A week at the Lizard...

Chapter I

Character of the District. — Fertility of Hornblende Roch. — Lizard Lights. — Bumble. — Fishing with Fly. — Lions'* Den, — Househole Bay. — Fishing for Launces. — Pen Olver. — Belidden Amphitheatre. — Bass and Hot Points. — Lizard Cove* — Pilchard Fis/iery, — Landewednack Church and Cross. — Peculiar Customs.

A deservedly famous writer on the picturesque, who towards the close of the last century made a tour of the West of England, in pursuit of his favourite study, after making a few remarks on the first town in Cornwall which he visited, Launceston, completes his pictorial survey of the county with the following comprehensive paragraph : " From Launceston we travelled as far into Cornwall as Bodmin, through a coarse,

B naked, country, and in all respects as uninteresting as can well be conceived. Of wood, in every shape, it was entirely destitute. Having heard that the country beyond Bodmin was exactly like what we had already passed, we resolved to travel no farther in Cornwall, and instead of visiting the Land's End, as we had intended, we took the road to Lescard, (Liskeard,) proposing to visit Plymouth in our return." There is no doubt that the author of " Forest Scenery" was right in the estimate which he formed of what he saw, for the whole of the country which he traversed, like many other parts of the county, is undeniably coarse and naked, and to a pictorial eye, most uninteresting. Long barren moors, scantily clothed with rushes, cotton-grass, and stunted heath — heaps of rubbish from deserted mines, interspersed with pools of stagnant water — here and there a mine at work, but wanting, in those days, even the interest now afforded by the steam-engine — low stone walls, wearing no vegetation but gray lichens and distorted furze-bushes — such objects offer no attraction to the eye, nor

CHARACTER OF THE DISTRICT. 6

occupation for the pencil of the painter ; so that if Gilpin was too much pressed for time, to be able to spend " A Week at the Lizard/' he was quite right to alter his route.

In the present day, tourists who visit Cornwall in search of the picturesque usually travel by the road from Plymouth, through Liskeard to Bodmin. This route lies through a succession of valleys, which being sheltered from the sea breezes, are well wooded, and owing to the dampness of the climate, abound in various kinds of ferns, &c, of most luxuriant growth. Between Bodmin and St. Austle, the traveller is interested in the china-clay works, through the midst of which the road passes, and, long after he has left the works, is not a little surprised to find himself following the course of a little river, the water of which having been employed in washing the clay, has acquired the hue and exact appearance of milk. It would be well worth his while to explore the woods at Tregothnan (which he leaves on his left) the seat of the Earl of Falmouth, situated on an arm of the sea, which being navigable as high up as the neat little town of Truro, expands at its mouth into the beautiful and commodious harbour of Falmouth ; but we will suppose these and many other interesting places in the neighbourhood passed by for the present, and that he is safely deposited at Helston. This remarkably clean, and, on market days, remarkably busy little town, is situated at the root of the promontory which terminates in the Lizard, and on the west is distant from the sea a little more than two miles, being on the east three miles from an arm of the sea which terminates at a village called Gweek. A road from Falmouth passes through Gweek to the Lizard without touching Helston, and there is a yet shorter road, by crossing the river at Helford Ferry. * Whichever way the Lizard be approached, the road for the last few miles at least, is very much as Gilpin describes it, " coarse and naked." A

* The whole district south of Helston is called Meneage, a name which those antiquarians, who maintain the oriental origin of many of the Cornish names, derive from a Persian word for " a low plant (heath) of which brooms are made.'"

CHARACTER OF THE DISTRICT. 5

tamarisk hedge here and there, and Cornish heath * everywhere, a few apple trees shaggy with lichens and struggling to be an orchard, will be novelties which will arrest the eye of the botanist, however rapid may be his progress ; while the geologist will turn aside to examine the quarries of dark veined stone which he occasionally encounters, or where the road is newly laid, he will stop to pick up specimens such as he has never seen before, except in the museums of the curious ; but the lover of the picturesque will in all likelihood be sorely disappointed ; he will have before him, for the greater part of his way, a long, weary road, skirted by commons or lined by treeless hedges, and on either side a flat tame country, with but rarely a distant peep at the sea, and no indication of a bold coast. A companion acquainted with the country, would tell him a barbarous tale connected with the tree of the district, called by way of distinction, " Cury great tree,"f and from one point in the road, would point out to him in the remote distance, the famed St. Michael's

* Erica vagans. t See "Forest Trees of Britain," vol. i. p. 156.

