A Book of Cornwall

Nicholas had a great advantage in living next door to the Town Hall, for he was able to break a way into it through the intervening wall. According to custom and rule, when a meeting of the Town Council was convened, the Town Hall bell had to be rung; but there was no specification as to the hour at which a meeting was to be held, nor was it laid down in black and white that the Hall door was to be unlocked for the occasion. Now when Nicholas Tyack desired to pass his accounts, or to transfer some bit of Corporation land to himself, or legitimatise any other little game to his advantage and the detriment of the public, he rang the bell at night, kept the Hall door locked, and admitted his adherents through his private door, held the meeting in the council-chamber, and passed his accounts and resolutions nem. con.

But now both the Town Hall and Tyack's house have been swept away. The latter had a fine mullioned and many-light window. The house went first; then the Guildhall.

The story of the borough of Esh, Esc, or Saltash is specially interesting, as it affords us a precious glimpse into the history of the origin and growth of our municipal towns.

Esh, that is to say, water, was so-called because situated on the tidal estuary of the united Tamar and Tavy, which junction bears the name of the Hamoaze (Hem-uisg), the border water between Devon and Cornwall, between the English and the British tongues.

Here by the water-side settled some serfs, or "natives in stock," of the Baron de Valletort.

"Natives of stock were the purest and most absolute bondmen. They were entirely subject to the will of their lord, and were subject to being placed in any tenement in which he might think fit to place them; and were compelled to do for him any work he might call upon them to do; and to pay a sort of capitation tax if they were allowed to be employed elsewhere."13

Living beside the water, these serfs ferried across to Devonport, managed the fishery, raised oysters, had a mill, and tilled the land for their lord. But a charter of 1381 exists which is a confirmation by Reginald de Valletort of earlier charters, wherein his ancestors had emancipated these serfs, and had conferred on them considerable liberties. They had been granted certain holdings of land as customary tenants. They were given a certain tract of land for common use, for pasturage, etc.; they were accorded the "ferébote," the mill, and the right to organise themselves into a corporation with an elected "prepositur." For all this and other liberties they were required to pay a small acknowledgment to the feudal lord.

This charter was confirmed by royal grant in 1385.

Now the number of conventional tenancies was always the same, but some of the old habitations on them were pulled down and the sites converted into gardens, and others were divided up and numerous houses erected on them. The holders of the tenancies were free burgesses, and formed the sole body which elected the aldermen and mayor.

In course of time a very curious condition of affairs arose. The ancient burgage holdings were 160; but many had fallen and were not rebuilt, and the population of Saltash had vastly extended beyond the bounds of the ancient borough.

The corporators, or holders of the old free burgages, engrossed to themselves all power and profit, and excluded from participation the inhabitants who were not living in the old tenements or on the land where these had stood. This led to a series of angry disputes. The privileges were worth fighting for. The corporators grew fat on them, and their faces shone. The harbour dues-one shilling from every English vessel and two from every foreign keel that anchored in the Hamoaze, and seven from each Spanish ship, charged after the Armada14-this brought in much money; so did the common land now built over, so did the oyster fishery, so did the ferry.

Almost every election of mayor and aldermen led to riots, and the place simmered perpetually with discontent. This angry feeling was greatly aggravated when Saltash became a borough, returning two members, and political controversy was added to the local and borough grievance. By this time, moreover, the number of free burgages had sunk to about sixty. Contest succeeded contest, the inhabitants claiming a right to vote.

In 1784 the corporation, won over by Government promises and appointments, voted as one man for their nominees. But forty-five freeholders tendered their votes for the opposition candidates put forward by their overlords. The House of Commons decided against these latter, and the Government candidates and the rights of the corporators were confirmed. Two years later, this decision against the freeholders was reversed. During four years (1786-1790) the question in whom the right of voting rested was four times decided-now in one way, then in another. Finally a compromise was arrived at-one representative of each set of electors sat for Saltash and "tied" on every important vote in the House. In 1806 the corporation was again successful.

