention, which was no more than the finding of a gold ring with the motto on it, “In hac spe vivo.” Mr. Price indeed conjectured that it had belonged to some gentleman engaged in the remote Plantagenet Civil Wars, and with much ingenuity contrived a series of adventures to suit the occasion and the sentiment.

Another curiosity, discovered much about the same time, is far more deserving of regard. Of this Mr. Lysons has given an engraved plate with the following description:

290 “In 1783, one of the ancient British ornaments of gold, in the form of a crescent, with a narrow zigzag pattern slightly engraven on it, and weighing two ounces, four penny weights, and six grains, was discovered near the remains of one of the circular earthworks in the neighbourhood of Penzance. This curious relic is now in the possession of Rose Price, esq.”

Gold ornaments, similar if not identical with this very curious remnant of remote antiquity, have been found in other parts of this island, and also in Ireland. One very like it in bronze, taken from a stream pool in 1802, is in the possession of Mr. William Rashleigh at Menabilly.

Objects so interesting have not failed of exciting investigation and conjecture; and they have been fancied to be a decoration of the chief priest among the Druids, worn round his head, and indicating by the crescent shape the exact age of the moon best adapted for ensuring the greatest possible virtues to the holy misletoe, which was then to be severed from its parent oak.

Paul measures 2,865 statute acres.

£. s. d.

Annual value of the Real Property, as returned to Parliament in 1815 7,464 0 0

Poor Rate in 1831 785 7 0

Population,—

in 1801, 2937 in 1811, 3371 in 1821, 3790 in 1831, 4191

giving an increase of 42½ per cent. in 30 years.

Present Vicar, the Rev. C. G. Ruddock Festing, presented by Lord Chancellor Eldon in 1826.

THE GEOLOGY, BY DR. BOASE.

A narrow belt of slate, belonging to the porphyritic series, bounds this parish on its eastern side, as far south as the village of Mousehole; it consists for the most part of hard massive and schistose varieties of compact felspar, occasionally spotted or intimately blended with actynolite and hornblend, or with some mineral intermediate between them. The rest of this parish is situated on granite, exhibiting the same varieties as that of Burian and St. Levan. At 291 Mousehole the slate and granite may be seen in contact with each other, the granite occurring as veins in the former rock.

PELYNT, or PLYNT.

HALS.

The manuscript relating to this parish is lost.

TONKIN AND WHITAKER.

Pelynt, vulgo Plynt, lies in the hundred of West, and joins to the west with Lantegles and Lansallas, to the north with Lanreath, to the east with Duloe and the river Loo, to the south with Tallant. In Domesday Book this parish is called Pluwent.

This church is a vicarage, valued in the King’s Book at £17. 18s. 6d.; the patronage in John Francis Buller, esq. the incumbent Mr. Howell.

This church, in anno 1291, 20 Edward I. was valued, (Tax. Benef.) viz. the rectory at £8, being then appropriated to the abbey of Wilton, in Wiltshire; and the vicarage at 40s.

The manor of Plunent, vulgo Plynt. By Domesday Book it appears that this was one of the two hundred and eighty-eight manors given by William the Conqueror to Robert Earl of Morton, when he made him Earl of Cornwall. In the extent of Cornish acres, 12 Edward I. (Carew, fol. 49,) Plenynt is valued in nine.

THE EDITOR.

This parish is named in the valuation of Pope Nicholas, Pleymut or Palemyt. It paid at the general suppression of religious houses, £4. 15s. a year to the priors of Wilton.

292 The church is spacious, although it has only two principal aisles, with two family aisles, standing across the other on the south side.

There are various monuments in the church. A very large monument to Francis Buller, esq. ornamented with the figures of himself and of his wife in an upper compartment, and of twelve children below, besides other figures, and numerous coats of arms. This gentleman died in 1615. There is also a monument to Edward Trelawny, a barrister, much noted on account of its quaint and singular inscription, said to have originated from his never having practised his profession, except once gratuitously, to vindicate an individual suffering under some oppression:

There are memorials to William Achym, Esq. as far back as 1589; to a de Bodrigan; and several to the Trelawnys.