Mount, but these are scenes of but passing interest — there has been no long continuous ascent for many miles, and he is not aware that the ground which he is traversing, is in reality considerably elevated above the sea, and that its termination is on every side sudden, and abruptly grand.

Tourists, and visitors from the neighbouring towns, generally confine their attention to two points of interest on the coast, Kynance Cove and the Lizard Lights, making their arrangements so as to be at the former place when the tide is lowest, and for the most part traversing the distance between by a road across a flat and singularly unattractive down. Kynance Cove undoubtedly combines more objects of interest than any other part of the coast, and the light-house is an object of curiosity, as being the most southerly structure in England ; so that the two will, I dare say, continue to attract visitors who have little time at their command, to the exclusion of many scarcely less remarkable spots ; but even these visitors would do well to deviate from the usual course of going from one to the other by

LIZARD LIGHTS. 7

the road, if such it may be called, and to perform the distance (about two miles) on foot, keeping as near as possible to the edge of the cliff. The ascents and descents are neither numerous nor difficult, and the views, in whichever direction the tourist may be going, are perpetually changing, but always beautifully grand.

Certainly, no less time than a week should be devoted to exploring all that is worthy of being seen in the neighbourhood. The reader must, therefore, suppose himself to have taken up his quarters at the inn, or one of the several cottages in the " Lizard-town," where lodgings are to be procured, prepared to sally forth every day on a fresh voyage of discovery.

Being so near the light-houses — the beacon, which so many of his countrymen have either bid farewell to, or greeted, with that depth of feeling which those who are doomed to be exiled for years from their native land can alone experience — he will naturally be anxious to pay them an early visit. They are visible from the village, and are within a short distance of it, being approached either by a rude carriage-road or by a path running along on the tops of the hedges or banks by which the fields are separated. Except in very stormy weather, the latter route is preferable for foot-passengers, the path being quite wide enough to allow persons to walk with safety, and, from its exposure to the sun and wind, it is generally dry. For the latter reason no trees grow here, and even shrubs are so rare, that one of these hedges, which has a few yards of its top fringed by stunted thorns, is called, contemptuously, Lizard Wood. The soil consists of decomposed hornblende rock, which is so fertile, that some land which was enclosed a few years since, was cropped with wheat and barley for several successive years, and bore abundantly without being manured. This productiveness, no doubt, is to be attributed in a measure to the mildness of a climate, where a few days' frost constitutes a severe winter, and snow is scarcely ever seen to lie on the ground ; but that it is not entirely so, is evident from the fact that the serpentine formation which bounds it is equally barren. The

LIZARD LIGHTS. V

decomposed rock is called marie, and being in many places of great depth, is carted away as manure for other less-favoured districts. In some fields this process has been continued for many years, and where this has been the case, one may walk on a hedge which is on one side twenty or thirty feet high, on the other eight or ten. Nor is it uncommon to see one part of a field with a level many feet lower than the rest, but both bearing a fine crop of wheat or barley. When the wind is high, the walking on these double hedges is attended with some danger, for whether it blows from the south, the east, or the west, it falls with that impetuosity which is rarely found to exist except when the wind has traversed an extensive plain ; and here the boundless sea is before, on the right and on the left.

The light-houses consist of two lantern-headed towers, connected by a long range of apartments and offices, with a continuous passage, so constructed that the light-keeper who is on duty may pass from one to the other without going from under cover. The whole building is ex-

A WEEK AT THE LIZARD.

ternally coated with whitewash, to ensure distinctness as a landmark by day, and kept scrupulously clean both within and without. Each tower is ascended internally by a commodious staircase, and terminates in a lantern of plateglass, set in iron. In the centre, an iron framework supports nineteen Argand lamps, arranged in two circular rows, and at the back of each lamp is a large concave reflector, made of copper thickly plated with polished silver. These are so placed, that in whatever part of the surrounding sea a ship may be sailing, at least one of the lights is always visible. The distance at which they may be seen at night varies with the state of the atmosphere ; but as the ground on which the houses stand is at a considerable elevation above the sea, they must give ample warning of danger at hand, except when the weather is unusually foggy. The two light-keepers alternately stay up the first and second half of the night to trim the lamps ; by day, their duty is to supply them with oil, and to polish the reflectors. It is not unusual for birds of passage to be attracted

LIZARD LIGHTS. 11

by the brilliancy of the light, and to dash with all their force against the glass, sometimes with such impetuosity as to be stunned or even killed by the blow. Outside the lantern runs a railed gallery, from which may be obtained a splendid view of the surrounding cliffs and sea. No one is allowed to remain here or on the inside after the lighting up, a regulation which, with great propriety, is strictly enforced, for even a temporary obscuration of the light might be fraught with dangerous consequences to any vessel in the offing.

