Traditions And Hearthside Stories Of West Cornwall Part 9

But Her Majesty, bless her honest heart, was so well pleased with her entertainment that she preferred to stay there with old Dame Pendar till her attendants returned; so they, with her permission, rode away to Castle-Treen.

When the Queen's suite had departed, Dame Pendar produced from her own private cupboard, a bottle of rare old mead, and a flask of extra strong brandy, for Her Majesty to taste; and she, liking them well, drank gla.s.s upon gla.s.s of mead, with several sips of brandy, to keep the fish from "flowing on her stomach," and to show their loving regard for each other, they exchanged all the contents of their pockets for keepsakes; yea, every item, except their crooked sixpences, which they kept for good luck.

At length the Queen, feeling drowsy, reclined in a long window-seat, thence rolled on the floor, where she lay puffing and snoring, unable to rise. Dame Pendar, by so often drinking "Here's health and long life to 'e, my dear lady, the Queen," was too fuddled to help her up, so she lay down with her for company; and old Joan, who had been sipping of all sorts, and drinking everybody's health, was stretched under the kitchen table.

The Queen's attendants, having pa.s.sed hours in viewing the Logan Rock and other wonders of Castle-Treen, 'couranted' about amongst the rocks, where they found pleasant places for courting, till nearly sunset. They then, concluding it was too late for going to the Land's End, mounted and returned to Baranhual, that they might wait on their royal mistress, and reach Moushal in time to be on board before dark. They galloped away in hot haste, expecting to find Her Majesty impatiently awaiting their return; but, sad to say, they found her--all her state forgotten--lying helpless on the floor, beside Dame Pendar. The royal lady was hastily lifted on her palfrey; Joan Taskes--now the least drunk of the three--helped to fasten a giss (hempen girth) across her Majesty's lap, to keep her safe in the saddle, and they quickly departed.

Now it so happened that Squire Pendar, his wife, and their servants, tired waiting for the Queen, in Church-town, till near night, returned home across the fields, Selena way, arrived at the Green-court gate just in time to catch a glimpse of Her Majesty under the trees that darkened the avenue. He had the merest glance of her going down hill with her head drooping over her horse's mane, and a gentleman holding her steady; and that's the last seen of her in Buryan. Squire Pendar, his wife, and their servants were all rather muddled too, from having pa.s.sed all day at Church-town with hundreds of gentle and simple, in drinking "Here's to the Queen and ourselves, comrades;" yet he and his wife expressed great surprise and ill-humour at finding their house all in disorder.

Joan told them how they all enjoyed their entertainment. "Bad luck to them all!" murmured he; "our cellar-floor is like mud with spilt liquor, and not a gallon of beer or cider left in the casks. What mother said was true enow; the Queen, for all her fine clothes, is much like another woman, especially when drunk." Next morning he could hardly be persuaded that Her Majesty had been there at all, till his mother showed him what fine things she had as keepsakes. "My thimble, as thou knowest, was bra.s.s," said she, "and my bodkin silver; but see, here's my gracious lady's silver thimble and golden bodkin:" then, with great pride, drawing from her pocket the Queen's huzzey, she continued "if anything more is wanted to a.s.sure thee how I've been honoured by my gracious lady, behold this!" She then displayed what one may conjecture to have been a remarkable contrivance for containing many requisites of a lady's work-box or bag, and several toilet articles besides. It was a yard long when unfolded; every little pocket and flap of a different sort of rich stuff, all worked in elegant designs, with gold and silver thread, coloured silks, intermixed with pearls and precious stones, or what pa.s.sed for such. It folded into strong leather covers, fastened with silver clasps like a book; and the upper cover was lined with a mirror.

Hundreds of people came to see it suspended, at full length, the looking-gla.s.s at top, over the parlour fire-place, where it was kept in remembrance of the Queen's visit.

The sh.e.l.l-room was built after, and some say it was intended to commemorate that honour. This apartment was incrusted with sh.e.l.ls,--mostly from Parcurnow. Among other devices, a cavalier was pourtrayed, as if pursued by robbers; and under this sh.e.l.l-picture, the legend,--"This is the heir, come let us slay him, that the inheritance may be ours."

We have frequently remarked to old persons, who related the above story, that nothing is said in any county or other history of a Queen having visited Baranhual. "Perhaps your history-makers never heard of it," they reply: "no one belonging to Buryan saw her plainly, that's true, except the two old women." Squire Pendar and his servants only had a glimpse in the twilight of a company on horseback pa.s.sing down the road, which was then overhung with large spreading sycamores,--three rows of them on each side,--which soon hid his royal guests. But the Pendars, even in our time, poor as they were,--many of them labourers and fishermen,--had always preserved something among them that the Queen was said to have left with old Madam hundreds of years ago; and all of the name, that we have met with, say that Pendre, Baranhual, Trevider, and other lands in Buryan, once belonged to their forefathers.

[Ill.u.s.tration]

THE SMALL PEOPLE'S COW.

They are fairies; he that speaks to them shall die.

I'll wink and couch; no man their works must eye.

