Near Camborne, in the mining district of South Cornwall, is Rosewarne,
where was once one of the great houses of the county. Two hundred
years or so ago an avaricious attorney named Ezekiel Grosse obtained
possession of the place by shady means, and this is the fate that
befell him.
One night, after he had taken possession of the place, Ezekiel, engaged
in studying some deeds, looked up to find standing before him a queer
wizened little man of ghostly appearance, motioning him to follow. The
crafty lawyer, afraid only of losing money, told the apparition to go
away. But the little man remained, still making his strange signs.
At length Ezekiel asked what he wanted, and the ghost replied: “To show
thee where much gold lies buried.”
Gold was a bait the lawyer could never resist, but there was something
so grim about the manner of his strange visitor that an unfamiliar
feeling of dread came upon him, and he was unable at first to rise.
“Come,” commanded the ghost. “Gold, Ezekiel, gold.”
Ezekiel at last staggered to his feet, now quaking with fear.
“Follow me,” said the spectre in a hollow voice, and the lawyer, torn
between emotions of fear and greed, obeyed.
The spectre led the shivering lawyer out into the grounds of Rosewarne
and, after a long walk, they arrived at a little dell surrounded by
high banks and trees, in the centre of which was a small carn of
granite boulders. In the darkness Ezekiel noticed that his guide seemed
to emit a weird phosphorescent light, and he was yet more terrified.
Then the spectre turned upon him and said: “Thou longest for gold,
Ezekiel, even as I did. Yet I could never enjoy it; see if thou canst.
Dig there. Beneath those stones is gold aplenty. Win it and enjoy it,
and when thou art happiest I will come to visit thee again.” With this
the strange figure gave a wild mocking laugh and disappeared in a blaze
of white light.
Ezekiel Grosse recovered his nerve and ran back to the house for tools.
All night he dug, and uncovered a huge pot filled with ancient gold
pieces. It took him seven nights to remove them all, and when he had
completed his task he found himself one of the wealthiest men in all
the countryside. His ghostly visitor never returned, and after a few
years Ezekiel almost ceased to remember him.
Time passed by and the world forgot the past reputation of Ezekiel
Grosse. Because of his great wealth, honours and position were showered
upon him. Then came a night when he was entertaining a magnificent
party in his great Hall. Laughter and the sound of music and dancing
made the old rafters ring until, of a sudden, the gaiety ceased as if
by magic. In the midst of the Hall appeared the aged spectre.
Ezekiel did his best to turn the matter into a joke, but his guests
could not be roused from their inexplicable gloomy emotions. One by one
they made excuses and departed and at last the lawyer was left alone
with his ghostly visitor.
From that time onward whenever Ezekiel had a party the wizened figure
of the spectre was present. He would sit without speaking at the
banqueting table or walk slowly among the dancers until at length,
gazing full at the Lord of Rosewarne, he would utter an unearthly laugh
of derision and disappear.
Soon Ezekiel Grosse’s friends all deserted him and he was left an old
and lonely man, whose sole companion was one, John Call, his clerk.
So Grosse sought to bargain with the spectre, and had at last to
consent to give up all his worldly possessions to John Call. When the
deeds were signed the ghost finally disappeared, uttering one last
demoniac peal of laughter as he went.
Old Ezekiel only survived for a few weeks. One morning he was found
dead, and the country folk tell that at his funeral a crowd of grinning
demons appeared, which afterwards flew away over Carn Brea, and that
from its midst came the same horrible laughter that the spectre had
been heard so often to emit.
Rosewarne, the scene of this story, lies in that barren mining
country which every visitor to Cornwall should see. It is intensely
interesting, and permission is not difficult to obtain, to visit some
of the tin mines where an industry, carried on in Cornwall since the
days of the Phoenicians, still survives.
The hills and moorland of this district are scarred with old workings
and abandoned mine buildings. Rugged Carn Brea, crowned by prehistoric
remains and the ruins of an ancient castle, rises 740 feet high, close
by the main line between Redruth and Camborne. Here, they say, was the
chief centre of Druid worship in the west. This district is easy of
access from St. Ives, Penzance, Falmouth or Truro, and a visit to it
will ever be remembered with pleasure, bleak and dreary though the mine
riddled land may seem at first sight.
[Illustration: _Carn Brea._]
[Illustration: A young woman sitting on rocks with and consoling an
elderly person.]