A CORNISH HAVEN
Come away with me to the sea! Let us go to Cornwall, where sea and air are of the purest and most exhilarating. Jumping into the train and proceeding westward until we come to Launceston, there we will leave the little quiet old-world town behind. So anxious are we to get to the sea, that we will not even stop to climb the hill and inspect the old castle which frowns down on us; but we will mount to the box-seat of the three-horse coach which stands waiting at the station, and drive away – still westward. Away, over the breezy uplands, where the cattle chew the cud sleepily beneath the August sun, between hedges set with brilliant jewels, which we call flowers, past undulating downs in whose hollows the purple shadows lie dreaming.
We stop presently at a little roadside inn, to give the horses a rest and a feed; and I climb down from my elevated position and partake of a cup of tea in the inn kitchen – a primitive flagged kitchen, with a great high-backed wooden settle by the fire, and pewter bowls and cups shining on the walls. They pour out my bohea from a teapot which a fancier of old china would pronounce to be priceless. Genuine old 'Plymouth' it is, I see, and ask if they would be willing to part with it. But no; 'It was granny's;' and they would rather not sell it; so I turn my covetous eyes away, and clamber back to my seat beside the coachman.
Off we go again, along a fairly level road. The country is but thinly inhabited, and there are long intervals between the houses. By-and-by we begin to descend a hill, and enter a little sleepy town, where at first sight it seems to me that there are an inn and one or two shops, but no inhabitants. Only at first sight; for as we draw up before the Hotel (such is the proud boast I see over the doorway), and the driver descends and walks away to deposit a parcel or two and to gossip awhile with his acquaintances, we are delivered over to the tender mercies of the whole juvenile population, who surround the coach, climb on to the wheels, and make audible comments in very broad vernacular on our personal appearance and on our apparel. This time we move off slowly, for we have a very steep hill to encounter, and the tired horses plod somewhat wearily up it. As we reach the top, and they stop panting to rest, I see far away on the horizon a silver streak, and my heart gives a throb of delight; for I have in its intensest form all an islander's love for the ocean, and I know what that silver streak is on which the sun shines so gaily. On rolls the coach merrily; the horses sniff the air, and seem to know that they are nearing home. Yes; here are the breezes we have come to look for. They peer familiarly under my hat; they blow my veil aside, and rudely kiss my cheeks; and their breath is fresh and salt, and whispers of new strength to the tired mind and body. On we hurry towards the setting sun, who is now mounting the chariot in which he drives away to the other side of the world. We have lost sight of the faint line of silver again, and our view is almost bounded by the dusky hedges. Presently we turn a corner abruptly, and there, apparently at our feet, lies the blue Atlantic, smiling bright welcoming smiles at us in the last rays of departing Sol. The active young breezes, which seem so glad to see us again, revive us with sweet aromatic odours, which they gather from the weed-strewn rocks. They evidently think we are wise people to have left those weak-minded little zephyrs coquetting with the flowers on the lawn at home, and to have followed them to their sporting place beside the restless ever-changing sea.
In another moment we stop, and all the tired travellers dismount and stretch their cramped limbs. I hear many around me inquiring for hotels or lodgings; but we are expected, and here is our landlady's husband come to meet us; so we hand over our luggage to him, and wend our way to Cliff Cottage. Here we find a smiling hostess, who tells us how glad she is to see us; and after we have removed some of the dust of our journey, we sit down to a well-spread tea-table, on which a noble Cornish pasty holds the post of honour. We draw the table into the bow-window, which faces not directly seawards, but towards the bay, which has been a haven of safety to so many. But it is growing dark already, and we are weary with our long drive; so, soon we seek our fragrant chamber, in which the lavender scents struggle faintly to overpower the pungent aroma of the sea; and it is not long before we are lulled to sleep by the monotonous thunder of the waves on the rocks below.