_Merry Wives of Windsor._

There is a story connected with the Pendars which says that, when this family was on its wane, the owner of Baranhual had a fine red cow, called Rosy, which gave twice as much milk as an ordinary one. She retained her milk-yielding power all the year through, and kept in good condition, even in winter, when other cattle on better food were reduced to skin and bone. Rosy would yield all her morning's milk, but every evening when much--and that the richest--still remained in her udder, she would stop chewing her cud, c.o.c.k her ears, low gently as if calling a calf, and the "shower" of milk would cease. If the maid attempted to renew her milking Molly would kick the bucket and gallop away to a remote part of the field.

Dame Pendar, thinking the milkmaid didn't shake Rosy's bag and coax her enough, tried, one evening, what she could do, but when she thought by "visting" Molly's teats to get more milk, after the cow's usual signal to cease, she up foot and smashed the wooden pail to pieces, tossed Dame Pendar over her back, and, bellowing, raced away--tail on end.

Though Rosy kept in milk when all other cows were "gone to sew" (dry), yet, because there was something strange about her and as she was always fit for the butchers, an attempt was made, soon after the dame's tossing, to get her to market; but all the people on Baranhual couldn't drive her off the farm.

Over a while Rosy had a heifer calf, and when it had sucked its fill, its dam gave her usual quant.i.ty of milk into the bucket, and then enough remained to fill another. Stranger still, in a few weeks the calf could eat herbage, and its dam weaned it gradually, but it could never be separated from her.

Everything prospered with Mr. Pendar. His cattle and crops throve wonderfully, till one Midsummer's night. His milkmaid having gone to games held at Penberth, or some place near it, only returned when the stars began to blink. Rosy, impatient to be milked, came to meet her in the field, stood still, placed back her leg, chewed her cud, and showered her milk into the bucket till she had yielded more than usual: then she stretched herself, looked around, and gently lowed whilst the maid, without rising from her milking-stool, pulled up a handful of gra.s.s, rolled it into a pad and placed it inside her hat, that she might carry her bucket the steadier. Having put on her hat she was surprised to see hundreds of "Small People" (fairies) around the cow, and on her back, neck, and head. A great number of little beings--as many as could get under Rosy's udder at once--held b.u.t.ter-cups, and other handy flowers or leaves, twisted into drinking vessels, to catch the shower of milk that fell among them, and some sucked it from clover-blossoms. As one set walked off satisfied, others took their places. They moved about so quickly that the milkmaid's head got almost "light" whilst she looked at them. "You should have seen," said the maid afterwards, "how pleased Rosy looked, as she tried to lick those on her neck who scratched her behind her horns, or picked ticks from her ears; whilst others, on her back smoothed down every hair of her coat. They made much of the calf, too; and, when they had their fill of milk, one and all in turn brought their little arms full of herbs to Rosy and her calf,--how they licked all up and looked for more!"

Some little folks, who came late, were mounted on hares, which they left to graze a few yards from the cow.

For a good while the milkmaid stood, with the bucket on her head, like one spell-bound, looking at the Small People; and she would have continued much longer to admire them, but, just as some came within a yard of her, Dame Pendar suddenly stood up on the field-hedge and called to know how she was so long about Rosy, and had all the rest still to milk, and how she hadn't brought in a bucket-full yet?

At the first sound of old Dame Pendar's voice, the Small People pointed their fingers and made wry faces at her; then off galloped Rosy and the troop of small folks with her--all out of sight in a wink.

The maid hastened in, and told her mistress, and master too, what she had seen.

"Ah! fax, I knowed," said Dame Pendar to her husband, "and didn't I always tell 'e something was the matter that Rosy wouldn't yield half her milk. And surely," she continued to the milkmaid, "thou must have a four-leaved-clover, about thee; give me the wad in thy hat that I may look through it."

She examined it, and sure enough, found a stem of white clover, or three-leaved gra.s.s, with four leaves on it.

The mistress asked how big the Small People were, and how dressed.

"But few of them are more than half a yard or so high," the maid replied; "the women not so tall, yet they looked beautiful, all dressed like gentry; the women wore gowns as gay as a flower-garden in summer; their flaxen hair fell, in long curls, on their necks; and the men were very smart, all like sodjers or huntsmen, so it seemed to me. But they made frightful faces at you, and glared as if they would be the death of 'e. I shouldn't like to be in your shoes."

"Our best cow is as bad as bewitched," said Dame Pendar to her husband, "and what shall we do to drive the plagues of sprites?"

Her husband told her not to be so greedy; for old folks said that the Small People always brought good luck when unmolested and their doings were not pried into by curious fools; for his part, he was content to leave well alone. She made no reply, but--determined to have her way, next morning, betimes, unknown to her good man--she trotted off to Penberth, or Treen, and consulted a red-haired woman that Mr. Pendar couldn't "abide," because she was reputed, and truly, to be a witch.

"I'll drive them from our best cow, and from Baranhual, too, if it can be done," said Dame Pendar to the hag. "Nothing easier," replied she, "for they can't endure the sea, nor anything that comes therefrom, and, above all, they abhor salt; so you have only to scatter it over your cow, wash her udder in brine or sea-water, and sprinkle it about your place."