Prior to the use of oil lamps, large fires were kept constantly burning. It is stated that during the late war, through the negligence of the light-keeper whose turn it was to be on duty, the fire had, on one occasion, been allowed to sink so low as to be barely visible. It happened, that at the time a packet in the employ of government was sailing by, the captain of which roused the sleepy watchman by firing a cannon-ball at the dim light. No mischief was done, but the slumberer was effectually reminded of his duty.

Below the light-houses, the ground suddenly slopes away, and terminates in an abrupt though not lofty promontory. The turf here, as is the case in many other of the more exposed parts of the cliff, is remarkably stunted and short, though comprising several plants which, in favourable situations, attain a considerable size. In summer it is soon dried up and becomes very slippery. The points of the rock which rise above the surface in this neighbourhood, are either mica, or talc, slate, distinguished by being composed of scales or spangles arranged in layers, or of hornblende, a greenish-black lustrous mineral of crystaline structure mixed with felspar. The natural appearance of the rock is, for the most part, concealed by a luxuriant growth of orange and yellow lichen, but in the interstices the mineral is found to be singularly unaffected by atmospheric influences, in most instances presenting as fresh an appearance on the surface, as on the newly broken rock. This point, though it seems to jut out beyond any of the others, is not in reality the extreme southerly rock, which is situated a few hundred yards to the west, and will be

LIZARD POINTS. 13

noticed in its proper place. The little promontory of which I am now speaking terminates abruptly in a steep cliff, the base of which is continued into the sea in the form of rugged black rocks, which from the constant exposure to a strong tide and the lashing of the waves, are almost entirely free from sea-weeds. At their extremity rises a lofty columnar rock called the Bumble, of which the artist has given an accurate portrait in the accompanying woodcut. At low-water it is accessible from the land, but on the outside is never deserted by the sea. A few years since, a gentleman who w T as walking round the coast attempted to climb to the top of it. When about half-way up he became terrified, and lost all power either of proceeding or retreating, and would undoubtedly have fallen, had not his perilous position been descried by a person on the cliff, who summoned to his aid from the light-house a young man who chanced to be working there. He, being a fearless climber, immediately ran to the spot, and by the help of ropes brought the adventurer down in safety from his perilous position, though not

A WEEK AT THE LIZARD.

THE BDMBLE KOCK.

without risking his own life in the enterprise. The gentleman gratefully rewarded his deliverer, by taking him into his service.

THE BUMBLE. 15

Looking to the east from the Bumble point, the tourist has before him an exceedingly beautiful little bay, about half a mile across, bounded on the opposite side by a rock-crowned head-land called Pen Olver. At certain times of the tide the current sweeps round this bay, and passes the base of the Bumble with extraordinary rapidity ; and here may often be seen in summer and autumn a lonely fisherman exercising his weary vocation, which is one requiring strength as well as skill. Sis implements consist of a long stout pole, and a few yards of strong cord attached to it. His line is furnished with a single hook, to which is attached a tuft of hair from a goat's beard, and which he is pleased to call a fly. Seen out of the water it resembles nothing in nature or art, and one might well apply the epithet silly to fish, for allowing themselves to be caught by so rude a device. On being immersed, however, the hairs separate, and as the fisher always keeps his fly in motion by drawing it quickly along near the surface of the water, it bears a close resemblance in shape, colour, and movement, to the little fish called a launce, which is abundant on the sandy parts of the coast. Large bass and pollack, weighing as much as twelve pounds, are unwise enough to be tempted by this mockery of a meal, and are a welcome prize to a man who fishes for a maintenance and not for sport.

Turning to the left and proceeding in a south-easterly direction, we must, after a few minutes, advance warily, for we here fall in with a singular geological phenomenon, which is well worthy of inspection, but dangerous if approached without caution. The ground east of the light-houses slopes downwards to the edge of a cliff, about seventy or eighty feet high. Here, in the night of the 19th of February, 1847, a portion of turf of an irregularly elliptical shape subsided, without giving any previous warning, to a depth of forty feet, forming a pit of the same depth with precipitous sides, and having their upper edge lined by ragged turf. It does not appear that any noise accompanied the fall of this mass, for the light-keeper lions' den. 17

was entirely unconscious of what had occurred until the next morning, when he discovered the new formation, and observed that the sea was discoloured to the distance of nearly a mile. The floor of the pit was then level, and composed of loose stones and earth, and in this state it continued for some months. Its diameter was about fifty feet in the broadest part, and the outer edge twenty feet from the brink of the cliff. It had long been known that immediately underneath this spot a cave extended from the base of the cliff in the direction of the new land-slip, and it was inferred that the roof of this cave (the Daw's Hugo,* as it is called) had given way, owing perhaps to the decomposition of the rock of which it was composed, and that the earth above had followed it. The sea entering the cave at high water, had washed away the earth and loose stones, and hence proceeded the discoloration of the water. When I first visited the spot in June the occurrence was scarcely known except in the immediate

* Hugo is Cornish for a cave.