By the Reform Bill of 1832 it was curtailed in its representation-it returned one member. Croker tried to prove borough and parish to be conterminous, but when it was discovered that this was not the case Saltash was put on Schedule A, and its representative history came to an end. More fortunate than some other Cornish boroughs, it has retained its municipal privileges, and boasts of a mayor and corporation to the present day.

Saltash was enfranchised in 1553 by Edward VI. "A little town," as described by Captain Courtney, "screening itself under the patronage of the Earls of Cornwall, and then of the Dukes, it paid tribute to the Black Prince, and received charters and royalties from Elizabeth."

In her time great sailors and ships of merchandise sailed from Saltash. The Castle of Trematon, which had belonged to the Valletorts, became a royal castle, and it was hoped by the advisers of Edward VI. that the newly-enfranchised borough would be completely subservient to the Crown.

But, like most of the other creations of this period, it passed almost at once into other hands, and the history of the borough shows the rise and supremacy of the Buller interest, unbroken during the Protectorate and unimpaired under the Stuarts. In spite of occasional lapses, the electors of this little borough continued faithful to the Bullers till within a few years before the Reform Bill, the connection broken now and then with flashes of independence.

In 1722 the electors gave thirty-two votes to Swanton and Hughes against twenty-five for the Buller candidates. The borough, however, soon learned to repent its independence, and returned to subservience.

For fifty years there was no contested election, but in 1772 the Buller candidate was defeated. Nevertheless, on petition he secured the seat.

In 1780 ensued another struggle with the patrons, and the Bullers were defeated, much to the joy of George III.

Again there was a contest in 1784, rendered, like the former struggles, doubtful because of the ambiguity in the right of voting, as already described.

As early as 1393 the county assizes were held in Saltash. The first charter of incorporation-that already alluded to-was granted in the reign of Henry III., and received confirmation under Richard II. Charles II. renewed it, with additional privileges, in 1662. 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. In it on each side are the remains of very ancient houses that were once those of merchants of substance and corporators exercising almost despotic power in the little town. Old windows, carved doorways, and even, when these have disappeared, panelled rooms and handsome plaster ceilings, proclaim at once antiquity and wealth.

There is much of interest remaining in Saltash. Not only are there in it still many ancient houses, but several of the ancient families that were burgage tenants hundreds of years ago are still represented there. As an instance we may notice the Porters. These were the janitors of Trematon Castle. The first of this family in a deed of the thirteenth century, noticed as gatekeeper of Trematon, was granted a plot of land outside the castle walls, which has remained in the hands of the Porters to the present day. The arms of the family-sable, three bells argent, a canton ermine-have undoubted reference to the duties of the porter to answer the bell and to ring the alarum. The motto "Vigilantibus" is no less significant.

The Bonds of Earth were landholders under the Valletorts; they remained for centuries on the soil, and in their name recalled their origin; and the name Tyack has much the same significance in Cornish.

Saltash has long been famous for its boatwomen. Mr. Justice Boucaut, a Saltash man, and late Premier of South Australia, at a recent banquet at Adelaide, spoke with affection of his native Ashe, and in the course of his speech said: -

"I won't even dilate on the pluck and endurance of the Saltash women rowers. It was a pretty sight to see half a dozen boats start in a regatta with all the women in snow-white frilled caps and frilled jackets. One crew, of which Ann Glanville was stroke, and which I have seen row, would beat a crew of men of the same number, and would not, I believe, have thought it anything very wonderful to beat a crew of men with a couple of men extra. I read in the Times that Ann Glanville, then an old woman, upwards of eighty, was introduced to the Duke of Cornwall when he was down West, and I have often heard that she used to row round the captain's man-of-war gigs in the Hamoaze and chaff the bluejackets."

This Ann Glanville (stroke), Jane House, Emilia Lee, and Hyatt Hocking formed the crew of the celebrated Saltash rowing women who won against crews of men at Plymouth, Portsmouth, Liverpool, and Hull. In 1850 a match was arranged between the Saltash women and a crew of Frenchmen, and Ann Glanville with the rest went to Havre in the Brunswick (Captain Russell). They were escorted into the town by bands and the military, and received by the mayor and corporation.