William of Worcester states this church to have been the burial place of St. Juncus, a holy personage not recorded in the Roman calendar. But Mr. Whitaker, without citing any authority, gives the patronage of the church and parish to St. Nunn, the mother of St. David, the Apostle of Wales, the first Archbishop of Menevia, since called after his name, and according to romance writers the champion, who having distinguished his levies by a 293 leek as a cognizance, defeated the Saxons in a night attack, and drove them beyond the confines of his province.

This church belonged to the Cistercian abbey of Newenham, in Devonshire, founded by Reginald de Mohun, lord of Dunster, about the year 1241.

In the return made to King Henry the Eighth, and preserved in the Augmentation Office, occur these entries:

£. s. d.

Plenynt Redd. lib. ten. 1 15 4

Redd. tam cust’ quam convent’ ten’ 21 5 7

Redd. Firma Rector’ 14 0 0

Redd. Perquis. cur’ 0 11 10

£37 12 9

The site of this monastery was granted by Queen Elizabeth to Thomas Howard, Duke of Norfolk, but sold by one of his sons to Sir John Petre, in whose family it continued till so recently as the year 1824. It was then sold to James Alexander Frampton, esq.

The manor of Pelynt, with the privilege of a fair on Midsummer day, parcel of this abbey, have travelled by some other channel to Colonel Frederick William Buller; and the manor of Hall, the great tithes, and the advowson of the living, belong to Mr. John Buller, of Morvall.

On the barton of Hall are some remains of ancient military works.

But the place of greatest note in this parish is Trelawn, for more than two centuries the principal seat of the Trelawnys; but, notwithstanding the great similarity of the two names, not having any connection one with the other, although, by a temptation too strong to be withstood, the place has recently been known by the name of its proprietor.

THE HISTORY, AS GIVEN BY MR. BOND.

This place, at an early period, belonged to the Bodrigans. 294 Sir Henry de Bodrigan gave it as a marriage portion with his daughter to Henry Champernowne. The heiress of this branch of the Champernownes married Polglass Herle. Sir John Herle the younger, who died without issue, settled the reversion of Trelawn on Sir William Bonville, the last of an ancient Devonshire family (summoned to Parliament Sept. the 23d, in the 28th year of Henry the Sixth, as Baron Bonville, which barony in fee became forfeited by the attainder of his great-grandson Henry Grey, Duke of Suffolk, in the first year of Philip and Mary. Ed.) It was a very remarkable circumstance attending this family, that the havoc of Civil War annihilated three generations within the space of two months. At the battle of Wakefield Lord Bonville witnessed the death of his son Sir William Bonville, and of his grandson William Lord Harrington, who enjoyed that title according to the custom of those days, as having married Elizabeth, the daughter and heiress of Lord Harrington, of Harrington, possessed of a barony in fee. This battle took place on the last day of December 1460. And in the month of February following the aged grandfather, Lord Bonville himself, was taken prisoner at the second battle of St. Alban’s, and although his life had been promised, he was beheaded by the order of Queen Margaret, who bore resentment against him, as being one of those who had custody of the king’s person after the battle of Northampton. Elizabeth Lady Harrington, after the accession of Edward the Fourth, had a large dower assigned her out of Lord Bonville’s estates in Cornwall. Her only daughter by Bonville brought Trelawn, and other estates, to Thomas Grey, Marquis of Dorset. On the attainder of his grandson Henry Duke of Suffolk, they were seized by the Crown. Queen Elizabeth, in the 42d year of her reign, sold the manor of Trelawn and the lands of Hendersich and Portello, in Talland prrish, to Sir Jonathan Trelawny. The old and famous family of Trelawny take their name from the barton of Trelawny, in the parish of Alternun. The arms of this 295 family are Argent, a chevron Sable, sometimes charged with three oak-leaves Proper.

It is said that Sir John Trelawny was so eminent in the wars of France, that King Henry the Fifth, on the 27th of September, in the seventh year of his reign, at Gison in Normandy, granted him £20 yearly for life, as a just recompense for his signal services; and that Henry the Sixth was pleased to confirm it to him in the first year of his reign, and granted to him an augmentation to his arms, the three oak-leaves. He was certainly the first of this family who bore that addition. Under the picture of Henry the Fifth, which stood formerly on the gate at Launceston, was this rhyme:

There was an ancient saying in Cornwall, That a Godolphin was never known to want wit, a Trelawny courage, or a Glanville loyalty.