Dame Pendar hastened home, and, without delay, powdered Rosy with salt, bathed her udder in brine and sprinkled it about the fields and town-place.

In the evening, betimes, she went herself to milk her best cow, and carried two buckets, thinking they would both be filled. Rosy, without budging, let her be seated and milk a little; but feeling her udder thumped, "visted," and roughly shaken, when she withheld her flow, she kicked the pail to s.h.i.+vers, laid Dame Pendar sprawling, then tossed her greedy mistress heels over head, and galloped off, "belving" like a mad thing.

All the people in Baranhual couldn't stop her in a corner, and, from that day, not a drop of milk did they get from her.

For days and nights she would roam about the farm, followed by her heifer--no hedges stopped them--and both "belving," all the time, like cows that had lost their calves. Before Christmas they became hair-pitched, lean, and lousy; and all the other cattle on Baranhual were as bad.

Mr. Pendar, being ignorant of what his wife had done, sought aid from, and brought to his farm, all the most noted conjurers, pellars, and white witches in the West Country to arrest the run of bad luck that pursued everything belonging to him. They bled his diseased cattle on straw, burned the straw and blood, carried flaming torches of a night, around the folds. Fire was also borne--with the sun's course--around sown fields. Bonfires were lit, and his cattle forced through their flame. Other rites were performed according to old usages only known to pellars. Even his finest calf was burnt alive. But all was of no avail.

To leave nothing undone, they cut down or rooted up all barberry bushes, that grew about on orchard hedges and elsewhere; but Mr. Pendar's crops were blighted all the same. In the meantime Rosy and her heifer were seldom seen, but often heard bellowing about Pednsawnack, over Porguarnon, or in other dangerous cleves and unfrequented places: they couldn't be brought into the town-place to undergo spells or counter-spells. But when more than a year had pa.s.sed, and the next Buryan fair came round, Mr. Pendar made up his mind to sell Rosy and her heifer. All Baranhual men and boys, with many neighbours mustered, and after much trouble, drove them on to the church-town road. But they could neither be got to fair nor home again. After following them on horseback till night, Mr. Pendar caught a glimpse of Rosy and her heifer racing over Sennen Green toward Genvor Sands, and they were nevermore seen. Dame Pendar, from the time she got kicked and tossed, was rickety till the day of her death. The milkmaid, too, from a spanking damsel who had her choice of sweethearts, in less than a year became a doudy that no young man cared for or would look at. From that time everything went wrong with the Pendars, and, in a few generations, those of the name who remained in Buryan hadn't an inch of land to call their own.

There are two or three versions of this story, which differ but little from the above, except in locating the Small People's Cow on other farms that were dwelling-places of the Pendars in olden times.

[Ill.u.s.tration]

TOM OF CHYANNOR, THE TIN-STREAMER.

A WEST-COUNTRY DROLL.

Telle us swiche thing, as may our hertes glade.

Be blithe, although thou ride upon a jade.

What though thyn horse be bothe foule and lene, If he wol serve thee, recke thee not a bene: Loke that thyn herte be mery evermore.

Yes, hoste, quode he, so mote I ride or go, But I be mery, ywis I wol be blamed.

But right anon thise gentiles gan to crie; Nay, let him tell us of no ribandrie, Tel us som moral thing, that we mow lere, Som wit, and thanne wol we gladly here.

CHAUCER.

A long way back, in old times, when Parcurnow was the chief port west of Hayle, and Treene a market town, (as it had been since the castle's outer walls were built, 'tis said), there lived in a little out-of-the-way place known as Chyannor, a man called Tom, with his wife--we don't know her name, more's the pity--and their daughter Patience. When farm-work fell scant Tom streamed for tin in moors near his dwelling; but, the overburthen there being deep and tin scarce, he got sick of the job, and one day, between tilling season and harvest, knacked his bal, and took the little tin he had raised that summer down to Treen for sale. Many woollen-weavers and ropers lived there, and withe-weavers (basket-makers) who made cowals (creels) that pleased fisherwomen better than any to be got elsewhere. In Treen market-place stood a fine broad garack-zans (holy rock). It was nearly round, about four feet high, eight feet across, and level as a table, except that in its upper surface shallow pits were hollowed, and in these stream-tin, brought for sale or exchange, was piled. Tom, having placed his tin in one of the hollows of this stone, inquired the news, and asked how work was away in the East Country, of merchants from Market-jew, who brought goods in their vessels to Parcurnow, which was then clear of sand, and the tide flowed in a deep channel up to an old caunse (paved road) still to be seen. The merchants told him that streamers' work might be had in a place called Praze-an-Beeble, a short day's journey from Market-jew.

Tom, having exchanged his tin for leather and other things, took a drink of cider with the merchants, went home, and told his wife what he had learned.

"One must be a fool," said he, "to stay here and starve, when two or three days' journey will take one to a land of plenty. What do'st thee think wife?"