The Saltash crew, steered by Captain Russell, won easily in the match. The women were dressed in black skirts, long white bedgowns, and nightcaps. Mrs. House was so elated at the victory, that on reaching the committee-boat she plunged into the water, dived under the vessel, and came up with dripping and drooping nightcap on the opposite side.

Ann was well known to H.R.H. the Duke of Edinburgh, R.N., and Lord Charles Beresford, R.N. She died in 1880 at the age of eighty-four.

A boat of Saltash women still appears at regattas, but it is now difficult to-can we say man it? The present generation of women do not take to the water as did their mothers.

Saltash has for long been an unrivalled nursery for the navy, and a place to which old salts love to retire.

In 1643 the Cornish forces, about 7000 strong, lay at Saltash under Slanning, at Liskeard under Lord Mohun, at Launceston under Trevanion, and at Stratton under Sir Bevil Grenville. At the outbreak of war, King Charles fortified Saltash, but in the following year, 1644, it was taken by the Parliamentary forces under Lord Essex, who at once strengthened the works, and also added a 400-ton ship, and sixteen pieces of cannon at the bottom of the hill. After the Royalist victory at Braddock Down, near Liskeard, the vanquished, under General Ruthven, retreated to their stronghold at Saltash, and here made an obstinate resistance; but the Royalists, led by Grenville and Mohun, attacked the place, took it, and made havoc among the rebels, many of whom were drowned. Their leader, Ruthven, succeeded in effecting his escape to Plymouth, which was held for the Parliament by a member of my own family, Colonel William Gould.

This resulted in the Royalists recovering the whole of Cornwall. Saltash, however, was again occupied by the Parliamentary forces in 1645.

Among the rights and privileges exercised by the borough of Saltash was that the mayor or recorder held a court of quarter sessions till 1886. In 1772 a woman was sentenced to be stripped to her waist and whipped in public for stealing a hat. But this sentence, if repugnant to our sense of decency, was light compared to one passed in 1844 on two women for stealing some shirting wherewith to make garments for their husbands. They were transported for seven years. The natural result was that they married again and settled in Botany Bay, and the husbands found for themselves fresh mates at Saltash. In this century the mayor sentenced a man to transportation for stealing a watch at a regatta. The only church at Saltash is the chapel of the Guildhall, and the chaplain formerly had a bad time of it as the creature of the mayor. Happily the advowson was sold in 1836 for £405, and fell to the bishop. The church possesses a splendid piece of plate, a silver cup over a foot high. This was given to the church in 1624 by Ambrose and Abraham Jennens and William Pawley, but it is far older.

It is said in the place that it is of Spanish workmanship, and was part of the spoil of a vessel of the great Armada. This, however, is not the case; it is a fine example of English silversmith's work of the reign of Henry VII.

The Castle of Trematon, to which the original serfs of Saltash owed service, still exists. It is not remarkable for picturesqueness. It occupies the top of a wooded hill on the banks of the Lynher, overlooking the Hamoaze and Plymouth harbour, and consists of a keep, the base-court, and the gate-house. The keep, placed at the north-east angle of the court, is oval in form, and dates from the thirteenth century. The walls are ten feet thick and thirty feet high. It was wrecked by the Cornish peasants, who rose against the Reformation, stormed the castle, and took the governor prisoner.

Among the many broils that took place in Saltash between the corporation and the great body of townsmen the most serious was in 1806, when the Rev. John Buller was mayor. On this occasion the mob broke into the Guildhall, where the mayor stood to his post on the stairs, and for some time held back the crowd, dealing mighty blows with the silver-gilt mace, and cracking therewith many crowns. Finally the rioters succeeded in getting hold of the chest, and they destroyed or purloined all the documents it contained, with the object of getting rid of the evidence in favour of the corporation. At the same time they carried off the silver oar, the symbol of jurisdiction over the Hamoaze, and this was not recovered for fifty years.