Mr. Lysons says, Lord Bonville built a castellated mansion at Trelawny, a part of which, with two towers, remain on the eastern side of the present house. Sir John Trelawny nearly rebuilt the house, soon after his purchase of the estate. It was again nearly rebuilt by Edward Trelawny, esq. Governor of Jamaica, after a fire, which happened about the middle of the last century. There are several family portraits in the house, two of the Bishop of Winchester; he built a chapel there, on the site of a former one, and the following inscription remains:

“This Chapel was consecrated by the Right Rev. Father in God, Sir Jonathan Trelawny, Bart. Lord Bishop of Exeter, on Monday, 23d day of November, Anno Dom. 1701.”

Without adverting to ancient times, two members of this family have been distinguished in times more recent, Doctor Jonathan Trelawny, and one of his sons, Edward Trelawny, esq.

296 Of the first Wood says, in his Athenæ Oxonienses:—

Jonathan Trelawny, son of Sir Jonathan Trelawny, of Trelawny, in Cornwall, Baronet, was born, as I have been informed, at Pelent, or Pelynt, in the same county, educated at Westminster School, entered into Christ Church in Michaelmas Term 1668, aged 18 (born therefore in 1650); and in the year following was made student thereof. Afterwards he took the degrees in arts, holy orders, and one or two benefices in his own county, conferred upon him by his relations.

In 1680 his eldest brother died, and thereupon, though the title of baronet and the paternal estate of his family were to come to him after the death of his father, yet he stuck to his holy orders, continued in his functions, and upon the translation of Doctor John Lake to the see of Chichester, was nominated Bishop of Bristol by his Majesty, (King James the Second, Nov. 8, 1685,) whereupon, after he had been diplomated doctor of divinity, he was consecrated, November the 8th 1685, in the Archbishop’s Chapel at Lambeth, and introduced into the House of Lords with Dr. Ken, Bishop of Bath and Wells, on the 11th day of the same month. On the 8th of June 1688 he was one of the six Bishops, besides Doctor Sancroft the Archbishop, that were committed prisoners to the Tower of London, for the alleged offence of contriving, making, and publishing a seditious libel against his Majesty and his government; that is for subscribing a petition to his Majesty, wherein he and the rest of the said Bishops showed the great averseness that they found in themselves to the distributing and publishing in all their churches his Majesty’s late declaration for liberty of conscience, &c. Where continuing till they were publicly tried in Westminster Hall for the same, they were, to the great joy of the true sons of the Church of England, released thence on the 15th of the same month. Subsequently, however, the see of Exeter was conferred on him by King James, vacant by the translation thence to York of Doctor Lamplugh; and about the 297 7th of April following, his Majesty King William the Third was pleased to give his royal assent for him, the said Doctor Jonathan Trelawny, Bishop of Bristol, to be Bishop of Exeter, in the place of Doctor Lamplugh, beforementioned.

From the Fasti it appears that Jonathan Trelawny, of Christ Church, was admitted Bachelor of Arts on the 14th of May 1672, and Master of Arts April the 29th, 1675. And on October the 26th, 1685, Sir Jonathan Trelawny, Bart. Master of Arts of Christ Church, the nominated Bishop of Bristol, was diplomated Doctor of Divinity.

As this gentleman was made Bishop of Bristol by King James the Second, and after his commitment to the Tower and acquittal, accepted from him an appointment to the bishopric of Exeter, almost the last act of that king’s government, which appointment was almost immediately confirmed to him by King William on his joining in the Revolution, one may apply in his case the observation made by the most philosophical writer of English history, on the Duke of Marlborough, when he led over Queen Anne to the Prince of Orange.

“This conduct was a singular sacrifice to public virtue of every duty in private life, and required for ever after the most upright, disinterested, and public-spirited behaviour to render it justifiable.”

He was further advanced by Queen Anne, being again translated, on the 14th of January 1707, to the see of Winchester. He died on the 21st of June 1721.