C

A WEEK AT THE LIZARD.

neighbourhood, and then only so far noticed that some one had cut away the overhanging turf to prevent accidents and had carved in large letters on the sward : —

'THIS IS LIONS' DEN. ,:

No change had taken place except that the ground on the higher side was opening in cracks, shewing that it was inclined to extend landwards.

lions' den. 19

After the spring tides in the beginning of July I visited it again for the purpose of ascertaining its depth, which, I found, had increased, and the floor was no longer level, but shelved towards the sea. On letting down a plummetline I found that the weight would not rest at a depth of sixty feet, and suspecting what had taken place, I descended the face of the cliff with the object of exploring the Daws' Hugo. The entrance to this cave, which can only be reached at low water, is about eight feet wide, and I should suppose about thirty feet high, divided half way up by a horizontal layer of rocks. As I approached I saw light streaming in from the extremity of the cave, which could only proceed from the bottom of the pit; a large quantity of rubbish was still left, but it was evident that this would in time be washed away, and that eventually the sea will enter the pit through the cave at high water, where in stormy weather it will bear no fanciful resemblance to a huge boiling caldron. If in course of time, as is very probable, the

A WEEK AT THE LIZARD.

perpendicular walls shelve away, it will become funnel-shaped, and account for the formation

Daw's Hugo. — Entrance to lions' Den.

of another singular cavity at Cadgwith, which will be described hereafter.

ENTRANCE TO LIONS' DEN. 21

The rocks of the Lizard district are liable to be traversed by irregular veins, or lodes, as they are called, of a mineral softer than themselves ; the serpentine by lodes of steatite, and the hornblende by decomposed veins of itself. When these crop out on the face of the cliff and are washed by the sea, the continued action of the water wastes away the softer particles, so that in time a cavity is formed at the base of the cliff, which increases in depth and height until either the bare surface of the hard rock is exposed, or if the roof be of the same substance, in process of time the whole crumbles away, and the sea encroaches on the land. In the case of the Daws' Hugo it would seem that a vein of soft rock extended inwards from the foot of the cliff, overarched by a layer of harder rock. Farther in, the softer stone enlarged upwards, and not being of a compact structure, when its support was removed it fell in and formed the chasm described above, the archway of the stronger material remaining unaltered. It is not often that changes in the geological features of a district can thus be caught in the act of taking place ; hence the Lions' Den is an object of greater interest than if it had never been observed in any other state than it is at present, and if nothing were known about its formation. A very few years, probably, will produce a great alteration in its appearance ; the walls will lose their perpendicular character, at least on the land side, but how far the chasm will eventually extend must depend on the nature of the ground.

East of the Lions' Den, the path winds round a much loftier cliff, and soon descends abruptly into a deep ravine, which runs down into a romantic little cove called Househole. The tourist may here either proceed a little inland and pass round the head of the valley, or descend by a scrambling path into the cove. The ravine itself appears to have been formed in great measure by a little stream which runs through it, having in the course of ages carried down the softer particles of soil, That it now extends farther inland than it did only a few

HOUSEHOLE BAY. 23

years ago is evident from the fact that the old pathway which crossed it has lately become almost impassable, and a new one has been worn higher up. Househole Cove gives name to the little bay of which it is the extremity. It is shut ' in on either side by picturesque rocks, the eastern boundary of the bay, Pen Olver, being a particularly striking object. The sand of which the beach consists, stretches out to a considerable distance, hence the water is in fine weather of a bright green hue, which in combination with the black rocks around, contrasts delightfully with the circling waves which roll in here with peculiar grace, and lights up the spray with a more than usually dazzling whiteness. In the sunniest weather one may always find a shady corner. Every vessel that passes the Lizard is visible from hence, and gives animation to the distant prospect, and as most of the fish which resort to the sandy parts of the coast are here abundant, the cormorant is an unfailing visitor. One low rock in particular near Pen Olver generally has on it a

A WEEK AT THE LIZARD.

