on the shore at Morlaix, three score years before, to buy greens, found that he could make his wants known in Cornish and be better understood in that dialect than at home.

William Matthews, of Newlyn, who died about 1786, also spoke the Cornish language later and more fluently than Dolly Pentreath.

The coup de grâce was no doubt practically given to the Cornish tongue when, as Scawen says, "our people in Queen Elizabeth's time desired that the common liturgy should be in the English tongue, to which they were then for novelty's sake affected, not out of true judgement desired it." Dr. Moreman, of Menheniot, is said to have first introduced this innovation.

In order that the reader may better see what the Cornish language looked like in print I give the Apostles' Creed as it was formerly used in all the Cornish churches:

"Me agris aez en Du an Tas Allogollogack wresses a neu hag doar; hag en Jesu Chrest, ys nuell mab agan arluth; neb ve concevijis ryb an hairon sperres, genjis ay an Voz Mareea, cothaff orthaff Pontius Pilat, ve crowsye, maraws, hag bethens; of deskynas en the Iffran; hag an Trysa journa ef sevye arte thort an maraws; ef askynnas en the Neuf; hag setvah wor an dighow dorne ay Du, as Tas Allogollogack; ag en a ef fyth dos the judgge an beaw hag an maraws. Me agris en benegas spirres, an hairon Catholic eglos, an Commumion ay sans, an givyaus ay peags, an sevyans ay an corfe, hag an bewe regnaveffere. Amen."

Though the Cornish language is, as a speaking tongue, as dead as the dodo, yet in a certain way it lives. The Rector of Paul told me many of the natives even now use Cornish words. In the names of towns, castles, rivers, mountains, fields, manors, and families, in a few of the technical terms of mining, husbandry, and fishing, Cornish, though dead, yet speaketh. Dr. Bannister has amassed no less than 2400 Cornish proper names beginning with Tre (=homestead), 500 with Pen (=head), 400 with Ros (=moor), 300 with Lan (=church or enclosure), 200 with Pol (=pool), and 200 with Caer (=town or camp). That so many names of Celtic origin should have come down to us is remarkable, and shows the tenacity of the Celtic nature. Danes and

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Saxons dispossessed the Celts, and then the Normans dispossessed the dispossessors, and through all the upheavals the old Celtic language survived. The vitality of the Celts is one of the great forces of the world.

The fast disappearance at the present day of the Cornish language as a spoken language, within a few generations after the general introduction of printing, may with some shred of probability be attributed to the shrewd good common sense of the people, their commercial character and employments, and the absence of eisteddfods and other artificial or dilettante contrivances for "keeping above the ground the ghosts of defunct nationalities."

It seems to me a retrograde step to endeavour to resuscitate a dead or a dying language. Civilisation points upward and onward to an ideal uniform language which can be understanded of all men. Those who try, I think quite vainly to reintroduce as a vulgar tongue the ancient Irish language are doing the very worst thing that can be done for Ireland, that is if they at all succeeded. Suppose the poor peasants of Connemara could once again speak only Irish, they would be thrown back centuries of progress.

Academically it is right, proper, and delightful to keep every record of an expiring tongue, but only as a matter of education and antiquarian interest.

And so the Cornish language has gone. Three or four small volumes would contain all that is left to us of the Cornish literature, and these MSS are in the British Museum and Bodleian, and they consist chiefly of mystery plays.

The most important is that by William Gwavas in the British Museum (Addit. MS, 28554). This gentleman, who had a perfect knowledge of the Cornish tongue, was born in 1676, and was buried on Jan. 9, 1741, in Paul Church, where a marble monument was erected to his memory. About 1710 Edward Lhuyd came into Cornwall, where he conferred with Gwavas, Thomas Tonkin, and John Keigwin about the formation of a Cornu-British vocabulary. The upshot of the conference was that a good many proverbs, idioms, mottoes, and sayings were collected and saved from oblivion.

CHAPTER XXV

TOWEDNACK

THE parish of Towednack is a most wild and desolate

region, but it possesses an old church of more than usual attraction.

On the way here a pause should be made on the top of Trendrine Hill, eight hundred feet above sea-level, for the view is one of the finest in Cornwall. The sea almost lies right under our feet, and miles and miles of furze-covered hills and fields, spread out like counties on a map, slope away to the edge of the ocean.

The little village of Towednack lies on a flat plateau in a wild tract of country entirely surrounded by low hills mapped out into fields by hedges. The church stands in a lonely position about 180 yards up a by-road. A ditch of water runs round the south side of the church, and there are no less than four stiles, of the stepping-stone order, by which this solitary house of prayer is approached from all points of the compass.