He married Rebecca, daughter and coheiress of Thomas Hele, esq. of Boscome, in Devonshire, and left a numerous family, but none of his sons left families, and only two of his daughters; Letitia, who married her cousin Henry Trelawny; and Rebecca, married to Mr. John Buller, of Morvall.

Few men ever obtained so great a share of popularity among all ranks and degrees in his own country as did the Bishop, when he protested against the insidious declaration 298 of King James the Second, and sustained persecution in consequence of the support he had given to the Church of England. Fears were entertained, or apprehensions were industriously circulated, of extremities never contemplated; and the prompt acquittal of the Bishops seems alone to have prevented Cornwall from rising in arms.

A Song was made on the occasion, of which all the exact words, except those of what may be called the burden, were lost, but the whole has recently been restored, modernized, and improved by the Rev. Robert Stephen Hawker, of Whitstone, near Stratton.

The strong sensation excited throughout England, by that decisive act of bigotry, tyranny, and imprudence, on the part of King James the Second, by which he committed the seven Bishops to the Tower, was in no district more manifestly displayed than in Cornwall, notwithstanding the part taken by that county in the Civil War. This was, probably, in a great degree occasioned by sympathy with this respected Cornish gentleman, then Bishop of Bristol. The following Song is said to have resounded in every house, in every highway, and in every street.

The song may be sung to the tune of “Auld lang syne.”

299 The seven Bishops were:

William Sancroft, Archbishop of Canterbury; consecrated 1678; deprived 1690-1; ob. 1693.

William Lloyd, Bishop of St. Asaph; consecrated 1680; translated to Lichfield and Coventry, 1692; and to Worcester 1699; ob. 1717.

Thomas Ken, Bishop of Bath and Wells; consecrated 1683; deprived 1690-1; ob. 1710.

Francis Turner, Bishop of Ely; consecrated 1683; deprived 1690-1; ob. 1700.

John Lake, Bishop of Chichester; consecrated 1682; suspended at the Revolution, but died 1689.

Thomas White, Bishop of Peterborough; consecrated 1685; deprived 1890-1; ob. 1698.

Sir Jonathan Trelawny, Bishop of Bristol; consecrated 1685; translated to Exeter in 1689, to Winchester in 1707; ob. 1721.

Bishop Trelawny has left at Christ Church a very valuable, esteemed, and appropriate memorial of himself, and of the Founder. Over the south-east gate of the great quadrangle, leading to the staircase of the hall, is a fine statue of Cardinal Wolsey, with the following inscription:

Eminentissimo Cardinali Thomæ Wolseio, viro inter hæc menia semper memorando, P. Reverendus in Christo Pater Jonathan Trelawny, de Trelawny, in comitatu Cornubiæ Baronettus, hujusce Ædis olim Alumnus, Wolseii in Episcopatu Wintoniensi successor, et Wolseianæ erga hanc Domum munificentiæ æmulus, A. D. M.DCC.XIX.

Edward Trelawny, esq. one of the Bishop’s sons, had the honour of being made Governor of Jamaica; and most fortunately for the Island, besides many other prudent and judicious acts, he pacified a formidable body of revolted negroes, who had long sustained a savage independence, 300 held the fastnesses belonging to the chain of mountains which divides Jamaica throughout its whole length, and maintained a predatory war against all the settlers. The treaty with these people, called Maroons, was in itself so equitable that it continued to be observed up to the period when the whirl of political opinions in Europe, mingled with others of fanatical enthusiasm, extended to these people, and in consequence they were all either exterminated or sent to perish in distant countries.

Sir William Trelawny, the sixth Bart. great-nephew of Edward Trelawny, was also Governor of Jamaica, in less trying times, and the period of his service was cut short by a premature death in 1772, when the property descended to his only son, Harry Trelawny, then a boy at school.

The career of this individual, though extraordinary and eccentric, need not be given in any detail. He appears to have been a man of naturally a strong understanding, but having imbibed the spirit of fanaticism in early youth, it carried him in all directions, as fancy guided, with equal facility; but in general directly against the consent of modern opinions, which have repudiated implicit confidence in traditions, in the decrees of councils, and in the dicta of ancient fathers, or of popes, substituting in their place the exercise of private judgment; guided no doubt in practice by the teacher who happens to carry with him the fashion of the day.