The corporation maces are singularly handsome and weighty, and are of silver-gilt.

The present Guildhall is erected over the market-house, and was built in 1770. It is ugly, and has this alone to recommend it, that it is unpretentious.

On the daïs within are three handsome carved oak chairs, that for the mayor having the arms of the borough on the panel-a lion rampant within a bordure bezanted. On each side of the shield is a Prince of Wales' ostrich plume.

A late mayor was the brother of the famous astronomer, Professor Adams.

The official costume of the mayor includes a robe of scarlet cloth trimmed with sable and a cocked hat; the justice or ex-mayor has a black mantle; and the mace-bearers have scarlet, silver-laced gowns and three-cornered hats. The maces date from 1696, and were presented by Francis Buller, Esq., and are three feet seven inches high.

Near the water, almost crushed under the mighty arch of Brunel's viaduct, is a little old shop with the date on it of 1584, and it is one of the very few specimens of a shop of that period that remain to us absolutely untouched.

It is precisely the sort of shop "in our alley" from which Sally must have issued to meet her lover.

And verily, as I stood drawing the quaint old place, there peeped out at me an absolutely ideal Sally.

"Her father he makes cabbage nets,And through the streets does cry 'em;Her mother she sells laces long,To such as please to buy 'em.But sure such folks could ne'er begetSo sweet a girl as Sally!She is the darling of my heart,And she lives in our alley."

CHAPTER XI

BODMIN

Grown up about a monastery-S. Petrock-Theft of his relics-Ivory reliquary-"Lord's measures" – The Allan rivers-Pencarrow-S. Breock-Padstow-The Hobby-horse-The neighbourhood-The Towans-Pentyre-Porth Isaac-A cemetery.

A town that has grown up about a monastery. The name is a contraction of Bod-minachau, "the habitation of monks"; and it owes its origin to S. Petrock. Petrock is Peter or Pedr, with the diminutive oc added to the name. He was a son of Glwys, king of Gwent or Monmouthshire, according to one account, but according to another his father's name was Clement. Anyhow, he formed one of the great migration from Gwent to North-east Cornwall. He found a hermit occupying a cell at Bodmin whose name was Guron, and this man surrendered to him his humble habitation. S. Guron's Well is in the churchyard near the west end of the church.

For his education he went to Ireland, where for twenty years he studied profane and sacred literature. He was probably a disciple of S. Eugenius, for Kevin, when aged seven, was entrusted to him by his parents to be reared for the monastic life, and Kevin, we know, learned his psalms from Eugenius.

So soon as Petrock considered that he knew as much as could be taught him by his master, he resolved on returning to Cornwall, and embarked on the same boat which had borne him to Ireland twenty years before-a great vessel of wicker-work, covered with three coatings of hide, and with a leathern sail.

Petrock and his companions came ashore in the Hayle, or saltflats, by Padstow. He was ill received on his arrival by a party of harvesters, who refused him water. In fact, the north of Cornwall had suffered so severely from the Irish, that the natives looked with suspicion on anyone coming from the Green Isle.

Petrock landed, and inquired whether any religious man lived in the neighbourhood, and was told that Samson was there. This was Samson who afterwards became Bishop of Dol. His chapel was demolished when Place House, above Padstow, was built. At Padstow, Petrock remained for thirty years with his disciples, one of whom was Dagan, who disputed with Laurence, Archbishop of Canterbury (597-604) and other Roman missionaries. He refused not only to eat with them, Bede tells us, but even to be under the same roof with them. The story of Petrock's pilgrimage to the East is full of myth, but the account of the reason why he undertook it is probably true.

There had been a rainy season. One day Petrock assured his disciples that next day the rain would cease, and it would be fine. But on the morrow the rain came down in streams. Petrock was so disgusted at his prophecy having failed, that he left the place, and resolved on visiting the East.

The rest is mere romance.