The church is entered by a low porch with a bench-seat on either side, that on the east side being one large granite stone on which is inscribed a cross of a simple though unusual form. It looks very much as if it had once been the stem of an old Celtic cross. The block of granite is 7 feet long, 1 foot 6 inches high, and 10 inches wide.

The arch of the porch outside is composed of two pieces of curved arched granite stones only. This, the simplest form of arch, barely pointed and formed of two stones only, is said to have been introduced into England and the Continent in the time of the Crusades, but it was probably used by Celtic Ireland and Celtic Cornwall long before. The doorway of Teampull Chiarain Church, in the Arran Islands, has, like this church, a beautiful example of the simple construction and common application of the arch

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formed of two stones only, which appear, as here, to have been worked from one and then split in the centre.

Above the arch is a small sundial which has this inscription upon it: "1720, Bright Sol and Luna Time and Tide doth hold. Chronodix Humbrale."

The great feature of Towednack Church, however, is the chancel arch, which is of the thirteenth century, very pointed, and consists of two chamfered orders springing from corbels. It is composed of only five granite stones on the north and seven on the south side, the corbels being just five feet from the floor-level.

The church consists of chancel, nave with western tower, south aisle, and the porch we have described.

The tower is unusually low, of local granite, and looks massive. It has been built devoid of any attempt at ornamentation. The string-course and cornice are bold and simple, the battlemented parapet walled in on the east and west sides. The belfry windows are square-headed, so that altogether this tower is admirably harmonious in its dignified solidity and simplicity with the wild and dreary landscape around.

The tower staircase is unusual: it springs direct from the north-west angle of the nave, in the church itself, with five steps, without any newels or winders. The four arches are supported by pillars of granite, each a single block from 3 to 4 inches high. The walls are plastered and yellowwashed, but the pillars and arches have been left bare and display the plain granite stones. The rafters are painted pale blue and white.

The font is interesting. It stands 3 feet 1 inch high, and is 1 foot 9 inches across the bowl, on a square granite slab 6 inches high. The bowl is octagonal, and on the facets are carvings in relief. These are "I. R.," " W. B.," the other compartments exhibiting two quatrefoils, a conventional lily, and the date 1720, while one is blank. The pedestal of the font is round, with an expanded base, and where the column and the pedestal meet a tooth pattern, with the serrated edges pointing upwards, runs round. This is singular, and it looks very much as if an old Norman font had been inverted and the modern one of 1720 (same date as the sundial over the porch) had been placed

there on the top of its base. The more modern portion is of the peculiar sparkling granite from Ludgvan, whereas the old Norman portion is of stone not found in the district of Towednack.

Close beside the font has been placed a large slab of granite 6 feet 2 inches long by 2 inches thick, on which are incised four small crosses and a larger one in the centre. This interesting relic was found about seven years ago by the churchwarden, Mr. H. Dunstan, and very wisely put by him in the church for preservation. It was probably an altar-stone, and when funds permit it is intended to use it in the church for that purpose in place of the ordinary table.

I noticed that, as in many of these churches in this district, there had been a north doorway, now blocked up. It was rudely constructed, the head segmental, cut out of one granite block.

There was formerly a side chapel, the piscina being still in the wall. The tower hangs four bells. The tenor bell weighs 8 cwt., and has upon it: "Sancti Spiritus Assit nobis gracia" ("May the grace of the Holy Spirit be with us"). Another weighs 5 cwt., and is inscribed: "A.D. 1667 R.P." A third, weighing 6 cwt., is dated: "1774, W. Curnow, R. Baragwanath, Churchwardens." These were all recast with their original inscriptions in 1905, and a new bell added weighing 4 cwt.

The church had doubtless many carved bench-ends, but two only now remain, and they are most peculiar. They have been worked into a chancel-seat, like the "Mermaid" bench-end of Zennor. On each is deeply carved in relief the profile portrait of a very Spanish-looking man in a felt hat with sweeping curves, mustachios and typical Spanish pointed beard, and has the lettering rudely cut, Master Mathew Trenwith Warden," the W being strangely formed-XX. On the other side is James Trewhela Warden." Each bears the date 1633. These two bench-ends were formerly on pews near the north door, which is now blocked up.

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The history of these bench-ends with Spanish Dons on them is unfortunately lost, but then it is not so surprising to find them as may at first seem. Early traffic with the