Sir Harry Trelawny commenced preaching at Westminster school. He proceeded to Oxford, where in consequence of nonconformity he could not obtain a degree. He then took orders in the church of Scotland, and began a course of preaching in various meeting houses, especially in one of his own erecting at West Looe. In the course of a few years, after the novelty had worn away, he complied with the requisite observances at Oxford and was admitted to a degree. He then received orders as a clergyman of the Church of England from Doctor John Ross, Bishop of Exeter, and soon afterwards the living of St. Allan, which he exchanged with his relation Dr. William 301 Buller, the succeeding Bishop, for Egloshayle. This living he ultimately resigned on becoming a Roman Catholic, and died in Italy, February the 25th, 1834, having, as it is said, received the nominal honour from the holy See of being appointed a Bishop in Partibus Infidelium. He married Anne, daughter of the Rev. James Brown, of Somersetshire, and has left a large family.

An event connected with the death of this gentleman, and which occurred about a year afterwards, roused the scorn of the whole parish, and of the neighbourhood, more than any thing that has taken place there within the memory of the oldest person.

Several priests arrived from the continent, bringing with them an empty coffin, and the various apparatus used in Catholic services, when masses were said and requiems sung at Trelawny for the peace of this individual’s soul, who had died and was buried in Italy, where it would seem that these pageants should have been celebrated, on the double supposition of their being really efficacious, and that the Almighty is incapable of hearing them from any other than a single spot. For if the latter supposition were not admitted, they might as well have been performed in France, from whence it is apprehended the priests embarked, unless indeed we suppose of these as of other histriones, that Μονον αργυρον βλεπουσιν; and in regard to such a subject, we may fairly go on to add, without want of charity, Απολοιτο πρωτος αυτος ὁ τον αργυρον φιλησας.

His eldest son, Sir William Lewis Salusbury Trelawny, married Patience, only daughter of John Phillipps Carpenter, esq. of Mount Tavey, near Tavistock, and is now one of the members in parliament for Cornwall, residing for the present at Harewood, on the banks of the Tamar.

Pelynt measures 4,170 statute acres.

£. s. d.

Annual value of the Real Property, as returned to Parliament in 1815 4,732 0 0

Poor Rate in 1831 594 19 0

302

Population,—

in 1801, 630 in 1811, 708 in 1821, 750 in 1831, 804

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

THE GEOLOGY, BY DR. BOASE.

The rocks of this parish resemble those of Lanreath and Duloe, the adjoining parishes; and belong, therefore, to the same calcareous series.

ST. PIRAN, or PERRAN ARWORTHALL, IN KERRIER.

HALS.

The manuscript relating to this parish is lost.

TONKIN AND WHITAKER.[9]

The manor of Arworthal (which signifies, upon the noted river,) giving the name of distinction to this parish, and taking in the greatest part of the lands thereof, I shall begin with it.

In 3 Henry IV. John Fitz William held half a knight’s fee in Arworthall, per cartam Edwardi quondam com. Cornub. dict. feod. Mortan. (Carew, p. 126, Lord Dunstanville’s edition,) which Edward Earl of Cornwall must be Edward de Caernarvon, afterwards King of England, the 2d of that name, for there was no other Edward Earl of Cornwall. 303 Elizabeth, the daughter and heir of this Sir John Fitz William (for he was a knight) brought the manor, &c. into the family of Mohun in which it continued till the reign of James the 1st, when Sir Reginald Mohun, to raise fortunes for his children by his third wife, sold this manor to Samuel Pendarves of Roscrow, esq. in whose posterity it yet remaineth, Mrs. Bassett, the sole heir of that family, being the present lady thereof.

On the wastrell of this manor have been large quantities of tin dug up from time to time; and just above the village of Perran Arworthall, by the pound near Perran Well, there is a strong chalybeate spring much frequented of late years.

