We will now follow the sun’s course, for good luck, and pass over the
Bay to Moushal and its “Cut-throats.”
Shortly after the Spaniards burnt this old town, many young men of Paul
and the adjacent parishes—eager to retaliate on the Dons—went
privateering. Some of them joined the Jamaica buccaneers, a few turned
pirates, and all of them scoured the Spanish Main. One and all of the
West Country men hailed from Moushal, which was then a noted place, and
the chief port west of Market-jew.
When the adventurous rovers returned home, laden with gold and
treasures, envious land-lubbers, out of spite, dubbed them “Moushal’s
Cut-throats.” Old folks used to say that, a century or so ago, the head
proprietors of Paul and some of Buryan were the descendants of
Buccaneers and “Madagascar Birds.” Those old families are, for the most
part, become extinct in this neighbourhood, though two or three of them
are flourishing elsewhere.
Our old privateering stories always speak of Moushal as the general
rendezvous of western sea-rovers; thus this bad-sounding nickname was
acquired
“In the days we went a pirating,
A long time ago.”
One needs go no farther than Moushal to learn how Newlyn people got the
name of “Buccas.” What old folks say is to the effect that the
fishermen of that place (within the remembrance of persons yet alive)
were accustomed, on their return to shore, to make a propitiatory
offering to a spirit (Bucca) by placing for him a fish, just within
high-water mark, in order that the spirit might ensure them good luck
in their fishing. It was believed that Bucca came at night and took
away the fish. Those who continued to observe this remnant of an old
religious rite were derided by their more “enlightened” neighbours of
recent times, and by them nicknamed “Buccas.”