In the morning we peep out at the colliers which ride safely in the little sunny bay, at the white houses which are dotted here and there over the cliffs, and at the little village itself lying snugly in the hollow. To right and left, sweeping far away, stand the great eternal sea-walls of sombre iron-stone crags, and the grassy downs rolling away inland, unbroken except by a lonely stone or a patch of golden gorse; and beneath us lie ancient gray boulders and stretches of yellow sand. Away on the hill opposite stands the little church, in whose quiet graveyard rests many a sailor who has found his death in the pitiless sea. Eleven graves mark the resting-place of the crew of one vessel, whose figure-head forms an appropriate headstone to the sad group.
The first thing to be done after breakfast is to bathe. It is not enough to be by the sea; we must be in it, if we wish to rob it of all the strength and vigour we can; so we start off over the downs to where a sudden depression in the cliff leads to the bathing beach. Here we find old Harriet the bathing-woman, browner than ever, who gives us a cordial welcome. The bathing is primitive in the extreme. Harriet possesses two tents, which she pitches daily on a smooth spot of sand. For the use of one in which to disrobe you pay a ridiculously small sum, which also includes old Harriet's watchful 'surveillance' while you are in the water. As the number of tents is so limited and the bathers many, not a few avail themselves of the shelter of a friendly rock behind which to perform their toilet; but I am squeamish, and wait my turn for the tent. And oh! how reviving the plunge into the surf, which comes rolling in frothing and seething like champagne, and which knocks me over and plays at ball with me as if I were a cork! The cool waves curl and cling round me, and kiss my arms and hands lovingly with their wet lips. I let them break over my bowed head, and clasp them tenderly to my breast; but they slip away from me, and riot and tumble round me with joyous laughter, sprinkling eternal freshness from their bounteous hands. I sniff the keen salt air with delight, and let the foam toss me to and fro at its own sweet will, until Harriet, who watches me anxiously (she thinks me a somewhat rash young person, I know), orders me authoritatively to come in, saying I have had enough of it – for the first time. Very reluctantly I obey; but it would require a braver person than I am to contradict the withered old sea-nymph, and soon I emerge from the tent with streaming locks, feeling like a giant refreshed.
Thank goodness, here are no brass bands, no esplanade; a circulating library of such modest pretensions that it does not circulate, and shops in which it is next to impossible to spend any money! At the chemist's we buy our groceries as well as our drugs, and he is the only wine-merchant the dear primitive little place can boast. But we get mutton which transcends Southdown; capital poultry and vegetables; butter such as I have never tasted before or since; rich cream, which you must call Cornish (not 'Devonshire'), to please the buxom farmer's wife who supplies it to you; and plenty of good fruit. And what do you want more, with such a sky above you, such a glorious sea at your feet, such a wall of ironstone crags behind you? Down on the beach we go, and dawdle away the hot summer afternoon. We stretch ourselves on the tawny sand, where great barriers of rock jut out on each side of us, beneath the shadow of a dreadful scarped cliff, to which no scrap of weed or herbage seems able to cling. We look up at it with a sense of awe. We think of the many ships, nearing home after a weary journey, which have been driven by the storm's pitiless whip straight into its terrible arms, there to meet a dread destruction. We think of the many struggling drowning wretches on whom it has gazed down with its stony eyes during all the ages it has stood there. The great billows in their winter's fury have beaten and lashed it until it is scarred all over; but still it gazes calmly down at them, as if defying their malicious rage. And yet, cruel as it is, how picturesque the colouring as it ranges from the intense purple black of the tide-line, through warm green and brown shadows, to the bright high lights far away above our heads.
Dark rock-pools lie behind us, lined with queer zoophytes and delicate sea-anemones; beside us are the crimson lady's finger and the golden trefoil; the dainty scents of the sea-weed and the fresh wet sand are in the air, and before us is the smiling sea. Yes; he smiles at us to-day, though here – with a restless surf breaking eternally on the beach – he is never calm and rippling, as we see him in more southern climes.
Presently the sun sinks lower in the heavens; a breeze awakes,