Carved on one of the pews in the church of Zennor in West Cornwall is a
strange figure of a mermaid. Depicted with flowing hair, a mirror in one
hand and a comb in the other, the Zennor folk tell a strange story about
her.
Years and years ago, they say, a beautiful and richly dressed lady
used to attend the church sometimes. Nobody knew where she came from,
although her unusual beauty and her glorious voice caused her to be the
subject of discussion throughout the parish.
So attractive was she that half the young men of the village fell in
love with her, and one of them, Mathey Trewella, a handsome youth and
one of the best singers in the neighbourhood, determined that he would
discover who she was.
The beautiful stranger had smiled at him in church one Sunday, and after
service he followed her as she walked away towards the cliffs.
Mathey Trewella never returned to Zennor, nor did the lovely stranger
ever attend church again.
Years passed by, and Mathey's strange disappearance was almost forgotten
when, one Sunday morning, a ship cast anchor off Pendower Cove, near
Zennor. The captain of the vessel was sitting idling on the deck when he
heard a beautiful voice hailing him from the sea. Looking over the side
he saw the mermaid, her long yellow hair floating all around her.
She asked him to be so kind as to pull up his anchor, for it was resting
upon the doorway of her house under the sea and she was anxious to get
back to Mathey, her husband, and her children.
In alarm, the captain weighed anchor and stood out to sea, for sailors
fear that mermaids will bring bad luck. But later he returned and told
the Zennor folk of Mathey's fate, and they, to commemorate the strange
event, and to warn other young men against the wiles of the merrymaids,
had the mermaid figure carved in the church.
And there it is to-day for all the world to see, and to prove, to those
who do not believe the old stories, the truth of poor Mathey Trewella's
sad fate.
Zennor is a lovely moorland village in the neighbourhood of some of the
wildest scenery in Cornwall. To the south-west rugged moors stretch away
to the Land's End. To the north a quarter of an hour's walk brings you
to the coast with its sheltered coves and its cruel cliffs. Gurnard's
Head, one of the most famous of all Cornish promontories, is less than
two miles away. Grim, remote, yet indescribably fascinating, the country
around Zennor is typical of that far western corner of England which is
swept continually by the great health-giving winds of the Atlantic.
In its sheltered valleys flowers bloom all the year round. On its
bold hill-tops, boulder-strewn and wild, there remain still the old
mysterious stones and the queer beehive huts erected by men who
inhabited this land in the dark days before Christianity.
Gorse and heather riot over the moorland. There is a charm and peace
about this too little known country that compels health and well-being.
Yet Zennor is only five and a half miles by the moorland road from St.
Ives, that picturesque little fishing town that artists and golfers know
so well. St. Ives, less than seven hours' journey from Paddington, is an
ideal centre from which to explore the coast and moorland beauties of
England's furthest west.
[Illustration: _The Mermaid of Zennor: Bench End in Zennor Church_]
[Illustration]