In this parish did antiently dwell the family of Renaudin, by their name of French extraction, but where I cannot positively say; and here dwelt, temp. Ricardi II. David Renaudin, who married Margaret, the eldest daughter and coheir of James Daungers of Carnclew. John Renaudin, their son, dying without issue temp. Henry V. this estate fell to Richard Bonython of Carclew, who had married Isabel, the other daughter and coheir of the said James Daungers, in which family of Bonython (whose heiress still lays claim to it, and, as by original deeds, it appears very justly,) it continued to the reign of Charles I. when Peter Beauchamp of Trevince, esq. having a lease of it for three lives, from John Bonython, esq. his posterity have been strangely outed of the fee ever since; which has of late years past through several hands, and is now vested in Thomas Hearle of Penryn, esq.

The arms of Renaudin, as painted in the old glass windows at Carnclew, were Sable, a chevron between three swans Argent.

THE EDITOR. 304

This parish, with two others, are dedicated to St. Perran, the most distinguished among the missionaries from Ireland, who converted the Pagan inhabitants of Cornwall to the Christian faith; but his history properly falls under the head of Perran Zabuloe, where he fixed his residence and breathed his last.

The church of Perran Arworthall is very small but neat, and it is decorated with a tower in due proportion to the whole fabric. The only ancient village of any consequence in the whole parish, is called Perran Well, probably from the chalybeate spring flowing near it; and this village has imparted its name in common parlance to the whole parish.

Perran Well is situated in a deep valley, having a hill and a corresponding vale on either side, terminating in the Carnon branch of Falmouth harbour: over all these the high road leading from Truro to Falmouth used to pass; but by a most judicious improvement a causeway has been laid over Carnon, and these transverse hills and valleys entirely avoided.

Not far below the village stood one of the tin-smelting houses constructed after the Germans introduced reverberatory furnaces; it has been used for the last thirty years for refining arsenic. This metal and its oxide, most destructive to animal or to vegetable life, is extensively useful in metallurgic operations and in the arts. Few substances are more generally diffused throughout mining districts: it unites with most other metals, sometimes alone, but more frequently in union with sulphur, and converts them into minerals. Metals are therefore said to be mineralized by arrenic, by sulphur, &c. The first operation used in extracting metals from their ores, is one for driving off by heat such substances as are volatile. Arsenic is eminently so: it therefore sublimes, and is deposited in long flues or chambers made to prevent the destructive 305 consequences of its being diffused through the atmosphere, and scattered over the country. From these chambers or flues the refiners of arsenic obtain their supplies, and are thereby enabled to afford it in a state of purity, at such prices as would be wholly inadequate for defraying the expense necessarily to be incurred, if the operation had commenced on the ores containing this metal in the mines.

Partly in this parish, but principally in Milor, on the next creek towards Falmouth, are situated the great iron works, conducted by Messrs. Fox, a family distinguished for ability, exertion, and liberality, from generation to generation. These works were the first constructed of any magnitude in Cornwall. Previously, all the cast-iron materials for steam engines were brought from Glamorganshire, and the working of an important mine very frequently depended on the uncertain direction of the wind; now every thing that can be required, even cylinders of the largest dimensions, seven feet and a half (90 in.) in diameter, and ten or twelve feet long, are cast and bored with the utmost accuracy here and at Hoyle, where similar works have arisen, to the incalculable benefit of the mining concerns.

The valley above and below these works is perhaps the most beautiful in the west of Cornwall, and it has recently been adorned, just opposite the fine woods of Carclew, by the elegant and tasteful residence of Benjamin Sampson, esq. who conducts an extensive manufactory for supplying the mines with gunpowder made in their immediate neighbourhood.

This parish, and the adjacent one of Stithyans, to which it is annexed, are believed to have been appropriated to the religious establishment at Penrey. The impropriation of the great tithes, and the advowson of the vicarage, have for a considerable time belonged to the Boscawens of Tregothnan.

Perran Arworthall measures 1,229 statute acres.

306

£. s. d.

Annual value of the Real Property, as returned to Parliament in 1815 2165 0 0

Poor Rate in 1831 451 15 0

Population,—

in 1801, 884 in 1811, 1104 in 1821, 1362 in 1831, 1504

giving an increase of 70 per cent. in 30 years.

GEOLOGY, BY DOCTOR BOASE.

