The ordinary fishing boat is manned by five or six men and makes two
trips each week to the deep-sea fishing "grounds," seventy-five to one
hundred miles away. The craft is rude and comfortless in the extreme and
so constructed as to be nearly unsinkable if kept off the rocks. The
fish are taken by trawling great nets and drawing them aboard with a
special tackle. The principal catch of the Newlyn fishermen is herring,
which are pickled in the village and exported, mainly to Norway and
Sweden. The value of the fish depends on the state of the market, and
the price realized is often as low as a shilling per hundred weight. The
majority of the population of Cornwall is engaged directly or indirectly
in the fisheries, and considering the inferiority of most of the country
for agriculture and the extensive coast line with its numerous harbors,
it is not strange that so many of the natives should follow this life.
In earlier days, smuggling and wrecking constituted the occupation of a
large number of the Cornishmen, but under modern conditions these gentle
arts can no longer be successfully practiced, and fishing furnishes
about the only alternative.
Just across the peninsula is St. Ives, another fishing village, even
more picturesque than Newlyn and quite as much in favor with the
artists. To reach this town we turned a few miles from the main road on
the following day, but missed the fisher-fleet as before. The bay on
which St. Ives is situated is the most beautiful on the Cornish coast,
and on the day of our visit the bright stretch of water, sleeping
placidly under the June skies and dotted with glistening sails, well
maintained its reputation for surpassing loveliness. Before we entered
the town a man of whom we inquired the way advised us to leave our car
and walk down the sharp descent to the coast, where the village mostly
lies. The idea of the return trip was not pleasing, and we boldly
started down, only to wish we had been more amenable to the friendly
advice, for a steeper, narrower, crookeder street we did not find
anywhere. In places it was too narrow for vehicles to pass abreast, and
sharp turns on a very steep grade, in streets crowded with children,
made the descent exceedingly trying. However, we managed to get through
safely and came to a stop directly in front of the Fifteenth Century
church, an astonishingly imposing structure for a village which showed
more evidences of poverty than of anything else. The church was built at
a time when the smugglers and wreckers of Cornwall no doubt enjoyed
greater prosperity and felt, perhaps, more anxiety for their souls'
welfare than do their fisher-folk descendants.
On re-ascending the hill we stopped at the Castle for our noonday
luncheon, but the castle in this instance is a fine old mansion built
about a hundred years ago as a private residence and since passed into
the possession of a railway company, which has converted it into an
excellent hotel. Situated as it is, in a fine park on the eminence
overlooking the bay, few hostelries at which we paused seemed more
inviting for a longer sojourn.
Four miles from Penzance is Marazion, and St. Michael's Mount, lying
near at hand, takes its name from the similar but larger and more
imposing cathedral-crowned headland off the coast of France. It is a
remarkable granite rock, connected with the mainland by a strip of sand,
which is clear of the water only four hours of the day. The rock towers
to a height of two hundred and fifty feet and is about a mile in
circumference. It is not strange that in the days of castle-building
such an isolated site should have been seized upon; and on the summit is
a many-towered structure built of granite and so carefully adapted to
its location as to seem almost a part of the rock itself. When we
reached Marazion, the receding tide had left the causeway dry, and as we
walked leisurely the mile or so between the town and the mount, the
water was already stealthily encroaching on the pathway. We found the
castle more of a gentleman's residence than a fortress, and it was
evidently never intended for defensive purposes. It has been the
residence of the St. Aubyn family since the time of Charles II, and the
villagers were all agog over elaborate preparations to celebrate the
golden wedding anniversary of the present proprietor. The climb is a
wearisome one, and we saw little of the castle, being admitted only to
the entrance-hall and the small Gothic chapel, which was undergoing
restoration; but the fine view from the battlements alone is worth the
effort. The castle never figured in history and is remarkable chiefly
for its unique location. By the time of our return the tide had already
risen several feet and we were rowed to the mainland in a boat.
On our return to Truro we took the road by which we came, but on leaving
there our road roughly followed the Northern Cornish coast, and at
intervals we caught glimpses of the ocean. For some distance we ran
through a rough moorland country, although the road was comparatively
level and straight. We passed Camelford--which some say is the Camelot
of the Arthur legends--only five miles distant from the ruins of
Tintagel Castle on the coast, and came early to Launceston, where the
clean hospitable-looking White Hart Hotel offered strong inducements to
stop for the night. A certain weariness of the flesh, resulting from our
run over the last long stretch of the moorland road, was an equally
important factor in influencing our action.
[Illustration: ON DARTMOOR.