THE RORMORAWT.

conclave of twelve or more birds, solemnly digesting their last meal, or expanding their wings

THE LAUNCE. 25

to the sun ; while, in the water, a solitary head at intervals shoots up, jerks itself from side

THE LAUKCE, to side, and immediately disappears. It is a charming place to idle away an hour. In the moonlight summer nights the beach is often enlivened by a party of men and women fishing for launces.

The launce or sand-eel is a small cylindrical fish from six to twelve inches long, which by day swims about in shoals on the sandy coast, and by night burrows in the sand, keeping near the water line. It is used by fishermen as bait for larger fish, and by others is eaten either fresh or salted. The method of catching it is quite peculiar. As it begins to grow dark the fisherman, armed with a crooked iron instrument, which, with its handle, is about a foot in length, buries its point a few inches in the sand which has just been left by a receding wave, and draws it towards him with a quick motion, holding his left hand ready to catch whatever he may scrape up. When he feels any impediment he lifts his hook with a jerk, bringing up a lively fish, which if it be not immediately secured, by a few contortions of its body penetrates the sand and disappears ; or if it happen that the sand be covered by ever so shallow a coating of water, instantly turns its head towards the sea and shoots

FISHING FOR LAUNCES. 27

down to meet the coming wave with such rapidity as to resemble a waving line of silver. Sometimes a Newfoundland dog accompanies the party, who with his paw T s fishes on his own account, never failing to seize his prize and to run off with it for security to a dry part of the beach. Moonlight nights are chosen for this occupation, as the fish are then betrayed by their silvery scales ; they are also most abundant at the lowest tides, which fall at a convenient time of the night, a few days after full-moon. Much amusement is occasioned when a novice tries his hand, for simple though the operation is, it is much more laborious than it looks, and he either plies his hook with such force as to cut the fish in two, or suffers it to burrow again in the sand before he can secure it.

Returning up the ravine, and following the path on the right, we soon arrive at Pen Olver, decidedly the finest headland on the eastern side of the Lizard. Its extremity is tipped by a pile of castellated rocks, to which a covering of shaggy grey lichen imparts an air of remote antiquity,

BELIDDEN. 29

the mass of stones so closely resembling an artificial structure, that the mind naturally refers to the venerable covering as a test of the ancient date of its erection. It commands on the right a beautiful view of Househole Bay and the Lizard Lights, with the boundless ocean beyond ; and on the left looks down on an almost inaccessible cove, called Belidden, which runs up to the root of the headland, and is terminated by a precipitous cliff. The ground above this is hollowed out, forming a sloping amphitheatre, and is clothed down to the very verge of the cliff by smooth turf. Whether this form was produced naturally or artificially it is impossible to say ; but there are circumstances which favour the idea that, though nature may have left it nearly in the same condition in which it exists at present, yet the hand of man may have been employed in completing its symmetrical character. A number of projecting ridges, at equal distances from each other, extend from one extremity of the amphitheatre to the other, and exactly of the height which would be most convenient to be used, either as seats or standing-places, by a large concourse of people. But, it might well be asked, " For what purpose in the world is it likely that a large number of people should ever be congregated here ? What motive could induce five or six hundred people to sit down together in semicircles to look at the sea ? " An answer to this question must not be sought for among the customs of modern times, but among the obscure records of the barbarous age, which preceded the introduction of Christianity into Britain. Either the Belidden amphitheatre is purely natural, or it must have been excavated to command a view of some religious rites performed by the Druids. And surely no worshippers of Nature, as the Druids confessedly were, could have selected a more appropriate spot for assembling their deluded disciples. Seated on the earth, the emblem of their temporal condition, with the sea, the type of eternity, extended at their feet, — the priests, invested with such state as they could command, officiating on the altar of Pen Olver, — the ceremonies there performed could not fail

BELIDDEN AMPHITHEATRE. 31

to inspire a superstitious multitude with the deepest awe, a feeling into which all their belief must eventually resolve itself. A consideration which increases the probability that this spot really was in ancient times selected for religious worship, is that there are no other Druidical remains in the neighbourhood, whereas, in most other of the remote districts of the county, to which we are told that the ancient Britons retired, rock altars, circles, or cromlechs occur very frequently. It seems, therefore, not unreasonable to suppose that Pen Olver, the most remarkable pile of rocks on this part of the coast, was the favourite place of worship among the Druids, and that the amphitheatre at Belidden, every part of which commands a full view of the altar, was partially excavated for the convenience of the crowds who, on their great festivals, thronged to the appointed place.