The western part of this parish is similar to the slate of Gwennap: the whole appears to belong to the porphyritic series; but on the extreme eastern part it makes a nearer approach to the calcareous series of Feock.

PERRAN UTHNO, or LITTLE PERRAN.

HALS.

The manuscript relating to this parish is lost.

TONKIN.

St. Piran Uthno, commonly called Little Perran, is in the hundred of Penwith, and is wholly surrounded to the north, west, and east, by St. Hilary, and to the south by the sea. In the Tax. Benefic. this is called Ecclesia de Udnow Parva, and in common speech Little Piran, from its smallness, not containing above 900 acres in all; but it was of greater extent formerly, the sea having much encroached upon it.

This is a rectory, valued in the King’s Book, £17. 11s. 3d.; the patronage in Sir John Trevillian, bart.; the incumbent Mr. John Davies. It hath its other adjunct of Uthno 307 [which appears from the Tax. Benef. above, to be the original name of the parish, and to have since had the name of the saint prefixed to it] from the manor of Uthno.

In the 3d of Henry IV. the heir of Mark de Walesbreu held two parts of a fee here, for Veno there is plainly a mistake for Uthno: since which time it has had the same lords as Whalesborough; the present lord of this manor being Sir John Trevelyan of Nettlecomb in Somersetshire, bart. as heir to that family.

THE EDITOR.

The church and the tower of this parish are small, but distinguished for their simple and neat appearance. They are situated with the church town in a valley opening to the sea. In the church is a plain memorial of Mr. Henry Davies, great-uncle to the editor, who died in 1737. Two of his relations, Mr. Davies father and son, were successive rectors of this parish, through the bounty of the Trevelyan family.

And it may be a matter of some curiosity to insert the oath administered a century ago to clergymen taking on themselves the office of Dean Rural, or Decanus Episcopus. The oath is now omitted, but the office itself has been uniformly preserved throughout the Diocese of Exeter, and this useful institution is revived in various parts of the kingdom.

The copy was found by the editor at Tredrea, his place in Cornwall, among other old papers.

TENOR JURAMENTI

Decani Episcopi, in Comitatu Cornubiæ et Diœcesi Exoniensi.

YOU GEORGE DAVIES shall swear, That you will well and truly execute the Office of DEAN RURAL, 308 within your Deanery, for the Year ensuing. You shall diligently, in the year, visit all Churches and Chapels within your Deanery; and also all Parsonage and Vicarage Houses. You shall make true Presentments of such Defaults, as you shall find therein; as also the defect of Books, Ornaments, Utensils, and other Furniture belonging to each Church. You shall observe the Manners and Conversation of your Brethren the Clergy; whom (if obnoxious) You shall admonish; and, if thereupon they shall not reform, You shall detect, and present them to The Ordinary; that they may be proceeded against according to Law. You shall, either by yourself or deputy, faithfully execute, or cause to be executed, all such processes and mandates, as shall be sent you from your Ordinary, and make true Returns of the same.

So help you God.

Sacramentum superscriptum præstabat Clericus prædictus GEORGIUS DAVIES de Parochia Sancti Perrani de Uthno in Diaconatu Penwith Rector. Tertio die mensis Decembris, Anno 1730. Coram me Ricardo W—[The name is defaced.]

Near the church used to flow a well, which, in addition to supplying ample quantities of excellent water, gave responses to the most interesting questions respecting life, deaths, marriages, &c. under the superintendence of a Pythian hierophant (since peeth, pythe, is Cornish for a well); but this oracle has ceased within the last twenty years, after a manner fairly appropriate to the county; the working of a mine having taken away all the water.

There are several good farm houses in the parish, formerly the residences of gentlemen; but, excepting the church town, only one place deserving the name of a village, which is Goldsithney, commonly pronounced Gulzinney, lying on the road from Redruth to Marazion. In this village was formerly a chapel dedicated to St. 309 James, as Doctor Borlase has ascertained from documents in the cathedral at Exeter. No memory remains of this chapel having ever been used for divine service; but within the editor’s recollection a small image might be seen over the door, said by the inhabitants to be St. Perran; but if the records consulted by Doctor Borlase are correct, more probably of St. James.