He went to India. There he saw a silver bowl floating on the sea. He stepped into it, whereupon the silver bowl carried him far away to a certain island in which he spent seven years, living on a single fish that he caught daily, and which, however often eaten, always returned sound to be eaten again next day.

At the end of the seven years the shining bowl reappeared. He stepped into it again, and was conveyed back to the coast whence he had started. There he found a wolf that had kept guard over his sheepskin and staff which he had left on the shore seven years before.

Clearly we have here ingrafted into the history a Cornish myth relative to the man in the moon; for the silver bowl cannot be mistaken-it is the latter-and for the dog of the modern version, we here have a wolf.

Through the rest of his journeyings the wolf attended Petrock. On his return to Cornwall he had some unpleasantness with Tewdrig, the king, who had opposed the landing of the Irish at St. Ives, and had killed some of them. He remonstrated with him for some of his barbarities, and Tewdrig had sufficient grace to make him grants of land.

Petrock now moved to Bodmin, and thence he made many excursions through Devon, founding churches and monasteries. The date of his death was about A.D. 575.

A curious circumstance occurred relative to his relics. In 1177 a canon of Bodmin, named Martin, made a clean bolt with the shrine of the saint, an ivory box that contained his bones, and carried them to S. Maen, in Brittany. There were "ructions." The Prior of Bodmin appealed to Henry II., who sent orders to the Justiciary of Brittany to insist on their surrender. Accordingly the prior and this officer went to S. Maen, but when required to give up the holy bones the abbot demurred. However, the justiciary would stand no nonsense, and threatened to use such severe measures that the abbot was forced to give way, and Prior Roger, of Bodmin, marched away with the recovered ivory box and its contents.

Curiously enough this identical box, quaintly ornamented with paintings, still exists, and belongs to the municipality: the contents have, of course, disappeared.

In the market-house is a very interesting granite corn measure.

It will not be out of place to notice here the "lord's measures" found in great numbers about Cornwall. They are small basins cut in granite or in some volcanic free stone, usually with lobes or ears outside. At S. Enodoc, near the "Rock Inn" on the Padstow estuary, a quantity of them have been collected, and are ranged beside the churchyard path. There is another large collection in the parsonage garden at Veryan.

They were probably standard measures for grain, and were preserved in the churches.

In Bodmin Church, which is fine, is the rich monument of Prior Vivian, 1533.

The bench-ends were carved by one Matthew More in 1491.

Castle Canyck is a fine circular camp, probably Celtic, and west of the town is a quadrangular entrenchment where Roman remains have been found. The Allan and the Camallan, or Crooked Allan, unite to form the Hayle or Saltings. Allan is the name of the river at S. David's, Pembrokeshire. The name is found also in Scotland, as the Ilen in Ireland, and as the Aulne in Finistère. The derivation is doubtful.

On the right hand are the woods of Pencarrow (Pencaerau), the headland of camps, with, in fact, remains of two; one must have been important. Here, perhaps, dwelt a chieftain Conan.

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. When they returned they found a pack of wolves round the old man, but whether his sanctity, or toughness, kept them from eating him is left undecided. They drove the wolves off, and were careful in future not to leave him unattended. Conan, the chief, who lived at Pencarrow, came to know him, and, if we may believe the Life, was baptised by him, and made him a grant of land; this is S. Breock on the opposite side of the river to Pencarrow, where there is an interesting church in a lovely situation. It is only a coincidence that at the foot of Pencarrow is a chapel bearing Conan's name. It is dedicated to a tenth-century bishop.

From Cornwall Breock departed for Brittany, about the year 500, and died there at an advanced age-over ninety-about 510.

Padstow should be visited on May Day. It is one of the few places where the hobby-horse still prances; but the glory of the old May Feast is much curtailed.

During the days that precede the festival no garden is safe. Walls, railings, even barbed wire, are surmounted by boys and men in quest of flowers. Conservatories have to be fast locked, or they will be invaded. The house that has a show of flowers in the windows is besieged by pretty children with roguish eyes begging for blossoms which they cannot steal.